Romans Chapter 10– John Karmelich

1. The title for this lesson is, “What we as Christians can learn about the Jewish nation today”.

a) This lesson focuses on the Jewish nation “Post-Jesus”. That is the time frame between Jesus’ First Coming and Second Coming. That is, the last 2,000 years of history.

b) Let me start by saying the emphasis of these bible studies is how the bible impact’s our lives and not say, the lives of Jewish people. The purpose of these studies is for us to learn what about God and what He expects for our lives.

i) With that said, one needs to this study focusing on the Jewish people as an illustration for us to learn. In other words, it’s not about learning about the Jewish religion, it’s about learning how to apply this illustration to our lives.

c) The main point of this lesson is how the Jewish nation failed to grasp God’s expectations of them. Paul will cite many Old Testament verses in support of this concept.

d) The underlying point is that even Christians can make the same mistakes. Because the Jews are “God’s chosen people”, they historically made the mistake of assuming “that’s all it takes” to get into heaven. Christians make the same mistake. We may think because our parents are Christians or we went through some childhood ritual that it’s now an “automatic ticket to heaven” and no further action is needed.

e) The issue at hand is salvation and our egos. We do religious “things” and we think God is pleased by our efforts. We think God must bless us today because we’ve been “good boys and girls” today. God never owes us anything. That is not how God works and we’ll get into that as the lesson progresses.

2. In this lesson, we’re going to talk a lot about the Jewish religion, what it teaches, what are its good points and what are its flaws.

a) For what it is worth, I have a number of friends who are religious Jews. My interest in God and the bible gives me something in common with them. I understand the basic principals of Judaism and I know the differences between the major denominations.

i) Personally, I would rather have neighbors who are devoutly religious Jews or Mormons than say, someone who claims they are born-again Christians but never practices what they preach. As a general rule, religious people who understand they are accountable to God live better lives and are happier people.

b) With that said, Chapter 10 is one of the most offensive chapters in the New Testament to a religious Jew. It essentially says they are wrong about salvation. To my Jewish readers of this study, please accept that this is part of the Christian view of salvation. Most Christians I meet are very “pro-Jewish” and we’ll discussion why in Chapter 11. As to this chapter, it explains some fundamental differences between Judaism and Christianity.

c) Christianity was meant to be taught as so as to change a person’s heart. It was never meant to be taught by force. Unfortunately, the history of the Christian church is full of long time era’s where people were asked to convert at the threat of death or some means of bribery or violence. The New Testament never teaches that and neither do I.

i) I state this to my Jewish readers so you understand I mean you no harm. ☺

ii) The worse thing that’s going to happen is that you’ll read arguments that you will disagree with. Christians believe the only way into heaven is through Jesus. We preach this out of love for our fellow humans as we don’t want to see anyone perish. It is not meant as a physical threat.

3. Now, back to my opening premise: This lesson is for the Christian as well as the Jew.

a) The mistake of “anyone” is think they are “holier-than-thou” and think they have some God-given automatic ticket into heaven because of one’s background. Salvation is an individual issue, regardless of race, religion or national origin.

4. This brings up the other key issue of this lesson, which is on individual responsibility.

a) The last lesson had a heavy emphasis on the fact that God knows all things. Since He knows all things, He knew in advance who would be saved and who would not.

b) This lesson deals with the “flip side of the same coin”. That is, we as humans don’t have that perfect knowledge. Only God knows who is saved and we don’t have that privilege of knowing that information. We don’t know who is going to heaven.

i) Therefore, we pray for all people.

ii) Therefore, we share the Gospel message with all people.

iii) From our perspective, salvation is up to “us” because it requires the acceptance of Jesus as God and our behavior should follow as proof of that acceptance.

c) Chapter 10 is one of the few places in the New Testament where salvation is actually defined for us. It is in Verse 9 and it should be memorized. That verse focuses on what “we” need to do in order to be saved as opposed to Chapter 9 when that issue was how God choose us.

d) Let me sum up the “pre-chosen by God” versus “personal responsibility” issue by saying it can never be fully reconciled in our minds. One simply as to accept both facts as true. The way I reconcile it is I accept God knows all things just as I accept I don’t know all things. Therefore, I never “give up” on anybody.

i) Salvation is “God’s problem” in that He knows who is saved and who is not.

ii) Salvation is also “our problem” in that God commands us to be His witnesses to the word and God desires to use us to spread that Gospel message.

iii) My point is one has to accept both factors, although it is difficult to reconcile.

