and please find a copy of the scriptures there ought to be Bibles in the chairs around you if you don't have a copy of your own with you here today and if you would open up to Romans the letter to the church at Rome Romans chapter 11 today Romans chapter 11 and here today we are largely going to conclude the future plan that God has for the nation of Israel and it is a very very important portion of the scripture really beginning in chapter 8 but getting specific in chapters 9, 10, and 11. If you want to understand what is God doing with national Israel Because just from a human logic standpoint, God obviously is doing something with national Israel today, and they're not believers. They're not worshiping their Messiah, and largely the nation is secular or cult. Did you know that Tel Aviv has the largest witchcraft population, the New Age movement and overt witchcraft? the largest group of people that openly worship Satan is in Tel Aviv. Did you know that? In the world? And you certainly wouldn't think that would be true because what group of people live in Tel Aviv? Well, mostly Jews. And that's in the nation of Israel. And most of the people that identify today as Israelites are not saved. Right? Would you agree with that? Most of the people that we know that are Jewish are not saying. Now there's a caveat to that that we're going to see today. So that's not completely the truth. But that would be the impression that we certainly have. So we know the theme of Jews and Greeks that is introduced and that finds itself all the way through. And here we're looking at the Jews and Greeks theme some more. But I want to just read a couple verses today for our text. And we're going to read verses 1 through 1 and 2. And then we're going to read verse 7, and then we'll pray for the Lord to help us. Actually, we have to read verses 7 and 8. So verses 1 and 2, verses 7 and 8, and then we'll pray for God to help us with our understanding and also with my brevity, my ability to speak without using too many words. Verse 1, 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. Watch ye now what the scripture saith of Elias, how he maketh intercession to God against Israel, saying, and we'll skip that portion and jump down to verse 7. What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for, but the election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded. According as it is written, God hath given them the spirit of slumber, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear. under this day. Now we'll pray. Father, I pray that as we look at what You're doing in the nation of Israel today, that first of all, would help us to have the ability to mind our own business. That is, understanding that we're part of the church today and that the church is not the same as Israel. Help us to be focused on living for today, not for yesterday or tomorrow. And we pray that also you would help us to be able to win lost Israelites and Gentiles as a result of our understanding. We ask for Jesus' sake. Amen. I don't mean to be unkind about this, but I have many times roundly denounced Messianic Christianity, and the reason for it is because it really is, and I'm not saying that they're not saved, but it really is almost cult-like in replacing the church with Israel and twisting the work that God is doing today in the church. Now, you say, Pastor, do you have friends that are into that? Yes, I do. And we don't talk about theology, because I open a Bible pretty quickly, and I actually, I have a friend, loosely using the term, I have an acquaintance who calls himself my friend, I'm not opposed to it, that leads a Messianic congregation, and he doesn't talk to me about theology. Because the Bible is clear about what God is doing in the world today and that God is working through the church and not through the nation of Israel. And that's really what Romans is all about. Romans has that theme that comes with those banner verses that sometimes we divorce from their context, like Romans 1.16. For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Jesus Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first, and also to the Greek and we know for therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith as is written the just shall live by faith so Paul right away in Romans goes from the introduction portion of this letter to the theme of the letter which is Jews and Greeks or Jews and Gentiles or the way we would understand it is Jewish or not you know Jewish and everything else that isn't Jewish. And so he is addressing a church at Rome which has a combined group of believers that are saved Jews and saved Gentiles. And the problem is they don't get along because their perspective is so different and they're really not very tolerant of different vantage points. And the fact is, is this, we don't want to make too much of this, but when God knows something, like we talked about about worship here today, when God thinks something, you either agree with God or you don't. If you agree with God, you are right. If you don't agree with God, you are wrong. Now, I don't mean to make everything just so cut and dry, but really, most things actually are. Most things, especially theologically. And people think, well, you know, that's what you believe and this is what I believe. Well, am I right? Or are you right? Or are we both wrong? We ought to be concerned not with who's right, but whether or not we agree with God. That's the way we should look at truth, shouldn't it be? We should say, what does God