Video Notes: 

• Sarah and Rebecca were both barren, yet God accomplished His work through them, clearly by no means or merit of their own.
• Jacob and Esau were twins. So, they were conceived at the same time, but Esau was born first. Yet, God worked through Jacob, rather than Esau, and He declared this before either had been born and could have done anything to merit God’s favor.
• “As it is written, ‘Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.’” – This is nearly a direct quote of Malachi 1:2b-3a “’Is not Esau Jacob’s brother?’ declares the Lord. ‘Yet I have loved Jacob but Esau I have hated.’”
  • The first thing to note is that the Roman emphasis is on Jacob and God carrying the promise through him though he was not deserving of it in any way.
  • Hated doesn’t mean what we typically think of in today’s use of the word.
    • Genesis 29:30-35
    • Love and hate, here, aren’t used in an emotional sense.
    • This is not referring to salvation/election and condemnation. This is irrelevant to a discussion of predestination.
    • God still cared for Esau (and for Ishmael).
    • Rather than “hated” with all the connotations of our current language, a better word might be “spurned” or “passed over”. It’s meant in a relative sense referring to God choosing Jacob undeservedly and Esau not being chosen, also undeservedly.
  • All this serves a few points…
    • The first point is what was made in vs 6, God’s Word doesn’t fail.
    • Secondly, God has chosen to work through certain people in history all to accomplish His ends, salvation. They didn’t earn it.
    • This is starting to answer the question of why many of the Jews did not accept Jesus. Romans 9-11 deals with this and we have a lot more to read to fully understand what is being conveyed. For now, the answer to the question of why many Jews didn’t accept Jesus is only, it wasn’t a failure of God’s Word, for not all who descended from Abraham belong to Israel, only the people who trust the promises of God.