Romans 10.16-Paul Cites Isaiah 53.1 To Demonstrate That Israel Rejected The Gospel
Wenstrom Bible Ministries
Pastor-Teacher Bill Wenstrom
Tuesday June 2, 2009
Romans: Romans 10:16-Paul Cities Isaiah 53:1 To Demonstrate That Israel Rejected The Gospel
Lesson # 345
Please turn in your Bibles to Romans 10:1.
This evening we will note Romans 10:16 in which the apostle Paul states that not all the citizens of Israel obeyed the gospel command to believe in Jesus Christ in order to be saved and to support this statement and to demonstrate that this rejection of Jesus Christ by Israel was anticipated by God, he quotes Isaiah 53:1.
Let’s read Romans 10:1-16 and then concentrate on verse 16.
Romans 10:1, “Brethren, my heart's desire and my prayer to God for them is for their salvation.”
Romans 10:2, “For I testify about them that they have a zeal for God, but not in accordance with knowledge.”
Romans 10:3, “For not knowing about God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own, they did not subject themselves to the righteousness of God.”
Romans 10:4, “For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.”
Romans 10:5, “For Moses writes that the man who practices the righteousness which is based on law shall live by that righteousness.”
Romans 10:6, “But the righteousness based on faith speaks as follows: ‘DO NOT SAY IN YOUR HEART, ‘WHO WILL ASCEND INTO HEAVEN?’ (that is, to bring Christ down).”
Romans 10:7, “Or ‘WHO WILL DESCEND INTO THE ABYSS?’ (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead).”
Romans 10:8, “But what does it say? ‘THE WORD IS NEAR YOU, in your mouth and in your heart’ -- that is, the word of faith which we are preaching.”
Romans 10:9, “That if you confess with your mouth Jesus as Lord, and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved.”
Romans 10:10, “For with the heart a person believes, resulting in righteousness, and with the mouth he confesses, resulting in salvation.”
Romans 10:11, “For the Scripture says, ‘WHOEVER BELIEVES IN HIM WILL NOT BE DISAPPOINTED.’”
Romans 10:12, “For there is no distinction between Jew and Greek; for the same Lord is Lord of all, abounding in riches for all who call on Him.”
Romans 10:13, “For ‘WHOEVER WILL CALL ON THE NAME OF THE LORD WILL BE SAVED.’”
Romans 10:14, “How then will they call on Him in whom they have not believed? How will they believe in Him whom they have not heard? And how will they hear without a preacher?”
Romans 10:15, “How will they preach unless they are sent? Just as it is written, ‘HOW BEAUTIFUL ARE THE FEET OF THOSE WHO BRING GOOD NEWS OF GOOD THINGS!’”
Romans 10:16, “However, they did not all heed the good news; for Isaiah says, ‘LORD, WHO HAS BELIEVED OUR REPORT?’”
This passage stands in direct contrast to what might have been expected from the nation of Israel, namely that they obeyed the gospel and trusted in the incarnate Son of God, Jesus of Nazareth as their Savior.
In Romans 10:15, Paul cites Isaiah 52:7 to describe those who communicate the gospel of Jesus Christ to the unsaved.
Israel’s appropriate response to these communicators of the gospel would be to embrace their message.
However, in Romans 10:16, Paul cites Isaiah 53:1 to demonstrate that they did not but rather disobeyed the gospel command to believe in the Lord Jesus and be saved.
“They did not all heed” is composed of the negative adverb ou (ou)) (oo), “not” and the nominative masculine plural form of the adjective pas (pa$), “all” and the third person plural aorist active indicative form of the verb hupakouo (u(pakouvw) (hoop-ak-oo-o), “they heed.”
In Romans 10:16, the verb hupakouo means, “to obey” and is used with the unregenerate citizens of the nation of Israel as its subject and the gospel as its object.
The emphatic negative adverb ou emphatically is used to deny the reality of an alleged fact of this obedience to the gospel of Jesus Christ occurring among the majority of Israelites.
