11
“Has God Rejected His People? Absolutely Not!”
1 In light of these things, I now ask: Has God rejected his people? Absolutely not! I, too, after all, am myself an Israelite, a descendent of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin.
2 God has not rejected his people whom he chose long ago. Surely you know what the Scripture says, don’t you, in the passage about Elijah, when he appeals to God against Israel?
3 “They have killed, Lord, your prophets, they have torn down your very altars; I am the only one left, and they’re trying to take my life.”+
4 Yet what was God’s reply to him? “I have kept for myself seven thousand people who have not bowed in worship to Baal.”
5 In the same way, then, in the present era, too, there has come into existence a remnant, chosen because of God’s gift.
6 If it is by God’s gift, moreover, then it cannot be by deeds, since a gift, in that case, would cease to be a gift.
7 What, then, are we to conclude? What Israel so earnestly desires, this she failed to obtain. It was only those who were chosen who obtained it. The rest, however, were made callous,
8 just as it is written:
“God has put their hearts and minds into a deep sleep,
giving them eyes that can’t see and ears that can’t hear,
9 And David says,
“May their sacrificial feasts turn into a snare and a trap,
a stumbling block and a punishment for them;
10 may their eyes be made so dim that they cannot see,
and may they be overwhelmed with troubles continually.”+
11 I ask, therefore: Did they stumble so grievously that they have fallen never to rise again? Absolutely not! The truth is, as a result of their stumbling, salvation has come to the Gentiles for the purpose of stirring them to jealousy.
12 If their stumbling, moreover, has resulted in rich blessings for the rest of the world, and their defeat in rich blessings for the Gentiles, how much more their fullness?
13 It is to you Gentiles that I am speaking. In view of the fact, then, that I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I take my assignment very seriously,
14 in the hope that I may somehow stir my kinsmen to jealousy and be used to save some of them.
15 If the casting away of them, you see, means reconciliation for the world, what does the acceptance of them mean if not life from the dead?
16 Now, if the first part of the dough itself belongs specially and exclusively to God as holy, then so does the rest of the lump, and if the root of the tree itself belongs specially and exclusively to God as holy, so too do its branches.
17 If some of the branches, though, were broken off, while ˢyou, being a branch cut from an uncultivated olive tree, were grafted in among them and so became a sharer in the nourishing root of the cultivated olive tree, you must not exalt yourself over and against those branches.
18 If ˢyou do, remember that ˢyou are not supporting the root, but the root is supporting ˢyou.
19 “But,” ˢyou will respond, “branches were broken off so that I could be grafted in!”
20 True, but remember—it was because of their lack of faith that they were broken off, and, in ˢyour case, it is by faith that you remain in place. Don’t have an attitude that is prideful and self-exalting, but fear.
21 If God, you see, did not spare the natural branches, neither will he spare ˢyou.
22 Take careful note, therefore, of the kindness and severity of God: Severity, on the one hand, toward those who fell, but God’s kindness, on the other, toward ˢyou—if you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, ˢyou, too, will yourself be cut off.
23 And as for those cut-off branches, if they don’t continue in their lack of faith, they will be grafted back in, because God is very able to graft them in again.
24 If ˢyou, after all, were cut from a wild and uncultivated olive tree, and were successfully grafted into a cultivated olive tree despite the fact that a branch from the one doesn’t originally grow on the other, how much more readily will these branches which were broken off from the original tree themselves be grafted back into their own olive tree?
25 Indeed, I want to make sure ᵖyou clearly understand this mystery, brothers and sisters, so that you won’t rely on your own supposed wisdom: A callousing has befallen Israel in part, until the coming in of the Gentiles’ fullness.
26 And in this way the whole of Israel will be saved, just as it is written:
“There will come from Zion the Deliverer;
he will remove ungodliness from the descendants of Jacob.
27 And this will be the covenant from me with them…”+
“…when I take away their sins.”+
28 Although with respect to the gospel they are enemies for the sake of you Gentiles, with respect to God’s choice they are dearly loved because of the solemn promises made to their ancestors Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
29 Indeed, God’s gracious gifts and his choice are irrevocable.
30 Just as you, you see, at one time were disobedient to God, but at the present time have been shown mercy as a result of their disobedience,
31 so these ones, too, at the present time, have become disobedient as a result of the mercy extended to you, so that they, too, may themselves be shown mercy.
32 God chose to yield the entire human race over to disobedience, you see, so that he could to the entire human race extend mercy.
33 O how deep are the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how unfathomable his ways!
34 “For who has known the mind of the LORD?
Or who has become his adviser?”+
35 “Or who has ever given something first to God,
so that God must pay him back?”+
36 For it is by his will and through his power and for his glory that the whole creation exists. To him be the glory forever into the ages! Amen.