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God is not through with the Jewish People
RO149-02© Berean Memorial Church of Irving, Texas, Inc. (1988)
Our subject today is "The Restoration of Israel." This is segment number two. We are looking at Romans 11:25-29.
The Jewish People
As you know, the apostle Paul's message in Romans 11 is that God has, during the church age, removed the Jewish people from their special place of blessing under the
Abrahamic Covenant. Now, we are not currently picking on the Jewish people as such. It might seem like that, but that's because the apostle Paul is picking on them in
this particular part of the Bible. Romans chapters 9, 10, and 11 deal with the Jewish people: chapter 9 has dealt with their past situation; chapter 10 deals with their
current situation; and, chapter 11 is looking forward to the future of the Jewish people. In the process of dealing with that, Paul has clearly said that the Jews are no
longer enjoying their special place of privilege that is theirs by divine promise under the Abrahamic Covenant. However, he has also pointed out that this removal from
that position of special blessing is temporary. Israel, as a nation has a future. The gentiles, instead today, hold the place of superiority with God that the Jews once
had. The Jews today are in a state of rebellion against Jesus Christ, and for that reason, they are in spiritual blindness, and in suffering.
The prophet Isaiah, anticipating under divine enlightenment that this was going to happen, describes what life would be like for the Jews during this era when they would
be out of the olive tree of special blessing. For example, in Isaiah 59:9, the prophet says, concerning the Jewish people, "Therefore, is justice far from us. Neither
does righteousness overtake us. We wait for light, but behold obscurity; for greatness; but we walk in darkness." How true of the Jew today: "We grope for the wall like
the blind? We grope as if we had no eyes. We stumble at noonday as in the night. We are in desolate places like dead men. We roar all like bears, and mourn greatly like
doves. We looked for justice, but there is none; for salvation, but it is far from us, for our transgressions are multiplied before you, and our sins testify against us.
For our transgressions are with us. And as for our iniquities, we know them; in transgressing and lying against the Lord, and departing from our God; speaking oppression
and revolt; conceding and uttering from the heart words of falsehood; and, justice is turned away backward, and righteousness stands afar off, for truth is fallen in the
street, and equity cannot enter."
That is the condition of the Jews today. The truth that they had has fallen under foot. They're trampling it in the streets. Therefore, they have no capacity for things
to go right in their lives.
Gentiles
However, Paul says, "Just so you gentiles do not become excessively arrogant over the fact that you have taken the place of blessing, I would remind you," Paul says,
"that God's special place of favor for the Jews was an act of His grace, just as it is for you. And the Jews have a very proper and right place in that special blessing,
and He's going to put them back again."
So, the gentiles are cautioned not to be complimenting themselves as in some way being deserving of this special blessing. God always acts in perfect justice. Therefore,
he will yet return the nation of Israel to the eternal blessings which He promised them in the Abrahamic Covenant. God has, in ages past, kept secret, Paul said, when
this nation of Israel would be restored to their blessing. It was not a secret that they were going to be put back in blessing. But when – that was a secret. Now
Paul says, "God has told me that secret." He has revealed to Paul that the time of restoration would be when God has completed His program of calling gentiles into
salvation. That would include, of course, the completion of the church as the body of Christ, which is made up mostly of gentiles. It would also include the gentiles who
are finally saved during the tribulation years.
The terminal point, then, is the Second Coming of Jesus Christ. At that point, as we saw last time, the Jews will see Him as a nation. They will acceptance Him as
Savior. So, at that point, positive volition Jews will be saved, and the result will be. That when the millennial kingdom begins, every Jew in the nation of Israel
will be born-again. Those who will not accept Christ are put to death at the point of the beginning of the 1,000-year reign of Christ here upon this earth. God, at that
time will cause the ungodliness that characterizes the Jew today to be turned away from Him. And what Paul means by that is the ungodly rejection of Jesus Christ.
Now we come to Romans 11:27, where we have Paul referring now to spiritual regeneration: "For this is My covenant unto them. In the Greek Bible, the word "this" looks
like: "houtos." This word is referring to not what comes before, but what follows, actually in the quotation that Paul is making. You will have to go back to
Isaiah 59 to see where Paul is quoting from in this verse to see what he means by "this." Isaiah 59:21 is where the apostle is quoting, and he says, "'As for Me, this
is My covenant with them,' says the Lord." Then he goes on to say what that covenant is. Isaiah says, "God says, 'This is my promise to the Jewish people." Then he
tells them what the promise is. So, when you read this in Romans 11:27, when he says, "This is My covenant," you don't want to go looking back to what has come before,
but you want to go back to what Isaiah said, and what follows in the quotation. What does Isaiah say is the promise that God is making?
