Father, I pray that as we look into Your Word that these verses, one, that we will understand them what they have to say, and second, You will show them how they relate to our lives here today. We pray for grace that You will enable us to be sanctified by these words. So, conform us into the image of Christ we pray, in His name. Amen.
Okay, this morning, we are in Romans 11:28 to 32, Lord willing, and the title of this study is “Unexpected Mercy,” unexpected mercy. And so I want to begin just by reading the passage beginning in verse 28, “From the standpoint of the gospel they are enemies for your sake, but from the standpoint of God’s choice they are beloved for the sake of the fathers; for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. For just as you once were disobedient to God, but now have been shown mercy because of their disobedience, so these also now have been disobedient, that because of the mercy shown to you they also may now be shown mercy. For God has shut up all in disobedience so that He may show mercy to all.”
These verses bring us virtually to the end of this major section in Romans 9 through 11, which is all about the salvation of Israel. The salvation of Gentiles is also addressed in this section. So, it is not exclusively for the salvation of Israel, but it is the major question that is on the table. If God is sovereign in salvation, if God has sovereignly elected from before the foundation of the world, then why are His own chosen people not saved?
It is a legitimate question and Paul addresses it. It may not be a question that is uppermost on our mind, but it is the more you study the Bible it should be on our mind. Any, just even casual reading of the Bible you would have to ask the question, “So what about Israel?” As you begin in Genesis and read all the way through the Old Testament, it is all about Israel, with just a couple of exceptions of Jonah going to Nineveh and Nahum addressed to Nineveh. But the whole rest of it is addressed to Israel, and the four Gospels basically are addressed specifically to Israel. So, as you are reading the storyline, the metanarrative of the Bible, you would have to ask the question, “So, is there a future for Israel? What happened to Israel?”
And so, Paul addresses that in these chapters. And as we come towards the end of Romans 11, we are addressing it if for no other reason it is in the Bible and the Bible matters to us. So, God has put into the Bible everything we need to know, and there are some things He did not include in the Bible we just don’t need then to know. If God wanted us to know, He would have put it in the Bible. And there are other things we may think we don’t need to know, but God is smarter than all of us put together and He has put it in the Bible because we need to know it. So, we need to know about Israel, and so that is why we have this.
Now, what about Israel? It is heightened even more because earlier in the chapter, in verse 7, it says that He has hardened at this present time the hearts of most Jews. There could be no harder evangelistic effort than to try to reach Jews for Christ because God has hardened their hearts. Their hearts were already hardened, and so it is a double hardening. And when God hardens a heart, it is hardened. Further, it says in verse 8 that God gave them a spirit of stupor, meaning God just put them to sleep. So, you can preach all day long to someone who is asleep but they are not going to hear nor respond to the gospel. And God has, it says in verse 8, blinded their eyes so they cannot see and God has deafened their ears so they cannot hear. So, that is the present state of the nation of Israel. They are an apostate people.
So, Paul now addresses the future of Israel, which we looked at last time in these verses. And the overarching truth of these verses is God is totally, completely, absolutely sovereign in anyone’s salvation, and He is sovereign in Israel’s salvation and He is sovereign in our salvation. It is the same operating principle.
So, let us work through these verses, and in verse 28, I want you to see the distinction. Paul now contrasts two ways for us to see the nation of Israel. In the first half of verse 28, it is looking at it from the perspective of the gospel, and the second half of verse 28, it is looking at it from the perspective of God’s eternal choice. So, first from a gospel perspective, he says from the standpoint of the gospel, we want to see everyone from the standpoint of the gospel. And from the standpoint of the gospel, everyone in the entire world is either saved or lost. There is not a third category. Everyone is either perishing or has been saved, and so that is the template through which we see everyone, everyone in your family, everyone in your neighborhood, everyone in your office, everyone with whom you come in contact. They are either your mission field or they are a brother or sister in Christ. There is no other way to see a person according to the flesh.
So, he says, “From the standpoint of the gospel they,” and that refers to unbelieving Jews, “are,” present tense verb, meaning right now during this church age from the first to the second coming of Christ, “they are enemies.” That is a strong statement. They are enemies of the gospel. They are hostile towards the gospel. And, I want you to note that no one is in a neutral zone concerning the gospel. No one is just sitting on the fence, not even an unconverted church member. It doesn’t matter how many times you have been baptized. You are either an enemy of the gospel or you are a friend of the gospel, and there is no other category. And the word “enemies” here, I looked it up. It is a very interesting word and it means, actually it comes from a root word that means “to hate,” and it means “those who hate.” And they hate the gospel. They reject the gospel. Some do it with just a passive indifference, others with active rebellion, but nevertheless they are on that side of the rope, pulling on that side of the rope. They are enemies of the gospel. And I don’t want to just drill down on this, but there it is in our Bible. Romans 5 verse 11, this truth has already been introduced. It says even we were enemies of the gospel and have now been reconciled to God through the death of Christ. So, it is not just an unbelieving Jew; it is an unbelieving Gentile. If you are not in Christ, you are in opposition to the gospel and you are a hater of the gospel, whether or not the person recognizes it or not.
Let me give you just two cross-references to nail this down. Colossians 1:21 says, “You,” addressing believers in the church, “You were formally alienated,” meaning separated and living in a foreign kingdom. “You were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds.” Again, no one is just in a state of neutrality towards God. James 4 verse 4 is a strong verse. It says, “Whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.” So, it is either/or. It is never both/and. You cannot be a friend of the world and a friend of God. If you are a friend of the world, you have declared yourself an enemy of God. And when he says “the world,” he is referring to the evil world system that is overseen by the prince of this world, the god of this age, Satan, with the anti-truth agenda, the anti-family agenda, the anti-God agenda, and we can just open our eyes and see it all around as the restraints are being removed and the world is becoming increasingly hostile towards God.