say? That's what I believe. You know, a long time ago, I just took the position that I believe everything in the Bible. God has proved to me that this book is divine, that it's inspired, that it's preserved, that it's His Word, and so I believe everything in it. I do not have the mental capacity to remember everything in the Bible. And neither do you, unless you come to me today and just quote Genesis through Revelation, then you can't perfectly remember everything that's in the Scripture. But you can believe everything in the Scripture by saying, if that's what God says, that's my position. Even if I don't know it, I agree with God. That's just my mindset. Whatever God says, I agree with it. And you're going to find, if you take that position, you're going to find that when you know something God says and you agree with it, people are going to say, well, you're arrogant. Or you're unswerving or unbending. Or you think you're always right. No, friend, I don't think I'm always right. I just want to be in agreement with God. And if I know God says something, I will unapologetically say, God says this. This is truth. And what is that saying to you? Well, it makes a person who doesn't agree with something God said feel very uncomfortable, because they feel like you're saying they're wrong. And it really is what you're saying, because they're wrong. You see. And then you say, Pastor, that seems kind of mean. Well, it's not intended to be mean. I want to agree with God. I don't want to be judged for telling God He doesn't know what He's talking about. That's what it comes down to. I fear God. That should be our mindset and our attitude. So the first Christians, the first individuals that were part of Christ's church, ethnically were Jews. You know, Catholicism tries to teach that the church is Roman, or Greek, or Turkish, or Russian, or whatever. But the truth of the matter is that the church originally was Jewish, all Jewish. All the people in the church were Jews. That's where the church began, isn't it? In Jerusalem. And the Great Commission found Jerusalem as its center point to go from out of there. So Jerusalem, Judea, which is the regions around Jerusalem, Samaria, areas of Israel that are kind of mixed And then the Bible says, the outermost part of the earth, everywhere else in the world, to give this gospel that God will save whosoever will call on the name of the Lord. So the result of that is that now the gospel has spread to Rome, the city of the great empire of the day, to which even Jerusalem politically was subservient. And now you would expect that every first century church would have Jews in it. Wouldn't you? Because why? Because the first believers were Jews. But now the church has morphed, it's grown to be Jews and Gentiles. And the Jewish believers don't like the way the Gentiles have jumped in to Christianity. They're fine with the faith in Christ, but bypassing the whole law and the Old Testament and all the things that Jews held to be important as part of their culture, they wanted the Gentiles to become Jews. But you didn't have to become Jewish to be saved. you had to come to the cross of Jesus Christ and be saved by faith. And so Romans, this letter to the church in Rome, Paul deals with the fact that salvation has never been through keeping the law that Israel nationally had agreed with God to abide by. Salvation for Israel was by faith. And so Paul took the greatest Jewish leader, the forefather, Abraham, and used Abraham to prove the point that salvation was by faith and we've been over this again and again and again but I hope that when you open your Bible to Romans you think of the repetitive thing that we've talked about that salvation has always been by faith Jews have to be saved they were under the law they kept the law and they still were lost because the law tells you what you do wrong it doesn't make you righteous It shows you your sin, but it doesn't absolve you of sin. So when the Jews are saying to people who are righteous because of the blood of Jesus Christ, now keep the law, not only is it redundant, but it's ridiculous. Because they're already righteous. The law can't condemn a righteous person. Because you're righteous not because of your works, you're righteous because of the work of Christ, which you have been credited for. You have His life. Eternal life, and you're forever righteous as far as your status before God goes. God will never judge you as a sinner once you've come to Jesus Christ for salvation. You are righteous eternally. But Abraham was a great Jew, wasn't he? No, he actually wasn't. There were no Jews until Israel, who was Abraham's grandson. And Genesis says that Abraham, when he believed God's promise that he was going to have a son, Isaac, he believed God, and it was counted to him, the Bible says, for righteousness. In other words, Moses was never born, and so they didn't have Moses' law. Most of the Jews would say, well, did Abraham keep the law? And they'd say, yeah, he did. A non-existent law He kept? He kept the law before it came into being, 400 years before He was born? Well, that's a little illogical, isn't it? And Paul just thumps this whole notion that anybody has ever been saved by what they do. If you get to be saved by what you do, the work of the cross, the great sacrifice God made, is wholly unnecessary. And keep in mind, anytime you add anything to the cross, that you not only diminish the importance of the sacrifice of Jesus, but you literally make a mockery of what God did. Because Jesus did something