Has God Cancelled His Promises to Israel? Part 4
Romans 11:11‑15
Tonight we're going to be looking at Romans chapter 11 and I want you to open your Bible to this wonderful wonderful portion of Scripture. And tonight our text begins in verse 11 of Romans 11 and really goes all the way down through verse 26. We'll go as far as we can in the providence of the Lord in looking at this marvelous marvelous passage.
Just to sort of get our thinking moving along the lines of what Paul is saying here, modern Israel is situated in a place of constant danger. And all you have to do is go there to realize that. They have enemies on three borders...the southern border, the eastern border and the northern border are basically hostile as far as they're concerned. They may be peaceful at the present time but throughout history these Arab nations that have surrounded the land of Israel had posed for them some severe problems in terms of security. And that's one reason why at all times their borders are guarded. At all times their borders are patrolled by jet aircraft. And it fascinated me that the jet aircraft, those fast jets that fly about 500 feet above the Dead Sea going north to south and east to west can't fly more than three and a half minutes in any direction without being out of the land of Israel. It's very small. And it's surrounded by historically hostile neighbors.
This threat is ever present. And basically the threat that Israel has from its Arab neighbors goes way way back in history to Abraham. Because Abraham also fathered the Arab nations and when God brought into the land of Canaan, during the life of Abraham, a great food shortage, a great famine, it presented a very tragic situation. Abraham who was promised by God that he would have a great nation out of his loins, Abraham who was promised by God that his needs would be met, that he would give to Abraham the fulfillment of His promise, entered into this time of food shortage and I believe rather than trusting God decided to escape to Egypt and to go into Egypt to find the food that was unavailable in the land of Canaan. Even though God had said to him, "Unto thy seed will I give this land." He abandoned that land and went into Egypt. And when he got into Egypt because I believe he was in a back‑slidden condition spiritually and had stepped out of the plan and purpose and will of God, he then had to lie, at least he thought he had to lie, which compounded his sin. You remember? He lied about the fact that his wife Sarah was his sister. He was afraid to tell the truth because he thought Pharaoh was attracted to her. And so now he's not only in a wrong place but he's in a wrong position, having lied about his own wife.
It's a good thing to keep in mind that when you step out of the place of God's will, you compound your problems. And that's exactly what happened to Abraham.
Well, when Pharaoh found that out, found out that Abraham was indeed the husband of Sarah, he was upset at Abraham doing that and threw Abraham out of Egypt. Abraham had gone there to be able to provide for his family ostensibly, and now he was thrown out of Egypt. When he left Egypt he did not leave alone. He had triply compounded his problem because while he was in Egypt he had taken on a servant by the name of Hagar who was an Egyptian, an Egyptian woman. So when he went back into the land of Canaan he took this handmaid Hagar, and you all know the story from there.
When he was again given the promise of God of a seed, he disbelieved that God could produce that seed through his wife Sarah who was barren and who was in her nineties. And so he went under the advice of Sarah in unto Hagar this Egyptian maid that he had picked up while disobedient to God and living in the land of Egypt. And out of the loins of Abraham, born through Hagar came a child by the name of Ishmael. And you read about that in Genesis chapter 16. But Ishmael was not the child of promise. Ishmael was not the covenant child. Ishmael was not to be the son through whom God would bring out His Jewish people and His Messiah and His plan of redemption. And Sarah speaks in Genesis 21 and verse 10 and says, "Cast out this bondwoman and her son, for the son of this bondwoman shall not be heir with my son, even with Isaac." By Genesis 21 Isaac has been born of Abraham and Sarah. But now a conflict has been set up because Abraham was disobedient and left Canaan, because Abraham was disobedient and lied to Pharaoh, because he was thrown out of the land, took with him an Egyptian handmaid, got that Egyptian handmaid pregnant trying to help God to produce His promise and produced Ishmael and then when God gave him Isaac there was a conflict because Ishmael was actually Abraham's older son, he set up a conflict that still goes on to this very day. For Ishmael produced much of the Arab people.
Now the promise of Genesis 16:20 and the promise of Genesis 17 is that out of the loins of Ishmael would come a great people, but not the covenant people...a great people but not the covenant people. But both Genesis 16 and 17 indicate to us that Ishmael was not the covenant people but would become the persecutor of the covenant people...the persecutor of the covenant people.
