Lessons

The lesson on June 7, 2009 picks up the Romans Study with part 13 and reads the scripture in Romans 11:25-32. God does have a purpose and He has always had one throughout the ages. When we go through Romans we find that God was dealing with Israel and they were classified the apple of His eye, His people. Paul writes that in Romans 11:1-2b “I say then, Hath God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew.” It was the promise of God that He gave to Abraham that through Israel all the nations of the earth would be blessed. That’s why when Jesus was here he said in Matthew 15:24 “…I am not sent but unto the lost sheep of the house of Israel.” He did not come for the Gentiles. Gods glory was to be demonstrated in the repentance of Israel and the acceptance of the blessings of God that was promised to Abraham and his seed. In that acceptance of repentance, the light of God would shine throughout the whole Earth and the Gentiles would come to God through the glory they found in Israel. This calling had not changed in Romans and that’s what Romans 11:29 means when it says “… the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.” God is dealing with Israel in all of this and the Gentiles are brought in with Abraham to make Israel jealous. Romans 11:11 ”I say then, Have they stumbled that they should fall? God forbid: but rather through their fall salvation is come unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them to jealousy.” God’s program through Romans and all the way through Acts is to establish the Kingdom of God here on Earth. That was God’s promise to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the twelve tribes of Israel. Many today think that the church began after Christ’s resurrection in Acts 2, and the church is the recipient of all the spiritual blessings of Israel because we are the heavenly seed of Abraham. This way of thinking is wrong.