My People

What if God, wanting to show His wrath and to make His power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction... even us whom He called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles? As He says also in Hosea: "I will call them My people, who were not My people, and her beloved, who was not beloved." ... Isaiah also cries out concerning Israel: "Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, the remnant will be saved..." And as Isaiah said before: "Unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we would have become like Sodom, and would have been made like Gomorrah."

How a prophet's painful marriage and a remnant's survival reveal that God's people—Jew or Gentile—are made by His merciful call alone.

An Impossible Command to Hosea

Have you ever been asked to do something difficult, even to the point of the impossible? In the eighth century B.C., God called a prophet among the northern tribes of Israel to such a task. A little history helps. After King David's reign and the heights reached under his son Solomon—the great palace and temple in Jerusalem—Solomon's son proved unwise. The apple fell far from the tree. He refused the counsel of his advisors, dealt harshly with the people, and stirred civil unrest. The nation split: ten tribes formed the northern kingdom of Israel, with Judah and Benjamin in the south.

The northern kingdom drifted far from God, to the point that He was ready to judge their sin. So God sent a prophet named Hosea. In Hosea 1:2, God told him to do something exceedingly difficult: "Go, take a prostitute as your wife, and have children with her." Marry a harlot. Any of us would ask why—why command something that, quite literally, ran against God's own commandment in Deuteronomy?

"Surely only heartache and pain can come of this." Nevertheless, Hosea obeyed. With this harlot, whose name was Gomer, he had three children. Through this prophet's painful experience, God revealed the depths of His heart for His people Israel—who had gone astray, turned their backs on Him, and lived idolatrously in spiritual harlotry.

Three Children, Three Judgments

God named the children. The first son, in verse 4, was called Jezreel, a word describing the action of tossing something away. It is the same Hebrew word used of a farmer sowing seed. God was saying, "You, My people, are going to be cast away because of your sin. Though you have been in My hand, now I will scatter you."

The second child, a daughter, He named Lo-Ruhamah in verse 6, meaning unpitied. "I will not only cast you away, but in all you suffer I will not pity you, because you have brought this judgment upon yourself."

Then in verse 9, Gomer bore another son, named Lo-Ammi, meaning not My people. This was God's final proclamation upon the sinful northern tribes: "You are not My people, and I will not be your God." That sounds harsh. These were the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—His chosen people. Why?

This was precisely in accordance with God's law. Deuteronomy had promised, "You will be My people, and I will be your God, and you will walk in My statutes, and I will bless you. But if you turn to false gods, you will no longer be My people, and I will no longer be your God." In fulfillment of those words given through Moses nearly a thousand years earlier, we see the longsuffering of God. He had constantly called them through the prophets to repent and return—yet they walked so far away that He pronounced this judgment.

Why Israel Was Cast Away

Hosea 4:17 tells us why: "Ephraim is joined to idols, let him alone." That word joined means married. Ephraim—the northern ten tribes—was married to idols. In letting them alone, God would turn them over to vanity and judgment.

In Hosea 8:8 we read, "Israel is swallowed up; they are among the Gentiles now like a vessel in which is no pleasure." And verse 14 gives the reason: "For Israel has forgotten his Maker." As we saw in Romans 9 last time, from the same lump of clay—fallen humanity—God can fashion a vessel for honor and a vessel for no honor. Here the northern tribes, though descendants of the patriarchs living in the Promised Land, had become dishonorable vessels.

In Hosea 9:15 God says, "Because of the evil of their deeds I will drive them from My house, and I will love them no more." Then in verse 17 Hosea applies the word: "My God will cast them away, because they did not obey Him; and they shall be wanderers among the nations." That word nations is the Hebrew gowy, also translated Gentiles. Though they were God's chosen people, they would now be counted like the heathen nations.

And why did all this come upon them? Hosea 11:5 gives the final answer: "Because they refused to repent." That word means turn back. They did not merely backslide—they determined never again to follow God, choosing idols and what was right in their own eyes. Did they ever have opportunity to repent? Yes—for hundreds of years God sent prophets pleading with them to return. They did not neglect; they refused.

Two Objections Paul Anticipates

What does all this have to do with Romans 9? Paul knew his readers would object to his teaching, especially the closing words of Romans 8: "Nothing shall be able to separate us from the love of God." Anyone who knew the Scriptures would remember that Israel was God's beloved people. Through Jeremiah He said, "I have loved you with an everlasting love." So the astute reader objects: "Wait—what about Israel? How are those whom God loved with an everlasting love now outside the blessing of God in Christ, if nothing can separate us from His love?" That is objection number one.

The second objection came especially from Jewish readers, who would resist the idea of Gentiles receiving God's salvation. "We are the chosen people, descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. We have the priesthood, the oracles of God, the covenants, the promises—and you tell us we are not the recipients of grace, while Gentiles who have none of these things are? Oy vey! That does not fit."