you and I couldn't do when He died on the cross for our sins. And we need to come to God in faith saying, God, you did something I can't do. It's an arrogant thing, isn't it? When somebody does something for you that you couldn't do, and then you act as though you could have done it anyway. You ever met somebody like that? They act like, well, thanks for helping. I didn't really need it, but, you know, I appreciate it. And when we try to be saved by faith, that's how we act with God. You know, I appreciate that whole dying, torture, being the sinless Son of God and being facing the wrath of God for sin, for me. Now, I would have handled it, but I'm glad you did it. That's ridiculous, isn't it? And yet, any time you add anything to simple faith in the cross of Jesus Christ for salvation, that is precisely what you're saying to God. And I don't like to help people that try to act like they don't need my help. Many times I've tried to help people, and then they need your help. They obviously need your help, but then they act like they don't. And I say, okay, I'll see you. You just go ahead and handle this. And I just leave. Go on ahead. If you don't need help. I've got things to do in life, I don't have to spend time trying to help somebody who doesn't need help. And God sure doesn't need to try to help sinners be righteous, who have their own righteousness. That is what we looked at last week, the righteousness. Look in chapter 10, in verse 2 of chapter 10, Paul has said about the Israelites, he said, I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. Verse 3, for they being ignorant of God's righteousness, and going about to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God. So when a person who has not come to Jesus for salvation has mitzvahs, good deeds, has celebrations and feasts and rules that they abide by, if you ask them why you're doing it, it's because I want to be righteous. And they literally think that they can be righteous. They can be good. And it's the most ridiculous thing you'd ever think of. Now, the worst thing that people can do is murder. Not probably literally. There's probably worse things than murder. I don't know. I'm not God. I'm not the ultimate judge. But we think of murder as bad, right? Because when we say to somebody something that implies that they're not perfect, then they say, well, I've never killed anybody right so people think we think murder is really really bad right and so you know there's manslaughter and then there are degrees of intent in murder right there's murder there's passion you know passion of the moment something somebody did something and you are so incensed and outraged that you took a life because you're so angry, you know, driving on I-95 or something like that. There's that kind of thing, right? Then there's accidental. Manslaughter. You didn't intend to, but you're responsible. You didn't fix the brakes on your car, and you ran somebody over. And so you took a life. If you'd fixed your brakes, it wouldn't have happened. So to some degree, you should bear responsibility for taking somebody's life. You should be held accountable for it. There's manslaughter. Then there's premeditated. You know, the guy has something I want, and if he were dead, I could get it. Now, don't be looking at me like I'm a murderer, folks. I've never killed anybody. I just want you to know this, okay? Inadvertently or on purpose, I've never done it. All right? I'll give you my word. But the fact is, we look at that as just something really, really terrible. Could God forgive a murderer? David murdered, right? He committed murder. And God forgave David. He murdered Uriah. Murdered him. I mean, with the intent, like he had full intention of murdering him. God forgave him. So God forgave murder? Yeah. Here's the thing. When we talk about the law, the law assigns, the law determines guilt, right? It says this is the line, cross the line and you're guilty. So the law determines guilt. The law doesn't make a person righteous. You don't get righteous, that is, sinless, by keeping the law because what you do that's good doesn't make what you've done that's bad go away. If a person's just a serial killer, just, you know, have this thing where they kill people, but they're a good neighbor. Most serial killers are good neighbors. Ask Tony. They're usually good neighbors. And don't people say, boy, you just never known. He was just one of the nicest guys you ever met. You just never known. He had all those people in his basement. You know, whatever. All those people in the garden. You just never knew. And then they go to court and they have character witnesses. Well, you know what? He was a community leader. You know, he contributed uniforms to the Little League, and he did this and this and this and this. And they wanted to talk as though the good things they did should somehow come into bearing with the thing they're being judged for, which is murder. But you know, the fact of the matter is, it doesn't matter what good things you did. It matters what evil you did, and that's what you get judged for, and that's the way it is. And so the Jews that think that keeping the law for believers somehow makes them righteous, they're going about to establish their own righteousness. You see that? They, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, are going about to establish their own righteousness. They have a zeal for God, but without knowledge. Okay, that gives us our context for our fast-flowing text that we're going to be in today. We look at verse 7. Now here is another one of those places where people that like to make theology without the Bible, but just create a system of theology, this is a proof text for them, for God electing people to be saved and lost, but that isn't what it's saying at all. Verse 7, �What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for, but the election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded.� Now, verse 7 of chapter 11 is commenting on verse 3 of chapter 10. Verse 3 says that Israel is ignorant about God's righteousness. See, you are ignorant if you think that you can step into the presence of holy God, whose righteousness is so against any sin, the greatest or the least amount, And that God shouldn't do anything about your sin because you're a good person. You're ignorant of how good God is, actually. And you're ignorant of how bad you are. Remember, somebody just doesn't get what they've done. Now wives, you all know this. Sometimes he just doesn't get it, right? You just don't get it. You don't understand what you did. You don't understand how I felt. You don't understand when you said that or when you did that, right? Guys don't get it, right? Guys, we all know men just don't get it. All right? Now, when they do get it, they're like, okay, I get it. I get it. I get where you're coming from. I understand. But here's the deal, and this is a fact. It may or may not be the way that a person thinks about another person in reality, but it is a fact that sin is worse than abhorrent to God. And if you think God should accept your sin, believe me, you don't get it. You don't understand how righteous God is. And how abhorrent your sin is. Think it's okay somehow. And so many people think they have an excuse or a reason that makes what they've done acceptable and it never is. It's never acceptable. Sin against God. And so when you think, well, you know, I keep these laws. Then you just think that the ones you violate aren't a big deal. You know, I'm a good neighbor, man. Who cares who's buried in the garden? It doesn't work with God. You don't get it. Murder is bad, you see. And no amount of nice things you do make up for it. You know, it's the whole Robin Hood thing though, isn't it? Rob from the rich and give to the poor. How would you like to be the person that earned enough to be rich? And Robin Hood comes along and kills you. And takes your things and gives them to the poor. And the poor are like, oh, he's such a great guy. Well, you know, the people he robbed don't think he's a great guy. And if the poor think so, they don't get it. They just don't get it. Okay. So that's the problem with Saved Israelite. So why have they not obtained righteousness? Johnny, would you help Frank? Why have they not obtained righteousness? Because they don't get it. They don't get how righteous God is. And they don't get how wicked they are. Period. Right? Simple as that. All right. All right. So let's look at our outline. One of the things we want to see today about Israel as we conclude what God is going to do in the future with the nation of Israel is that God isn't finished with the Israelites. And the first reason God isn't finished with the Israelites is because many Israelites are saved. This is my frustration with a lot of Jewish only focused ministries where people want to just reach lost Jews. I think it's fine to reach anybody if that's the only people you know around you. But one of the things that they think oftentimes is that there aren't any saved Jews. I've never been in a church where there weren't saved Jewish people. There have always been saved Jewish people, and the first century church began, it was a Jewish church. But ultimately the identity became, for Christianity, that Jesus was their identity, not the nation of Israel. Because God today is not working through Israel, God's working through the church. So the church is filled with and has many saved Jews. And God knows the DNA. God knows that some people that don't even know they're Jewish because their identity is Jesus, actually are Israelites. And that could be true of many of you. Could be true of many people. But the fact is that Paul first of all points out this whole notion that Israel doesn't get saved is a misnomer. And he said, the reason I know that Jews get saved is because I are saved. Is that proper English? Oh, because I'm saved, Paul said. He said, 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." Now there is a dangerous sect in Baptist churches today that are trying to teach that God hates National Israel and that's a lie. It's anti-Semitic and it's godless. It's wicked. The fact of the matter is that Jews get saved today just like Gentiles do and just like Jews did in the first century and God loves them just as much as anyone. So, the question is, do Jews get saved? Does God hate the Jews? No, my friend, God loves the Jews just like He loves everybody, and anyone who calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved. That was the conclusion last week, remember, in chapter 10. So verse 2, God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew. Watch ye not what the scripture saith of Elias, how he made the intercession of God against Israel, saying, Lord, they killed thy prophets, and dig down thine altars, and I am left alone, and they seek my life. Remember Elijah? And after he won against the prophets of Baal and proved who God was, Jezebel tried to have him killed, and so he ran and hid, and he said, God, nobody believes in you. I'm the only believer. I'm the