"'My spirit that is upon you, and My words, which I have put in your mouth, shall not depart of your mouth, nor out of the mouth of your seed, nor out of the mouth of your
seed's seed,' says the Lord, 'from henceforth and forever.'" He says, "My Holy Spirit is going to be put into you Jews, and with it will come Bible doctrine viewpoint
that will never depart from you.
Now, we shall find in a moment that what Isaiah was actually saying was that God is going to give the power of the Holy Spirit to the Jew as we Christians now enjoy it
today. And He is willing to give them a full knowledge of Bible doctrine truth. That's something you and I don't have. You and I have to keep learning it. The Jew will
never have to be told anything about doctrinal truth. God is just going to automatically infuse their thinking with His mind. And God the Holy Spirit will then be able
to lead them in perfect, majestic blessing. There'll be winners like the world has never seen, because they have all the information they need inside them. And all God
the Holy Spirit has to do is plug in the appropriate guidance system in any particular situation.
So, the word "this" is referring to what follows in that verse in Isaiah 59:21 – the promise of pouring out the Holy Spirit upon the Jews, so that, first of all,
they will be born again. And so that the Word of God, that they will know automatically now, will be able to function in them.
The Mosaic Covenant
Now, this condition is in contrast to the era under the old Mosaic Covenant. This covenant, as you know, imposed certain external rules which were to be obeyed, but
they were to be obeyed without any divine assistance. They had to do everything on your own. Sure, they had the Ten Commandments. They knew what was morally right and what
was morally wrong before God. And, of course, if they kept the commandments, they preserved your personal freedom and liberty. But the problem was that nobody gave them
any capacity to do right. They had to grit their teeth; they had to do the best they could; and, and most of the time, they blew it. That was the old covenant of Moses.
In Exodus 19:5-6, when this covenant is presented, God says to the Jewish people, "Now, therefore, if you will obey." Aha, do you notice the "if?" This is the only
covenant that God ever made with the Jewish people in which He inserted the word "if," which means: "If you do your part, then I'll do mine. If you don't do your part,
you get nothing from Me.
The Other Covenants
What a wonderful thing it was for the Abrahamic Covenant not to have the word "if" in it. That is also true of the Davidic Covenant, with the promised virgin-born
Messiah. There were no "ifs" in it. Also, for the Palestinian Covenant, the possession of the land that God promised – there were no "ifs" in it. Also, for the
New Covenant, there were no "ifs. And, of course, the New Covenant meant the new regeneration (being born again), and that's what we're talking about here.
So, when they got this Mosaic Covenant, God said, "If you will obey My voice, indeed, and keep My covenant, then you shall be a peculiar treasure unto Me, above all
people, for all the earth is mine. And you shall be unto Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation. These are the words which you shall speak to the children of Israel."
Well, as you know, they blew it. They did not become a nation of priestly people before God. They simply could not obey it. But along comes the church (we Christians),
and we're called a royal priesthood. That's why I tell you that you are the aristocrats of all the saints that have ever lived throughout the ages. You are royalty.
The Jews are mere commoners. They're not in our class at all. I'm talking about saved, Old Testament Jews. They never came up to the level that is ours in Christ.
Believe it or not, in walking every moment of your life with Jesus Christ living in your body as your personal companion for fellowship, and with God the Holy Spirit
completely indwelling you as the powerhouse for your functioning, so that you don't have to be a slob. Also, you don't have to be a dog like the rest of society who has
no orientation to the Word of God. So, you don't have to grow up, and ruin and foul up your life.
In Isaiah, God promises the Jews that there will come a time when God the Holy Spirit will transform them internally, and they will have then the power to do right, as
Christians possess that power today, with the indwelling Holy Spirit.
God is not through with the Jewish People
In Ezekiel 11:17, this important promise to the Jews is set forth for us – the promise of personal regeneration, internal power. Now, this is the covenant. This
is what we're talking about, when God says, "He will someday do for the Jewish people. And I stress all this because, after we have established that God has made some
promises He hasn't kept, the question is: what's He going to do about it? Aha. Now you see why we cannot say that God is through with the Jewish people. God has to keep
His word.