5. Chapter 10, Verse 1: Brothers, my heart's desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved.

a) The last chapter dealt with “Israel past”. That was the time frame from the first Jew, Abraham to the time of Jesus. The main point of Chapter 10 was their failure to corporately please God as a nation. That leads to the question of “Is God done with Israel? Can individual Jews still be saved? That is the main issue of this chapter.

b) The first word of this chapter is “Brothers”. This chapter is address to fellow Christians.

c) The rest of Verse 1 is the purpose of the chapter: It states that Paul’s desire and pray is for the Israelites to be saved, in that they accept Jesus’ sin payment for their salvation.

i) Notice what is not said in this verse, or this chapter, or the New Testament:
Any call to violence to attack non-believers.

ii) Paul says his “heart’s desire and prayer” is that his fellow Jews would believe that Jesus died for their sins.

d) Paul understood that his primary mission was to bring non-Jewish people to Christ. Paul saw how Peter was best effective in converting Jewish people to Christ and Paul saw how he was best effective in converting Gentiles, i.e., non-Jews. (Reference Galatians 2:7-8).

i) Still, Paul has a heart for his fellow Jews. Paul was a devout, religious Pharisee prior to his conversion (See Philippians 3:5). He studied under Gamaliel (Acts 22:3) who is revered to this day by Orthodox Jews as being a great rabbi scholar.

e) For whatever reason, whenever Paul preached to a Jewish audience, very few people converted. Whenever Paul preached to a non-Jewish audience, there were many converts. I believe Paul just “figured out” that God called him to witness to Gentiles.

i) My point here is a way to figure out “God’s will” for one’s life is often just to watch the results. For example, one reason I do these bible lessons is I see how God is using them and blessing them. Therefore, since it is “working”, I accept it as God’s will for my life for this moment.

f) One final point on Verse 1: Notice Paul prayed for the salvation of his fellow Jews.

i) Even though Paul was not called to preach to them, Paul never stopped trying, which is what most of the Book of Acts indicated.

ii) Further, it appeared Paul never stopped praying for the Jewish people.

iii) The lesson for us? Never stop praying for someone’s salvation. God desires effective prayer and consistent prayer. The reason for the “consistent” prayer is that it keeps our focus on God and not on us. My point is we should never say, “I prayed for that guy once twelve years ago, and that’s that.” God desires regular prayer, if for no other reason that God desires we never give up on someone just as God never gives up on someone.

a) Remember that we work on God’s timing and not ours. Consistent prayer means that we are waiting on God’s timing to answer the prayer.

b) Again, God knows who is saved, but we don’t. Therefore, we pray for anyone and everyone that is on our mind for that moment.

6. Verse 2: For I can testify about them that they are zealous for God, but their zeal is not based on knowledge.

a) Let me paraphrase Paul. “Look, I understand my fellow Jews. I’ve been there. I know their lifestyle. I know how they memorize scripture. I know how they study the great rabbi’s of time’s past. They have great head knowledge, but they are missing the key issue, which is, you can’t earn God’s favor by one’s attempt to keep God’s laws.”

i) My point here is that when Paul says, “their zeal is not based on knowledge”, it does not mean the Jewish people never studied. It means they missed the key point of God’s requirements for salvation. That is discussed in Verse 3.

b) Paul gives his fellow Jews a great compliment in that they are zealous for God.

i) That means that the religious Jews have a great desire for pleasing God.

ii) Today, only a small percentage of the Jewish people are devoutly religious. Unfortunately, most don’t even observe the Sabbath. The same way there are “Christians” who rarely go to church; there are Jews who only go to synagogue once or twice a year at best.

iii) Still, there is the other faction of Jews that is very devout. They know the Old Testament backwards and forwards. They study thick books that are “official” commentaries on how to properly interpret the Jewish laws. These interpretations are for the most part, good things and can cause one to live a happy and productive life.

iv) The key point they misunderstand what God requires by “perfection”. That is the point of Verse 3.

