Friday DIVE – May 16, 2025 – Romans 11:13-36

WELCOME and THANKS

 

 

 

TEXT FOR TONIGHT’S STUDY …

Romans 11:13-24     

¹¹ I say then, have they stumbled that they should fall? Certainly not! But through their ^[b]fall, to provoke them to jealousy, salvation has come to the Gentiles. ¹² Now if their ^[c]fall is riches for the world, and their failure riches for the Gentiles, how much more their fullness!

¹³ For I speak to you Gentiles; inasmuch as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry, ¹⁴ if by any means I may provoke to jealousy those who are my flesh and save some of them. ¹⁵ For if their being cast away is the reconciling of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?

¹⁶ For if the firstfruit is holy, the lump is also holy; and if the root is holy, so are the branches. ¹⁷ And if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them, and with them became a partaker of the root and ^[d]fatness of the olive tree, ¹⁸ do not boast against the branches. But if you do boast, remember that you do not support the root, but the root supports you.

¹⁹ You will say then, “Branches were broken off that I might be grafted in.” ²⁰ Well said. Because of unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by faith. Do not be haughty, but fear. ²¹ For if God did not spare the natural branches, He may not spare you either. ²² Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God: on those who fell, severity; but toward you, ^[e]goodness, if you continue in His goodness. Otherwise you also will be cut off. ²³ And they also, if they do not continue in unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. ²⁴ For if you were cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, who are natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree?

²⁵ For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own ^[f]opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. ²⁶ And so all Israel will be ^[g]saved, as it is written:

²⁸ Concerning the gospel they are enemies for your sake, but concerning the election they are beloved for the sake of the fathers. ²⁹ For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. ³⁰ For as you were once disobedient to God, yet have now obtained mercy through their disobedience, ³¹ even so these also have now been disobedient, that through the mercy shown you they also may obtain mercy. ³² For God has ^[h]committed them all to disobedience, that He might have mercy on all.

³³ Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out!

³⁶ For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen. 

 

The CONTEXT for today’s text …

• In Romans 1-8, Paul looked at Man’s Problem and God’s Provision in Jesus Christ through the Holy Spirit.
• In Romans 9-11, is looking at the problem of Israel … and God’s plan of salvation for Israel as a whole.
  • In Romans 9, we saw that Israel was blessed (with many blessings) because of God’s election … but Israel was cast off because of their lack of faith — trying to establish their own righteousness rather than trustin in God. (Romans 9:30-32)
  • In Romans 10, we saw that Israel has no excuse … because the Gospel was preached to them (the good news being that acceptance by God was by grace and faith, NOT by works or race) … and that acceptance was open to Gentiles, as well as Israelites. (Romans 10:3-4, 12-13, 14-15, 16-18)
  • Now, in Romans 11, we have seen that … although God rejected the Israelites so that Gentiles could have access to God, His rejection of Israel was NOT TOTAL … In this study, we should see that His rejection of Israel was NOT FINAL either.

That said, let’s get into the passage for tonight …

Romans 11:13-36     

¹¹ I say then, have they stumbled that they should fall?  Certainly not!  But through their ^[stumbling]fall,  to provoke them to jealousy,  salvation has come to the Gentiles.  ¹² Now if their ^[c]fall is riches for the world, and their failure riches for the Gentiles, how much more their fullness!  

¹³ For I speak to you Gentiles;  inasmuch as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry,  ¹⁴ if by any means I may provoke to jealousy those who are my flesh and save some of them.  ¹⁵ For if their being cast away is the reconciling of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?  

• NLT …  ¹³ I am saying all this especially for you Gentiles. God has appointed me as the apostle to the Gentiles. I stress this, ¹⁴ for I want somehow to make the people of Israel jealous of what you Gentiles have, so I might save some of them.  ¹⁵ For since their rejection meant that God offered salvation to the rest of the world, their acceptance will be even more wonderful.  It will be life for those who were dead!  

