Romans

Romans Chapter 9

• Romans 9:1 I say the truth in Christ, I lie not, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost, 
• 2 That I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart. 
• 3 For I could wish that myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh: 

How long has it been since we grieved over souls that are lost? Paul felt so heavy and burdened for his lost Jewish brethren. Paul never once taught a dual covenant theology. He knew that the day would come that all Israel would be saved but he knew also that those the rejected Christ as individuals would be lost. 

I don't think very many of us could bear it if we went about with this heaviness all the time. That is exactly why we need refreshing from the Holy Spirit both in our private prayer life and when we come together. Even Jesus got alone to pray after He ministered to the crowds. We need regular fellowship with those of the same mind and one accord so that we can worship together and be refreshed in the Lord but we also need to pray that God doesn't allow us to forget the lost around us that need to hear the gospel. One sad verse in the bible says of Jesus that He wept when He was burdened for what He saw the Jewish people were to suffer in days ahead. It was "Jesus wept." 

• Romans 9:4 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; 
• 5 Whose are the fathers, and of whom as concerning the flesh Christ came, who is over all, God blessed forever. Amen. 

Jesus was a Jew also and was born among them. They were not only chosen to receive the law but to bring forth the Messiah. 

Paul's burden was for these Israelites who were chosen of God to receive the covenants, the law and all His promises, yet they struggled with unbelief and had a history of falling into the idolatry that the other nations surrounding them followed after. That is why God allowed them to be taken captive by the very nations they were mimicking. 

They were cast away, then restored many times. When they rejected Christ, they lost their nation again in 70 AD. Yet we see them re-gathered again in their own land to fulfill the latter day prophecies when Israel will be saved. The nation of Israel returned in 1948.

While I rejoice in the Messianic believers that are coming to Christ in droves, we sorrow like Paul over the ones that still have not found the Lord Jesus Christ as savior. We are not to use the crucifixion of Christ as an excuse to hate and be cruel to the descendants of the Jewish people. 

First of all we don't blame someone for what his or her ancestor does. Second it was the religious Pharisees that wanted to get rid of Christ; the common people of that day loved Him until those that hated Christ stirred up trouble and falsely accused Jesus. That is when the tide turned against Christ and He was crucified. 

Of course that was why Jesus came in the first place. A perfect man had to die for sins in order for any soul could be saved from being lost for eternity. God the Son had to come in the flesh in order to pay for the sins we deserve to die for. 

• Romans 9:6 Not as though the word of God hath taken none effect. For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel: 

Not all Israel are the children of God but only those that exercise faith in Jesus. The unbelieving of Israel are temporarily cut off the vine. Gentile believers are grafted into that vine but they do not replace Israel or become the chosen of God in the place of Israel. 

God chose Israel to bring forth the one who was to save the world from sin. Gentile believers do not replace them. The gifts and calling of God is without repentance. But unbelieving Jews still need to be saved from sin just as unbelieving Gentiles do. There is no difference. 

• Romans 9:7 Neither, because they are the seed of Abraham, are they all children: but, In Isaac shall thy seed be called. 

Isaac represents the child of promise. Jesus came through that lineage when He came into flesh. God the Son became a man to die for sin. All who believe in Him will inherit eternal life. There is no other way to God.

We become children of Abraham by adoption through faith in Christ just as Isaac was a child of faith. He represents the life in the Spirit as opposed to a life lived in the flesh. Ishmael represents a child of the flesh similar to Esau. God's way is spiritual rather than the flesh. All salvation comes through Christ as the Holy Spirit convicts of sin and draws an unbeliever to faith in Jesus Christ.  We then become a child of God by the Holy Spirit. We do not become children of God by deeds done in the flesh or outward religious rituals and acts. To be saved one must be "born again" by the Spirit of God. Isaac represents this spiritual birth rather than the natural birth represented by Ishmael. 

• Romans 9:8 That is, They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God: but the children of the promise are counted for the seed.

This doctrine is where some people get the replacement theology. However, no where in the scriptures does the Gentile church replace Israel as a nation.  

By faith we are adopted into the same vine as Israel but the root is the same. We are privileged to be a part of Israel by faith in Christ but we never replace Israel. When the bible says Israel, it means Israel. The church means the church.  

However, Paul says not all Israel are the children of the promise because some of them rejected Jesus Christ. Because of this rejection, they are temporarily cut off as a nation but they will be grafted in when their unbelief turns to faith. 

Many Jewish people that we now call Messianic Jews have already come to faith in Christ. Paul would have rejoiced to see this in our day. 

• Romans 9:9 For this is the word of promise, At this time will I come, and Sarah shall have a son. 
• 10 And not only this; but when Rebecca also had conceived by one, even by our father Isaac; 
• 11 (For the children being not yet born, neither having done any good or evil, that the purpose of God according to election might stand, not of works, but of him that calleth;) 
• 12 It was said unto her, The elder shall serve the younger. 
• 13 As it is written, Jacob have I loved, but Esau have I hated. 
• 14 What shall we say then? Is there unrighteousness with God? God forbid. 
• 15 For he saith to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I will have compassion. 
• 16 So then it is not of him that willeth, nor of him that runneth, but of God that showeth mercy. 
• 17 For the Scripture saith unto Pharaoh, Even for this same purpose have I raised thee up, that I might show my power in thee, and that my name might be declared throughout all the earth. 
• 18 Therefore hath he mercy on whom he will have mercy, and whom he will he hardeneth. 
• 19 Thou wilt say then unto me, Why doth he yet find fault? For who hath resisted his will? 
• 20 Nay but, O man, who art thou that repliest against God? Shall the thing formed say to him that formed it, Why hast thou made me thus? 
• 21 Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honor, and another unto dishonor? 

