I'm going to jump into the text this morning in Romans chapter 11. I'm not going to read the text. Elder Joe already read it, and I'm going to just jump right in, just continue the theme of God's faithfulness. So let me pray first, and then we'll jump in. Gracious Father, what an awesome God you are.

We want, as you've been faithful all these years, and at times as we labor, sometimes there's frustration of wanting to see fruit in a certain way, but we know, Father, you're sovereign that in your time and in your purpose, Lord God, that you will fulfill what you have desired.

I pray that as we've been reminded, Lord, of your grace over Rita's life, that you would continue to help us to be faithful, to fix our eyes on Christ's eternity and all the promises. So I pray that your word would speak to us to remind us that again. In Jesus' name we pray, amen.

You know, the question that Paul has asked previously, and he's been trying to answer, not just in the last few chapters, but probably from the very beginning of the book of Romans, is what about the Jews? And this is a huge question in the church today, that the church in some sense is divided because depending on what commentary you open up or what church you go to, they will say that Israel is done, that God had his time with the nation of Israel and now Israel and church has become one.

And so whenever the scripture talks about his people, he's talking about the church, the Gentile and the Jews alike. I believe, again, and my conviction has grown only stronger in the years, that when God was working with the nation of Israel, he wasn't just temporarily saying that until Christ comes and the Gentile church comes into existence, that he's going to be faithful to them.

And once that happens, he's going to mesh them all together and we're just all going to become one. That sounds good, but it's inconsistent with what I see in scripture. And I'm going to be talking briefly about the subject of the church in Israel. Again, I'm not going to go too deep into it, but about God's faithfulness, his love to the church.

And we may sit here and think, that's one of those topics that only seminary students or pastors or theologians are interested, but for the average person, that's not a subject that's that important. At least that's what we would tend to think. But I want to start off by telling you just how important this is.

And the main point or the application of God's love for Israel, I'm going to share that at the very end. So even though you might be sitting, I'm already addressing the issue of maybe some of you guys sitting here is like, "Oh, he's going to talk about Israel." But again, I hope that you stay with me to get to the conclusion and the application of that.

Obviously, Paul has said already, but he's repeating again, if everything that you have said about the gospel is true, that it is by faith and by grace alone and not by observing the laws, then is God done with Israel? If they've hardened their hearts against God and they sin over and over again, is God done?

And his answer to that is, "By no means." By no means is it done. And then the answer he gives is, "I'm a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin." In other words, he said, "I have personal vested interest in this." That this is not just some random subject.

You're talking about me. You're talking about my people. He says, "By no means." I could spend probably weeks talking about why I believe that Israel is still in the heart of God. And when I say Israel, we're talking about Israel as his people, as a nation. Now we don't have time to go into the details and intricacies of how that will play out, when it will play out, but why I believe this subject is so important.

One, the previous passage, he said that the gospel was opened up, the kingdom was opened up to the Gentiles for what purpose? To stir up what? Do you remember? To make them jealous. To get them jealous. I don't know about you, but I don't know anybody who breaks off from a previous relationship that he's completely done with and is doing things to make that person jealous.

The only reason why you're trying to do things to make that other person jealous is hoping that you get back together with them. Nobody who's moved on is going to do anything to make them jealous, because if they're jealous, they're going to hinder what you're doing with this new person.

The only reason why God is doing this to make them jealous is because God is not done with Israel. It would only make sense that God is trying to stir up the nation of Israel. So at one point, say, that same God who loves the Gentiles, he also loved us, but look at the blessing upon them so that Israel will be brought back into the fold.

Not only that, the whole time in Jesus' ministry, the disciples were asking, is it now? Are you going to now bring the kingdom? At the kingdom, can you let me sit to the left or to the right? At the kingdom, who is the greatest? They didn't fully understand, but after his death and resurrection, before he goes up to heaven, the disciples still couldn't let it go.

And the last question that they asked Jesus before they left in Acts chapter 1, 6, so when they had come together, they asked him, the disciples asking Jesus, "Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?" Because you and I don't live in a, you know, like a patriotic, and even though we think we are, but if you've ever been to a country where the nationalism, the patriotism toward their country is the most important thing.

It's their religion. You know, when I was younger, Korea was like that. You know, when Korea had, some of you guys may or may not remember, when they had the World Cup, they said 80% of Korea had watched the World Cup soccer. I grew up, when I was younger, in a country where the country came above everything.

