In this episode, dive into the heart of Paul’s struggle to understand the Jewish rejection of the Gospel while Gentiles embrace it with open arms. Through a philosophical lens, explore the question of human suffering and the divine plan laid out in the Bible. The discussion delves into the analogies of fish eggs and olive trees, presenting a complex yet intriguing perspective on salvation’s path in the eyes of God.
The CEM Network is pleased to present Ronald L. Dart and Born to Win.
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I had a friend once who allowed us how us human beings were in the sight of God, like fish eggs. Really, we were sitting in the sun in a bass boat trying unsuccessfully to catch something, and he was trying to make sense out of the world. A fishing boat, by the way, is a great place for philosophizing. I know, he said, that there is only one way of salvation. I know that is by the name of Jesus Christ. But he said, I also know that the vast majority of the people in the world who have ever lived have never so much as heard that name. So he likened us human beings to the life cycle of the large mouth bass who lays millions of eggs. Now, many of her eggs will be eaten by the male that fertilizes them. Most of her eggs will be eaten by bream and other small fish and will never hatch. Of those eggs that do hatch, most of those tiny little fish fry will be eaten by minnows and bream. She has to lay millions of eggs, by the way, and as they mature to minnow size, most of those will be eaten by adult bass. And in the end, only a tiny fraction of the eggs actually laid… will become mature bass. She has to lay millions of eggs in order to get a very few mature fish. My friend speculated that God, in order to bring a very few sons into his kingdom, had to put billions of people on earth to allow for wastage. I had to admit that the idea had a perverse kind of logic to it. But what did it say about the kind of being who would create a system like that for man? We’re not fish. We’re human. We suffer. We hope. We love. We create. Is the God we read about in the Bible the sort of person who would waste people in their billions to achieve his objectives? It’s one thing for God to give man the freedom to accept or reject life with God, but it’s another thing altogether to subject man to the kind of suffering we see in this world without giving a man hope of something better. And another thing altogether, if you’re going to roast all those wasted millions and billions of people in hell, not for just a day, not for just an hour, but always. There’s a little passage that Paul makes in a letter he wrote to Timothy. It’s 1 Timothy 2, verse 3. He says, For this is good and acceptable in the sight of God our Savior, who will have all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth. So right off the bat, we understand God’s objective is not to waste anybody. It’s to save everybody. It doesn’t mean everybody’s going to be saved necessarily in the end, but nevertheless, that’s what he wants. The Apostle Paul was concerned about the wastage of people. It was unlike God, he thought, to throw people away, to cast them to the wolves, or in the metaphor of fish, to the largemouth bass. There’s a long passage in Romans where Paul agonizes over the question of the Jews. We would really like to think that men like Paul had all the answers. You know, we sit down and we try to define from the writings of the men of the Bible the truth. And oftentimes we come to stylize constructions of what we think are the truth from their words. But the fact of the matter is, we don’t understand it any better than they did. And they didn’t understand it perfectly. Because God left a certain amount of ambiguity in all these questions, I guess just to frustrate all the know-it-alls in the world. We would like to think Paul had all the answers, but it’s apparent that he didn’t. Paul struggled with this, and in his letter to the Christians in Rome, he thinks out loud about how troubled he was about this question. He tried to take what he knew about God and his plan to create an explanation for his lack of success in taking the gospel to the Jews. Because in every city where Paul went, the Jews rejected the gospels while the Gentiles flocked to it, and that didn’t make sense to Paul. And when you think about it, it really doesn’t make sense anyhow, because here is a Messiah who has come to a people, the Jews, who had been for generations expecting a Messiah. The very idea of the Messiah is a Jewish idea. And so here is a people expecting a Messiah, looking forward to a Messiah, praying for a Messiah, and looking for him, and with high levels of anticipation of the Messiah at the time Paul comes on the scene. Paul walks into the synagogue and says, The Messiah is here. And the people who expected the Messiah turn him down, and the Gentiles, who never even heard of a Messiah, accept him in droves. Now, this section of Romans where Paul talks about this, you can read the entire section beginning with Romans 9. For right now, I want to focus on Romans 11, the 11th chapter. Paul says, I say then, has God cast away his people? What he’s asking them is because of this wholesale rejection of the gospel by the Jewish people, his question is, has God then rejected his people? No, he says, for I also am an Israelite of the seed of Abraham of the tribe of Benjamin. God has not cast away his people whom he foreknew. Don’t you know what the scripture says of Elijah? How he makes intercession to God against Israel saying, Lord, they have killed your prophets. They’ve digged down your altars. I’m left alone. I’m the only man of