So, there is a big future for the Jews. And all the poor amillennialists are completely off-base. They miss the point. Ezekiel 11:17 says, "Therefore, say, 'Thus says
the Lord God, I will even gather you from the people, and assembled you out of the countries where you have been scattered, and I will give you the land of Israel.'"
Has He done that? No. He's starting to. He sure scattered them. He said, "If you don't obey Me, I'll take you like a handful of feathers, and I'll throw you in the air.
And you'll blow in all directions all over the world." Well, that's where they are.
However, now He says, "I want you to know that I'm not going to leave you there:" "And they shall come there, and they shall take away all its detestable things, and
all its abominations from there. And I will give them one heart, and I will put a new spirit within you (born again), and I will take the stony heart out of your flesh,
and will give them a heart of flesh." A stony heart is of a mind that only can function on the old sin nature: "That they may walk in My statutes and keep My ordinances
and do them; that they should be My people, and I will be their God."
Aha! So, the Old Testament did talk about being born again, just like the New Testament does. It did talk about turning to God and trusting in the Savior that is to
come, so that you might internally be regenerated.
Notice Ezekiel 36:24. What is ahead for the Jewish people? Ezekiel knew because God had told him. Ezekiel said, in Ezekiel 36:24, "For I will take you from among the
nations, and gather you out of all countries, and bring you into your own land. Then I will sprinkle clean water upon you." This is a religious symbol, symbolizing as a
sacrificial symbol of making things clean, which were sinful: "Then I will sprinkle clean water upon you, and you shall be clean; from all your filthiness and from all
your idols I will cleanse you. A new heart also I will give you. And a new spirit I will put within you." What is He talking about? Regeneration – being born
spiritually again: "And I will take away the stony heart out of your flesh, and I will give you a heart of flesh. And I will put My Spirit within you, and cause you to
walk in My statues. And you shall keep My ordinances and do them. And you shall dwell in the land that I gave to your fathers. And you shall be My people, and I will be
your God.
"'I will also save you from all your uncleanness. And I will call for the grain, and will increase it, and lay no famines upon you. I will multiply the fruit of the tree,
and the increase of the field, and you shall receive no more reproach of famine among the nations. Then you shall remember your own evil ways, and your doing which were
not good, and shall loathe yourselves in your own sight, for you iniquities, and for your abominations. Not for your sakes do I do this,' says the Lord God. 'Be it known
unto you. Be ashamed and confounded for your own ways, O, house of Israel.'"
This passage stresses again that God is going to do something for the Jewish people they don't deserve to have done for them. He is going to cause them to be born
again. He's going to remove all the filthy practices, and all the evil things their sin natures have caused them to do. Furthermore, He says, "You're going to look
upon yourselves, and you're going to loathe yourselves as you look back and you remember what you did." Have you ever had that experience? You Christians have been
saved by the grace of God made the aristocrats of God's saints. And now you know the Word of God, and you know the principles upon which to operate. And you acted
with carelessness and with indifference. And you look back upon eras in your life, and you shake your head with sorrow.
Well, you should not grieve over that, and you should not dwell upon it, because, having confessed that to God, He has forgotten it, and you must forget it. But it did
happen. And here God says to Israel, "You will not help but be able to remember what you once did over against what you could have been, and against what I would have
done for you, had you just listened to Me.
So, here in Romans 11, this is what Paul is talking about. In verse 27, he says, "This is My covenant (My promise): to make them a born-again people, and to give them
a knowledge of the Word of God (and then you notice); to prosper them materially." When He says, "My happiness unto then," the word "covenant" here is the Greek word
"diatheke" in the Greek Bible. And the word "My" emphasizes that it is God's set-up all the way. He put the thing together. And there is no condition – no "if."
What he is referring to is the new covenant that God promises to make with the Jewish people when He regenerates them, not as individuals only, but as a whole nation.
You will find that in Jeremiah 31:31-34, and we'll look at that in a moment. But I do want to point out that the new covenant here is new in contrast to the old covenant
of Moses, under which the nation failed. The basis for the Jews restoration to their special place of blessing is this new covenant: "This is My cabinet" – that
new covenant that promises personal regeneration unto them, individually and as a nation. This is what I promise to them, when I shall take away their sins."
