Participants: Alex Schlusser (Host), Rachael Hyman (Host), Sasha Bolotnikov
Series Code: BTOR
Program Code: BTOR000023
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00:01 You know, I've heard it said that
00:03 "God is finished with the Jews." 00:06 Can I tell you that Paul has some 00:08 very different ideas that he presents us. 00:11 Join us today as we look at Romans 11 00:15 to understand really what Paul said. 00:37 Hello and welcome once again to "Back to our Roots." 00:40 I'm your host Alex, Pastor Alex Schlussler 00:43 and my co-host... Rachel Hyman. 00:45 And we are so happy that you've decided to join us once again. 00:50 We have another very interesting 00:54 if not slightly controversial topic today, 00:57 as we are going to explore a portion of the Book of Romans. 01:01 You know, Paul, he penned this book 01:04 to a congregation of people that were struggling 01:07 with many ideas and many concepts. 01:10 And Paul speaks very succinctly to it. 01:13 You know, there are some who have said, 01:15 that God is finished with the Jews. 01:18 And I think that we're gonna see that Paul, 01:20 the Apostle as some people think to the Gentiles 01:24 has some very strong thoughts about this 01:26 as he expresses it in the Book of Romans. 01:30 Rachel, when you think about Paul 01:34 and maybe in particular the Book of Romans 01:37 you know, he--in so many ways Paul gets negative press. 01:41 But this is the case where if we really look at 01:43 what he is saying, we get a whole different picture. 01:46 Right. 01:47 Have you had any experience 01:49 in talking with people you know-- 01:51 Yeah, I mean, I feel like some groups of people 01:54 that I know would say that, you know, 01:58 Paul is putting the Jews above Gentiles 02:03 and other people would say 02:04 he is putting the Gentiles above the Jews. 02:06 You know, it's very interesting to hear the different opinions 02:09 in the controversy surrounding these texts. 02:11 Right. Right. 02:12 And you know, we really hope that through today's program 02:15 as we explore this that we're gonna be able 02:18 to push past a lot of that 02:20 and really try and understand the beauty, 02:23 truly the beauty of what Paul has to say. 02:26 It's found in Romans in particular chapter 11. 02:29 So at this point I would like to bring out our friend 02:31 Alexander Bolotnikov Sasha. Dr. Alexander. 02:36 The Doctor. To come join us. 02:39 How are you doing, brother? 02:40 I'm doing fine. Good to see you, Alex. 02:44 Looking bright and shining in your yellow shirt today. 02:48 We have a sandwich, with that blue and yellow. 02:52 There you go. So, Sasha-- 02:55 You're the kosher bacon. 02:58 It's the colors of the Ukrainian flag. 03:03 So, Sasha, we have in previous programs 03:06 we have spend some time now exploring Paul, the rabbi Paul. 03:11 We looked at him as we talked about the Book of Acts. 03:14 And now we're going to centre in on a particular part 03:19 of some of the things that he had to say 03:21 as recorded in the Book of Romans primarily. 03:25 Paul opens up, Romans 11 03:28 and he asked a very clear succinct question. 03:32 Paul says without mixing words 03:34 has God rejected the Jews, right? 03:37 And he comes back with a statement 03:41 that makes it very clear God forbid, right? 03:45 Paul had said rhetorical question with the answer no. 03:48 No. The answer is no. 03:49 But then he does something that I find kind of interesting, 03:53 he turns to begin to talk about Elisha... in this passage. 03:57 Yes. Why does he do that? 03:59 And why does he immediately draw 04:00 from Elisha in the context of this? 04:03 Well, it's important to understand 04:07 what Elisha was going through 04:11 when he had this experience on Mount Carmel. 04:16 And this is with the prophets-- 04:18 Exactly, that's-- you know, all of this stress he had 04:24 when he challenged 400 prophets of Baal. 04:31 If their god is right, if their god could answer 04:35 and then he had to ask to pour water around his altar 04:41 after their god fails to answer 04:45 and then God sent the fire and he was so, so happy 04:52 that God--that he fulfilled the mission 04:55 he--he hoped that he convinced all Israel 05:00 and Jezebel is-- after that decided to kill him. 05:05 He wasn't afraid of death. 05:07 He was so, so disappointed and distraught 05:11 that he ran away he said, I quit, I can't stand. 