The Nation that SATURATED the OT is now irrelevant? Nah. Israel was merely set aside temporarily for Gentiles to obtain salvation.
Romans 11:1-5 (NKJV)
[sup]1 [/sup]I say then, has God cast away His people? Certainly not! For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. [sup]2 [/sup]God has not cast away His people whom He foreknew. Or do you not know what the Scripture says of Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel, saying, [sup]3 [/sup]"Lord, they have killed Your prophets and torn down Your altars, and I alone am left, and they seek my life"? [sup]4 [/sup]But what does the divine response say to him? "I have reserved for Myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal." [sup]5 [/sup]Even so then, at this present time there is a remnant according to the election of grace.
Duckybill, the passage you quote is about God not keeping the Jews hardened forever. It's about God not keeping the Jews hardened forever. Remember, they were hardened, to allow the Gentiles to be grafted in. God gave all over to disobedience, so that He can have mercy on all.
Read Romans 9:25-29 carefully. The Jews were were God's people, now read who God's people are.
Romans 9:25-29 As he says in Hosea: “I will call them ‘my people’ who are not my people;
and I will call her ‘my loved one’ who is not my loved one,”
[sup]26[/sup] and,
“In the very place where it was said to them,
‘You are not my people,’
there they will be called ‘children of the living God.’”
[sup]27[/sup] Isaiah cries out concerning Israel:
“Though the number of the Israelites be like the sand by the sea,
only the remnant will be saved.
[sup]28[/sup] For the Lord will carry out
his sentence on earth with speed and finality.”
[sup]29[/sup] It is just as Isaiah said previously:
“Unless the Lord Almighty
had left us descendants,
we would have become like Sodom,
we would have been like Gomorrah.”