Romans 10 • “Everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.”

Romans chapter 10. Let's pray. Father as we get into the Word tonight, as we dig into the Scriptures, we come before you with humble hearts, with a desire to learn, to understand, and to lay hold of your Word in a way that's going to change us. Because Father we recognize our own personal need for transformation and we ask you Lord God to do that work. We believe that it is a work of the Spirit and we desire very much Lord to yield to that work and we know that through the Scriptures we are transformed because your Word is alive, it's active, and it's sharp.

So we pray that you would use it tonight. We just really want to tune our hearts into your voice. Help us to do that tonight we pray. We thank you in the name of Jesus our Savior. Amen, amen, amen.

You know I mentioned last week as we started Romans chapter 9 that 9, 10, and 11 are kind of Paul's presentation of his own heart and his own thoughts as it relates to the the spiritual condition of the nation of Israel. And you'll remember that that Paul really opened up by bearing his heart about how he felt about Israel's unbelief. He said it gave him great sorrow and unceasing anguish. It sounds a little dramatic but I think it's true. I think it's genuine.

He was really truly just anguished in heart about Israel and you'll remember that he made an important statement as we concluded last week's study. And I'm just so we can see it all together I'm going to put it up on the screen here for you. It goes like this. Now he's talking about Israel. He says they've stumbled over the stumbling stone as it is written and then he goes on to quote the prophet Isaiah, behold I am laying in Zion a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.

So Paul was very clear as we kind of concluded the last chapter about the fact that Israel had in fact stumbled and he was equally clear about the person over whom they had stumbled and that is Jesus, right? Because he is the stumbling stone. You might kind of wonder why would God put a stumbling stone in the path of the Israelites, his people? Well we're going to get into that. We're going to see a lot about this in chapter 10 now.

Paul is going to develop this idea of explaining more about this stumbling that Israel has experienced. So let's read the first four verses and we'll unpack those. He says, brothers, my heart's desire and prayer to God for them, meaning Israel, is that they may be saved for I bear them witness that they have zeal for God but not according to knowledge. For being ignorant of the righteousness of God and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God's righteousness. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.

So Paul says in these first four verses that Israel is a nation that has a very real zeal for God and he tells us, however, that that zeal is not according to knowledge and what this reiterates for you and me is the fact that it is very possible to be genuinely convinced, I guess, for lack of a better word, and very sincere about what you believe and still be wrong and still be incorrect. And to be honest, Paul knew all about this because he'd been there. He knew what it was to be very zealous. In fact, he described himself before coming to Christ as, you know, probably like the most zealous. He says when it comes to zeal, man, I persecuted the church.

And so, you know, he realized, however, after the Lord met him on the road to Damascus with an order in hand to arrest Christians, he found out he was 100% wrong. So, you know, when people talk to me about somebody else's belief structure and they say things like, you know, he's so sincere, that really doesn't mean anything. You can be very sincere and very, very much convinced that you are in the right and be, again, 100% wrong. But in verse 3, you'll notice that Paul begins to unpack the root issue that caused Israel to stumble, and he says this in verse 3, for being ignorant of the righteousness of God. That sounds crazy, doesn't it?

They were ignorant. I mean, no other nation on earth had it been revealed more about righteousness than Israel, and yet they were ignorant about the righteousness of God. And look at this, and seeking to establish their own, they did not, in fact would not, submit to God's righteousness. And right there in that verse, don't skip over that too quickly, what we learn there is what Jesus said, the path to life is narrow and hard. He said, the gate is narrow and the path is hard.

And that is, in fact, what Paul is talking about. Let me put that passage by Jesus up on the screen, just as a reminder, from Matthew chapter 7. The gate is, there it is, the gate is narrow, the way is hard that leads to life. What did Jesus say? There's only a few find it.

Only a few find it. Well, here's the question that this begs asking. Why is the gate narrow, and why is the way hard? What's the problem? You and I look at salvation, we look at the gospel, and go, that's the easiest thing I ever did, you know?