God left around here and they’re trying to kill me. What was the answer of God to him? I have reserved to myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal. Even so, at this present time, says Paul, there is a remnant according to the election of grace. Okay, so Israel has not rejected it entirely. A remnant have accepted it. Verse 7 says, What then? Israel has not obtained what he seeks for. The election, that is a small selection out of Israel, has obtained it, and the rest were blinded. Wow! In other words, here’s a whole nation of people. A tiny handful of them were selected out of that who could see the truth. The rest of them were blinded. As it is written, Paul says, God has given them the spirit of slumber, eyes they should not see, ears they should not hear, unto this day. And David said, let their table be made a snare and a trap and a stumbling block and a recompense to them. Let their eyes be darkened that they may not see. Bow down their back always. Now, this is very troubling because it seems to suggest that God did not allow the majority to see, to hear, and to understand. Now, what in the world are we to make of that based upon what we know about this God from the pages of the Bible? Paul then continues, I say then, have they stumbled that they should fall? No, but rather through their fall, salvation is come to the Gentiles to provoke them to jealousy. Now, if the fall of them be the riches of the world and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles, well, how much more their fullness? Now, this is an awkward sentence Paul’s written here, and it’s hard to follow, but the logic of it is even harder than the grammar. Why should the fall of Israel lead to salvation for the Gentiles? How on earth can it help for Israel to fall, for Israel to fail, for Israel to turn away in God’s great objective of converting the Gentiles? And then what about all those who fell? Are they lost forever? Some of them might repent later, but in the meantime, many would die, not having returned. What about them? Paul then continues writing. He says, I speak to you Gentiles. Inasmuch as I am the apostle of the Gentiles, I magnify my office. If by any means I may provoke to emulation those who are of my flesh and might save some of them. In other words, I want to somehow provoke the Jews to respond to this and save some of them. Four, if the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead? But look at the problem here. Why should the casting away of Israel be the reconciling of the world in the first place? Then he asks, what is the receiving of them but life from the dead? Now, Paul is struggling with the same question that troubles a lot of people. What hints does he find in the Word of God to help him understand what God is doing? If God is going to ultimately save people who live out their lives and die without knowing Him, how is He going to do this? It’s a thing that people talk about a lot, and a lot of people lose sleep over it, because they have people they know, that they love, who never accepted Christ, who never knew Christ in this life, and their church, their doctrine believes that these people who never knew Christ in this life are already in hell, starting out on an eternity of torment. Yet Paul seems to be holding out hope for these people. He hints at it when he said, what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead? Does he see this taking place at a resurrection? It would seem so. Stay with me. When I come back, we’ll talk further about this difficult question.
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Paul continues in verse 16, looking for a way to develop his theme, to try to deepen our understanding of it. And he turns to an analogy of an olive tree. He says, “…if the root is holy, then so are the branches. And if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them, and with them partake of the root and the fatness of the olive tree…” You see what he’s driving at? He’s basically saying, as we got a tree, we broke out some of the branches to make room for the Gentiles to be grafted in, and therefore the Gentiles are every bit as holy as the original branches or as the Jews were. Then he says, don’t boast, though, against the branches, because you need to understand you don’t bear the root. The root bears you. You will say then, well, the branches were broken off so I could be grafted in. Well, Paul says, because of unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by faith. But don’t be high-minded. You’d better fear. Because if God didn’t spare the natural branches, take heed lest he also not spare you. So he could break you out just as easily as he broke out the natural branches. But the logical question that follows on the heels of this, Why does breaking these branches out help? This is what we keep coming back to. What’s the point in cutting all these Jews off from the faith in order to make room for Gentiles? Why isn’t there room for everybody? Why does it help to remove the branches of Israel in order to graft in Gentiles? The simile Paul draws is of the olive tree, which has a limited capacity for branches, both in room and sustenance. If we’re going to make the graft, we have to make room for it. It’s a fact that most Jews were simply not ready to make room for Gentiles in the community of God’s people. The story goes on and on through the book of Acts. Actually, you can see hints of it in the gospel, but primarily in the book of Acts, where the Jews simply didn’t want to accept the Gentiles. They said, well, if they are going to come in, they’ve all got to be circumcised. Now, if you’re an adult male and you’re