Whenever God is going to remove something terrible from them, this attitude of sin which so controlled them – when is that going to be? He is going to take away
this, which He has already forgiven through the death of His Son. The Jews will then be restored as a godly nation on earth, and that's going to happen at the Second
Coming of Christ. God Himself is the source of this unconditional promise to the Jewish people – that He is going to take away their sin guilt (their moral guilt).
God is the source. They have been killing bulls, and goats, and all kinds of animals. And Hebrews 10:4 tells us that the blood of those animals could never take away
sins. It could only symbolically say, "Somebody has to pay for this." The sacrificial blood of Jesus Christ, however, can take away their sins. John 1:29 and
1 Corinthians 5:7 make that clear – that the death of Christ shed His blood, once and for all, for the forgiveness of sins.
God Made the Jews Savable
So, our sovereign God does what He chooses as per His own holiness, and He does it for whomsoever He chooses to do His blessings. But it is always in keeping with His
holiness. Remember that God's holiness is made up of two things: His absolute righteousness; and, His perfect justice. He always does what is right – perfect,
absolute righteousness. And He always does what is fair – His justice. Therefore, God could not restore Israel as a nation in their special place of blessing until
He first covered the sins that caused them to be removed. And through Jesus Christ, He has made the Jews savable. He has made the Jews compatible with His Holiness. And
it is God's desire to save people from hell. But that desire can never be executed apart from Jesus Christ. And that's the great mistake that the Jewish people make today,
as well as a lot of other people. They think they can get to heaven apart from Jesus Christ. They know they're sinners. They know they've got a moral problem with God,
but they think they can handle it in some way other than with Jesus Christ.
Jesus Christ is the only way to Salvation
When I say that, you should realize that that means just about everybody on earth. You people are practically nonexistent. You think that you get to heaven through
trusting in Christ for salvation. Numerically, you are practically nonexistent on this earth. The vast majority of people are going to prove that Jesus was right when
He said that the way into eternal life is a very narrow gate (Himself), and that the path is a very straight path (Himself), and that there are few people who are going
to find that gate and that path.
Revelation 1:5-6 put it this way, when it connects salvation always to the death of Christ: "And for Jesus Christ, Who is the faithful witness, and the first begotten
from the dead, and the Prince of the kings of the earth; unto Him that loved us, and washed us from our sins in His own blood, and has made us a kingdom of priests unto
and to God and His Father. To Him be glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen." We Christians have been washed in that blood. We Christians have become the kingdom of
priests that Israel could have been.
So, all of this is tied to what is called in the Bible "a New Covenant." We refer to it as the New Covenant. The Abrahamic Covenant, which is the foundation of all of
God's dealings with the Jewish people, was laid out for us in Genesis 12:1-3. We've gone over that in detail. In that statement, God promises a blessing to the Jewish
people. Part of the blessing was personal regeneration – being born again. The New Covenant to Israel amplifies that feature of the Abrahamic Covenant.
When Nicodemus, one of the rabbis of Israel, came to Jesus to inquire of Him concerning how one gets to heaven, Jesus said to him, "It's very simple, Nicodemus, you have
to be born again." And Nicodemus, understanding that the birth process is once and for all, did not catch on to what Jesus was saying. And he said, "How can a person go
back in his mother's womb and be born again?" He was thinking of it in terms of a physical birth process. And Jesus says, "He can't. Once you're born, you're born," which
is one way that the Lord was saying that once you come into salvation, and you're born again spiritually, you can't get back out again. You cannot reverse a birth. Then
Jesus said, "You must be born again." The Greek says, "From above." And Jesus rebuked Nicodemus He said, "You're a teacher of the Law? You have a degree from Jerusalem
Dallas Theological Seminary, and you don't know about being born again?" Why could the Lord say that? Why could the Lord rebuke this man in John 3:10? How could Nicodemus
have known about being born again?
Well you know now. I've shown you from the Old Testament prophets. They promised that God was going to put a new heart in these people. He was going to get rid of that
trying to keep it by the old external rules. He was going to put the Spirit of God within them so that they were a people who were born spiritually as well as people who
were born physically. And Nicodemus should have understood that. Certainly, he should have understood that from Jeremiah. 31. Please turn to that.