It emphatically negates the idea that Israel obeyed the gospel command to trust in Jesus of Nazareth as Savior.
Therefore, the verb hupakouo and the emphatic negative adverb ou refer to the nation of Israel’s disobedience to the command that is found in the gospel to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ.
The adjective pas, “all” and the third person plural form of the verb is a reference to the citizens of the nation of Israel since in Romans 9-11 Paul is discussing the nation of Israel’s failure to accept Jesus of Nazareth as their Savior.
Further indicating that Paul is speaking of Israel specifically rather than the Gentiles is that Paul is quoting Isaiah 53:1, which was addressed to Israel in Isaiah’s day and Paul applied it to the Jews in his day.
The expression ou pantes, “not all” is a figure of speech called “litotes” (pronounced: lie-ta-tees), which is an affirmation expressed in negative terms, or in other words, a positive point is made by denying its opposite.
Therefore the expression ou pantes, literally means “only a few.”
This expression echoes Paul’s “remnant” doctrine he introduced in Romans 9:6.
In Romans 9:6, he taught that the nation of Israel’s rejection of Jesus of Nazareth does not imply that God promises to the nation have been nullified because those who descended in a racial sense from Israel, aka Jacob are never considered by God to be spiritual Israel.
Romans 9:6, “Now, this does not by any means imply that the word originating from God is nullified because each and every person who descended from Israel, these are, as an eternal spiritual truth, by no means, Israel.”
Paul’s remnant theology is developed in Romans 9:27-29.
Romans 9:27, “However, Isaiah cries out over Israel, ‘Though the number which is the posterity descended from Israel is like the sand, which is by the sea only the remnant will be delivered.’”
Romans 9:28, “In fact, the Lord will execute judgment upon the inhabitants of the land thoroughly and decisively.”
Romans 9:29, “So that just as Isaiah predicts, ‘If the Lord over the armies had not left to us descendants and He has, we would have become like Sodom and in addition like Gomorrah, we would have been made like.’”
Romans 10:16, “However, they did not all heed the good news; for Isaiah says, ‘LORD, WHO HAS BELIEVED OUR REPORT?’”
“The good news” is the articular dative neuter singular form of the noun euangelion (eu)aggevlion), which means “good news” and refers to the gospel in relation to the unsaved since Paul is speaking in the context of the nation of Israel’s rejection of Jesus of Nazareth as Messiah.
It refers to the gospel in the sense of the good news message to sinners that they can receive divine righteousness as a gift through imputation as a result of faith alone in Christ alone, which in turn results in the Father declaring them justified.
The noun euangelion, summarizes the Christ event: (1) His incarnation (2) His earthly life (3) His death on the cross (4) His resurrection (5) His ascension (6) His session. (7) He Will Judge.
In relation to the unbeliever, the noun euangelion is God’s victorious proclamation of God’s love in delivering the entire human race from sin, Satan, his cosmic system and eternal condemnation and has reconciled them to Himself through the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ.
1 Corinthians 15:1-4, “Now I make known to you, brethren, the gospel which I preached to you, which also you received, in which also you stand, by which also you are saved, if you hold fast the word which I preached to you, unless you believed in vain. For I delivered to you as of first importance what I also received, that Christ died for our sins according to the Scriptures, and that He was buried, and that He was raised on the third day according to the Scriptures.”
The Gospel is the good news to the human race that God has made a peace treaty with the entire human race and the terms of that peace treaty is accepting the Gospel message through faith alone in Christ alone.
John 3:36, “He who believes in the Son has eternal life, but he who does not obey the Son shall not see eternal life, but the wrath of God abides on him.”
Romans 10:16, “However, they did not all heed the good news; for Isaiah says, ‘LORD, WHO HAS BELIEVED OUR REPORT?’”
“For Isaiah says, ‘LORD, WHO HAS BELIEVED OUR REPORT?” is a quotation from Isaiah 53:1 that serves to “confirm” Paul’s previous statement “they did not all heed the good news,” which refers to the fact that not many people in Israel obeyed the proclamation of the gospel.