It came above your parents, your friendship, your school, your education. You sacrificed and died for your nation. So living in a country like this, it's hard for us to understand the kind of nationalism that the Jews had. So that's why Paul, the very first question, he says, "Is God done with his people?" He said, "By no means, I'm a Jew." See, when the disciples were asking, they weren't just asking about this kingdom that involves everybody.

They were specifically saying, "Are you done with Israel?" Jesus doesn't say, "Hey, you've got the kingdom wrong. You've had your chance up to this point, so now the kingdom is going to open to everybody else." And so we're talking, if he wanted to correct them, that would have been the perfect time to correct them.

"You just can't let go of Israel." He doesn't say that. He answers them and says, "It is not for you to know the times or the season that the Father has fixed by his own authority." He doesn't say, "You're wrong." He doesn't say, "You need to have a new understanding of the kingdom." He says, "No, God has fixed, he has ordained a specific time when that is going to be fulfilled." He doesn't say, "If." He said, "When." "When is this going to happen?" "You just don't know that, but it's going to happen." In Revelation chapter 5, even at the very end when we see the vision of heaven, we see a vision of 144,000 Jews.

Now we don't know if that's an actual number of 144,000, but there is a distinction between the nation of Israel and then behind them standing the Gentiles who are worshiping behind them. So there is a clear distinction between Israel and the rest of the church. Now why is this so important?

Again, I'm going to get to that at the very end. But let me give you a hint of why this is so important. Because it reveals to us our God's nature of who he is. The answer he gives in chapter 11, verse 1 and 2 is very simple. Is God done with Israel?

He said, "By no means, for I myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin. God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew." The simple answer to that question is he didn't reject Israel because he foreknew them. Now it's important for us to understand the doctrine of foreknowledge because in it contains why God is not done with Israel and why we can bank on his promises.

He says, "God is not done with Israel because he foreknew them." Now what I want to do for the rest of the time is to dissect and understand the doctrine of foreknowledge. What does God mean when he says he foreknew Israel? And also in return what it means to foreknow us.

One, foreknowledge means that God chose to know Israel intimately. That God sovereignly chose to know Israel intimately. Some people have taken the English word foreknowledge and said, "Well, God knows what they were going to do." That's not what the word means at all. The word for foreknowledge in Greek is pro-gnosco, that he knew beforehand.

Not knew as in he looked down history and he kind of predicted and he saw something that was going to happen. It means that he predetermined. I'm just going to read straight from the Bible dictionary in complete word study dictionary. This is kind of like my go-to Bible Greek dictionary.

And instead of me explaining it to you, I'm just going to read what it says about this word. "In the language of Scripture, something foreknown is not simply that which God was aware of prior to a certain point. Rather, it is presented as that which God gave prior consent to, that which received his favorable or special recognition.

Hence, this term is reserved for those matters which God favorably, deliberately, and freely chose and ordained." So he wasn't just looking down history and say, "Oh, that's what he's going to do." The doctrine of foreknowledge is God willfully, deliberately, freely choosing the nation of Israel. But to add to that, the meaning of that, the word to know in the Bible is not the way you and I normally use the word know.

Like I know how to eat, I know how to drive, I know how to read. Those of you who are at the family retreat, I think Pastor Ray did a great job talking about what it means to know. The Bible used to know oftentimes to describe a relationship between husband and wife, that Adam and Eve knew each other and they had children.

What does that mean? That they didn't exchange information about each other. It means they had physical relation, sexual relation. They were intimate. And because of this intimacy, they were able to have a child. So the scripture often uses the word knowledge as intimate, personal relationship between a person, two people.

So to pre-know something means that God had determined prior to Israel even existing that He had predetermined to focus His attention, to choose them. So in Amos chapter 3 verse 2, when it says, "Israel only have I known," He's not saying that He didn't know anything about the Babylonians, He didn't know anything about Assyrians, He didn't know anything about Persians.

That's not what He's saying. He said that Israel was specifically chosen to focus His attention and His love for them. So the first understanding of foreknowledge, it was predetermined, that God pre-knew and focused His attention on them. Secondly, the doctrine of foreknowledge means that God committed to make them His people.

He didn't just choose to know them, He chose to make them His people, to love them. Deuteronomy chapter 7, 6 through 8, God describes the beginnings of Israel and He says, "For you are a people holy to the Lord your God. The Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for His treasured possession." Not just to own, He said, but treasured possession.

"Out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth, it was not because you were more in number than any other people that the Lord set His love on you and chose you. For you were the fewest of all the peoples, but it is because the Lord loves you and is keeping the oath that He swore to your fathers." He predetermined not only to choose them, but to love them.

