Romans 9-11

We are going to go to Chapter 9 of Romans and notice how interesting, Chapters 9, 10 and 11 have been called by some as a parenthesis, they have said that it is like a parenthesis in the book of Romans, because Paul in those three Chapters introduces a It is a subject very different from the topics that he has been dealing with up to now, and it deals with Israel.

Until Chapter 9 he has been talking about spiritual principles, the choice of the world, the election of humanity, the principles of salvation, how man is saved, he has talked about the perdition of all humanity, we have all sinned, we are separated from the grace of God and only through faith in Jesus Christ can we be saved. He has talked about how every man is doomed to sin against God. We cannot be saved by our own works, because no one can fill all the law. That's why we need a savior, a go-between, and that go-between, Paul says, is Jesus Christ.

Now he's kind of starting to talk about the Jews and what I'm going to do in this one... my goal is to compress the next three Chapters into one message. Obviously we're not going to be able to cover each Chapter in depth, but it's really a minor topic in a sense, compared to everything else in the book of Romans, and so I want to compress it all. And actually I think it can be done very well.

Chapters 9, 10 and 11 talk about God's purpose, God's plans with the Hebrew people specifically. Paul says in Chapter 9, “.....I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying and my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit that I have great sadness and continual pain in my heart because I myself wished to be anathema, separated from Christ out of love for my brothers.....”

He's talking about the Jews. He is Jewish. ".... those who are my relatives, according to the flesh, who are Israelites of whom are the adoption, the glory, the covenant, the promulgation of the law, etc., etc...."

Paul here begins by talking about his sadness for his people. Notice, before going into that in detail, one question we can ask: Why does Paul consider it relevant and part of his treatment in this spiritual epistle to talk about the Jews? And it's because, remember, he's raising something that was revolutionary at the time. Paul is saying, in a sense, that Christ has surpassed the law. In a sense it is rendering the Jewish system, the Hebrew system, almost null. He has already said that the law, what it has achieved, is simply to show man his inability to save himself, that the law is a way that God used to bring man to a confrontation with his inability to save himself. . The only thing the law achieved was to point out sin, to make us aware of our fault.

And that is why he says, the law is only good for that, it is a tutor, he says, it is a nurse that God used in the infancy of humanity to establish a judicial precedent to show humanity that it needs a savior who is Jesus Christ. And that for the Hebrews was something totally radical, it was something totally scandalous, in a sense. Remember that we are at the very beginning of Christianity.

Today, 2,000 years later, we know all these things and understand something, if only, of the relationship between the law and Christianity. But those first Jews and Gentiles who knew Judaism even from afar, it was strange. So, you may have wondered, 'Well, then what happened to all these years that God has been working through Judaism? Is it that God was wrong, is it that the law did not serve, is it that the Jews then, what happens to them? And why did God do things that way?

So, he's trying to answer those questions because he knows, Paul knew that this letter was going to be read by many different people, by Jews, by Gentiles, and who knows if he also understood that many other cultures were going to read this letter. So, he established, he wanted to clarify there, 'well, what is God's plan for the Jews?

How many of you have ever wondered. 'Well, what about the Jews, what about them? They are there in Israel, does God still have plans with them? Are they going to be saved, are they going to be lost? What is the situation right now in Israel? Are they a chosen nation, does God still have purposes for them? The Jews, are they all going to be saved because they are simply Jews? All these questions we often ask ourselves.

Paul, here it is proposed to answer those questions so that it is clear what is the relationship between the ancient Jewish people, the current one and also those who come later with salvation through Jesus Christ. So, in that first of the three Chapters, he talks about various things.

One of the things that Paul says, for example, is the following: not all who are Jews according to the flesh, that is, according to nationality, are children of God. Paul clarifies something that he clarified earlier, in Chapter 4, regarding Abraham. Paul always says God's dealings with man were by faith, not by flesh, not by work. Abraham was saved because he believed God, not because he was the great man just and perfect in all his behavior.