only one that knows who you are. Remember his little whiny thing he did? And God said, I have 7,000 people that haven't knelt to Baal. They've never knelt to Baal. It's not like they've turned away from Baal. But they've never worshipped Baal. And God knew who they were. So Elijah said, he said, you know, no Israelites are believers in God. And God said, well 7,000 are. And so this notion that Jews don't get saved is a lie. You know, God knows how many Jewish Christians there are, doesn't He? And so that's the first point that God makes in this Scripture here, is that Israelites are saved. Paul's an Israelite. He's writing a letter to the church, and the Gentiles are saying, Well, God, the Jews have rejected Jesus. Well, the unbelieving Jews have rejected Jesus. Let me ask you a question. Have unbelieving Gentiles rejected Jesus? Has everyone believed in Jesus? What's the difference between an unbelieving Jew and an unbelieving Gentile? Not a thing in the world. What's the difference between a believing Jew and a believing Gentile? Nothing. Because we have the righteousness of Christ, we're the same. It's a pretty good point, isn't it? Sometimes we draw these lines and these distinctions that separate people. And we make people different. And Jesus made us the same. That's what the cross does. It makes us equals. And not with a good kind of equality, not like, you know, a serf system or where there is, you know, certain levels. No. We have the righteousness of Christ and we have the standing of the sons of God. We're royalty. you know, you could be a Levite, you could be of the tribe of David, you could have prophecies that have to do with the lineage of the Messiah, and the great promises, and only one person could be that person, right? Only one person could be the King of Israel. But which of us, which of you and I, can be called the sons of God? All of us can. All of us can. In other words, we're equals, and we're not equals on a low level, we're equals We have the status or standing of the righteousness of Christ. That's a high level, isn't it? More than equality. Moving forward. Do Israelites get saved? Yes, they do. We saw the illustration of Elijah and we saw that there is a remnant. Paul said in verse 5, "...even so, then, at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election of grace." So these individuals, how do you get to be part of the election of grace? Faith in Christ. And that's what we see in verse 7 where we found our text today. Now, I want to see now the second point about Israel is that the whole nation have not obtained salvation, but it has been to our benefit. In other words, all the Jews aren't believers, and you and I benefit from that. Now that's a negative thing, isn't it, that some of the people that God wants to be His children aren't? but gentiles benefit from that look at verse uh... eleven i say then have they stumbled that they should fall god forbid but rather that through rather through their fall salvation is come under the gentiles for to provoke them to jealousy if the fall of them be the riches of the world and the diminishing of them the richest of the gentiles how much more for their fullness so Only God could take something like people who have so much opportunity squandering it and unbelieving, and God using it to give more people opportunity. We saw that in Jesus' parables, didn't we? Of the wedding feast, where people are bidden and made excuses and couldn't come. And so Jesus said, go into the highways and the hedges, find the halt and the lame, and compel them to come. We're the lame. We're the beggars. We're the people that weren't part of the family, but the doors were open wide, and the wedding feast was repaired, and they said, we're going to have, God said, I'm going to have people at my table. Come on in. Everybody come in. I'm thinking of a funny personal story, and I'm not going to tell it. Verse 14, it's twice today that I've held back something that would have probably ruined your way of thinking about me for the rest of your lives. Verse 13, For I speak to you Gentiles, insomuch as I am the apostle of the Gentiles, I magnify mine office. If by any means I may provoke to emulation them which are my flesh, and might save some of them, For if the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be but life from the dead?" So how excited is God over Jewish believers, Jewish individuals trusting Jesus as their Savior? Well, it thrills His heart. They're natural believers. But as Gentiles, we look at it and say, well, if God is able to take their casting away to be the reconciling of ourselves, how much better is it? And now we'll look at verse 16. For if the first fruit be holy, the lump is also holy, and if the root be holy, so are the branches. And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou being a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them, and with them partakest of the root, and fattenest of the olive tree, Boast not against the branches, but if thou boast, thou bearest not the root, but the root thee." So what's the origins of Christianity? Our heritage is Judaism, Israel, right? And anybody today that bashes Israel, it's like bashing your parents, destroying your own heritage. It's our heritage. It's an important thing. Now let's talk about my whatever the tree is. I'm about to find out that one little, I think it's a tiny lemon growing on it, came from a limequat seed given to me by Eddie Butler, planted in my yard a few years ago, and now it's growing, it gets all these