So, I guess one other comment just to make: Jesus only died for one kind of person, and that is an enemy of the gospel. So, Jesus did not die for good people, because there are no good people outside of Christ. He came into this world and laid down His life for His enemies, which was the extraordinary demonstration of His love. So, that is looking at Israel from the gospel’s perspective. They are enemies. They have declared themselves enemies of the grace of God by their unbelief, just like anyone else in your family has who is not a believer.
Now, the second half of verse 28, he turns the prism and looks at it from another perspective, and he looks at it from God’s sovereignty perspective, God’s sovereign will perspective. He says, “but,” which means sharp contrast, “from the standpoint of God’s choice.” In other words, alright, we can look at it from another perspective, not just from a temporal, but from an eternal perspective. “But from the standpoint of God’s choice,” and “God’s choice” here referring not to just God’s choice of ethnic Israel to be His chosen nation, but from the standpoint of God’s sovereign election in salvation. From that standpoint, “they are beloved,” they are deeply loved, and we knew that earlier in the same chapter verse 2. He says that “God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew.” And the word “foreknowledge” there means those whom He previously loved or those whom He previously chose to love. And God in His sovereign election has chosen to love a remnant within ethnic Israel to be a part of the bride of Christ.
And he says He has done so “for the sake of the fathers.” “The fathers” here refer to the patriarchs. It refers to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and promises that were made to them long ago that they will be blessed by God and their seed will be blessed by God so that through them blessing will come to all the nations. It is the Abrahamic covenant. And so, God will make good on His promises given in the book of Genesis to the nation Israel. God promised to bless Israel so that they would be a blessing to the nations.
And so, as Paul is wrapping up Romans 9 through 11, he is saying, just remember, there are two ways of looking at ethnic Israel right now. One is from the perspective of the gospel. Okay, they are enemies of the gospel. We see that. But the other is from an eternal perspective, from God’s sovereign will, that at the end of this age there will be a great evangelistic harvest of Jews who will come to faith in Christ. And we talked about that in our last study. I don’t need to go back through that. I would refer you to listen to the study from last time that is posted on the website.
“But all Israel will be saved,” it says in verse 26. “A Deliverer,” that is Christ in verse 26, “will come from Zion, He will remove ungodliness from Jacob,” “Jacob” referring to the whole nation of Israel. Verse 27, “This is My covenant with them, when I take away their sins.” That is still out on the horizon, and if Christ were to return soon, this conversion of Israel, we are standing on the very precipice of that national conversion of the vast majority of Jews.
So, verse 28 now. That is “the distinction.” We have to make this distinction between the two ways to look at ethnic national Israel. Right now, they are apostate. Right now, they are in unbelief. Right now, they are in cosmic treason against the gospel, just like New York City and Los Angeles and Chicago and Dallas, unbelievers. It is not like they are unique. However, from the perspective of God’s sovereign will, God still has a future to save Israel, and by His sovereign omnipotence He will bring it to pass.
So, that leads us now to verse 29 which is “the explanation.” And verse 29 begins with the word “for,” which I have told you an untold number of times that introduces an explanation. It is probably Paul’s most used word to begin a verse with the word “For,” F-O-R. It introduces an explanation of what he just said. Paul not only says it, but he will explain it. So, here is the explanation why Israel remains beloved of God with a future salvation. Verse 29, “For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.” Let us start with the word “irrevocable,” It means unalterable. It means unbreakable. Literally, out of the original language, it means not repented of, meaning unchangeable, immutable. God’s sovereign will from before the foundation of the world to save His elect cannot be broken. It cannot be altered. So, God’s sovereign will to save Jews will come to pass.
Now, let us start at the beginning of the verse. He says, “For the gifts.” The gifts here, I think, refer back to Romans 9 verses 4 and 5, where he talks about the blessings that have been poured out on the nation of Israel. He talks about the adoption as sons, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the temple service, the promises, the fathers, and then most of all in the middle of verse 5, the Christ, the Messiah. All of this has been given to Israel, not to the Egyptians, not to the Assyrians, not to the Babylonians, not to the Romans. It is given to the nation Israel. God has chosen to bless Israel with an exposure to truth. No nation in the history of the world has ever been given a greater exposure to the truth of the Word of God for such an extended period of time as the nation Israel. That is the reference here, I believe, with the word “gifts.”
But then, following up with the gifts is the calling. The calling is the application of the truth represented in the gifts. It is one thing to have exposure to the truth. That is not going to save you. You can go to hell from a church pew in a Bible-preaching church. There must be the effectual calling of God that takes the truth from the mind and the ear to the heart and brings it home to the heart so that there is regeneration and so that there is conversion. And so, it is very important that Paul mentions “the calling of God,” which is irrevocable. And the word “irrevocable” here principally describes the calling of God. You will note the definite article “the,” which specifies it as the call of God to save, the call of God into fellowship with Christ. It is a divine summons that apprehends and arrests the one that is called and draws them, even drags them, overcoming their resistance of unbelief into a saving relationship with Jesus Christ. In the process, God changes their heart and gives them a new heart of flesh such that they willingly believe in Christ, but God changes their heart as they are being drawn to faith in Jesus Christ.
So, why will Israel, as verse 26 says, why will all Israel be saved? And in verse 28, why is Israel beloved of God from the standpoint of God’s sovereign choice? It is because God will have His way, that there can be no opposition to the sovereign will of God. God will have His way with His elect within the chosen nation of Israel. I would remind you in chapter 9 he said not all Israel is Israel. There is ethnic Israel which is the larger circle. Inside of ethnic Israel is a smaller concentric circle of those who are chosen for salvation. So, those who are chosen for salvation will be called because it is irrevocable. It will not be changed in the sovereign will of God.
