The Sorrowful Unbelief of Israel, Part 2
Romans 9:4‑5
Let's look to the Word of God, Romans chapter 9 is our text. I want to read for you verses 1 through 5. I really don't feel in my heart that I'm going to preach a sermon tonight, but I'd like to have a Bible study with you. And I'd like us, if we can, to allow the Spirit of God to be the preacher and just impress some things deeply in our hearts as we look at this passage and several others.
Paul begins this ninth chapter by saying, "I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit that I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart for I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh who are Israelites to whom pertaineth the adoption and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the law and the service of God and the promises, whose are the fathers and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ who is over all God blessed forever, amen."
Now this passage as we noted last time opens up a whole new section of Romans to us...a vital section, vital to any reader of this epistle. The section is not parenthetical, it is not arbitrary. It is not just tacked on or slapped in. It is essential. It is germane to the whole argument of the Apostle Paul and the Holy Spirit in this great epistle. In fact, in some sense it could be said to be the most essential passage of all for if left out there's a great gap in the believability of the message of the gospel. Because if we are to accept the fact that the new covenant, salvation by grace through faith, which has been the theme of the first eight chapters is in fact true and if we are also to accept that it is for all men in all nations and all times, then what happens to God's special nation Israel? What happens to them?
Several questions must be answered because Paul has been presenting a gospel that has been preached to all nations. He said that in chapter 1. And he has characterized the lostness of all men and the redemption of all men. And in presenting this gospel of salvation by grace through faith to all who believe, whatever their national heritage, he naturally poses this very important question that would be asked by a Jew or anyone who knew the special place of the Jews, what does this mean in relation to Israel? Are they no longer God's chosen people? Are they permanently set aside? Has God cancelled His promises to them? Is the Gentile church the new Israel? And then this question, how can Jews to whom this gospel came first and who are the sons of Abraham be rejecting it if in fact it is the truth? Wouldn't they be the most likely to recognize its truthfulness? And then there's this question, if Paul has been saying in chapter 8 particularly how secure we are in Christ and how nothing can ever separate us from Him or His love, how can we be sure God's going to keep that promise if He broke His promises to Israel? I mean, if God didn't keep the Jews in the place of covenant blessing, why should we believe He'll keep us there no matter what he says?
Now these are important issues. And before Paul can move on to the application of this great truth to the matter of practical living, before he can call for a response of the heart to these great truths, he must deal with this strategic area. And he does that in chapters 9, 10 and 11. And I say it is essential to the argument because if he stops and doesn't deal with this, there's a gaping hole in his presentation. So the questions must be answered. In chapters 9, 10 and 11 Paul's objective is to deal with these issues. He shows, for example, why the Jews who are God's people and to whom the gospel did come first and who truly were and are the children of Abraham nevertheless have rejected. He shows why. And he states that their rejection is only partial and only temporary and that it was always in the plan of God to be partial and temporary. He also makes it abundantly clear that God will fulfill ultimately all the promises to Israel. Therefore God can be trusted to keep His word to the church because He will keep His word to His people Israel.
Now those are the things he deals with in this section. It's a thrilling section because it tells us where the Jew and the Gentile fit into the redemptive plan of God, more than any other portion of Scripture this section tells us. It tells us how the Jew in his unbelief is temporarily and partially set aside and the Gentile brought in to be redeemed and Gentile redemption then provokes Israel to jealousy and they, too, then desire that which Gentiles have so that the coming in of the Gentiles provokes the salvation of the Jews. It's a marvelous plan, marvelous. So marvelous is it that the whole section ends with praise.
Look at chapter 11 verse 33, "O the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God, how unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out! For who hath known the mind of the Lord or who hath been His counselor? Or who hath first given to Him and it shall be recompensed unto Him again? For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things to whom be glory forever. Amen." It ends with a doxology of praise...praise for a God who could come up with such an incredibly marvelous supernatural and amazing plan of redemption.
