Hey You Gentiles
Romans 11:17-21 · Mike Doyle · Dec 29, 2024
Romans (2022-25), No. 104
Holly Hills Bible Church
https://www.hollyhillsbiblechurch.org/teaching/messages/49261937495719

Transcribed from the recording by SermonAudio, so expect the occasional misheard word.

I had Jim read, even though we're past verse 13, when verse 13 Paul says, I am speaking to you who are Gentiles, I think it's a critical thing as we go through these verses through chapter 11. He's talking about and talking to Gentiles. He's not, I can't overemphasize, he's not talking about the church. He's talking about Jews and Gentiles. So a lot of times, people will, like Jim said, confuse what Paul means with this scenario he lays out here, so keep that in mind, and that's why I titled this sermon, Hey, You Gentiles.

So, and then verse 16 comes along, and, Hold on a second, let me get my right notes. We studied verse 16 last week. 16 is, Paul says now, he gets down to the first fruits are holy and fill the lump also if the root is holy, so are the branches. And it's a reminder that what marked the beginning of God's ways, and what we're really studying here is how does God do stuff? Because a lot of times we think he ought to be doing stuff the way we think it ought to go when we should sort of be paying attention to what he's doing.

And when he made a sovereign choice of Abraham and called him out and registered within him divine promises, that's really where we are. So the promises given to Abraham were holy, like the root, because they had reference to the Messiah, Christ. and to all that God would bring to pass by him and through him.

They were altogether apart from the failure and imperfections of man. If you've ever read any of the Old Testament, men are not the shining example of behavior and life in the Old Testament. But God came to this man, Abraham, And they were held by Abraham as opposed to all others, not in a natural way, but in the faith which showed that all that was of the flesh and the nature was in the weakness of death.

And we'll see in a minute how I try to put that into perspective. Adam was in a distinct way the first fruits of divine promise. I just said Adam, didn't I? I meant Abraham. You guys should correct me when I do stuff like that. So the feature of Abraham's family is plainly described by him, and when it's expressed as the one thing that he did is he believed God. That's the one thing that he did. He believed him. The promises and the faith that valued them were holy, set apart.

So the first fruit, and so must the lump be also. If such fruit, so much be the branches. The branches are Israel. So therefore, some of the natural branches, as we are gonna discover, proved not to have faith. What happened to them? They got broken off. They got broken out, so to speak, and the Gentiles have been grafted in so that the Gentiles now, after centuries, became fellow partakers of the root and the fatness of the olive tree.

Again, this is not talking about the church, okay? You have to keep that in mind as we go through. We as Gentiles, though, owe all of our favorable status to the divine promise which pertained to Israel as the seed of Abraham, but from which they had been broken out through unbelief. So we have Jews and we have Gentiles. We don't have the church. So Abraham wasn't the first man who had faith.

There were others, but he was called out from the world where God was really unknown in his world, to be the dispository of the divine promises and to be the father of the family of faith. That's what he was called to do and be. So he became characterized by the promises, which he believed, and they were holy promises as being of God and giving knowledge of God. I think it's important for us to understand that before Abraham, and we'll see in a second, the rest of the world didn't pay a whole lot of attention to what God had to say, even though they had a flood. The features of that family were plainly delineated in him who has expressly said he believed God. The promises and faith that cherish them were holy. That faith and those promises in themselves are holy. So the first fruits and such must be the lump and also the root and also the branches. They're all holy because they start with the promise.

Olive tree, look like an olive tree? Pretty hard to find an olive tree on the web. So the question is, what is the root of the olive tree? Some might say it's Israel. Others might say it's the church. Some would say, well, it's Abraham, or it's Christ. The Jew, springing from Abraham, the one first chosen and called out, to have the promises in his line had been the natural trunk and branches of the olive tree. So we have to say that it's not the church.

And the reason is Ephesians 1.3 that says, blessed be the God and father of the Lord Jesus who has blessed us with every spiritual blessings, where? heavenly places, where were the promises of Abraham on the earth, not in heaven? Big distinction. It's not the nation of Israel, why? Because they've been set aside. They're set aside, so it can't be them.