Now, this leads us to verses 30 and 31, “the comparison.” And Paul now uses the Gentiles as an example of the way by which God works. This could be called “the illustration.” I have gone with “the comparison.” It is either way. But in Paul’s brilliant mind directed by the Holy Spirit as he writes this, he uses Gentiles as the example for how God’s going to deal with Israel. So, he says in verse 30, notice how he begins verse 30, “For.” So, this is an explanation of the explanation. This is like a double explanation. So, verse 30, “For just as you,” and the “you” here refers to believing Gentiles, “For just as you once were,” so that is referring to their past before their conversion when they were lost and when they were perishing. “For just as you once were disobedient to God.”
Every believer once was an unbeliever. I mean, how simple of a statement is that. And every believer once was disobedient to God. Even if you grew up in the nursery at the church, even if you were in a baby dedication service, even if you were sprinkled as an infant, you were still disobedient to God regardless of the outward symbol or the outward rite, religious rite, you nevertheless were a rebel in your own heart and you nevertheless were separated from God, and you were hostile toward God because you were born with a totally depraved heart with radical corruption. Sprinkling a little water on you didn’t change anything. I was sprinkled when I was a little baby, and Kent was as well, and that didn’t change anything until the call of God comes after the gospel has been taught to the mind and God sovereignly calls you to faith in Christ.
So, Paul here in verse 30: “For just as you once were disobedient to God.” And just a footnote here, the word “disobedient” means unpersuadable. You were totally resistant and unpersuadable to the gospel. I mean, you may have been in Awana, you may have done the memory verses, you may have gone to vacation Bible school. That is all good and fine. The seeds of the gospel were being sown into your heart. It is just at that time your heart was shallow soil. It was hardened soil until God broke up the hardened soil and caused the gospel to germinate.
But he says at the end of verse 30, “For just as you once were disobedient to God, but now.” Martyn Lloyd-Jones says, “Praise God for the ‘buts’ in the Bible,” right? “But now have been shown mercy.” That is their great conversion of Gentiles to faith in Christ. And the word “mercy” here is synonymous with all that God has done in saving and converting Gentiles. That would be all of us in this room except for one, Dan. So, “mercy” means pity. It means compassion towards those who are perishing and in great need. And God had mercy, God had compassion on those who were suffering. And it is a word that he used earlier in Romans 9 multiple times. He says in Romans 9:15, “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy.” In verse 16 he says, “So it does not depend on the man who wills or on the man who runs, but on God who has mercy.” And then again in verse 18, “So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.”
So, that tells us no one deserves mercy. Everyone deserves to be hardened. Our surprise is not that He hardens some; our surprise is that He has mercy on some, because we all deserve to be hardened. And so, God has chosen to have mercy upon whom He will have mercy according to His sovereign will. And even mercy here becomes a dominant theme. Not only is it mentioned in verse 30, but also in verse 31 he says, “Because of the mercy shown to you,” and again in verse 32, “So that He may show mercy to all.”
“Mercy” here is synonymous with God’s saving grace and all of the acts of God in saving those who are perishing. It is synonymous with the new birth. It is synonymous with the granting of repentance and faith. It is synonymous with reconciliation and redemption and adoption and all that accompanies salvation. The emphasis, though, is on the tenderness of God’s heart towards those whom He will save.
So, we should not think of God in heaven as a stoic sovereign who is just making mechanical moves, as if this world is a chessboard and God is just moving the pieces around to bring history to His appointed end. No, God is a God of infinite love, a God of tender mercy, a God of sweet compassion that He has funneled toward those whom He has chosen and has lavished His grace out of the abundance of His heart towards those who are being saved. And if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, God has demonstrated His love toward you in that while you were yet a sinner, Christ died for you. God gave His only begotten Son to be your Savior, to give up His only Son to die the horrific death upon the cross. So, as we see this word “mercy,” we should be somewhat in awe of the fact that God has had mercy.
And, just to give you two more cross-references that I think would be important. In Ephesians 2 and verses 4 and 5, we read that God is “rich in mercy.” What must it mean for God to be rich in anything? But it says in verse 4 of Ephesians 2, “But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, He made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved).” God is fabulously wealthy in mercy and in grace, and God delights in saving those whom He has chosen to save and His grace has triumphed over His judgment.
There is another verse. 1 Peter 1 verse 3 begs to be read at this moment as well. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” That means praise be to God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, “who according to His great mercy,” His mega mercy, His limitless mercy, “has caused us to be born again.” He has induced labor and has caused us. He is the active Agent, capital A, in causing us to be regenerated by His Spirit when we were spiritually dead in our trespasses and sins, when we could not even cooperate with God in our own new birth. It was exclusively a work of His great mercy to cause us “to be born again to a living hope.” And that hope” refers to our glorification in heaven one day, “through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” Just as He raised Christ from the dead, so He has spiritually raised us from the grave of unbelief and has raised us from the grave of our resistance to the gospel. God’s mercy was so great that He intervened in our affairs. There was actually an intervention from heaven in our lives to not allow us to continue to go our own way.
So, back to Romans 11, “For just as you once were disobedient to God, but now have been shown mercy because of their disobedience,” the “their disobedience,” and it is hard to follow the ball through all this. That is why I am pausing periodically. “Their disobedience” refers to Jewish disobedience. It was their disobedience that caused God to turn His attention to the Gentiles. Israel crucified their Messiah. Israel had killed the prophets. Israel martyred many of the apostles. And so, God hardened the hearts of Israel, blinded their eyes, deafened their ears, and God turns His attention to the Gentiles. And so, God is saying it is because of their hardness of heart that God has now diverted the demonstration of His mercy to Gentiles. That is why we are sitting here this morning.
So, now to complete this comparison, he goes, “so these,” and the “these” refers to unbelieving Jews. “So these also,” meaning just like unbelieving Gentiles how they once were disobedient, “so these also now have been disobedient, that because of the mercy shown to you,” and the “you” refers to believing Gentiles, “they,” referring to unbelieving Jews.” Sorry for all this, I didn’t write this. “They also may now be shown mercy.” Mercy. So, what does all this mean? This means, very simply put, that just as God showed mercy to Gentiles because of the unbelief of Jews, God will reverse it in the end, and because of the unbelief of Gentiles, God will show mercy to the Jews at the end.
