SERIES: The Book of Romans
The Jewish Problem
Introduction: Of all the nations in the history of mankind, the one that has been the center of controversy more than any other has been the nation of Israel. Nearly 4,000 years ago, while Egypt was a world empire, the Jewish nation was born. It soon became a burr under Egypt’s saddle and remained so until the Pharaoh let them go to the Promised Land. The Assyrian, Babylonian, Medo-Persian, and Greek empires in succession focused an inordinate amount of attention on that tiny sliver of territory at the eastern end of the Mediterranean, alternately conquering and negotiating with the rebellious people known as the Jews. Finally, Rome accomplished what every previous empire had probably hoped to do, namely obliterate Israel as a political and social entity. In A.D. 70 the emperor Titus destroyed the city of Jerusalem, murdered most of its inhabitants, and assumed that “the Jewish problem” had finally been solved.
However, nineteen centuries later the dry bones of the forgotten nation of Israel has been resuscitated. The diabolical scheme of Hitler to eliminate every person of Jewish descent on earth actually provided the impetus for the reestablishment of the Jewish nation in Palestine in 1948, and once again Israel began to take up a greatly disproportionate amount of the world’s attention. With only about 1/10 of 1% of the world’s population, Israel grabs more headlines year in and year out than perhaps any other single country.
What is the nature of “the Jewish problem?” What exactly is it that the world has been wrestling with so long? Well, there are probably a number of different ways in which it can be defined. It could be defined, first of all, politically and geographically. Israel lies at the very heart of the most strategic part of the world. Three continents—Africa, Asia, and Europe—come together there, with every world power having strategic interests there.
Secondly, the Jewish problem can be defined culturally and academically. Because the Jews are a very intelligent race, they tend to rise to the top of whatever profession they are in, which makes them a convenient scapegoat for those who are not as successful. This seems to be the source of much of the blind and irrational racial hatred aimed at the Jewish people in our century.
Thirdly, the Jewish problem can be defined economically. The world’s greatest energy supply surrounds Israel, and that automatically entails great power struggles between interested nations.
But the Jewish problem Paul is wrestling with in Romans 9-11 is neither political, geographic, cultural, or economic. Rather it is spiritual. In a nutshell it can be put this way:
Nearly 4,000 years ago God chose the Jewish people to be His own special people. He gave them great privileges that He gave to no one else. He poured out His grace upon them to a greater extent than He did on any other nation. And finally He allowed His own Son to become a member of their race, to be their Messiah, and to become their King. As a whole, however, they rejected God’s special favor, and in particular they rejected their Messiah. Not only that, but the Apostle Paul, himself a Jew, found that in his missionary activity the Jews were constantly opposing the Gospel and persecuting the followers of Christ.
How does this square with what Paul has just said at the end of chapter 8? If it is true that those God foreknew he also predestined, and those he predestined, he called; and those he called, he justified; and those he justified, he glorified … and if it is true that God’s chosen ones are absolutely secure in His love, which was the entire theme of last week’s message on Romans 8:31-39, then what happened to the Jews? After all, they are God’s chosen people par excellence. Why have they floundered in unbelief? Why have they been set aside by God? What is their future?[i]
This is the theme of the entire section of Romans 9-11. I have chosen to give an overview of these chapters today, then follow that with a more detailed exposition of key portions of these chapters in the coming weeks. I want us to read some selected portions this morning, starting in Romans 9:1:
I speak the truth in Christ—I am not lying, my conscience confirms it in the Holy Spirit— {2} I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. {3} For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, those of my own race, {4} the people of Israel. Theirs is the adoption as sons; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises. {5} Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of Christ, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen.
{6} It is not as though God’s word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. {7} Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham’s children. On the contrary, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.” {8} In other words, it is not the natural children who are God’s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham’s offspring.
(Romans 9:30-33) What then shall we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith; {31} but Israel, who pursued a law of righteousness, has not attained it. {32} Why not? Because they pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the “stumbling stone.” {33} As it is written:
“See, I lay in Zion a stone that causes men to stumble
and a rock that makes them fall,
and the one who trusts in him will never be put to shame.”
(Romans 10:1-3) Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved. {2} For I can testify about them that they are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge. {3} Since they did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness.
