Romans 11:1–10.
This section is especially important because Paul asks the question many readers ask after Romans 9–10: If so many Israelites rejected Christ, has God rejected Israel? Paul's answer is emphatic: “By no means!” But we need to watch carefully how Paul proves that. He does not say that every physical Israelite is therefore saved. He points to himself and then to the Old Testament idea of a remnant.
HAS GOD REJECTED HIS PEOPLE?
Romans 11:1–10
Romans 10 ended on a sad note.
God said of Israel:
“All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people.”
Israel had heard.
But many had not believed.
They had stumbled over Christ.
They had not submitted to God's righteousness.
So an obvious question follows.
Paul asks it himself:
“I ask, then, has God rejected his people?”
— Romans 11:1
His answer could hardly be stronger:
“By no means!”
But what does Paul mean?
Let's let Paul explain Paul.
PAUL POINTS TO HIMSELF
Paul's first evidence is very personal:
“For I myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin.”
Paul was Jewish.
He was a physical descendant of Abraham.
He even names his tribe.
And Paul had been saved through Christ.
So God obviously had not rejected every Israelite.
Paul himself was living proof.
But notice something important.
Paul doesn't say:
“I am an Israelite, therefore I was automatically saved.”
Paul had once rejected Christ.
He had persecuted Christians.
His physical descent did not save him.
His salvation was in Christ.
“GOD HAS NOT REJECTED HIS PEOPLE”
Paul continues:
“God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew.”
— Romans 11:2
That raises an important question.
Who are these people?
Rather than immediately importing our own definition, keep reading.
Paul explains his point with an Old Testament example.
He takes us back to Elijah.
ELIJAH THOUGHT HE WAS ALONE
Paul reminds us of Elijah's complaint:
“Lord, they have killed your prophets, they have demolished your altars, and I alone am left, and they seek my life.”
From Elijah's viewpoint, Israel appeared completely lost.
Everyone seemed to have abandoned God.
Elijah thought:
I'm the only one left.
But Elijah didn't know the whole story.
God answered:
“I have kept for myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.”
— Romans 11:4
Israel as a nation had fallen deeply into apostasy.
But not every Israelite had abandoned God.
There was a faithful:
remnant.
“SO TOO AT THE PRESENT TIME”
Now Paul applies Elijah's story directly to his own day:
“So too at the present time there is a remnant, chosen by grace.”
— Romans 11:5
Those words are crucial.
Paul does not say:
Every Israelite is saved because Israel is God's chosen nation.
He says:
“There is a remnant.”
And when?
“At the present time.”
Paul is explaining what was happening in his own generation.
Many Israelites rejected Christ.
But some believed.
Paul was one of them.
The Jewish Christians in the first-century church were part of that remnant.
God's word had not failed.
CHOSEN BY GRACE
And how did this remnant exist?
Paul says:
“Chosen by grace.”
Then he adds:
“But if it is by grace, it is no longer on the basis of works; otherwise grace would no longer be grace.”
— Romans 11:6
There is Paul's great theme again:
grace.
Israel could not demand salvation because of ancestry.
They could not earn it through works.
Salvation rested upon God's grace.
That is true for Jews.
And it is true for Gentiles.
WHAT THEN?
Paul asks:
“What then?”
— Romans 11:7
And gives us a summary:
“Israel failed to obtain what it was seeking. The elect obtained it, but the rest were hardened.”
That takes us back into Romans 9.
There we encountered:
mercy
and
hardening.
Now Paul brings hardening back into the discussion.
Some obtained what Israel sought.
Others were hardened.
But again, we should not isolate that word from everything Paul has already told us.
REMEMBER WHAT PAUL JUST SAID
Why had Israel failed?
Romans 9:32:
“Because they did not pursue it by faith.”
They:
stumbled over Christ.
They:
did not submit to God's righteousness.
They:
did not all obey the gospel.
They had heard.
And God described them as:
“A disobedient and contrary people.”
Now Paul says:
“The rest were hardened.”
We need to allow all those statements to stand.
Hardening does not erase the responsibility Paul has just spent an entire chapter describing.
PAUL GOES BACK TO SCRIPTURE
Paul writes:
“As it is written, ‘God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes that would not see and ears that would not hear, down to this very day.’”
— Romans 11:8
Paul combines language from Deuteronomy 29:4 and Isaiah 29:10.
