The scriptures clearly give to understand that the elect of Israel, together with Abraham and all of the foreordained prophets, were the more obedient and valiant spirits in their pre-mortal defense of Jehovah, the pre-mortal Christ, and of his gospel plan of individual freedom and exaltation. They were those who followed him, seeking truth and righteousness. God is no respecter of persons. His organization and foreordination of the house of Israel (or Jacob) in pre-mortality to become his elect and covenant people on earth was justly occasioned by obedience and valor. God identified, among all of the pre-mortal hosts, those who had qualified themselves to be counted among his chosen people.
The house of Israel is paramount in the history of mankind. It has the leading role on the stage of religious mortality. The sacred history of this world will someday be written in terms of Israel — God's covenant with Israel; God's struggles with wayward Israel; God's subsequent scattering of Israel; God's latter-day restoration of the gospel to Israel; God's gathering of Israel, and Israel's ultimate habitation of this world when it becomes celestialized.