(Romans 11:1-2) I ask then: Did God reject his people? By no means! I am an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin. {2} God did not reject his people, whom he foreknew. Don’t you know what the Scripture says in the passage about Elijah—how he appealed to God against Israel.
(Romans 11:11-15) Again I ask: Did they stumble so as to fall beyond recovery? Not at all! Rather, because of their transgression, salvation has come to the Gentiles to make Israel envious. {12} But if their transgression means riches for the world, and their loss means riches for the Gentiles, how much greater riches will their fullness bring!
{13} I am talking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch as I am the apostle to the Gentiles, I make much of my ministry {14} in the hope that I may somehow arouse my own people to envy and save some of them. {15} For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?
(Romans 11:25-27) I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers, so that you may not be conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in. {26} And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written:
“The deliverer will come from Zion;
he will turn godlessness away from Jacob.
{27} And this is my covenant with them
when I take away their sins.”
We begin, then, with the opening verses of chapter 9.
The Jewish people, as God’s chosen people, were loved deeply by the Apostle Paul.
Paul has great sorrow and grief for his people. (9:1-2) Isn’t it interesting that Paul appeals here in the first two verses to his truthfulness, to his conscience, and to the Holy Spirit? Why is he so concerned that his readers know that he is not lying? Because they would undoubtedly find it remarkable that anyone could love those who hated him as much as the Jewish people hated Paul. Everywhere he went they treated him as an enemy and a traitor. They harassed him, they threatened him, and they stirred up mobs against him. Once 40 Jewish zealots bound themselves with an oath that they would not eat or drink until they had killed him (Acts 23:12-13). He tells us in one place that “five times I received from the Jews the forty lashes minus one,” adding that he was in constant “danger from my own countrymen” (2 Cor. 11:24,26).
Yet nowhere in his writings is there ever found even the hint of personal retaliation, or bitterness against the Jews. On the contrary, Paul’s spirit was the same as that of Christ, who wept over the city of Jerusalem even though he knew he was about to be crucified by its leaders.
Just how genuine Paul’s sorrow and grief are can be seen in verse 3:
He is willing to exchange places with them eternally. (3) “For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, those of my own race, the people of Israel.” The emotions expressed here are almost impossible to fully appreciate, for this kind of love is a supernatural love. Paul knows he cannot actually be separated from Christ—he has just said so in unmistakable language at the end of chapter 8, but the feelings are nevertheless genuine. He loved his people enough to be willing to lose his own salvation if it were possible and if it would lead to their salvation.
Then in chapter 10 Paul demonstrates that his affection for the Jews was active, not passive.
He desires and prays for their salvation. (10:1) “Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved.” And we could go even further by saying that he not only prayed for them, but he also preached to them. He took it upon his own shoulders to share the Gospel with his fellow-countrymen. Friends, do we love the lost like Paul loved the lost? Is there anyone over whose spiritual estrangement from God we sorrow and grieve? Is there anyone for whom we consistently, over a long period of time, pray that God will bring them to a saving knowledge of Christ? If not, perhaps that is the main reason we don’t see more of our friends and family coming to know the Savior.
Having expressed his affection, Paul’s next step is to reiterate the advantages which accrued to the Jews. This will serve to highlight the tragedy of their failure to believe. After all, the more privileges a person has, the more thankful and responsible we expect them to be.
The Jewish People were given certain special advantages by God. (9:4-5)
Eight of them are enumerated in just two verses, 9:4-5:
Theirs is the adoption as sons; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship, and the promises. Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of Christ, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen.
Let’s look at these special advantages briefly one at a time.
Adoption as sons. This is not the same as the spiritual adoption we read of in chapter 8, which is an act of the Holy Spirit, giving us all the rights and privileges of sonship in the Body of Christ when we believe. This is a national adoption and has to do with a unique action on God’s part to put His special mark of ownership upon one race of people. God Himself said, “Behold, Israel is My Son.”
The divine glory is a reference to the splendor of the divine presence. The mention of this would have raised immediately to the mind of every Jew the specter of the cloud which hung over the nation during their wilderness wanderings and eventually took up residence over the mercy seat in the Holy of Holies. Later it filled the great temple that Solomon built. No other nation ever received such a remarkable sign of God’s presence as the Shekinah glory.
