Believing Gentiles, Members of the Israel of God

Paul has established that not all the natural descendants of Abraham are the elect of God, but those whom God according to His own free will has chosen. But that elect people is by no means limited to ethnic Jews only. The true Israel of God is a spiritual Jews only club, but it is by no means an ethnic Jew only club. In these verses we learn that the inclusion of the Gentiles was prophesied in OT Scripture, the exclusion of the vast majority of Jews was also prophesied, and so was the offense of the cross.