 

¹⁶ For if the firstfruit  is holy, the lump is  also holy;  and if the root is holy, so are the branches.  ¹⁷ And if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them, and with them became a partaker of the root and  ^[richness]fatness  of the olive tree,  ¹⁸ do not boast against the branches.  But if you do boast,  remember that you do not support the root, but the root supports you.  

 

¹⁹ You will say then, “Branches were broken off that I might be grafted in.”  ²⁰ Well said.  Because of unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by faith.  Do not be haughty, but fear.   ²¹ For if God did not spare the natural branches, He may not spare you either.   

• NLT …  ¹⁹ “Well,” you may say, “those branches were broken off to make room for me.”  ²⁰ Yes, but remember — those branches were broken off because they didn’t believe in Christ, and you are there because you do believe. So don’t think highly of yourself, but fear what could happen. ²¹ For if God did not spare the original branches, he won’t^{[perhaps he won’t]} spare you either.

 

²² Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God: on those who fell, severity;  but toward you, ^{[NU adds of God]}goodness,  if you continue in His goodness.  Otherwise  you also will be cut off.   ²³ And  they also, if they do not continue in unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again.   ²⁴ For if you were cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, who are  natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree?   

• NLT …  ²² Notice how God is both kind and severe. He is severe toward those who disobeyed, but kind to you if you continue to trust in his kindness. But if you stop trusting, you also will be cut off.  ²³ And if the people of Israel turn from their unbelief,  they will be grafted in again, for God has the power to graft them back into the tree.  ²⁴ You, by nature, were a branch cut from a wild olive tree.  So if God was willing to do something contrary to nature by grafting you into his cultivated tree, he will be far more eager to graft the original branches back into the tree where they belong.   

 

²⁵ For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own ^{[-estimation]}opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel  until  the fullness of the Gentiles  has come in.  ²⁶ And so all Israel will be ^{[–delivered]}saved, as it is written: 

• NLT …   God’s Mercy Is for Everyone … ²⁵ I want you to understand this mystery, dear brothers and sisters,^{[Gk~brothers]} so that you will not feel proud about yourselves.  Some of the people of Israel have hard hearts, but this will last  only  until  the full number of Gentiles comes to Christ.  ²⁶ And so all Israel will be saved.  As the Scriptures say,

 

²⁸ Concerning the gospel  they are enemies for  your sake,  but  concerning the election  they are beloved for the sake of the fathers. ²⁹ For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.   

 

• NLT …   ²⁸ Many of the people of Israel are now enemies of the Good News, and this benefits you Gentiles.  Yet they are still the people he loves because he chose their ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.  ²⁹ For God’s gifts and his call can never be withdrawn.

 

³⁰ For as you were once disobedient to God, yet have now obtained mercy through their disobedience, ³¹ even so these also have now been disobedient, that through the mercy shown you they also may obtain mercy.  ³² For God has ^{[-shut them all up in]} committed them all to disobedience, that He might have mercy on all.  

• NLT …   ³⁰ Once, you Gentiles were rebels against God, but when the people of Israel rebelled against him, God was merciful to you instead.  ³¹ Now they are the rebels, and God’s mercy has come to you so that they, too, will share^{[now share/someday share]} in God’s mercy.   ³² For God has imprisoned everyone in disobedience so he could have mercy on everyone.  

 

³³ Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!  How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out!  

• NLT …   ³³ Oh, how great are God’s riches and wisdom and knowledge! How impossible it is for us to understand his decisions and his ways!  

 

³⁶ For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen. 

• NLT …   ³⁶ For everything comes from him and exists by his power and is intended for his glory.  All glory to him forever!  Amen.   

 

 

 

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What can we take away?

• God’s rejection of Israel was NOT FINAL, just as it was NOT TOTAL. 
  • Not total … in the sense that not all Israelites would be rejected … by being blinded/hardened
  • Not final … in the sense that there would come a time when the rejection (blindness and hardness of heart) would end
• God had a specific purpose to fulfill in allowing Israel to stumble – so that salvation would come to the Gentiles. 