The covenants speak of the special agreements which God made with Abraham, with the nation at Sinai, and with David. These covenants were primarily unconditional commitments from God that He would do certain things for the nation, and God has never broken or forgotten these covenants. No other nation has been so privileged.
The Law is, of course, the handbook of moral standards God communicated to the children of Israel through Moses at Sinai. In Paul’s time the nation tended to look upon the Law as its most prized possession. Some Jewish men would memorize the entire Torah, and it was their dearest and greatest treasure. While Paul disagreed that one could be saved by keeping the Law, he did teach that the Law was righteous, holy, and good. It was an extraordinary advantage for the Jews to have received the very words of God.
The temple service. Much of the Torah consisted of instructions about worship in the Tabernacle or Temple—how they should conduct themselves, what kinds of offerings to bring, the rituals to be practiced, the symbols of spiritual truth. All of this was designed to show the way for a sinful human being to approach a holy God.
The promises of God fill the Old Testament. Probably the ones primarily in Paul’s mind are those relating to the coming Messiah and the salvation He would achieve for His people.
The patriarchs are a reference to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph, plus probably the other great leaders, prophets, and kings God blessed Israel with, like Moses, Samuel, David, Isaiah, and Daniel. No other nation has had such great leaders as Israel.
The Messiah was, of course, the greatest privilege ever granted to the Israelite nation. But this privilege is stated differently. All the previous items are mentioned as possessions of Israel. The Messiah, on the other hand, is simply from Israel: “from them is traced the human ancestry of Christ.” But even that is a unique advantage, for He spoke their language, He practiced their customs, He lived among them, and He offered Himself to be the Lamb of God for them first, then for the world.
Notice, however, that Paul not only identifies Christ as of the Jewish race, but also stresses His deity. He is “God over all” and is “forever praised.” Because of his heavenly origin and mission, He cannot be claimed exclusively by any segment of the human race.
This extended enumeration of Israel’s privileges serves to accent the tragedy of her state of unbelief. So Paul turns to the fact that …
The Jewish People failed spiritually despite these special advantages.
The natural question which arises after reading about the special spiritual privileges which the Jews have enjoyed is, “Why didn’t they believe?” After all, many Gentiles, who didn’t enjoy any of these privileges, ended up receiving Jesus as their Messiah. Why not the Jews? Paul offers three reasons:
They presumed that God’s choice of Israel as His people guaranteed their individual salvation. (9:6-29) It did no such thing, as Romans 9:6-29 makes clear. Now this is probably the hardest portion of a hard book. It is the principal treatise on election and predestination in the whole Bible. I’m not going to spend a lot of time on it today because the whole message next Sunday will be on this passage. However, it is important for our purposes today to at least recognize that there is a distinction between God’s choice of a group and His choice of individuals. There is no question but that God chose Israel as His people. They were an elect nation.
However, salvation has never come by membership in a group, but rather by individual faith. Look at verse 6. Paul is addressing the problem of why the Jews, as a whole, have not believed in Messiah Jesus. “It is not as though God’s word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham’s children.” In other words, what he is saying is that it is possible to be a member of God’s chosen people and still not be a member of God’s spiritual family. That is something many Jews could simply not accept. They believed that being Jewish was all it took to make it to Heaven.
Frankly, we have a similar problem today with many Christians. Vast numbers of individuals believe they are part of God’s family and on their way to Heaven simply because they are members of this Catholic Church or that Protestant Church. Certainly it is generally good to belong to the Church; there is a certain protection with its boundaries. However, it can actually be dangerous to be a member of a church if one does not have a personal relationship with God through Christ. It has a way of lulling one to sleep and offering a security behind which there is no substance.
Now a second reason why the Jewish people failed spiritually despite their special advantages is that …
They pursued righteousness by works rather than by faith. (9:30-33) Let’s read 9:30-31: “What then shall we say? That the Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have obtained it, a righteousness that is by faith; but Israel, who pursued a law of righteousness, has not attained it.” Here is a tremendous paradox. The Gentiles are pictured as unconcerned about pursuing righteousness, but they actually end up with the prize, while the Jews who made the pursuit of righteousness their national pastime and their favorite indoor sport, come up empty-handed.
