Romans IX (The Israelites Had It All)

Verses 4-5

Now that we see Paul's heart for "countrymen according to the flesh, who are Israelites"(v.3b, 4a), he now expounds on why it is that this is so great a tragedy. For the Israelites had everything, and for them to reject Christ Jesus, who was their promised Messiah, is the greatest heartache in the mind of Paul. For they were given the, "the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises; of whom are the fathers and from whom, according to the flesh, Christ came."(v.4,5). I'll take these one at a time...

I. They Were Israelites

God's chosen people, given everything from God (which is all the things following this). Important though is this, that we should "imitate Paul, who conceded to the Jews their privileges in such a manner...he afterwards declared that they were all of no worth without Christ"(Calvin).

II. The Adoption

"Israel is My son, My firstborn"(Exodus 4:22), "When Israel was a child, I loved him, and out of Egypt I called My son"(Hosea 11:1). "Israel was seperated out to be His unique and righteous witness to the rest of the world"(MacArthur), "And you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation."(Exodus 19:6). "It is clear from the context of those verses, as well as from countless other parts of Scripture, that the nation of Israel was, in some respect, God's child"(MacArthur). Not to be confused with the spiritual adoption spoken of in more detail in the New Testament, because "they are not all Israel who are of Israel"(v.6). So then not all of Israel was saved because they were part of the nation, but they did benefit from being the chosen nation of God.

III. The Glory

By all the commentators I am using this is attributed to the ark, I think Calvin has the best to say about this:

"Glory means the excellency into which the Lord had raised up [Israel] above all other nations, and that...[God] dwelt in the midst of them; for besides many other tokens of his presence, he exhibited a singular proof of it in the ark, where He gave responses, and also heard His people, that he might show forth his power in helping them...for this reason it was called 'the glory of God'(1 Samuel 4:22)"(Calvin).

IV. The Covenants and The Promises

Many covenants and promises were given to the nation of Israel. Observing the distinction between a covenant and promise, Calvin writes:

"A covenant is that which is expressed in distinct and accustomed words, and contains a mutual stipulation, as that made with Abraham; but promises are what we meet with everywhere in Scripture; for when God had once made a covenant with his ancient people, he continued to offer, often by new promises his favour to them. It hence follows, that promises are to be traced up to the covenant as to their true source"(Calvin).

V. The Giving of the Law

The Isrealites had the greatest privelage of receiving the law (ceremonial and judicial) and commandments of God. "It is a great privelage to have the law of God among us"(Henry), this is true from the way the Psalms speak of the law and the privilege that Christians have of being able to serve the Lord in obedience based on the law He his given.

VI. The Service of God

Rendered also as the "worship" of God, meaning the same.

"They had the ordinances of God's worship among them...the temple, the altars, the priests, the sacrifices, the feasts, and the institutions relating to them. While other nations were nations were worshipping and serving stocks, and stone, and devils, and the knew not what other idols of their own invention, the Israelites were serving the true God in the way of his own appointment"(Henry).

VII. The Fathers

It was through these men, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob that the foundations of the blessings that would come to the descendents would be laid.

VIII. Jesus Christ

The most important of all the blessing. "According to the flesh" meaning they were directly related to Him, in that He came through the line of the Patriarchs and was a Hebrew. He was the greatest "promise" given to the Israelites. All these things such as adoption and the fathers and the law and so on, were great, but apart from Jesus Christ it is meaningless. This is why Paul was so distressed, the Jews had all this, but they lacked the biggest part of it all, their Redeemer.

"Who is over all, the eternally blessed God"(v.5), something very interesting about the way this is worded, that I believe to be very important here. If looking at the NASB rendering of this passage you get, "who is over all, God blessed forever" which I like better in this case because it helps to make my point, but the NKJV has the same meaning. Anyways in all of the Greek and Hebrew manuscripts all the doxologies are normally rendered "blessed God," in this case it is "God blessed." The reason for saying this is that if you read the passage over again, you will see he is basically saying, "Jesus Christ is God blessed forever" focusing on "Jesus is God." Some translators attempting to deny Christ's divinity have attempted to change this passage around, but all manuscripts show it as "God blessed forever. Amen."

Citation:
*NASB Bible
*NKJV Bible
*Matthew Henry Commentary (Romans 9)
*Calvin Commentaries (Romans 1-16)
*MacArthur New Testament Commentary (Romans 9-16)