Confidence in God’s Mercy
Just as you who were at one time disobedient to God have now received mercy as a result of their disobedience, so they too have now become disobedient in order that they too may now receive mercy as a result of God’s mercy to you. For God has bound all men over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all. Romans 11:30-32
Israel’s large-scale rejection of her Messiah does not mean God has rejected Israel. ‘God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable’ (11:29). Not for their own sakes but because of God’s pledged word to the patriarchs, He will not annul Israel’s calling. God is now saving some Jews (the remnant on 11:1-10) and He will save a significant number of Jews nearer to the end of time (11:26). This is our first ground for confidence: God’s election is irrevocable.
The second ground for confidence that God has a future for the Jews is His mercy. God shows mercy to the disobedient. ‘Just as you who were at one time disobedient to God have now received mercy as a result of their disobedience, 31 so they too have now become disobedient in order that they too may now receive mercy as a result of God’s mercy to you’ (11:30,31). Note the parallel. Human disobedience and divine mercy were and are depicted in the experience of both Gentiles and Jews. The difference is that, while God has already been merciful to disobedient but repentant Gentiles, His mercy to disobedient Israel is still largely future. It is because of disobedient Israel that disobedient Gentiles have received mercy, and it is because of this mercy to disobedient Gentiles that disobedient Jews will receive mercy too.
‘For God has bound all men over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all’ (11:32). This is God’s overruling purpose and plan. Disobedience is likened to a jail in which God has placed every human being. They have no possibility of escape except by God’s merciful release. In the first three chapters of Romans, Paul has shown that all humanity is sinful, guilty and without excuse. But from 3:21 onwards he has unfolded the way of salvation by grace through faith in Christ (cf. Galatians 3:22ff).
Some have taken this verse (11:32) out of its context and used it to argue for universal salvation. They ignore that it is in this very letter, in Romans, that Paul speaks of a ‘day of God’s wrath’ (2:5) on which some will receive ‘wrath and anger,’ ‘trouble and distress’ (2:8ff). Paul’s wording was literally that God may have mercy on “the all.” In context this refers to the two groups contrasted throughout the chapter, the Jews and the Gentiles.
Paul has been at pains to argue that there is no difference between Jews and Gentiles either in sin (3:9,22) or in salvation (10:12). Now he describes them in the prison of disobedience so they can enjoy together the joy of the freedom of God’s mercy. Beyond this he has predicted the future ‘fullness’ of both Israel (11:12) and of the Gentiles (11:25). When these two ‘fullnesses’ are fused together, the new humanity will have been realised, consisting of huge numbers of the redeemed. The ‘many’ who were formerly in Adam will then be in Christ, experiencing His overflowing grace and reigning in life with Him (5:12ff).