Paul's love for Jews

Romans 9:1-3

Paul’s love Jews Salvation!

Romans 9:1-5, I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, ² that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart. ³ For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh, ⁴ who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises; ⁵ of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, the eternally blessed God. Amen. Some believe that Paul was diverted from his major theme of justification by faith, and discussing Israel, and then gets back to his main subject in chapter 12.

Romans 8:39, nor height nor depth, nor any other created thing, shall be able to separate us from the love of God which is in Christ Jesus our Lord.

The great eulogy of praise reaching its pinnacle and should be really followed in thought by chapter 12.

Romans 12:1, I beseech you therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, that you present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your reasonable service.

The logical sequence is between Romans 8:39 and Romans 12:1. Therefore 9 to 11 is just a parenthesis dropped in that really doesn't have anything to do with the major subjects, it's just something that Paul wanted to deal with and so he put it here.

Now in response to that particular view, chapter 12 could have come after chapter 8, and we really would have understood it. The flow would have been there logically. If the end of chapter 8 fills the believer with anticipation about the future with a sense of security. Let him know what God has planned for him in Christ that can never be altered.

There is a logical connection between chapter 8 and chapter 12. But as reasonable as that case may be, that's not the case, because there is chapter 9,10 and 11.

Paul cannot go on to chapter 12 until he deals with the subject of these three chapters. Paul has learned what the objections are to his teaching. Though inspired by the Holy Spirit, here are not being taught by Paul surely for the first time.

By experience Paul has learned that there are some questions he must deal with before he can move on. Leaving the subject of justification by grace through faith and talking about its implications. There are some questions raised by objectors that must be dealt with.

Paul is very logical in Romans. He is like a lawyer arguing his case and he wants to leave no stone unturned and no loopholes in his presentation. There are some things that he says earlier in Romans that make it mandatory that he say what he says in chapters 9- 11.

Objection: Gentiles replaced Jews?

Romans 1:1-5, "Paul, a servant of Jesus Christ, called to be an apostle, separated unto the gospel of God, which He had promised before by His prophets in the Holy Scriptures,

concerning His Son, Jesus Christ our Lord, who was made of the seed of David according to the flesh and declared to be the Son of God with power according to the Spirit of Holiness by the resurrection from the dead, by whom we have received grace and apostleship for obedience to the faith among all nations.”

Among all nations. At the very outset of the letter, he affirms that he is the apostle to the nations. You can translate the word "nations"Gentiles. He is the apostle to the Gentiles. The gospel here is said to be given to the nations, to the Gentiles.

The questions that are going to come up in the mind of a Jew.

• Does that mean that God has set aside His people Israel?
• Does this mean that they are no longer worthy to participate in God's salvation and God's kingdom?
• Are the Jews being written off?
• Is justification by grace through faith a Gentile gift, not for Jews?
• Has this nation of people who for all these centuries has been God's chosen people now been permanently and totally set apart as an unworthy nation and God has turned to the Gentiles?

Paul needs to deal with that. Paul does, in chapters 9-11.

Romans 11:1-2, I say then, has God cast away His people? Certainly not! For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. ² God has not cast away His people whom He foreknew. Or do you not know what the Scripture says of Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel, saying,

Romans 11:26-28, And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written: “The Deliverer will come out of Zion, And He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob; ²⁷ For this is My covenant with them,

When I take away their sins.” ²⁸ Concerning the gospel they are enemies for your sake, but concerning the election they are beloved for the sake of the fathers. No, God has not set apart Israel from blessing. Paul must say that.

He can't just preach the message of justification by grace through faith to the nations without dealing with the fact that some Jews are going to say, "Does this mean we are left out?" Before he can go on to discuss the personal implications of the gospel, he must explain to them the national implications of this gospel to the nation Israel.

Objection: Jews first?

Romans 1:16, "For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believes, to the Jew first and also to the Gentile."

Romans 2:10, "But glory, honour and peace to every man that worketh good, to the Jew first and also the Gentile."

Now the Jew is going to say, "didn't you say that the gospel was to the Jew first? Was not the early church made up primarily of Jews?" Truly it was, Acts chapter 2 tells us that. If the gospel was primarily to the Jew and if the early church is primarily made up of Jews, how does this square with the present unbelief and apostasy of the nation Israel?