Coming to Jesus, good grief, you know? But this is looking at it once we're in the kingdom, you know? We have a completely different sort of an attitude about it, because what makes the gate narrow, and what makes the way hard, is how righteousness is achieved. How I, and when I say righteousness, I'm talking about a right standing before God, okay? You and I, in Christ, have a right standing before God, and that's a very wonderful place to be.

It's a very comfortable and peaceful place to be. And the Jews sought to achieve that, but they went about it the wrong way. And in case you need a refresher on some of this, the way that the gospel presents a right standing before God, and how to achieve it, we have to go back to what Paul said in an earlier chapter of this study. On the screen, once again, Romans chapter 3, it says, but now the righteousness of God has been manifested, it's been revealed, apart from the law, although the law and the prophets bear witness to it, and he says, the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ for all who believe. Now we're going to leave this passage up for just a moment, because there are two key phrases here that we're going to point out that are the very reason the Jews stumbled.

They're highlighted on the screen right now. Look at them. They are, apart from the law, and for all who believe. So in the last chapter, he says, God had foretold, I'm going to put a stumbling block in the path of the Jews. What was the stumbling block?

Well, it's Jesus, but it essentially, from Jesus comes our means of right standing before God, and what he says is, first of all, the way the righteous or the right standing with God is achieved is, first of all, apart from law. It's very important that you see that. He means it's not based on keeping the law, and what that means for you is it has nothing to do with your ability to be a good person or to accomplish, frankly, anything related to the will of God. It's not based on that. Sometimes we hear these things, and then we lose sight of it over a period of time, but I want to remind you that your right standing with God has nothing to do with your ability to be a good person, and really that's another way of saying that God is never going to see any effort that you make as sufficient.

That's kind of a hard thing to hear, isn't it? He's never going to see anything that you ever do or say as sufficient for a right standing with him, all right? Now, the next phrase that's highlighted on that verse you'll see in that red box at the bottom is, for all who believe, and of course that's a reminder that our righteous standing is a result of faith. So what did Paul do here in these two areas we highlighted on this verse? He told us what it is not based on and what it is based on.

It is not based on law-keeping or being a good person or your obedience. It is based however, on faith, right? And of course while you and I see this as the good news, to me that's the best news I heard all day. Good grief, my salvation isn't based on my effort, it's based on just putting my faith in the finished work of Jesus on the cross. Woohoo!

Let's have a party. This is good stuff, you know. But there are many who just can't take it. And they don't see it as good news. In fact, they refused to submit to God's righteousness.

That's what Paul said about the Jews. They refused. They would not submit to God's righteousness. Why? Because they couldn't understand the gospel?

Heavens, no. It was because their pride wouldn't let them. Their pride wouldn't let them accept the gospel. You see, accepting and receiving the righteousness that is given to us through faith in Jesus Christ means that I have to admit certain things and accept certain things about myself. Things that I would probably rather not admit.

Because, you know, we're born with a real sense of pride in ourselves and so forth. But I have to admit certain things. First of all, I have to admit that I'm a slave to my sinful nature apart from Jesus. And there's nothing I can do about it. There's nothing I can do to get free.

Every Christian has to do this. They have to grapple with this. I'm a slave. The next thing I have to do is I have to admit that my best possible goodness isn't good enough. This is something that the Jews were told even in the Old Testament.

They were told that their their most righteous acts are as filthy rags. But they didn't get it. They couldn't get it. Their pride wouldn't let them get it. You know, they couldn't get it.

Their pride wouldn't let them get it. You know, they wanted to believe they could be good enough. And lastly, I have to accept by faith that somebody else was good enough. And that hits me right smack dab in the center of my pride. Paul can't do it.

Jesus did it. And I got to receive him and what he did in order to be saved. And those are things that are just, it's too much. You're asking too much. And so what we see here is that God's way of declaring us righteous strikes us just right in the soft spot of our pride.

And that is why the path to eternal life is hard. That's why the gate is narrow. Because it requires that we humble ourselves. That's not easy to do. Even as a Christian.

