The Wall That Jesus Christ Broke Down; Rebuilt?

This is the "Israel" that Paul is talking about in Romans 11

 

"So all Israel shall be saved," is as future as future can be. And it is still future. It has not happened yet. The remnant of Israel will yet be saved when Christ comes again. The teaching is so obvious but you just don't want to believe it for it interferes with your narrow-minded view of the Bible.

 

Romans 11:25-27 (YLT)

"For I do not wish you to be ignorant, brethren, of this secret -- that ye may not be wise in your own conceits -- that hardness in part to Israel hath happened till the fulness of the nations may come in; and so all Israel shall be saved, according as it hath been written, `There shall come forth out of Sion he who is delivering, and he shall turn away impiety from Jacob, and this to them [is] the covenant from Me, when I may take away their sins."


This is what you were referring to, DHK. But back up a few verses to see what it is exactly that Apostle Paul was speaking about....



Romans 11:19-24 (YLT)

"Thou wilt say, then, `The branches were broken off, that I might be graffed in;' right! by unbelief they were broken off, and thou hast stood by faith; be not high-minded, but be fearing; for if God the natural branches did not spare -- lest perhaps He also shall not spare thee. Lo, then, goodness and severity of God -- upon those indeed who fell, severity; and upon thee, goodness, if thou mayest remain in the goodness, otherwise, thou also shalt be cut off. And those also, if they may not remain in unbelief, shall be graffed in, for God is able again to graff them in; for if thou, out of the olive tree, wild by nature, wast cut out, and, contrary to nature, wast graffed into a good olive tree, how much rather shall they, who [are] according to nature, be graffed into their own olive tree?"



As you can see, Paul is contrasting the Jews unbelief to the Gentiles belief. By the Jews unbelieving, the Gentiles were believing and were being grafted into the natural Olive Vine, Jesus Christ.

In vss 1-4, Paul stated something I thought would be good to bring out.....



"I say, then, Did God cast away His people? let it not be! for I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin: God did not cast away His people whom He knew before(Romans 8:28-30); have ye not known -- in Elijah -- what the Writing saith? how he doth plead with God concerning Israel, saying,`Lord, Thy prophets they did kill, and Thy altars they dug down, and I was left alone, and they seek my life;' but what saith the divine answer to him? `I left to Myself seven thousand men, who did not bow a knee to Baal.'


God has foreknown many peoples that were not of ethnical Israel. They were His chosen...His foreordained....His sheep...His people. Yet, you want to hang onto Israel's coattails like they're this special, "an apple in God's sight" people. They are no more special than the american, mexican, canadian, russian, spaniard, british, cuban, chinese, japanese, thai, swede, croatian, &c. Yet, you want to bite your nails every time a missile is pointed their way. I don't want anything bad to happen to them, either, but they get to God via the same route...grace through faith, and not by being solely an Israelite.

FTR, there was no Israel before Jacob, yet, many before Jacob's time were God's chosen people.


The middle verses betwixt vs 4 and 19 deal with Israel's fall and our being taken in. They were broken off due to unbelief and we were grafted in.

 

Very well made points!

 

Part I (necessary by length of post)

Amen, brother, amen. But I didn't have to die for her. I just had to sit through dinner with our friends for her. :laugh:

Ok, to the point. Chapters nine and ten of Romans brings about an interesting conundrum. Paul describes a theological problem: Most Jews were -- and still are --- rejecting the gospel. Not only are they missing out on salvation, it makes other people wonder whether God is faithful to his promises. I'm convinced this continuing apparent difficulty is responsible for the rising up of doctrines claiming either that God has abandoned Israel, or passed the promises on to the church, or even (I think you said it earlier, C1) that the church is "an extension" of Israel. Off-topic for a moment, doesn't that make the church "parenthetical" to Israel, as we've discussed here and elsewhere recently, with none of us willing to apply that label to Christ's body?