 

 

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According to Barclay …

THE CALLOUS ON THE HEART 

Romans 11:1-12

So then, I ask, “Has God repudiated his people?” God forbid! I, too, am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin. God has not repudiated his people whom long ago he marked out for his purposes. Do you not know what scripture says in the passage about Elijah? You remember how he talked to God in complaint against Israel: “Lord, they have killed your prophets; they have torn down your altars; and I alone am left and they are seeking my life.” But what was the answer that came to him? “I have kept for myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to Baal.” So, then, at this present time too, there is a remnant chosen by his grace. And if they were chosen by grace, their relationship to God is no longer dependent on works, for, if that were so, grace is no longer grace. What then? Israel has not obtained that for which she is searching; but the chosen remnant has obtained it, while the rest have been made so dull and insensitive in heart that they cannot see. As it stands written: “God gave them a spirit of lethargy — eyes not to see, ears not to hear — down to this day.” And David says: “Let their table become a snare, and a trap, and a thing to trip them up, and a retribution for them. and let their backs be bent for ever.” So, I say, “Have they stumbled that their fall might be complete?” God forbid! So far from that, salvation has become a gift for the Gentiles because of their fall, so as to move them to jealousy of the Gentiles. If their fall has brought wealth to the world, if their failure has brought wealth to the Gentiles, how much more shall the whole world be enriched, when they come in, and the whole process of salvation is completed?

There was a question now to be asked which any Jew was bound to ask.  Does all this mean that God has repudiated his people?  That is a question that Paul’s heart cannot bear.  After all, he himself is a member of that people.  So he falls back on an idea which runs through much of the Old Testament.  In the days of Elijah, Elijah was in despair (1 Kings.19:10-18).  He had come to the conclusion that he alone was left to be true to God.  But God told him that, in fact, there were still seven thousand in Israel who had not bowed the knee to Baal.  So into Jewish thought came the idea of The Remnant.

The prophets began to see that there never was a time, and never would be, when the whole nation was true to God; nevertheless, always within the nation a remnant was left who had never forsaken their loyalty or compromised their faith.  Prophet after prophet came to see this.  Amos (Amos 9:8-10) thought of God sifting men as corn is in a sieve until only the good are left.  Micah (Micah 2:12; 5:3) had a vision of God gathering the remnant of Israel.  Zephaniah (Zeph. 3:12-13) had the same idea.  Jeremiah foresaw the remnant being gathered from all the countries throughout which they had been scattered (Jer. 23:3).  Ezekiel, the individualist, was convinced that a man could not be saved by either a national or an inherited righteousness; the righteous would deliver their own souls by their righteousness (Eze. 14:14,20,22).  Above all, this idea dominated the thought of Isaiah.  He called his son Shear-Jashub, which means The Salvation of the Remnant.  Again and again he returns to this idea of the faithful remnant who will be saved by God (Isaiah 7:3; 8:2; 8:18; 9:12; 6:9-13).

There is a tremendous truth beginning to dawn here.  As one great scholar put it: “No Church or nation is saved en masse.”  The idea of a Chosen People will not hold water for this basic reason.  The relationship with God is an individual relationship.  A man must give his own heart and surrender his own life to God.  God does not call men in crowds; he has “His own secret stairway into every heart.”  A man is not saved because he is a member of a nation or of a family, or because he has inherited righteousness and salvation from his ancestors; he is saved because he has made a personal decision for God.  It is not now the whole nation who are lumped together as the Chosen People.  It is those individual men and women who have given their hearts to God, of whom the remnant is composed.

Paul’s argument is that the Jewish nation has not been rejected; but it is not the nation as a whole, but the faithful remnant within it who are the true Jews.

What of the others?  It is here that Paul has a terrible thought.  He has the idea of God sending a kind of torpor upon them, a drowsy sleep in which they cannot and will not hear.  He puts together the thought of a series of Old Testament passages to prove this (Deut. 29:4; Isa. 6:9-10; Isa. 29:10).  He quotes Ps. 69:22-23.  “Let their table become a snare.”  The idea is that men are sitting feasting comfortably at their banquet; and their very sense of safety has become their ruin.  They are so secure in their fancied safety that the enemy can come upon them all unaware.  That is what the Jews were like.  They were so secure, so self-satisfied, so at ease in their confidence of being the Chosen People, that that very idea had become the thing that ruined them.

