Jews And Gentiles
JEWS AND GENTILES
ROMANS 9:30-33
Righteousness freely offered and received by faith in Jesus is a stumbling block to the Jews.
How strange the paradox! The prepared and gifted children of promise and covenant fail to grasp the consummation of all their history, the final significance of all their God had done for them, while those who are remote from the plan which worked out through Israel’s history see, in a burst of sudden glory, the meaning of Christ, and enter into his salvation. It left Paul shocked and crushed but thrilled. But the explanation lay close to hand. Israel lacked faith. The Gentiles who accepted Christ had faith. It was as simple as that.
So this closely woven chapter concludes. It is the attempt of a “Hebrew of the Hebrews” to explain that which was a fearful problem for those of his race who were attracted to Christ, but who felt that the bypassing of Israel was tantamount to a breaking of ancient and sacred covenants. We have seen the main points now of Paul’s solution: (1) The Jews thought that absolute obedience to the Law set them right with God; (2) Paul, in his own living experience, had found the Law impossible to keep; (3) the Law, therefore, being undoubtedly of God, had another function. It was incomplete, a preparation for Christ; (4) Christ saved by faith, a gift of grace which the Law could not grant; (5) and if Christ forgave in this way, it followed that Gentiles who received him, though they had lacked the preparation and advantage of the Jews, were received in Christ; (6) it also followed that the Jews who rejected Christ were lost, and had no claim on God whatever. Therefore, the terrible dilemma.
So Christ became a stumbling block for the Jews. He was the foundation stone of God’s new structure (Matthew 21:42; Psalm 118:22; Isaiah 8:14; 28:16; Acts 4:11; Ephesians 2:20; 1 Peter 2:4-8). The New Testament was fond of elaborating the image. What was intended to be the basis and understanding of salvation became a barrier in the path, a “rock of offense” (9:33) to those who refused to place it in the proper position.
The closing words are a precious promise. Those who stand firm upon the foundation “other than which no one can lay” will not find their confidence ill-founded. The raging flood of the passage from Isaiah will pass by, thick with the world’s chaos, but they will remain firm.