Anyway. I'm going to revisit some of the Scripture I quoted in that lengthy post yesterday that no one has bothered to challenge. In chapter 11, Paul affirms that God has a surprising plan for the people of Israel. He writes in the first half of v. 2, "God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew." Here, "foreknew" refers to the long-term relationship God has with the Jews, his "preapproval" of them as His people and the longsuffering patience He has shown them. In Christ, He has revealed the termination of that relationship as relates to The Law, but that does not terminate the relationship of love and choosing them as His people. God still has plans for Israel. Paul continues:

Romans 11, NASB
2b ... Or do you not know what the Scripture says in the passage about Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel?
3 "Lord, THEY HAVE KILLED YOUR PROPHETS, THEY HAVE TORN DOWN YOUR ALTARS, AND I ALONE AM LEFT, AND THEY ARE SEEKING MY LIFE."
4 But what is the divine response to him? "I HAVE KEPT for Myself SEVEN THOUSAND MEN WHO HAVE NOT BOWED THE KNEE TO BAAL."
5 In the same way then, there has also come to be at the present time a remnant according to God's gracious choice.​

Paul quotes the story of Elijah from 1 Kings 19:18. A remnant remained then, the apostle concludes, just as it did in his time, just as it does now. In Paul’s day, thousands of Jews believe in Christ. Today, tens or hundreds of thousands do. There is a remnant, a small percentage, of Jews who are following what God is doing.

They are chosen by grace, not by their zeal for the law.

Romans 11
6 But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace.
7 What then? What Israel is seeking, it has not obtained, but those who were chosen obtained it, and the rest were hardened; ​

The works of Paul's fellow Jews who clung to the Law did not achieve what they wanted, which sincerely was to be righteous. Paul explains that apparent split between the believing and unbelieving Jews by adapting Deuteronomy 29:4, Isaiah 29:9, 10 and Psalm 69:22, 23.

Romans 11
8 just as it is written, "GOD GAVE THEM A SPIRIT OF STUPOR, EYES TO SEE NOT AND EARS TO HEAR NOT, DOWN TO THIS VERY DAY." 9 And David says, "LET THEIR TABLE BECOME A SNARE AND A TRAP, AND A STUMBLING BLOCK AND A RETRIBUTION TO THEM. 10 "LET THEIR EYES BE DARKENED TO SEE NOT, AND BEND THEIR BACKS FOREVER ." ​

In David's Psalm, the king, poet and warrior went so far as to ask God to punish his enemies -- even to blot them out of the book of life! But keep in mind, that is David asking, not God granting, thus abandoning Israel. Paul is not asking that, obviously. The Jews have not stumbled beyond recovery, and Paul works hard so that some might be saved. Paul is not quoting the psalm for eternal punishment, but only for its comment about eyes that cannot see.

The minority of his people accepted the gospel, but the others did not because God gave them over to their own inclinations. However, Paul had said in chapter ten that they heard and understood, and that God pleaded with them. They refused. Paul goes on to say in the Romans passage that he works hard so that some of them might be saved (v. 14). God has not decided that these people will be lost. But they rejected Christ as His visitation, and God let them have their own way. This does not represent a final judgment. The blindness will eventually be removed.

Have to split this here because of length. See Part II

 

Part II

First, Paul goes on to repeat his question from v. 1: "I say then, they did not stumble so as to fall, did they (v. 11)?" And he answers his own question with a resounding "NO!"

Romans 11
11b ... May it never be! But by their transgression salvation has come to the Gentiles, to make them [The Jews] jealous.​

The Jews who reject Christ are not hopelessly lost — they can still be saved. But in the meantime, salvation is being offered to Gentiles. Paul is alluding here to Moses' warnings late in his life.

Deuteronomy 32
21 " They have made Me jealous with what is not God;
They have provoked Me to anger with their idols.
So I will make them jealous with those who are not a people;
I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation, ​

Guess who that "foolish nation" is? Well, that'd be us -- or rather all the non-Jewish nations that have believed on Christ for salvation. In Romans, Paul reasons from a less-than-ideal situation to a better one for Israel. He states in vv. 12-15: "Now if their transgression is riches for the world and their failure is riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their fulfillment be! But I am speaking to you who are Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an apostle of Gentiles, I magnify my ministry, if somehow I might move to jealousy my fellow countrymen and save some of them. For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?"

