Calvinism and Arminianism

"It is not as though God’s word has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. Nor because they are Abraham’s descendants are they all his children. On the contrary, “Through Isaac your offspring will be reckoned.” So it is not the children of the flesh who are God’s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as offspring. For this is what the promise stated: “At the appointed time I will return, and Sarah will have a son.”

Not only that, but Rebecca’s children were conceived by one man, our father Isaac. Yet before the twins were born or had done anything good or bad, in order that God’s plan of election might stand, not by works but by Him who calls, she was told, “The older will serve the younger.” So it is written: “Jacob I loved, but Esau I hated.”

What then shall we say? Is God unjust? Certainly not! For He says to Moses: “I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”

So then, it does not depend on man’s desire or effort, but on God’s mercy. For the Scripture says to Pharaoh: “I raised you up for this very purpose, that I might display My power in you, and that My name might be proclaimed in all the earth.” Therefore God has mercy on whom He wants to have mercy, and He hardens whom He wants to harden.

One of you will say to me, “Then why does God still find fault? For who can resist His will?” But who are you, O man, to talk back to God? Shall what is formed say to Him who formed it, “Why did You make me like this?” Does not the potter have the right to make from the same lump of clay one vessel for special occasions and another for common use?

What if God, intending to show His wrath and make His power known, bore with great patience the vessels of His wrath, prepared for destruction? What if He did this to make the riches of His glory known to the vessels of His mercy, whom He prepared in advance for glory— including us, whom He has called not only from the Jews, but also from the Gentiles? As He says in Hosea:

“I will call them ‘My People’ who are not My people, and I will call her ‘My Beloved’ who is not My beloved,” and, “It will happen that in the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not My people,’ they will be called ‘sons of the living God'." Isaiah cries out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the Israelites is like the sand of the sea, only the remnant will be saved. For the Lord will carry out His sentence on the earth thoroughly and decisively.”

It is just as Isaiah foretold: “Unless the Lord of Hosts had left us descendants, we would have become like Sodom, we would have resembled Gomorrah.”

What then will we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith; but Israel, who pursued a law of righteousness, has not attained it. Why not? Because their pursuit was not by faith, but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone, as it is written:

“See, I lay in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense; and the one who believes in Him will never be put to shame." Romans 9:6-33

"In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God. He was with God in the beginning. All things were made by him; and without him nothing was made that has been made. In him was life; and the life was the Light of men. And the Light shines in darkness; and the darkness has not overcome it.

There was a man sent from God whose name was John. He came as a witness, to testify about the Light, so that through him everyone might believe. He himself was not that Light, but he was sent to testify about the Light, the true Light who gives Light to everyone, was coming into the world.

He was in the world, and though the world was made by him, the world did not recognize him. He came to his own, and his own did not receive him. But as many as received him, to them he gave power to become children of God - children born not of blood, nor of the desire or will of man, but born of God.

And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth." John 1:1-14