6 It is not as though God’s word had failed. For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel. 7 Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham’s children. On the contrary, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.” 8 In other words, it is not the natural children who are God’s children, but it is the children of the promise who are regarded as Abraham’s offspring. 9 For this was how the promise was stated: “At the appointed time I will return, and Sarah will have a son.”
Another huge stumbling block for the Jews (then and now) is simply this - if Israel was God's chosen people and if they had the revelation of God, and the leading Jews at the time of Christ didn't believe He was the Messiah, and if the majority of the people didn't believe He was the Messiah, and if the majority of Jews throughout history since then don't believe He was the Messiah - how could He possibly be the Messiah? How could God send a message that His chosen people wouldn't believe? And how could the message seem to be calling out a Gentile church and setting aside the Jews? It must be heresy, blasphemy, impossible.
But Paul tells them outright - the fact that Israel doesn't believe, doesn't mean God has cancelled or broken His promise.
MacArthur says.....
here the Holy Spirit answers any accusation that might be leveled at God saying that if Israel rejected and was out of the covenant then God's word would be broken, His promises useless, His character untrustworthy because He changed His mind, He'd overturned everything He said. And Israel would have been able to say God is not a covenant keeping God, you can't trust Him.
Despite all the privileges given to Israel, as a nation they have chosen unbelief, and they have been temporarily set aside by God - and that is why Paul is sorrowful (as we saw in yesterday's passage). But Paul confirms that despite that fact, God's promise is still consistent.
what Paul wants to say here is that Israel's rejection somehow some way is still consistent with God's promise, still consistent with God's faithfulness, still consistent with God's covenant. And what appears as a breech of promise is only an apparent breech, not a real one....
When God gave covenants and promises to His people Israel to save them, to give them a Kingdom, to give them glory, to bless them, to give them a King, and so forth, He meant what He said. These have not been cancelled. They haven't been cancelled. Beloved, you must understand that. That's why the nation Israel still exists. That's why it's still there. Of all of the people of that part of the world who existed when Israel existed, there are none left but the Israelites. And God has preserved them because He has yet to fulfill those promises and yet to fulfill those covenants. And their unbelief in no way violates those.
Notice v6b - For not all who are descended from Israel are Israel.
He means that God never promises unconditionally to each offspring of Abraham covenant blessing just because he is an offspring of Abraham...You see, the Jew believes that because he is fleshly descending from Abraham he therefore is included in the covenant...because he is a Jew by birth he is therefore a child of promise. He is therefore redeemed... But God never intended that all Israel would be redeemed Israel...spiritual Israel is contained within physical Israel. And though the nation, now listen very careful distinction, though the nation was chosen as a nation to be a vehicle to transmit the Scriptures, to be a vehicle to propagate the message of monotheism, one God, though the nation was chosen to be a witness nation, the choosing of the nation as an entity does not mean that every individual within that nation was also chosen to salvation. So the fact that Israel does not believe, that many individuals don't believe doesn't cancel the promises because God never intended in His sovereignty that every Jew would believe but that within the physical Israel there would be a believing remnant. The nation was elected to privilege but only individuals are elected to salvation.
the fleshly Israel, the nation of privilege is not necessarily the same as the redeemed Israel, the nation of righteousness, the individuals who obey God......not all Jews are really saved. But the ones who have faith in God as God has prescribed it in the Word, they are the true Israel....
The reason why the rejection of the Jews involved no failure on the part of the divine promise is that the promise was never addressed merely to the natural descendants of Abraham. The true Jew and the blessed Jew is the believing Jew, and it's always been that way. When a Jew received Jesus Christ as Savior and Messiah, all the promises are fulfilled, all the promises are fulfilled. When a Jew comes to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ, then that Jew enters into covenant blessing, the fulfillment of the promises. That's the promise of God....
the national unbelief and rejection of Israel doesn't mean God's promises are not true, doesn't mean His covenants aren't being kept, it simply points out the thing that they should have known throughout all their history that for the most of the history of Israel the major portion of the nation rejected the truth of God and it was always a remnant that believed it.
7 Nor because they are his descendants are they all Abraham’s children. On the contrary, “It is through Isaac that your offspring will be reckoned.”
Just being a child of Abraham does not make you a child of the promise. Ishmael was Abraham's firstborn, but he was not a child of the promise. Isaac was. Abraham's other wife, Keturah, also had sons, and they too were excluded from the promise. Only Isaac was chosen by God.
Isaac is a perfect illustration of a believer because he was born by a special act of God, he was born by supernatural power and he was born according to a divine promise. He's a picture of anyone who is redeemed.
V8 confirms that it is not biology that makes you a child of God, but rather your election by God Himself to become a child of the promise.
V9 shows that God has always worked through an elect remnant. Abraham had many sons. But God specifically said that the child of the promise would be born to Sarah (not Hagar, not Keturah). Isaac was God's choice.
The doctrine of election always makes me a bit nervous, because it seems so unfair. But then I need to remind myself that I don't get to decide what's fair and what's not fair. God does. And if I think something differently than what God thinks - guess who's wrong? Me. I may not like it. But it's the truth. And I need to align myself with God's truth, not my own.
Tomorrow's scripture focus: Romans 9:10-18
1 comment:
It is a hard thing to understand, and I have more or less given up on understanding it myself. If I believe by faith that God is the one true God and that He loves and cares for me as an individual person, not just one of millions, then I can also believe by faith that God's way is better than my way, whether I understand it or not. It's not always easy, but there it is.
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