Rejected His People? - Part 3

I hope it's not true. So I invite you to get inside God, inside His history, where He reveals Himself for your good. He wants you to know the whole God, not a little skinny God, not a little thin God, not a little granddaddy God, the whole massive universe sustaining and ruling God. That will get you through. That will bring you to glory. That will help you be unashamed when you stand before Him and catch your breath. So let's go to chapter 11, verse 1 to 6. God does four things here. Number one, something He does not do. God does not reject His people. Verse 1, I ask then, has God rejected His people? By no means. So Paul declares something God does not do, reject His people. Number two, something He does do, namely foreknow them. Verse 2, God has not rejected His people whom He foreknew. Third, now something He did and is doing in Paul's day, namely keep for Himself a remnant. Verse 4, in Elijah's day, I have kept for myself seven thousand men who have not bowed the knee to Baal. Hear the sovereignty in that, folks. He didn't say they happened to survive unbelief. I kept them. Know this, Elijah. Know this, Paul, when you tremble and wonder whether the church will survive. I kept them for myself. Verse 5, so too at the present time, there is a remnant. Number 4, how did He do it? Through election by grace, chosen by grace. So, next week, we will talk about grace and election and how election and grace produce a remnant. That's next week. Today, I want to talk about God's not rejecting His people, rooted in His foreknowing them. Now, by way of review, when Paul says in verse 1, I asked him, has God rejected His people? And he answers, by no means. He argues for that by saying, I myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin. So, the conclusion you have to draw is that the people, in verse 1, who He has not rejected are Israelites, ethnic Israel. They're not the remnant. They're not the church mixed of Jew and Gentile, because Paul's argument would make no sense, if it were. He says, God has not rejected His people, I'm of the tribe of Benjamin. The argument demands that the people, in verse 1, be the Jewish people. God has not rejected the Jewish people. And somebody asked me after the service last week, does that mean then, are you saying all Jews of all time will be saved, because God doesn't reject the totality of Israel? And I said, no, that's not what I meant, and that's not what Jesus, or Paul, or the prophets taught. For example, Jesus said, I tell you, many will come, He's talking about Gentiles, many will come from east and west, and recline at table with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven, while the sons of the kingdom will be thrown out into outer darkness. In that place, there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth. It's very clear. Gentiles will come, and some of those who should have inherited, will not. He said to the Pharisees in Matthew 23, you serpents, you brood of vipers, how are you to escape being sentenced to hell? Those were the Jewish teachers of his day. Paul, chapter 2 of Romans, said, for those who are self-seeking and do not obey the truth, but obey unrighteousness, there will be wrath and fury. There will be tribulation and distress for every human being who does evil, the Jew first, and also. So Jesus and Paul, and we could go back to the prophets, do not believe or teach that every Jewish person, or any other ethnic person, will automatically be saved because of their Jewishness or ethnicity. So then, question, what is the people referred to in verse 1 precisely? If it's not every single individual that's ever lived who's a Jew, and you say it's Israel, well then what do you mean when you say God has not rejected Israel? God has not rejected His people. And one possible answer that might be suggested would be the remnant that's referred to in the following verses. Verse 5, so too, at the present time, there is a remnant chosen by grace. And those are the people of Israel. Those are the Jews, the remnant of Israel. Those who believe in the Messiah, He hasn't rejected those. That is almost the right answer, but it's not the right answer. And the reason we know it's not the right answer, but almost the right answer, is because in verse 1, the existence of a remnant was not in question. Paul had made really clear in chapter 9 and 10, there's no question that a remnant is being saved. Chapter 9, verse 27, a remnant will be saved of Jews and Gentiles. Coming into chapter 11, nobody reading what Paul has been saying would say, I'm not sure there's a remnant. What they're saying is, in spite of the remnant, what about Israel? So my interpretation of verse 1, people that are not rejected, is the corporate whole of ethnic Israel alive in any generation. Just when you think of all Israel, you don't mean every individual that's ever existed over centuries, and you don't mean the remnant who are now believing in Jesus. You mean Judaism, alive in the world, active as a whole, corporate entity. That's not hard to get your hand around. We know what that means. There is a reality in every generation called Israel, Judaism taken as a whole. And that's what people are concerned about when they ask the question, has God rejected them? It looks like He has. The vast majority of them aren't believing in Jesus in every generation. So my conclusion is that what Paul is asserting here...