blossoms on it, and the iguanas come and eat the blossoms off, but I have one surviving little thing, some little fruit thing that's about to survive. It's a Hopefully going to be my grafting tree I want to get some fruit that I really like from a citrus tree And I want to graft some branches in to this wild It's probably a lemon tree. That's what the recessive trait of a seed from citrus usually ends up being I've got my little tree in my backyard, and I haven't killed it because it's producing one lemon right now and But my guess is that it's not gonna be a great lemon tree, and I like lemons okay. I'm not an anti-lemon person, but I'd rather have some other kind of citrus. I like the navel oranges, for instance, and I think I'll graft a navel orange into it. Now, grafting normally is you take a tree that has hardy characteristics. And then you take a branch from a tree which doesn't have hardy characteristics, but that has good fruit. And you take the best of both worlds. You take the branch from the weaker tree with good fruit and graft it into the trunk or the stem and the root of the tree which has hardy characteristics and you get a really productive hardy fruit tree. That's the way it should go. God uses the illustration of Gentiles in Israel showing that, okay, the nation of Israel didn't receive their Messiah, so cut those branches off. And instead we'll take the believers and graft them in. Put those branches in. And what a beautiful picture, right? Productive producing. But now the illustration is, what branch really belongs with that tree? The ones that are cut off. What's the most natural fit with the tree? The branch you graft in, and by the way, I can really make a graft work well. You ever seen a really good graft? But you can always see a graft. I can look carefully at a tree, if it's a fruit salad tree or whatever, I can look at it and I can tell where they did the grafts. Because, you know, there's scarring there. And it's not a natural fit, the bark's a little different in characteristics and things like that. But now you put the branch that came off back in, it's gonna fit a lot better, isn't it? You're not going to get a better size of fit in the graft. And when Jews get saved, my friend, they're more natural believers than Gentiles are. They understand God's law. They understand many things that are just tradition that now make sense through the Messiah. They're fulfilled. I love it when a Jewish person gets saved. They want to go around and they want to show people what the Passover means. Because the Passover was so important to them, but it didn't have any meaning. until they were completed in Christ. And they're very natural Christians. Most of the Jewish individuals I know that are practicing Jews that become believers are fanatical Christians. And that's a wonderful thing. Being a fanatic for Christ is a marvelous thing. And God greatly uses them. Why? They're just natural Christians. That's a wonderful thing what grace does, and how God changes us, and any of us can be like Jesus. But verse 18, the Bible says, "...boast not against the branches, but if thou boast, thou bearest not the root, but the root thee." What are you without the root? Take the root away from any tree, and what is it? Dead. Nothing, lifeless. That will say then, the branches were broken off that I might be grafted in. Okay, so here's the argument. The reason those branches were broken off was so that better branches could be put in. And that would be true of my tree, right? Because I want to put better branches in. So if I cut the original branches off, it'll be so I can put more fruitful, productive branches in. There'll be better branches. But that's not the way it is with Israel and the church and Jews and Gentiles being grafted in. Well, because of unbelief they were broken off. They weren't broken off because the believing ones were unfruitful or were inferior to the Gentile believers. They're broken off because of unbelief. In other words, it would have been natural for an Israelite to be a believer. And I think we can understand this. There are some principles in the Bible that I believe are true, not just principles, but like for instance, Proverbs 22.6 says this, "...train up a child in the way he should go, and when he is old he will not depart from it." And I think it's the most hopeful passage of Scripture for parents there could possibly be. We know we're not perfect, but if you do right by your children, you train them up the way they should go, you teach them the Word of God, and you do right by them, they're going to be believers. They're not going to be believers because when they were infants you baptized them, or you had ceremony and sprinkled them or did something to them. They're going to be believers because you raise them to know the Lord. And the reason that the Jews are unbelievers is because they weren't raised to be believers. But many were, weren't they? Many Jews were believers. Why? Well, because they were trained to be believers. And as a Christian, you and I should know One of the things that we can find great hope in is that if your children are born, they're going to be raised to be believers. So belief, in many cases, can be taught. This is why parents, you should really, really seriously consider, and I'm trying to understate it so I don't hurt your little feelings, but you should very, very seriously consider never lying to your children. You look at me like, well, pastor, why would I even have to think about that? Well, why do you tell them