You know, I mean, I ongoingly, I struggle humbling myself. I had to humble myself to come to Jesus, and I'm glad I did. But then later on, as you're walking out the Christian life, you know, somebody comes along and rebukes you or says something, you know, or tells you something you did you shouldn't have done or whatever. What's your immediate reaction? It's like, who are you to tell me what I did was wrong?

Well, that's just my pride. It's just the pride rising up. So this is an ongoing issue, you know, in everybody's life, but not more so than when we hear the gospel. And then Paul goes on to make this important statement in verse four. Look again in your Bible, verse four, he says, for Christ is the end of the law for righteousness.

That's important. He's the end of the law for righteousness. To everyone who works hard and is a good person. No, it doesn't say that. It says to everyone who believes.

Okay. I like the way the New Living Translation renders this sentence. It says, for Christ has already accomplished the purpose for which the law was given. Isn't that interesting? It's an interesting, you know, it's an interpretive sentence to be sure, but I think it's a fairly good one.

You could also say Jesus is the culmination. He is the fulfillment. I mean, those are his words of the law. Let me show you one of the most challenging verses in the Bible, not to hear, but to explain. Up on the screen, Matthew 517.

Do not think, Jesus talking here, that I've come to abolish the law or the prophets. I have not come to abolish them, but to fulfill them. This is a lovely verse. I'm so glad Jesus said it. It's so important for us to hear.

But if there's one thing I've learned in my years as a follower of Jesus is that the full implications of what Jesus says in that statement are so far reaching that it literally cannot be explained in a few short minutes. If somebody were to walk up to you and say, I read this verse in Matthew 517, you know, what does this mean? You'd have to say, well, sit down because we need to talk, and this might go on for a while. What are you doing for the rest of the day? Because again, the full implications of this statement are challenging, again, not because they're hard to understand, but because it affects so many parts of our Christian life, so many aspects of our Christian walk.

And when you properly understand what Jesus said and meant when he said, I've not come to abolish the law and the prophets, but to fulfill them, it's life-changing. It is literally life-changing. I mean, this is one of those verses that if you've ever been looking for a verse just to meditate on, this is a great one because you're going to find as the Holy Spirit opens up this over a period of time progressively that there is more and more depth to it as more and more of the layers of this thing get peeled back and you begin to see just how incredibly powerful that statement is. He says, I didn't come to abolish these things, he said. And that means they still have a role in our lives.

That's why we study through the Old Testament. We study through the law and the prophets. It's a very good thing to study through the Old Testament. And you can thank God that you attend a church where the whole Bible is studied, Genesis to Revelation, and that's so important. But it also means that he himself, meaning Jesus, and his work on the cross has now become the primary means by which we are righteous before God.

It's kind of funny, you know. People often ask, well, if we're righteous before God today by accepting the work that Jesus did on the cross on our behalf, how were people in the Old Testament declared righteous before God? Well, you know, the Old Testament says a lot about righteousness as it relates to the law, and we're going to see that here. We're going to see that in just a moment, that Moses did talk about righteousness after the law, but he didn't say it in a sense that this is something you can truly accomplish. But if a man wants to be righteous before God by following the law, he can try, you know.

He's going to fail, but he can try. So how were people tried? So how were people declared righteous in the Old Testament? By believing God. That's it.

Remember what it said about Abraham? He believed God, and God credited it to him as righteousness. So it was the same way in the Old Testament. We now just have the person of Jesus Christ to look to specifically and his work on the cross today. But anyway, the reason I emphasize this, that passage from Matthew and what Jesus said about not abolishing the law but fulfilling it, is that we must understand what Jesus said correctly, because there is a danger of being led astray if we have a misunderstanding of it, and many Christians have been.

And Paul's going to spend more time in this chapter explaining what the statement of Jesus means. Look with me at verse 5. We're going to read down here through 10. It says, For Moses, and this is what I was just talking about, Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments shall live by them. But the righteousness based on faith says, Do not say in your heart, Who will ascend into heaven?

