The whole remnant idea is taught throughout the Hebrew text. It is seen in the intimacy described between God and His elect. It is witnessed in the personal exchanges between the Lord and His people. There has always been a faithful spiritual people, even before Abraham, Israel and the Jews. As the people of God became an organized community through Abraham, they were known by their outward profession, physical circumcision and godly living. This gave evidence of a saving knowledge of Yahweh God.
This remnant idea took on a broader and more organized form through the life of Abraham the patriarch. In him, and his progeny, God expanded His elect people – the children of promise. This was not just a natural genetic reality, because race of itself never denoted divine election. The elect community was exclusively the believing element of Abraham’s offspring who spiritually belonged to the true household of faith.
Genesis 12:1-3 records, “Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will shew thee: And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee (Abraham) shall all families of the earth be blessed.”
This covenant was made with Abraham from the land of “Ur of the Chaldees” (Genesis 11:28). God specifically and sovereignly chose this man to fulfill His purposes. He was not chosen because of his ethnic pedigree but rather as a result of God’s infinite grace in using a faithful man of God. Obviously, from what we have just established, God did not make a covenant with Abraham because he was an Israeli or a Jew (as many modernists contend), because he wasn’t. This arrangement was not therefore built upon race. It was based totally on grace. God’s favor has always been governed by spiritual considerations. Nationality alone has never been anyone’s ticket into heaven.
A lot of later Jews (including the Pharisees 2000 years ago) wrongly imagined that favor with God automatically came through simply being the natural offspring of Abraham. Dispensationalists have unfortunately swallowed that same lie. But nothing could be further from the truth. Romans 4:13 instructs: “For the promise, that he should be the heir of the world, was not to Abraham, or to his seed, through the law, but through the righteousness of faith.”
Here we see that the blessing was not passed on through the law or by natural means, as the Jews imagined, but rather came through a people of faith. These alone were the promised seed. Natural genetics, racial birth and family background never carried any merit with God.
Romans 4:16-18 continues: “Therefore it is of faith, that it might be by grace; to the end the promise might be sure to all the seed; not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham; who is the father of us all, (As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations,) before him whom he believed, even God, who quickeneth the dead, and calleth those things which be not as though they were. Who against hope believed in hope, that he might become the father of many nations, according to that which was spoken, So shall thy seed be.”
This demolishes the Dispensational fallacy that God’s earthly people are the Hebrew people who foolishly put their confidence in keeping the law. Clearly, it is the household of faith that are the promised seed. It is they alone who are God’s holy remnant.
The spiritual birthright went from Abraham to Isaac, and then from Isaac to Jacob. It was not passed on indiscriminately or unconditionally to all of Abraham’s physical offspring but rather spiritually and purposely. Isaac spoke over Jacob, that crafty supplanter, in Genesis 27:28-29: “God give thee of the dew of heaven, and the fatness of the earth, and plenty of corn and wine: Let people serve thee, and nations bow down to thee: be lord over thy brethren, and let thy mother's sons bow down to thee: cursed be every one that curseth thee, and blessed be he that blesseth thee.”
The blessing of God did not rest upon both Esau and Isaac but only Isaac. Remember, both were the natural offspring of Abraham. But only Isaac carried the promise. Esau is depicted as a child of the devil. This nails the lie to the whole unscriptural elevation of natural ethnic Israel today. Being one of the patriarch’s physical offspring did not automatically equate to being one of the people of God:
God specifically differentiates between the natural seed of Abraham. He sovereignly and discriminately puts His blessing upon Isaac and not Esau. You don’t need to study the story of Esau long before you see why this happened. Genesis 25:32 reveals Esau’s hideous attitude to the birthright. He asks: “what profit shall this birthright do to me?” This statement by Esau is amazing. He strikingly failed to value the birthright and thus failed to take a hold of it.
