sake, but was entrusted with a divine ministry
to fulfil for all the nations of the earth[20]. It is to this higher
sense of what Israel's position meant, and the perils it involved, that
John the Baptist and our Lord Himself had sought to recall the Jews.
They must not 'think to say within themselves, They had Abraham for
their Father; for God was able of the stones to raise up children unto
Abraham.' For 'many should come from the east and the west, and sit
down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of God, and the
sons of the kingdom should be cast into {26} the outer darkness[21].'
But it is evident that this higher meaning of the doctrine of election
had been forgotten by contemporary Judaism, and they would not be
recalled to it. They refused to contemplate the spiritual risk of
missing their vocation, or the universal purpose for which it was
given. They chose to think that Israel, i.e. the actual Israelites in
bulk, _must_ remain God's elect; that the Christ, when He came, must
come to exalt their race and nation: that they were bound to inherit
the blessings of the world to come: that the divine government of the
world existed for their sakes[22].

St. Paul, then, is here intending to vindicate the real meaning of
election, in the sense in which it is bound up with the ethical
character of God and carries with it a deepened feeling of
responsibility in those who are the subjects of it. {27} But his
argument is directed, first of all, to one point only--to bringing the
eyes of the Jews straight up to their own scriptures, and forcing them
to see that _they_ do not justify the idea of election purely by race.
It is not all of a certain seed, but only part of it, that is chosen.
There is nothing to hinder a great part of the race again becoming as
Ishmael or as Edom by the side of Israel. Ultimately, no doubt, there
are _two_ points to be proved. First, that God's method of choosing an
elect body to be His people in the world is inscrutable, so that we
cannot produce or determine His election by any calculation, or by any
real or supposed merits, of ours; secondly, that though we cannot
create our vocation, we can retain it by moral correspondence or faith,
and by that only. But at present it is only the first point that is
insisted upon--the absolute, inscrutable element in the divine choice.
And that, we should notice, is a fact not merely of scriptural evidence
but of common experience. Me