That is to bring Christ down. Or, Who will descend into the abyss? That is to bring Christ up from the dead. But what does it say? The word is near you, in your mouth, and in your heart.

That is the word of faith that we proclaim. Because if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead, you will be saved. For with the heart one believes and is justified, and with the mouth one confesses and is saved. I'm going to have you stop there here and let's talk about this because these are important verses, particularly verses 9 and 10. Well, they're all important, but particularly 9-10 because when you read through this section of verses, verses 5-10, it's really easy to kind of get confused because Paul does a lot of quoting here from the Old Testament, and he's also using a rather ancient way of making an argument that is based on something that Moses said.

And he starts by saying that Moses writes about the righteousness that is based on the law, that the person who does the commandments, he says, shall live by them. And that's true. Moses made it clear that if you want to live by the law and stand before God as righteous, then, you know, you got to keep the law, and you got to keep it perfectly. And we've talked a lot about that in this study so far in Romans, and you know that that's not something that is possible. But, you know, if somebody thinks they can do it, God's going to have to show them that they can't.

But how are we to understand verses 6-8? What is Paul saying here? He's quoting in this whole section three different passages from the book of Deuteronomy, but he's going to apply it here to Jesus. And these comments about going up to heaven to bring Jesus down, and descending into the abyss to bring Jesus up, these are basically drawn from words that Moses spoke to the nation of Israel in Deuteronomy 31. We'll put them up on the screen so you can read the original comments that Moses made.

It goes like this, For this commandment that I command you today is not too hard for you, neither is it far off. It's not in heaven that you should say, who will ascend to heaven for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it. Neither is it beyond the sea that you should say, who will go over the sea for us and bring it to us, that we may hear it and do it. But the word is very near you. It is in your mouth and in your heart so that you can do it.

Now this is again Moses talking to Israel. Now Paul is very aware of this passage, and so he uses this to speak to them about the gospel and faith. But essentially what Moses was telling the nation of Israel is that God had made it possible for them to follow the law as he had laid it out. Isn't that a strange thought? It's a paradox, isn't it?

Because we know that no man can perfectly keep the law, and yet the covenant that God made with Israel was possible to keep. And by giving the nation of Israel a sacrificial system, we can see there that God was communicating that he didn't expect them to do it perfectly, because he factored into the covenant a way for them to be forgiven and restored, right? So he's saying this isn't too difficult, this isn't too hard. I mean I'm glad I'm not a Jew living in Old Testament, I gotta just be honest with you. Because it was not easy from the standpoint of there was a lot of work involved, but it was not impossible.

And God showed them that he was willing to forgive them when they messed up. In fact, he expected them to mess up. And so Moses is saying, you don't have to go up to heaven or go across the...it's all right here, he's laid it out for you, and this is something that you can do. All right. So now Paul, here in Romans chapter 10, he's going to use this same argument, and it's not the exact same argument, it's a concept drawn from the argument, to communicate that God doesn't expect some massively tremendous personal effort to save yourselves.

That's the point. He says, you don't need to strive and labor and go up to heaven and go down to the abyss, and who's gonna help? He says, it's all right here. The hope that we have in Jesus is right in front of you. You don't even have to go looking for it.

He's made it obvious. All you have to do is believe and receive. And so he's using the words of Moses and applying it now to the gospel, right? And then verse 10 is very important. He says, for with the heart one believes and is justified, with the mouth one confesses and is saved.

And it's very important here to be careful when you look at verse 10, not to see an inflexible roadmap. You know, every time a verse or a passage in the Bible ends with, and you will be saved, and of course there's something that comes ahead of that, da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da-da, and you will be saved. There's always people who will see those things as a do-it-or-else kind of an approach. They'll look at those, and you know, we see this happening in the New Testament. You know, we've got the book of Acts where Peter's talking to the assembled people.