And likewise Paul says, the Israelites, let us be clear, are Israelites by spirit, those who believe God, those who conform to God's law, those who believe God's declarations. Those are the ones who are Jews. In verse 6 of Chapter 9 he says: "... not that the word of God has failed, because not all who descend from Israel are Israelites, nor because they are descendants of Abraham, are they all children, but, says God, in Isaac shall be called your offspring...”

Paul is here pointing out a possible concern of the people, is that God failed in his purpose to save the Jews? Was he not able to do it? Was he simply unable? And Paul says, no, God's plans with the Hebrew people were always the same as with all humanity. Those who are Hebrews are those who have believed in God and that is how it will always be. Today, Paul says, it is the same way, those who believe in Jesus Christ as the Son of God, because God has established him as the savior of humanity, those are Jews.

In a sense, brothers, we though we are Gentiles by nationality, but spiritually we are Hebrews through Christ Jesus. We are true Hebrews in a sense, in the spirit sense of the word because we are part of that chosen people of God that is the church.

So Paul is saying, God did not fail in this situation now that the Hebrew people are, in a sense, out of God's plans.

Another question as well, verse 14 “.....what then shall we say, that there is injustice in God? In no way because he says to Moses, I will have mercy on whom I have mercy and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion....”

In other words, Paul is here clarifying another thing as well, God is not unfair, because some people can say, 'well, this town, wow, so many years they have been serving the Lord and trying to live by the law and what happens? That now God just kicks him and says, ok, I've had enough of you, now I have nothing to do with you.

And notice, Paul makes two things clear here: Number 1: he says, if God wanted to do it that way, he might as well, because he does what he wants to do. He has mercy on those who want to have mercy. He makes vessels of anger from whoever he wants to do it. He talks about pharaoh, for example, later on, that's why I'm running around here in different places.

In Chapter 9, verse 20 he says ".... but before, man, who are you that you argue with God" The clay vessel will say to the one who formed it, why have you done like this? Or the potter does not have the power over the clay to make from the same mass one vessel for honor and another for dishonor. And what if God, wanting to show his wrath and make his power known, endured with great patience the vessels of wrath prepared for destruction, and to make the richness of his glory known, he showed it to the vessels of mercy that he prepared beforehand? to glory, whom he has also called.....” –this is us, not only Jews but also Gentiles.

I know this all sounds like math to you, but I'm reading it because it's important principles and it's an important part of this book of Romans that we're studying.

Paul says, 'look, brothers, the matter of salvation God can do whatever he wants. There is a mystery that we can never understand. God is sovereign. There are times when God, if he wants, chooses a people, chooses a generation to point out certain things, to declare certain spiritual principles. And what happens is that many times the sin that exists in man meets the purpose that God has to show certain spiritual truths to the world and often allows God to do things that seem unfair.

For example, in the case of Pharaoh in Egypt, Pharaoh was a hard-hearted man, he did not want to submit to God's law, he did not want to let the people of Israel leave Egypt. He rebelled against God from the beginning and God, seeing that sin in Pharaoh's heart, hardened his heart and used Pharaoh to show his glory before the Jewish people and before all the nations that have read the book of Exodus where God destroyed the people of Egypt with all its plagues and with all its judgments. So Pharaoh's sin allowed God to further harden his heart and use it as a way to demonstrate his judgments.

Judas, likewise, some say, 'Well, if God chose Judas from the beginning to hand over Jesus Christ, how then could He condemn him? Well, Judas's heart was already hardened. Judas was a carnal man, he was a greedy man and God used that root of sin that was in him, and with that he used him to carry out a purpose that required someone to deliver his Son Jesus Christ.

With the Hebrews it was the same. The Hebrews were people of heart, disobedient, stubborn in doing things their way. When God brought his plan for them to be saved through his Son Jesus Christ, they rejected it, just as they rejected God throughout all of history. God then said, well, I'm going to harden his heart. I am going to put a veil over you and discipline you until you learn a lesson.

So, Paul is saying, look, God can do whatever he wants. God moves in humanity as he wants, but God is never unfair. God always does things working according to principles of justice.