It's not Christ, because Christ is the one in which the one new man where he joined Jew and Gentile together So it has to be in the promises to Abraham of a seed who is Christ, Christ the Messiah. And the lack of faith had to do, as we've studied the last weeks, whether you believe that Jesus of Nazareth was the Messiah. Abraham and the promises installed in him are the root. and the tree because he is the man of faith. He's the father of us in terms of faithfulness, okay? Now, verse Romans 11, 16 through 19, for if the first piece of dough is holy or lump, the lump's also holy. And if the root is holy, the branches are holy.

You know the Jewish feast of first fruits. They would take the, Like let's use the grain, and they would take the first seeds of the grain, and they would offer them to the Lord. And what the part of that offering said, now this is the first part of it, and all the rest of the crop is gonna be just like this. So what the promises put into Abraham meant that those promises were holy, and everything that came out of that was gonna be holy to you.

But if some of the branches were broken off, and you being a wild olive, that's what all of us are, we're wild olives, were grafted in among them and become partakers with them of the rich root of the olive. Don't be arrogant towards the branches, but if you're arrogant, remember that it's not you that supports the root, but the root that supports you. In other words, most Sin nature dominated Christians think that they're the cause of everything. They think that the branches, and they forget about the root, where the source of life comes from. And you will say the branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in. So, a little history here.

After the flood, Men had, turning from God, set up to make themselves a name, that they might not be scattered. What did God tell Abraham, or Noah and his family? Spread out, cover the earth. What did they do? They went down about three blocks and built a city. They didn't go anywhere. And so they all had one language, and God wanted them to scatter, but they didn't listen to him. In other words, they didn't believe him. So he scattered them in judgment, and what did that do?

It formed the nations. If the Lord came to us today and we had that experience, you know, Donna and I and four of the rest of you would speak one language, then the next four would speak another, and we'd all have to, we'd end up going together like that, and we would start nations. That's what God did.

They gave themselves to idolatry and God called Abraham when they were in this condition. If you've read about what was going on in the earth at the time of Abraham, it was terrible. There wasn't a godly person in the place. And made Abraham the root of a separate family in which the promises were according to the flesh.

I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do this, I'm gonna do this. And it was a unilateral covenant that meant that God said, I'm gonna do it all. I don't need your help and I'm gonna do it through you. Now the great thing was Abraham said, okay, I believe you. So in Christ and in a special way, it was the introduction of grace.

Up to that time, there had been no head of a race or a family that was for good on the earth. Before, we can talk about Noah's family, but if you read the history, Noah didn't turn out to produce. He had three sons, and all mankind came from those three sons, and they weren't exactly reputable people based on they were idolaters. So for Adam was the father of sinners. Imagine that your title in history is I'm the Father of Sinners. Abraham, and the seed of God in the world, he was a father of faith. In him, election, promise, and calling were established.

Not merely individually in grace, but as a root and a tree of promise. I have this up here because the red arrow represents the promised land. And if you look at the globe from just the way it's laid out, it's the center of the world. So what God does is he calls Abraham, and he gives them the land, and the idea was is that through those promises and through Abraham's education, all the world might be blessed by the Jewish nation. But instead of being that way, they got cliquish about it, and they looked down upon the Goyim Gentiles and wouldn't, and that wasn't their purpose. Their purpose was to demonstrate to the world the promises that God gave to Abraham. So every promise by God was to Abraham and his seed the root in the tree. What about the rest of mankind? It belonged to the plan of God to graft the Gentiles into the line of promise on earth in place of Jewish branches broken off through Jewish unbelief. You know, you look at the point of that red arrow and you see the land of Israel. the rest of the globe were wild olive branches doing their own thing and never ever heard about God.

If a person was going to be saved in that time, they had to run into a Jew someplace and be taught a little bit about Jehovah and getting involved with the Jewish system. There wasn't, you know, I can imagine being a South Korean in 3000 BC. You never heard about. And see, today, with the way that things are set up today of God's grace, a person way out somewhere God can put a hunger in their heart to find out who the Lord Jesus is, and he'll send somebody to him. That wasn't true then.

He dealt with Abraham and his family only. Puts him in a unique position. Now, you will say then, as Gentiles, branches were broken off so that I might be grafted in. What were we grafted into? Some of the natural branches prove not to have faith. Yep. And they're broken out of the tree.