facing the question of circumcision, this should really put a real test on your faith as to see whether you believe this or not. But they made a decision early on that that was not going to be required of the Gentiles. And the whole question is, can the gospel continue to go to the Gentiles, or is this going to be purely a Jewish religion? And the fact is that as Paul went around on his trip, if every synagogue had accepted Christ in its entirety— the chances are they probably would have still wanted it to be strictly a Jewish faith, and that’s where it would have ended. But it didn’t. Having rejected the gospel, Paul was forced to turn to the Gentiles, who, marvel of marvels, accepted it wholeheartedly. Now, in verse 22, Paul says, Behold, therefore, the goodness and the severity of God. upon them which fell, severity toward you, goodness, if you continue in his goodness, but you can be cut off too. And this is what my friend cited to support his idea. Behold the severity of God. For the minnows that get eaten, it’s just tough luck. But Paul is not quite ready to allow this. He went on in verse 23 to say, They also, if they abide not still in unbelief, can be grafted in, for God is able to graft them back in. After all, if you were cut out of a wild olive tree, wild by nature, and you were grafted contrary to nature into a good olive tree, how much more shall these, the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree? How much easier is it to bring them back? And then he says this, I don’t want you, brethren, to be ignorant of this mystery. Oh, he acknowledges the fact that this isn’t something that’s just real plain. On the other hand, he doesn’t want us to stay ignorant of it, lest we be wise in our own conceits. Okay, what is it? that blindness in part is happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in, and so all Israel shall be saved. As it is written, there shall come out of Zion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob. Now I dare say, you and I could ask more questions right here than Paul himself could ever answer. but he understood the basics. He understood that the cutting off of the Jews was a temporary expedient. It was being driven by the plan of God. Paul understood that it was God’s intent to save all of Israel, not just a few of them. Now, we naturally wonder how in the light of history, but Paul doesn’t help us much here. He says, For this is my covenant with them when I shall take away their sins. As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sake. As touching the election, they are beloved for the Father’s sake. For the gifts and the calling of God are without repentance. For as you in time past have not believed God, yet now have obtained mercy through their unbelief, even so these have now not believed that through your mercy they may obtain mercy. Strange, Paul is implying that through the mercy of the Gentile converts, Israel will be saved. And then he gives us this, for God has concluded them all in unbelief that he may have mercy upon all. Now, how on earth is it possible to shut people up in a state of unbelief to have mercy on them? You would think giving them belief would be the way you would have mercy, wouldn’t it? Well, there’s a short statement in the book of Hebrews that I think just might help us understand this. It’s in Hebrews chapter 10 and beginning in verse 26. The writer says, “…if we sin willfully after we have received the knowledge of the truth, there remains no more sacrifice for sins, but a certain fearful looking for of judgment and fiery indignation which shall devour the adversaries.” He that despised Moses’ law died without mercy under two or three witnesses. Now how much sorer punishment do you suppose shall he be thought worthy who has trodden underfoot the Son of God and has counted the blood of the covenant wherewith he was sanctified, an unholy thing, and has done despite to the Spirit of grace? Do you realize what he’s saying? He is saying that willful sin, when you have the knowledge of the truth… is the end. That’s it. You’re finished. But if you conclude that people sinned ignorantly, in unbelief, or in weaknesses, you leave room for mercy. So if God senses that the Jews will reject the knowledge of the truth, perhaps he concludes it is safer not to show them the truth for the time being. Paul concludes his argument by saying, Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways. His ways are past our finding out. For who has known the mind of the Lord? Who has been his advisor? Or who has given to God and is going to get it back? For of him and through him and to him are all things to whom be glory forever. Amen. Now, Paul does not do us the grace of explaining his conclusions. But he has given us something to go on. You know, as someone once said, I don’t know how God’s going to save all these unconverted people who never had a chance to be saved. I just believe God will make a way. All right. What would we not look to in the Bible? Where would we find something that might help us understand what that way might be? What scriptures might have supported Paul in his belief? What scriptures, because Paul knew the scriptures, might have led him to his conclusion? Well, there’s an obscure prophecy from Ezekiel that I’ve always found fascinating ever since I first heard it as a Negro spiritual. Now, you have to understand that this prophecy that I’m going to read to you from the book of Ezekiel is set way out into the future, not merely from then, but even from now. It’s obscure in its own way as many prophecies are, but it may provide a glimpse into the mind of God on this very important question.