They're hearing, you know, they heard the Holy Spirit fall upon the people. And so Peter gets up and he preaches, and he preaches very effectively. And the people of Israel say, you know, what should we do? They were cut to the heart. And Peter said, you know, believe on the Lord Jesus, you know.

And he talked about, you know, believe and repent and be baptized. And I think it's like Acts 2.38. There are so many people out there who look at that verse, and they think, well, that's it. That's the recipe. And you got to do it in that order.

And if you don't do it in that order, you're not saved. You got to do it, and da-da-da-da-da-da-da, and you got to be baptized to be saved, because that's what he put it in there. And that's their conclusion. See, to them it becomes a rigid formula. And we got to be careful when we're looking at the Bible to see the heart of what God is saying, rather than seeing a rigid formula.

And essentially what Paul is saying here in verse 10 is that salvation begins in the heart. That's the essence of it. Salvation begins in the heart. And that's why he says, for with the heart one believes. Right?

And then he goes on to say, and with the mouth, one confesses. And so he goes on to say that, you know, when you have faith that is birthed in your heart, it eventually emerges out of your mouth, and you give confession. But you know, because of the fact that Paul ended that verse with, and is saved, there's a lot of people out there that say, you got to do it just this way. You got to believe in your heart, and then you got to, if you don't confess with your mouth, you're not saved. See?

And it becomes this rigid formula. And Paul didn't mean it to be a rigid formula. And we know this because there are different passages throughout the scripture that talk about salvation. And some include water baptism, some include confessing with your mouth, and some just say believe. That's all.

You know, like John 3.16, whoever believes, you know. It doesn't say anything about water baptism. It doesn't say anything about confession. So we have to be careful when we're looking at these things. Paul goes on, verse 11, for the scripture says, everyone who believes in him will not be put to shame.

And he's just underscoring again that salvation has always been a byproduct of faith. Verse 12, for there is no distinction between Jew and Greek. And remember, the context here is salvation. For the same Lord is Lord of all, bestowing his riches on all who call on him. For everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved.

And this time he's quoting the prophet Joel to show that whether someone is Jew or Gentile didn't make any difference. Because everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved. Everyone. Doesn't matter where you came from, what your ethnic background is, your upbringing, or whatever. But Paul asks in verse 14, look with me there, how then will they call on him in whom they've not believed?

And how are they to believe in him of whom they have never heard? And how are they to hear without someone preaching? And how are they to preach unless they are sent? And what Paul is doing here is he is underscoring the necessity of sharing the gospel and the importance of sending out those who are going to announce the good news. I have such a deep respect and appreciation for those who are we call missionaries who allow themselves to be sent out into cultures that I would find incredibly uncomfortable or difficult to live in.

I am such a weenie when it comes to stuff like that. I mean, you know, but thank you, Lord. I remember a Christian song back in the day. It was back in the 90s. It was a Christian song.

It was Scott Wesley Brown. He wrote a song called, Please Don't Send Me to Africa. And it kind of expressed my heart. I'm so thankful for the people that are willing, you know, to go, and it's such a beautiful thing, but this is what evangelizing is all about, and evangelizing is all about announcing the good news. In fact, have you ever wondered where the word evangelical came from?

It's kind of an interesting thing. We refer, you know, to some churches as evangelical, but it's really important. Calvary Chapel Meridian is evangelical, and when you see the words good news in your Bible, that is a Greek word, and I hope I don't make this awful. Iwongalizo. There it is.

Aren't you glad I did that? Now you can go tell that to somebody. It basically means to announce good news, and it's where we get our word evangelize or evangelical. Well, what's interesting is in the 16th century, when Reformers, you know, like Martin Luther came on the scene, he used the German version of the word evangelical to basically set apart churches that preach the gospel from Roman Catholicism because that wasn't being done, essentially, as he saw it in Roman Catholicism, and so he used the word to describe those churches that were really focused on the gospel message to the lost, and then, you know, if you know your history, you know that in the 18th century, the Great Awakening took place along with the Methodism, the Methodist movement, and all those sorts of things, and the word evangelical began to simply apply to any group or people that emphasized preaching the gospel, that made it their focus to preach the gospel to the lost, and you know, here we are in 2026, and that meaning has essentially stayed with us ever since. I've mentioned to you guys many times here in this study that I was raised in a church.