Now, you see, Paul has to deal with this because Paul has become defined in that day and age and that part of the world as the archenemy of Jews, that's how he is known. And the Jews actually believe that Christianity is an anti‑Jewish conspiracy, that Paul is the beginner, if you will, or the mainstay of an anti‑Semitic movement. They believe that. And Paul wants them to know that that's not the case at all. And before he gets into the theology of that, he wants to give them his heart. And so in verses 1 to 5 he does that, he unbears his heart and the deep and profound love that he has for Israel. He cherished that people. They were his people. And he celebrates his Jewish identity. In Acts 23:6 he says, "I am a Pharisee, the son of a Pharisee." And he celebrated it in the letter to the Philippians, "A Hebrew of the Hebrews of the tribe of Benjamin, circumcised the eighth day, zealous for the law above all my countrymen." He was a Jew and he respected and revered and honored and loved and treasured that Jewishness. And he loved his people. Look at chapter 10 verse 1. "Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be...what?...saved." He wasn't anti‑Jewish, nor is any true minister of the gospel of Jesus Christ.
But the Jews, you see, need to know where his heart is. And so he gives them a look at his heart at the beginning of chapter 9 and then again at the beginning of chapter 10. He loved his people. The fact that he went to the Gentiles and the fact that he preached the truth about salvation by grace through faith, not law through works, doesn't mean that he was anti‑ Jewish. The fact that he confronted the lost Jew with his sinfulness and the emptiness of his system was not an act of hate but an act of...what?...of love, for love calls men away from sin to salvation. Love calls men away from the delusion to the truth. So they missed the point. The reason he confronted the false system of Judaism and called men to Christ was not because he hated the Jewish system or the Jewish people but because he loved them so much.
But they saw him as the archenemy. They hated him. They hated him with a burning passion. They hated him as much as they hated Jesus Christ. And he even said, "I bear in my body the marks of Christ." The reason they hate me so much is because they hated Christ so much. They can't hit Him so they hit me in His place. You see, in their eyes he was a traitor because he started out persecuting Christians and then became one of them. He was selected because of his zeal for Judaism to stop the Christian movement and he turned traitor.
Now I want you to go with me to the book of Acts. And I just want to do a little study with you for a few moments, to give you a perspective of how he was perceived in his day. And I think it will begin to dawn on your mind what he was up against. He was converted in chapter 9, so let's begin there.
In chapter 9 we have this great story of his conversion on the Damascus Road. And apparently after his conversion he spent some time with the Lord in a very unique and private relationship. He was called away into the Nabatean Arabia area, not the Arabia that we know today as Saudi Arabia, but Nabatean Arabia, an area around Palestine. He was there for a period of several years at which time the Lord dispensed to him the gospel. And in Galatians 1 he says the message I preach I didn't receive from men, I received it directly by revelation from Christ Himself. And it was during that time that he did.
And it was after that time that immediately he returns to the area at Damascus and verse 20 stays he preached Christ in the synagogues that He is the Son of God. Now that would be a pretty volatile place to preach that message. That would be like me going down the street to the synagogue to preach Jesus Christ as the Son of God. Only even more volatile in that time. And all that heard him were amazed and said, "Is not this he that destroyed them who called on this name in Jerusalem and came here for that intent that he might bring them bound to the chief priests? But Saul increased the more in strength and confounded the Jews who dwelt at Damascus, proving that this is very Christ." So he not only preached that Jesus was the Messiah but he proved it, literally confounded...what it means is he defeated them in debate, they were no match for his presentation.
And what was their reaction? Verse 23, "After many days were fulfilled the Jews took counsel to murder him." They wanted him murdered. They were so enraged that they finally sought to eliminate him all together. It started that way, folks. Didn't get any better. Chapter 13 verse 14, he has just been set apart for missionary service, along with his dear friend and companion Barnabas. Set apart from their role as pastors in the church at Antioch and sent out to preach Christ. They departed, verse 14 says, from Perga, came to Antioch in Pisidia, went into the synagogue on the Sabbath day and sat down. And after reading of the law of the prophets, the ruler of the synagogue sent to them saying, Ye men and brethren, if you have any word of exhortation for the people, say on."
