Faith for Faith

This is the reason why I have so often been hindered from coming to you. But now, since I no longer have any room for work in these regions, and since I have longed for many years to come to you, I hope to see you in passing as I go to Spain, and to be helped on my journey there by you, once I have enjoyed your company for a while. At present, however, I am going to Jerusalem bringing aid to the saints. For Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make some contribution for the poor among the saints at Jerusalem. For they were pleased to do it, and indeed they owe it to them. For if the Gentiles have come to share in their spiritual blessings, they ought also to be of service to them in material blessings. When therefore I have completed this and have delivered to them what has been collected, I will leave for Spain by way of you. I know that when I come to you I will come in the fullness of the blessing of Christ (Rm. 15:22-29).

Though it may seem unclear on the surface of our present text, the entire Epistle to the Romans has been building up to this point. For the apostle Paul has at this point concluded the purpose of his letter, which was declared in v. 1:5, viz. “To bring about the obedience of faith for the sake of [Christ's] name among all the nations.” For he brackets his entire letter by this objective, stating again in v. 15:18, 19, “For I will not venture to speak of anything except what Christ has accomplished through me to bring the Gentiles to obedience–by word and deed, by the power of signs and wonders, by the power of the Spirit of God.” Everything in his letter can be traced to this purpose, and it is a purpose that is founded in a passage written by the prophet Isaiah concerning the End of all things.

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Unfortunately, rebellion against government by those who call themselves Christians is not an uncommon occurrence. The reasons behind such rebellion, be it actual or philosophical, more often than not has more to do with one’s political theory than one’s desire to live peaceably with all men (cf. Rm. 12:18). For despite one’s belief where true authority should be vested (e.g. in the Magna Carta or in the king; in the Constitution or in the governors), authority truly resides only where there is actual power. For any human document is only as powerful as its government allows it to be, and where there is perceived conflict between the human code and the human government, the government is the one to whom the Christian must submit, for it is the government who has authority.

And though exceptions might be brought up in the case of the national Israel in the Old Testament, national Israel is unique in that she was governed by a document written by God. Therefore in its case, not to submit to the law of the land was tantamount to rebellion against God himself, for he was the Author of the law.

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As regards the gospel, they are enemies of God for your sake. But as regards election, they are beloved for the sake of their forefathers. For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. For just as you were at one time disobedient to God but now have received mercy because of their disobedience, so they too have now been disobedient in order that by the mercy shown to you they also may now receive mercy. For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy on all (Rm. 11:28-32).

[Warning: Post is at present unedited] This passage of Scripture is perhaps one of the most difficult passages in Romans, perhaps in all of Scripture, to grasp. It is so because of the language that is used in it– language that is complicated by our natural tendency to assign strict definitions to words that do not in themselves demand strict definitions. In this particular passage, the word of which I am speaking is the word that is translated “election” in v. 11:28, which I shall deal with in short order.

First, as always, we must understand the context in which this passage is spoken. As has been so throughout Romans 11, Paul is speaking of two groups of people–the Jews and the Gentiles. And because of God’s good wisdom and pleasure, he has decreed that salvation would only come to Gentiles if the Jews on the whole (less the remnant) would reject the Messiah. This purpose of the Lord is summed up in the apostle’s final statement in Romans 11 concerning the matter, viz. “For God has consigned all [both Jews and Gentiles] to disobedience so that he may have mercy on all.” This is a reiteration of what the apostle has declared earlier in the epistle, viz. “What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin” (Rm. 3:9). For what reason? “So that every mouth may be stopped and the whole world may be held accountable to God” (v. 3:19). Therefore, just as the law has stopped the mouths of the whole world (for they have no justification in themselves), so too this section is designed to stop our self-righteous mouths and declare what the apostle declares at the conclusion of this treatise: “Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! etc.” (vv. 11:33-36).

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This final section of Romans 11 beginning in v. 25 is in many ways a solidification of what the apostle has been saying throughout the chapter, viz. “A partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in” (v. 11:25b) We know this, first, because this claim is nothing new to Paul’s discourse, for the section that precedes it contains in it the picture of Jewish branches being broken off of the natural olive tree for the sake of making room for the wild, Gentile branches that were to be grafted in to it (cf. vv. 11:17-24). We know this also because of how Paul introduces this section, viz. “Lest you be wise in your own sight, I want you to understand this mystery, brothers, etc.” (v. 11:25a). In other words, the apostle reiterates this because he especially wants Gentiles to understand this mystery so that they might not be wise by their own estimations, or, perhaps synonymously, so that they would not be arrogant toward the Jewish branches that were broken off (cf. v. 11:18).

Also part of what the apostle wishes the Gentiles to understand is that it is “in this way [i.e. by the present partial hardening of Israel] that all Israel will be saved” (v. 11:26). However, in spite of the apostle’s wish for clear understanding concerning this matter, at least a couple of interpretations have come from this statement. Some have interpreted the apostle’s meaning in this verse to be this: In this way, all of spiritual Israel will be saved, i.e. an Israel comprised of both Gentiles who were grafted in and the remnant of Israel that remained. This interpretation is not too much of a leap, for it acknowledges that all who are grafted into the root of the Promise, whether Jew or Gentile, are in some way a part of the Israel of God (cf. Rm. 9:6; Gal. 6:16).