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Poor Ezekiel. This man was put through so much in the course of getting all these prophecies, it’s hard to know how wrung out he must have been when the whole thing was over. But on this one occasion, it was a vision. He says, the hand of the Lord was upon me. This is Ezekiel 37, verse 1. The hand of the Lord was upon me, and he carried me out in the spirit of the Lord, and he set me down in the middle of a valley which was full of bones. Just visualize it. Skeletons, broken pieces of skeletons, rib cages, skulls, femurs, all that stuff scattered all over the place. And he put me down, and he caused me to pass by them roundabout, and there were very many in the open valley, and, lo, they were very dry, old, dead. You know, you run across the carcasses sometimes of dead animals, a deer or something that’s been dead a long time in the field when you’re hunting, and the bones are bleached white and very dry. He said to me, Son of man, can these bones live? And Ezekiel, probably stepping over somebody’s bones, said, Lord God, you know, he’s not apt to get trapped on this one because he knows there’s something coming. Can these bones live? Normally you would say no. So he said to me, prophesy upon these bones and say to them, O you dry bones, hear ye the word of the Lord. As the old spiritual goes, you know, you preach to these dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Now, the word prophesy, basically, and I’m bringing it forward in modern English, would be preach. And what God told Ezekiel to do was go out here in the middle of this valley and preach to these bones. And you say to them, oh, you dry bones, hear the word of the Lord. Thus saith the Lord to these bones, Behold, I will cause breath to enter into you, and you shall live. I will lay sinews upon you, and I will bring up flesh upon you, and I will cover you with skin and put breath in you, and you will live, and you shall know that I am the Lord. Okay. Ezekiel says, So I preached as I was commanded. It must have felt a little bit silly, standing out in the middle of a bunch of skeletons and broken bones. I preached, and there was a noise and a shaking, and the bones came together bone to his bone. And I expect some of the shaking was Ezekiel’s bones. And when I beheld, low sinews and flesh came upon them, and skin covered them above, but there was no breath in them. Just a bunch of dead bodies lying around on the ground all over the place. You know, it’s hard to imagine how strange all this must have sounded in generations going by. I think it probably sounds less strange to us because of the movies and because of special effects. We’ve seen stuff like this in reconstructions and science fictions. But it’s still like fiction. It’s still an incredible thing to visualize. Well, he says, there they were. And then God said, preach to the wind. Preach, son of man, and say to the wind, thus saith the Lord God, come from the four winds, O breath, and breathe upon these slain that they may live. So I preached as he commanded me, and the breath came into them, and they lived, and they stood on their feet, an exceeding great army. And what in the world is this? Who are these people? What is this all about, and what does it mean? Then he said to me, Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. All Israel. Remember Paul’s words? And so all Israel shall be saved. And what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead? Son of man, these bones are the whole house of Israel. Look, they say, our bones are dried, our hope is lost, we’re cut off for our parts. Therefore preach and say to them, Thus saith the Lord God, Behold, O my people, I will open your graves and cause you to come up out of your graves and bring you into the land of Israel. Now, it doesn’t take a lot of imagination. I realize we are talking about a vision. a vision of a long, long time ago, but that looked down to right down to the very end times. And he says there’s going to be a resurrection. And something more important, something very important to understand about this resurrection is it’s a resurrection to physical life. Normally, when Christians think of the resurrection, they think of becoming spirit beings and flying off into the sky. Not this one. This involves bone, flesh, sinew, skin, breath. Human, physical life. I’m going to bring you into the land of Israel, and you shall know that I, the Lord, have opened your graves, O my people, and brought you out of your graves, and shall put my Spirit in you, and you shall live. And I shall place you in your own land, and you shall know that I, the Lord, have spoken it and performed it. Notice, I will put my Spirit in you. This whole thing, whatever the model may ultimately mean, the possibilities that it holds out are that at some time in the future, there is a resurrection, bone to bone, skin to skin, flesh to flesh, breath to breath, and an opportunity for salvation to be given to those people so raised and put back into the land. Can God do that? Is that fair? Is it right? Hey, God’s sovereign. He can do whatever he wants to do. Putting it another way, whatever he does is right. The word of the Lord came to him the second time, Ezekiel says, saying, Moreover, son of man, take a stick and write upon it for Judah and the children of Israel, his companions. Take another stick and write upon it for Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and all the house of Israel, his companions. And join them together in one stick, and they shall become one in your hand. And when the children of Israel shall speak to you, saying, You’ve got to show us what you mean by this. Say to them, Thus saith the Lord God, I’m going to take the stick of Joseph, the hand of Ephraim, the tribes of Israel, his fellows, and put him with him, and the stick of Judah, and make them one stick, and they shall be one in my hand. Now, if you didn’t know that way back in history before Ezekiel’s time, Israel had been divided into two kingdoms, one, Joseph, the house of Israel, the other, the house of Judah. that the house of Israel had gone into captivity many years before Judah did and was disappeared, was lost to history and completely gone, you might not understand the significance of this. That at the very end time, a time of the resurrection, a time of people being brought back into the land of Israel again, that at that time, the Jews and the house of Israel will be united. And then at the end, the house of Israel and the house of Judah are two separate political entities. Nearly everyone knows where the house of Judah is. Right now, it’s in Tel Aviv, it’s in Jerusalem, it’s in that land down there. But where, oh where, is the house of Israel as a separate political entity? That’s a fascinating question, but it’ll have to wait until another time. Until next time, I’m Ronald Dart, and you were born to win.
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