And so, as this world becomes darker and darker as the end of the age approaches and just as the restraints to sin will be removed and this world will become plunged deeper and deeper into wickedness and licentiousness and depravity, it will be out of this cesspool of iniquity at the end of the age that God will show mercy to Israel and bring it full circle. Only God could be orchestrating the affairs of human history and moving on such a macro as well as micro level.
Now, this brings us to verse 32, and “the summation.” And Paul now sums up the entirety of Romans 9 through 11 and everything that he has said here in Romans 11. There will be verses 33 through 36 that we will look at the next time that we meet on April the 2nd. That is really my favorite section of Scripture. So, he will still have a closing doxology, but as we come to verse 32, it really brings to summation his whole argument in Romans 9 through 11. So, that is why I call this “the summation.”
So, please note how verse 32 begins with the word “For.” I mean, Paul just continues to explain what he has taught and what he has said as a master teacher. So, the word “For” now explains God’s working through Gentile salvation to bring about Jewish salvation. “For God has shut up all in disobedience.” The “all” here refers to both Jews and Gentiles, and “all” here does not refer to all without exception; it refers to all without distinction. God has not shut up believers in disobedience. So, “all” cannot mean “all without exception.” It doesn’t mean every single person on the planet, because there are untold vast numbers of people on the planet who are obedient to the gospel and who are believers in the gospel and the Lord Jesus Christ.
So, this is a wonderful example that whenever you see the word “all” in the Bible, please do not be a naive Bible reader and automatically assume that “all” refers to every single person without exception. It does not. In this case it refers to all without distinction. It means all categories of people, both Jews and Gentile who are unbelievers are shut up in disobedience. They are sealed in their disobedience. They are entrapped in disobedience. Here is the bondage of the will. They are imprisoned in disobedience. I mean, we sing that hymn, “And can it be that I should gain an interest in the Savior’s blood?” That great stanza, “Long my spirit was bound, imprisoned in darkness until the flash of light came shining into the prison room where we were.”
So, this is another statement of the bondage of the human will that God has sealed unbelief in the heart of the one who is an unbeliever. And let me just tell you if God has sealed it, it is sealed. The seal will not be broken. But, notice how the verse ends: “So that He may show mercy to all.” Only God can break this seal. Only God can save those whom He has shut up in disobedience. Only God can intervene and God does intervene. And it says here that He will “show mercy to all.” Now, the “all” obviously does not refer to every single person. Hell would be emptied. “All” here refers to all kinds of people, to men and women, to Greeks and barbarians, to the wise and to the foolish, to the Jews and to the Gentiles, etc., that there will be a vast number in heaven from every tribe, from every nation, from every tongue and language group of people. So, God will show mercy despite the fact that He has shut up all in their disobedience. So, here we see Paul ends this section with really a strong dose of medicine in sovereign grace. God alone has shut them up, and God alone will show mercy according to His sovereign election.
So, let us talk about some application as we bring this to conclusion and we will have time for Q&A. Let me tell you three things by way of application. How should this impact our lives, what we have just looked at here? How should we respond? Number one, have faith in God. Those who are hardened of heart can be softened by God, and God is the only one who can open that heart that has been shut. Here is the encouragement. No heart is so hardened but that God is able to pry it open and to provide entrance for the gospel. You may right now think of the person and people in your life that you think would never be saved. I want you to know God can save them, and God often does save those who you think it is impossible for them to be saved.
And it begins with the person who wrote this book. It begins with Paul, who was the chief of sinners, who was a blasphemer, who was a violent aggressor by his own testimony. God brought him down in a second. And when he was knocked off his horse, by the time he got to the ground, Paul was acknowledging the lordship of Jesus Christ. God can do the same, and God does the same according to His own purpose, but we need to have faith in God that God continues to intervene in the affairs of human history. And if God can save Israel in the last days after He has blinded their eyes and deafened their ears and hardened their hearts, your next-door neighbor is nothing for God. Your lost father-in-law is nothing for God. Your business associate is finger play for God. Have faith in God. Do not write anyone off your list for salvation. We don’t know who the elect are. God does, and God will save them because it is irrevocable. So, have enormous faith in God to save. It is the very heart and nature of God to save. He is a saving God.
Second, offer prayer to God. You and I should pray to God to save these lost people. We should take it up with Him who alone is able to cause their eyes to see, to cause their ears to hear, to open their hearts. If God is not sovereign, we are wasting our time to pray. We ought to go talk to the lost sinner then exclusively and never talk to God if God is not sovereign. Our prayers are prevailing with God. God is hearing and God is answering prayers for the salvation of people in our lives. So, this says to me it is worth the time we invest to pray for the salvation of lost people because God can overcome their resistance. Not only has God appointed the end of all things, which is the salvation of the elect, but He has appointed the means to the accomplishment of that end, which includes our prayers for them. Admittedly, these lines intersect far above our heads, but we are not going to throw the baby out with the bathwater either. We are going to labor in prayer for the salvation of lost people and leave it at the foot of the throne of grace.
Third and finally, give glory to God. Give praise to God that He is the author and the architect of all salvation. Let us give praise to God for every conversion. Every conversion is a miracle of divine intervention into the affairs of a person’s life. God is worthy of our worship when He saves a lost soul. Let us give praise to God that He is full of mercy to save. He is a God of compassion. He is a God of grace. He is a God who not only has love and is love but He has demonstrated this love in your own conversion and in the sending of His Son into this world. We have every reason to rise up and bless the name of the Lord that salvation is of the Lord. So, that is the application.