05:15 That he thought that with the-- 05:16 this manifestation of power that God had displayed 05:21 that the people would instantly turn and say, oh, you know. 05:25 And so God had-- he went all the way up 05:28 to the Mount Sinai where Moses was. 05:31 And God had a talk with him over there. 05:35 And first He said, Elisha you are wrong. 05:40 There are 7000 people in that upper state 05:45 northern kingdom of Israel that did not worship Baal. 05:49 Right, that still follow the living God. 05:51 And you now, sorry, Sasha, but listen, that is even today, 05:57 sometimes we feel like we're all alone, 06:00 are we the only ones that believe 06:04 in the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob 06:06 that worshiped in the right way 06:07 but God there says to Elisha and I think He says to us, 06:10 look, I always have my faithful. 06:14 Even if you don't see them. Right. 06:15 Well, what we need to really look into many people-- 06:21 why Paul brings it up because even that early many Gentiles, 06:27 many non Jews were disappointed, they're like, 06:30 they go to the synagogue 06:33 and try to talk to Jews about Jesus 06:37 showing them the Scriptures and don't get a response. 06:41 So people get upset and then you say, 06:43 Oh, Jews rejected Jesus and so what we see is similarity, 06:49 yes, similar to the fact that 06:51 there was a fire from heaven so convincing, 06:54 the miracles Jesus preformed were extremely convincing 06:59 and not, you know, there were people-- 07:03 there were Pharisees, there were priests 07:05 who rejected them no matter what. 07:06 Lazarus was raised from the dead 07:11 and after that priest decided to kill Jesus as the reaction. 07:17 So what can somebody make 07:20 as a conclusion all Jews rejected Jesus. 07:23 In Psalm. In Psalm. 07:24 Brings the idea the same way as with Elijah not everyone 07:31 in kingdom of Israel went after Jezebel. 07:35 Not everyone in Judea rejected Jesus. 07:40 How many people followed Jesus? 07:41 How many people listen to His sermons? 07:44 How many people accepted? 3000 during the Acts 2. 07:48 Then 5000 more. 07:50 But we don't even know how, 07:51 how many even prior to the Book of Acts, 07:54 how many really were following Him. 07:56 Oh, definitely. Had received Him. 07:58 I've heard you now, and I would expect 08:00 that there was tens of thousands of people 08:02 that believed that Jesus was the promised one. 08:06 Oh, absolutely. 08:07 You look what we have-- we have a distribution. 08:11 And today, even we're talking about 08:13 some places that are easier 08:16 receiving the gospel easier than the other. 08:19 In that time in the land of Israel 08:22 Galileans received, were more receptive than Jerusalem might. 08:27 So, Paul sets this up and presents 08:33 this convincing argument just as Elisha 08:35 look, there's always been God's faithful. 08:39 Don't think that because some rejected that all rejected. 08:43 But then he changes in the same chapter 11 08:48 in verse 11, listen to what he says. 08:51 So I ask you did they-- they being the Jewish people, 08:55 did they stumble in order that they might fall. 08:58 Okay, so he is saying first of all, 09:00 was it just that they tripped and fell 09:03 just for the sake of fallen on their face. 09:05 Okay, and he comes back again a rhetorical question, 09:08 and he says by no means rather through their 09:12 trespasses salvation has come to the nations, 09:15 to the Gentiles, right? 09:17 So as to make Israel jealous. 09:21 So I always love this because Paul is saying, 09:24 look, yeah, a bunch of them fell, 09:27 a bunch of them didn't get it and stumbled, all right. 09:31 But was it just for the sake of stumbling. 09:33 No, of course not, because the fact that they stumbled, 09:37 it opened up the door for the nations, 09:39 for the Gentiles to begin to receive the gospel. 09:42 But he doesn't stop there, does he, Sasha? 09:44 He says look, the reason why the Gentiles have received 09:49 the gospel is so that it will make Israel jealous. Okay. 09:55 Well, I said that they will come back 09:57 to their Heavenly Father. 09:59 And that's what happens. 10:00 I was jealous when I saw in the Christians 10:02 and-- and that's what converted my soul 10:05 because it made me curious. 10:06 Yeah, absolutely for me it was the same experience seeing-- 10:09 seeing my stepfather presenting Christianity in a way 10:16 that I had never seen it before 10:17 living as a Godly Christ like man, 10:19 provoke me to jealousy to want to-- 10:21 Is that awesome. 