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According to Paul’s argument, the extent of the rejection which he denies in Rm. 11:1-5 is not merely rejection but it is total rejection. He is not denying what is obvious, namely that the majority of Israelites are turning and have turned away from God in Christ, but he arguing here that Israel has not been rejected absolutely. This is clear in the context, because, one, as we saw yesterday, Paul uses his pedigree in conjunction with his personal faith as an argument to the contrary, and, two, in today’s verses, the apostle quotes the prophet Elijah who believed himself that Israel was absolutely rejected by God. He writes, and the apostle quotes and adds:

”Lord, they have killed your prophets, they have demolished your altars, and I alone am left, and they seek my life.” But what is God’s reply to him? “I have kept for myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.” So too at the present time there is a remnant, chosen by grace (vv. 11:3-5).

Therefore, the apostle’s point is the point that he puts in the form of a rhetorical question in v. 11: “So I ask, did they stumble in order that they might fall? By no means!” In other words, God has not utterly destroyed physical Israel to the extent that they are beyond recovery. The apostle also makes this point in v. 23, “And even [the Jews], if they do not continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God has the power to graft them in again.”

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Disclaimer: Before beginning this chapter, it is especially important to understand that context drives meaning of words as much as the definitions of words drive the meaning of words. In other words, word studies in Romans 11 are more likely to do harm to our study than good, therefore we shall keep an ever watchful eye upon our presuppositions and theological tendencies as we go through this text.

As the greater context demands, our present subject is, as it has been since the beginning of Romans 9, the disbelief of physical Israel. Since beginning this discourse, the apostle has taken us on the pertinent side paths of God’s election of individuals (v. 9:11), God’s sovereign will and decree over the destination of souls (vv. 9:19-24), the necessity of the proclamation of the Gospel for salvation (vv. 10:14, 15), and the creation of faith by God in the individual soul to embrace and see “the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ” (2Cor 4:6; cf. Rm. 10:17). Thus our understanding as we begin Romans 11 is that, though there is a perceived problem with Israel’s rejection of the Messiah, God if faithful and has a sovereign and perfect plan.

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There is a great lie that has been perpetuated in America’s religious culture that says that if one has a great passion for God or if one is sincere in his own particular religion that when that person at the end of his life encounters the true God that that God would be obligated to accept him for his sincerity of heart. This false teaching has knocked down the doors of the American Church and has many in the Church contemplating the heresy of inclusivism—that God rewards those who seek any god religiously and with great zeal. This salvation by zealotry applies to the mystic Christian who lives down the street as well to the Pygmy in North Bora Bora who has never heard the name of Jesus Christ, for both seek after God in a their own self-prescribed fashion and both do it with great fervency.

In our study of the Epistle to the Romans, we encounter the apostle Paul contemplating the state of his countrymen, the Israelites, who themselves had great zeal for God. The apostle writes, “My heart’s desire and prayer for them is that they may be saved. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge” (Rom. 10:1, 2). Before can we begin to unpack this text, there are two important things that we must acknowledge: First is the Israelites’ great zeal for God as testified to by the apostle, and second is their unsaved and reprobate state despite their zeal for God.

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After Paul reveals to us his deep love for brothers according to the flesh in Romans 9:1-5, he begins to address the chief subject of this passage, namely God’s faithfulness to his promises. For there are those who look at the promises to Israel before Christ and then look at the rejection of physical Israel by God after Christ and question the validity of God’s promises. They might ask, “If God cannot be trusted to keep his promises to his people Israel, why should we expect God to keep his promises to Gentiles who are followers of Christ?” This is a valid concern indeed, if it were in fact true.

To address this, Paul goes directly to its root—the promise given by God to Abraham. Paul does not look at the promise itself, but to whom the promise is given. He writes:

Not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.” … For this is what the promise said: “About this time next year I will return, and Sarah shall have a son” (vv. 9:7, 9).

These statements are significant because, if you remember, Isaac was not Abraham’s first son. Abraham had taken Sarah’s maidservant and had a son with her by the name of Ishmael who by law and custom was the rightful heir of Abraham’s inheritance. Yet God had chosen Isaac over Ishmael as the one through whom the promise would be fulfilled.

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When coming to Scripture, there are few phrases that have such weight and implication as does “Not All Israel belong to Israel” in Romans 9. It says first that there are essentially two Israels—one that is truly Israel and another that merely a shadow or a prefiguring. It says also that there has been a misunderstanding by some earlier interpreters of Scripture. These interpreters believed that it was the physical descendents of Jacob who were the children of God and that it was those who would inherit eternal life (cf. Mark 10:17). Jesus refutes this notion on several occasions, none more poignant than his refutation of the Pharisees:

They answered him, “Abraham is our father . . . We were not born of sexual immorality (i.e. like the Samaritans). We have one Father—even God.” Jesus said to them, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I came from God and I am here. I came not of my own accord, but he sent me. Why do you not understand what I say? It is because you cannot bear to hear my word. You are of your father the devil, and your will is to do your father’s desires” (John 8:39, 41-44).

The ultimate rejection of Christ’s words was not limited to the Pharisees for it was true of most of Israel, which prompts Paul, after his glorious declaration of the unfailing love of God in Christ at the end of Romans 8, to address the unbelieving, condemned state of Israel by looking at the nature of the Promise of God to Abraham.

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