That is the question. How can your message of salvation be the true message when the people whom you have said it is for have rejected it? How can you be communicating a salvation by grace through faith to the Jew first when the Jews have rejected your message?

It started out as a Jewish thing, but it proceeded from there to become a Gentile thing, may be the thinking of this objector. If the nation is rejecting it, how can it be for them? How can it be right when the people you say it is primarily for do not accept it?

In fact, under the apostle Paul himself the Jews set about to remove Christianity from the face of the earth. Paul must answer that. How can this message be for the Jews when the Jews refuse it?

Romans 9:30-33, What shall we say then? That Gentiles, who did not pursue righteousness, have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness of faith; ³¹ but Israel, pursuing the law of righteousness, has not attained to the law of righteousness. ³² Why? Because they did not seek it by faith, but as it were, by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumbling stone. ³³ As it is written: “Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, And whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.”

What he says here is it isn't that the message wasn't for them, it is that they refused to believe it.

➢ The Gentiles would accept it by faith. ➢ The Jews thought they could save themselves by works.

Romans 10:1-3, Brethren, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved. ² For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. ³ For they being ignorant of God’s righteousness, and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God.

• It isn't because God didn't want them to have it,
• It isn't because God didn't give it to them,
• It's because they refused to believe it.

Romans 11:11, I say then, have they stumbled that they should fall? Certainly not! But through their fall, to provoke them to jealousy, salvation has come to the Gentiles.

What you have is Israel falling, no believing. The gospel then is opened to the Gentiles. When the Gentiles believe the Jews become jealous and are drawn to what the Gentiles have. So ultimately their fall leads to their salvation.

Romans 11:12, Now if their fall is riches for the world, and their failure riches for the Gentiles, how much more their fullness!

If the Gentile world receives the gospel because of the fall of Israel, what's going to happen when they believe? In the book of Revelation 7 they are going to be so many people saved they can't count how many they will be!

In Romans 11, Paul gives an illustration of how that the original branches were the Jews, and they were cut off. A new one was grafted in but someday Israel is going to be grafted back into that branch of salvation blessing.

So, Jewish unbelief doesn't affect against the priority of Jewish evangelism. The gospel is to the Jew. It isn't that God turned against them. It is that they turned against God, and they don't receive it. But ultimately, they will receive it.

It is and was intended for them. Objection: All Jews or not Jews!

Romans 2:28-29, For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh; ²⁹ but he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the Spirit, not in the letter; whose praise is not from men but from God.

Paul is saying that the one who is really a Jew isn't a Jew on the outside, but on the inside. ➢ Jew isn't marked simply by the sign of circumcision. ➢ Jew is marked by a circumcised heart. The majority of Israel are circumcised on the outside but not on the inside. Something must happen on the inside.

Nothing new. A Jew has always been a Jew who is one inwardly, not outwardly.

Romans 3:21-22, But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, ²² even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference;

The gospel is the same thing.

• It's not external keeping of the law.
• It's internal righteousness.

It's always been that way. Paul is not telling you anything new. A Jew has always been one who was inwardly a Jew. It's the same message God has always given to you.

God's concern has always been that the heart is the issue.

Romans 3:29-30, But now the righteousness of God apart from the law is revealed, being witnessed by the Law and the Prophets, ²² even the righteousness of God, through faith in Jesus Christ, to all and on all who believe. For there is no difference; It's always been the same way, by faith. It's an inward thing. So as Paul comes along and preaches salvation by grace through faith, that isn't anything new. It's brought to fullness of understanding in Christ.

This was at the heart of Paul's argument. The plan of salvation by grace through faith was not new. But it is affirmed in the Old Testament because it's always been God's way to deal with the heart of a man, deal with what's inside of a man.

Romans 3:20, Therefore by the deeds of the law no flesh will be justified in His sight, for by the law is the knowledge of sin. So, it's not something new.

• It is the fulfilment of the same promise of salvation God gave to all the fathers of the Old Testament.
• It is the same for Gentiles as it was for Jews.
• It is the same today for the whole world.

God wasn't isolating salvation in the Old Testament to Israel. He was using them as a channel to reach the world. Paul says there is no difference. Salvation is an act of faith. It's an inward thing, not an outward thing.