And the Gentile had been grafted in so as to become a fellow partaker of the root and the fatness. The point I'm trying to make here is that if you were a Gentile before Abraham, or I'm sorry, after Abraham was resident with the promises, you were not in a favorable position. Only the Jews were. So when God, when the unbelieving Jews get cut out of the tree, the Gentile nations, as nations, were now moved into a place where they could be receptive of God's grace.

Before then, they weren't. Does that make sense? We're not talking about salvation. We're talking about the opportunity to understand, receive, and know God's grace, the resonant promises in Abraham. So if a Gentile ran into Abraham and Abraham gave him the message and they believed it, a Gentile now was grafted into that tree of promise. It doesn't mean he was saved. It doesn't mean he's a member of the church. There is no church by then. So that's why I'm trying to make it clear that we're only talking about Jews and Gentiles. We're not talking about the church here. But this allowed God to be gracious towards the Gentile nations. We're not talking individual Gentiles. We're talking about nations. They got themselves, they ended up being a favorable position.

Why? Because the Jews didn't appreciate what they had and they didn't believe. So the wild olive tree grafted in refers to the act of God breaking down the wall of separation between the Jew and the Gentile. He broke it down. At the cross is when he did it. And by nullification of the Mosaic economy and the inclusion of the Gentiles and the promises secured in Abraham.

So I thought, well, I better, Back up those statements with a few verses. Ephesians 3, 6. To be specific, that the Gentiles, Gentiles, not members of the body, are fellow heirs and fellow members of the body, fellow partakers of the promises in Jesus Christ through the gospel. Jesus Christ was one of the promises. He was the seed.

If you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's descendant, heirs according to promise. That is, it's not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are regarded as descendants. For if the inheritance is based on law, it is no longer based on a promise, but God has granted it to Abraham by means of a promise.

And then Galatians 4.28, And you, brethren, like Isaac, are children of the promise.

So God dealt with us as Gentiles before he presented Christ as the Savior. But Christ was the seed now. Back to the map of the world. The Gentiles lived in the whole world and were wild olive branches and did not, were not partakers of the true root and trunk Now Abrahamic promises, now after the promises and today, the promises are worldwide, whosoever will may come. But you couldn't say that back when the promises were given. The Gentiles grew wild outside of Israel, but God must have branches in that root that keep with the holiness of him. And because the Jews were not in keeping with the root, the judgment ensued against them. We of the wild nations have come in to enjoy the good of all those promises of God fulfilled in Christ, but which the greater part of the natural branches have been unbelieving. So God has this tree, this olive tree, and all the branches are Jewish.

Well, what does he do with the ones that don't believe him? He cuts them off. Now, that's not to say that God is done with Israel, as we've talked about, and he set them aside, and we'll talk about that in a second. Quite right, you were broken off, they were broken off for their unbelief, but you stand in your faith. Don't be conceited, but fear.

Why are you there? Because you believed. So I got to thinking about it, what is the one, and I mentioned to Ella the other night, I said, what's the one thing God has demanded of all of his sentient, created beings? What's the one thing that he demands? You know? Simple answer. He demands that you believe him. Simple. He doesn't want works. He doesn't want spiritual pushups. He just wants you to believe him.

And that's what he puts those promises in Abraham. And the foolishness of the Jews is they didn't believe him. They just didn't believe him because they thought that the gaining of God's righteousness had to be through their effort rather than just receiving it by believing him. So that's in all of Christianity. This is the most important issue. Do you believe them or don't you? It's really what it comes down to.

Last week, Roger spoke about a message about Zacharias. He's such a great example. I'm not gonna go through all the verses that Roger did, but here's Zacharias. He's an interesting guy. He's a priest. He's in the temple and he's, I don't know what he's doing. He's doing some work next to the altar. And verse 16 says, and the angel Gabriel appeared to him. Now you would think that if you're a Jewish rabbi, and you're working in the temple, and Gabriel shows up, you'd pay attention.

Wouldn't you? Say, well, I'm all ears. And Gabriel said to him that the son that's gonna be born to you is John, and he'll turn many of the sons of Israel back to the Lord their God. And it is he, John, who will go as a forerunner before him, and him is the Lord Jesus. in the spirit and power of Elijah and turn the hearts of the fathers back to the children and the disobedient to the attitudes of the righteous. What did Zacharias say to Gabriel?

