Rabbi Schneider - The Power of Israel's Salvation
Many of us, when we study the book of Romans, we first of all think that the book of Romans tells us how to get saved. Some of you that are a bit older, you remember there used to be a way to lead people to salvation, a witnessing tool that we called the Romans Road. We would go to selected scriptures from the book of Romans to show people that Jesus would save them. For example, we would go to a scripture in the book of Romans that says, "All have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God". And then we go to another scripture in the book of Romans, "But while we were yet sinners, Christ died for us".
And we'd walk them through the book of Romans with selected scriptures showing how all men are guilty before God, but that God has bridged the gap between sinful man and Himself through the person of Yeshua. Then we taught them how to get saved. Romans 10, "If you believe in your heart that God raised Yeshua from the dead, and confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, you will be saved". And then we gave them assurance of their salvation. And we did it all by pointing to specific scriptures in the book of Romans. So many of us when we think of the book of Romans we think about that's the book that tells us how to get saved. And indeed it is.
But we have to consider what was in Paul's heart and mind when he wrote the epistle. Was Paul simply trying to tell us how to get saved? Or was there more going on? Because to truly understand any book in the Bible we have to understand the purpose of the writer. What was in Paul's heart when he wrote it? And through careful examination and inquiry, we discover that there was more going on in Paul's mind when he penned this book. And we began last time by going to Romans 9. Romans 9 in review starts out like this. Paul says, "I'm telling the truth in Christ, I'm not lying, my conscience testifies with me in the Holy Spirit..."
So now Paul is in fellowship with the Ruach Hakodesh as he shares this burden. His conscience is in fellowship with the Holy Spirit. And it's a word of truth, this burden. Paul continues and he says, "...that I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart". Paul's burdened. He's sad about this. "For I could wish that I myself were accursed, separated from Christ for the sake of my brethren, my kinsmen according to the flesh, who are Israelites..." So Romans 9 begins to unveil and reveal Paul's burden for his people, the Jewish people, the Israelites. And he takes all of chapter 9 to begin to help us understand Israel's call and the place that they still hold in God's heart. But it's not just Romans 9 that addresses God's desire to see Israel saved.
Let's turn the chapter and go to Romans 10. Hear this. The grass withers and the flowers fade, but beloved, the word of your Lord abides forever. Let's continue now with Romans 10. Remember, all of nine is about Israel. Now we come to chapter 10. "Brethren, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation". Okay. This is not just like a one verse. This is like a whole chapter has gone by, Romans 9. And now we begin another chapter. And Romans 10 now is all about Israel's unique role in God's plan of redemption and the burden that the apostle, that Shalíach Paul had for them.
Look again at Romans 10:1-2. "Brethren, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation. For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge". And then Paul goes on to say, "For not knowing about God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God". In other words, Paul is saying they're sincere, they are sincere, they are deliberate but they missed the boat that would take them into the heart of God. He said, because they wouldn't subject themselves to the purposes of God through Messiah Yeshua but instead, simply tried to earn God's favor through the law, they missed their opportunity to enter in to the new covenant God had made, which brings us into the intimacy that can only be experienced when the Ruach Hakodesh, the Holy Spirit comes to live inside us, which can only happen when we receive Jesus Yeshua. But the point that I'm making, beloved, is Paul's continual longing to see Israel saved.
So once again, "...my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation". So I want you to see this was very important to Paul. And he goes through chapter 10 now, again, addressing the place of Israel, the challenge that he's facing. And the challenge that Paul is explaining here is twofold. Number one, he's explaining that even though national Israel has, by and large, rejected their Messiah, he said, the call of God on them as a nation is irrevocable. They are still beloved to the Father, to Father God, for the sake of the Father. They are still very special in God's redemptive plan and in God's heart. So he's addressing that, first of all. God has not rejected Israel. The second thing that Paul's addressing is this. Walk through this with me.
