Replies

***”There remain a number of verses that speak of the elect in the New Testament. In light of all that we have studied we can confidently know that they have nothing to do with the Calvinistic idea of predestined to salvation or damnation. Furthermore, in almost all of the cases, understanding them to be a reference to the Jews, God’s chosen people, is warranted. Let’s briefly consider those remaining. When Jesus spoke of God avenging “His own elect who cry out day and night to Him,” (Luke 18:7) He was talking about the Jews. “Rufus, chosen in the Lord,” (Rom 16:13) may be speaking of him being Jewish. This would make the most sense given that of the many other (obviously) believing brothers and sisters in the chapter, only Rufus is called elect. Why would Paul refer to only him as being elect, if the Calvinistic definition of election were true? Were the others not also heirs of eternal life? Understanding that elect/election is not salvation and is generally a reference to the Jews the passage makes complete sense. It must be noted that Priscilla and Aquila, from Rome, were also Jewish and yet were not called elect. Could it be that because Paul had nothing else to say about Rufus that he simply stated that he was chosen/elect in the Lord? Ephesians 1:4 ought to be viewed in light of the chosen people, Israel: “just as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and without blame before Him in love,” (Eph 1:4). We know that Paul traveled to Ephesus and there spent three months reasoning with the Jews in the synagogues (Acts 19:1-8). Thus, Ephesians seems to be once again, for “the Jew first and then the Gentile” paradigm.”

Ephesians 1:4-5 does not support Calvinism***

See, here is where a person must look to the whole and not the part. The ASSUMPTION is that Paul is speaking to the Jews. How that assumption is made, I’ll never know. If you were to look just a few, only a few words above Ephesians 1:4, you would find that...GASP... Paul wrote this letter TO BELIEVERS IN EPHESUS, not to Jews. When he says “Just as he chose US”... Paul was talking to CHRISTIANS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The ASSUMPTION is that Paul is speaking to the Jews. How that assumption is made, I’ll never know. If you were to look just a few, only a few words above Ephesians 1:4, you would find that...GASP... Paul wrote this letter TO BELIEVERS IN EPHESUS, not to Jews. When he says “Just as he chose US”... Paul was talking to CHRISTIANS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

If the Scripture states that Paul traveled to Ephesus and there spent three months reasoning with the Jews in the synagogues (Acts 19:1-8), who would he be speaking to?

See, here is where a person must look to the whole and not the part. The ASSUMPTION is that Paul is speaking to the Jews. How that assumption is made, I’ll never know. If you were to look just a few, only a few words above Ephesians 1:4, you would find that...GASP... Paul wrote this letter TO BELIEVERS IN EPHESUS, not to Jews. When he says “Just as he chose US”... Paul was talking to CHRISTIANS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Ha ha ha ha ha. Come on, tell me that you actually read Ephesians. The purpose of Jesus was to bring the circumcision and the uncircumcision together in one body, his own, and to abolish the enmity between them, making it possible for those who were far off, the Gentiles, to become members of the commonwealth of Israel and partakers of the covenants of promise, to become fellow citizens with the saints and of the household of God. Or, as he said in Romans, they, the Gentiles, were, through faith, unnaturally grafted into the cultivated olive tree, Israel. All believers are the Israel of God, whether Gentile or Jewish. All believers are, through faith, children of Abraham and inheritors of the promises God made to him. There is no distinction made in Christ between Jew and Gentile or even between male and female, certainly not between "Christian" and Jewish. All Jews and, for that matter, all those throughout time all the way back as far as you can go who believe God and are justified by faith are part of the same body, Christ's body, the church. The "church" is not something composed of Gentile Christians as opposed to Jewish believers, nor is it anything distinct from the family of faith promised by God to Abraham.