And here is a very important lesson for us, brothers: when God speaks to us, when God communicates his purpose in our lives, when God tells us, 'son, I want you to get away from this behavior', 'I want you to behave this way', and we persist in revealing ourselves against God and doing what we want, many times what it does is hardening our hearts and many times we suffer so much pain and so many difficulties. And sometimes wanting to repent is already too late, because the hardening that has occurred in our hearts has been so great. Let us be tender to the voice of God.

When God tells us, walk this way, let's go that way. Let us be obedient to the voice of the Lord. The Hebrew people continually rebelled against God, a rebellious people. The word says that every day, it says, the voice of God came to that town and what it found was rebellion. Rebellion is terribly offensive to God and that is why this people became hardened and could not enter into God's plans.

In verse 30 of Chapter 9, he says “...what then shall we say, that the Gentiles who did not pursue justice have achieved justice? That is, the righteousness that is by faith. More Israel that went after a law of justice did not reach it..." Why? “....for they followed it, not by faith but as by works of the law, for they stumbled at the stumbling block...”

Who is the stumbling block? Christ Jesus, there are at least one or two people who are awake. They stumbled on the stone. When the Jews met Jesus, as the Son of God they could not receive him and Jesus became a stumbling block to them. To this day the Jews cannot enter into God's plan of salvation, because they cannot admit that Jesus is the promised Messiah. Christ has become a stone. The stone that God has wanted to be the cornerstone of the building, the one that defines the whole building, has become a stone of stumbling and scandal for them.

The prophet Isaiah had already said, "... behold, I put in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of fall, and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame..." That is in Isaiah 28: 16, was a promise. It is going to be through my Messiah, my Son Jesus that you are going to be saved and that is going to be a stumbling block for you because you are hard of heart. Israel wanted justice but went after it according to the works of the law. They wanted to save themselves by their own works. And God said, it is not like that, salvation will be through grace and through believing in me and believing in my Son that I have sent. He is the one you have to listen to. But the Jews did not want to do it.

When God tells you, 'Look, I want you to do things this way,' don't make alternative plans according to your own preference. There are many people, today, in the modern world who are hungry for relationship with each God, they are spiritually hungry. But when we offer them God's plan through Jesus Christ, they say, no, that's too simple. They go after Buddhism, Hinduism, Dienetics, strange and complex philosophies, because this seems too simple to them.

In Spain I met on a couple of occasions with people who..... great desire, great hunger for God, but who do not know how to enter into that simple plan of salvation that is through Jesus Christ . It is not through religion, it is not through your doing good works. It is simply believing that Jesus is the Son of God and that if you believe in him that activates the grace of God and that through him you are saved. It's as simple as that.

Don't believe other alternative plans. God is a simple-hearted God and if you enter in that way that God has established, then you can receive the necessary salvation, otherwise God will pass over you, just as it happened to the Jews.

In Chapter 10, Paul simply elaborates the same theme once more. Salvation is by faith, salvation is by grace. The Apostle Paul says in Romans 10, verse 3: ".... because they are ignorant of God's justice and trying to establish their own, they have not submitted to God's justice...."

That is the problem of humanity, always looking for its own way to ensure its salvation, instead of entering into God's plan. God's plan you have to take it or all or nothing. You cannot take a little piece here, another little piece there, but you have to take it all. You cannot set your own way to find justice.

It says in verse 4, "...for the end of the law is Christ for righteousness to everyone who believes..."

What Paul is emphasizing here is that, is the simplicity of the plan of salvation. The Jew thought it had to be much, much more complicated than that. And then in verse 8, at the end of that verse, or at the very beginning it says, "... but what does it say, the word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart...."

Where is the instrument that can save you, my brother, my sister? It's in your mouth and in your heart, as close as that. You don't have to go to the end of the world. Rhetorically, sarcastically, he says, will we have to descend into the abyss and take Christ out of the abyss and bring him to earth so that he can teach us how to be saved? Or go to heaven and lower it to teach us....? No, it says:

“....this is the word of faith that we preach: if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, what pass?, you will be saved...”

That is why he is contrasting the struggles of the Hebrew people with the plan they had of salvation by works, with the simplicity of God's plan. He is using the Hebrews as an illustration of all that he has been raising above.