How do I know this for certain? You know, it's like you've given the gospel to somebody and they say, how do I know that's true? So, for I'm an old man and my wife is advanced in years. Who else gave God this same question? It was Abraham. But God said to Abraham, I'm gonna do this whether you cooperate or not. I'm gonna do it. And they said, okay. So Zacharias said to the angel, how will I know for certain for I'm an old man? Now watch what the angel says to him. He said, I'm Gabriel. who stands in the presence of God. And I have been sent to speak to you and to bring this good news to you. And what is he saying? How do I know that's true? And behold, you shall be silent and unable to speak until the day when these things take place because you did not believe my words, which will be fulfilled in their proper time. Isn't that interesting?

Even then, The angel Gabriel, God sends him to give Zacharias a message, and he goes, I'm not so sure. So I thought, examine yourself, whether you be in the faith. When you read something of God's word, do you say, you know, I may not understand it, but Father, you said it, and I believe it. And I know that you're gonna explain it and lay it out for me to understand. But I believe it not because of what it says, it's because of who said it.

You said it. And so here's Zacharias telling the angel Gabriel, who stands in the presence of God, are you telling me the truth? What's interesting about that, what was the big thing in the Garden of Eden that Lucifer said to Eve, did God really say? Did he really say that? And of course, the natural mind said, oh, I don't know, I better check it out.

What have you just demonstrated? Lack of faith. So first of all, we've got to remind ourselves that without faith it's impossible to please God. If you don't have faith, I don't care how much work you do, you can't please him. Faith is the only thing. True faith must be based solely on spiritual facts, for faith comes by hearing. and hearing by the word of God, Romans 10, 17. So unless our faith is established in facts, it is no more than conjecture, superstition, speculation, or presumption.

I can't imagine Zacharias standing in front of an archangel and he's speculating, is this really true? And we have God's word. So quite right, they were broken off for their unbelief, but you stand in your faith. That's how you Gentiles stand. Do not be conceited but fear. A quote from Andrew Murray.

They know not that the life of grace is always and only a life of faith. and that in the relationship to the Lord Jesus, the only daily and unceasing duty of the disciple is to believe. Because believing is the one channel through which divine grace and strength can flow into the heart of a man. The old nature of the believer remains evil and sinful to the last. It is only as he daily comes all empty and helpless to the Savior to receive his life and strength that he can bring forth the fruits of righteousness to the glory of God. I love Andrew Murray. You know what I like about him? He was a Dutch reformer, yet he understood this. He understood this.

So, Talk a little bit about fear. Don't be conceited, but fear. This word conceited means don't be big headed. And fear means really to be in awe of a reverence of God. This doesn't mean go hide under a rock someplace. Boasting doesn't fit the Gentiles because what they got was by grace, who had no necessary or natural connection with the root. They didn't have any connection with the Abrahamic root at all. the father of the faithful like the Jews did. The Gentiles had the most reason to be in awe, for if God had dealt with the failure of the seed of Abraham, it was simple to understand that he would not tolerate Gentile iniquity. Not talking about Christians, we're talking about Gentiles. So, for if God didn't spare the natural branches, He will not spare you either. So here are the promises that go out to the Gentile nations.

And the Weymouth Bible said, beware of glorying over the natural branches. In other words, I'm better than you Jews now, because I got the opportunity to go in. For if you are so glorying, don't forget that you're not It is not you who uphold the root, but the root that upholds you, who's the root, the promises and Abraham. So there's a great danger, as Paul says in verse 18, that we Gentiles glory over the Jewish branches. And forget it's not you that bears the root, but the root you.

So I found this on the web, and it's this great source of spiritual understanding, like Courtney does with the Webster Dictionary. So this is the natural way you prune a olive tree, but as I went through these things, I thought, there's a lot of spiritual application, just watch. First step, remove the suckers, the low-growing branches that don't fit with the general growth. I know Christians like that or Gentiles. Remove the branches growing below the main fork. Remove the dead or damaged branches. Take out any downward growing branches. Cut back any cross branches and cut back along the long overgrown branches by about one quarter.