7. Verse 3: Since they did not know the righteousness that comes from God and sought to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness.

a) Let’ start with the phrase, “did not know the righteousness that comes from God”.

i) This gets back to one of my favorite assumptions about God: God is perfect.

a) If God is capable of making mistakes, then we can’t trust God.

b) If God is capable of lying or changing his mind, we can’t trust God.

c) Therefore, we accept that if God exists, He must be perfect in all his ways.

d) “As for God, his way is perfect; the word of the LORD is flawless.”
(Psalm 18:30 NIV)

ii) If God is perfect, and God’s word is perfect, then that word must contain God’s standards for right and wrong. One must read the bible laws and understand, “this is God’s standard for admission into heaven and how to live today”.

iii) If God is perfect, then we must perfectly obey that law for admission into heaven.

iv) If God is perfect, then He cannot tolerate any sin whatsoever.

a) “Your eyes are too pure to look on evil; you cannot tolerate wrong.” (Habakkuk 1:13 NIV).

v) In other words, if we want to spend our eternity with a perfect God, then we have to become perfect ourselves. God cannot tolerate any sin whatsoever in heaven.

b) Now let’s get back to the term “God’s righteousness”.

i) This is the idea of being “perfect”. It is the idea of never committing any sin whatsoever. It is about getting a perfect score in our life. Some disclaimers first:

a) There is an age of accountability. God does not expect, say babies to comprehend this and I believe children are saved for that reason.

b) Further, God judges us based on what information we have about God. Those who know more are more accountable.

ii) Here is the “flaw” in Judaism (in my humble opinion ☺). First let me state there are lots of views within Judaism. This is my interpretation of a consensus opinion. Here is the argument:

a) “If God gave us these set of laws, then He must expect us to have the capability to obey them. God does provide a way of forgiveness through animal sacrifices. When we sacrifice innocent animals for our sins, it reminds us that innocent people get hurt due to our actions. The bible implies that the shedding of innocent (animal) blood is necessary for the forgiveness of sins. We performed that ritual and our sins were forgiven.”

b) “Since we don’t have a temple today (destroyed in 70AD), we religious Jews have believe in verbal confession of one’s sins for forgiveness.”

iii) The Jewish argument is that it is possible to be obedient to God by obeying His laws to the best of one’s ability and seeking forgiveness when they fail.

iv) Some Jewish people interpret these laws very strictly and strive to obey them. Others take a more loose interpretation.

v) The “flaw” is in the issue of perfection. The purpose of God’s laws is to show us how imperfect we are before God. God is perfect and expects perfection.

vi) The great problem with Judaism is one never has assurance of salvation. One has to keep striving to keep the law and hoping “they didn’t miss something”. They pray for forgiveness of the sins they committed and ask forgiveness for any they might have missed. Still, one never “knows for sure”.

vii) With Christianity, there is assurance. We know we are saved because the full price for our sins has already been paid. It’s already a “done deal”.

c) This leads us back to Verse 3: “they (Jews) did not submit to God's righteousness”.

i) It doesn’t mean the Jewish people did not try to please God. It means that they failed collectively and individually to please God by their own efforts.

ii) If there is one idea I’ve stated over and over again in these lessons is that one cannot please God by a self-disciplined effort to obey God’s laws. In that case, one is making an idol out of one’s self-discipline and not letting the power of God work through us for the better.

iii) Let me state this from God’s perspective: “From the time of Abraham to the time of Jesus is roughly 2,000 years. During that time period, has the Jewish nation ever gone through a period of time where they have collectively obeyed all of my laws? No. That historical period shows the failure of the Jewish people to keep all of My laws. Now that history has proved it can’t be done, I’ve provided the “solution” to how to have a right-standing before Me. That is the acceptance of Jesus’ payment for all of their sins”.

iv) The Jewish nation’s failure to recognize that payment is another way of saying, “they (Jews) did not submit to God's righteousness”.

8. Verse 4: Christ is the end of the law so that there may be righteousness for everyone who believes.

a) Let’s start with the first phrase, “Christ is the end of the law”. Look at what Jesus himself said on this issue: “Do not think that I have come to abolish the Law or the Prophets; I have not come to abolish them but to fulfill them.” (Matthew 5:17 NIV)

b) What this means is that Jesus himself paid the penalty for all of our sins, once and for all. That payment is for everyone and anyone willing to accept that payment.

c) In life, when we violate a law and are “caught”, then we must pay the price. In society, it is either a monetary fine, community service or jail time. The point is we are punished when we are caught doing something wrong.

i) With God, we don’t get away with anything. For everything we do wrong, (that is a violation of one of the bible laws), we must pay the penalty for that sin.

ii) God then offers us a choice: Choose Jesus to accept our penalty or suffer it ourselves. Personally, I’ll pick “Choice #1”. It’s a lot less painful. ☺

iii) That is how Jesus made an “end to the law”. It does not mean God’s laws are now null and void. It means the penalty has been paid in full. That is also what Jesus meant when He said He has come to fulfill the law.

d) Does that mean we no longer have to obey the law? For example, one of the 10 Commandments is “do not steal”. Are you saying we are now free to steal?