And he says, look, salvation is as simple as two things: confess with your mouth that Jesus Christ is Lord. Wow! That is a form of virtual signing. Has anyone ever come by from Fedex or Federal Express or one of those companies that brings packages to homes? Nowadays, he knows that people do not have to sign with ink on a piece of paper that leaves everything completely signed, but that one signs, it looks like a pen, but one signs through a computer in a box that they give you electronically, and that signature is later erased, immediately erased, but it remains electronically registered. You can write a thousand times on that square and there will always be something different because today it is not on paper, it is signed electronically and it goes invisibly to a computer.

And I see a comparison there about what it is like when you confess Jesus with your mouth, what you are doing is that you are signing electronically, spiritually. God has a computer that immediately when you confess with your mouth, your signature is registered in the heavenly kingdom that you have declared that yes, I believe that Jesus Christ is my Lord and my Savior.

That's why it's so important for people to verbalize. People say, 'Well, why do I have to come forward, raise my hand, declare that Jesus Christ is my Savior, if I believe it in my heart? There is something that in you verbalize it, externalize it activates, like it seals the pact between you and Jesus Christ. That is why you have to confess Jesus.

The Lord says: "... if you confess me before men, I will confess you before my Father who is in heaven...."

You have to give public faith that we have committed. When we get married, we get married in public, yes or no? When we graduate from college, we graduate with a ceremony. Many times when we get divorced, the divorce is put in the newspaper. When a person dies, many times it is also announced in the newspaper. Why is it that men choose public ways to point out important things in life? Because it is necessary for the community to know when serious things are being done.

And the same thing happens... there is nothing more serious for the destiny of a man than to receive Christ as Lord and savior. And that's why it has to be done in a public way, so that the whole community knows. I don't believe in underground Christians out there, you know, undercover Christians, secret agents. I think we all have to... people have to know that I am a Christian.

If you're at your job and you've been there for ten years and people don't know you're a Christian, you've failed, they have to know somehow. It is not that you have to stand at the factory table and say, "Gentlemen, I want to make an announcement: I am an evangelical. " No. But because of your behavior, because of your witness to people, because of the way you share your faith in different ways, God wants you to be salt, that you be light on earth. You have a precious message that you need to share with your mouth with others. You need to invite people to come to church, you need people to know that you are a child of God, because there are people in need and unless they don't know where to go...

Paul says in a part later “.... how will they hear if it is not announced to them? And how will they believe in the one of whom they have not heard?, in Chapter 10, verse 14. “...And how will they go without someone preaching to them? And how will they preach if they are not sent?

Brothers, our faith in Christ cannot stay inside, we have to confess it with our mouths, we have to share it with humanity. Where you least expect there is a person who needs God. And there are people who seem completely self-sufficient, everything fine, their suit, their good car, and it seems that they don't need anything, but inside they are bleeding to death. They have problems in their marriage, they have diseases that they have not shared with anyone, their children are giving them problems, they are afraid of death, they have insomnia, they take pills before going to bed, but in the morning you see them and they are a paragon of virtues , a good knot, a three-piece suit, but they need Jesus Christ and you can be the way. You can be the agent that God uses. You have to confess Jesus with your mouth, you have to share it. There are no undercover agents, I tell you, brothers. James Bond is not for evangelicals. We have to be public believers.

It says that “.... if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved...” < p>Those are the two things that are needed for salvation. When you preach the Gospel to someone, and that can be wherever you want, ask them two things: Look, can you believe with your mouth and your heart and confess that Jesus Christ is Lord? And many people are going to tell them, yes, I believe it, I am.... Don't ask them: do you want to be an evangelical, do you want to be from León de Judá? No. Do you believe that Jesus Christ is the Lord of your life, that he is the savior of your life?

And a lot of people are going to say, yes. If you confront them like that. Ok, now, do you believe that God raised him from the dead, that he rose on the third day? Yes. Well, you know what? You are saved. If you believe that Jesus Christ is your Lord, your savior, and that God raised him from the dead and you are willing to confess it here before me, with your mouth...

