It's too bad our government, in all it's strategizing after 911, didn't first go to Romans 11 to get an answer for the madness that had just happened. Why is there war in the middle east? For the most part, aside from greed, money, etc... it's ultimately God's judgment. Everyone hates Israel, they all have an intense anger for the Jewish people. Why?
Your probably asking what does war have to do with Romans 11? Verse 8 says, "God has given them a spirit of stupor, Eyes that they should not see, And ears that they should not hear, To this very day." I believe this whole mess is God's judgment against His people because of unbelief. And that unbelief comes so we (the Gentiles) can be grafted into the root, the root being God. We are the wild branches God is having mercy on, and by His grace we are being grafted into the family of God. (v 17) We are the reason for the war, ultimately it's our fault, not the terrorist.
Verse 29 "The gifts and calling of God are irrevocable". Long ago God made Abraham a part of that calling, He made a covenant with the forefather of the Jews, that He would make a nation, the descendents as numerous as the sand in the sea. As promised God followed through with that convenant, we've seen God bring the Jews through thick and then, saving a remnant to this day, even through their unbelief. God also made a covenant with the Gentiles (prophesied in Isaiah 9:6) that through Jesus, God's Son , we would have an opportunity to restore the fellowship (that was broken in the Garden of Eden) with God. So Paul is saying that until the fullness of the Gentiles, God is going to keep Israel in a spirit of blindness toward Jesus Christ. We have so much to be thankful for. The question is, when is our time up, when is the fullness of the Gentiles?
If Romans 11 still confuses you take heart, Paul says in verse 33, His ways are past finding out.
Grace, MB
2 comments:
"Consider therefore the kindness and sternness of God: sternness to those who fell, but kindness to you, provided that you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off. And if they do not persist in unbelief, they will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. After all, if you were cut out of an olive tree that is wild by nature, and contrary to nature were grafted into a cultivated olive tree, how much more readily will these, the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree!"
This verse made me think about the idea of eternal salvation. Paul talks about the "sternness to those who fell". Using the example of the olive tree, he talks about how those that fell were cut off, but could easily be grafted back in if they did not "persist in unbelief". So... does this mean that you only lose your salvation if you actually turn your back on God and don't believe anymore, or... do you lose your salvation if you "fall"? Here's the good news though: regardless of which one of those it is, you can always be "grafted back on to the tree". God doesn't give up on us. Ever. Now that's something to be thankful for.
Carrie, your eyes are beginning to see things that Paul called a mystery. Not everyone sees nor understands this concept of grace. Who's the Potter here? I love it. Thanks for sharing.
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