We can stumble easily about Paul's writings and get all kinds of false doctrine from them, like hyper Calvinism and such things but let's try to just take them for what they really mean. 

Here is Paul's explanation of the verses above. Scripture will interpret scripture many times.

• Romans 9:22 What if God, willing to show his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: 
• 23 And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory, 

God put up with people like Pharaoh, Esau and other men of the flesh. When they show themselves to be unworthy of the promises of God, He uses them to make His power and glory revealed among us who receive God's mercy. 

• Romans 9:24 Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles? 

I believe Esau had the same chance to be a spiritual person as his brother Jacob was but he was more interested in his stomach and his natural desires than the spiritual things of God. 

The same is true of Pharaoh, Cain, and all others who choose the flesh over the spirit. 

• Romans 9:25 As he saith also in Hosea, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved. 

When Israel rejected Christ, it opened the door for the gospel to be given to the Gentiles. This too fulfills the prophecy given to Abraham that through his seed, would come a blessing upon all nations not just Israel. Gentiles are saved completely by the mercy of God because they were originally outcasts, idolaters and separated from God. They were not the chosen people. When His elect or chosen people rejected Him, the gospel went to the Gentiles. Yet we know that Jesus had come to die for sins so He did have to be killed eventually, then raised from the dead so that we too as believers in Christ will be raised in the same manner.

I supposed if Israel would have received Christ, God would have used them to preach the gospel to the world but only a few received this gospel, yet they did turn the world upside down with their preaching.

God knew though that they would reject Christ because they were looking for a military type of Messiah and not a savior from sin. The gospel went to the Gentiles as it was prophesied of old by the prophets  Now we are seeing in this latter day that many Jews coming to Christ. We see now the Gentiles started to slide back into unbelief and apostasy. Perhaps the time of the Gentiles is drawing to a close.  

• Romans 9:26 And it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people; there shall they be called the children of the living God. 

Gentiles were without any hope. The law was given to the Jews. We did not know God, we did not have the law, we did not have Moses and we were eternally separated from God. 

• Romans 9:27 Isaiah also crieth concerning Israel, Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea, a remnant shall be saved: 

It is sad that only a remnant is saved. The same is true though of all the earth. Jesus said that narrow is the way that leads to everlasting life and few is there that find it. That narrow way of course is going by way of Jesus Christ. 

The reason it's so narrow is because there are other religions and other ways people say that will get us to heaven but no other way will work. 

Even among those that name the name of Christ, not all will be accepted. Jesus says to some, "Depart from me, I never know you." 

So we see that He is the way but it is purposely walking in Him and the path He lays before us that gets us to heaven. We can't say we believe in Jesus Christ verbally and not abide in Him or abide by His word.

• Romans 9:28 For He will finish the work, and cut it short in righteousness: because a short work will the Lord make upon the earth. 

The tribulation is coming but God will cut it short so there is a remnant that will be saved. 

• Romans 9:29 And as Isaiah said before, Except the Lord of Sabaoth had left us a seed, we had been as Sodom, and been made like unto Gomorrah. 

If God does not intervene, all mankind would eventually destroy one another. All God has to do is step aside and allow it. He is actually what is keeping any peace on earth we have now. 

• Romans 9:30 What shall we say then? That the Gentiles, which followed not after righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness which is of faith. 
• 31 But Israel, which followed after the law of righteousness, hath not attained to the law of righteousness. 

That's exactly what Paul is pointing out. The Gentiles did not have the law and did not know the will of God but by believing the word of God which was preached to them and turning to Jesus Christ, they became righteous by their faith. 

The Jews who were supposed to have the law of righteousness missed out on the righteousness of Christ because of unbelief. Their own righteousness is not good enough to enable them to enter eternal life. 

• Romans 9:32 Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumblingstone; 
• 33 As it is written, Behold, I lay in Zion a stumblingstone and rock of offense: and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed. 

They did not recognize the one who came to save them from sin. They held on to the law which they thought was able to make them righteous. They were expecting a military Messiah who would deliver them from Romans, They did not see themselves as sinner in need of a savior.

The Gentiles on other hand, knew they were sinners and when they heard of one who saves from sin, they received it. 

No one can possibly be saved from sin if he or she does not see themselves as sinners. Why would we ask Jesus to save us from sin, if we thought we had no sin to be saved from? This was the stumbling block to the Jews. They thought they were already righteous because they had the law. They just wanted deliverance from natural enemies. They didn't recognize the spiritual enemies that could destroy the soul. 

This also is why a little child is sometimes saved quicker than a hardened adult. If you tell them to believe in Jesus and that they needed to be saved from sin, they are quick to believe. 

To be saved then, we need to see that we are sinners that need to be saved. Otherwise, eternal life cannot be ours. DC