Right off the bat we need to be reminded that it is a mistake to suppose that Paul is putting a premium on carelessness regarding moral or spiritual pursuits. The spiritual success of the Gentiles is not attributed to their lack of concern but rather to their willingness to receive righteousness as a gift rather than to work for it.
Look at the text again, verse 32: “Why did the Jews not get it while the Gentiles did? Because the Jews pursued it not by faith but as if it were by works. They stumbled over the stumbling stone.” That stumbling stone, of course, is Messiah Jesus. They couldn’t accept Him because His plan of salvation was too easy. Had God asked them to go on a pilgrimage, or work their heads off, or give generous portions of their resources, they would have accepted that. But because He simply asked them to believe in a humble Messiah, they refused. They stumbled over the simplicity of it all.
A third reason why the Jewish people failed spiritually despite their special advantages is this:
Their zeal was not based on knowledge. (10:2,3) Chapter 10 opens this way:
Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God of the Israelites is that they may be saved. For I can testify about them that they are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge. Since they did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness.
Zeal is an admirable quality, but zeal without knowledge is pitiable. We see people all around us who are zealous for lost causes. We see it in the cults; we see it in politics; we see it in social areas; we see it in the militias which have been so much in the news. In fact, sometimes it seems as though zeal increases in direct proportion to ignorance. Paul should know. There was a time when his own zeal was notorious. After being arrested in Jerusalem at the temple, Paul received permission to share his own testimony with the people, and I read from Acts 22:3:
I am a Jew, born in Tarsus of Cilicia, but brought up in this city. Under Gamaliel I was thoroughly trained in the law of our fathers and was just as zealous for God as any of you are today. I persecuted the followers of this Way to their death, arresting both men and women and throwing them into prison, as also the high priest and all the Council can testify. I even obtained letters from them to their brothers in Damascus, and went there to bring these people as prisoners to Jerusalem to be punished.
What Paul did not understand at that time, however, is that God’s righteousness cannot be earned by any amount of zeal. It can only be received as a gift. After he became a Christian, of course, he didn’t lose his zeal, but now it was based on truth.
So far Paul has told us how much he loved his countrymen, the Jews. He has also enumerated the special spiritual privileges they all received. That made their spiritual failures, his third topic, all the more ironic and tragic. Fourthly, he goes to some pains to show that …
The Jewish people have no valid excuses.
The fact is he entertains three possible excuses and shows that each is invalid.
They cannot claim they never heard the Gospel. Verse 16 of chapter 10 tells us that not all the Israelites accepted the good news (another term for the Gospel) which the prophets preached to them.
For Isaiah says, “Lord who has believed our message? (implying “almost no one.”) Consequently, faith comes from hearing the message, and the message is heard through the word of Christ. But I ask: Did they not hear? Of course, they did: “Their voice has gone out into all the earth, their words to the ends of the world.”
This quotation is from Psalm 19, which opens up with that well-known statement of natural revelation:
The heavens declare the glory of God;
the skies proclaim the work of his hands.
Day after day they pour forth speech;
night after night they display knowledge.
There is no speech or language
where their voice is not heard.
Their voice goes out into all the earth,
their words to the ends of the world.
Nature, the Psalmist tells us, has a voice, and while that voice is non-verbal, it reaches every human being. Since every human being has enjoyed natural revelation from God, obviously every Jew has also received it. And the last half of Psalm 19 deals with the special revelation of God’s written Word, and every Jew also received that. The Old Testament included scores of prophecies of the coming Messiah. Isaiah 53 is as clear an exposition of the Gospel of salvation by the sacrifice of Christ as you can find anywhere in the New Testament. So the Jews cannot use the excuse that they never heard the Gospel. Besides, Jesus and the Apostles shared the Gospel with the Jews before they ever took it to the Gentiles.