In response, Paul has given clear proof. Through Romans 9 he used the actual descendants of Abraham—Ishmael and Isaac, Jacob and Esau—and then Moses and Pharaoh, showing how God extends mercy to whom He will. Now, in the closing verses, he turns from Israel's history to Israel's own Scriptures, using the Old Testament prophets to prove that many descendants of Abraham would be rejected for their hardness, while many among the Gentiles would be saved.

The Old Testament Written for Our Instruction

How many here today are Gentiles? Lift your hands—most of us. Is the salvation of Gentiles really seen throughout the Scriptures? Yes. Paul rightly recognized that all that happened to Israel was written for us. In 1 Corinthians 10:11 he says, "Now all these things happened to them as examples, and they were written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the age have come."

It is a sad reality that so many in the modern church spend little time in the Old Testament. They have no idea what happened from Genesis to Malachi—the bulk of our Bibles—yet all of it is written for our instruction. If we truly are living in the last days, then we had better be reading the Old Testament. At least one thing is clear there: the Lord was coming, the prophets announced His coming, and the people needed to be ready. When He came the first time, they were not ready. They had hardened their hearts and turned away.

So Paul points back to two prophets who lived at the very same time. Hosea ministered among the northern ten tribes; Isaiah ministered among the southern tribes of Judah and Benjamin. God spoke similar words through both, slightly different because addressed to different people.

God's Grace to Buy Back His People

As you read the sad story of Hosea, you find he repeatedly had to retrieve his wife as she continued to play the harlot. At one point she sank so low she became a slave, and God told Hosea, "Go and buy her back to be yours again." Through that story God said, "This is My story with Israel. They have repeatedly turned their backs on Me, even to the point that I must buy them back out of slavery."

And yet, in the very same book, comes astonishing grace. Paul quotes Hosea 2:23 in Romans 9:25: "I will call them My people, who were not My people, and her beloved, who was not beloved. And it shall come to pass in the place where it is said of them, 'You are not My people,' there they shall be called the sons of the living God." Though God pronounced judgment in chapter 1, only a few verses later He says, "I love them so much that I will reach out once more to the remnant. Whoever will come, I will call those who are not My people to be My people again."

In about 720 B.C., these words spoke to the nation of Israel. But they reached into the future, even to our day. Paul, inspired by the Spirit, applies them to Gentiles: "You who were not God's people—God has called you, and if you will come, you will be My people." Don't we all want to be someone's people? I want to be His people. Man is born into the fall, fallen away from God, yet God gives the call: "Whosoever will, come"—and they become the people of God.

How the Not-People Become His People

How can those who were not His people become His people? Turn to 1 Peter 2:9, where Peter writes to Gentiles and Jews alike made Christians by the blood of Jesus: "But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people"—some say peculiar people; we fit that—"that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light. You who were once not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy."

We become His people by responding to His merciful call. By His calling and our response, we are made His. How did Abraham become one called the people of God? He responded to a merciful call—Abraham was just another sinner, a Babylonian polytheist who worshiped idols, and God called out, "Come follow Me." He responded. We cannot manufacture this ourselves; by His grace we become His people.

John 1 says the same. "He was in the world, and the world was made through Him, and the world did not know Him. He came to His own, but His own did not receive Him. But as many as received Him, to them He gave the right to become the children of God, to those who believe in His name: who were born, not of blood, nor of the will of the flesh, but of the will of God." It is by His grace and mercy: we heed the call, put our trust in Him, and become His people—"My people."

The Call of God at the Center

Notice that the call of God is the focal point of this passage. Whenever words are repeated, they are repeated for a reason. Romans 9:23-24: "that He might make known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He had prepared beforehand for glory, even us whom He called, not of Jews only, but also of Gentiles."

We become vessels of mercy prepared for glory by God's calling and our response to it. As we saw last week in the parables of Matthew 20 and 22, "many are called, but few are elect." The Greek word eklektos means elect. The call goes out to all who would respond, and those who respond are the elect of God. How do they become the elect? The only case those parables make is that they responded where others did not.

So both Jews and Gentiles who respond to God's merciful call receive grace and salvation in Jesus Christ—found in Him alone. Ephesians 1 makes this clear: there is no grace and no salvation outside of Him. Jesus said in John 14:6, "I am the way, the truth, and the life, and no one comes to the Father but through Me." Our culture calls that arrogant and narrow. But consider: if there were only one cure for cancer, would anyone call it arrogant to say so? No—it would be gracious and honest. Try everything else, but there is only one cure. That is not narrow or arrogant; it is gracious and just.

Only a Remnant: The Witness of Isaiah

But why is not all Israel saved simply because they descended from Abraham? Paul answers by pointing to Isaiah. Romans 9:27: "Isaiah also cries out concerning Israel: 'Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, the remnant shall return. For He will finish the work and cut it short in righteousness.'" The work God does is just. And, "Unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we would have become like Sodom, and we would have been made like Gomorrah."

