Brennon's Thoughts: William Lane Craig on Romans 9

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Brennon has posted the following quote from William Lane Craig summing up the meaning of Romans 9.

Paul's burden, then, in Romans 9 is not to narrow the scope of God's election but to broaden it. He wants to take in all who have faith in Christ Jesus regardless of their ethnicity. Election, then, is first and foremost a corporate notion: God has chosen for Himself a people, a corporate entity, and it is up to us by our response of faith whether or not we choose to be members of that corporate group destined to salvation

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Read the entire article this comes from here: http://www.reasonablefaith.org/site/News2?page=NewsArticle&id=6675

I admire William Lane Craig a great deal. I believe he loves Jesus and that he is saved. i do have to differ on how he is reading corporate election into Romans 9. I mean is it possible to choose a group of people without also designation who is in that chosen group? Is it really like two empty rooms with an open doors, and God says, I'm saving all those who choose to go in to that door and all those in the other room are going to hell? That is what I understand Dr. Craig to be saying. There are two problems. One: no one has the ability to go into that room for salvation, nor wants to go into that room, unless God enables him/her. (John 6:44). Two: The truth is that hell is the default destination for each and every human being. Often times we make it sound like a person's eternal destiny is up in the air until they make a choice for or against God. The Bible teaches that each one of us chooses to reject God from the get go. How we change unless God "takes out that heart of stone and replaces it with a heart of flesh"? We don't. A better picture is an empty room that God fills with those selected - predestined - from outside the room who are on their way to hell - us.

11In him we were also chosen, having been predestined according to the plan of him who works out everything in conformity with the purpose of his will, 12in order that we, who were the first to hope in Christ, might be for the praise of his glory. 13And you also were included in Christ when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation. Having believed, you were marked in him with a seal, the promised Holy Spirit, 14who is a deposit guaranteeing our inheritance until the redemption of those who are God's possession—to the praise of his glory. Ephesians 1:11-14

1As for you, you were dead in your transgressions and sins, 2in which you used to live when you followed the ways of this world and of the ruler of the kingdom of the air, the spirit who is now at work in those who are disobedient. 3All of us also lived among them at one time, gratifying the cravings of our sinful nature[a] and following its desires and thoughts. Like the rest, we were by nature objects of wrath. 4But because of his great love for us, God, who is rich in mercy, 5made us alive with Christ even when we were dead in transgressions—it is by grace you have been saved. 6And God raised us up with Christ and seated us with him in the heavenly realms in Christ Jesus, 7in order that in the coming ages he might show the incomparable riches of his grace, expressed in his kindness to us in Christ Jesus. 8For it is by grace you have been saved, through faith—and this not from yourselves, it is the gift of God— 9not by works, so that no one can boast. 10For we are God's workmanship, created in Christ Jesus to do good works, which God prepared in advance for us to do. Ephesians 2:1-10

Okay, given what Paul wrote to the Ephesians, I can't see how he intended to give us the idea that the elect was something you joined of your own free-will in Romans 9. It is true that God is telling us that it has nothing to do with who your daddy is but His choice in choosing you. He's not rejecting those who are no chosen, they are doomed before there is any choice is made.

Brennon's Thoughts: William Lane Craig on Romans 9