25I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers, so that you may not be conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in. 26And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written:
"The deliverer will come from Zion;
he will turn godlessness away from Jacob.
27And this is my covenant with them
when I take away their sins."
28As far as the gospel is concerned, they are enemies on your account; but as far as election is concerned, they are loved on account of the patriarchs, 29for God's gifts and his call are irrevocable. 30Just as you who were at one time disobedient to God have now received mercy as a result of their disobedience, 31so they too have now become disobedient in order that they too may now receive mercy as a result of God's mercy to you. 32For God has bound all men over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all.
33Oh, the depth of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!
How unsearchable his judgments,
and his paths beyond tracing out!
34"Who has known the mind of the Lord?
Or who has been his counselor?"
35"Who has ever given to God,
that God should repay him?"
36For from him and through him and to him are all things.
To him be the glory forever! Amen.(NIV)
Main Points and Discussion Questions
1. Great numbers of Jews will come to Christ just before He returns (vv. 25-27).
-“so that you may not become conceited” – Paul desires that the Gentiles - to whom he already gave a great warning (11:20-22) - be humbled by God’s grace and not fall into the trap of thinking that they were the “replacement” for Israel.
- ”All Israel will be saved” – the church has differed over just what the meaning of this phrase is here. Typically, there are 3 interpretations:
a) the entire church
b) the “remnant” already spoken of in Rom 9-11
c) the entire nation of Israel
-I subscribe to c), partly because 1) against view a), the word “Israel” has referred to the ethnic nation throughout Rom 9-11; and 2) against view b), it is precisely not the remnant that Paul is referring to in the immediate context – rather, his “them” and “you” contrast (esp. in v. 28) reveals he is talking about the Israelite nation.
-However, this does not mean that all who have ever been an Israelite will be saved (that would contradict Paul’s words in Romans 9:6ff), nor does it even mean that all Israelites at the time of Christ’s return will be saved. Often the phrase ‘All Israel” refers to ‘many as a representative whole’ (see Josh 7:25; 1 Sam 25:1; Dan 9:11).
2. Jews and Gentiles are ‘on equal footing’ in God’s sight (vv. 28-32).
-From verses 28-32, John Piper draws out “the four stages of God’s design in history”. Through these we can see that neither Jews nor Gentiles have anything to boast about before God:
1) The time of Gentile disobedience—the time when God let the nations go their own ways and sink further and further into sin, while God patiently wrote a lesson book for the nations in the history of Israel as he gave them law and writings and prophets.
2) The time of Jewish disobedience—the time when they rejected their Messiah, Jesus Christ, and God gave them up to hardness.
3) The time of mercy shown to millions of Gentiles through the spread of the gospel to all nations and calling out a redeemed people of God—a fullness of the Gentiles.
4) The time of mercy on Israel as God completes his redemptive plan and takes away the hardening and saves the nation of Israel with a mass conversion to Christ.
Note: Above four points taken from this sermon of Piper's.
The main point of chapter 11 is to show that “God has designed and guided history—both its disobedience and its obedience—so that in the end it will most fully display the reliability of his promises and the magnificence of his mercy—to prevent human pride and produce white-hot worship.” (Piper)
3. God’s ways are perfect, and perfectly free of any contribution by anyone or anything. Therefore He deserves all glory and praise (vv. 33-36).
-Theology gives way to doxology. And yet, there’s still plenty of theology in this doxology! Note the following things:
a) God is infinitely above and beyond us (v. 33, 34)
b) God doesn’t need our counsel (v. 34)
c) God doesn’t need our service or gifts (v. 35)
d) He gives everything (v. 36)
e) He sustains everything (v. 36)
f) He demands our worship in return (v. 36)
For similar thoughts, check out Ps 50:7-15 and Acts 17:22-31.
Discussion Question 1: How does this view of God compare and contrast with ideas of God in the world – and even in the church – today?
Discussion Question 2: So far in the Book of Romans we’ve seen that Paul wanted to remind the church in Rome of God’s mercy, even though they were genuine believers. Why did the church in Rome need this reminder, and why do we, by extension, need it too?