It isn't being Jewish. It is being right with God. If you are preaching a no-difference salvation, the objector might say, if you are talking about something that makes everybody equal. Brings everybody to God on the same terms.

Where does this leave Israel? Where does this leave us as a unique nation?

• If our unique mark of circumcision is no more important,
• If it doesn't matter if you are circumcised because God judges the circumcised and the uncircumcised on the basis of faith,

Then where does Israel stand?

Romans 3:1, What advantage then has the Jew, or what is the profit of circumcision?

If you are talking about a gospel that is a gospel that makes no difference, that it's inward and not outward. Everybody who comes to God by faith inwardly is equal.

What are you doing to the Jewish nation?

Are you setting them apart? His answer again is no!

Romans 9:4-5, who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises; ⁵ of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, the eternally blessed God. Amen. Paul reiterates the wonderful reality of what it is to be a Jew.

Romans 9:6, But it is not that the word of God has taken no effect. For they are not all Israel who are of Israel, Paul again preaching the same things that it is inward. Not everybody who is a Jew is true Israel because the true Jew is the one whose heart is right with God.

What advantage to being a Jew? Many advantages.

God is still the God of Israel who gave Israel all these wonderful things. But just because you are a Jew doesn't mean they are all yours automatically because not all Israel is Israel, not all outward Israel is inward Israel.

Romans 9:27, Isaiah also cries out concerning Israel: “Though the number of the children of Israel be as the sand of the sea,

The remnant will be saved. God has not cast away His people. There will always be a remnant. V 5, there is a remnant now, according to the election of grace. God still has a special and unique love for His people Israel, even though the gospel is a levelling thing.

Even though it brings all men down to the equal level of faith Even though it makes them all without difference, in terms of the gospel, it doesn't mean that Israel has no uniqueness left. Because Israel never was uniquely God's outwardly, it's always been an inward issue.

So, Paul wants to make that clear. God's covenant has not been broken.

Romans 11:29, For the gifts and the calling of

God are irrevocable. God will never change His mind and if He called Israel to a special unique place, that's where they will always be and they will always occupy.

Objection: Father Abraham descendants? Romans 4 Paul brings up Abraham our father as pertaining to the flesh, justified by faith.

Romans 4:3, For what does the Scripture say? “Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness.” So, Abraham is a very important person.

Romans 4:11, And he received the sign of circumcision, a seal of the righteousness of the faith which he had while still uncircumcised, that he might be the father of all those who believe, though they are uncircumcised, that righteousness might be imputed to them also, Abraham is the father of all of them that believe.

The question might come like this: If Abraham is the father of those who are truly saved, how in the world can Abraham's descendants reject the message? If yours is the true message, how come the one who is the father of all those who are supposed to accept that message finds that his descendants reject it. It doesn't make sense.

The nation that is uniquely out of the loins of Abraham who is to be the father of their faith rejects the message? How can justification by grace through faith explain what is currently a reality in the nation Israel, that they reject the gospel?

How can that be if it was to be for them first? How can that be if their father was Abraham, and he was to be the father of all the faithful? Are you saying as an apostle to the Gentiles who is preaching a gospel in which there's no difference and it's only internal anyway that the Jews have no longer any unique place with God?

What does this do to the unique promise given to us that we will have a kingdom? That the Messiah will come and establish His kingdom in Jerusalem? What does this do with say Daniel 2, Daniel 7?

What does this do with Psalm 2 where the Messiah comes and makes His enemies His footstool? What does this do with many passages in Isaiah? Are you saying there is no more kingdom, literal kingdom, and millennium to be anticipated?

There is no earthly hope for the nation to be restored, rejuvenated, redeemed and to have Messiah reigning, and its enemies made subject?

Is that all eliminated now in the church? This is what covenant theology and amillennialism believe. Has God cancelled the kingdom for Israel in favour of a universal internal kingdom?

Has He cancelled His earthly kingdom? Has He cancelled all the promises to the Jews in favour of the church? Paul being a missionary to the Gentiles,

• speaking about a gospel that made everybody equal by faith,
• which was supposed to be the Jew first, but the Jewish people rejected it,
• supposed to belong to the sons of Abraham but the sons of Abraham rejected it.

