andave's place

I think Romans 11 is my newest favorite chapter in the Bible.

Romans is a cool book. I read it through a while ago, taking my time, reading each chapter two or three times before moving on to the next one. When I finished reading it through I didn’t want it to end.

So I’m reading it again.

Chapter 11 is one of those mind-boggling chapters that paint the word “God” in red letters ten feet tall. It’s finishing up the theme of chapters 9 and 10, which was Israel and its rejection of the gospel. Chapter 11 then brings in the wonderful promise of HOPE. J

The Jewish people are God’s chosen people. He made a covenant with the patriarch Abraham, way back in Genesis, and promised to be his God and the God of his people (!). Going back to Romans, chapter 11 reaffirms the promise. It says that “God has not cast away His people whom He foreknew,” (vs. 2) and despite all the evil we see in the world, He has reserved for Himself “seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.” (vs. 4) In other words, there is still good in this world J.

And though Israel rejected God, the rejection isn’t permanent; in fact, it’s part of God’s plan (my goodness, is it ever ). My God has provided for me with this: “But through [Israel’s] fall, to provoke them to jealousy, salvation has come to the Gentiles.” (vs. 11)

Paul then draws the analogy - an oft-used one in the Bible - of the vine and branches. The vine (or Christ) is holy, therefore the branches (the Body of Christ) are holy. Sometimes branches (believers who’ve fallen away) are broken off that new believers might be grafted in. To those who were grafted in, Paul warns against boasting of the inheritance given to us, because just as others were chopped off for us, so can we be chopped off if we don’t love Him.

Tell me that’s not a scary thought! It makes God seem like some automaton - some dispassionate machine that looks at the quality of the product and, if it’s defective, chucks it out the window.

But…He’s not.

No one can accuse God of inhumanity because of the Resurrection.

It’s at this point that anyone has to break into praising God.

God’s own Son, infinitely holy, precious and lovely, my Savior Jesus died and rose again SO THAT I COULD BE GRAFTED IN. So that I could become His daughter.

Gosh! The Resurrection colors every single word in the entire Bible. I truly believe that if it weren’t for the death and Resurrection of Jesus the Bible would be just like any other book. It would have some literary value, some historical value, even some moral value, but there would be nothing to truly set apart from any other book.

But He died and rose again so that I could be freed from sin. Can “I love you” be said a better way?

I think Paul must have come to the same conclusion. He ends the chapter with this: “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!” (vs. 32) What an exuberant testimony of the hope that is in Christ! I can almost see Paul, bent over some parchment with a stylus or whatever he would have used, scratching busily along of the mercy God has shown us through the disobedience of Israel, then pausing, looking up and smiling, maybe even tearing up, and just praising God.

Ah, Paul, I know! I know well that my Redeemer lives!

See my mighty God? He can be yours too…

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