Rom 10:18 – 11:12

Nov 15, 2020 // By:Dave // No Comment

Rom 10

18  But I say, surely they have never heard, have they? Indeed they have; 

“THEIR VOICE HAS GONE OUT INTO ALL THE EARTH, 

AND THEIR WORDS TO THE ENDS OF THE WORLD.”

Paul mentioned hearing as a critical step in the salvation chain back in verse 17.  he goes back to this to respond to anticipated excuses for Israel.

He says, “israel has heard, because the ends of the civilized world has heard (and what they heard actually started right there in their front yard (Jerusalem)

Rom. 10:18 ¶ But haven’t there been plenty of opportunities for Israel to listen and understand what’s going on? Plenty, I’d say.

 

Preachers’ voices have gone ’round the world,

Their message to earth’s seven seas.

19 But I say, surely Israel did not know, did they? First Moses says, 

“I WILL MAKE YOU JEALOUS BY THAT WHICH IS NOT A NATION, 

BY A NATION WITHOUT UNDERSTANDING WILL I ANGER YOU.”

“but I say again” = presenting a deeper argument “Israel did not know”

know what ?

(God’s plan for redemption, the purpose of the Messiah, and the plan to share this redemption to the gentiles)

Moses is brought forth to respond to this argument:

quoting Deut 32:21

aThey have made Me jealous with what is not God;   They have provoked Me to anger with their 1bidols.   cSo I will make them jealous with those who are not a people;   I will provoke them to anger with a foolish nation,

share redemption to the point that Israel would be angered at these redeemed gentiles.

20 And Isaiah is very bold and says, 

now Isaiah is brought forth to also reply to this argument that Israel didn’t know any better:

“I WAS FOUND BY THOSE WHO DID NOT SEEK ME, 

I BECAME MANIFEST TO THOSE WHO DID NOT ASK FOR ME.”

But it is not only the law that anticipates the gospel and Israel’s negative reaction to it; the prophets bear witness to the same truth. In fact, Paul suggests, the prophetic text testifies even more clearly to these points: “Isaiah boldly553 says, ‘I will be found by those who are not seeking me, I will make myself manifest to those who are not asking for me.’”554 Paul quotes from 

Isa. 65:1, a verse that in its context refers to God’s making himself known to the people of Israel.555 

we also have verses like:

Hos. 1:10 

Yet the number of the sons of Israel   Will be like the asand of the sea,   Which cannot be measured or numbered;   And bin the place   Where it is said to them,   “You are cnot My people,”   It will be said to them,   You are the dsons of the living God.”

Hosea 2:23

“I will asow her for Myself in the land.   bI will also have compassion on 1her who had not obtained compassion,   And cI will say to 2those who were dnot My people,   ‘You are My people!’   And 3they will say, ‘You are my God!’”

Paul is not only stressing the point that the people of Israel had ample opportunity to hear and know,

he is, at the same time, applying these verses to the gentiles who have received the gospel as fulfillment  of these same verses.

at the same time that the people of Israel reject God and His plan for redemption, the gentiles are receiving it.

they are the ones who 

  • found God without seeking Him.
  • saw the manifestation of God without asking
  • are first called “not His people by the Jews who are called “His people” by God Himself
  • are called the sons of the living God
  • will be able to say “You are my God”

Israel has actually denied two plans at the same time

  1. their own redemption from sin
  2. the redemption of the “other people”, the gentiles, what is commonly referred to in the gospels by the word “the whole world” (as many scholars interpret this contextual use of “κόσμον”)
    (since Jews referred to the everything outside israel as the “world” = the system and people out there ! )

21 But as for Israel He says, “ALL THE DAY LONG I HAVE STRETCHED OUT MY HANDS TO A DISOBEDIENT AND OBSTINATE PEOPLE.”

Isaiah 65:2

 aI have spread out My hands all day long to a brebellious people,   Who walk in the way which is not good, 1following their own cthoughts,

stretched out my hands = reached out to offer help, or to beckon to come back

in Psalm 143:6-8

“I spread out my hands to you; I thirst for you like a parched land.”

carries the same meaning but in passive tense (rather than active)

all day long = hyperbolic statement indicating a long period of time (emphasis on “all”)

meaning “constantly, consistently , always

note the double descriptive of Israel in verse 21 as well:

disobedient and obstinate.

obstinate in greek means argue back or talk back

these two often accompany each other

(thinking it is okay to disobey often results in talking back to that same authority that you started out by disobeying)

disobedience is an embolding process that deepens until one actually not only defies authority in passive action , but begins to defy actively by arguing back against that same authority that was being patient with the disobedience in the first place

Rom 11

1  I say then, God has not rejected His people, has He? May it never be! For I too am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.

2 God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew. Or do you not know what the Scripture says in the passage about Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel?

foreknew 

   προγινώσκω, proginōskō, v.  [4574 + 1182]. to know beforehand, foreknow; (mid.) to choose beforehand

(same exact form and sense as used in Rom 8:29)

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.

6 But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works, otherwise grace is no longer grace.

chosen on the basis of grace has nothing to do with the merit of the person chosen, it is all up to the chooser (works is the opposite, the one chosen has earned the choice)

which means what would have been called grace is no longer an application of grace but is proven to be a choice based upon works.

in God’s reply to Elijah and Paul’s statement about Israel, the remnant of true chosen people exists , solely by the grace of God, not works.