about Santa Claus? Liar. I'm serious. It undermines their faith in the supernatural. Be careful about the superhero cartoons your kids watch. Because you see the things that Superman, and I know that dates me. Actually, Superman existed before I was. But the things that Superman did, God actually can do supernatural things. And so when we teach kids that there are supernatural things and then they find out actually that's not real, they just lump all the things that are supernatural into it and it undermines their belief in a supernatural God. So you have to be careful because when your kids find out something that you told them was a lie, then they don't know what's true. And this is a real problem. It's one of the reasons why what we teach our children is very important. But the whole of Israel have not obtained salvation. It's to our benefit. It was prophesied and then also we see the benefits of it. Now I want to conclude by looking at the future natural fit of the Israelites or the Gentiles. Look at verse 22. Verse 21, For if God spare not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee. Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God, on them which fail severity, but toward thee goodness. If thou continue in his goodness, otherwise thou also shalt be cut off. Why does somebody get cut off? Because they don't believe. And what is more natural to believe? Well, it's more natural to believe if you've been raised to believe. I don't take any offense at all when somebody says to me, the only reason you're a Christian is because your parents are Christians. Now I believe that God knows my heart, God knows the future, and I have a heart to believe. And so I know that I would have heard the gospel, whether my parents did or not, and I would have believed in God. But do you think that I don't benefit a great deal by the fact that before I was born my parents believed, and it changed the course of their lives and the way that I was trained and raised? You think that didn't affect my life? My friend, it had everything to do with it. And I don't mind at all people saying, you're a Christian because your parents are. I am. And I thank God that they believed the truth. It doesn't undermine the fact that it's truth or not. There's people that are raised to believe lies. And they have to overcome the lie to come to truth. And I didn't have to do that because my parents were believers. And that's a wonderful benefit, isn't it? You know, if you're a first-generation Christian, you know how much you had to overcome to be saved. The betrayal you felt toward your family's religion or belief system? For you to acknowledge that that was false and that the cross is the only thing that's true? That's a difficult thing to overcome, isn't it? And yet your children, if you raise them in the Lord, will come to the same truth that you came to, but they will be natural in their belief. Kids naturally believe everything you teach them. You tell a child, the child says, where did I come from? You don't have to explain biology. You can say, God made you. You came out of mama's belly, but before that, God knew you, and God specially made you, and you're made in the image of God. Where did the world come from? God made it. Kid doesn't have any trouble doing it. You tell them, God did this on the first day, the second day, the third day, fourth day, fifth day, they believe it. Makes sense, and they believe it. It's natural. Belief is natural to the offspring of believers. And that's what's emphasized here. But the Bible says about the people that are cut off because of unbelief, verse 23, they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. Now I hate to do this, but I have to. Many individuals that again are trying to teach the system of Calvinism and teach that God hates some people and loves some people and that our salvation is not our choice, it's God's choice whether He loves us or rejects us and God's good regardless whether He chooses you to be saved or chooses you for His wrath. And that's just a lie and they try to use words like elect. selected." You know, you're elect and they're not. Verse 7 says what then? "...Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for, but the election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded." The word elect is a term that is in this portion of Scripture used to describe believers. And Israel did not obtain what? Well, they went about to establish their own righteousness. They did not obtain their own righteousness. In other words, Israel said, OK, I'm going to be righteous, and God's going to accept me because I'm righteous, and they got a big fail. Unrighteous. They didn't obtain their own righteousness. But the elect did. What's elect? Believers. How much of a will, choice of the will, is the word belief? Belief and unbelief are both a choice of the will. The very notion they're volitional, meaning we give our permission for them. And so when we see in verse 23 a conditional clause, "...they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again." So here's the question. Can the branches which have been cut off because of unbelief be grafted back in? The answer is yes. And what determines whether they get grafted in again? God's love or God's hate? No, God loves all men. He loves unbelievers. What determines whether they're grafted back in again is whether or not they'll believe God. It's their choice. And the very passage of Scripture which individuals try to take and say that man doesn't have a choice about believing