I read that and I thought, oh yeah, that makes sense to me. From the principles familiar to the Jew in the Old Testament, the reasoning tells us that the ways of God and government are maintained with single force here. A Jew springing from Abraham, the one first chosen and called out to have promises in his line had been the natural trunk and branches of the olive tree. The Gentiles grew outside that. But God must have branches that are keeping with the root.

You get that part? That's why when you become a believer, when a Gentile believed the promises to Abraham, they were like the root. They were set apart. The Jews were not. Judgment proceeded against them. And what was the judgment? They were cut off. Not permanently, but it's evident now that bragging doesn't fit the Gentiles, who had no necessary or natural connection with the root, the father of the faithful Abraham, like the Jews do. That they had reason to be in awe of God, for if God had dealt with the failure of the seed of Abraham, it was not to be perceived that he would tolerate Gentile inequity.

It belonged to the plan of God to graft the Gentiles into the line of promise on the earth. We end up being saved and in the body of Christ just because grace has come to the Gentile nations in place of Jewish branches broken off. By faith, Gentiles stand. Gentiles, Gentiles, can't say it enough. Let him not be high-minded but in awe, otherwise God will spare you either. In other words, the Gentiles today that the gospel message is given to about the Messiah, God won't spare them if they don't believe.

The question comes up then, is this talking about the church and the body of Christ? We don't see here that Jew and Gentile brought into one new man. You don't see that. One body in Christ, you don't see that. united to Christ in heaven. We don't see that here. That's not in these verses. Where there is neither Jew nor Gentile, and you don't see the mystery that's been hidden from the ages and generations. That's not here. That's not what this discussion's about.

But we do see Israel, the olive tree of promise, subsisting out of Abraham in possession of the promises. Now some Jews have been broken off from the place where they were because they didn't believe him. The Gentile nations were included in the earthly promises resident in Abraham and could now avail themselves as nations, but the receivers of the promise made to Abraham. The root meaning remained the same. The tree were the Jews and the promises. The branches of the trees were the Jews and Gentiles were grafted in among them. because they weren't natural branches but only had their standing by faith. You ever wonder, and I've wondered about this, what happens when Israel is restored and there are Gentiles that believe in the Messiah? What about them? They're not gonna be in the body of Christ because we'll be gone. This gives them entrance. It's not the church, it's the body of Christ because there isn't any breaking off of the branches in the church.

That's not what the church is about. Then the Gentile is fully worn and showed the principle of God's dealing, Israel's dangers are Gentiles' dangers too. Not church members, Gentiles. The Gentile is just as likely as the Jew to draw near with his lips while his heart is far away from God. Christendom, coin that term, this is what Christendom is really all about. You draw near with your mouth, but your heart isn't in it.

In verse 21, we have to keep in mind that the corporate nation Israel and the Gentiles as distinctive parts of the race are in view, not an individual Gentile. We're not talking about individual salvation. Paul's not asking or not speaking of the possible loss of salvation on the part of the Gentile who glories over the Jew.

Those in danger of being cut off are unsaved Gentiles. who are under the umbrella of grace, and it's there for them, and are not cut off from salvation, for they don't have it to start with, but cut off from the place where God can bless them. I think that helps. So in conclusion, I would say the Gentiles in general have benefited by Israel's unbelief in their transgression, the nations have. Gentile believers are now the focal point of God's blessings and mercies. Since this is all by his grace, Paul warns us not to be conceited or arrogant about it. One day, the last Gentile will get saved, and God's program for the historical process with the earth will again be centered around the nation of Israel. and focus will be totally on them with their king and with their, they will all enter the kingdom as believing Jews.

So I hope that's clear. They're hard verses because you, You want to attach, easily attach, well, he must be talking about the church, and I don't think he is. I think he's talking about the Gentiles being pushed in a position of favor where they ultimately end up in the body of Christ. So let's close.

Father, how we thank you for your word, and we thank you for how you do things, your methods, the way they're always based on grace. You always, always are trying to bless, whether they're your people, the Jews, the Gentiles, and certainly those who are members of the body of your son, the Lord Jesus. We're so thankful for grace and for the Lord Jesus, and we pray in his precious name, amen.