Reading Romans 9 with 70AD in mind - Revisting Abraham's faith reckoned as righteousness (part 7)

I have recently been pondering Romans 9 with the backdrop of 70AD in mind, and a lot of what follows ties into the Revisiting Abraham's faith reckoned as righteousness series (here). If Paul has the destruction of the Temple and destruction of Jerusalem in 70AD in mind - which signifies God formally rejecting the Jews as His chosen/elect people - then that would explain a lot of the pain and concern Paul has in this and the following chapters. The standard "Calvinist" reading of Romans 9 is that of emphasizing God's sovereignty in choosing, but I think that misses the point and takes a too shallow of reading of Paul here. Romans is not concerned about defending God being all powerful, but rather about explaining why God would elect someone just to reject them later on. Consider that 75% of the Bible is focused on God electing the Israelites as His "chosen" people (Deut 7:6), only to suddenly do a reversal in the "last days". God graciously gave the Israelites divine gifts of adoption, covenants, glory, promises, etc (9:1-5), most of which was unmerited by them. Nobody denies that God could have made you born a different race, in a different time, under different circumstances, etc, so it is kind of pointless for Paul to make "unconditional sovereignty" the issue. Similarly, I don't think Paul is suggesting God chooses for purely hidden reasons, but rather that God chooses for very strategic reasons. In fact, I have come to see the "thesis" verse of Romans 9 to be in verse 8, where Paul says, "those who are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God, but the children of the promise are reckoned as the seed," which I believe means those who are born of purely natural or biological means are secondary to those who are born of special or supernatural means. With this in mind, let's take a look at Paul's actual examples. 

First, Paul brings up Isaac versus Ismael. We know that Ishmael was firstborn and born by natural human relations, but God had Isaac in mind as the blessed chosen linage which would bring about the "Seed" or Messiah. Paul emphasizes this same lesson especially in Galatians 4:21-31, so it would be reasonable to see the same lesson elsewhere in Paul's writings. I believe this is also taught in Romans 4:1-4, where Paul begins by asking about Abraham being father "according to the flesh" (4:1b), and "justified by works, but not before God" (4:2), because Ishmael was born "according to the flesh" (i.e. Abraham's sleeping with Hagar), making it seem like Abraham had achieved by human means the promised heir of Genesis 15:5-6. This producing of Ishmael was thus a "justification by works" in the sight of men (4:2a), because in the human calculation they reckoned Ishmael to be the promised seed heir...but not in the sight of God (4:2b), since God had in mind Isaac instead to be the promised heir or at least chosen lineage. Thus, Paul gives a human analogy, whereby when a person works a job he is rightly entitled a wage (4:4a), but how much more blessed is it to receive a gift beyond what your job can get you? Abraham could produce a natural heir (working wages), but trusting in God and receive a supernatural blessing, such as Isaac coming from a barren Sarah, that's beyond natural or normal transactions (4:4b). Similarly, the Mosaic Covenant promised health and wealth for faithfulness to it, but these were earthly wages, whereby being a Believer in the higher things of life comes with the promise of forgiveness of sins and heaven. Thus, Paul is trying to condition us to start thinking in a spiritual way rather than the long time "fleshy" way of earthly blessings. 

Second, this sets up Paul for a second example, noting the first few words he uses: 

10 And not only this, but also when Rebecca had conceived by one, even by our father Isaac 11 (for the children not yet being born, nor having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works but of Him who calls), 12 it was said to her, “The older shall serve the younger.” 13 As it is written, “Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated.”

Does "Evening then Morning" mean one day? (Seventh Day Adventists)

Genesis 1 contains the language of "evening came, then the morning" for each of the Six Days of Creation. This Biblical language of putting the "evening" first then "morning" second has lead the Jewish custom to count all of our days as starting/ending at sunset. So when they get ready for the Sabbath on Saturday, this means the Sabbath/Saturday actually begins at sunset on Friday afternoon. Though I had not thought about it, I had always assumed this to be what Genesis 1 meant because so many people had said this is what "evening then morning" meant. While that is a possible meaning, I came across someone claiming that "evening then morning" just refers to the night time, and that Genesis 1 was actually saying a day beings in the morning. This will be a short post discussing this possibility. 

The best place to begin is by looking at how Genesis 1 uses the "evening then morning" language, which I will briefly show here:

The Bible easily refutes the Lutheran & Reformed view of Original Sin

Sorry for the delay in posting, my life has been so busy that I've not had any chance to post, and when I sit down to post I run into all kinds of unfortunate distractions that leave many things as an unpublished "draft". That said, I have been occasionally active on Twitter (HERE), and have met some great Catholic and Protestant people on there, with some good topics that have been discussed. For this post I want to discuss a fundamental and serious error that I saw a Lutheran espousing about Original Sin, which is a major reason why they espouse Imputed Justification against Catholicism (and Scripture). I see it as a simple and short refutation of their erroneous view of Original Sin.

The Protestant Reformers erroneously saw the "evil desires" that remain within the Christian as truly and properly sinful before God. As one Lutheran put it on Twitter: "Man's fallen and wicked desire, Concupiscence, is itself actually sinful, for it is lawless and rebellion against God's law and holy will." This sinful desire, called "Concupiscence," is a major point of contention between Catholics and Protestants. If such desires as the temptation to lust after a woman, which are constantly arising within us, are truly sinful, then the Christian is in a serious bind, for how can they hope to live a life of holiness before God if they are constantly hit with lustful desires throughout their Christian life? The Protestant view is that these lustful desire are truly sinful, and thus the only way to "escape" this constant feeling of defeat and guilt before God is to "hide" behind Christ's Righteousness through Imputation, such that God now only sees Christ's holy life instead of you whenever God looks at you. It would seem that some kind of Imputation model would be the only "solution," even though this doesn't really amount to a solution when other factors are considered. Meanwhile, the Catholic view is that Concupiscence is not sinful in itself, but rather is an inclination to give into sin, and thus Concupiscence is only a temptation in the Catholic view, whereas sin is an act of the human will to choose to give into temptation. In short, for Catholicism and Scripture, we would say concupiscence is not sinful in itself but it certainly is a result of Original Sin and an unfortunate effect that remains even in Christians.

One primary Catholic proof text that concupiscence is not formally/truly sinful comes from the Epistle of James, chapter 1, which says:

12 Blessed is the man who remains steadfast under trial [temptation], for when he has stood the test he will receive the crown of life, which God has promised to those who love him. 13 Let no one say when he is tempted, “I am being tempted by God,” for God cannot be tempted with evil, and he himself tempts no one. 14 But each person is tempted when he is lured and enticed by his own desire ["concupiscence" in Latin]. 15 Then desire when it has conceived gives birth to sin, and sin when it is fully grown brings forth death.

What James is saying is that there is a distinction between temptation/concupiscence versus that of sinning. Merely being tempted or feeling lustful desires is not sinful, but it is an effect of Original Sin. This passage would not even make sense if temptation itself was formally (i.e. truly) sinful rather than an effect of Adam's sin. In fact, this passage would seemingly undermine the Protestant view quite plainly, and I think it does. But to turn up the heat against the erroneous Protestant view, I pointed the Lutheran to many passages from the First Epistle of St John, which I will now cite here, and which he didn't seem to have any response to.

Consider these passages from First John: