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11 anybody's following along this morning on audio they'll think we had a guest preacher we have a church near our house that frequently has guest preachers one who's there regularly
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Through The Years fellow by the name of Larry James Saw the Sign one time and he said now is the time in our program for silly sermons with
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lar so that's it every time we see it Veggie Tales comes back and we get a good laugh out of that oh my we're moving through Paul's Treatise
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unbelief and I think it it shows as the passage we're going to look at here verses 22- verses 22- 24 not so much as we think it does the history and the future of Israel but really the nature of God
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himself going to read these verses I'd like to ask John Marsh if you pray for the ministry of this of the word Romans 11 starting in verse
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22 behold then the kindness and severity of God to those who fa severity but to you God's kindness if
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you continue in his kindness otherwise you also will be cut off and they also if they do not continue in their unbelief will be grafted in for God is able to graft them
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in again for if you were cut off from what is by nature Wild Olive Tree and were're grafted contrary to Nature into a cultivated Olive Tree how much more
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shall these who are the natural branches be grafted in to their own Olive Tree let us pray father thank you for put our mind
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amen what is God like that is certainly a question that philosophers have dealt with theologians have dealt with Believers have dealt with for thousands of years what is Godlike in the second century there was
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a theologian by the name of marcian and he came up with the opinion that there were actually two different gods reflected in the scriptures the god of the Old Testament who was harsh and
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retributive and retributive and judgmental and the God and Father of Jesus Christ who was forgiving and
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marcian consequently cut up his Bible quite a bit removing the entire Old Testament most of the New Testament and remaining with a few letters of Paul but that was
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often The View that people have held regarding God especially as they read the Old Testament he seems to be constantly just throwing down the lightning bolts of of his
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judgment modern day however God is much more forgiving much more loving 21st century that's kind of the attitude that most people have if they
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think about God at all at all is that God is love so from an old Old Testament God who was demanding and retributive we now have the god of diversity and
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inclusion the Old Testament God who was quick to punish any infraction against his impossible law we now have a God who need not forgive anybody because there's
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really nothing to forgive those are the extremes of course of human views upon God but I think the question of course is what does the scripture say about God and here we have
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Paul again he's talking about Israel he's talking about an olive tree and branches natural and unnatural but really what he's talking about is God we start in verse 22
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behold you know look literally what that means look at this kindness and severity of severity of God well that seems a bit an odd
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combination the kindness and severity of God it's almost as though Paul has merged marcion with the with the modern inclusionist you know the kindness and
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the severity or the severity and the kindness of God as opposed to just severe or just kind Paul speaks of both Romans 9:10 and 11 are definitely
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about Israel and the reality of Israel's unbelief in her Messiah this is a historical fact that we cannot get around as we read our Old Testament as
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we read the unfolding redempt plan of God we come smack into this wall of Israeli unbelief they do not accept their
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Messiah for the most part although we're clearly told that God has kept for himself in every generation a remnant of those who do believe yet we're also told
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that a hardening has come upon his people Israel and this this is a uh existential reality for the church and for its message of the Gospel normally
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what the church has done is simply forgotten about Israel and set out with Christianity as if it was created ex nio without any background and without any
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history but then we run smack into the wall of the New Testament where all of the writers derive their understanding of what God has done in Jesus Christ
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from The Very Old Testament that we tend to ignore and they do not see themselves as some new religion but rather as the unfolding and the Fulfillment of the abrahamic Covenant that we find in the
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Old Testament and so we're faced again with the question what about what about Israel but the question I want to ask today is what about God because that's ultimately what this Treatise is all
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about and it's what the gospel is all about is about is God behold the kindness and severity of God now I think that we need to keep in
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mind as I said many weeks ago as we go through these three chapters we we need to remember where we're headed and that is verse 33 of this
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chapter chapter 11 where Paul basically erupts in erupts in doxology he says oh the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge
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of God how unsearchable are his judgments and unfathomable his ways if our understanding of what Paul is telling us that God is is doing again
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not just with Israel and with his Israel's unbelief but through Israel and through Israel's unbelief if we don't arrive at arrive at doxology then we've taken a wrong turn
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somewhere if we arrive at some convenient replacement theology where we can just get rid of Israel and just merge it into the church if we arrive in
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in some failure of God's plan a and Adoption of a plan B the church you know Gentiles if we have to substitute some plan that does not arrive in us
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marveling at the unsearchable depths of God's riches we've taken a wrong turn somewhere we are not interpreting
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scripture correctly because all scripture should result in doxology but certainly scripture that deals specifically with the work of God through Jesus Christ even in the midst of Israel's almost
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wholesale rejection of her Messiah yet Paul erupts in praise and glory to God so that is where we're
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headed and when Paul says in verse 22 behold the kindness and severity of God I think he is echoing as we've talked
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about on Thursday evenings he is echoing a very important moment in the history history of his people Israel and that is as they
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gathered at Mount Si now we generally associate mount siai with the law with Torah and certainly that is where Moses received the Ten
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Commandments is where Moses received the the entire instruction statutes ordinances that Israel as God's people were to obey but it's also where God
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revealed himself you remember the s episode in Exodus 32 and 33 and 34 where Moses is saying God if you don't go up with us let us not go up but
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even more than that he says Show Me Your Glory and God says no man can see my glory and live but I will hide you in a
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Clift of The Rock and I will pass by you and it's in Exodus 34 that God discloses to us his deepest nature as it relates
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to mankind he says the Lord the Lord God compassionate and gracious slow to anger and abounding in loving kindness and Truth who keeps loving kindness for
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thousands who forgives iniquity transgression and sin yet he will by no means leave the guilty unpunished behold the kindness and the severity of God the
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kindness if you if you just compare adjectives kindness clearly wins he Le he heaps adjectives of
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compassion and graciousness slow to anger abounding in loving kindness and Truth who keeps loving kindness for thousands who forgives iniquity
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transgression and transgression and sin oh by the way he will not leave the guilty unpunished this is not a 5050 split it doesn't hinge on how God feels when he
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wakes up in the morning is he in a good mood or a bad mood his primary nature is one of loving kindness even a word that we had to make up in our language
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because there's no equivalent word for the Hebrew the idea of a an unworthy a love being showered upon someone Unworthy of that love a love
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that is all encompassing a love that is forgiving of transgression of iniquity and sin I think that's what Paul is uring when Paul says behold the kindness and
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severity of God I don't know whether he was thinking it at the time or was just so woven into his understanding of
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Israel's God this is a God who is full of loving kindness and Truth this is a God who desires to forgive iniquity and transgression and sin a god who is
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compassionate a God who is gracious and he is slow to anger marcion slow to anger and yet he will not allow the
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guilty to go unpunished a little addendum there because fundamentally God is neither loving and
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kind nor is he harsh and rri retributive fundamentally God is Holy that that is his fundamental
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characteristic those others have to do with God's relationship with his creatures compassionate gracious abounding in loving kindness and
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Truth forgiving iniquity and transgression and transgression and sin but not leaving the guilty unpunished these are relational adjectives or attributes and they
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operate within the fundamental characteristic of God as holy so his nature as compassionate and
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gracious manifests itself manifest his Holiness in Holiness in kindness that's how we see the nature of
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God In Loving kindness and Grace and compassion and we see it the psalmist teach us to see it in everything we behold of
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his creation the psalmist teach us to see it in the the heavens and the Earth showing us that God is good God is kind we have tasted of the kindness of the Lord so
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throughout the wisdom literature and even in the prophets in spite of the continued rebellion of his people Israel God continues to portray himself as the Lord
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the Lord God full of compassion and Grace slow to anger he remains the same way and so he manifests his
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manifests his Holiness through kindness but his nature as just is Manifest as severity on the one hand God
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demonstrates his own love toward us that while we were yet sinners Christ died for us but we also read in Exodus 34 yet he
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will by no means leave the guilty unpunished visiting the iniquity of the fathers on the children and on the grandchildren to the third and fourth
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Generations his eyes are too pure even to look upon
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iniquity still the tone of Romans 9:10 11 fit the self-disclosure of God in Exodus 34 at no point does Paul betray
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bitterness or bitterness or invective toward invective toward Israel now keep in mind that his fellow Jews have been his primary opponents and
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persecutors he had if you read through the book of Acts he had far more trouble with the Jews than he did with the Romans with the Romans you could say well hey I'm a Roman citizen well that
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didn't work with the Jews it was because he was a Jew a Hebrew of Hebrews that they hated him and they considered him a defiler of Moses and yet you find find no trace of
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bitterness in Romans 910 and 11 the tone of these three chapters is compassion toward Israel Paul himself in in Romans
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9: 1-3 Romans 10 ver1 he says for I could wish that I myself were a cursed separated from Christ for the sake of my
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God is God happy with Israel's unbelief no is Paul happy with Israel's unbelief no were there times that Paul despaired of Israel well probably we have evidence
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that there were times that God despaired Israel but at all times we read through this compassion and Grace listen to what he says in
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verse 23 and they also if they do not continue in their unbelief will be grafted in for God is
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again so God compassionate and gracious gracious has at all times kept for himself a remnant of believing Israel to this day this day there are descendants of Abraham Isaac and Jacob who have received their
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Messiah Jesus who are believers in Jesus Christ and there will be such until the time that the hardening as we'll read a little later is removed from Israel and
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they see and look upon the one whom they have pierced and they believe that is the hope that we're going to see in these chapters even in the midst of generation after generation of
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unbelief but throughout history even at times of Israel's greatest rebellion and Disobedience there was always the note of Hope and of
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restoration this is in fact their greatest act of Disobedience the rejection of Jesus Christ God's son Israel's Messiah and yet there's still the note
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of restoration because that is the nature of God of God is it our nature is it the nature of the church do
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we in this imitate god well let continue to see that even in judgment as we're reading these
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passages here in Romans 9:10 and 11 even when God judges Israel his grace overflows to overflows to others we see that time and time again
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in history in history God judges Israel with famine in the land and so we get the story of Naomi and Ruth God sends Israel into Exile and we
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have the story of God visiting Nebuchadnezzar God overflowing his grace in small portions to show that ultimately through judging Israel he
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will overflow his grace to the Nations to the Gentiles and that's what Paul is teaching here by their transgression salvation has come to the
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Gentiles and that's because God's primary work and this may be a shock to some God's primary work is salvation not condemnation his primary nature is not judgmental and
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judgmental and harsh but abounding and loving kindness and Truth Now very rarely in the history of the church have we imitated God in this
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very rarely have our pulpits proclaimed compassion and Grace and very often they have complained judgment and
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retribution Paul says elsewhere that we are to imitate him as he imitates God and I think the question as we read Paul's understanding of the nature of God even towards his rebellious People
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Israel challenges us as to whether or not we're following Paul as he follows God do we have the compassion toward our
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fellow man unbelieving and even sometimes persecuting that Paul had toward his fellow Jew this is a a real
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challenge because it seems like we are abdicating our rights and exposing ourselves to ourselves to danger if we reach out in kindness
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rather than rather than severity if we choose kindness instead of severity as we Face the world are we not vulnerable well yes we are Paul was as
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well and he suffered greatly and yet he was rewarded greatly because he imitated God in choosing kindness and not
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severity this is the the heart of God full of loving kindness and Truth slow to anger forgiving iniquity transgression and sin Jesus himself said that if we do not forgive the sins of
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others against us neither will our father forgive father forgive ours and I found this passage to be one of the most challenging to study and to
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meditate upon because it it it's like a mirror a a mirror in which I don't look so good a mirror in which I'm not
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reflecting Jesus Christ they do not have this attitude in me that I find in Jesus Christ who emptied himself and became a
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servant even unto death the death on the cross and yet through that emptying through that compassion through that kindness God has now highly exalted him
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and given him the name above every name and so it's it's a challenge for
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church do we portray to the world the God of God of Thunder are we too often of the attitude of James and John the sons of thunder asking the Lord can we just call
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down thunder and lightning upon this Village and wipe it out is is that the message of the church toward the disobedient and the wicked
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Lord just wipe them out now on the one hand there are such things as imprecatory Psalms we are not to embrace the enemies
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of God the enemies of God are our enemies as well and following the psalmist we may call upon God to gain victory over his
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enemies and there are those you are indeed enemies of God but not every unbeliever deserves of an imprecatory
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sermon for the most part what mankind deserves they deserve nothing but in the gospel and through the gospel what they deserve is compassion and
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Grace because they are blind they know not what they do a blindness and a hardness has come over them and until the spirit of God remove that they
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cannot see what is obvious to us that the god of Grace has provided salvation through his son Jesus Christ Paul himself is the example part
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Excellence breathing out threats and murder he was a persecutor of the church and yet God Paul says showed me mercy
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for I acted in ignorance he says God opened his opened his eyes and allowed him to see the kindness and Grace the compassion and loving
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kindness of God in the face of Jesus Christ we need to measure our attitude toward others by God's
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standard the Lord is not slow about his promises Peter writes as some count slowness but is patient toward you not wishing for any to perish but for
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all to come to repentance now now we know that that does not mean that God intends to save every man woman and child of the human race and we know that
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for but it has been my experience that we have a very large category of people we can't pray for much larger than God has or Paul would have I I remember being told by a a
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sister in the Lord of her deep unwillingness to pray for a particular president of the United States at the time in spite of the biblical injunction
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to pray for our leaders leaders who at the time that Peter and Paul wrote were far worse than any any president that we've had we write people off pretty
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quickly and and I don't know that that we can honestly say of the church behold the kindness and severity of the
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church I think the reputation of the church throughout its history doesn't hold the word kindness very often and many people as they think
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of Christianity of Christianity that word doesn't come to mind but the word severity yeah that comes to mind the word
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judgment the word anger the word hatred they they come to mind pretty quickly but not the word kindness and so again I think we're
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we're deeply we're deeply challenged this is actually what I would say is a Christian world view the manner in which we as Believers view the world
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around us and process the events and the people that come into our lives either by news or by personal encounter how do
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we respond to that can anybody say of each of us individually behold the kindness and severity of so and
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so again I'm not advocating that all they say is behold the kindness that's that's not the nature of God even though it's the primary characteristic of God's dealing with
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mankind is kindness even to the unbelieving world he gives them seasons and rain and crops the kindness of God there's always that and yet and
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yet and so please don't misunderstand me in thinking that the church should be full of diversity and inclusion and accepting everyone absolutely not he is abounding and loving
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and truth you can't get rid of the one which is so often done when we do see the church in kindness in social action and in acceptance It's usually without truth
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and therefore it's without power no if we are imitators of God then it would be said of us behold the kindness and
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kindness and severity wouldn't be that isn't that what you want your children to think of when they consider you as a father or mother behold the
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kindness and severity of dad you you wouldn't want them to think behold the severity of dad some of us have experienced
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have experienced that and on the other hand you know it's of no benefit to your children if all they behold is the kindness of mom or dad and sometimes and maybe that's why
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God gave us father and mother behold the kindness and severity one or the other you know we we we have that you go to one you got the
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severity you go to the other you got the money you go to the movies now it's not two gods and we're not split
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not split personalities so we are called to kindness and to severity again as we look ahead as Paul summarizes what he's
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saying about Israel he says in verse 28 from the standpoint of the Gospel they are enemies for your sake but from the standpoint of God's election they
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are beloved for the sake of the fathers we don't know the identity of the elect and elect and while Israel is unique among all peoples
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of the of the Earth all people are are the sons and daughters of God through Adam they are not the redeemed sons and gods Daughters
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of God in Jesus Christ but they are the imodi all mankind and so I think we can say in a
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manner of speaking to to our neighbors and of our neighbors for the sake of the Gospel they are the enemies but for the sake of the promises in Genesis 3:15
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they are beloved for God's sake for Christ's sake we don't know and it's not our place to judge who
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is and who is not among the elect very few of the early disciples would have selected Saul of Tarsus as one of the elect and yet he
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indeed was written his name was written in the Lamb's Book of Life from before the foundation of the world so Paul's teaching
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that we see here in Israel was very important to the Roman Church which as we'll see in Romans 14 when we get to that there were Jewish Believers there were Gentile Believers in Rome there was friction between the two there was
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Prejudice there was some anti-Semitism present as present as well this teaching has also been important throughout church history as we have chronically dealt with
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anti-Semitism in our history and not just in Nazi Germany one of the leading anti-semites of the 1930s was Henry
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Ford of Ford Motor Company and you read some of his writings and some of his speeches and you think I'm sorry he was an American but he hated Jews that was very
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popular in the Western World in France and Great Britain the United States and Canada was Canada was anti-Semitism and they use the cloak of Christianity to hide the hatred that
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they had of the Jewish people and so yeah what Paul's saying here I think has its application but the thought goes deeper than just this he is teaching the very
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heart of God and the attitude that God wants his people to have toward the rest of the world kindness and severity the
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believer's worldview we can ask ourselves a question is there anyone who cannot be grafted into the Olive Tree we read here that of course the the Jewish branches are natural and so it
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would be no trouble for God if they will lay aside their unbelief for him to graft that natural Branch back into the trunk but what about the rest of the unnatural olive trees in the world the
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Pagan Nations we Gentiles can we say that anyone that we meet or hear of is incapable of the grace of God and that God's arm is too
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short to save such a one and that God's grace is too Limited to graft such a one into that one Olive Tree I think the answer is no we
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can't though we may be shocked that God's grace could extend to someone so wicked and blasphemous as we may have
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encountered God's grace extended to Paul God's grace extended to each one of us I don't know that the degree of our sin or wickedness was all that different
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than the worst people we've ever met and so as we look at the world again kindness and severity we know that there will be many who will not be grafted in
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we don't know who they are and yet we do know that there's no Branch native or otherwise beyond the reach of God's
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kindness this is a positive hope but not Pana yeah I I really don't like the attitude of Christians who go into the world with a a smile on their face and
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really nothing in their brain kindness and severity loving kindness and kindness and truth I don't think we go to bed with a
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hanger in our mouth so we wake up with a smile that is not what the scripture
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teaches that is kind of funny there are some preachers that are very very popular in the western church who are very much like that their words are full of saccharine their smile is
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false and dangerous and they know nothing about Sin and judgment and the kindness that they bring to the world is is the kindness that kills so I I'm not
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advocating that behold the kindness and severity we must hold fast to the truth as it is in Jesus
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Christ but what I am advocating here for myself for us for the Church of Jesus Christ is that the the common work of God is
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God is Grace the common attitude of God is kindness the desire of God is revealed to his people and then to the world is forgiveness there's a place in scripture
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where it talks about judgment as God's strange work it it's not what he wishes to do we read of him bearing his arm to save we read of him putting forth the greatest
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effort to effort to save honestly I don't think it takes much effort for him to judge because we judge ourselves we render ourselves obnoxious to his
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Holiness the real difficulty is to take such obnoxious creatures and redeem them and that's the work of God in Jesus Christ it should be the work of his
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church there are no polit iCal adversaries who are beyond the reach of God's grace and when we malign other human beings as James teaches us we are
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maligning those who bear the image of God now they may be deep in wickedness but that is for God to judge vengeance is mine says the Lord and they may be
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according to God's judgment Beyond his reach we don't know that and and and I'm challenged and I hope you are challenged as well to
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choose kindness that we should speak of unbelievers in even what we consider to be the most wicked in our generation with compassion and with pity knowing
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their end as Asaf learned in Psalm 73 as he was bitterly reminded of the prosperity of the wicked and how they seem with impunity to blaspheme God
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and then he said but I went into your sanctuary and I perceived their end do we do we sense the severity of God do we understand that those who are
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outside of Jesus Christ and they die in that alienated condition they will experience the severity of God and we should not wish that on
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anyone no matter what they may have done for us we are not worthy enough to gine an offender to an eternity in
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Hell God Hell God is and behold the kindness and severity of God let us
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pray father we do thank you for your kindness and I pray that your spirit would overwhelm us with the sense of that kindness that we would never for a
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moment think that we deserve your kindness or think that we are somehow better than another because we were raised in a Christian home or we
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attended church no all have sinned and fallen short of the glory of God all have been condemed both Gentile and Jew as Sinners
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under your judgment we all dwell under your wrath until we are Redeemed by your grace so father I ask that we might have this attitude in us which was in you and
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manifested in your son Jesus Christ that we would consider others better than ourselves and that we would betray not
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severity only but even more so kindness and even father as we seek to hold fast the truth as it is in Jesus Christ may we do so with loving kindness
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may we do so with comp comp passion and Grace so that we might indeed imitate you that our nature might be as your nature that we would forgive those who
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sin against us because you have forgiven us who have sinned against you and father in this way I pray that
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your church would manifest Your Glory the glory of your grace proclaiming the truth in kindness we ask in Jesus name
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name amen please rise for the benediction Hebrews chapter 13 now the God of Peace who brought up from the dead the great Shepherd of the
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sheep through the blood of the Eternal Covenant even Jesus our lord equip you in every good thing to do his will working in us that which is pleasing in
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his sight through Jesus Christ to him whom be the glory forever and ever amen