10:22 What is it that he has? It's holy jealous. 10:24 I want to have the same thing, right? 10:26 It was interesting that I-- in my experience 10:30 although when I was 18, 19, 20 10:33 I was going to the synagogue to, 10:36 you know, to Orthodox synagogue. 10:40 I wasn't really like keeping 10:42 the Sabbath or something like this. 10:44 He was my Christian friend who was challenging me 10:49 on the matter of salvation that pushed me to take 10:53 Sabbath more seriously than I was doing. 10:56 Oh, you know, the irony for me 10:57 and I don't want to upset anyone 10:59 but look, the truth is that 11:01 I became if you can understand this-- 11:03 a far better Jew once I accepted Jesus. Amen. 11:07 Because you know, as an adult even though being Jewish 11:11 before I came to Him, my Judaism was something cultural, 11:15 was something that was relegated back to second class, 11:18 had no real meaning but once I accepted the Jewish Messiah 11:23 and started wanting to live for Him 11:25 and starting to study wanting to serve Him 11:28 the more I did, the more my Jewishness 11:31 started to move forward. Came alive. 11:32 Well, and it's because to me they were inseparable, 11:36 which by the way is really the driving force 11:39 behind this program? Right. 11:41 Is that the roots are Hebrew, which brings us to 11:45 the next important part of this discussion, "The Root." 11:49 Paul presents a new analogy, right? 11:53 He starts talking to the non-Jewish believers. 11:58 And he presents an interesting analogy to them. 12:02 Yeah, he talks about the root. 12:04 And we have to even look a little bit wider 12:08 into the whole context, into the entire context of Romans. 12:12 These Romans run several themes and the theme of Israel, 12:17 the theme of Jewish people does not appear 12:20 first in Romans 11 for the first time. 12:23 First time, it starts in Romans Chapter 2 and Chapter 3. 12:29 The biggest misconception that is--that is present today 12:34 is the fact that after Jews rejected "Jesus" 12:41 they lost their status of being chosen. 12:45 And when I see, when I hear these statements 12:49 I always ask, explain to me what is chosen. 12:53 And people start giving their absolutely wrong understandings 12:57 thinking that chosen's being some so kind of a higher race. 13:01 Well, this is absolutely incorrect, 13:04 God never had any favoritism 13:07 just for somebody's ethnicity or race or culture. 13:12 God have a special purpose when He raised the people of Israel. 13:17 Well, what would you say to the people who say well, 13:21 I don't think the Jews are chosen more because 13:23 if they were chosen to proclaim the Messiah 13:24 and then they rejected the Messiah, 13:26 they don't really have anything to proclaim 13:28 and therefore they shouldn't reach us anymore 13:30 because they don't really have to-- 13:31 the message which God chosen for. 13:32 What would you say to that? 13:34 Well, the incorrect statement is that 13:36 they were chosen to proclaim something. 13:38 Right. Right. Which is not what the Bible says. 13:41 Yeah, they were chosen to preserve the Holy Scripture. 13:46 The Scripture proclaims the Messiah. 13:49 And Jewish prophets and Jewish priests 13:53 over the centuries created, copied 13:57 and preserved the Scriptures. 13:58 Like the Dead Sea scrolls. 13:59 We've gotten so much truth from the Dead Sea Scrolls today 14:02 and that's because the Jews did their Job. 14:04 And by the way if you are aware of that Sea Scrolls 14:08 were discovered in 1947, 1948 that's the same year 14:13 when the state of Israel was created. 14:15 Was found. Isn't that amazing? 14:16 And by the way had it been discovered earlier, 14:20 it would be destroyed because 14:21 there was no infrastructure nothing. 14:24 When you talk about Israel, 14:26 the one of the foundational institution 14:29 of the state of Israel that was created in late 1800 14:33 was Hebrew University where they had archeologists, 14:37 textologist, everything for the study of the Bible. 14:40 And the science that is produced in Hebrew University 14:44 dispel so much skepticism which existed in the 19th century. 14:51 So Paul is driving this right in the beginning 14:55 of his epistle when he ask question, 14:59 what is the advantage of being a Jew. 15:03 And he says right away, to them Romans 3:1, 15:06 "The Oracle of God were given." 