October 2nd, 2011
Romans 11:11-24
“Power Plant—Grafted In”
Bible Memory Verse for the Week: “Therefore, since the promise of entering his rest still stands, let us be careful that none of you be found to have fallen short of it. For we also have had the gospel preached to us, just as they did; but the message they heard was of no value to them, because those who heard did not combine it with faith.” Hebrews 4:1-2
BACKGROUND INFORMATION:
Gentile: a person of a non-Jewish nation or of non-Jewish faith; especially: a Christian as distinguished from a Jew.
v.11 – Paul asks a rhetorical question (see verse 11:1). Although this section of scripture was written to a predominantly Gentile congregation, Paul wasn’t neglecting his roots and makes a strong connection between the Gentile believers and Moses’ prophecy in Dt. 32:21 (as he also hinted to earlier in 10:19). Jewish identity focuses hard around the fact that the Jews are God’s chosen people. His prized possession. For the Jews, God and his Torah are the focal point of their existence. For His favor to dwell on any other would (and should) entice them to jealousy. In Acts 15, Paul declares that since the Jews were rejecting the gospel that he would now go to the Gentiles.
v.12, 15 – The Jewish rejection of Jesus meant riches for the world, and their re-acceptance will mean something unimaginably profound… Life from the dead! Commentators have two views of this passage; one being eschatological (of the end times) the other being figurative or metaphorical. Either way, when this happens, watch out! This will be huge!
v.13 – Jesus told Ananias in Acts 9 that he was going to call Paul out to carry his name to the Gentiles.
v.16 – The concept behind firstfruits was that of giving the first portion of a harvest back to God in his honor; in acknowledging that he owned it all anyways. (Ex. 23:16, 23:19, 34:22, 34:26; Lev. 2:14, 23:17; Num. 28:26 etc)
v.17 – Some broken off. Obviously not all Jews were broken off. Paul is an obvious example, but it’s easy to forget that the first church was Jewish in every sense of the word.
The questions to be answered are… Why does Paul once again bring up Israel’s status before God, and what (if anything) does it have to do with our status as Gentiles?
Answer: Paul is emphatically declaring that God is not yet through with the Jewish people, that He has a divine plan for them in the unfolding of the redemption story, and that we Gentiles are only grafted-in by faith, on their roots. In other words… their story is our story.
The Word for the Day is… Grafted
What is Paul trying to communicate to us through these verses?
I. That because of Israel’s temporary stumbling; we too can now be grafted-in to the family of God. (1 Peter 2:4-10; Luke 2:32, 21:24; Acts 9:15, 10:45, 11:18, 13:46-48, 15, 18:6, 22:21, 26:23, 28:28; Rom. 3:29)
“But you are a chosen people, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people belonging to God, that you may declare the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his wonderful light. Once you were not a people, but now you are the people of God; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.” 1 Peter 4:9-10 NIV84
Israel’s eclipse is not permanent, she is only temporarily placed in a condition less favored than that of the Gentiles. Although in itself this may seem bad, in the context of God’s long-range plan it is good; as will be shown, it is part of how God brings salvation to the Jewish people. (David H. Stern, Jewish New Testament Commentary, p. 407)
This passage does not teach that the national promises to Israel have been abrogated and are now being fulfilled by the church. This idea, taught by amillenarians, is foreign to Paul’s point, for he said Israel’s fall is temporary. While believing Gentiles share in the blessings of the Abrahamic Covenant (Gen. 12:3b) as Abraham’s spiritual children (Gal. 3:8-9), they do not permanently replace Israel as the heirs of God’s promises (Gen. 12:2-3; 15:18-21; 17:19-21; 22:15-18). (John A. Witmer, The Bible Knowledge Commentary, p.485)
II. That God’s desire is to make the Jews jealous of what they have lost and for them to look to Yeshua (Jesus), their Messiah, and be grafted back in. (Mat. 27:11; Mark 15:2; Luke 23:3; Acts 18:6; Rom. 1:16)
Throughout most of the last two thousand years, the Church, to its great shame, not only has not provoked Jews to jealousy but has engendered repugnance and fear; so that Jewish people, instead of being drawn to the love of the Jewish Messiah Yeshua, have unusually come to hate or ignore him, remaining convinced that their non-Messianic Judaism or secularism or agnosticism is superior to Christianity. (David H. Stern, Jewish New Testament Commentary, p. 408)
III. That together, both Jews and Gentiles share in a rich spiritual heritage. (Rom. 1:16, 3:29, 10:12; 1 Cor. 1:24, 12:13; Gal. 3:28; Col. 3:11)
True Christians have no basis for persecuting others. Attempting to force Christian belief only destroys that belief. “Evangelism” does not justify hurting others. Both Gentiles and Jews have done so much to damage the cause of the God they claim to serve that Paul’s vision of unity seems very distant. Yet God chose the Jews, just as he chose the Gentiles, and he still works to unite Jews and Gentiles in a new Israel, a new Jerusalem, ruled by his son. (Bruce B. Barton, Life Application Bible Commentary, Romans, p. 213)
IV. That we Gentiles are not to boast. We are the unnatural branches, the outsiders, the unnatural ones. (Rom. 3:27, 11:18, 1 Cor. 5:6; 2 Cor. 11:30; Gal. 6:14; Eph. 2:8-10)