The New Covenant
Jeremiah 31:31-34 are the statements that present to us the New Covenant, in which there is declared the new birth for the Jewish people. Historically, Jeremiah writes
within this context. The ten northern tribes, which were called Israel, had been taken into captivity by Assyria. That happened in 722 B.C. The two southern tribes,
which were called Judah, continued until 586 B.C., when they were removed from the land, and taken into captivity to Babylon. At this dark point in Jewish history, with
the dispersion of the people from their Promised Land, God comes through, with the prophet Jeremiah, to declare to them the new covenant – expanding upon the
promise to Abraham to bring these people into heaven. This is an unconditional covenant. It has never been fulfilled for Israel, because it's directed to them as a
nation. A nation is made up of individuals. But the covenant is what God is going to do for them nationally. It has never been fulfilled til in the future. It does not
apply to the church. We have no part in this. We have a new grace dealing with God, but this is a covenant that pertains to the Jews only.
Here it is. Jeremiah 31:31: "'Behold the day is come,' says the Lord (and they haven't arrived yet), 'that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with
the House of Judah.'" It hasn't been executed yet. And you notice that He is speaking to the house of Israel and the house of Judah. Can you twist those words into
anything but Jews? Not if you let the language mean what it says, "But the amillennialists do exactly that. They say, "No, that does not mean the northern tribes of
Israel. That does not mean the southern tribes of Judah. That means we Christians. I'll let you talk to them as to how they get around that. Both the northern and
southern sections of the nation were included in the new covenant. That is the point.
Verse 32: "Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt." And I read you
the statement in Exodus, when He made that covenant, the Mosaic Covenant, when He said, "If you do this, then I'll really be nice to you: "'Which My covenant they broke,
although I was a husband unto them,' said the Lord." God said, "I treated them as my wife, and I was ready to give them anything. All they had to do was be subject to
Me as their husband." The new covenant will not be like the old Moses Covenant, because it will have powers for enforcement. The old one did not.
Verse 33: "'But this shall be the covenant that I will make with the House of Israel. After those days,' says the Lord, 'I will put My Law in their inward parts, within
their minds, and will read it on their hearts, and will be their God, and they shall be My people.'" This new covenant would be a new Law, but it would be within the souls
of the Jew rather than external rules. And here we have again a restatement of the fact that the Jew will know Bible doctrine. He will just come into it like a person
grows with two hands and a nose – just a natural part of his being. He will have the capacity to know God's thinking. It will be in him.
Verse 34: "'And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother saying, 'Know the Lord,' for they shall all Me, from the least of them to the
greatest of them,' says the Lord. 'For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sins no more.'" And there He clinches it. He says that the New Covenant
will be so fantastic that you will not have to learn the Word of God anymore. You will know it." That's not like us. That's why Hebrews 10:25 tells us Christians that
when the church door is open, don't fail to be there, because that's your prime source of learning God's divine viewpoint. So, just be there every time: "Do not neglect
the assembling of yourselves together." This is why 2 Peter 3:18 tells you: "Now you're a Christian. Wonderful! Now start growing in your personal experience of grace,
through the knowledge of Jesus Christ." You don't know it. You may have been out of touch with the Word of God, and you may be the kind of a character that never cracks
a Bible during the week.
Bible Study
Somebody told me that this is national Bible week. If you don't bring a Bible to church with you, that's pretty bad. But it's even worse if the one you have at home
never is a thing that you turn to; that you do not read; that you do that study; and, that you do not at least just immerse yourself in a few divine viewpoints thoughts,
you're a loser. And I don't care where you go in life, and how prominent you may become, and how popular and powerful you may become, and prosperous and everything else.
You're a pumpkin-poor loser. That's all. It is the Word of God that changes each person from an animal into the image of Christ. And you are born animals. The sin nature
is in full control. And you can be a Christian (and I'll not get into the doctrine of reversionism today), and you can slide right back down the scale to the animal
level. "You cannot live without every Word," Jesus says, "that proceeds from the mouth of God."
So, verse 34 is really a tremendous promise. And Nicodemus should have known this passage, where God says, "I'm going to give you a new spirit. I'm going to cause you
to be regenerated. I'm going to cause you to be born again. And you'll know everything there is to know about doctrinal principles. Therefore, you will be an obedient
people to Me." All will know the Lord, with full capacity in doctrinal understanding. All sins will be forgiven. Nothing will be held against them.