God does not throw the baby out with the bathwater.  He always has a remnant there, chosen by His grace, though whom He can work His divine plans.

7  What then? What Israel is seeking, it has not obtained, but those who were chosen obtained it, and the rest were hardened;

Those who pursued God by works never found Him

Those whom God chose obtained (were given) understanding and righteousness 

Those who pursued God in their own power and pride found themselves hardened in their hearts as God set them so

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.”

  STUPOR  κατάνυξις, katanyxis, n.  [2848 + 3817]. stupor, bewilderment, unable to think

parable of the soils

Mark 4: 

9 “He who has ears, let him hear.”

10 And the disciples came and said to Him, “Why do You speak to them in parables?”

11 Jesus answered them, “To you it has been granted to know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, but to them it has not been granted.

12 “For whoever has, to him more shall be given, and he will have an abundance; but whoever does not have, even what he has shall be taken away from him.

13 “Therefore I speak to them in parables; because while seeing they do not see, and while hearing they do not hear, nor do they understand.

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.”

psalm 69:22

Psa. 69:22 ¶ May their table before them become a snare; 

And when they are in peace, may it become a trap.

Psa. 69:23 May their eyes grow dim so that they cannot see, 

And make their loins shake continually.

Spurgeon says of these two verses:

Verse 22. Let their table become a snare before them. There they laid snares, and there they shall find them. From their feasts they would afford nothing but wormwood for their innocent victim, and now their banquets shall be their ruin. It is very easy for the daily provisions of mercy to become temptations to sin. As birds and beasts are taken in a trap by means of baits for the appetite, so are men snared full often by their meats and drinks. Those who despise the upper springs of grace, shall find the nether springs of worldly comfort prove their poison. The table is used, however, not alone for feeding, but for conversations, transacting business, counsel, amusement, and religious observance: to those who are the enemies of the Lord Jesus that table may, in all these respects, become a snare. This first plague is terrible, and the second is like unto it. And that which should have been for their welfare, let it become a trap. This, if we follow the original closely, and the version of Paul in the Romans, is a repetition of the former phrase; but we shall not err if we say that, to the rejecters of Christ, even those things which are calculated to work their spiritual and eternal good, become occasions for yet greater sin. They reject Christ, and are condemned for not believing on him; they stumble on this stone, and are broken by it. Wretched are those men, who not only have a curse upon their common blessings, but also on the spiritual opportunities of salvation.

“Whom oils and balsams kill, what salve can cure?” This second plague even exceeds the first.

Verse 23. Let their eyes be darkened, that they see not. They shall wander in a darkness that may be felt. They have loved darkness rather than light, and in darkness they shall abide. Judicial blindness fell upon Israel after our Lord’s death and their persecution of his apostles; they were blinded by the light which they would not accept. Eyes which see no beauty in the Lord Jesus, but flash wrath upon him, may well grow yet more dim, till death spiritual leads to death eternal. And make their loins continually to shake. Their conscience shall be so ill at ease that they shall continually quiver with fear; their backs shall bend to the earth (so some read it) with grovelling avarice, and their strength shall be utterly paralysed, so that they cannot walk firmly, but shall totter at every step. See the terrifying, degrading, and enfeebling influence of unbelief. See also the retaliation of justice: those who will not see shall not see; those who would not walk in uprightness shall be unable to do so.

11  I say then, they did not stumble so as to fall, did they? May it never be! But by their transgression salvation has come to the Gentiles, to make them jealous.

Paul compares stumbling and falling

stumbling is the struggle to stay up

falling is the failure to do so

Pauls context implies that the fall is (while singular) final in the consequence

while stumbling may be ongoing but not final in consequence.

supported by the greek itself

stumble

4760   [4417]   πταίω, ptaiō, v.   to stumble, fall, trip

fall

4406   [4098]   πίπτω, piptō, v.. to fall, collapse; to die

12 Now if their transgression is riches for the world and their failure is riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their fulfillment be!

transgression = sin, crossing the line with God

resulted in gain for the cosmos 

failure = loss, defeat

gentiles = ethnos (nations)

God’s plan to give salvation to the non-jews was not an backup plan in case Israel rejected Christ

IT WAS the plan and included that rejection

Israel’s loss was all the nations of the worlds gain

It was the plan ! 
(and even though God has skipped over israel right now, HE’s not done with His chosen, foreknown people.

Hosea 6

Hos. 6:11  Also, O Judah, there is a aharvest appointed for you, 

When I brestore the fortunes of My people.

Zech 9

Mal 3:1-4

God promised to use Israel, He also promised to bless all the nations through this one country

(it’s rejection of the Christ, is proof of His plan, not proof of His abandonment of them)

God often has plans to carry out that include the sin of man.

Sometimes He hardens people’s hearts, sometimes He softens them.

It is STILL His plan.  Our job it to trust.

We bear the privilege and responsibility to nurture our relationship with Him

(cooperating with His work in the soil of our heart)

and to trust Him enough to tell others about Him at each chance given to us by Him

(scattering seed in neighboring soils not worrying about the state of the soil)

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