15:10 So that's directly when he picks up the question of the root, 15:16 this root is rooted on the fact that there was-- 15:22 that God created a nation of Israel 15:25 so that through them His revelation 15:31 would be manifested to the world and accessible. 15:35 Well, which verses would you use from the Old Testament 15:37 to help us to really embrace the truth of the Jews 15:42 being chosen to preserve the scriptures. 15:45 There is one text which I believe 15:48 is fundamental is Exodus 19:5, 15:53 when it talks about the priesthood. 15:55 Jews were selected for priesthood, 16:00 the priesthood of the nation. 16:01 And the priesthood had two tasks, 16:05 one task is rituals and sacrifices at the sanctuary 16:09 and the second task is preserving the scripture. 16:12 Wow, that's neat. 16:13 You know, I once heard and I don't even remember 16:16 where I heard this from. 16:18 Someone had made and I may have read this-- 16:22 the statement that one of the greatest testimonies 16:25 that God exist is the fact that 16:28 the Jewish people still exist. Yeah. 16:30 And what he was saying was 16:31 is that if you look back through the history 16:34 at least even modern history 16:36 there has been numerous, numerous, numerous attempts 16:40 to wipe out the Jewish people. 16:41 And it made no sense that this little tiny group of people 16:45 could somehow though they were dispersed 16:48 and scattered and persecuted and killed 16:50 that somehow has been able to unlike any other 16:54 people group maintain their identity, 16:58 but then on top of it to look at the language. Right. 17:02 It's the only language that at one point was considered 17:05 a dead language only for religious purposes 17:08 and then to be revived as a spoken modern language. 17:14 I think that that so much speaks to God's desire 17:17 to preserve for a specific reason. 17:20 And they didn't just survived. It is a great testimony. 17:22 They didn't only survived but they thrived 17:25 which is even more of a testimony. Right. 17:28 So I want to read and I want to continue in Romans 11, Sasha. 17:33 But I do want to read Roman 11:17,18 17:38 because we were talking about this, the root. 17:41 And I love what Paul says here. 17:45 But if some of the branches were broken off, 17:48 he is talking about now the Jews 17:50 that have been broken away, right? 17:53 And you the nations, the non Jews were, 17:57 although you were a wild shoot he says 18:01 were grafted in among the others 18:03 and now sharing the nursing root of the Olive tree, 18:06 he says don't be arrogant towards the branches, all right. 18:10 And then this is the statement that I always loved. 18:13 If you are remember it is not you who support the root 18:18 but the root supports you. 18:22 On so many levels I think 18:24 this is such an important statement that, 18:28 I'm not so much talking about the modern Jewish religion, 18:33 I'm talking about the roots of our Christian faith 18:37 and what they are based in, okay. 18:40 That-- It's the Hebrew language, Jewish culture-- 18:44 The mindset and all of that. Mind set, mentality. 18:47 I mean, that's the source 18:50 that we should be looking to understand first 18:54 the scriptures before we make attempts to apply them. 18:59 Why do you think they are-- I mean, 19:00 since I have become a believer and I've joined 19:03 you know, "Christendom" in a way, 19:05 I meet a lot of Christians who seem to be afraid 19:08 to incorporate their Jewish roots 19:11 or to look at their roots of Christianity, 19:13 why do you think that there is some fear there? 19:15 It seems to me that there is fear because they 19:18 because they think it's maybe possibly totally separate, 19:21 you know, or that they are going to be giving up Christ, 19:24 you know, but when we recognize that majority of Jews, 19:28 many Jews did accept Christ when He was here 19:30 and many of them are accepting Him today. 19:32 And then looking at the reality of our roots 19:35 and becoming at peace with the connectedness of that, 19:38 I think that can take away that fear 19:40 because I do meet a lot of people 19:41 who are afraid to talk about our Jewish roots. 19:43 They wanted to be totally separate from the Jews. 19:45 Well, you know, what I would say 19:47 that probably the idea that-- it's the Jewish roots 19:54 and it's kind-- I guess the best way 19:56 I can explain this that as a Jew 19:58 when I would hear, I mean, before becoming a believer, 20:01 when I would think of Christianity, 20:03 I didn't necessarily think about Jesus. 