How can Abraham be the father of a movement which eliminates the very hope of Abraham's people?

How can Abraham be the father of a movement that has no kingdom? Where Israel loses its identity. It really sounds like a condemnation of Judaism.

Objection: What about Jewish uniqueness?

Romans 2:17-24, Indeed you are called a Jew, and rest on the law, and make your boast in God, ¹⁸ and know His will, and approve the things that are excellent, being instructed out of the law, ¹⁹ and are confident that you yourself are a guide to the blind, a light to those who are in darkness, ²⁰ an instructor of the foolish, a teacher of babes, having the form of knowledge and truth in the law. ²¹ You, therefore, who teach another, do you not teach yourself? You who preach that a man should not steal, do you steal? ²² You who say, “Do not commit adultery,” do you commit adultery? You who abhor idols, do you rob temples? ²³ You who make your boast in the law, do you dishonour God through breaking the law? ²⁴ For “the name of

God is blasphemed among the Gentiles because of you,” as it is written. Now that is very hard and severe indicting. You think you know it all, you don't know anything. Instead of drawing people to God, you drive them away.

Paul comes across as condemning. The believers in the Roman church to whom he writes may well have been Jews. But it wouldn't take very long for them to become outnumbered by the Gentiles. This may have added to sort of salt to the wounds because it may have existed in the church that some of the Gentiles looked down upon the Jews as second-class citizens mercifully rescued from the apostate Judaism.

Is Israel now a second-class nation?

Do they lose their unique identity? Do Gentile Christians have a right to look down on them as brands snatched from the burning and nothing more? Paul needs to settle that issue and he does that in Romans 9. Paul lifts them up.

Romans 9:4-5, who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises; ⁵ of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came, who is over all, the eternally blessed God. Amen. Theirs are the ➢ Adoption, ➢ Promises,

➢ Covenants, ➢ Fathers. Through them that Christ according to the flesh came. Yet to be grafted in, chapter 11. They are yet to be saved. So, we don't look down on them. God is not finished with them.

Objection: Gentiles eternal security can be replaced? Romans 8. Nothing shall separate us. ✓ God will never condemn us, ✓ Christ will never condemn us, ✓ nothing in this world can ever condemn us, ✓ no angel can ever condemn us, ✓ no miraculous event can ever condemn us.

✓ We are so secure. Objection may be saying this. How could Paul promise to you in the church that you are so secure when God broke all His promises with Israel? If God set Israel aside, who are you to think He is not going to set you aside when He decides to?

God set us aside and how do you know He won't do the same to you?

The Gentile also might ask the same question. If God set aside those Jews, how can I be secure that He is not going to set me aside? If God didn't keep His eternal promises to them then why should I trust His eternal promises to us?

Paul must deal with that. He does that by reminding them that God didn't break His promises to the true Jews, He broke no promises. He didn't break any promises to the Israelites who were Israelites at heart. The promises of salvation and blessing were only given to those who truly knew God in their hearts.

Romans 9:6, But it is not that the word of God has taken no effect. For they are not all Israel who are of Israel, It's the true Jew in the heart, and God never broke a promise, never. Romans ¹¹ Paul goes back through the fact that the Lord is going to bring the nation back in.

God never breaks a promise. His promise is this, I will bless you if your heart's right with Me, and He never broke that.

The Jews that got separated, the Jews that were broken off from God were broken off because of Unbelief. But even that can't change the fact that ultimately God's going to bring the whole nation back. If God cut them off, how do you know He won't cut us off?

The only ones that ever got cut off from God's blessing were the ones who refused to believe in Him. They were Jews outwardly but not inwardly. Look at it nationally even though the nation is temporarily set aside, ultimately, they are going to be grafted back in, chapter 11.

So, these things will give us a feel for what it is that the apostle is going to say in chapter 9, to 11. Paul is going to try to answer these objections that rise in the heart of one who listens to what he says.

Romans 11:33-36, Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out! 34 “For who has known the mind of the Lord? Or who has become His counsellor?” 35 “Or who has first given to Him And it shall be repaid to him?”

³⁶ For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen. Paul is an apostle to the Gentiles. True that the gospel is a gospel of salvation by grace through faith to all and there's no difference. Outward circumcision isn't the issue.