We went to church every Sunday, but I didn't hear the gospel at church, and right there it tells you that my family was not attending an evangelical church. That wasn't their goal, and it was a very social kind of a message, and I had to hear the gospel somewhere else, but so what you need to know is that evangelical is not a denominational word, even though there are some denominations that use it in their name, like the Evangelical Free Church and others, it is not a denominational word. It is a gospel word, and it is a word that applies to any church or group that is focused on and believes they are called to preach the gospel to the lost, all right? All right, we're in the middle of verse 15. Sorry about breaking it up in the middle, but Paul goes on to say, as it is written, he quotes from Isaiah here, how beautiful are the feet of those who preach the good news, and that's a beautiful statement, isn't it?

How beautiful are those who go out and preach the good news. We appreciate evangelists and missionaries, but now he's going to go on and he's going to discuss Israel's resistance to that message. Verse 16 says, but they've not all obeyed the gospel, for Isaiah says, Lord, who has believed what he has heard from us? In other words, many of the people of Israel just simply refuse to believe. So he goes on here, and I love this, verse 17, so faith comes from hearing, and hearing through the word of Christ.

He's saying, even though Israel heard the message of salvation, they didn't believe it. They didn't mingle it with faith, but for those who choose to hear, faith is born, and they receive, and you know, I use this verse right here when anybody ever asked me, Pastor Paul, how can I build my faith? Well, what does the Bible say? Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word of Christ. That's how you build your faith.

You're doing it right now, and if you come to a place in your life where you're like, I need more faith. I want to build even more faith. Well, then spend more time in the word. Do a deep dive in the word of God. Spend as much time as you are able in the word of God.

That's how your faith is built. Faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the word. It is really a very sort of a simple, simple thing, and then the final section, verse 18, but I ask you, have they not heard? Indeed, they have, for their voice has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world. Quote there from Psalm 19, but I ask, did Israel not understand?

First, Moses says, I will make you jealous of those who are not a nation with a foolish nation. I will make you angry, and that's from Deuteronomy 32. Then Isaiah is so bold as to say, I have been found by those who did not seek me. I've shown myself to those who did not ask for me, but of Israel, he says, all day long I have held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people. So the final picture that the Apostle Paul is creating for us here is one of the Lord holding out his arms to the nation of Israel and longing, you know, for a positive response, and yet being met with stubbornness and resistance.

But I got to tell you something, this statement that Paul makes at the end of this chapter, that where he quotes the Scripture saying, all day long I've held out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people. This is one of the verses that people have used to have a very negative attitude toward the nation of Israel. You know, we are given the unvarnished story of Israel, aren't we, in the Bible. When you read through the Old Testament, you see a people that constantly fell into disobedience, constantly walked away from their covenant relationship with God, constantly embraced paganism, and then by the time Jesus came along, they were steeped in legalism to the point where they truly believed they could be righteous before God by all of their rule upon rule and so on and so on. And then finally, as one of the worst sins that Israel could probably commit, they crucified their Savior, their Messiah.

And there have been people throughout the years who have looked at everything the Bible has to say about the nation of Israel, and they have come to some conclusions about Israel that I think are not only unbiblical, they're dangerous. And that is that Israel's done. There's nothing, they're a disobedient people. They're a disobedient and obstinate and stiff-necked people. The church has taken over for Israel, and there's really no need to be a friend of Israel or to think positively or highly of Israel.

And this is a debate that is raging right now in the world. And I got to tell you something, the younger generation is pretty down on the nation of Israel, and they struggle to understand why we would even speak in any sort of a nice or positive way about the nation of Israel. Aren't they just killers? They kill the Palestinians. Do you know that in the 1940s, in the 1940s, Palestinian referred to the Jews?