Think through this with me. Here's what Paul is addressing. He said, "If Israel is God's chosen people, which they are..." Deuteronomy 7:6, God said to Israel, "You alone have I chosen to be a people for myself out of all the peoples or above all the peoples on the face of the earth". Israel has a unique role. They always have had a unique role, and they will into the future. We're gonna see that later on in the series. So the question Paul's asking is, is if Israel was God's chosen people... And let me say to you beloved one, it doesn't mean that you're not chosen because we're all God's favorite, but there's a special place that Israel plays. It doesn't make anybody else less because we're all only servants. We're all perfectly loved by the Father, all perfectly affirmed. But God is going to magnify Himself through Israel in a very unique way.
So the question or the problem Paul's addressing is, if Israel is God's first covenant chosen people that has unique role to play forever, and they're rejecting their Messiah, has God's plan failed? That's the question Paul's asking. Has God's plan failed? If Israel is His chosen people and He sent them the Messiah and they're not believing, has the plan of God fallen apart? And Paul said, "No, May it never be". Paul answers, he says, "I'm an Israelite and I believe". And then Paul goes on to describe that God has a remnant. Just like in the days of Elijah, where Elijah thought he was the only one that believed in Israel, and he called out to God, he said, "I alone am left". And the Lord said, "No, Elijah, I've got 7,000 in Israel that are mine that haven't bowed to the knee of Baal".
And then Paul says... After using that example to illustrate the remnant of Israel, Paul says, So too there's a remnant of Israelites of Jewish people that have been saved, like myself, in the planet. So God's plan hasn't failed because His people have always only been a remnant. Okay? So Paul's addressing that he's explained that even though natural Israel in the majority has not believed, God's plan hasn't failed because God's always worked through a remnant. And there's a remnant on earth in every generation of Jewish people that have believed. So Paul addresses that issue. and we're going to continue on now, and we're going to chapter 11. So all of chapter 9 is about Israel's salvation. All the chapter 10 is about Israel's salvation.
So you're starting to see that the book of Romans is about much more than just getting saved. The book of Romans reveals the important place that Israel plays in God's heart and in the plan of redemption. So now we've already had two chapters that are about the Israelites and Jewish people. Now we're gonna go to Romans 11. Now we've got three chapters. Paul says this, "I say then, God has not rejected His people, has He? Far from it! For I too am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin". And then Paul goes on to explain the believing remnant as I just described to you using the illustration of Elijah.
I'm going to pick back up in verse 11 of Romans 11. Paul says this, "I say then, they did not stumble so as to fall, did they"? In other words, is God done with Israel? Have they fallen forever? Have they been left behind? No way. Paul says, "No way". Listen. "I say then, they did not stumble so as to fall, did they? Far from it"! In other words, the difference between stumbling here and falling is, you know, stumbling is if you trip but you don't fall flat on your face. Israel stumbled but they didn't fall flat on their face from God's perspective because God's still got something that He's doing. So God has not rejected His people is the point.
Let's continue on. "...but by their wrongdoing," Paul continues on, "salvation has come to the Gentiles to make them jealous". In other words, Paul is saying, "Listen, God's plan hasn't failed. And even though they're not believing right now, they haven't fallen irrevocably. In fact, because they have stumbled, the word of salvation has come to the Gentile". What does Paul mean by this? When Paul first came to faith,-we read about this in the book of Acts-he was convinced after he came to faith in Yeshua that the Lord was sending him to His own people to proclaim Yeshua as Messiah. Because Paul was... he was a Hebrew of Hebrews. In other words, Paul was a leading respected religious leader of his age. He was a Pharisee of Pharisees. In other words, he was at the top of the pecking order when it came to being respected by the religious Jewish leadership. He was a Pharisee described himself as to the law blameless.
In other words, when you look at it from a human perspective, he thought he was keeping the law perfectly. Not only that, but Paul had been educated under the leading Jewish sage of his day, Gamaliel. So Paul was a Hebrew of Hebrews from the tribe of Benjamin, circumcised, educated under the leading Jewish sage of his day. So when the Lord revealed to Paul that Yeshua was the Messiah, Paul thought he was qualified because everyone respected him to go to the Pharisees whom he was a part of to share with them Jesus is the Messiah after all.
