Grafted In

August 21, 2016 Background Scripture: Romans 11:11 – 36 Lesson Passage: Romans 11:11 – 24 Jesus said it best: Salvation is of the Jews. That is to say, everyone God chooses to save will be saved through the faith God gives based on the covenant that belongs to the Jews. The beginning of the Jewish faith is the circumcision of the male babies. This makes all of the males participants in the covenant of God and the females are sanctified as part of the family. It was through the Jews that the Law of God was received. The Jewish faith was built on the keeping of the Law—which included circumcision. But the Law is contrary to the flesh and leads to an individual’s moral disobedience becoming exceedingly sinful. The Jews’ hope of deliverance was dependent on the promised Messiah of God arriving in their midst. However, because of the disobedience in the children of the covenant, they were not prepared to receive the long awaited Messiah when he was presented to them. In our lesson today, Paul stated that Israel’s disobedience provided a window God used to extend salvation, by faith, to the Gentiles. The Gentiles were previously outside of the covenant of God. This window of salvation for the Gentiles, Paul reasoned, was provided to provoke the Jews to jealousy. But Paul’s conclusion is that all of Israel will still be saved. God promised salvation to the Jews and He is not going back on His promise. During this time between Pentecost and the Rapture, also known as the Church Age, God has spiritually blinded the Jews and this has made them enemies of the gospel. The Jews are not enemies of God for they are still God’s covenant people. Therefore, Paul warned the Gentile believers to not get beside themselves and think they are superior to the Jews. The Jews are the original people of God and that has not changed. Paul used the analogy of an arborist’s work with trees. The arborist can improve the quality of fruit produced by grafting branches from a tree into the trunk another tree. The grafted branch relies on the trunk and roots of the tree it has been grafted into for all of its substance. When the grafted branch begins to bear fruit, it is due solely to the trunk and roots of the tree it is grafted into. Paul viewed the Gentile believers in the same manner as the grafted branch. The fruitfulness of Gentile believers is due solely to the tree of salvation they have been grafted into—not because of self-worth or merit. The tree of salvation is the people of God. Again, the Jews are the original people of God. The caution here is that Gentile believers should not become high-minded and think they are better than the Jews. The fact of salvation is that Gentile believers have been grafted into the Jewish family and made partakers of the covenant. This is the essence of the doctrine of adoption. Abraham is the father of the faithful and we have been made children of Abraham through adoption. God’s entire plan of salvation is of the Jews. During this Church Age, Gentiles are being saved because we are being grafted in. Robert C. Hudson August 13, 2016