Because the whole area was called Palestine. The Jews were called Palestinians, you guys. But you see, it's become this political thing. And there has been so much rhetoric and so much, and I'm not going to try to get political here on you guys tonight. I don't like doing that.

I want to stay grounded in the Bible. But if someone were to ask me why, as a Christian, should I think anything positive about the nation of Israel at all, I would come back and I would say, well, first of all, God showed them incredible favor. He revealed things to them that He revealed to no other nation on the earth. And it was from the Jews, I want to remind you, that the Messiah came. Can I remind you that Jesus still has a physical body, and that has a Jewish heritage.

Jesus is a Jew, you guys. And here's the other thing that you need to understand. God isn't done with the Jews. He's not done with Israel. There has been a hardening temporarily.

But listen, there's coming a day when the Bible says that we're gonna meet the Lord in the air. Paul talks about this in 1 Thessalonians. We're gonna meet the Lord in the air in what we call the rapture. People object to it being called the rapture because the word rapture isn't in the Bible. Big deal.

It is described in the Bible. That's all you need to care about. Paul makes it very clear that when the Lord returns, we are going to be caught up to meet the Lord in the air, and the words caught up are where we get our word rapture. Don't let anybody tell you that the rapture is not in the Bible. It is clearly taught.

And when that happens and we are caught up to be with the Lord, that stopwatch that has been on hold for the church age is gonna start once again for the nation of Israel. And things are gonna heat up in the world. And the Bible tells us that the nations of the world are gonna come against Israel to destroy her. And it's gonna look like they're doing a really good job. And it says all the nations of the earth are gonna gather against Israel.

And this is gonna be at the conclusion of the great tribulation period. And at that conclusion, Jesus himself is going to return, and he's gonna fight on behalf of Israel. And you need to know that. This is what the Bible says. God is not done with the nation of Israel.

And the reason we support Israel is not because they do everything right. In fact, I don't even agree with everything Israel does. I have Christians ask me all the time, do I have to agree with everything Israel does? Of course not. Are you a thinking person?

Well, if you are, then of course you're not gonna agree with everything they do. And you're not, you don't have to. There are plenty of things that Israel does. I look at it and I go, oh, well, that was bad. But the reason my heart is still focused on Israel is because prophecy and the word of God tells me that God isn't finished with that country.

He has a plan for the nation of Israel. And you need to know that during the millennial kingdom, Jesus is going to establish his throne over the earth in Israel. Not in the United States of America, or Germany, or anywhere else in Europe or Asia. He's going to do it in Israel. God's not done.

The reason that I respect Israel is because of what God's word says about Israel. Not because they do everything right. Or not because I think they're the perfect nation. Far from it. It is okay to be critical of the political, even military decisions that Israel makes.

It's fine. If you differ with the way Israel is doing things today, fine, say it, no problem. But don't deny what the Bible says. That God is not finished with the nation of Israel. And Israel still has an enormous role to play in the last days.

And the Bible says that during the millennial kingdom, the nations of the earth are gonna stream to Israel. Because that is where Jesus's throne will be established. And that is gonna be the center of where the rulership of the earth at that time comes from. So we're not gonna diss Israel, okay? That's just, that's not on the menu.

If you know your Bible, and you know your prophetic understanding of scripture, you're gonna honor the fact that God still has a plan. And a purpose for Israel. We're gonna talk more about that as we get into the next chapter next time. So, let's close in prayer. Heavenly Father, we do thank you so much for the time that you've given us here tonight to investigate your scriptures and to look at the things that are given to us here in the word.

And we just really pray that our hearts would be attuned to you. And that you would give us a broad understanding of your redemptive program. And all that it involves, so that we would have a right and proper understanding of the church, and Israel, and the work of God. So, we thank you and praise you, Lord, for the good things that you have spoken here tonight in the word. We pray that you would help us to grow in the grace and knowledge of what we have learned tonight.

And we ask your direct guidance as we move forward in our walk with Jesus. For it is in his name that we pray. And all God's people said together, amen. Amen.