Paul obviously believes the majority will be saved -- first a remnant of Jews, then a good number of Gentiles, then the majority of Jews, and finally another blessing for the Gentiles -- the salvation of the great majority. Essentially, Paul is saying in this passage, "If the failure of the Jews brought salvation to everyone else, won’t it be even better when the Jews finally accept the gospel? They might be spiritually dead now, but God can raise the dead."

There is a great deal of discussion regarding the "grafting in" passages that follow. I'm not going to get heavily into those, except to say that Paul writes extensively here using analogies from Israel's system of worship. He speaks of firstfruits, which corresponds to the commands of the Law that no one could eat of the harvest until the firstfruits had been offered to God, after which the entire harvest was sanctified. In context, the firstfruits are the remnant of Israel, the small percentage of Jews who accept Jesus. They are given to God, and this means that the whole Jewish nation is set apart for God, then, now and forever.

In speaking of the "grafting in," Paul isn’t giving horticultural advice -- he is tailoring his analogy to suit his purposes. The root of which he speaks is the promise of salvation given to Abraham, a promise now given nourishment by Jesus Christ. Many of the Jews are cut off from Christ, and Gentiles are being attached to the tree. The Jews are not superior -- but neither are the Gentiles. Our salvation depends on a promise given to the ancestor of the Jews, Abraham, and to the Messiah of the Jews, Jesus. We have done nothing to earn the right to be grafted in. It is only by God's grace that we are welcomed in.

He warns of our being just as capable of being "broken off" from the branch as were the Jews. This is not a claim of lost salvation as so many read it, but it is a matter of taking seriously that which we have been given. Paul considers it possible for someone to reject the faith, not after they have received truth faith, but as the Hebrews 6:1-9 passage teaches, that we can be given the grace of God in the form of hearing the gospel, and we can even think we have acted on it. But if there is no heart- and life-change, we are not saved. If salvation were predestined, then people would have no need to tremble, and Paul would not imply that God could break them off. Paul wants people to be confident, but not to assume that everything is guaranteed no matter what they do. Acts aren't salvation. Changing one's mind about God, who He is, what rights He has over us and believing it to be our only hope to trust in Him -- that is salvation.

At the end of the chapter, Paul calls this all "a mystery."

Romans 11
25 For I do not want you, brethren, to be uninformed of this mystery -- so that you will not be wise in your own estimation -- that a partial hardening has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in;
26 and so all Israel will be saved; just as it is written, "THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB." ​

Paul knows that the Redeemer has already come to Zion. Jesus has come, and Paul is confident that Jesus will accomplish the work He came to do. Even when Israel was a mess, and even now that it continues to be a mess, God promised a day of salvation for them, and He promised a new covenant for them. The fact that Gentiles are entering the new covenant does not change the fact that it was promised to the Jews. The promise is not broken. It is delayed, that the full measure of the Gentiles who will believe can come into covenant with God as well.

Obviously, a "mystery" is something previously hidden but now revealed. It is now revealed so Gentiles do not regard themselves as superior to Jews. They aren't. Israel has been hardened in part, meaning that most Jews do not currently believe. But this restriction is temporary, and as he clearly indicated earlier in the chapter, it is to our benefit that it is so. But it lasts only until the full number of Gentiles come into faith.

Paul has already argued that the Jews have not stumbled beyond recovery, and Jewish branches can be grafted back in if they believe, The verses following say that the Jewish people are still loved, that their calling cannot be revoked, and that God will have mercy on them. Paul believed that most of the Jews will be saved, because Deuteronomy 32 predicts a time when they will accept Jesus as their Savior.

At that time, they will come into their earthly kingdom to the fullness of its promise. Their reward will be different from ours because their relationship with God has been different from the beginning. They have been our model. This stiff-necked, stubborn, disobedient people whom God has not abandoned and who will receive their covenant promises prove to us that we also can trust God to be faithful, even when we are not.