Again, Paul isn't inventing the idea of Israel's hardening.
Israel's own Scriptures described times when persistent rebellion resulted in blindness and judgment.
That background matters.
Hardening in Scripture is not merely an abstract theological concept.
It occurs in the history of people who repeatedly resist God.
We already saw that with Pharaoh.
Now Paul applies similar language to unbelieving Israel.
THEN PAUL QUOTES DAVID
Paul continues:
“And David says, ‘Let their table become a snare and a trap, a stumbling block and a retribution for them.’”
— Romans 11:9
Then:
“Let their eyes be darkened so that they cannot see, and bend their backs forever.”
The quotation comes from Psalm 69.
That Psalm is particularly interesting because the New Testament repeatedly connects it with Christ and His suffering.
The very Scriptures Israel possessed testified concerning the Messiah.
Yet many stumbled over the One to whom those Scriptures pointed.
What should have been a blessing could become a snare when separated from faith in Christ.
BUT WE MUST NOT STOP AT VERSE 10
This is extremely important.
Romans 11:7–10 sounds severe.
Israel has been hardened.
Eyes are darkened.
They cannot see.
If we stopped reading here, we might conclude:
That's it. Their condition is permanent. There is no possibility of change.
But Paul is not finished.
In the very next verse he asks:
“Did they stumble in order that they might fall?”
And again he answers:
“By no means!”
Later he will say something even more striking about those unbelieving Israelites:
“And even they, if they do not continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in.”
— Romans 11:23
That verse must be allowed to help us understand the hardening of Romans 11:7.
The hardened can still cease their unbelief.
And if they do:
God can graft them in again.
HARDENING IS NOT THE END OF THE STORY
This is one reason we must be careful with Romans 9–11.
If we stop too early, we can make Paul's argument say something Paul himself qualifies a few verses later.
Romans 11 contains:
hardening.
But it also contains:
“If they do not continue in their unbelief.”
That means unbelief matters.
Their present condition does not mean repentance and faith have become impossible.
Paul still sees hope for unbelieving Israelites.
WHO IS THE REMNANT?
Paul's Elijah example helps us.
In Elijah's day, the entire physical nation was called Israel.
But within Israel was a faithful group who had not bowed to Baal.
Paul says:
“So too at the present time there is a remnant.”
The remnant is not another ethnic group.
They are Israelites.
But they are Israelites who belong to God's faithful people.
That fits what Paul said at the beginning of Romans 9:
“Not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel.”
Physical descent alone has never been Paul's final definition of God's saved people.
HAS GOD REJECTED ISRAEL?
Paul's answer is:
No.
But we need to let Paul define that answer.
God had not rejected every Israelite.
Paul himself was an Israelite.
A remnant of Jewish believers existed.
God's promises had not failed.
But neither does Paul say that every physical descendant of Abraham was therefore saved regardless of faith.
Quite the opposite.
He has repeatedly identified unbelief as the problem.
READ PAUL BEFORE READING A SYSTEM INTO PAUL
Romans 11 is often pulled into modern debates about the political nation of Israel or predictions about events near the end of the world.
But before we ask those questions, we should first ask:
What problem was Paul himself addressing?
Paul was grieving because so many of his fellow Israelites had rejected Christ.
Had that caused God's promises to fail?
No.
Had God rejected every Israelite?
No.
Paul himself was proof.
There was:
“A remnant, chosen by grace.”
And even those presently hardened were not necessarily beyond hope.
Paul will soon say:
“If they do not continue in their unbelief, they will be grafted in.”
That needs to remain on the table as we continue through Romans 11.
BEFORE YOU LEAVE
Ask the text:
Had God rejected every Israelite?
No.
Paul himself was an Israelite.
Did Paul say every Israelite was therefore saved?
No.
He spoke of:
“A remnant.”
On what basis did that remnant exist?
Grace.
What happened to the rest?
They were hardened.
Does that mean their unbelief could never change?
Keep reading.
Paul will explicitly say that if they do not continue in unbelief, they can be grafted in again.
And that brings us to Paul's next surprising question.
Israel stumbled.
But:
Did they stumble so that they would fall beyond recovery?
Paul answers:
“By no means!”
And then he introduces an image that will dominate the rest of the discussion:
an olive tree.
NEXT: BRANCHES BROKEN OFF
Romans 11:11–24
TEXT B4 TRADITION
Read First. Conclude Later.
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