Here he is again in the synagogue. And they offer him the platform as they were accustomed to doing when a visiting rabbi came. "Paul stood up and beckoning with his hands said, Men of Israel and ye that fear God, listen." Men of Israel refers to Jews, God fearers would be Gentiles who had identified with the Jewish religion. "You listen, the God of this people of Israel chose our fathers..." and he goes on to preach this sermon and guess who the subject is...Jesus Christ...Jesus Christ. His name is mentioned in verse 23. And he goes on to preach Jesus Christ. And you can pick it up in verse 38, "Be it known unto you therefore, men and brethren, that through this man is preached unto you the forgiveness of sins and by Him all that believe are justified from all things from which you could not be justified by the law of Moses." Do you realize what a devastating statement that would be in a synagogue? "Beware therefore lest that come upon you which is spoken of in the prophet, Behold you despisers and wonder and perish for I work a work in your days of work which you shall in no way believe though a man declare it unto you. And when they...that is Paul and Barnabas...were gone out of the synagogue, the Jews, they...again...besought that these words might be preached to them the next Sabbath." Boy, they were fascinated by this. "And they persuaded them to continue in the grace of God. And the next Sabbath day the whole city, almost, came together to hear the Word of God but when the Jews saw the multitudes they were filled with envy and spoke against those things which were spoken by Paul contradicting and blaspheming."
I mean, they were willing to listen until they realized the Gentiles could get in on it. And they became jealous and envious. Gentiles in their minds were outcasts...racial pride raises its ugly head. They certainly couldn't believe something that Gentiles believed. And so they became hostile...contradicting, blaspheming. "Paul and Barnabas grew bold." I love that. The more the negative reaction came, the greater the message. And they went on articulating and preaching. And, of course, in verse 48, "The Gentiles heard, were glad, glorified the Word of the Lord, as many as were ordained to eternal life believed and the Word of the Lord was published throughout all the region." But note verse 50. "But the Jews stirred up the devout and honorable women."
Now apparently there were some women, Gentile women, who had attached themselves to the synagogue...honorable women, devout women, women who sought God, women who were tired of the pagan morality and identified...immorality, rather, and identified with the unique moral convictions of Judaism, women of high position who were religious, who were drawn to monogamy and drawn to family life and drawn to all the virtues of Jewish tradition. And they stirred up these devout and honorable women and the chief men in the city and raised persecution against Paul and Barnabas and expelled them out of their borders...threw them out.
Chapter 14, would you notice verse 1? "It came to pass in Iconium, they went both together in the synagogue of the Jews," they went right back in the synagogue next time. You say, "Why did they keep going there?" Because they had an interest there, they were Jewish. And...you say, "Weren't they sent to reach the Gentiles?" That's right. But they didn't want to do it alone and they figured their first fertile soil for recruits was in the synagogue...cause they would have a hearing there and if they could get a few Jews to help them it would be a little easier to do. Plus, if they went to the Gentiles first, they could never come back to the Jews. So they had a strategy. They went into the synagogue. They spoke. There were Jews and Greeks who believed. "But the unbelieving Jews stirred up the Gentiles, made their minds evil affected against the brethren. The city became divided...verse 4 says...there was an assault made, both of the Gentiles who had been stirred up by the Jews, they wanted to stone them, crush their life out."
Well, you find them in Lystra in verse 19, "And there came there certain Jews from Antioch and Iconium." They go down to Lystra and here come the same Jews that gave them trouble in Iconium. "And persuaded the people." They stirred up another riot. They were rabble rousers. They wanted this guy stoned to death. They threw him out of the city, stoned him to death, that's how he was treated. He was a blasphemer to them. They despised the man because he confronted the evils and the untruths of their system.