Whether in worship, prayer, or our relationships with non-believers, from time to time all believers need to be reminded of who are the sinners in who is the Savior. There must never be any doubt who is the dependent one and who is the Sustainer. We are to share with the world a gospel they don’t deserve, while remembering that we don’t deserve it either! (Bruce B. Barton, Life Application Bible Commentary, Romans, p. 219)
CONCLUSION/APPLICATION:
A. Don’t bad-talk the Jews. Their loss is our gain. Their story is your story. (Ex. 3:7; Luke 8:21; Acts 3:25; Acts 17:29; Rom. 9:8, 11:18; Phil. 3:8)
Paul makes clear that the argument in these verses has a practical purpose. He scolds Gentile Christians in Rome for their Arrogant boasting over the Jews (vv. 13, 18-22). Here surfaces what was probably one of the basic purposes of the letter to the Romans. Gentiles have become the majority in the church at Rome as well as in the church at large. They are tempted to take undue pride in their new position, even to the extent of thinking they have now replaced the Jews in God’s plan. Paul disabuses them of this notion, showing that, by an act of sheer grace, they have been added to Israel. Boasting is out of the question, then, because their own salvation is part of God’s plan to offer his mercy to all people. (Douglas J. Moo, The NIV Application Commentary, Romans, p.335)
B. We should live lives that cause all people to envy our relationship with the God of the Universe. (Mat. 5:16; 1 Peter 2:12)
Are the Jews we meet provoked to jealousy or just provoked? We Christians ought to be so alive, so full of Christ, and so full of love for one another that Jews and Gentiles say to themselves, “They have something I don’t have, and I must have it.” (R. Kent Hughes, Preaching the Word, Romans, p. 197)
Does our conduct as Gentiles lead the Jews to desire what we have? Does it lead anybody to desire it? Honesty compels us to admit that our conduct has in general led to exactly the opposite result. (James Montgomery Boice, Romans: Volume 3, p. 1324)
C. Don’t boast about your spiritual status. You are only attached by faith, not of anything you’ve accomplished or are doing. (Rom. 1:5, 1:17, 3:21-23, 3:28, 11:20, Gal. 3:26)
The Jewish leaders were the people historically used by God to bring his Son to the cross. But it was the sin of the entire human race that ultimately required that sacrifice. We are all guilty of the blood of Christ’s death, and all of us equally are offered the opportunity to have our sins cleansed by it. (Douglas J. Moo, The NIV Application Commentary, Romans, p. 373)
Worship Point:
Worship happens when you fully understand and appreciate that God is in control; that by His love and grace, salvation has come to all people who will put their faith in Jesus.
Spiritual Challenge:
Become more familiar with your roots and appreciate God’s love even more as you realize the extent at which He was willing to go to graft you in to the family; as an unnatural branch.
Quotes To Note:
We ought to remember that the Lord may have infinitely wise and gracious motives for his most severe and terrible judgments. (Robert Haldane, An Exposition of the Epistle to the Romans, p. 532)
Why has the conversion of Israel as a nation not taken place? If we answer in terms of the mechanism given as an answer in verse 11, the problem is obvious. For the most part, Gentile Christians have not lived in a way that would provoke anyone, let alone the Jews, to envy what they possess. (James Montgomery Boice, Romans: Volume 3, p. 1324)
The distinguished missionary statesman E. Stanley Jones once asked the Indian leader Mahatma Gandhi what Christians would have to do to win India for Jesus Christ. Gandhi knew India well, and he knew Christians well, too. He said, “There are four things Christians should do if they want to win India for Christ. First, Christians should act like Jesus Christ. Second, do not compromise your faith. Third, learn all you can about the non-Christian religions. And fourth, let everything you do be characterized by love.” Gandhi knew the force of love, and he had seen much of its opposite, particularly from Christians. So he spoke wisely when he reminded the followers of Jesus: “Let everything you do be characterized by love.” (James Montgomery Boice, Romans: Volume 3, p. 1325)
In the Old Testament, God made his rightful ownership over everything clear, but he only required token gifts that acknowledged his ownership. The gift represented the whole. If given to God, it was declared holy and served to sanctify the whole. Paul extends this principle to cover the state of his people. If the firstfruits, the remnant of Jews who since Abraham had lived by faith, were called holy by God, then there is still hope for the whole, proving that God has not rejected the dough (Israel). If the root, the tree of justification by faith, is holy, then any branch attached to and nourished by that root will also be holy. (Bruce B. Barton, Life application Bible commentary, Romans, page 218)
“Branches were broken off that I might be grafted in.” A Gentile believer might make this argument. It is true that it was necessary to break off some branches in the grafting in process. But it would be a mistake to assume that Paul is limiting God’s acceptance, as if there was only so much room on the tree for branches. The point is not so much replacement as opportunity. The idea is not that Jews were broken off so that we could take their place; but rather that they were broken off so that the Gentile opportunity for justification by faith might become clear. This is underscored by Paul’s assertion that even broken off branches can be grafted back in (see 11:23). (Bruce B. Barton, Life Application Bible Commentary, Romans, p. 219)