A key element of the New Covenant is the preservation, however, of the Jews as a nation. Please notice, beginning at verse 35, that this is stressed. A key element of
this New Covenant is that the Jews will always exist as the Israeli nation: "Thus says the Lord, who gives the sun for a light by day, and the ordinances of the moon
and of the stars for a light by night, who divides the sea when its waves roar. The Lord of host is His means: "If those audiences depart from before Me' (that is, if
these natural laws should cease, relative to the interstellar spaces and the planets and the sun and the stars), says the Lord, "then the seed of Israel also will cease
from being a nation before Me forever.' Thus says the Lord: 'If heaven above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, I will also cast
off all the seed of Israel for all that they have done,' says the Lord."
The promise is that Israel will exist forever. And God says, "If the natural forces stop functioning, then Israel will cease being a nation. Then He really nails it down
when He says, "If you could measure the extent of space, that's the day that Israel cease to be before Me." And you know how staggered we were when we were studying the
signs of the Zodiac, and their original spiritual message, and we discovered how big the Milky Way galaxy is, of which we are a part of, out in the outer fringes, and
that we are just one segment of thousands of thousands of these things. It's like one lady said to me, "Boy, as you described that, I just felt goosebumps all over me."
I don't know whether it was a message or a cold day or what. But I think it was the stupendous, staggering trying to grasp in your mind how big, big is with God. He says,
"Now, if you can get out there with your carpenter's ruler, and measure that, that's the day Israel is going to go down the tube. Well, the point is that that cannot be
done. The nation will always exist.
I don't know how an amillennialist can read passages like this, and say, "God's through with the Jews. The church has taken its place. The problem with the old Mosaic
Law was this: It was, as Romans 7:12 has told us, a good and holy thing. It gave us absolute righteousness. It told us how God does function, and it gave us a guideline
for our own actions. But the Mosaic Law does cannot cleanse a person from sin. It could not produce the blessings of the indwelling Holy Spirit. As a matter of fact,
what the Mosaic Law did was hit your old sin nature, which, by its natural characteristic, is rebellious against rules, and it made it react against rules.
It's like when a sign that says, "Wet paint. Please do not touch." You walk by, and nobody's watching you, and touch it. Why? Because you are told: "Don't touch that."
And it's not a good thing to do. It's tempting when you have a little kid that won't do you want her to do. So you use that reverse psychology on her. She won't eat
that little last bite of the hamburger, and you say, "Don't let her eat that piece of hamburger. We need to save that." then it's gone. She'll gobble it down, because
the sin nature says, "Do the opposite." It's right there. You don't want to do that, because it give them a bad pattern of reacting in a negative way that they shouldn't
be. But that's the idea here. God says that the Mosaic Law was clearly designed to show you people just how sinful you were. And it did. It forced a standard externally
on a person which internally he rejected. Even if he was intellectually sympathetic with it, he could not do it.
So, the New Covenant came along. Hallelujah! It promised a new nature within the Jews, which will cause them to want to obey God from within. Furthermore, it would
enable them to do so. So, this law of God, under the New Covenant, when placed within the Jews, was equated with being born again. They will then have the same
capacity we Christians have today to do what is right.
Jesus Christ
The agent of this covenant, of course, is Jesus Christ. In the upper room at the Passover meal, you remember that Jesus announced that the New Covenant for Israel would
be inaugurated with His death. Luke 22:20 tells us: "With this death of Mine, the New Covenant has been set in motion," because the groundwork had now been laid. It was
now possible for people to have their sins forgiven. Furthermore, this New Covenant was infinitely better than the old Mosaic Covenant because it was based on such
greatly better promises. Hebrews 8:6-12 indicates that.
Furthermore, the blood of Jesus Christ is the basis for forgiveness under the New Covenant, as He gave His life for the sins of the world. Hebrews 9:14-15 point that out.
Then, in Hebrews 10:16-20, you have indicated that there are no further sacrifices needed to forgive sins. I stress that again: There are no more sacrifices; no more
effort; noble acting nice; and, no more good deeds – nothing to be added to the death of Christ for you to be saved. If you do, you can count on it that you will
spend eternity in the lake of fire, because you have undermined the grace basis of salvation.