i) In terms of salvation, technically yes. You still may go to jail for your crime, but if you are putting your trust in Jesus for all of your sins, yes you can.

ii) The point is, “If I want to please God, why would I want to disobey His laws?” If I am grateful for God providing that free gift of salvation, why would I want to do anything that displeases Him or others? If God calls me to be His witness to the world, why would I want to harm that reputation by violating His laws?

iii) My point is God still desires obedience. It is not for the sake of salvation, it is for the sake of living a life pleasing to God. The secret to living a life pleasing to God is to harness the power of God in order to be obedient.

e) A classic example is the issue, “Can Christians drink alcohol?”

i) The correct answer is, “The Christian can drink all the alcohol they want. The question becomes, why would you want to? If you have the internal peace that God gives us, why would we want to suppress that with a depressive drug?”

ii) The issue of Christians and drinking is more complicated than that. The New Testament preaches against being drunk (e.g., Romans 13:13). My point here is that one does not “have” to do anything else for salvation other than accept Jesus payment for our sins. We’ll discuss that further in Verse 9.

f) The last phrase of Verse 4 says, “For everyone who believes”.

i) God does not discriminate. God has an equal opportunity salvation plan. ☺

ii) There is no group or person that is any more special than any other.

iii) It doesn’t matter what one has done with one’s life prior to salvation. You don’t have to “clean up one’s act” before coming to Jesus. God’s job is to work on us once we’ve made that commitment, not beforehand.

iv) This verse is another reminder for us to not look down upon others who haven’t accepted Jesus.

9. Verse 5: Moses describes in this way the righteousness that is by the law: "The man who does these things will live by them."

a) This is quote of Leviticus 18.5. By the way, get used to Paul quoting the Old Testament. In Romans Chapters 9-11, there are roughly thirty Old Testament quotes.

b) Paul is using the Old Testament to show how the Jewish people didn’t grasp the true purpose of God’s law: It is to show our imperfection and need of a “suffering Messiah” as well as a ruling Messiah for our lives.

c) The idea of Leviticus 18.5 is if we want God to judge us based on our ability to keep the laws, then we better do it 100% right all the time or we will fail.

d) A classic joke that applies here: “There are two ways to get into heaven. One is to perfectly obey every Old Testament law one’s entire life. Then, when we get to heaven, we tell Jesus to move over. ☺The other way is accepting Jesus’ payment for our sins”.

i) That is the idea of “The man who does these things will live by them.”

ii) It is the idea of “You want God to judge you based on your ability to keep the Old Testament Commandments? Terrific, just don’t mess up even once as God’s standards are perfection and He doesn’t grade on the curve!” ☺

10. Verse 6: But the righteousness that is by faith says: "Do not say in your heart, `Who will ascend into heaven?' " (that is, to bring Christ down) <sup>7</sup> "or `Who will descend into the deep?' " (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead).

a) Paul does what I am guilty of on a regular basis: Quoting the bible with my own thoughts added in parenthesis. The difference is I’m not God-inspired literature. ☺

i) Paul quotes Deuteronomy 30:12-13. In the parenthesis above, Paul adds references to Jesus. He is stating that this text in Deuteronomy is about Jesus. I’m betting a few Jewish rabbis might disagree with that, but I’ll save that for another day. ☺

b) Let’s discuss the text itself and understand it’s context:

i) The context in Deuteronomy is about understanding God’s commands. When Moses wrote that, he meant in effect, “All of these laws that I’m commanding you to learn, you are capable of understanding. You don’t have to go up to heaven and ask for clarification. Neither do you have to travel to great lengths to find special wise men to interpret it for you. It’s pretty “black and white”. Just read it and obey it. If you think you’re violating a law, you probably are.”

c) It might help to give a Jewish rabbi’s understanding the Messiah at this point. There is a tradition that when the Messiah comes He will give the proper interpretation of the Jewish laws. There will be no more internal debate. That would make “sense” as the Messiah would be God-ordained, and therefore, he would have instructions from God on proper interpretation.

i) With that in mind, if you study the Sermon on the Mount (Matthew 5-7), Jesus pretty much does that: He gives an interpretation of God’s commands and says they must be obeyed to the strictest, most extreme interpretation.

d) Remember that Paul believed one can be obedient to God’s commands. The secret is the power of God working in us to give us the ability to be obedient. In other words, it’s not through self-discipline, its God working through us. The underlying theme of the Sermon on the Mount speech is all about turning over different aspects of one’s life to God so He can work through us. To use another classic Christian cliché: “Let go, let God”.

e) This brings us back to the point of these verses: Obedience to God’s laws.

i) Let me bring in Verse 8 at this point and tie Verses 6-8 together.