God willingly set aside Israel because of their stumbling and blindness to the good news. The Gentiles should remember that God will set them aside as well if they become arrogant-he will not spare them either. Some readers may wonder if Paul is speaking of apostasy in this verse. According to the context, it is not absolutely clear whether Paul is referring to those who have fallen away from the faith or those whose faith was never real. What is clear is that he is warning Gentiles not to arrogantly think that they’re being grafted in is irreversible. The only way they can remain in the tree is by continuing to trust in God’s grace. (Bruce B. Barton, Life Application Bible Commentary, Romans, page 220)
And although jealousy is essentially a negative term, God’s intention was for Israel’s jealousy of Gentiles to be a positive stimulus to draw his people back to himself. But Jews had long disdained Gentiles, whom they considered to be outside the boundaries of God’s grace. To be told that they have lost their special relationship to God was distressing enough, but to be told that God offered that forfeited relationship to Gentiles was a bitter pill indeed. (John MacArthur, the MacArthur New Testament commentary, Romans, page 109)
It should be the desire of every Christian to manifest the spiritual realities of a transformed life that would draw unbelieving Jews to belief in our Lord and their Messiah, a witness that would test their divinely inspired jealousy of Gentiles and be used to turn it to a divinely desired faith in his Son. Unfortunately, the Christianity that you see in many professed, and even some genuine, Christians reflects little of the love and righteousness of Christ and of the salvation he brings. When they see Gentile Christians who are dishonest and immoral, and especially those who are anti-semetic in the name of Christ (who was the supremely perfect Jew), they are deeply and understandably offended and repulsed. They are anything but jealous of such Gentiles, and they distance themselves still further from the Lord instead of drawing closer to him. (John MacArthur, the MacArthur New Testament commentaries, Romans, p.109)
============================== BELOW NOT IN PRINTED NOTES ========================
The Gentiles that were grafted in are only there by their faith and by God’s grace. Thus they are warned, “do not be arrogant, but be afraid”. Those who are arrogant cherish proud thoughts about themselves; they do not have a proper fear and respect for God. Our relationship with God is to be one of humble dependence. (Bruce B. Barton, Life Application Bible Commentary, Romans, page 219)
Not all envy is tainted with selfishness, because it is always either a grudging discontent or a sinful covetousness. At base, envy is “the desire to have for oneself something possessed by another”, and whether envy is good or evil depends on the nature of the something desired and on whether one has any right to its possession. If that something is in itself evil, or if it belongs to somebody else and we have no right to it, then the envy is sinful. But if the something desired is in itself good, a blessing from God, which he means all his people to enjoy, then to “covet” it and to “envy” those who have it is not at all unworthy. This kind of desire is right in itself, and to arouse it can be a realistic motive in ministry. (John Stott, Romans, page 297)
Grafting is one of the most interesting phases of gardening and horticulture. Many plants are almost useless unless they are grafted to a rootstock that is different from their own. The best roses are grafted to strong roots which, if left to themselves, would not produce beautiful blooms. At the close of the last century, a great infestation practically destroyed all of the grape vines in France. The Vineyards of France were saved only because strong roots of California vines that were immune to phylloxera were brought in and the scions of the famed French vines were grafted onto them. There is scarcely a grape vine in France today that is not growing on California roots. (Donald Grey Barnhouse, Romans, page 137)
The phrase “from the dead” refers to the resurrection of the body in 46 of its 47 occurrences in the New Testament (the only exception is Romans 6:13). Underlying Paul’s sketch of salvation history here is an apocalyptic worldview that focuses on the resurrection of the dead as the last and climactic stage in God’s plan for history.
Thus, Paul suggests that the return of Israel to favor with God will occur at the climax of history, when the dead are raised. This likely reference of “life from the dead” constitutes one important reason to think that Paul is describing a linear sequence of acts in salvation history that climax with the return of Christ in glory. (Douglas J. Moo, the NIV application Bible commentary, Romans, page 366)
Whatever its causes, anti-Semitism continues to be a problem in the church. We often treat it lightly, making Jewish jokes and calling people who are tight with their money “Jews”. When pressed, we will say that we don’t mean anything by it. But we do. Whether we admit it or not, such ways of speaking foster prejudice in ourselves and pass it on to others. It has no place in a community with Jewish roots and in which all nations are to be welcomed and honored. (Douglas J. Moo, the NIV application Bible commentary, Romans page 373)
Leave a Reply