So what happens is Paul thanks God sending him to testify to the Pharisees regarding the person of Jesus. And Paul goes to Jerusalem, he goes to the temple. And while he's at the temple, the Lord speaks to him. And God speaks to him and says this. He said, "Paul, Shaul, his Hebrew name, they are not going to receive your testimony, Paul. I am sending you far away to the Gentiles". So if the Pharisees, if the Jewish leaders would have received it, Paul would have stayed there. But God said to him, "Paul, that door is shut. I'm sending you far away to the Gentiles".
So what Paul is saying here in Romans 11, as a result of the Jewish people's rejection, he was sent to the Gentiles. So by their rejection, salvation was sent to the Gentiles. In other words, it's all part of God's plan. This was all part of God's unfolding historical plan of redemption. And then Paul goes even on further to say that as he delivers the word to the Gentiles and they become believers and start to experience the supernatural reality of God's presence in their lives, it's going to be so evident that they're experiencing the reality of God that it's going to provoke Jewish people to jealousy. So Paul understood that through his ministry to the Gentiles he was going to reach his own people indirectly because Gentiles would be used of the Lord to provoke Jews to jealousy when Jewish people saw the reality of God in Gentiles lives.
I actually have a real example. I have a relative that as a college assignment they had to go to an environment to go to a cultural experience that they had never experienced before to expand their horizon. So my relative went to a Pentecostal church. My Jewish relative who had no exposure to Christianity, no exposure to the charismatic gifts, no exposure to Pentecostalism, my relative went to a Pentecostal church as part of this college project. And she was so blown away by what she experienced there. By the reality of the experience, those in this congregation were having as they worship God it spurred her on to try to bring what they had into Judaism. And this individual actually became a rabbi.
My relative actually become a rabbi in the Jewish renewal movement. Unfortunately, you can't bring what that congregation had into your life or into Judaism without Jesus. But she was made jealous. Unfortunately, she didn't respond by receiving Jesus, she tried to take the outer trapping of it and bring it into Judaism. But again, Jesus is the center of everything. So without Him as the fullness you're going to end up lacking.
So, again, Paul understood that through his ministry to the Gentile, Jews would be provoked to jealousy. And in fact, today, if I go to a Jewish person and share Yeshua with them, and the good news of salvation, oftentimes they're gonna react right away because they think it's so anathema for a Jew like myself to believe in Jesus. They look at me like a heretic. But if you as a Gentile go to a Jewish person and start sharing your faith, they're gonna think, well, they're supposed to believe in Jesus. They're a Gentile, so they're not going to react so emotionally.
Now, don't misunderstand. We see many Jewish people coming to faith through Discovering the Jewish Jesus being broadcast in their home. And I want to thank all of you that are supporting this ministry. Because of your support we are able to broadcast this message all over the earth. And Jewish people are sitting alone in the privacy of their home, watching, listening, paying attention. And we're getting testimonies all the time of how Jewish people are coming to faith as well as getting testimonies from Jewish people that do believe in Jesus but felt like they were all alone. So thank you, thank you, those of you that are partnering with the Lord through this ministry.
You see, Paul concludes by saying this: at the end of the day, there is no place for pride, because the Jewish people, in rejecting Jesus, will be humbled. But the Gentile people had no place at all before Paul the Jewish apostle came to them. So at the end of the day we all stand before God being able to offer nothing of our own goodness. No one's better than anybody else. We all receive God's gift of salvation, of shalom, of wholeness through His grace by receiving God in the flesh through the person of Messiah Jesus. I want to encourage you, beloved ones, if you know Jewish people, share your love for Jesus with them. You don't have to have the entire Bible memorized. All you have to do is let them know that you love the God of Israel and how Jesus the King of the Jews made the God of Israel real to you. Israel real to you.