Please turn to Hebrews 10:16. I do not want you to miss this principle concerning the New Covenant based upon the death of Christ. Hebrews 10:16 says, "'This is the
covenant that I will make with them after those days,' says the Lord. 'I will put my laws into their hearts, and their minds I will write them, and their sins and
iniquities I will remember no more. Now where remission of these is, there is no more offering for sin; having therefore, brethren, boldness to enter into the holiest
by the blood of Jesus, by a new and living way, which He has consecrated for us through the veil; that is, to say, His flesh.'" We now can enter the Holy of Holies
where God Himself dwells, directly God to believer, because Christ flesh was like the veil that held people out of the holy of holies. That has been torn. That has
been broken in his death. We have access directly to God. Nothing can keep you from God except your own willful stupidity in pursuing a life of sin, and of deciding
that you will go for that which is the cheap, and that which is unbecoming a royal person of the family of God.
The Gospel
In Romans 11:28-29, the apostle Paul gives the divine plan. He says for the Jews and the gospel: "As concerning the gospel, they are enemies." The word "gospel" here
is the Greek word "euaggelion." This means "good news," and it refers here to the grace of God in Jesus Christ. The gospel is stated for us in 1 Corinthians 15:3-4.
It says that Christ died for our sines; He was buried; and, He rose again. That is the gospel. The Bible tells us that the gospel is made up of some bad news for
sinners. It says, "First of all, that all have sinned, so all morally guilty before God. Another piece of bad news is that the divine penalty for sin is death. That
means eternal separation from God in hell.
When you are witnessing to a person, the first thing you tell them, if you want to explain to that person how to get to heaven, is you give him the bad news: you are a
sinner, and that's going to take you to hell, because the wages of sin is death. Then you give him the good news from God. Jesus Christ died to pay the penalty for sin
in your place. The second piece of good news is that you can be saved from hell by trusting in Jesus Christ alone for salvation. So, you tell the person what the gospel
is; what his problem is; and, then you tell him what to do with it: you tell him to believe it. You don't tell them to invite Jesus into his heart. You don't tell them
to clean up his life. You don't tell them to pray that God would save him. You don't tell them to walk an aisle, or to raise a hand, or to do any other of those confusing
things that the Word of God does not justify.
I remind you that the gospel is a very specific area of truth (of information), and it is more than believing that God exists. The demons, the Bible tells us, believe
that God exists, but they're not going to heaven. They're condemned. For them there is no salvation offer.
So, in terms of the gospel, which is going to take you and me, as gentiles, into heaven, the Jews are related to that as enemies. The Greek word is "echthros." This
means someone who is totally alienated and unfriendly. Here, it refers to the Jews' attitude toward the gospel of the grace of God. The Jews worldwide today have an
unrelenting antagonism toward Jesus Christ. And as enemies of the gospel, the Jews are the enemies of God. And for that reason, they've lost favor with Him.
So, Romans 11:28 says: "Concerning the gospel, the Jewish people are enemies for your sake." That is because the door of blessing has been shut on them, it has been
opened to us as gentiles. We have benefited by this provision of the Abrahamic Covenant.
Then he goes on and says, "But as touching the election." He says, "But as concerning something else – the election. The Greek Bible uses the word "ekloge."
"Ekloge" means "choice:" "But as far as God's sovereign choice goes, relative to the Jewish people, they are beloved." The Greek word is an adjective: "agapetos."
You can see the "agape" word here which means a mental attitude love: no bitterness; no condemnation; no indifference; and, no antagonism toward the Jewish people.
While they are His enemies, they are very dear to Him. God loves the nation as a parent loves a beloved child who has gone off into the sin of the world system.
Why is he doing this? He says, "For the fathers' sake." And when he said "the fathers," he is referring to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. He's referring to the promises
that God made to Abraham, and to those patriarchs, of what God would do for this nation, and how He would love them forever. As a nation, God has elected the Jews to
a special place of blessing in the world forever. Deuteronomy 7:6-8 reinforced that.
So, God loves the nation of Israel in spite of its evil ways, because He has made a promise to make them a great nation. The Abrahamic Covenant is clearly against the
idea that the amillennialists hold, that God is permanently through with the Jews as a nation, and that He has replaced them with the church.