As I look at these verses that I would say admittedly are at times hard to understand, I have had the advantage of being able to study it for several days and walk in here with notes. So, that is an advantage to me, but I trust that as we have looked at this, God will give you understanding as I have tried my best to explain these verses and that you will see the relevance in your own life, because however God saves a Jew is exactly how He has saved you. There aren’t two different runways here that God is taxiing down to save someone. There is only one runway, and the way He will save Israel is the way He has already saved you.
These verses bring us virtually to the end of this major section in Romans 9 through 11, which is all about the salvation of Israel. The salvation of Gentiles is also addressed in this section. So, it is not exclusively for the salvation of Israel, but it is the major question that is on the table. If God is sovereign in salvation, if God has sovereignly elected from before the foundation of the world, then why are His own chosen people not saved?
It is a legitimate question and Paul addresses it. It may not be a question that is uppermost on our mind, but it is the more you study the Bible it should be on our mind. Any, just even casual reading of the Bible you would have to ask the question, “So what about Israel?” As you begin in Genesis and read all the way through the Old Testament, it is all about Israel, with just a couple of exceptions of Jonah going to Nineveh and Nahum addressed to Nineveh. But the whole rest of it is addressed to Israel, and the four Gospels basically are addressed specifically to Israel. So, as you are reading the storyline, the metanarrative of the Bible, you would have to ask the question, “So, is there a future for Israel? What happened to Israel?”
And so, Paul addresses that in these chapters. And as we come towards the end of Romans 11, we are addressing it if for no other reason it is in the Bible and the Bible matters to us. So, God has put into the Bible everything we need to know, and there are some things He did not include in the Bible we just don’t need then to know. If God wanted us to know, He would have put it in the Bible. And there are other things we may think we don’t need to know, but God is smarter than all of us put together and He has put it in the Bible because we need to know it. So, we need to know about Israel, and so that is why we have this.
Now, what about Israel? It is heightened even more because earlier in the chapter, in verse 7, it says that He has hardened at this present time the hearts of most Jews. There could be no harder evangelistic effort than to try to reach Jews for Christ because God has hardened their hearts. Their hearts were already hardened, and so it is a double hardening. And when God hardens a heart, it is hardened. Further, it says in verse 8 that God gave them a spirit of stupor, meaning God just put them to sleep. So, you can preach all day long to someone who is asleep but they are not going to hear nor respond to the gospel. And God has, it says in verse 8, blinded their eyes so they cannot see and God has deafened their ears so they cannot hear. So, that is the present state of the nation of Israel. They are an apostate people.
So, Paul now addresses the future of Israel, which we looked at last time in these verses. And the overarching truth of these verses is God is totally, completely, absolutely sovereign in anyone’s salvation, and He is sovereign in Israel’s salvation and He is sovereign in our salvation. It is the same operating principle.
So, let us work through these verses, and in verse 28, I want you to see the distinction. Paul now contrasts two ways for us to see the nation of Israel. In the first half of verse 28, it is looking at it from the perspective of the gospel, and the second half of verse 28, it is looking at it from the perspective of God’s eternal choice. So, first from a gospel perspective, he says from the standpoint of the gospel, we want to see everyone from the standpoint of the gospel. And from the standpoint of the gospel, everyone in the entire world is either saved or lost. There is not a third category. Everyone is either perishing or has been saved, and so that is the template through which we see everyone, everyone in your family, everyone in your neighborhood, everyone in your office, everyone with whom you come in contact. They are either your mission field or they are a brother or sister in Christ. There is no other way to see a person according to the flesh.
So, he says, “From the standpoint of the gospel they,” and that refers to unbelieving Jews, “are,” present tense verb, meaning right now during this church age from the first to the second coming of Christ, “they are enemies.” That is a strong statement. They are enemies of the gospel. They are hostile towards the gospel. And, I want you to note that no one is in a neutral zone concerning the gospel. No one is just sitting on the fence, not even an unconverted church member. It doesn’t matter how many times you have been baptized. You are either an enemy of the gospel or you are a friend of the gospel, and there is no other category. And the word “enemies” here, I looked it up. It is a very interesting word and it means, actually it comes from a root word that means “to hate,” and it means “those who hate.” And they hate the gospel. They reject the gospel. Some do it with just a passive indifference, others with active rebellion, but nevertheless they are on that side of the rope, pulling on that side of the rope. They are enemies of the gospel. And I don’t want to just drill down on this, but there it is in our Bible. Romans 5 verse 11, this truth has already been introduced. It says even we were enemies of the gospel and have now been reconciled to God through the death of Christ. So, it is not just an unbelieving Jew; it is an unbelieving Gentile. If you are not in Christ, you are in opposition to the gospel and you are a hater of the gospel, whether or not the person recognizes it or not.
Let me give you just two cross-references to nail this down. Colossians 1:21 says, “You,” addressing believers in the church, “You were formally alienated,” meaning separated and living in a foreign kingdom. “You were formerly alienated and hostile in mind, engaged in evil deeds.” Again, no one is just in a state of neutrality towards God. James 4 verse 4 is a strong verse. It says, “Whoever wishes to be a friend of the world makes himself an enemy of God.” So, it is either/or. It is never both/and. You cannot be a friend of the world and a friend of God. If you are a friend of the world, you have declared yourself an enemy of God. And when he says “the world,” he is referring to the evil world system that is overseen by the prince of this world, the god of this age, Satan, with the anti-truth agenda, the anti-family agenda, the anti-God agenda, and we can just open our eyes and see it all around as the restraints are being removed and the world is becoming increasingly hostile towards God.
So, I guess one other comment just to make: Jesus only died for one kind of person, and that is an enemy of the gospel. So, Jesus did not die for good people, because there are no good people outside of Christ. He came into this world and laid down His life for His enemies, which was the extraordinary demonstration of His love. So, that is looking at Israel from the gospel’s perspective. They are enemies. They have declared themselves enemies of the grace of God by their unbelief, just like anyone else in your family has who is not a believer.