Now Paul picks up this story and if you'll notice Galatians 3 and 4 for just a moment, in Galatians 3:16 Paul writes, "Now to Abraham and his seed...singular...were the promises made. He saith not and to seeds as to many, but as of one and to thy seed which is Christ." Now Abraham really initially had two seeds but only one of them would be the line through whom the ultimate one seed, Christ, would come.
In chapter 4 he further discusses this in verse 23. "But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh, but he of the free woman...that is Sarah...was...implied...born by promise." In other words, the child of the bondwoman was an act of the flesh, not fulfilling the promise of God. Verse 28, "Now we, brethren, as Isaac was are the children of promise." Verse 29, "But as then he that was born after the flesh persecuted him that was born after the spirit, even so it is now." The children of Ishmael still persecute the children of Isaac. "Nevertheless, what saith the Scripture, Cast out the bondwoman and her son, for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the free woman."
And so, Paul picks up that same thing only he's using it there for a spiritual analogy we'll not get into. But the point I want to make is this, it was due to the sin of Abraham initially in going into the land of Egypt and bringing out an Egyptian handmaid that the Arab people were born who claim a right to Abrahamic inheritance to this day and are still after the Jews, not all of the Arabs, of course, feeling the same strength of animosity toward them, but they still desire or at least many of them, the elimination of the Jewish people that they may possess what they believe to be rightfully their own land.
It is also very interesting that later on in the patriarchal line there were two sons born by the name of Jacob and Esau. Jacob was the son of promise, Esau was not. Out of Esau's loins came the Edomites. Again a people that we know today as an Arab people. And it fascinates me that in Genesis 36:3 it says, when it lists Esau's wives, it lists a Bashemath, the daughter of Ishmael. So the line of Ishmael, not the children of promise but from the loins of Abraham, and the line of Esau, not the children of promise but also from the loins of Abraham, united to produce these people. And so they become the antagonists of the people of promise, the people of God, the nation Israel. And Ishmael's children and Esau's children join together to persecute the seed of Isaac. And that has been true century after century after century. And it's still going on. They live in an imminent threat of Arab invasion and it doesn't matter what kind of treaties exist or what kind of promises are made. As they told me many times when I was over there, those mean nothing. If they decide that it's a holy war for the taking of what they believe is theirs, all treaties are null and void and so we live in the constant awareness that there might be an attack against us.
In Psalm 83 we read this, "Keep not Thou silence, O God, hold not Thy peace and be not still, O God, for lo, Thine enemies make a tumult and they that hate Thee have lifted up the head, they have taken crafty counsel against Thy people and consulted against Thy hidden ones, they have said, Come and let us cut them off...that means kill them...from being a nation that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance." In other words, the psalmist says there are people around us who want to wipe us out. They have consulted together with one consent, they are confederate against Thee. Who are they? Edom, the Ishmaelites, Moab, the Hagarenes, Gebal, Ammon and Amalek, the Philistines with the inhabitants of Tyre, Assyria also is joined with them and they have helped the children of Lot. And he lists all these varying people that surround the nation Israel that we know as Arab people today.
Now having said that let me hurry to say that not all Arabs are equally the persecutors of Israel but there have been many throughout history. And there are many now still surrounding the nation Israel who would like to see the elimination of that nation. And what amazes me is that even though in many ways the Arab world occupies the oil riches presently that they do and have many riches in some places, though others are poor, they still long to have the country of Israel. Many of Ishmael's descendants would obliterate Israel if they could immediately.