Look at chapter 17 verse 1. This is the chronolog of Paul's ministry. "When they had passed through Amphipolis and Apollonia, they came to Thessalonica where was a synagogue of the Jews. And Paul, as his manner was, this was the way he did it, went into them and three sabbath days reasoned with them out of the Scriptures, opening and alleging that Christ must needs have suffered, risen from the dead, that this Jesus whom I preach unto you is Christ. And some of them believed and consorted with Paul and Silas and of the devout Greeks a great multitude and of the chief women not a few." So there were some good responses...good responses.
Look at verse 5, "But the Jews who believed not, again moved with envy." So many times with them it was racial pride. The reason they wouldn't accept a gospel wasn't because the gospel wasn't believable or verifiable, but it was because there were Gentiles in it and they couldn't handle that...they couldn't handle that. They were moved with envy. And it says, the King James says, "They took unto them certain vile fellows of the baser sort." What those are is marketplace hoodlums, local hoods that hung around the marketplace, loafers, dissipated characters. And they paid them some money to start a riot, to set the city in an uproar. That's exactly what they did.
And then down in verse 13, "When the Jews of Thessalonica had knowledge that the Word of God was preached by Paul at Berea, they came there also and stirred up the people." Everywhere he went, everywhere he went they were set against him, to kill him, to start a riot, to get him thrown out of town. They dogged his steps. And even when he established a church, they'd come in after that and they'd try to get the people to reject what he told them...the Jewish people.
Look at chapter 19 verse 8, we find him here in Ephesus. "He went into the synagogue, spoke boldly for the space of three months disputing and persuading the things concerning the Kingdom of God." Can you imagine him coming in every sabbath day preaching in the synagogue for three months? Boy, what an opportunity. "Some were hardened and believed not, spoke evil of that way...referring to the Christian way...before the multitude. He departed from them and separated the disciples disputing daily in the school of one Tyrannus. And this continued for the space of two years so that everybody in Asia Minor heard the Word of the Lord Jesus, both Jews and Greeks." They threw him out of the synagogue. They didn't want him there. And they got up and literally cursed that way. They cursed Christianity before the crowd.
Look at chapter 20. And this is a most interesting point in Paul's life. "After the uproar was ceased at Ephesus, Paul called unto him the disciples and embraced them and departed to go to Macedonia...that's Greece...and when he had gone over those parts and given them much exhortation, he came to Greece and there abode three months. And when the Jews laid wait for him." Now they're hiding in the bushes and they want him dead, plotting.
We can stop there and interject this. It was at this point in his life in Greece, staying in the house of Gaius, also known as Titus Justus, likely in the city of Corinth. At his right arm was a secretary by the name of Tertius. And it was at this point in the twentieth chapter of Acts that he dictated Romans...he dictated Romans in the midst of Jewish persecution, the Jews were laying wait for him. They were plotting his death. It was in the midst of the death plot that he's writing Romans. So even as he writes he feels their bitter hatred. And so when he says in chapter 9 that he has the wish that if it were possible he himself could be damned for the salvation of his brethren, his kinsmen, he is expressing the heart of the Apostle who loved his people in spite of their hatred for him...in fact in the midst of their hatred.
It never changed. Chapter 21, the same thing, in verse 27 here he arrives in Jerusalem and he goes into the temple. And they found him there, in verse 28, and they cried out, "Men of Israel, help, this is the man that teaches all men everywhere against the people." He's anti‑Semitic. "And the law," he's anti‑God. "And this place," he's anti‑worship. "And further, he brought Greeks or Gentiles into the temple and polluted this holy place for they had seen before with him in the city, Trophimus." They saw him with Trophimus in the city, he didn't bring him in there. They just made that up. They stirred up the whole city, verse 30, the whole city of Jerusalem. "People ran together, took Paul, pulled him out of the temple and shut the doors," verse 31, "and they went about to kill him." They were going to kill him. Fortunately the Romans moved in and saved his life as God would have it.