Now, the second half of verse 28, he turns the prism and looks at it from another perspective, and he looks at it from God’s sovereignty perspective, God’s sovereign will perspective. He says, “but,” which means sharp contrast, “from the standpoint of God’s choice.” In other words, alright, we can look at it from another perspective, not just from a temporal, but from an eternal perspective. “But from the standpoint of God’s choice,” and “God’s choice” here referring not to just God’s choice of ethnic Israel to be His chosen nation, but from the standpoint of God’s sovereign election in salvation. From that standpoint, “they are beloved,” they are deeply loved, and we knew that earlier in the same chapter verse 2. He says that “God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew.” And the word “foreknowledge” there means those whom He previously loved or those whom He previously chose to love. And God in His sovereign election has chosen to love a remnant within ethnic Israel to be a part of the bride of Christ.
And he says He has done so “for the sake of the fathers.” “The fathers” here refer to the patriarchs. It refers to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, and promises that were made to them long ago that they will be blessed by God and their seed will be blessed by God so that through them blessing will come to all the nations. It is the Abrahamic covenant. And so, God will make good on His promises given in the book of Genesis to the nation Israel. God promised to bless Israel so that they would be a blessing to the nations.
And so, as Paul is wrapping up Romans 9 through 11, he is saying, just remember, there are two ways of looking at ethnic Israel right now. One is from the perspective of the gospel. Okay, they are enemies of the gospel. We see that. But the other is from an eternal perspective, from God’s sovereign will, that at the end of this age there will be a great evangelistic harvest of Jews who will come to faith in Christ. And we talked about that in our last study. I don’t need to go back through that. I would refer you to listen to the study from last time that is posted on the website.
“But all Israel will be saved,” it says in verse 26. “A Deliverer,” that is Christ in verse 26, “will come from Zion, He will remove ungodliness from Jacob,” “Jacob” referring to the whole nation of Israel. Verse 27, “This is My covenant with them, when I take away their sins.” That is still out on the horizon, and if Christ were to return soon, this conversion of Israel, we are standing on the very precipice of that national conversion of the vast majority of Jews.
So, verse 28 now. That is “the distinction.” We have to make this distinction between the two ways to look at ethnic national Israel. Right now, they are apostate. Right now, they are in unbelief. Right now, they are in cosmic treason against the gospel, just like New York City and Los Angeles and Chicago and Dallas, unbelievers. It is not like they are unique. However, from the perspective of God’s sovereign will, God still has a future to save Israel, and by His sovereign omnipotence He will bring it to pass.
So, that leads us now to verse 29 which is “the explanation.” And verse 29 begins with the word “for,” which I have told you an untold number of times that introduces an explanation. It is probably Paul’s most used word to begin a verse with the word “For,” F-O-R. It introduces an explanation of what he just said. Paul not only says it, but he will explain it. So, here is the explanation why Israel remains beloved of God with a future salvation. Verse 29, “For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.” Let us start with the word “irrevocable,” It means unalterable. It means unbreakable. Literally, out of the original language, it means not repented of, meaning unchangeable, immutable. God’s sovereign will from before the foundation of the world to save His elect cannot be broken. It cannot be altered. So, God’s sovereign will to save Jews will come to pass.
Now, let us start at the beginning of the verse. He says, “For the gifts.” The gifts here, I think, refer back to Romans 9 verses 4 and 5, where he talks about the blessings that have been poured out on the nation of Israel. He talks about the adoption as sons, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the temple service, the promises, the fathers, and then most of all in the middle of verse 5, the Christ, the Messiah. All of this has been given to Israel, not to the Egyptians, not to the Assyrians, not to the Babylonians, not to the Romans. It is given to the nation Israel. God has chosen to bless Israel with an exposure to truth. No nation in the history of the world has ever been given a greater exposure to the truth of the Word of God for such an extended period of time as the nation Israel. That is the reference here, I believe, with the word “gifts.”
But then, following up with the gifts is the calling. The calling is the application of the truth represented in the gifts. It is one thing to have exposure to the truth. That is not going to save you. You can go to hell from a church pew in a Bible-preaching church. There must be the effectual calling of God that takes the truth from the mind and the ear to the heart and brings it home to the heart so that there is regeneration and so that there is conversion. And so, it is very important that Paul mentions “the calling of God,” which is irrevocable. And the word “irrevocable” here principally describes the calling of God. You will note the definite article “the,” which specifies it as the call of God to save, the call of God into fellowship with Christ. It is a divine summons that apprehends and arrests the one that is called and draws them, even drags them, overcoming their resistance of unbelief into a saving relationship with Jesus Christ. In the process, God changes their heart and gives them a new heart of flesh such that they willingly believe in Christ, but God changes their heart as they are being drawn to faith in Jesus Christ.
So, why will Israel, as verse 26 says, why will all Israel be saved? And in verse 28, why is Israel beloved of God from the standpoint of God’s sovereign choice? It is because God will have His way, that there can be no opposition to the sovereign will of God. God will have His way with His elect within the chosen nation of Israel. I would remind you in chapter 9 he said not all Israel is Israel. There is ethnic Israel which is the larger circle. Inside of ethnic Israel is a smaller concentric circle of those who are chosen for salvation. So, those who are chosen for salvation will be called because it is irrevocable. It will not be changed in the sovereign will of God.
Now, this leads us to verses 30 and 31, “the comparison.” And Paul now uses the Gentiles as an example of the way by which God works. This could be called “the illustration.” I have gone with “the comparison.” It is either way. But in Paul’s brilliant mind directed by the Holy Spirit as he writes this, he uses Gentiles as the example for how God’s going to deal with Israel. So, he says in verse 30, notice how he begins verse 30, “For.” So, this is an explanation of the explanation. This is like a double explanation. So, verse 30, “For just as you,” and the “you” here refers to believing Gentiles, “For just as you once were,” so that is referring to their past before their conversion when they were lost and when they were perishing. “For just as you once were disobedient to God.”
