Allowing Romans 9 to speak for itself

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bible06As the Apostle Paul transitions into what we now call Romans 9 we should recall that there were no chapter and verse divisions in the original text. He is not starting a new theme but answering the question … if (or rather, since) God has an elect people who can never be separated from the love of God (which is what Romans 8 has just stated), what happened with the Jews? Weren’t they God’s elect people too?

History records that most of the Jews failed to recognize their own Messiah when He came… How can what Paul has written be true if God’s own people failed to receive Messiah when He came (and therefore are unsaved – Romans 10:1)? Hasn’t God’s promise failed to materialize for these people? What about the Jews Paul?

Paul was no ivory tower academician who had merely great intellectual acumen but no heart felt concern for people. Paul had a very real sympathy and compassion for his fellow countrymen and if it were possible (which of course it was not) he would have forfeited his own salvation if it would mean that his own people would be redeemed. He felt the issue very deeply.

Romans 9:1 I am speaking the truth in Christ—I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit— 2 that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. 3 For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh.

The Jews had unique privileges which were enjoyed by no other people on earth. Paul lists eight distinct and unique benefits:

4 They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises. 5 To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen.

Much time could be spent outlining all the things the people of Israel had going for them. So why is it that we observe such a great many Jews rejecting Messiah? Paul wants to answer that question and does so by stating in very categorical terms that God has not in any way failed to keep His promise.

6 But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel,

Notice what Paul is doing here in this verse. He tells us that God’s word has not in any way failed and now explains WHY this is the case. The word “for” is used to show the reason why the word of God has not failed.

Why has the word of God not failed?

The answer: because “not all Israel is Israel” or “not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel.”

That is quite a statement and one we must understand because Paul is about to take the next many verses to illustrate and prove this exact point.

He is about to show us that it in biblical history, it has always been this way. Continue reading →

His Robes For Mine

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Grace Community Church Worship Choir singing this great piece with beautiful, Bible-saturates lyrics about the gospel of Jesus:

HIS ROBES FOR MINE (Text by Chris Anderson; Tune by Greg Habegger)

His robes for mine: O wonderful exchange!
Clothed in my sin, Christ suffered ‘neath God’s rage.
Draped in His righteousness, I’m justified.
In Christ I live, for in my place He died.

Chorus:
I cling to Christ, and marvel at the cost:
Jesus forsaken, God estranged from God.
Bought by such love, my life is not my own.
My praise-my all-shall be for Christ alone.

His robes for mine: what cause have I for dread?
God’s daunting Law Christ mastered in my stead.
Faultless I stand with righteous works not mine,
Saved by my Lord’s vicarious death and life.

His robes for mine: God’s justice is appeased.
Jesus is crushed, and thus the Father’s pleased.
Christ drank God’s wrath on sin, then cried “‘Tis done!”
Sin’s wage is paid; propitiation won.

His robes for mine: such anguish none can know.
Christ, God’s beloved, condemned as though His foe.
He, as though I, accursed and left alone;
I, as though He, embraced and welcomed home!

The Bible and Genocide

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God commanded the Jews to utterly wipe out people groups that inhabited Canaan. If this is so, why didn’t Jesus denounce him? Christians often try to avoid this question, it seems to me.

Response (from monergism.com): Actually, I am surprised that it should be avoided as it gives us one of the clearest pictures of one of the most important truths in the Bible: That not only did God take the lives of those he ordered the Israelites to kill (such as the Canaanites) – He also takes the life of everyone on earth. The peoples of Canaan were perhaps dealt out the death penalty earlier than they may have expected; but in essence, their lot was no different than ours. We are all subject to death. Death, as the Bible reveals, is the just penalty exacted for Adam’s disobedience in the garden (Genesis 2:16-17; Rom. 5:12-14). So not only may God take life as he sees fit – he does take the life of every last human on earth (see Heb. 9:27). We should not lose the shock of this fearful truth: death is not natural, it is not a normal process of time and chance, it is not a necessary mechanism of evolution. Humans were created to live, and the fact that they do not bespeaks a terrifying truth – we are all born under divine wrath and judgment.

Indeed we must therefore yield to the fact that God is God and we are not. He alone is the Creator, the Giver of Life – and so he, too, is the Taker of Life. He takes life from whomever he will, whenever he will, and however he wants (1 Samuel 2:6; Job 1:21; Deut 9:4-6, 10:14; Isaiah 45:5-7). Even if we take nothing else into consideration, that alone is more than sufficient cause for us to “lay our hands upon our mouths” (see Job 38-42, esp. 40:4). Doesn’t the potter have a right to make one vessel for honorable use, and another vessel for dishonorable use, from the same lump of clay (Isaiah 45:9-10; Rom. 9:19-24)? Well then, so does God, who created humans from the dust, have the right to do with all of them however he sees fit?

In Deuteronomy 9:4-6 God himself gives the reason for his command to slaughter the Canaanites; but it is of great importance that we also notice the following passage, where God declares that the Israelites were no less wicked than the Canaanites, and deserved the same fate:

4 “Do not say in your heart, after the LORD your God has thrust them out before you, ‘It is because of my righteousness that the LORD has brought me in to possess this land,’ whereas it is because of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD is driving them out before you. 5 Not because of your righteousness or the uprightness of your heart are you going in to possess their land, but because of the wickedness of these nations the LORD your God is driving them out from before you, and that he may confirm the word that the LORD swore to your fathers, to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob 6″Know, therefore, that the LORD your God is not giving you this good land to possess because of your righteousness, for you are a stubborn people.

Deut 7:7″The LORD did not set His love on you nor choose you because you were more in number than any of the peoples, for you were the fewest of all peoples, 8 but because the LORD loved you and kept the oath which He swore to your forefathers, the LORD brought you out by a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.”

This latter passage directly relates Israel’s mandate to destroy the Canaanites and possess their land to what God had done for Israel in Egypt; therefore, it is vital to understand how God had just redeemed the nation of Israel. The climactic event marking Israel’s exodus from slavery was the Passover; and in the Passover, the people all had to paint a lamb’s blood on their doors so the angel of death would pass over their home (Exodus 11-15). If they did not apply the blood of the lamb, their firstborn would have been taken just like the rest of the Egyptians – they deserved the same judgment and only escaped it by the blood of the lamb. Continue reading →