Chapter 22, it's no different. Chapter 22 is basically the same. Look what he says, verse 18, he's in a trance, some kind of a vision. "He saw them saying unto me, Make haste, get thee quickly out of Jerusalem, for they will not receive thy testimony concerning Me." He sees the Lord and the Lord says they're not going to listen...they're not going to listen. "And I said, Lord, they know that I am prisoned and beat in every synagogue, those that believed on Thee and they know that when the blood of Thy martyr, Stephen, was shed, I also was standing by and consenting to his death and kept he raiment of them that slew him." In other words, Paul is arguing in this vision and saying, "Lord, don't You think they're going to respond to me. I mean, they know that I was really one of them. I was a zealous one of them. I was a leader among them. I persecuted Christianity. Don't you think the transformation will be highly impactful?" He said to me, "Split, get out. I have to send you to the Gentiles." There's one group that is not going to hear you, that's the Jews because they see you as a traitor. I'll send you to the Gentiles...far from here. That was the Lord's call to him.
Chapter 23, this is very interesting. They bring him before the council in Jerusalem. Verse 2, "The high priest, Ananias, commands him...them that stood by him to smack him on the mouth. He says, I have lived in all good conscience before God until this day. And the guy says, Hit that man in the mouth, says the high priest, smack his mouth for that blasphemy. He has not lived in good conscience before God, he is anti‑Semitic, anti‑ God, anti‑worship. And then Paul says, God smack you, you whited wall. Sitest thou to judge me after the law and commandest me to be smitten contrary to the law." Boy, he had a sharp mind. But he did get a little carried away here. That's really not the way you deal with your enemies. "And they that stood by said, Revilest thou God's high priest. He said, I knew not, brethren, that he was the high priest, for it is written, Thou shalt not speak evil of the ruler of thy people." But you can see the level of conflict. "And there arose a tremendous dissension...verse 7...the dissension is indicated in verse 10...the chief captain fearing lest Paul should have been pulled in pieces." They would have ripped him in pieces. There's an argument...he created an argument, he pitted the Pharisees against the Sadducees over the issue of resurrection. And they were using him as a...as a tug‑a‑war rope, pulling each way to see who won. They would have split him in half. And again the Romans rescued him from the Jews.
Chapter 23 further down, verse 14 to 22, we see more of this. And again they would have killed him. They plotted against him. And I want you to notice verse 16, "Paul's sister's son..." we don't know much about Paul's family but he had a sister who had a son, "heard of the plot of the Jews and he went into the barracks and told Paul." See, at the end of verse 15 they were ready to kill him. They had this plot ready. And Paul's sister's son told Paul and again he was saved from death.
Chapter 26 verse 19, he reiterates a testimony here to Agrippa, just pick up verse 21. "For these causes the Jews caught me in the temple and went about to kill me...they went about to kill me."
It all ends in chapter 28, look at verse 25. This is the life of Paul. "When they agreed not among themselves, they departed. After Paul had spoken one word, well spoke the Holy Spirit by Isaiah the prophet unto our fathers saying, Go unto this people and say, Hearing you shall hear and shall not understand, and seeing you shall see and not perceive, for the heart of this people has become obtuse and their ears are dull of hearing and their eyes they have closed lest they should see with their eyes and hear with their ears and understand with their heart and should be converted and I should heal them. Be it known therefore unto you that the salvation of God is sent unto the Gentiles and they will hear it. And when he had said these words, the Jews departed and had great disputing among themselves."
I don't know if you ever thought about it, the reason I took the time to take you through that is two fold. Number one, I want you to understand that this man from the beginning of his ministry to the end was under the animosity and the bitterness and the hate and the plotting of the murderous Jews all the way along the line. And I want you also, secondly, to note that one great reason why God had to s