Brothers, you have to take people at that moment of confrontation. When that confrontation takes place and people verbalize it that way, publicly, deliberately, something happens, internal barriers collapse, things break. Perhaps that person is not going to go to church immediately the next day. But you know what? Something happened in his spirit, there was a spiritual confrontation between that person and darkness and that is going to be the beginning of a total collapse of all the principalities and powers that govern his life, and sooner or later that person is going to come to the ways of the Lord. Take them to confess that just, take them step by step. And that will make a big difference in their lives.

The Apostle Paul says in verse 10, ".... because with the heart one believes for righteousness, but with the mouth one confesses for salvation..." There is the whole plan of salvation, so simple as that. "For the Scriptures say, everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame, for there is no difference between Jew and Greek, for the same one who is Lord of all is rich towards all who call on him, because everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved..." Glory to God

Brothers, what a wonderful plan, what God has chosen. Paul is using the Jews here as an example of a humanity that cannot understand how simple God's plan is and therefore refuse to accept it and enter into the plan. And Paul says, look, it's as simple as this and God has always dealt with humanity in this way, and there is no exception, both the Jew and the Gentile have to enter through the same door that is called Christ Jesus.

And that's why we have to announce to people. We have the plan, we have the answer, we have the key, the key, it is the only way that a human being can be saved and by denying people that information we are denying the most precious thing that a human being can have. : the salvation of his soul.

That's why we have to always be ready, it says "... in season out of season to announce the Gospel..." There are wonderful opportunities that God is putting in front of us many times.

We are going to ask the Lord to open up opportunities for us to announce the Gospel, what is more, I feel right now in my heart, we are going to say a prayer, sitting where you are, we are going to say a prayer to May God begin..... God put that in my heart while I was traveling, that we ask God to open doors for us to announce the Gospel, in our jobs, on the streets, in our neighborhoods, and we go to ask the Lord right now to start giving us opportunities to testify of Jesus Christ, to invite people to meet the Lord, and to start seeking God and come to church, for example, and continue on their spiritual journey.

So let's take a moment right now. Father, in the name of Jesus we ask that you make us spiritually magnetic. Father, visit us right now with an evangelistic anointing. We have received from you the most beautiful revelation of all: that salvation is obtained simply through a verbal and interior confession of the heart in Christ Jesus. And we want to be able to take that message to a lost humanity.

Now, Father, we ask that you open up opportunities for us in this city and the surrounding cities where we live, and that you put people around us, that you open our eyes, Lord. How Philip was supernaturally led to speak to the Ethiopian and he was reading the book of Isaiah and did not understand what he was reading. And Philip announced the Gospel of Jesus Christ to him and revealed to him that this book of Isaiah spoke of Jesus, and the Ethiopian converted and was baptized and returned to his homeland joyful because he had received the word of God. So we ask, Lord, that you put in our paths many Ethiopians, men and women to whom we can announce the Gospel of peace in Christ Jesus. Open our eyes and our understanding so that we can discern these opportunities, Lord. And help us in the coming months and weeks to bring many people to the knowledge of Jesus Christ and we give you grace that we believe that it will be so.

Put passion in our hearts, Lord, for we ask it in Jesus' name. Amen. Make a covenant right now with the Lord to be a public Christian, a Christian who lets people know that Christ is Lord of their lives.

Last thing I say here, 5 more minutes. In Chapter 11, Paul wants to clarify something, that although the Jews are now separated from the Gospel, but God still has a purpose with them. You know that in the 21st century God has not yet disengaged from the Hebrew people. Don't be fooled by anyone who tells you that God has already given up on the Jews. There is still one last moment that God wants to have with his nation, with his chosen people. God loves the nation of Israel.

And that's why Paul in Chapter 11 says, "... I say then, has God rejected his people?..." In other words, God has completely disregarded Israel. “....by no means, he says, then in verse 8 he says, “....as it is written, God gave them a spirit of stupefaction, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear until the day of today...”

Guess what? God put like a veil over the Jews for a while. He kind of put... froze for a moment his dealings with the Jews so that the Gentiles could come in and the Gentiles could be saved. And in these two thousand years of the new plan through Christ Jesus, the Gentile nations have been coming into the ways of the Lord and Israel has kind of been turned away.