And so, all throughout history they have lived with this incessant conflict with their neighbors. And you can add to that the fact that the Nazis wanted to eliminate Israel, the Communists, the Russians today want to eliminate Israel. And we ask ourselves the question: will any of them ever succeed at doing that? Will any of these nations ever be able to pull off the elimination of the nation Israel? Well Jeremiah 31:37 says, "If heaven above can be measured and the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, I will also cast off all the seed of Israel for all they have done, saith the Lord." In other words, they have no more hope of doing that than they do of measuring the infinite heaven...or pursuing into the foundations of the earth. It is not possible. And Deuteronomy 14:2 says, "For thou art an holy people unto the Lord thy God and the Lord hath chosen thee to be a peculiar people unto Himself above all the nations that are on the earth." In other words, God has established a very unique place for the nation Israel. "There is none like unto the God of Jeshurun," says the thirty‑third chapter of Deuteronomy verse 26, "who rides upon the heaven in thy help and in his excellency in the sky, the eternal God is thy refuge and underneath are the everlasting arms and he shall thrust out the enemy from before thee and shall say, Destroy them." Listen to this, "Israel then shall dwell in safety alone: the fountain of Jacob shall be upon a land of grain and wine, also his heaven shall drop down dew. Happy art thou, O Israel: who is like unto thee, O people, saved by the Lord, the shield of thy help and who is the sword of thy excellency! And thine enemies shall be found liars unto thee; and thou shalt tread upon their high places."
And the promise of God to this people at the end of the Pentateuch was that they would be a preserved people, saved from extinction which is the goal of many of their enemies. So in spite of Israel's sin, in spite of Israel's disobedience, in spite of their unbelief and rejection of God's Son, the Lord Jesus Christ, there is still a future for that nation and that people. And their enemies will not prevail against them.
The present time, as we've been learning, however, is a time when God is chastening the nation for their unbelief. It is not that He is putting them out of existence, it is that He is chastening them. And that's Paul's message in this chapter. Though Israel is in unbelief and though Israel is going through a time of chastening, they will not be utterly destroyed. They are set aside for the time in terms of the nation of blessing. They are no longer that special recipient of God's blessing. They are no longer that special channel through which he blesses the world. They have been set aside as the nation of privilege and blessing. We saw that, didn't we, in chapter 9 and 10. They have been set aside because of God's sovereignty and because of their sin. But we're learning in chapter 11 that their setting aside is three fold. It is partial, only some of them set aside. It is passing, that is it's only for a period of time. And it is purposeful as we'll see in the final part of this eleventh chapter.
And Paul intends this whole section to answer people who say...well if what you say is so true, if the gospel that you preach is true, how come the Jews rejected it? They're the people of God. And if they have rejected it, then God must have cancelled all His plans. They're saying, "Well, if we believe what you say, then we've got to believe that God cancelled His whole plan for Israel." And what Paul is saying is not so, you can believe this gospel is true and I'll prove to you that God planned the setting aside of Israel by His sovereignty because of their unbelief. But that is not a permanent setting aside, that is not a total setting aside, and that is not a setting aside in a final act of judgment. And that's what Paul is dealing with in Romans 9, 10 and 11.
So he has said already, "Yes they've been set aside." But in chapter 11 he says, "It is only partial, it is only passing and it is for a very important purpose."
Now, let's look at the second of these three thoughts. We've done the partial aspect, now we're looking the passing aspect, verses 11 and following. The setting aside of Israel is only a passing thing. In other words, it is a temporary thing...it is a temporary thing. And I want you to see some very important points. The setting aside of Israel is only temporary as seen in the fact that it has a definite purpose, premonition and promise...a definite purpose, premonition and promise.
First of all, the purpose. Notice verse 11, "I say then, Have they stumbled that they should fall? God forbid." Now stop at that point for a moment. This is the very same formula that he used in chapter 11 verse 1. Has God cast away His people? God forbid. And now he says, Have they stumbled that they should fall? God forbid. He introduced point one that it was only a partial setting aside by this same answer to a rhetorical question. He introduces part two in the same way. God has not allowed them to stumble that they should totally fall. He has not set them aside that they should be totally and forever set aside. And that's a wonderful testimony to God's grace because if you see the end of chapter 10, in the end of chapter 10 he talks about the fact that they were a disobedient and a contrary people. And that's sort of judgment language. And then if you go to chapter 11, notice verse 8, God has given them the spirit of slumber, God has given them eyes that can't see and ears that can't her...hear, and their table is a snare, and a trap and stumbling block and their eyes are to be darkened that they may not see. And they are to go around poking and groping in the blackness with bent backs because they can't find the truth. That's judgment talk.
They are a disobedient people, a contrary people, a blind people, a deaf people. Their own table becomes for them a snare and a trap, that is the things religiously that they think they're feasting on are going to consume them in reality. And yet with all that judgment talk in verses 8 to 10, he comes right back in verse 11 and says, "Have they stumbled that they should finally and ultimately fall?" And the answer is no. It's no.