They cannot claim they had no warning that God would “set them on the shelf” in favor of the Gentiles. (10:19-21) As far back as the time of Moses God warned the Jews that strangers and aliens would become partakers of covenant favor and blessing in their place if they continued in disobedience. Look at verse 19, where three quotations from the Old Testament are offered, each of which is a warning to the Jewish people by their own prophets:
Again I ask: Did Israel not understand? First, Moses says, “I will make you envious by those who are not a nation; I will make you angry by a nation that has no understanding.” And Isaiah boldly says, “I was found by those who did not seek me; I revealed myself to those who did not ask for me.” But concerning Israel he says, “All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and obstinate people.”
They simply cannot excuse themselves on the basis that they didn’t understand the warning.
They cannot claim that God rejected them. (11:1-2) Look at the opening of chapter 11: “I ask then: Did God reject his people? By no means! I am an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin. God did not reject his people, whom he foreknew.” Paul says, in effect, “I’m living proof that God hasn’t rejected the Jews, because I am one and He hasn’t rejected me.” Yes, He chastised the nation, but even that cannot be blamed on God. In fact, the last verse of chapter 10 quotes Isaiah the prophet as saying of God, “All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and obstinate people.” If anyone is to be blamed for Israel’s tragic history, it is not God but the Jews themselves.
So far the picture is pretty bleak. In spite of receiving some very special spiritual privileges, the Jewish people as a whole have failed miserably to enter into the spiritual blessings available to them, and they have no excuses. But thank God, that’s not the end of the story.
The Jewish people still have a splendid hope in the future.
Two key propositions are here given to us: Israel’s rejection is partial not complete; it is temporary, not permanent.
Israel’s rejection is partial, not complete. (11:5,6) There has always been a faithful remnant of God’s people, so at no time could it be said that their rejection of God’s truth was total. Paul himself is an example of a Jew who believed, but he is not the only example. Look at the middle of verse 2 of chapter 11:
Don’t you know what the Scripture says in the passage about Elijah—how he appealed to God against Israel: “Lord, they have killed your prophets and torn down your altars; I am the only one left, and they are trying to kill me”? And what was God’s answer to him? “I have reserved for myself seven thousand who have not bowed the knee to Baal.” So too, at the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace.
There has always been a remnant of Jewish people who believed in Messiah Jesus; there are a number today who believe; in fact, there are a number of people of Jewish descent in this Church. Don’t forget, though, that this remnant is “chosen by grace.” No one was ever saved without God’s unmerited favor. I don’t care whether you are a Jew or a Gentile today; if you are a child of God, you are His because He graciously chose you, not because you were born into it or earned it. Verse 6: “And if by grace, then it is no longer by works; if it were, grace would no longer be grace.” Salvation cannot be by grace and works; it must be one or the other.
Israel’s rejection is temporary, not permanent. (11:25-26) Listen to Romans 11:25-26:
I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers, so that you may not be conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in. And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: “The deliverer will come from Zion; he will turn godlessness away from Jacob. And this is my covenant with them when I take away their sins.”
Israel’s period of national unbelief is temporary. It will continue only until the full number of Gentile believers have come to faith. What is that number? I have no idea, but God knows and when that time comes the church age will end, Jesus Christ will wrap up human history by His Second Coming, and Jesus will establish His divine kingdom here on earth.
I cannot believe that the rebirth of the State of Israel in 1948 is an historical accident, the product of political chance. Instead I believe God is setting the world stage for the spiritual repentance and final delivery of His people, Israel. The groundwork has been laid and the time could be short.
In conclusion, I suggest to you that God is not finished with the nation of Israel. They have been on a shelf, spiritually speaking, for nearly 2,000 years, but the dry bones are coming to life. Sadly, too often the Christian church has gone to one of two extremes regarding the Jewish people. One extreme has been to blame them (and them alone) for the death of Christ, which in turn has led to terrible anti-Semitism. The other extreme is blind support for the State of Israel and all that it does.
A balance is desperately needed here. God is not through with the people He sovereignly chose, but at the same time He does not approve of everything they do. Israel is essentially a secular state today, pursuing its own agenda irrespective of almighty God, and I fear it will take national tragedies even beyond those they have already experienced to bring them to their knees before their Messiah. In the meantime, we still have the injunction to take the Gospel to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.
One thing of which we can be absolutely certain is that the Jewish problem is no argument against the character or faithfulness of God.
DATE: May 21, 1995
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Jewish problem
Adoption
Zeal
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[i] Citation lost.