Some see injustice in this, because many descendants of Abraham are not granted heaven while many Gentiles are. In Paul's day, many Jews counted themselves recipients of God's promise whether or not they were faithful, reasoning, "Because we have Abraham as our father, the priesthood, the oracles, the covenants and promises, we are God's possession whether or not we follow Him." But the whole of Scripture does not bear that expectation. Through Isaiah 10:22-23, God prophesied to the southern tribes, "Though your people, O Israel, be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall return."

God had promised Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—four times in Genesis—that their descendants would be as the stars and the sand of the sea. Yet Isaiah, speaking centuries later to the same people, said that although the descendants are many, only a remnant would be saved.

Assyria, the Rod in God's Hand

The context of Isaiah 10 matters. The northern ten tribes had departed from God, and He was about to judge them—using the nation of Assyria as His instrument. Assyria was a major power, led by kings like Tiglath-Pileser, Sargon, and Sennacherib—names history remembers for conquering the known world. For more than a century the Assyrian Empire held the entire world under its hand, and people still marvel at their power and ingenuity; the History Channel runs segments on their inventions for war and torture.

But God tells us through Isaiah 10, "Listen, king of Assyria—do not think you are mighty. The only reason you can do this is because I have given you the power. I am using you as the tool in My hand to execute judgment on My people, and when I am done with you, I will destroy you." And He did. Historians look back and ask how such a vast empire vanished in an instant. Because God said, "I am done." See what you learn through the lens of Scripture.

In Isaiah 36–39, Sennacherib brought his army against Jerusalem, and in one night God sent one angel and killed 185,000 of them. Sennacherib went home—wisely, because God had told him through Isaiah, "I know where you sleep." The entire nation of Judah was annihilated except for the city of Jerusalem, and Jerusalem was spared not by Hezekiah's ingenuity but by God's grace.

Isaiah 10:20-21 explains what makes the remnant the remnant: "The remnant of Israel... will never again depend upon him that defeated them, but they will depend on the Lord, the Holy One of Israel, in sincerity. The remnant will return... to the Mighty God." They trust in God, not in man. And Isaiah 1 adds, "Unless the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we would have" been utterly annihilated like Sodom and Gomorrah. If not for God's mercy, all Israel would justly have been destroyed.

Saved by Grace Through Faith

How then is the remnant—of Israel and of all humanity—saved? Romans 9:30: "What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have attained"—or appropriated—"righteousness, even the righteousness of faith; but Israel, pursuing the law of righteousness, has not attained to the law of righteousness. Why? Because they did not seek it by faith, but as it were, by the works of the law. For they stumbled at the stumbling stone... 'Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone, a rock of offense, and whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.'"

Whether Jew or Gentile, those who become God's people receive mercy and salvation by grace through faith. Man has always been saved this way. Genesis 15:6: "Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness." It is not of works, lest anyone should boast. The people who were not a people have become the people of God by His mercy. But the people who were a people—the descendants of the patriarchs—are not the people of God unless they receive His grace, for by the works of the law no flesh shall be justified.

Paul himself, before following Christ, was Saul of Tarsus, a Pharisee who counted himself blameless according to the law. But on the road to Damascus he learned he was not righteous—he needed grace. And when he received the grace of Christ, he was saved.

A Simple, Not Impossible, Call

God is not asking us to do something difficult or impossible. If He demanded we keep the law—all 613 commandments of Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy—that would be both difficult and impossible, and every one of us would be toast. He is not asking humanity to scale a mountain or build a monument to reach Him. He says, "Turn from your sin, believe in Me, and you shall be saved." That is amazingly simple—were it not for our proud flesh that wants to do something. He asks us to put our faith in His Son, to stop trusting in our own works and ourselves, and wholeheartedly to trust in Him.

It is my prayer that everyone in this room has done that, but that may not be the case—so we want to give you the opportunity today. It may be that, like Israel, some of you have turned away, and God is calling you to turn back, to repent. How? The Scriptures are clear: confess your sins, believe that Jesus died and rose from the dead for you, accept His payment for your sin, and turn from your sins to follow Him, putting your faith in Him.

Closing Prayer

Father, we thank You for Your great grace. We thank You that You extend righteousness to us by faith and not by our works. Lord, help us to articulate that and share it with those we meet—in our neighborhoods, among family members who don't know You, in our workplaces, wherever we go. We thank You that, as we will see in Romans 10, whosoever calls upon You shall be saved; whoever believes in You will not be put to shame, whether Jew or Gentile, for You are the same Lord who is rich to all who call upon You. If there is any here today who has not called upon You for salvation, may they confess their sins to You, believe and trust in what You did on the cross, accept that as payment, Jesus, and turn from their sins to follow You. Work that in our lives, we pray; draw those who have not yet done so, in Jesus' name. Amen.