Jesus Is the Bridge Ministries

1 I say then, Hath God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.
2 God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew. Wot ye not what the scripture saith of Elias? how he maketh intercession to God against Israel, saying,
3 Lord, they have killed thy prophets, and digged down thine altars; and I am left alone, and they seek my life.
4 But what saith the answer of God unto him? I have reserved to myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal.
5 Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace.
6 And if by grace, then is it no more of works: otherwise grace is no more grace. But if it be of works, then is it no more grace: otherwise work is no more work.

Every book of scripture was written by a child of Israel; the authorship of Job, the oldest book, is uncertain, but many attribute it to Moses, who compiled the first five books of scripture. Without the Jews, there would be no New Testament; without them, Christ would not have been born. The fact that most of them ultimately rejected their promised Messiah does not change those facts. It was the occasion of their great failure that gave rise to the success of the church among the Gentiles, among whom we are numbered. Paul emphasizes that later in the chapter, but the point here is that not all of them rejected Christ. Those who accepted him were sufficient for the task of spreading the Gospel around the world. The Lord only needs a few committed servants to carry out his great work.

The failure of Israel was their confidence in the works of the flesh, keeping the law, rather than God's grace. That is always the failure of any religion not based in faith in Christ. No matter what deity or deities they profess to worship, the eyes of such worshippers are always turned ultimately inward; what can I do to please my god, and gain his favor? Our eyes are turned to Jesus, not seeking what we might do for him, but understanding what he has already done for us.

7 What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for; but the election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded
8 (According as it is written, God hath given them the spirit of slumber, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear;) unto this day.
9 And David saith, Let their table be made a snare, and a trap, and a stumblingblock, and a recompence unto them:
10 Let their eyes be darkened, that they may not see, and bow down their back alway.
11 I say then, Have they stumbled that they should fall? God forbid: but rather through their fall salvation is come unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them to jealousy.
12 Now if the fall of them be the riches of the world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles; how much more their fulness?
13 For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the apostle of the Gentiles, I magnify mine office:
14 If by any means I may provoke to emulation them which are my flesh, and might save some of them.
15 For if the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be, but life from the dead?

I have seen no figures on the number of Jews who have accepted Christ as Savior, though I am aware that there are congregations of so-called "Messianic Jews" around the country, probably in many parts of the world. The great turning of Israel to Christ, though, will not happen until the Tribulation period, even though we have seen the restoration of Israel as a nation. What finally provokes them to turn back to God and accept Christ is not clear to me, other than the fact of God's sovereign act of calling out the 144,000 to be his witnesses. In the meantime, the whole church age we have lived in for 2,000 years dates back in a straight line to the Jews' rejection of Christ. In their casting away, the Word says, we were reconciled, as Gentiles, to God. In God's receiving back of Israel to himself, in the last days, will come the resurrection of the dead. The long-interrupted story of God's chosen people, as recounted in Daniel 12, will finally be completed. In no small way, the history of the world is bound up in the story of Israel, and God's promise to bring them back once more to himself when they strayed away.

16 For if the firstfruit be holy, the lump is also holy: and if the root be holy, so are the branches.
17 And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert graffed in among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree;
18 Boast not against the branches. But if thou boast, thou bearest not the root, but the root thee.
19 Thou wilt say then, The branches were broken off, that I might be graffed in.
20 Well; because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be not highminded, but fear:
21 For if God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee.
22 Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity; but toward thee, goodness, if thou continue in his goodness: otherwise thou also shalt be cut off.
23 And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be graffed in: for God is able to graff them in again.
24 For if thou wert cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and wert graffed contrary to nature into a good olive tree: how much more shall these, which be the natural branches, be graffed into their own olive tree?

The children of Israel are God's natural children, his chosen ones and the heirs to his promises. We Gentiles who accept Christ are adopted children, with the same rights as natural children, but not the same heritage. Jesus was born in the blood and lineage of David, so all those born into Israel have a blood relationship to him. None of us as Gentiles can make that claim. The same blessings that were apportioned to the children of Israel, but so are the same responsibilities. All of us have the privilege and opportunity to claim our inheritance of eternal life in Christ, but, like the Jews, we can lose that inheritance through unbelief. Every Gentile has the right to ask for and receive salvation, because Christ purchased that right for us, but all of us who refuse accept what is offered to us are cast out as surely as the Jews who rejected Christ. God has never withdrawn the possibility of salvation from the Jews, either; any of them who receive Christ as Savior are just as assured of their status as joint heirs as we are. The only difference is that their status is one of conformation of their relationship as children, not by adoption, but by blood. Then, too, all of us can claim the relationship of children to our Father by blood -- the shed blood of Christ. God is no respecter of persons; we are no better than the Jews, nor they than us; the only reason any of us has standing with him is because of Jesus.

25 For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.
26 And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob:
27 For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins.
28 As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sakes: but as touching the election, they are beloved for the fathers' sakes.
29 For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.
30 For as ye in times past have not believed God, yet have now obtained mercy through their unbelief:
31 Even so have these also now not believed, that through your mercy they also may obtain mercy.
32 For God hath concluded them all in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all.

Israel's blindness, this passage says, will last until the fullness of the Gentiles comes. The word used, pleroma, means completion, or being filled up. In other words, when the period allowed for the Gentiles to come to Christ is completed, Israel will once again see the truth, and turn to God in acceptance of the lordship of Christ. Many of us believe that the period of the Gentiles, the church age as come call it, is almost at its end. It is interesting to note the connection between our own mercy, or compassion, and the mercy God extends to Israel. Through Israel's unbelief, we obtained mercy; is it too much a stretch to say that, in the last days, the great falling away of the Gentiles may have a similar relationship (though not a causal one) to God's extending mercy to his people? In any event, God does extend his mercy through us, and I believe that one way this is expressed is our continuing support, individually and as a nation, of the state of Israel. God's mercy is not necessary for those who believe in and obey him; it is by his mercy that none of us are condemned for our unbelief without being given the opportunity to believe. At some point, though, for those who reject his offer of salvation, mercy must give way to judgment.

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!
34 For who hath known the mind of the Lord? or who hath been his counsellor?
35 Or who hath first given to him, and it shall be recompensed unto him again?
36 For of him, and through him, and to him, are all things: to whom be glory for ever. Amen.

This is one of the hymns of page that Paul breaks into from time to time in his letters, as the enormity of God's love and mercy overflows in him. That rhapsody of joy should be a natural part of our fellowship with the the Lord, but so few of us ever actually experience it. Many are content to accept a counterfeit of it in the form of an emotional binge brought on by rhythmic music and crowd hysteria. Certainly we should expect, and not reject, the sweet majesty of God's power and presence in our worship services, but it should come from the moving of the Sprit. The same unspeakable joy may, and should, come to us in our own private times of devotion, as a result of the same sense of God's majesty, beauty, and glory that Paul experienced here. It is that sweet fellowship, that overpowering knowledge of loving and being loved, that God wants with us first of all. That relationship is everything, and everything else we do, everything else we are, comes out of it.