The day will come when they cannot see at all, and when they will grope with bent backs like men stumbling blindly in the dark.  In Rom. 11:7, the King James Version says, “they have been blinded.”  More correctly, it should be, “they have been hardened.”  The verb is poroun.  The noun porosis will give us the meaning better.  It is a medical word, and it means a callus.  It was specially used for the callus which forms round the fracture when a bone is broken, the hard bone formation which helps to mend the break.  When a callus grows on any part of the body that part loses feeling.  It becomes insensitive.  The minds of the mass of the people have become insensitive; they can no longer hear and feel the appeal of God.

It can happen to any man.  If a man takes his own way long enough, he will in the end become insensitive to the appeal of God.  If he goes on sinning, he will in the end become insensitive to the horror of sin and the fascination of goodness.  If a man lives long enough in ugly conditions he will in the end become insensitive to them.  As Burns wrote:

“I waive the quantum of the sin, The hazard of concealing; But och! it hardens a’ within, And petrifies the feeling!”

Just as a callus can grow on the hand, a callus can grow on the heart.  That is what had happened to the mass of Israel. God save us from that!

But Paul has more to say.  That is tragedy, but out of it God has brought good, because that very insensitiveness of Israel opened the way to the Gentiles to come in.  Because Israel did not want the message of the good news, it went out to people who were ready to welcome it.  Israel’s refusal has enriched the world.

Then Paul touches on the dream which is behind it all.  If the refusal of Israel has enriched the world by opening a door to the Gentiles, what will the riches be like at the end of the day, when God’s plan is fully completed and Israel comes in, too?

So, in the end, after tragedy comes the hope.  Israel became insensitive, the nation with the callus on her heart; the Gentiles came by faith and trust into the love of God; but a day will come when the love of God will act like a solvent, even on the callus of the heart, and both Gentile and Jew will be gathered in.  It is Paul’s conviction that nothing in the end can defeat the love of God.

 

THE WILD OLIVE — PRIVILEGE AND WARNING

Romans 11:13-24

Now I speak to you Gentiles.  You well know that in so far as I am the apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my office, for somehow I want to find a way to move my own flesh and blood to envy of the Gentiles, so that I may save some of them; for, if the fact that they are cast away has resulted in the reconciliation of the world to God, what will their reception mean?  It can only be like life from the dead!  If the first part of the dough is consecrated to God, so is the whole lump; if the root is consecrated to God, so are the branches. If some of the branches have been cut off, and if you like a wild olive have been grafted in among them, and if you have become a sharer in the rich root of the olive, do not allow yourself to look down boastfully upon the branches. If you are tempted to act like that, remember you do not bear the root but the root bears you. You will say: “Branches have been broken off that I may be grafted in.” Well said! They were broken off because of their lack of faith; and you stand because of faith.  Do not become proudly contemptuous, but keep yourself in godly fear; for if God did not spare the branches, which were natural branches, neither will he spare you.  See, then, the kindness and the severity of God.  On those who fell there comes the severity.  On you there comes the kindness of God, if only you remain in that kindness. If you do not, you, too, will be cut away.  But they, if they do not continue in their lack of faith, will be grafted in; for God is able to graft them in again.  For, if you were cut from the olive, which is by nature a wild olive, and, if, contrary to nature, you were engrafted into the garden olive, how much more will the natural branches be engrafted into the olive to which they really belong?

It is to the Jews that Paul has been talking up to this time, and now he turns to the Gentiles.  He is the apostle to the Gentiles, but he cannot ever forget his own people.  In fact, he goes the length of saying that one of his main objects is to move the Jews to envy when they see what Christianity has done for the Gentiles.  One of the surest ways to make a man desire Christianity is to make him see in actual life what it can do.

