The Highway Forums General Discussion Theology Discussion Forum Double predestination

I say then, Did God cast off his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God did not cast off his people which he foreknew. Or know ye not what the scripture saith of Elijah? how he pleadeth with God against Israel: Lord, they have killed thy prophets, they have digged down thine altars; and I am left alone, and they seek my life. But what saith the answer of God unto him? I have left for myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to Baal. Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace. But if it is by grace, it is no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. What then? that which Israel seeketh for, that he obtained not; but the election obtained it, and the rest were hardened: according as it is written, God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear, unto this very day. And David saith, Let their table be made a snare, and a trap, And a stumblingblock, and a recompense unto them: Let their eyes be darkened, that they may not see, And bow thou down their back always.

I have kept for myself. They are called a “remnant” from the fact that they were left over, for God kept them for Himself. In this word we see a marvelous commendation for His grace and election. For God does not say: “They remained,” although this is true, to be sure, but this act of remaining was not the act of those who remained but of God who kept them, that it might be a matter not “of man’s will and exertion, but of God’s mercy” (Rom. 9:16). By the same expression indeed He indicates indirectly that He Himself is the author of the reprobation of the others, just as He Himself drove Israel into the Babylonian exile in their time. For the meaning of the expression “I have kept for Myself” is: “Although I myself drove out all of them, I kept for Myself seven thousand men.” He does not say: “When all were driven out, there remained, or when Nebuchadnezzar or the devil carried them all away, he left Me seven thousand,” but rather: “I myself kept them back, while I took the others away,” in order that it might be established firmly that “The potter has the right over the clay, to make out of the same lump one vessel for beauty and another for menial use” (Rom. 9:21); again: “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy” (9:15).

Luther, Martin. Vol. 25, Luther's Works, Vol. 25 : Lectures on Romans. Edited by Pelikan, Jaroslav Jan, Hilton C. Oswald, and Helmut T. Lehmann. Luther's Works. Saint Louis: Concordia Publishing House, 1999, c1972.