Is it a permanent falling? Is not a permanent falling. Did the mass of Jews stumble? That verb is interesting, ptaio, it's an interesting verb. It just means a stumbling. Did they stumble in order that they might fall? That verb means fall in a situation where you could never get back up again. It's one thing to stumble, it's something else to hit with such a crash that you're totally debilitated and can never get up again. Did they fall in order that they would never be able to come back? Is their stumbling complete and irreversible? Is it a permanent falling from which no recovery is ever possible? Is national Israel dead? Are they never to receive the promises? And the answer is God forbid...God forbid.
Now the stumbling to which he speaks obviously refers to their rejection of the saving gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ. And many have thought that when Israel rejected Jesus Christ they stumbled and they stumbled into a permanent fall from which they will never recover and God has nothing more planned for Israel as a nation itself. But Paul's answer is "God forbid," it's as if he says, "Horrors no." Such a suggestion is totally rejected with vehemence, far from it.
Now notice verse 11, "But rather...is implied...but on the other hand, through their fall salvation is come to the Gentiles...watch this...to provoke them to jealousy." It's a marvelous statement...a marvelous statement. Will you look at the little term "but rather?" That indicates a far different purpose than the purpose of stumbling to fall permanently. Not that at all. But rather something very different from that. They did not stumble in order to fall permanently but rather to fulfill a marvelous purpose. And this is, I think, so exciting. The fall of Israel was very purposeful. It had a definite purpose. That's the point we want you to see.
Look at the first element in that three‑fold purpose. "But rather through their fall salvation is come unto the...what?...Gentiles." The first element in the purpose for Israel's fall is Gentile salvation. In other words, in the fall of Israel there is even a gracious purpose, a far‑reaching aim, the salvation of non‑Jews. When Israel fell away, the gospel was taken to the Gentiles, it was taken to the world. And so in their falling the world was incredibly enriched with the gospel. In fact, in Matthew chapter 8 we read this in verse 11 and 12, "I say unto you that many shall come from the east and west and shall sit down with Abraham and Isaac and Jacob in the Kingdom of heaven." In other words, it's going to populated by Gentiles. "But the sons of the Kingdom...that is Jews...shall be cast into outer darkness, there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth." The very people for whom the kingdom was intended and to whom it was offered are going to be shut out of it and people are going to be gathered from the east and the west and brought into the Kingdom. So the falling away leads to the introduction of Gentiles to salvation.
Now Matthew 21:43, and if you've been with us in our studies of Matthew, this will be very familiar to you, in Matthew 21:43 Jesus says this, "Therefore I say unto you, The Kingdom of God shall be taken from you and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits of it." Or literally, to a people, many nations, bringing forth the fruits of it. Because you refuse it, it will open up to the Gentiles. Chapter 22 gives us another parable. You'll remember there's a king who made a feast for his son, it is God calling people to His Son's celebration. He calls them to the fact that Messiah has come, it's a feast in honor of Messiah. He sends out His servants to call them that were bidden to the wedding, verse 3, that's Jews, who were already the called ones to come and greet the Son, the Savior, the Messiah and enter the Kingdom. But they would not come. He sent forth other servants to tell them everything is ready, come. They made light of it. They went their ways. One to his far and another to his business. Some of them just mocked and laughed. Some of them just were indifferent, I've got to take care of my farm, I've got to take care of my business. And verse 6, "Others literally killed the servants." Some were extremely hostile when the gospel came and when the Messiah offered Himself to Israel.
And then there's a judgment given. And then it says in verse 8, "The wedding is ready. The ones who were already bidden, that is Israel, weren't worthy, so go into the highways and as many as you find, bid those to the marriage. So they went into the highways and gathered together all as many as they found, good and bad, and the wedding was furnished with guests." The salvation of Gentiles came about on a wide scale because of the fall of Israel and the reaching out of the gospel to the Gentiles. Now it wasn't that saving Gentiles was an afterthought. God desired to reach them through Israel, but when Israel rejected that calling, God moved right out to reach the Gentiles.