There was a soldier who was wounded in battle.  The padre crept out and did what he could for him.  He stayed with him when the remainder of the troops retreated.  In the heat of the day, he gave him water from his own waterbottle, while he himself remained parched with thirst.  In the night, when the chill frost came down, he covered the wounded man with his own coat, and finally wrapped him up in even more of his clothes to save him from the cold.  In the end, the wounded man looked up at the padre.  “Padre,” he said, “you’re a Christian?”  “I try to be,” said the padre.  “Then,” said the wounded man, “if Christianity makes a man do for another man what you have done for me, tell me about it, because I want it.”  Christianity in action moved him to envy a faith which could produce a life like that.

It was Paul’s hope and prayer and ambition that some day the Jews would see what Christianity had done for the Gentiles and be moved to desire it.

To Paul it would be paradise if the Jews came in.  If the rejection of the Jews had done so much, if, through it, the Gentile world had been reconciled to God, what superlative glory must come when the Jews came in.  If the tragedy of rejection has had results so wonderful, what will the happy ending be like, when the tragedy of rejection has changed to the glory of reception?  Paul can only say that it will be like life from the dead.

 

 

THAT ALL MAY BE OF MERCY

Romans 11:25-32 

Brothers, I do want you to grasp this secret which only those who know God can understand, because I do not want you to become conceited about your own wisdom.  I want you to understand that it is only a partial hardening which has happened to Israel, and it will last only until the full number of the Gentiles shall have come in.  And then, in the end, all Israel will be saved, as it stands written: “A Saviour will come forth from Zion; and he will remove all kinds of wickedness from Jacob.  This is the fulfilment of my covenant with them when I take away their sins.” 

As far as the good news goes, they are enemies of God — but it is for your sake.  But as far as God’s choice goes, they are beloved of God, for their fathers’ sakes, for the free gifts and the calling of God can never be gone back upon.  Once you disobeyed God, but now you have found his mercy because of their disobedience; just so, they have now disobeyed, so that they now may enter into the same mercy as you have now found.  For God has shut up all men to disobedience, that he may have mercy upon all.    

Paul is coming to the end of his argument. He has faced a bewildering, and, for a Jew, a heartbreaking situation.  Somehow he has had to find an explanation of the fact that God’s people rejected his Son when he came into the world.  Paul never shut his eyes to that tragic fact, but he found a way in which the whole tragic situation could be fitted into the plan of God.  It is true that the Jews rejected Christ; but. as Paul saw it, that rejection happened in order that Christ might be offered to the Gentiles.  To maintain the sovereignty of God’s purpose, Paul even went the length of saying that it was He himself who hardened the hearts of the Jews in order to open a way to the Gentiles; but, even then, however contradictory it might sound, he still insisted on the personal responsibility of the Jews for their failure to accept God’s offer.  Paul held fast at one and the same time to divine sovereignty and human responsibility.  But now comes the note of hope.  His argument is a little complicated, and it will make it easier if we try to separate the various strands in it.

(i) Paul was sure that this hardening of the hearts of the Jews was neither total nor permanent.  It was to serve a purpose, and when that purpose had been achieved, it would be taken away.

(ii) Paul sets out the paradox of the Jewish place in the plan of God.  In order that the Gentiles might come in and that the universal purpose of the gospel might be fulfilled, the Jews had arrived at a situation where they were the enemies of God.  The word that Paul uses is echthroi.  It is difficult to translate, because it has both an active and a passive meaning.  It can mean either hating or hated.  It may well be that in this passage it has to be read in the two meanings at the one time.  The Jews were hostile to God and had refused his offer, and therefore they were under his displeasure.  That was the present fact about the Jews.  But there was another fact about them.  Nothing could alter the fact that they were God’s chosen people and had a special place in his plan.  No matter what they did, God could never go back upon his word.  His promise had been made to the fathers, and it must be fulfilled.  It was therefore clear to Paul, and he quotes Isa.59:20-21 to prove it, that God’s rejection of the Jews could not be permanent; they, too, in the end must come in.