Every believer once was an unbeliever. I mean, how simple of a statement is that. And every believer once was disobedient to God. Even if you grew up in the nursery at the church, even if you were in a baby dedication service, even if you were sprinkled as an infant, you were still disobedient to God regardless of the outward symbol or the outward rite, religious rite, you nevertheless were a rebel in your own heart and you nevertheless were separated from God, and you were hostile toward God because you were born with a totally depraved heart with radical corruption. Sprinkling a little water on you didn’t change anything. I was sprinkled when I was a little baby, and Kent was as well, and that didn’t change anything until the call of God comes after the gospel has been taught to the mind and God sovereignly calls you to faith in Christ.
So, Paul here in verse 30: “For just as you once were disobedient to God.” And just a footnote here, the word “disobedient” means unpersuadable. You were totally resistant and unpersuadable to the gospel. I mean, you may have been in Awana, you may have done the memory verses, you may have gone to vacation Bible school. That is all good and fine. The seeds of the gospel were being sown into your heart. It is just at that time your heart was shallow soil. It was hardened soil until God broke up the hardened soil and caused the gospel to germinate.
But he says at the end of verse 30, “For just as you once were disobedient to God, but now.” Martyn Lloyd-Jones says, “Praise God for the ‘buts’ in the Bible,” right? “But now have been shown mercy.” That is their great conversion of Gentiles to faith in Christ. And the word “mercy” here is synonymous with all that God has done in saving and converting Gentiles. That would be all of us in this room except for one, Dan. So, “mercy” means pity. It means compassion towards those who are perishing and in great need. And God had mercy, God had compassion on those who were suffering. And it is a word that he used earlier in Romans 9 multiple times. He says in Romans 9:15, “I will have mercy on whom I will have mercy.” In verse 16 he says, “So it does not depend on the man who wills or on the man who runs, but on God who has mercy.” And then again in verse 18, “So then He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.”
So, that tells us no one deserves mercy. Everyone deserves to be hardened. Our surprise is not that He hardens some; our surprise is that He has mercy on some, because we all deserve to be hardened. And so, God has chosen to have mercy upon whom He will have mercy according to His sovereign will. And even mercy here becomes a dominant theme. Not only is it mentioned in verse 30, but also in verse 31 he says, “Because of the mercy shown to you,” and again in verse 32, “So that He may show mercy to all.”
“Mercy” here is synonymous with God’s saving grace and all of the acts of God in saving those who are perishing. It is synonymous with the new birth. It is synonymous with the granting of repentance and faith. It is synonymous with reconciliation and redemption and adoption and all that accompanies salvation. The emphasis, though, is on the tenderness of God’s heart towards those whom He will save.
So, we should not think of God in heaven as a stoic sovereign who is just making mechanical moves, as if this world is a chessboard and God is just moving the pieces around to bring history to His appointed end. No, God is a God of infinite love, a God of tender mercy, a God of sweet compassion that He has funneled toward those whom He has chosen and has lavished His grace out of the abundance of His heart towards those who are being saved. And if you are a believer in Jesus Christ, God has demonstrated His love toward you in that while you were yet a sinner, Christ died for you. God gave His only begotten Son to be your Savior, to give up His only Son to die the horrific death upon the cross. So, as we see this word “mercy,” we should be somewhat in awe of the fact that God has had mercy.
And, just to give you two more cross-references that I think would be important. In Ephesians 2 and verses 4 and 5, we read that God is “rich in mercy.” What must it mean for God to be rich in anything? But it says in verse 4 of Ephesians 2, “But God, being rich in mercy, because of His great love with which He loved us, even when we were dead in our trespasses, He made us alive together with Christ (by grace you have been saved).” God is fabulously wealthy in mercy and in grace, and God delights in saving those whom He has chosen to save and His grace has triumphed over His judgment.
There is another verse. 1 Peter 1 verse 3 begs to be read at this moment as well. “Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ.” That means praise be to God the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, “who according to His great mercy,” His mega mercy, His limitless mercy, “has caused us to be born again.” He has induced labor and has caused us. He is the active Agent, capital A, in causing us to be regenerated by His Spirit when we were spiritually dead in our trespasses and sins, when we could not even cooperate with God in our own new birth. It was exclusively a work of His great mercy to cause us “to be born again to a living hope.” And that hope” refers to our glorification in heaven one day, “through the resurrection of Jesus Christ from the dead.” Just as He raised Christ from the dead, so He has spiritually raised us from the grave of unbelief and has raised us from the grave of our resistance to the gospel. God’s mercy was so great that He intervened in our affairs. There was actually an intervention from heaven in our lives to not allow us to continue to go our own way.
So, back to Romans 11, “For just as you once were disobedient to God, but now have been shown mercy because of their disobedience,” the “their disobedience,” and it is hard to follow the ball through all this. That is why I am pausing periodically. “Their disobedience” refers to Jewish disobedience. It was their disobedience that caused God to turn His attention to the Gentiles. Israel crucified their Messiah. Israel had killed the prophets. Israel martyred many of the apostles. And so, God hardened the hearts of Israel, blinded their eyes, deafened their ears, and God turns His attention to the Gentiles. And so, God is saying it is because of their hardness of heart that God has now diverted the demonstration of His mercy to Gentiles. That is why we are sitting here this morning.
So, now to complete this comparison, he goes, “so these,” and the “these” refers to unbelieving Jews. “So these also,” meaning just like unbelieving Gentiles how they once were disobedient, “so these also now have been disobedient, that because of the mercy shown to you,” and the “you” refers to believing Gentiles, “they,” referring to unbelieving Jews.” Sorry for all this, I didn’t write this. “They also may now be shown mercy.” Mercy. So, what does all this mean? This means, very simply put, that just as God showed mercy to Gentiles because of the unbelief of Jews, God will reverse it in the end, and because of the unbelief of Gentiles, God will show mercy to the Jews at the end.
