Romans 11:17-36 - "Pruning The Olive Tree" - Part 2

Because Paul accepted the OT as God’s word, he had every reason to expect the restoration of his people already announced in the prophets. He addresses this matter most clearly in Romans 11. In this chapter he is clear that God has not rejected his people (11:1-2). That a remnant remains, as in times of Israel’s wider apostasy in the OT, indicates that he continues to work among his people (11:2-5). That the Jesus-following “remnant” in Paul’s day included a larger proportion of the Jewish people than was the case in most of subsequent history challenges the idea, held by some today, that the “remnant” must always be small. A remnant differs, however, from the prophets’ expectation of Israel as a whole, to which Paul eventually turns (“all Israel,” 11:26; their “fulness,” 11:12).

In God’s plan, Israel’s stumbling was not meant to be terminal, but to allow time before the restoration for gentiles to come to faith (11:11). God planned the conversion of gentiles to Israel’s God, through faith in Jesus, to make Israel jealous (11:11), a point Paul has already argued from Scripture (10:19, citing Deut 32:21). In God’s plan, this way of doing things would also yield greater fruit in the long run: Israel’s failure brings riches for the gentiles, and Israel’s “fullness” (plêrôma) would bring yet greater riches (Rom 11:12). These riches would include the promised end-time resurrection of the righteous (if Paul means 11:15 literally). Like the “fullness” of the gentiles, i.e., the final, full number of gentiles who would be converted (11:25), the “fullness” of Israel entails fulfilling the number of Jewish people who, in God’s plan, will be saved.

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