• It is true that temporarily and partially Israel is set aside by unbelief.
• It is true God is gathering a new people, a no people and making them His people.
• It is also true that God has not ever set aside the true Jew. There has always been a remnant according to grace.
• It is also true that God will re-gather the whole nation, chapter 11, and they will all be saved.

God will keep every promise He ever made to Israel, never break one of them. If He ever did or ever does, then we will have reason to shake because we will lose our confidence in the fact that He would keep His promise to us, but it will never ever happen.

So, basically chapters 9 to 11 are to help us understand how Israel fits into this perspective.

Paul begins in chapter 9 with a discussion of Israel's unbelief. It is a discussion of Israel's unbelief because that's the key.

Why have we been set aside? Why has God not kept His promise with us? Answer: Because of your unbelief.

Romans 9:1-5, Their unbelief is sorrowful.

Romans 9:6-13, Their unbelief was planned. It didn't take God by surprise.

Romans 9:14-33, Their unbelief is sorrowful. Paul has just given eight chapters of a message that's devastating to an unbelieving Jew. ➢ He feels like he has been eliminated. ➢ He feels like the whole thing is written off. ➢ He is no longer God's chosen people. ➢ He looks at Paul as the enemy. Paul, who was once the greatest persecutor of Christians, therefore the greatest champion of Judaism, did a total switch.

Now he is the enemy of Judaism. Paul is the Judas of Judaism. He is the epitome of traitors.

He was selected out of all the leading Jews to be the persecution of the church, as they saw it, that threat against traditional Judaism. He was chosen to be the point man to lead that attack and he turns around to attack Judaism.

Romans 9:1-3, in these three verses he gives his heart.

It is not theological, but personal. Paul loves the nation, Israel. He loves them for two reasons. 1. His personal connection. 2. Their divine connection. He loves them because he is one of them and he loves them because God loves them.

Paul talking about here is love. He is trying to link up with them on an emotional level if he can. He has got to build a bridge to these people who have been alienated by his message. They are not going to listen to chapter 12, "And now present your bodies a living sacrifice."

They have got all these questions. How can this be a gospel to the Jews when the Jews reject it? How can God say this is to the Jew first when the Jews don't even accept it? How can it be that Abraham is the father of the faithful when the children of Abraham don't even believe this message?

They see Paul as the enemy, destroying their great tradition and religion. Paul must give them his heart to them first. They have got to know that he is not leading an anti-Semitic conspiracy. Because he has denounced Israel's false security.

Paul has shown that outward circumcision and outward ritual doesn't redeem, doesn't mean he doesn't love the people. But it does mean that they would have hated him. Paul spells out his love. He does it in the most powerful terms that you can find anywhere in Scripture.

V 1, I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, I am in Christ. I am one with Him.

When you say the truth to somebody, I am telling you the truth in Christ. What you are saying is Christ is my witness. ✓ Christ who is omniscient. ✓ Christ to whom I am united. ✓ Christ, who is my very life, knows. ✓ Christ knows that I am telling the truth.

It's calling on Christ to witness to the honesty and integrity of the heart. What a strong way to affirm.

Romans 1:9, For God is my witness, whom I serve with my spirit in the gospel of His Son, that without ceasing I make mention of you always in my prayers, Tremendous integrity of Paul.

It was a way of life.

2 Corinthians 1:23, "Moreover I call God for a witness upon my soul that to spare you I came not as yet unto Corinth." ✓ Paul wants to give testimony that God can affirm, that

God can corroborate. ✓ Paul calls Christ to affirm the testimony. Then he comes with a negative statement. I am not lying,

2 Corinthians 11:30-31, If I must boast, I will boast in the things which concern my infirmity. ³¹ The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who is blessed forever, knows that I am not lying. Paul has got tremendous integrity. He called God to testify. He calls Jesus Christ to affirm. “my conscience also bearing me witness” Conscience is that little voice within you that commends or condemns you.

Acts 23:1, "I have lived in all good conscience before God till this day." He lived in all good conscience before God to this day. Paul lived a life that's free of an accusing conscience. Because what he does is right.

2 Corinthians 1:12, For our boasting is this: the testimony of our conscience that we conducted ourselves in the world in simplicity and godly sincerity, not with fleshly wisdom but by the grace of God, and more abundantly toward you.