In Deuteronomy chapter 32, His love for Israel is described as the apple of God's eyes. Apple of God's eyes, again, I think for the sake of time, the best way to describe it is He's illustrating the fact that if something is coming toward your eyes, you don't think as the thing is coming and say, "Should I close my eyes?" There's no thought process involved.

Even a lint is coming in and you immediately swipe it away. If it's a little tiny fly, you don't think there, it's like, "You can't harm me." You don't sit there and say, "You know, I'm just going to wipe this out." You instinctively close your eyes. You instinctively swat at it.

You do anything in your power to duck, to get it away, to protect your eyes. You may not do that if it's coming toward your arm or anything else, but for whatever the reason, God had made it instinctively because of the sensitivity that if anything is coming toward your eye, we instinctively, without even thinking, God is using that as an illustration to describe the preciousness of Israel to Him.

Instinctively, if you harm Israel, you are harming the apple of my eye. Not only did He predetermine to choose them, He says He predetermined to love them, to cherish them. Also in Psalm 105, verse 8 through 8, He says He remembers His covenant forever. The word that He commanded for a thousand generations, the covenant that He made with Abraham, He swore, His sworn promise to Isaac, which He confirmed to Jacob as a statute, to Israel as an everlasting covenant.

He said He made this covenant and He said He will never break this covenant. But yet some people will look at the prophet Isaiah and they say, "Well, I mean, there's a clear evidence that He is done with Israel. Israel kept on rebelling over and over again and as a result of that, they're going into captivity." And so, some of you guys who studied the book of Hosea, it starts out by saying God telling Hosea to go marry Gomer, a prostitute, and she's going to keep prostituting herself, but you're going to keep forgiving her and embracing her to physically illustrate the relationship between Israel and God.

To further illustrate this frustration, this rebellion, that Hosea has three children. The first child's name is Jezreel, which means God's souls, meaning that God is about to reveal something very important to the nation of Israel. The second child they have, a daughter, her name is Loharuma. Loharuma literally means she has not received mercy.

As a result of the rebellion, God is going to withhold His mercy. And then third, finally, the end result of this rebellion, the third child's name is Lo-Ami. Lo-Ami literally means not my people. Some people will read that and say, "Well, there's clear evidence that their rebellion against God has caused God to withdraw." And He says, "You are not my people." But if you keep reading in the book of Hosea, you will find that even in the context of rebellion, even in the context of God bringing judgment upon the nation of Israel, He tells them He is not done with Israel.

Hosea chapter 1, 10-11, "Yet the number of the children of Israel shall be like the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured or numbered. And in the place where it was said to them, 'You are not my people,' it shall be said to them, 'Children of the living God.'" This is right after He told them that because of your rebellion, you are not my people.

But He said even in that context, He says, "I am not done with you." In Isaiah 49, verse 15 and 16, He says, "Can a woman forget her nursing child that she should have no compassion on the son of her womb? Even these may forget, yet I will not forget you.

Behold, I have engraved you on the palms of my hands. Your walls are continually before me." He promises the nation of Israel over and over again that He will not forget His covenant. It wasn't at some point, you know, even as they were rebelling against God, God says, "Because of your rebellion, judgment is coming, but I will never forget my covenant with you." So first, He preordained His choice of Israel, and then He preordained His choice to love them and He promises to be faithful to them.

Thirdly, the doctrine of foreknowledge means that God chose to establish Israel through the remnants. So the natural question is, if God is going to be that faithful to the nation of Israel, does that mean that they don't need to believe the gospel, that they're just going to be saved?

And that's where He brings this example of how God preserved the nation of Israel during the time of Elijah. So some of you guys may know the story. Elijah's ministry happened during the time of King Ahab. King Ahab is probably considered maybe either the worst or second worst king of Israel.

So there's a debate between, is Ahab worse or Manasseh the worst? There's a, you know, it's a toss-up between the two. They were both extremely evil. Elijah, even before his encounter with the Baal priest, he's already burnt out. His encounter in chapter 18 begins by saying, "There's no other prophet left.

Everybody is worshiping God." And God speaks to him and says, "Go tell Ahab. Go tell Ahab that there's going to be an encounter." So Elijah goes down and challenges Ahab. And he gathers the whole nation of Israel. He wants to make this very public in hopes that after this encounter of demonstrating God's power, that revival is going to break out in Israel.

So he makes a deal. You gather 450 Baal priests, and then I will stand by myself, and we're going to put up an altar, and let's see whose God is real. And then he turns to the nation of Israel, and he says to them, "It is enough for you to be teeter-tottering between these two.