The Grace Gifts of God
Let's tie this up with verse 29. Why is this true that, while the Jews are the enemies relative to the gospel that they reject, they are still beloved of God as a
nation, and that that is the way it's going to be: "For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.: The gifts refers to a grace expression – the
"charisma." This refers to benefits that are received purely as a gift. You don't deserve them. God gives it to you. It applies here to special blessings which have
been promised to the Jews in the Abrahamic Covenant, and later expanded upon. These are promises such as the Jews would be multiplied and made a large nation; that the
Jews would receive the unique true spiritual enlightenment which no other people on earth possess; that the Jews would be the channel for producing the God-Man Savior
of mankind; that the Jews would produce the inherent and completed Bible; that the Jews would be the first in line for salvation by faith in the Savior; that the Jews
would enjoy great material prosperity and super physical health; and, that the Jews were to possess the moral principles which preserved God-given freedom in human
society while they been through the devil's world. These were fantastic special blessings that were promised to the Jews: "For the gifts (the grace, special blessings
of God."
The Calling of God
Furthermore, he refers to their calling. The "calling" is the Greek word "klesis." "Klesis" means "a summons." It's actually a divine invitation. Here, it applies to the
special invitation of God to the nation of Israel for a special mission in the world. What is that mission? They are to become the leading nation in the world. The Jewish
people will be the superpower of the Millennial Kingdom. The Jews, furthermore, are to influence all the nations of the world with their divine viewpoint truth. They will
be the nation that all nations will listen to. That is like the United States is, basically, today, except that we have blown it. Instead of putting out divine viewpoint
truth, we constantly put disoriented thinking out to the nations of the world, because we are a post-biblical society.
Irrevocable Promises
Furthermore, the Jews are going to be an example. They are called to be an example of obedience to the Word of God, and the blessing which it brings. You remember those
better days that you used to have in your life when you were more faithful to the Word of God? God says that the Jews are going to be an example of what happens when you
listen to God: "For the grace gifts and the special objectives and calling of God for this people are without repentance." This is a long Greek word, but it is a
significant one: "ametamelatos." "Ametamelatos" means "irrevocable." It's a precious word in the Greek Bible. It means that God is never going to go back on His Word.
This word is so sacred that it's only used twice in the New Testament. The only other time the Holy Spirit uses this word is in 2 Corinthians 7:10, where it means
"without a change of mind." You can trust God that He's not going to go back on His thinking. He's not going to go back on His Word.
So, once God has given a grace gift, and given a special calling (a special plan) for you, He's not going to change His mind. God is not going to take His promises back
from the Jewish nation. Generations of Christ-rejecting Jews have marched into hell in spite of God's faithfulness to His promises. Someday, God is going to cause the
Jews to turn to Jesus Christ as Savior. Then the promises to the nation will be fulfilled, as the Millennial Kingdom begins. But how sad that so many Jews will end
up in the lake of fire in spite of these promises, just because they thought they could get away with it, and because they thought that God thinking can be conned, and
changed, and twisted. He is irrevocable. The immutability of God, of course, is a great comfort to all of us who believe Him, and who have trusted in Jesus Christ as
Savior. That means we're safe too. In other words, God never springs something on us in the small print in the contract, like people do. He's always up front. You can
take Him for His Word.
Why He has elected any of us to salvation, and to grace us out in daily blessings is a wonder indeed. That is especially true when you think about all the really nice
people that you and I know who have been passed over by God, and who have been allowed to go on to receive the consequences of their evil in the lake of fire. Why would
He take you, and pass over such a nice person? How sad, on the other hand, to spoil God's grace calling to us, with our negative volition toward His Word, and with our
carnal living. How awful to know the Word of God, and to have been warned, and to have been given the scoop, as you people here at Berean constantly are, and then to go
out and live in a way that contradicts, and undermines, and is incompatible with the holiness of God and your calling as a Christian. Where do you think you're going to
get with that? Just imagine where you could be if you quit listening to the world, and to the devil, and to your sin nature. It's awesome to think where you could be.
God certainly makes no mistakes, and it's just a pity that we can't all decide to pay attention and go along with Him.
So, I would give you this admonition in closing, for myself as well as for you. Don't waste any more of the days of your life, but concentrate on serving your Heavenly
Father with your special spiritual gifts. I can assure you that you people are only going to be here a few more years. And it's going to go zap – just like that.
A few more years, and you're going to be up there, and it's going to be report card time. That's when your eternity is going to begin with what you really have decided
to send ahead. Are you ready to gamble on wasting your life? God, our Heavenly Father, is the number one person in our lives. So, why, in practice, allow ourselves to put
Him last? I don't know. But it's not smart.
Dr. John E. Danish, 1988
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