And so, as this world becomes darker and darker as the end of the age approaches and just as the restraints to sin will be removed and this world will become plunged deeper and deeper into wickedness and licentiousness and depravity, it will be out of this cesspool of iniquity at the end of the age that God will show mercy to Israel and bring it full circle. Only God could be orchestrating the affairs of human history and moving on such a macro as well as micro level.
Now, this brings us to verse 32, and “the summation.” And Paul now sums up the entirety of Romans 9 through 11 and everything that he has said here in Romans 11. There will be verses 33 through 36 that we will look at the next time that we meet on April the 2nd. That is really my favorite section of Scripture. So, he will still have a closing doxology, but as we come to verse 32, it really brings to summation his whole argument in Romans 9 through 11. So, that is why I call this “the summation.”
So, please note how verse 32 begins with the word “For.” I mean, Paul just continues to explain what he has taught and what he has said as a master teacher. So, the word “For” now explains God’s working through Gentile salvation to bring about Jewish salvation. “For God has shut up all in disobedience.” The “all” here refers to both Jews and Gentiles, and “all” here does not refer to all without exception; it refers to all without distinction. God has not shut up believers in disobedience. So, “all” cannot mean “all without exception.” It doesn’t mean every single person on the planet, because there are untold vast numbers of people on the planet who are obedient to the gospel and who are believers in the gospel and the Lord Jesus Christ.
So, this is a wonderful example that whenever you see the word “all” in the Bible, please do not be a naive Bible reader and automatically assume that “all” refers to every single person without exception. It does not. In this case it refers to all without distinction. It means all categories of people, both Jews and Gentile who are unbelievers are shut up in disobedience. They are sealed in their disobedience. They are entrapped in disobedience. Here is the bondage of the will. They are imprisoned in disobedience. I mean, we sing that hymn, “And can it be that I should gain an interest in the Savior’s blood?” That great stanza, “Long my spirit was bound, imprisoned in darkness until the flash of light came shining into the prison room where we were.”
So, this is another statement of the bondage of the human will that God has sealed unbelief in the heart of the one who is an unbeliever. And let me just tell you if God has sealed it, it is sealed. The seal will not be broken. But, notice how the verse ends: “So that He may show mercy to all.” Only God can break this seal. Only God can save those whom He has shut up in disobedience. Only God can intervene and God does intervene. And it says here that He will “show mercy to all.” Now, the “all” obviously does not refer to every single person. Hell would be emptied. “All” here refers to all kinds of people, to men and women, to Greeks and barbarians, to the wise and to the foolish, to the Jews and to the Gentiles, etc., that there will be a vast number in heaven from every tribe, from every nation, from every tongue and language group of people. So, God will show mercy despite the fact that He has shut up all in their disobedience. So, here we see Paul ends this section with really a strong dose of medicine in sovereign grace. God alone has shut them up, and God alone will show mercy according to His sovereign election.
So, let us talk about some application as we bring this to conclusion and we will have time for Q&A. Let me tell you three things by way of application. How should this impact our lives, what we have just looked at here? How should we respond? Number one, have faith in God. Those who are hardened of heart can be softened by God, and God is the only one who can open that heart that has been shut. Here is the encouragement. No heart is so hardened but that God is able to pry it open and to provide entrance for the gospel. You may right now think of the person and people in your life that you think would never be saved. I want you to know God can save them, and God often does save those who you think it is impossible for them to be saved.
And it begins with the person who wrote this book. It begins with Paul, who was the chief of sinners, who was a blasphemer, who was a violent aggressor by his own testimony. God brought him down in a second. And when he was knocked off his horse, by the time he got to the ground, Paul was acknowledging the lordship of Jesus Christ. God can do the same, and God does the same according to His own purpose, but we need to have faith in God that God continues to intervene in the affairs of human history. And if God can save Israel in the last days after He has blinded their eyes and deafened their ears and hardened their hearts, your next-door neighbor is nothing for God. Your lost father-in-law is nothing for God. Your business associate is finger play for God. Have faith in God. Do not write anyone off your list for salvation. We don’t know who the elect are. God does, and God will save them because it is irrevocable. So, have enormous faith in God to save. It is the very heart and nature of God to save. He is a saving God.
Second, offer prayer to God. You and I should pray to God to save these lost people. We should take it up with Him who alone is able to cause their eyes to see, to cause their ears to hear, to open their hearts. If God is not sovereign, we are wasting our time to pray. We ought to go talk to the lost sinner then exclusively and never talk to God if God is not sovereign. Our prayers are prevailing with God. God is hearing and God is answering prayers for the salvation of people in our lives. So, this says to me it is worth the time we invest to pray for the salvation of lost people because God can overcome their resistance. Not only has God appointed the end of all things, which is the salvation of the elect, but He has appointed the means to the accomplishment of that end, which includes our prayers for them. Admittedly, these lines intersect far above our heads, but we are not going to throw the baby out with the bathwater either. We are going to labor in prayer for the salvation of lost people and leave it at the foot of the throne of grace.
Third and finally, give glory to God. Give praise to God that He is the author and the architect of all salvation. Let us give praise to God for every conversion. Every conversion is a miracle of divine intervention into the affairs of a person’s life. God is worthy of our worship when He saves a lost soul. Let us give praise to God that He is full of mercy to save. He is a God of compassion. He is a God of grace. He is a God who not only has love and is love but He has demonstrated this love in your own conversion and in the sending of His Son into this world. We have every reason to rise up and bless the name of the Lord that salvation is of the Lord. So, that is the application.
As I look at these verses that I would say admittedly are at times hard to understand, I have had the advantage of being able to study it for several days and walk in here with notes. So, that is an advantage to me, but I trust that as we have looked at this, God will give you understanding as I have tried my best to explain these verses and that you will see the relevance in your own life, because however God saves a Jew is exactly how He has saved you. There aren’t two different runways here that God is taxiing down to save someone. There is only one runway, and the way He will save Israel is the way He has already saved you.