In Acts chapter 13 verse 46, "Paul and Barnabas grew bold and said, It was necessary that the Word of God should first have been spoken to you." And he's talking to the Jews. The Word of God first needed to be spoken to you. "But seeing you put it from you and judged yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, Lo we turn to the Gentiles," Acts 13:46. And where you have the obstinate unbelief of the Jew, you have the gospel opened up to the Gentile. In the sixteenth chapter in Corinth, pardon me, the eighteenth chapter in Corinth, verse 6, "And when the Jews opposed and blasphemed, Paul shook his raiment and said to them, Your blood be on your own heads, I am clean. From now on I will go to the Gentiles...from now on I will go to the Gentiles." And we find at the very end of the book of Acts, chapter 28 and verse 23, Paul witnesses to the Jews again. "And when they had appointed him a day, there came to him many into his lodging to whom he expounded and testified the Kingdom of God, persuading them concerning Jesus both out of the law of Moses and out of the prophets from morning till evening. And some believed the things which were spoken and some believed not. And 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," and then the part about being deaf and being blind and so forth, the heart being fat and all of that. Then verse 28, "Be it known therefore unto you that salvation of God is sent unto the Gentiles."
So you have it illustrated in those several places in the book of Acts and even in a couple of occasions in Matthew where the blindness, the deafness, the obstinacy of Israel works to the salvation of the Gentiles. And you remember that when Paul went on his missionary journey and he went into a new city, where did he go first? To the synagogue. And when he found that they would not respond, he turned to the Gentiles. And so this then is what Paul wants us to understand, that the setting aside of Israel has a very definite purpose. It is that God may then take the gospel immediately rather than mediately to the Gentiles that they may hear and see and believe. God could not reach the world through the Jews so He did so by setting them aside. We then are redeemed as a direct result of the blindness of Israel.
God down to verse 25 in this eleventh chapter. It says, "I would not, brethren, that you would be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own conceits," I don't want you Gentiles to be conceited. "Blindness in part is happened to Israel," why? "Until the fullness of the Gentiles come in." In other words, this temporary partial blindness on Israel is to allow the gathering in of the full redeemed group from among the Gentiles. It's a very important truth.
So, back to Romans chapter 11 verse 11. Has God allowed them to stumble that they should forever fall? No. But rather through their fall...now notice the second word fall, it's a completely different word than the first word fall. The first word is from the verb pipto, this is a word paraptoma and is better translated trespass. And it talks about their sin. Through their sin of rejecting Christ salvation is come to the Gentiles, or to the nations. What a wonderful thing. So God even overruled the Jewish unbelief. Now that's the first element of the definite purpose.
The second one is this, the first thing was Gentile salvation, the second one is Jewish jealousy. Look at verse 11 again. Salvation is come to the Gentiles, this is marvelous, "To provoke them...that is the Jews...to jealousy." Now you have to understand this or you'll never understand the heart of the Apostle Paul. This is a very critical passage in understanding Paul. He says when the Jews stumbled their...the purpose in God allowing them to stumble was not to destroy them forever, but to bring about Gentile salvation which would in turn provoke them to jealousy that they too might be saved. So the purpose of God then was to save them ultimately through their stumbling, not to destroy them. Do you see that?
A very important thing. To provoke them to jealousy. It is an infinitive with a preposition which means it indicates purpose. The purpose of Israel's stumbling was that the Gentiles would be saved and the Jews in seeing the blessedness of being saved among the Gentiles would be drawn by jealousy or envy, a desire to emulate, a desire to imitate, a desire to possess what the Gentiles possess in being blessed by God and therefore would come to salvation. So the word "jealousy" here is used in a positive sense. It has to do with admiration, or emulation, or a striving after. In other words, Israel would see the Gentile church. Israel would be drawn when they see how blessed it is and what it is to know Christ and how they have been so enriched and privileged as those who are redeemed. And then Israel in individual Jewish cases would look at itself and say, "Look what we missed, look what we have lost, look what we have forfeited." And by seeing the glory of God given to the Gentile church, be drawn to Jesus Christ.
And I daresay that there are many people in this church, Jewish believers, who were drawn to Christ by the testimony of a Gentile. Many...many. Some have been drawn to Christ by the testimony of another Jewish believer, but many by Gentile conversion...by what God has done in the life of a Gentile. So Israel in seeing the privilege of the Gentiles will desire that privilege for themselves.