Paul in examining if the message of the Gospel has reached Israel, offered up four questions and we take up our notes now to examine the third: It’s not is it, that God has rejected His people? (Rom 11:1)
“Yes we heard and yes we understood but we couldn’t believe because God rejected us beforehand. We couldn’t believe even if we wanted to.”
Once again Paul’s answer demands the negative: of course the Jews have not been rejected. Here people are quick to point out that the seven thousand saved are the believing remnant of Israel and Paul being one of them shows that God has an Israel within Israel but Paul isn’t defending the Israel within Israel—he’s praying for the salvation of Unbelieving Israel.
Paul, speaking as a Jew shows himself as proof that the Jews have not been rejected for the gospel is available to them. God foreknew his people and just as in Elijah’s day when the man stood thinking that he was alone as he pled against Israel, God pointed out that there were seven thousand (a perfect remnant you can read it) of men who haven’t bowed the knee to Baal. Elijah wasn’t alone but there was a perfect counting of men who stood with Elijah and thus continuing to preserve the nation.
This remnant remains such by God’s grace and mercy—He has not wiped out the Jews but rather is preserving them for a specific, as of this point, unmentioned purpose. And this believing portion holds on and the rest were partially hardened so as to stumble.
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