in God is very, very blatantly, overtly, obviously teaching the opposite of that. Isn't it so? And it's worth our noting. And I'm sorry if that's not an issue for you, but the day will come when you'll hear somebody spouting that nonsense and you'll have to know what the Bible says. So the future of the nation is natural Israelites are going to fit. Verse 26 is our final verse today. The Bible says, and so all Israel shall be saved. As is written, there shall come out of Sion the deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob." There are individuals that try to teach that the church has replaced Israel and that the church is Israel, and we use the word church, but it really is the same thing, it's just morphed into something different, and the salvation has become a different means, and that's actually not true at all. The truth is, is that Israel was a nation who are the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, whose name is Israel. Israel are descendants of Israel. Israel's sons and his descendants. That's who Israel is. They're real, tangible, genetic people. And someday they're going to all be saved. You can read the revelation of Jesus Christ in the book of Revelation, and you can see that one day there's no more church. After chapter 4 of Revelation, the church is gone, and from that point forward, God is working in the world through Israelites. And there are 144,000 people, 12,000 from 12 tribes of individuals that take the mark of God in their forehead. And by the way, that predates the individuals that take the mark of the beast. They literally turn to God, and God delivers them, and God works in the world during the millennial reign through the nation of Israel, through national Israel. And all the Israelites at that point are saved, and all the wicked are destroyed. So there's nothing but saved Israelites. And we're going to join them when Jesus Christ returns at His second coming. We're going to join them, and guess what nation we're going to be in? Israel. We're going to be Israelites. But we're going to be grafted Israelites. In other words, we're made Israelites because we have the status of Jesus. He's of the tribe of David. So He's from Judah. So we're going to be Israelites from the tribe of Judah if we don't have our own genetic heritage. And we'll be able to sojourn with them. And we'll be able to be Israelites. But God's going to work one day through the nation of Israel. So let me just warn any person that would go around spouting off nonsense and hatred toward the people that God one day is going to work exclusively in the world through. Better be careful. You ever flown Spirit Airlines? We were talking about spirit and truth today. Spirit in the flesh. Don't want to fly in the flesh with spirit. I remember the first time back when you had to check in at the gate. They do require that, don't they, Spirit, again? I remember the first time giving my baggage. By the way, don't fly with baggage on, Spirit. Bad idea. But giving my baggage to the Spirit agent. And then when I got on the plane, it was the same person. They leave the kiosk and then they go into the controlled area of the airport and they check in. The person here is the person there. You know, same person. And my thought on it was, better not be mean to the person at the ticketing counter, because you're going to meet them again. You know? When you go to a small restaurant in a small town, be careful how you talk to the waiter or waitress, because they're probably going to make your food too. Now these are silly illustrations, but I hope they help you understand, you better be careful about how you think about God's chosen people. the nation of Israel. You better not boast yourself against the original branches. They're more natural when they fit. If they become believers, they're going to be better believers. And not only that, but one day, unbelieving Israel, they're all going to believe. And guess what party you're going to join? Theirs. And so you better think the right way or you'll have a lot of regret and a lot of need to realign your way of thinking. And I hope this helps, because they had this friction in the church at Rome, where the Jews are trying to make the Gentiles be Jews, and the Gentiles came back at the Jews with saying, well, you're throwaways anyway. Well, no, they're not. They're believing Jews in the church, aren't they? And they're more natural branches. So you better watch how you talk about them. You better appreciate and love them, and be glad that you're part of the party. Glad that you're there. Because you're one of those blind and halt and lame from the byways and the hedges. And the food's the same. Whether you were on the guest list or whether you just joined up because the door was open. You have access to God through Jesus Christ. You have the righteousness of Christ. But you better think about it the right way. And that's what Romans chapter 11 teaches us here today. God, I know it's been a long message today, but I pray that you have helped us to understand your future plan for your people, the nation of Israel, who naturally belong, who naturally have a heritage. Lord, have a heritage of forefathers that believed you by faith and followed you. And Lord, I thank You so much that we can just come in and be part of this great heritage. Even though we don't have the royalty and the genetics, we get the genetics of Jesus Christ and the position, the righteousness which isn't our own. So God help us to understand how necessary that is.