If Baal is God, make up your mind and worship Baal. But if Yahweh is God, then make up your mind and commit and repent and worship him." So the whole reason of this encounter was in hopes that when God showed up, that there would be a revival that breaks out.

If you know the story, he says, "You know what? There's 450 of you. Why don't you start?" So he gets a bull. He sacrifices it and puts it up on the altar. And he says, "Go ahead. You know, all 450 of you, start praying to Baal. See what happens." So all morning, they're chanting, and they're crying out, and they're asking Baal to come and consume this worship.

Nothing happens. And something comical, and this is Elijah, the first sarcastic prophet that we know in the Bible. And he basically says, "Is your God sleeping? Maybe he's relieving himself. Maybe he's tired." You know? And he's mocking them. There's one guy with 450, and he's like, "Maybe he's tired.

Keep going. Keep going." So they keep going all day long, and nothing happens. Right? So maybe he's tired. And then he moves him aside, and I'll show you. And he begins to pray to God. But before he does that, he wants to make sure that everybody knows that something supernatural is going to happen.

So he takes three buckets of water, and he pours it on. Make sure that it's so wet. I mean, this can't catch on fire. And he says, "That's not enough. Bring another three buckets." He pours it on. He does it three times. He puts so much water over this sacrifice that the water is flowing over this altar.

And he said, "Now we're ready." So he prays to God. Fire comes down. Consumes everything. And as a result of that, he says, "Now. Now you know who's God." And so he fully expects revival to break out. The bald priest are destroyed. Ahab is going to repent, overthrow. Instead, after this is all done, Jezebel, the wife who was silent throughout this whole process, you know, who was the wife of Ahab, appears.

Now, you know, you probably heard, at least jokingly, people say that the husband is the head and the wife is the neck, you know, because the neck controls the head. Completely unbiblical. But you probably heard that before. In this case, it was absolutely true. Jezebel was the neck. Ahab, though he was the king, was completely controlled by Jezebel.

You know, there's a reason why people don't name their daughters Jezebel, because she's not a good figure. Like boys aren't named Judas and girls are not named Jezebel. There's for a reason. She's not a good character. She shows up on the scene, and Ahab is scared to death because of what happened.

Jezebel comes on the scene, is like, "You fool. You're going to let that one weird prophet destroy everything that we built?" And so she makes an edict, "Get that guy and kill him." Strangely, you would think after experiencing this kind of power, and Elijah is known in Israel's history to be the most powerful prophet.

He performed the most miracles, the greatest and most powerful miracles, and because of her threat, because of her threat, he runs out into the desert and he's hiding in the cave. It's a weird scene. Like, why? You just won the MMA championship and it was the greatest fight of your life.

You destroyed everybody, and all of a sudden, the guy you destroyed, his wife says, "Get that guy." And he's just, "Oh," and then he just starts running. That's basically what happens in 1 Kings chapter 18. He's hiding in the cave. God shows up and God simply says, "What are you doing here?" Right?

And he asked him several times, "Elijah, what are you doing here?" So that whole scene is weird. Like why is he scared? Why is he there? But if you look carefully, you'll find exactly why. He wasn't necessarily scared of Jezebel. He was frustrated with Israel. He comes and he says in 1 Kings 19.10, he says to God, "I have been very jealous for the Lord, the God of hosts.

For the people of Israel have forsaken your covenant, thrown down your altars, and killed your prophets with the sword. And I, even I only, am left, and they seek my life to take it away." In other words, he thought revival was going to break out, but it didn't. He thought people are going to be on their knees repenting and claiming love for Yahweh, but it didn't.

Instead, they were more hardened. And Jezebel saying, "Let's get this guy." He's like, "Oh my gosh, after all of that?" He lost all hope in Israel. And I'm sure he was probably thinking the same thing. "Are you done? Is this it? If they won't repent after this, what hope do we have?" That's why he was in the cave, because he felt like he had nobody.

Obviously, you know the story, God shows up, not in the earthquake, not in the fire, but in the gentle wind. God reminds him, "It's not because of your power. It's not because of your effort." He said, "I have 7,000 men who have not bowed to Baal. Now get back up and do your ministry." And God sends him on his way.

That it wasn't your effort, it wasn't your cleverness, it wasn't this powerful encounter, simply because God made a promise to Israel that, "I'm going to keep my covenant." In Isaiah 10.20, "In that day, the remnant of Israel, of the survivors of the house of Jacob, will no more lean on him who struck them, but will lean on the Lord, the Holy One of Israel, in truth." Again in Isaiah 37.31.32, "And the surviving remnant of the house of Judah shall again take root downward and bear fruit upward, for out of Jerusalem shall go a remnant, and out of Mount Zion a band of survivors.

The zeal of the Lord of hosts will do this." Now why is this so important? Why am I speaking about this so passionately? "Oh God is faithful to Israel, God's not done with Israel." Because God's faithfulness to Israel is his resume. There's a reason why your credit score matters.

Why before they give you a loan, they look at your credit score, and if you, you could have been faithful and you paid off your loan 9 out of 10 times, but that one time that you didn't pay off your loan, there's a possibility that you might, even if it's 10%, even if it's 5%, if I loan you the money, there's a good chance that you might not pay it back because you have a history of unfaithfulness.

There's a reason why when you go get a job, they ask you to get references. And they want to check your different references. Or you may show up and say, "Oh, that was like that in the past. You know, I'm sure I'm not going to be like that today.

I'm not going to rip you off. I'm going to be a faithful worker." But they say, "Well, your past doesn't show that." There's a reason why these things are important because in order to entrust something to you, that there has to be a track record that you're not going to, you're going to be faithful with what I entrust to you.

See, God's love for the nation of Israel is his resume. For 2,000 plus years, he made a promise to the nation of Israel, and he stuck with it thick and thin. In their rebellion, in their idolatry, in their complacency, even as they're going into captivity, even after prostituting themselves over and over again, even after beating, even after killing his own prophets.

And then if that wasn't enough, he sends his only begotten son, and they don't recognize him either. They beat him, they crucify him. And you would think that that was a final straw. That I've been patient with all of this stuff, and you even beat my son? You crucify my son?

And you would think that that would be it. So when Paul asked that question, now, will you reject his people now? Even now, I can understand why you would have rejected Israel a long time ago. It isn't simply no. It isn't simply it's not done. He says by no means.

By no means. God will remain faithful to his covenant because that's who he is. In Hebrews 6, 18, it says, "So that by two unchangeable things in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to hold fast to the hope set before us." He cannot change his mind.

He cannot change his covenant, and he cannot lie. So therefore, we have encouragement, strong encouragement, to hold fast to everything that he has promised. If he said to the nation of Israel, "I will be faithful to you," and then says, "You know what? I didn't really mean Israel. When I said Israel, I didn't mean Israel.

I meant kind of like Israel," then how can we be confident when we get to the end? He said, "Well, when I say saved, I didn't really mean saved. When I said heaven, I didn't really mean heaven. When I said love, I didn't really mean love." If fundamentally, he made all of this covenant and all the things that he said in the Old Testament, all of it is nullified.

He said, "You know, I only held on to you to serve a purpose, and you served a purpose, but now I'm done." That is not what God is doing. That is not what we see in Scripture. He made a covenant with the nation of Israel, and he is faithful.

And all the books of the Old Testament is a history of God keeping his covenant. What he says, he does. God is not man, neither shall I, nor the Son of Man, that he should repent. Has he not said it, and will he not do it? That's who he is.

And because he is faithful to his covenant, he is faithful to his covenant with us. That what he says, we can bank on. The only reason why you and I are here today as a church is because Jesus said, "I will build my church, and the gates of Hades will not prevail against it." Despite our sins, despite our rebellion, despite the divisions, despite our weakness, despite our everything that we've done, we're still here today because God foreordained to love us like he foreordained to love the nation of Israel.

Amen? This is why this doctrine is so important, because the study of the nation of Israel is his resume that guarantees that everything that God has promised for us, that we can bank on, that we can invest today and forsake everything, because God said, "Heaven is coming." That no matter how difficult this life gets, no matter how many times we fail, he said, "If you ask for forgiveness, he will forgive you of your sins." And you can bank on that, just like Israel has banked on the promises that God made to the nation of Israel.

It's that important. Don't you want to follow this God? Don't you want to worship this God? Don't you want to surrender to this God? To know that the promises of every word, jot and tittle, will not pass away until it is fulfilled. Would you take a minute to pray with me?

Again, as we ask the worship team to come back up. Maybe because of life circumstances and difficulty, maybe because of your own failure, sometimes you doubt God's promises. Look at Israel. Look at Israel. When you look at the faithfulness of Israel, you know God will be faithful to you.

Let's take some time as we come before the Lord and as our worship team leads us, be reminded again why you and I are here today. Because God's been faithful to his covenant. He's been faithful to his promise. Let's pray.