1 I am speaking the truth in Christ—I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit— 2 that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. 
3 For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh. 4 They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises. 5 To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen.
—Romans 9:1-5, ESV

Few things are as daunting in the life of a disciple of Christ as a deep dive into the 9th, 10th, and 11th chapters of the book of Romans.  

Chapter 9 confronts us with  “God’s purpose in election” (ref. 9:11), a doctrine a lot of church members don’t understand or don’t want to accept.  

Chapter 10 reminds us of the importance of evangelism, “For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (ref. 10:13), a task a lot of church members believe in but just want someone else to do it.  

Chapter 11 ends with the exaltation of God, “For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever.  Amen.” (ref. 11:36), which should help reconcile all Christians to the fact that the doctrine of election should be believed and the practice of evangelism should be performed in order to exalt and glorify our great God and Savior Jesus Christ!

Election, evangelism, and exaltation, this is what Romans 9, 10, and 11 are all about.  Let’s dive in!  We begin with chapter 9, which is primarily about election, but begins with vs. 1-5 with Paul’s passion for evangelism, especially for the people of his beloved Israel.

Love for Israel causes sorrow.

The Apostle Paul was many things.  He was a Jew for Jesus.  He was a former pharisee on fire for the Lord.  He was also a man of constant sorrow, troubled all of his days because of his great love for Israel.  

Saul had left Judaism behind to become Paul, following Christ and Christianity.  For this reason he had “great sorrow” over the vast majority of Jews who had not accepted and followed Jesus.  Paul had gotten over his former pharisaical legalism to embrace grace, and this gave him “unceasing anguish” over all of his former friends who were still trying to work their way to Heaven.  

In other words, Paul’s great love for the Lord often filled him with sadness over the lost condition of his nation, his home, his relatives, his friends, the Israelites.  

All Christians should love Israel in such a way that the tragedies they have faced and the sadness of their lostness touches our very own souls.  We should have sorrow over the destruction of Jerusalem by the Romans, a decade or so after Paul wrote this book of Romans.  We should be sad they lived as a diaspora people for nearly 1,900 years.  We should have anguish over what Hitler did to them during World War II, and the holocaust that took six million Jewish lives.  We should be sad that even though they got their homeland back in 1948, they have had to fight for their existence ever since, in 1948, 1967, 1973, and they are now in the biggest fight of their lives after what happened on October 7, 2023.  

But Most of all, like the Christian Paul, we Christians should harbor the most sorrow over the fact most Jewish people are lost.  Jesus Christ came from them.  Jesus Christ came to them.  But Jesus Christ is not in them, for the vast majority of Jewish people reject Jesus as Lord and Savior.  For that matter, so do most of the people of the world.  Our love for all people should give us sorrow over their lostness and separation from God.

Admittedly, it is hard to bear the burden for everybody.  But we must do it for somebody.  Perhaps like Paul, we could start with our own people.  Let us love the people of Hot Springs, Arkansas, America, and our own family and friends, so much that any who are lost gives us great sorrow.  Then, let us be willing to do what Paul did to reach them with the gospel.  

Love for Israel calls for sacrifice.  

In short, Paul was willing to go through Hell if it would result in his family and friends getting to Heaven.  Paul’s love for the lost was so great, it caused him to think the unthinkable.  He contemplated being “accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of [Israel].”  

If death is the ultimate price, Paul was willing to pay double for the people he loved.  Speaking hypothetically and hyperbolically, he would take on death, and damnation, if he could, in order to save some Jewish souls.  In this he summoned his inner Moses (ref. Exodus 32:32).  Even more so, Paul showed the spirit of Jesus Christ, who truly is the only begotten who ever died and suffered God’s wrath in order to save His people.  

Love, biblical love, agape love, is sacrifice.  We see it illustrated regularly by our law enforcement officers and military soldiers.  We see it exemplified in a Christian way by the many martyrs made by missionary service.  We see it here, in the heart of the Apostle Paul, who captures the passion of the Isaac Watts’ hymn, “Love so amazing, so divine, demands my soul, my life, my all.”

Would you sell your soul to the devil to save another soul?  Of course you cannot, neither could Paul.  This is one you will not have to do.  

Would you give your life to save a soul for Christ?  This is a more fair question, because this is a veritable option.  Would you serve as a missionary in a dangerous place for the sake of the gospel, a place where you could be imprisoned or killed?  Will you serve as a missionary in your own home and hometown, giving your life away a little every day, so that others may come to know Jesus as Lord and Savior?  Will you set the example that opens the door, then give them the gospel key to come in?

Would you give your all, all for souls in Israel, the good old USA, the family and friends God has placed in your life?  All you can do is all you can do.  All of us can sacrifice time to pray.  All of us have money to give.  All of us can go, as God leads us, to invite people to church and to Christ so that they may be saved.

Hold those thoughts, sorrow and sacrifice, and let’s go back to the Holy Land for a moment.

Love for Israel cites specific reasons.  

Paul is prominent in the New Testament because Paul is a prototypical Christian.  “Imitate me,” he rightly wrote (ref. 1 Corinthians 4:16, 11:1; Philippians 3:17).  We may not be Jewish, but those of us who are Christians should love the “Israelites,” for the same specific reasons as Paul.  He cites seven:

“The adoption” means they were chosen by our sovereign to be His people under the Old Covenant.  If they were so beloved and special to God then, they ought to be beloved and special to us now.  A Christian should love Israel.

“The glory” means they experienced and chronicled the revealed glory of the true and living God in the Old Testament.  Without the Old, there would be no New, so we can now live our lives for the glory of God.  A Christian should love Israel.

“The covenants,” plural come from Israel.  God gave them the Old, and offered them the New.  Almost all of the early Christians were Jewish.  Sixty-four out of the sixty-six books of our Bible come from Jewish authors.  A Christian should love the Bible, and love Israel.

“The law” is the righteous standard of God, the revealed and shared holiness of God, imbedded in the word of God.  The Judeo-Christian ethic is the moral code behind the great democracies of the world, and where it is diminished freedom does not ring.  Thanks be to God, Moses, and all of the mostly Jewish writers of Holy Scripture for this.  For this reason, a Christians should love Israel.

“The worship,” the way to truly worship the true and living God, has been handed down from the Jews to the Christians.  Reverent, joyful, and serious worship was practiced in the temple and the synagogue.  Now it is our turn to read and preach the Bible, sing Psalms and hymns and spiritual songs, offer prayers and offerings, and see Jesus high and lifted up in communion and baptism.  Let the world have the fluff and stuff, we have real worship in the church when we follow the example of the Jews.  A Christian should love Israel.

And finally, consider the people.  “The patriarchs” produced “the Christ.”  If it were not for Abraham and Isaac and Jacob, David and Solomon, there would be no Jesus, who was, is, and always will be, Jewish!  A Christian should love Christ, and a Christian should love Israel.

How you feel about Israel will tell you a lot about how you feel about God.  How you feel about God will dictate how you feel about the gospel.  How you feel about the gospel will determine whether or not you will share it with others.  At the end of the day, and in accordance with the context of this text, a Christian’s love for Israel is ultimately a love for lost people in the world, especially those who are closest to us.  

A Christian’s love is a love that should often give us sorrow, for the lost.  A Christian’s love is a love that should call for us to sacrifice our time and energy to reach people for Christ.  A Christian’s love is a love that will cause us to do specific things for specific people in a specific effort to bring them to Christ and His church.

Ironic, isn’t it, that in a chapter dedicated to the doctrine of election, we are talking about the importance of evangelism.  Both are important, election and evangelism, for the exaltation of our great God and Savior Jesus Christ!