In these two my years Israel, the Jew cannot understand the Gospel normally. Very few, there is a small remnant coming in but through the centuries 99% of the Hebrews have been rebellious. You talk to them and they can't understand about Jesus Christ and that's why that nation has suffered so much. In the last two thousand years the Jewish people have been persecuted, martyred, killed by millions, persecuted in all the countries where they have been. In practically every country on earth there are synagogues that were abandoned by Jews who in one way or another were persecuted by the nations where they arrived. For two thousand years this town has been trapped in a bubble, unable to understand God's plan.

In fact, in second Corinthians, Chapter 3, it says in verse 14 “... but their understanding was dulled because to this day when they read the Old Covenant they still have the same veil , undiscovered, which by Christ is taken away, and even to this day, when Moses is read the veil is placed over their hearts....”

There is a veil, there is like a cloth that covers the mind of the Jews. The message of Jesus Christ does not penetrate them. It's something terrible that's sitting there. And God has it there for a purpose. It says “..., but when they turn to the Lord, the veil will be removed....”

God has destined a day when the entire nation of Israel will be saved. There is going to be a revival in Israel at some point and we are looking forward to this. I believe that we are very close to that time when God is going to remove the veil from the Jews and thousands and thousands of Jews are going to come to know Jesus Christ. A gathering of the Hebrews from all the nations of the earth is already taking place in the world.

When I was in Israel last year, I was able to find out that all the tribes were supposedly lost. Those ten tribes that nobody knows where they have been in all these centuries, since Israel was scattered, and it is even more so in the Old Testament, as it is not heard of the ten tribes that were left over from the 12 tribes of Israel. But all those tribes are being found again. They have been found in South Africa, in Ethiopia, in China, in different parts of the world these tribes are being discovered. And the Hebrews are identifying themselves in all parts of the world and they are going back to Israel in preparation for what God has said, that God will gather them from all the nations, from all the parts of the earth where they were scattered, God is going to bring them back to Israel.

And God says that one day the desert will even flourish, that all that part of Israel that is desert, which is the majority, one day God is going to make it flourish again as a sign of his pact , that it will flourish again among its people.

And one day, the Bible says, the Hebrews will look at the one they pierced and weep for him as they weep for a brother they have not seen for a long time.

God has a purpose for his people and one day God will allow them in too. And that is why Paul says, do not boast you Gentiles, we can never despise the people of Israel. Christians have to love Israel, we have to pray for the peace of Jerusalem. There is a very great blessing for Christians and for men and nations that honor Israel. That is why this country has been blessed a lot, because it has been a country that has defended Israel. And there are many nations that hate the Jews, many Arab countries that want to destroy Israel, but we have to pray that God saves his people. There is something special. They are a tough people, they are a rebellious people, but God has a purpose for them. And one day, they too are going to enter into God's plan of salvation and then God will unite the Gentiles and the Jews and everyone, everyone will be saved.

All who confess Christ as their Lord and savior. Today, Israel is a secular nation. Israel as a nation, as a government, many of them do not even believe in God, it is an officially secular, socialist nation. There is a remnant of conservative Jews, but the majority are secular. There is a hardening but God one day is going to cause the very government of Israel to receive Jesus and declare Israel a Christian nation. But that is there in the future. God has reserved it for the last moment, meanwhile we have to pray that God brings his people to the knowledge of Jesus, and that he keeps and protects them. Amen.

Let's stand up then. I wanted to just touch on those three Chapters so that we would understand how this whole great plan of God fits together. We have a mysterious God, a God who moves as he wants. He knows when he does things. Meanwhile we just obey him and walk by faith in what he wants to do.

Father, thank you for your revelation, for the teaching we have received this morning. Open our spiritual eyes so that we can understand your mysteries, Lord. Help us to walk with simplicity all the days of our lives and help us to conform to your plans and your commandments, no matter how hard they are to believe. Help us to be an obedient and submissive people, Lord, to your will.

We thank you for this teaching, in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. We are going to ask the Lord, there is a chorus that says, "Open the eyes of my soul", let us ask God to open the eyes of our understanding so that we can understand his plans in our lives. And also that he open the eyes of the people of Israel so that they can understand his spiritual plan of salvation.