Did The Jews Not Know About Jesus?

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Romans 10:14-21

14 How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? 15 And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!” 16 But they have not all obeyed the Gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?” 17 So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.

18 But I ask, have they not heard? Indeed they have, for

“Their voice has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world.”

19 But I ask, did Israel not understand? First Moses says,

“I will make you jealous of those who are not a nation; with a foolish nation I will make you angry.”

20 Then Isaiah is so bold as to say,

“I have been found by those who did not seek me; I have shown myself to those who did not ask for me.” 

21 But of Israel he says, “All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people.”

 
 

Paul begins by making the point that unless the Gospel is shared with the Jews, then there is no way they could respond to the news:

14 How then will they call on him in whom they have not believed? And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? 15 And how are they to preach unless they are sent? As it is written, “How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news!” [Romans 10:14–15].

Unfortunately, the Jews just haven’t listened:

16 But they have not all obeyed the Gospel. For Isaiah says, “Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us?” 17 So faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ [Romans 10:16–17].

And they haven’t listened, even though, speaking with hyperbole, Paul says, “everyone has heard about Jesus, so it’s not like it’s a secret:”

18 But I ask, have they not heard? Indeed they have, for

“Their voice has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world” [Romans 10:18].

So, did the Jews not understand the Gospel? Why haven’t more Jews accepted Christ?

19 But I ask, did Israel not understand? First Moses says, “I will make you jealous of those who are not a nation; with a foolish nation I will make you angry” [Romans 10:19].

Paul says that God seems to be using the Gentiles to get the attention of Israel—if the Gentiles believe in Jesus as Messiah, shouldn’t this provoke Israel to faith?

And, once again, Paul makes the point that the Old Testament prophets foretold that God was planning all along to bring in the Gentiles:

20 Then Isaiah is so bold as to say,
“I have been found by those who did not seek me; I have shown myself to those who did not ask for me” [Romans 10:20].28 

But why haven’t more Jews believed? Well, Paul says it is because they are being disobedient and hard-hearted:

21 But of Israel he says, “All day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people” [Romans 10:21].

In our time, many parts of the Muslim world are totally unreached by the Gospel. Pray today that the Lord would raise up missionaries that will go share the good news in those places. 

 

How Does A Person Become A Christian?

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Romans 10:5-13

5 For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them. 6 But the righteousness based on faith says, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down) 7 “or ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). 8 But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); 9 because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. 11 For the Scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” 12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. 13 For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

 
 

Throughout chapters 9–11, Paul is examining and answering four related questions:

  1. Why did so many of the Jews refuse to accept Jesus as Messiah?

  2. In light of Jewish rejection of Jesus and Gentile acceptance of Jesus, has God replaced the Jews with the Gentiles as His chosen people?

  3. Is there any hope that the Jews who previously rejected Jesus as Messiah might one day turn back and believe?

  4. In light of all of the above, what is God up to?

In our previous day’s reading (vv. 10:1–4), Paul has explained that Jesus as Messiah was a difficult concept for the Jews to accept; many of them “stumbled” over Jesus and consequently missed the life that He came to bring.

Here, Paul makes the point that the Old Testament had said that if you want life, you have to obediently follow the Law:

5 For Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them [Romans 10:5].

The problem (as Paul has explained in chapters 1–7) is that no one was actually able to follow the Law. But the good news is that though no one else was able to perfectly keep the Law; Jesus Himself perfectly followed it and, though He died in place of disobedient Israel, God raised Him from the dead; through His obedience Jesus now offers the blessings of the Law to all who trust in Him. Paul calls this “the righteousness based on faith” (v. 6).

And then Paul explains that faith is trusting that God has already done in Christ what needed to be done—we don’t have to do it:

6 But the righteousness based on faith says, “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down) 7 “or ‘Who will descend into the abyss?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead) [Romans 10:6–7].

In other words, there is no need to try and bring Christ down from heaven, since He has already made that journey, and there is no need to try and descend into the place of the dead—that is, “the abyss”— to raise up God’s people, since Jesus has already descended to the dead and ascended to sit at the right hand of God the Father Almighty, holding in his hand the keys of death and Hades (Revelation 1:18).

No, there is no need to do any of that, because Christ has already done it. Rather, all you have to do is trust:

8 But what does it say? “The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart” (that is, the word of faith that we proclaim); 9 because, if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. 11 For the Scripture says, “Everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.” 12 For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. 13 For “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” [Romans 10:8–13].

  • You just need to trust—have faith in—Jesus;

  • This faith is both an internal decision to trust Jesus (“believe in your heart”) and an external action that conforms to the internal decision (“confess with your mouth”);

  • Anyone who trusts in Jesus will be saved;

  • And there is one salvation for both Jews and Gentiles—everyone is saved by the same way—by faith.

Have you placed your trust in Jesus by internal decision—belief in your heart—and external action—confession with your mouth?

Who around you can you lead to Christ in this way? Be praying for the opportunity.

 

The Jews Missed The Forest For The Trees

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Romans 10:1-4

10 Brothers, my heart's desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved. 2 For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. 3 For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness. 4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.

 
 

Remember, it seems that some of the Roman Gentile Christians had come to believe that God was replacing the Jews as His chosen people with the Gentiles as His chosen people, and so Paul is giving a long, complicated response to that issue.

Here, he says that he really wants the unbelieving Jews to be saved.

1Brothers, my heart's desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved [Romans 10:1].

The reason the Jews aren’t believing is not because they don’t care, but that they care about the wrong things:

2 For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. 3 For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness [Romans 10:2–3].

The Jews had the Law of God, and they thought this made them superior to the Gentiles, but when the Messiah came in a way different than their expectations, they missed Him. Israel’s problem is that they missed the forest for the trees—they were “zealous” but not for the right cause. Think of the Pharisees, arguing with the Son of God and totally missing Him. The Jews were so concerned with the Law that they were unable to see that: 

4Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes [Romans 10:4].

This is a beautiful, profound point. The Greek word telos means “end” as in “The End” at the end of a movie, and it also means “goal” as in the phrase “the ends justify the means.” So, Paul means two things here:

1. Christ is the goal of the Law, its destination—everything was always moving toward a culmination in the life, death, and resurrection of the Son of God.
2. Christ is the final act of the Law. As Paul has already said in Romans 8:2–4, the death and resurrection of Jesus fulfilled the Law’s purpose once and for all so that now we live in the freedom and life that the Law was always meant to bring.

Paul’s point: the Jews have missed seeing that in Christ God didn’t abandon the Law, He fulfilled it and brought it to its completion.

Be careful not to miss Jesus today.