11. Verse 8: But what does it say? "The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart," that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming:

a) Remember that Chapter 10 of Romans is about the Jewish nation “post-Jesus” and what it takes to have salvation. Jewish people believe that salvation is about obedience to God’s laws. They are “half-right” in that God’s laws are still His requirements for salvation. They miss the point in that it is impossible to keep those laws under their own power.

b) Salvation is about accepting Jesus payment for our sins. Salvation is also about letting Jesus “take over” our lives. We sin partially because we tell God at any given moment, “Well yeah, you’re generally in charge of my life, but I want to be in charge of “this” aspect for this moment. We try to do things in our own power and we fail.

c) Which leads us back to Verses 6 and 7:

i) When Moses wrote those verses in Deuteronomy, he is saying God’s word is near to you. You don’t have to travel to heaven or the ends of the earth for interpretation. Paul is saying in effect that one needs Jesus in our lives in order to have salvation and grow in our relationship with God. That is why Paul adds in parenthesis references to “finding Jesus” to those Deuteronomy verses.

d) The main point of Verses 6 to 8 can be summarized as follows: We don’t have to travel to heaven or to far out reaches of the world in order to “find Jesus”. We don’t have to take seminars on “finding your inner-Jesus”. It is simply a matter of stating one’s belief in Jesus as Lord of one’s life.” It is when one understands that Jesus is God, Jesus paid the price for our sins and we want to live our lives to serve Him. We don’t have to travel anywhere to go search out Jesus in order to have salvation. It is a matter of a true confession based on that knowledge.

12. Verse 9: That if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved.

a) If I had to pick one verse to memorize in Romans 10, this is it.

b) Notice the last four words: “you will be saved.” In other words, if we do whatever “Verse 9” tells us to do, one has eternal salvation. It must be pretty important stuff. ☺

c) Let’s start with the first phrase, “That if you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord,"”.

i) Tying this back to Verses 6-8, this phrase is saying we don’t have to travel to great lands or go to any special church in order to “find Jesus” for salvation. It is a simple matter of confessing Jesus as Lord.

ii) The term “confession” means to “agree with”. It is the idea that we agree with God that what we did was wrong and we desire to act differently.

d) It is important to understand the concept of “Lord”. It is best to think of it as if one is a slave and “lord” is your slave-master. If you call someone lord, that means you desire to obey all of their commandments.

i) Some English bible translations put the word “LORD” in all caps when the reference is to God himself. The word “LORD “is a translation of “Jehovah”.

ii) When it is someone addressing God, the word “Lord” is put in title case.

iii) There are occasions where one uses the word “Lord”, but their heart is not in it. Peter once said, “not so, Lord” (Ref: Acts 10:14). That is a contradiction. One cannot call someone “Lord” and use the word “no” at the same time.

e) Let’s look at something Jesus said, “Not everyone who says to me, ‘Lord, Lord,’ will enter the kingdom of heaven, but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven.”

i) This is a quote of Matthew 7:21 (NIV). Jesus is saying that not everyone who calls Him “Lord” will enter the kingdom of heaven.

ii) Here in Romans 10:9, Paul says that anyone who does call Jesus “Lord” will be saved. It is not a contradiction.

iii) The idea is salvation is not just “head knowledge”. You can believe Jesus is from God and He died for the sins of the world. The question then becomes “what do you do with that knowledge?” If you change your life accordingly, then Jesus is then “Lord” of one’s life. That is what Jesus meant by the second part of Matthew 7:21 when He says, “but only he who does the will of my Father who is in heaven”. Jesus is saying salvation is about the desire to do “God’s will”, which is about living in obedience to His commands for our lives.

f) This leads us back to Verse 9. It says, “And believe in your heart”.

i) The bible term for “heart” is not a reference to your blood pumping organ. It is best paraphrased as “all of your inner beings”. Just as the heart pumps blood to every aspect of your inner being, so your belief in God must cover every aspect of one’s inner soul. In other words, salvation is not just “head knowledge”; one must believe God is “taking over” their lives in every aspect.

ii) There is a classic expression that says, “Many people miss heaven by 18 inches”.

a) That is the rough distance from the brain to the heart. It is the idea that people understand the concept of Jesus as Lord, but never act upon it.

b) That is also the idea of what Jesus meant in Matthew 7:21 that many people who call Jesus “Lord” will not be admitted into heaven.

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