(iii) Then Paul has a strange thought. “God,” he says, “shut up all men to disobedience  that he may have mercy upon all.”  The one thing Paul cannot conceive of is that any man of any nation could merit his own salvation.  Now, if the Jews had observed complete obedience to God’s will, they might well have reckoned that they had earned the salvation of God as a right.  So Paul is saying that God involved the Jews in disobedience in order that when his salvation did come to them it might be unmistakably an act of his mercy and due in no way to their merit.  Neither Jew nor Gentile could ever be saved apart from the mercy of God.

In many ways Paul’s argument may seem strange to us and the “proofs” he brings forward unconvincing.  Our minds and hearts may even shudder at some of the things he says.  But the argument is not irrelevant, for the tremendous thing at the back of it is a philosophy of history.  To Paul, God was in control.  Nothing moved with aimless feet.  Not even the most heartbreaking event was outside the purpose of God.  Events could never run amok.  The purposes of God could never be frustrated.

It is told that once a child stood at the window on a night when the gale was terrifying in its savage velocity.  “God,” she said, “must have lost grip of his winds tonight.”  To Paul, that was precisely what never happened.  Nothing was ever out of God’s control;  everything was serving his purpose.

To that Paul would have added another tremendous conviction.  He would have insisted that in it and through it all, God’s purpose was a purpose of salvation and not of destruction.  It may well be that Paul would even have gone the length of saying that God’s arranging of things was designed to save men even against their will.  In the last analysis it was not the wrath of God which was pursuing men, but the love of God which was tracking them down.

The situation of Israel was exactly that which Francis Thompson so movingly portrayed in The Hound of Heaven.

“I fled him down the nights and down the days; I fled him down the arches of the years; I fled him down the labyrinthine ways Of my own mind; and in the mist of tears I hid from him, and under running laughter.   

But with unhurrying chase, And unperturbed pace, Deliberate speed, majestic instancy, They beat–and a Voice beat More instant than the feet– `All things betray thee, who betrayest me.'”

Then comes the time when the fugitive is beaten.

“Naked I wait thy love’s uplifted stroke! My harness piece by piece thou hast hewn from me, And smitten to my knee, I am defenceless utterly.”

Then comes the end:

“Halts by me that footfall; Is my gloom. after all, Shade of his hand, outstretched caressingly?  `Ah, fondest, blindest, weakest, I am he whom thou seekest! Thou dravest love from thee, who dravest me!'”

That was exactly Israel’s situation.  They fought their long battle against God; they are still fighting it.  But God’s pursuing love is ever after them.  Whatever else Romans 9-11 may sometimes read like, it is in the last analysis the story of the still uncompleted pursuit of love.

 

THE CRY OF THE ADORING HEART

Romans 11:33-36

O the depth of the riches and the wisdom and the knowledge of God!  How his decisions are beyond the mind of man to trace!  How mysterious are his ways!  For who has known the mind of the Lord?  Or, who has become his counsellor?  Who has first given anything to him, so that he is due any repayment from God?  For all things come from him, and exist through him, and end in him.  To him be glory for ever!  Amen.

Paul never wrote a more characteristic passage than this.  Here theology turns to poetry.  Here the seeking of the mind turns to the adoration of the heart.  In the end an must pass out in a mystery that man cannot now understand but at whose heart is love.  If a man can say that all things come from God, that all things have their being through him, and that all things end in him, what more is left to say?   There is a certain paradox in the human situation.  God gave man a mind, and it is man’s duty to use that mind to think to the very limit of human thought.  But it is also true that there are times when that limit is reached and all that is left is to accept and to adore.

“How could I praise, If such as I might understand?”

Paul had battled with a heartbreaking problem with every resource which his great mind possessed.  He does not say that he has solved it, as one might neatly solve a geometrical problem; but he does say that, having done his best, he is content to leave it to the love and power of God.  At many times in life there is nothing left but to say: “I cannot grasp thy mind, but with my whole heart I trust thy love.  Thy will be done!”