We live the way we ought to live, and we have a clear conscience.

Can you trust your conscience? The answer to that is no.

Titus 1:15, To the pure all things are pure, but to those who are defiled and unbelieving nothing is pure; but even their mind and conscience are defiled. You can't trust your conscience if it's defiled. If it's just a normal human conscience, you can't trust your conscience. my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, Who is in control of Paul’s conscience?

The Holy Spirit. Conscience. The conscience is not a motor, the conscience is a flywheel. Something else must energize it. Something else must start it moving. If you are unregenerate, without God, without Christ, your conscience is controlled by the evil that exists in your life.

If you are under the control of the Holy Spirit, He controls your conscience. The conscience is only a tool! It's a flywheel set in motion by the engine who is the Spirit of God. As we live in the Spirit, walk in the Spirit, obey the Spirit, we can trust our conscience because it's under His control.

Holy Spirit trigger that conscience to commend us or condemn us. Paul got Christ and the Holy Spirit both affirming that what he says is true. V 2, that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart. Great heaviness, continual sorrow in my heart.

He has called two out of the three members of the trinity to affirm that this is how he feels. Paul was not bitter against Jewish people. His heart is broken over these people and he calls everything he can to attest to the integrity of his heart.

Great weight, a tremendous burden and continual sorrow. The great heaviness has to do with continuous pain.

V 3, For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh, Who are they? V 4, "Who are Israelites." Evangelism is the heart of it all. If we really loved like Paul loved and could call Christ to affirm that and the Spirit to affirm that, we would turn the world upside down.

John Knox, who cried through his tears, "Give me Scotland, O God, or I die." Henry Martyn, said, "O that I were a flame of fire in the hand of God." David Brainerd who said, "Now let me burn out for God," Paul's constant sorrow that provided the holy tension with an unequalled, unceasing joy.

V 3, For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh, If I could I would go to hell if it would get the Jewish people saved. His sorrow is in direct proportion to the seriousness of Israel's unbelief.

He says, "I could wish,"it's expressing a hypothetical situation. "I could wish myself accursed if it could bring salvation to my brethren." Obviously, it couldn't. One man's damnation is not another man's salvation, except in the case of one man. Who was that?

Christ, not Paul. Paul can't die for the world. He can't go to hell for the world. He can't suffer the pains of chastening and judgment for others, he can't. But he says I could if it were possible wish that I myself was anathema, the word means devoted to damnation, accursed, from Christ.

He has just finished a whole chapter on how he could never be separated from Christ. If someone says that I care so much about your salvation, if it were possible, I would go to hell if you could be saved. Those are just words.

Why don’t you have an effective evangelistic ministry?

Because you don't understand this kind of a heart. They were killed and cut off and never able to be redeemed. Moses is interceding for his people. They have broken God's law. They have worshiped the golden calf and God comes down and says, I am going to kill them all.

Exodus 32:31-32, Then Moses returned to the Lord and said, “Oh, these people have committed a great sin, and have made for themselves a god of gold! ³² Yet now, if You will forgive their sin—but if not, I pray, blot me out of Your book which You have written.” If they die, O God, I will die with them. A heart of great compassion, not unlike the expression of Paul in Romans 9.

But there's a greater illustration.

Galatians 3:13, Christ has redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us (for it is written, “Cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree”)

How?

2 Corinthians 5:21, For He made Him who knew no sin to be sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him.

What Paul couldn't ever have done, Jesus did? "He who knew no sin was made sin for us." It's really an incomprehensible love to many of us. Don't ever accuse the apostle Paul or those who preach the gospel of Jesus Christ of being the enemies of Judaism or Jewish people. No, it is their salvation we seek.

The heart of the evangelist is not the heart of one who is angry, but the heart of one who is loving. That was the heart of Paul.

How could you ever love like that? Simple to explain yet extremely difficult to attain. You must have the mind of Christ. The closer you draw in intimacy to Christ, the more you obey His Word, the more you walk in His love, the more you will love the way He loves, so that you can love the world as He loves the world when you see the world as He sees the world, as Paul did.

Paul knows that if he has anything to say to these people, he must give them his heart before he gives them his theology. Paul unveils the great love that he has.