You are making those verses more confusing than they need to be.
Paul does that sometimes. Hadn't you noticed?
I disagree with your analysis. Your statements might be true, but they are not self-evidently true, and you seem to present them as if they are. I have answered above, that Paul has nowhere in any of his writings suggested that he expects a conversion of the Jews
en masse. If he is suggesting that now, in verses 12, 15 and 28, why does he speak as if he is referring to something familiar to his readers? I simply see his argument differently than you do. I see no predictions about the future. Even if they are "beloved for the father's sake," this does not tell us whether they will be saved (the whole world is loved by God, but not all are saved).
You wrote to Sean:
But, Paul quotes the following as still in the future: "The Deliverer will come out of Zion, And He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob; 27 For this is My covenant with them, When I take away their sins." If you don't believe that this is still a future prophecy, then when did it occur? That the Jews of Paul's day could be grafted back in is quite clear as well (11:23). Yet, this should not be an argument against a future remnant being saved at the second coming.
Paul does not say he is applying Isaiah 59:20f to the future. I believe the quote (which is in the future tense because Isaiah wrote it before the fulfillment) is an elaboration on Paul's statement, "All Israel will be saved." When did that happen? It is still going on. "Israel" (as Paul has labored to demonstrate in the immediate context preceding) consists of believing branches, both Jew and Gentile. Jews and Gentiles were being saved even as Paul wrote, and have continued to be saved throughout history, and will be until the end. When all the branches are finally on the tree, it will be seen that "all Israel" has been saved, as Isaiah wrote.
You apparently believe that the Isaiah passage is only speaking about a remnant of Israel in the last days (as per your last sentence quoted above). Yet, there is a remnant being saved at all times. How would the saving of a remnant at the end of time represent a different development? Since you believe that "all Israel" means "ethnic Israel," it makes no sense to say that this phrase speaks of only a remnant. In Paul's teaching, a remnant of Israel was
already saved (vv.1-7). Why would he mention that a remnant of Jews were now saved (v.25), but then predict (as if a striking eschatological change) that "all Israel" (meaning a remnant of the Jews) will be saved at the end of time (v.26ff)?
Bringing eschatology into Paul's discussion is uncalled-for, and misses the point that Paul has been arguing since the beginning of chapter 9.
Now, please do me a favor and answer the points I made on page 3, which I will here bring forward from there:
Brian,
I am still not getting it. You believe that the Gentiles are partakers with the Jews of all the promises made to Israel, but you still have trouble allowing that the Jews and Gentiles who are the partakers of these promises are "the Israel of God"? You seem to want to retain a strictly ethnic definition of "Israel"—but this is entirely artificial, since there never was a time in history when all of Israel were Jewish by blood. There were always proselytes, who had no ancestry from the patriarchs, but who, after being circumcised, were included in Israel. This is because "Israel" was never a strictly racial designation. All of Jacob's sons married Gentile women, which means that every descendant of theirs was at least 50% Gentile by blood. It is obvious from both testaments that bloodline has never been the primary concern in defining who is a "child of Abraham" (God could turn stones into them!) nor in deciding who is included in "Israel."
A racially-mixed multitude left Egypt and and became "Israel" by entering into the covenant at Sinai. Later, Gentile bondservants and "strangers within the land" were able to be a part of Israel, simply by accepting the terms of the Old Covenant. In fact, in the days of Esther, many of the Persians also "became Jews" (Esther 8:17). They had no pedigree of descent from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, but that did not prevent them from becoming part of Israel.
Today, when a Gentile becomes part of Israel, it is not by accepting the terms of the Old Covenant, but by accepting the terms of the New Covenant that God made with Israel (the remnant) in the upper room. Instead of circumcision, the terms require that one becomes a new creation in Christ (Gal.6:15). If a Gentile could be part of Israel under the terms of the Old Covenant, why do you object to Paul including Gentiles in Israel under the terms of the New Covenant? "Israel" has always included ethnic Gentiles as well as ethnic Jews.
You acknowledge the obvious fact that Romans 9:6 excludes some Jews from what Paul is calling "Israel," because we can all see that Paul is only including the believers among them (the remnant) under that label. Thus, you recognize that an actual Jew (as in Old Testament times, so also now) can be excluded from the people of Israel by his betrayal of the Covenant, but you inconsistently want to deny that a Gentile who embraces the Covenant can be included in Israel (see Isaiah 56:6-8).
Strangely, you allow the Gentile believers to be recognized as "Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise"(Gal.3:29), and to be "the [true] circumcision" (Phil.3:3) and to be "the children of promise"(Gal.4:28), and even "a chosen race, a holy nation, and a royal priesthood" (1 Pet.2:9—all terms used in the Old Testament distinctly of Israel)—but you do not extend to them the right of being called "Israel." If you are right, then, since Christ came, we are in the only period of history during which Gentiles cannot be a part of Israel. Are you aware that this means that privileges for Gentiles under the New Covenant are less than they were under the Old Covenant—and we are kept more "at arm's length" from Israel today, after "the middle wall of partition has been broken down," and "we who were afar off have been brought near," and have been made "one new" man with them? This is bizarre theology, my brother!