3 Bible Verses about election, privileges of

The God of this People Israel chose our fathers; he multiplied the people as they sojourned in the land of Egypt and with arm uplifted led them out of it. For about forty years he bore with them in the desert, and after destroying seven nations in the land of Canaan he gave them their land as an inheritance for about four hundred and fifty years.

It is not, of course, as if God's word had failed! Far from it! 'Israel' does not mean everyone who belongs to Israel; they are not all children of Abraham because they are descended from Abraham. No, it is through Isaac that your offspring shall be reckoned ??8 meaning that instead of God's children being the children born to him by natural descent, it is the children of the Promise who are reckoned as his true offspring.

Now what are we to infer from this? That Israel has failed to secure the object of its quest; the elect have secured it, and the rest have been rendered insensible to it ??8 as it is written, God has given them a spirit of torpor, eyes that see not, ears that hear not ??down to this very day.