<p>2:13 <i>But, brothers, we are obligated to give thanks to God always for you, beloved of the Lord, for God chose you from the beginning to salvation, through sanctification of the Spirit and belief of the truth</i>- This final section down to :17 emphasizes the work of the Spirit in confirming the believers, because we have been reading that those who refuse to believe are confirmed in their unbelief by another spirit sent from God to psychologically confirm them in their path; see on :11. As also explained in Romans 8, God's election of us is part of His grace, and if we believe the truth of Christ, He will sanctify us by the gift of His Spirit in our hearts. We can resist that process, quench or grieve the Spirit, limit the Holy One of Israel. The Judaizers taught that Israel were the chosen people; the same word for &quot;chose you&quot; is used in the LXX of Israel (Dt. 7:7; 10:15). But the new Israel in Christ are the chosen ones, &quot;the beloved of the Lord&quot;. The Jews had chosen not to &quot;believe the truth&quot; of Christ (:12); those who do believe the truth are the chosen. It is by such belief that we make our &quot;calling and election sure&quot; (2 Pet. 1:10). Those who do not believe nullify their calling; they become those whose names were not written in the book from the beginning (Rev. 13:8) and are therefore destroyed because of it. Our having been chosen from the beginning was so that we might be holy or sanctified (Eph. 1:4); if we refuse to be holy then we are annulling our calling. But if we wish to be holy, then the gift of the Spirit will work in our hearts to sanctify or make us holy in practice.</p>