20:05 I thought about everything the Christianity was. 20:07 To me all the baggage. 20:09 And we said this in another holiday 20:11 I mean, in another program the holidays, 20:14 all the things that were so foreign to me 20:16 that were another people's thing, okay. 20:19 And I think that when-- 20:22 when we are talking in terms of the Hebraic roots 20:25 that we use you know, like the Jewish, 20:28 you know, the Jew thinks Jewish. 20:31 That's a whole different thing to me. 20:34 The things Jewish or the things maybe 20:35 they are even being practiced today. 20:37 And not everything Jewish today 20:39 you know, has any connection to biblical in origin. 20:43 That's true. That's true. 20:44 So maybe part of it, Rachel, is just semantics. 20:47 Right. It's just how it's presented. 20:49 And to not be caught up into traditions 20:51 and rabbinical thought but to stay with the Bible, 20:53 so there is probably a healthy fear there 20:55 combined with some ignorant fear. 20:57 You know, it runs very deeply you know, 21:00 it runs into the idea when people get afraid 21:03 when you start talking about the Levitical Feast 21:05 you know, or the Jewish holidays. 21:06 No, no, no, there's no where in Leviticus Chapter 23 21:09 that it says these are the Jewish holidays, 21:11 since these are the feast of the Lord. 21:13 Well, yeah, but the other side of it is, 21:15 is that then people run and they say we have to keep the feast. 21:19 Well, you know, we've said this in previous program, 21:21 there's no way to keep the feast. 21:23 They are all related to harvest to the sacrificial system. 21:28 You know, the best we can do is celebrate 21:30 and you know, I would say that the only thing 21:32 we could rightly celebrate is how they portray 21:35 the plan of salvation through our Messiah. 21:38 But let's get back to--to this idea of being broken off. 21:45 Sasha, what do you think about this in Romans 17 and 18. 21:49 Well, we definitely have the biblical history 21:54 where we have basically 12 tribes of Israel. 22:00 And by the time Paul is writing, 22:02 there is only basically three barely existing you know, 22:10 you have tribe of Judah, the large one. 22:13 Paul himself is from the tribe of Benjamin, 22:16 but how many Benjaminites are left, a very little. 22:20 And of course the tribe of Levi 22:22 and so Paul definitely here refers to the fact 22:27 that ten tribes of Israel in 722 were taken 22:34 into a Syrian captivity and never returned. 22:36 So he is talking about the fact that 22:40 when people go away from the truth of the Lord, 22:45 they will be, they will be cut off. 22:48 And so he makes the analogy here. 22:51 You know, don't boast, you've just been grafted in. 22:55 If they were cut off more so will you be cut off. 23:00 Right, and the important thing is that Paul goes on 23:03 and he expresses that in terms of their unbelief. 23:06 It was because of their unbelief that they were cut off 23:09 and the same unbelief that's gonna cause-- 23:11 Cause anybody-- Anyone to be cut off. 23:13 Right. That's gonna happen. 23:15 Well, we have run out of time. 23:19 Rachel has a song for us. 23:20 Eli, Eli, My God, my God 23:22 written by Hannah Senesh famous paratrooper 23:26 who fought Nazis during the Holocaust. 24:03 Eli 24:07 Eli 24:12 I pray that these things never end 24:19 The sand and the sea 24:26 The rush of the water 24:33 The crash of the heavens 24:41 The prayer of man 24:48 The sand and the sea 24:55 The rush of the water 25:03 The crash of the heavens 25:09 The prayer of man 25:37 Eli 25:43 Eli 25:49 I pray 25:52 that these things never end 25:58 The sand and the sea 26:04 The rush of the water 26:11 The crash of the heavens 26:18 The prayer of man 26:25 The sand and the sea 26:33 The rush of the water 26:40 The crash of the heavens 26:46 The prayer of man 26:52 The light 26:55 of the blue skies 27:01 The prayer 27:03 of the world 27:24 Well, Rachel, what a beautiful, beautiful song. 27:27 You know, that's just such a testimony 27:30 how in the darkest of times 27:33 it seems like the human spirit shines the brightest. 27:36 So true, the author of that song was just executed 27:38 just a few weeks after she wrote that song. 27:40 Wow. Amazing. 27:41 Well, friends, it's been a wonderful program 27:45 and we thank you so much for joining us 27:47 God is not through with anyone. 27:50 May the Lord bless you and keep you 27:52 until we return next time. 27:54 Join us again on Back to our Roots. |
Revised 2014-12-17