Paul Really Seems to Mean ALL - Romans 11

1. A Prayer for the People of God
God of foreigner and outcast,
your arms reach out to embrace
all those who call upon you.
Teach us as disciples of Christ
so to love the world
that your name may be known
throughout the earth.
Amen.

2. Coronavirus Sunday #23
The COVID-19 Calendar

3. The Church Calendar
August 16

4. the doctrine of universal
reconciliation – the view that
all human beings will ultimately
be saved and restored to a
right relationship with God
CHRISTIAN UNIVERSALISM

5. - John 12:32
- Acts 3:21
- Rom 5:18
- Rom 11:32
- Rom 14:11
- 1 Cor 15:22-28
- 2 Cor 5:19
RELEVANT PASSAGES
- Phil 2:9-11
- Col 1:20
- 1Tim 2:4
- Titus 2:11
- 2 Pet 3:9
- Heb 2:9
- 1 John 2:2

6. Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32
Paul REALLYSeems to Mean ALL…

9. So I ask, has God abandoned his people?
Certainly not! I myself am an Israelite,
from the seed of Abraham and the tribe
of Benjamin. “God has not abandoned
his people,” the ones he chose in advance.
ROMANS 11:1-2a (KNT)

10. God’s gifts and God’s call, you see, cannot
be undone. For just as you were once
disobedient to God, but now have received
mercy through their disobedience, so they
have now disbelieved as well, in order that,
through
the mercy which has come your way,
they too may now receive mercy. For God
has shut up all people in disobedience,
so that he may have mercy upon all.
ROMANS 11:29-32 (KNT)

11. The word of God has not failed.
God has been true to the covenant;
God’s righteousness has been
unveiled in the gospel of Jesus
the Messiah, “to the Jew first,
and also equally to the Greek” (1:17.)
Verse 32 is the conclusion,
not only to chapters 9-11,
but to the whole letter so far.
N.T. WRIGHT

12. In the Roman context, mercy was
reserved for the worthy among captives and
vanquished enemies. Nowhere in the ancient
would, outside this text, was mercy granted in
so indiscriminate and impartial manner as
“all.”The reduplication of “all” (here) is the
climactic expression of one of the most
important themes of (this) letter,
salvation found for all…
ROBERT JEWETT

13. - 1:5, 7, 8, 16, 18
- 2:9-10
- 3:9, 12, 19, 20, 22, 23
- 4:11, 16
- 5:12, 18
- 6:3
- 8:14
- 9:5-7, 17
- 10:11-13, 18, 26
- 11:32
A “UNIVERSAL” TRAJECTORY…

14. As James Dunn observes, this extraordinary
epigram manages in (one sentence) to
sum up what he takes to be ”the principal
themes of the whole letter,” climaxing in the
“final reconciliation of the whole world to God
through the triumph of mercy.”
The expectation of universal salvation
in this verse is indisputable, regardless
of the logical problems it poses for systematic
theologians.
ROBERT JEWETT

15. God’s justification of the undeserving
embraces all human beings on
equal terms, but this “universalism”
is one that confronts them all
with both judgment and mercy.
THOMAS L. HOYT JR.

16. When anyone is saved it is only
because God is merciful.The mercy of
God underlies Paul’s whole message.
But God is not just
merciful: he is “rich in mercy.”
He is ”the Father of mercies and
the God of all consolation” (2 Cor 1:3). We
are not to think of God as
one who occasionally has merciful
impulses: for Paul God is essentially
and wholeheartedly merciful.

17. “the purpose of God is grace
and redemption…God is finally and
disproportionately a God of mercy
and grace, who does what he does
for the good of his creation and its final
healing and redemption. God deals
with us not on the basis of what we
are but on the bases of what he is:
a merciful Father. ”

18. Romans 10:5-13
So…Does ALL Mean ALL or…?

19. Romans 11:1-2a, 29-32
Paul REALLYSeems to Mean ALL…

20. - Everything in the creeds
o Unity of theTrinitarian God
o Incarnation of Jesus
o Death, burial & resurrection of Jesus
o Judgment for all (s/Sin)
o Resurrection and the Age to Come
WHAT I’M AFFIRMING…
- Authority of God in Scripture
- Existence of hell as an experienced reality
- The ultimate victory of God’s mercy
for and over all people and all things

21. Closing Prayer
God of foreigner and outcast,
your arms reach out to embrace
all those who call upon you.
Teach us as disciples of Christ
so to love the world
that your name may be known
throughout the earth.
Amen.