Hebrews 12:16-17 adds: “Lest there be any fornicator, or profane person, as Esau, who for one morsel of meat sold his birthright. For ye know how that afterward, when he would have inherited the blessing, he was rejected: for he found no place of repentance, though he sought it carefully with tears.”
It is hard to believe it, but Esau sold his whole destiny and inheritance for a measly bowl of lentil soup. Essentially, he was a natural man who was more interested in his natural needs than his spiritual destiny. Or put simply, Esau sold his eternal inheritance in order to satisfy his ugly flesh. This is the way the unregenerate operate. Malachi 1:2-3 confirms: “Was not Esau Jacob's brother? saith the LORD: yet I loved Jacob, And I hated Esau, and laid his mountains and his heritage waste for the dragons of the wilderness.”
Here is a very solemn text, confirming that the blessing of God did not just come through natural birth, it came through a promised seed. It was experienced by God’s chosen people, those who were in personal covenant arrangement with Him. Salvation and eternal life never came through genetics, but grace. So being a Hebrew never meant automatic favor with God.
Romans 9:6-13 explains how God’s people and the seed of promise are not a natural but a spiritual seed. In his thesis on the promised seed, we find Jacob and us the believing Gentiles. He asserts: “For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel: Neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children: but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called. That is, they which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God: but the children of the promise are counted for the seed. For this is the word of promise, At this time will I come, and Sara shall have a son. And not only this; but when Rebecca also had conceived by one, even by our father Isaac; (For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth. It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger. As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated.”
The whole of Paul’s teaching in this New Testament passage is establishing who “the children of God” really were/are. We see that Abraham had a natural lineage and also a spiritual lineage. Significantly, it was only the spiritual seed that carried any spiritual credentials. Paul distinguished here between biological Israel and faithful Israel. He shows that these are two different diverse peoples. In doing this he is attempting to illustrate the impotence of the natural and the potency of the spiritual.
Just because they belonged to Israel (or the natural seed of Abraham) did not signify that they were God’s chosen people. He shows how “the children of the flesh” are not “the children of God;” it is rather “the children of the promise” – faithful believing Israel. How can Dispensationalists get around this? No one should miss the distinction between the true spiritual seed of Abraham and the mere natural seed. Plainly: “they are not all Israel, which are of Israel: Neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children” (Romans 9:6). Paul demonstrates that it is “the children of the promise” that “are counted for the seed.” This spiritual company are the ones that really matter.
How do Dispensationalists not get this? They have a wrong perception of who the Old Testament people of God are. Because of this they get confused about who the New Testament people of God are. That Hebrew of the Hebrews Paul the Apostle blows apart the fleshly genetic hope of the natural children of Abraham. He then demonstrates how the favor of God does not rest on ethnicity. Their racial credentials mean nothing. Those within the natural Abrahamic family that reject God’s offer of salvation were not under blessing but under a curse. They were not in any considered as God’s chosen people. Whilst God’s blessing would be upon Abraham’s seed it would not be because of natural pedigree but for spiritual pedigree.
Paul expands upon this great truth in Galatians 4:21-31, by asking a question: “Tell me, ye that desire to be under the law, do ye not hear the law? For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a freewoman. But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of the freewoman was by promise. Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar. For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all. For it is written, Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which hath an husband. Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of promise. But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the Spirit, even so it is now. Nevertheless what saith the Scripture? Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman. So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free.”
The whole discourse here focuses in on identifying what is of God and what is not, especially in regard to Abraham’s descendants. The dividing factor comes down to: men are either “born after the flesh” or “born after the Spirit.” This has always been the case from the beginning. Race or physical birthright was never the determining feature when it came to blessing. It was instead spiritual vitality. After all, both of these boys were biological children of Abraham. But the difference between them was that Isaac was a child of promise and Ishmael was not. Those who are merely born naturally (regardless of their race), or who have only experienced one birth, are of the devil, those who have experienced a second birth – a spiritual conversion, belong to God. The writer demonstrates how natural ancestry means nothing, even if your blood father was Abraham himself.