Was Israel “set aside” by God at the end of the “Acts period”? (Part two)

For part one, click here: https://thathappyexpectation.blogspot.com/2025/02/was-israel-set-aside-by-god-at-end-of.html

Did Paul have a “prophetic ministry under the auspices of Israel”?

Among those who believe that Israel wasn’t “set aside” until after Paul arrived in Rome, some argue that, during the “Acts period,” Paul’s ministry was inseparably connected with Israel’s “prophetic program.” Consider, for example, the following statements by Clyde Pilkington:

“During Paul’s early ministry, covered by the book of Acts, he was a prophetic light “to the Gentiles” (Acts 13:47). Being such was a prophetic ministry under the auspices of Israel (Isaiah 49:6). Salvation during the Acts period was bound up in Israel’s restoration and the “sure mercies of David,” with Paul “acting as a priest” (Romans 15:15-16, CV). Therefore, during the Acts period, by Paul’s own admission, his ministry was limited to what “the prophets and Moses did say should come” (Acts 26:22).”

Rather than being “under the auspices [i.e., kindly patronage and guidance] of Israel,” Paul’s ministry tended to elicit a negative reaction from the majority of Israelites as soon as they became aware of what he was doing among the nations. Throughout the “Acts period,” the majority of Israelites were completely hostile toward Paul’s apostolic ministry to the nations.

We also know that it was the twelve apostles – and not Paul – who were the apostles of Israel (and who – in accord with Christ’s promise in Matt. 19:28 – will, in the eon to come, be sitting “on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel”). It was these apostles whose ministry was a continuation of Christ’s earthly commission “for the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Matt. 10:6; 15:24; cf. Rom. 15:8). But Paul’s apostolic ministry was not “under the auspices” of these men, either. For they weren’t even aware of what Paul was heralding among the nations until approximately 5-7 years after Paul and Barnabas had been heralding the evangel of the Uncircumcision among the nations.[i] It’s thus impossible for Paul’s apostolic ministry among the nations to have been under the kindly patronage and guidance of Israel when the very leaders of the believing Jewish remnant weren’t even knowledgeable of the evangel that Paul and Barnabas were heralding among the nations prior to their being informed of it by Paul himself at the meeting referred to in Gal. 2:1-2.

We also know that the salvation of the nations during this time wasn’t “bound up in Israel’s restoration.” Rather, the salvation that Paul said had been sent to the nations (and, by implication, Paul’s dispensation as “the apostle of the nations”) was a result of what Paul referred to as Israel’s “offense” and “discomfiture” (Rom. 11:11-12). It was the “casting away” of the majority of Israelites who comprised the nation of Israel in Paul’s day – and not “Israel’s restoration” – that had resulted in the state of affairs that Paul referred to as “the conciliation of the world” (Rom. 11:15). And since it was Israel’s “casting away” that made it possible for the nations to be conciliated to God, the “casting away” of Israel necessarily took place before Paul’s ministry among the nations began.

Moreover, Paul knew that the state of affairs involving Israel that’s described in Rom. 11:11-15 wouldn’t end until after the “complement of the nations” had “entered in”; only then will the “callousness” that is upon the nation be removed (or begin to be removed). Paul also knew that there were some among God’s covenant people who, as a result of his ministry among the nations (a ministry which, by its very nature, resulted in unbelieving Jews being provoked to jealousy), could be saved (Rom. 11:14). This would result in them becoming part of the chosen remnant of believing Israelites that existed in Paul’s day (Rom. 11:5-6), and which comprised “the Israel of God” (Gal. 6:16). This chosen remnant among God’s covenant people existed before, during and after the two years referred to in Acts 28:30.

With regard to Acts 13:46-47, these verses do not support the view that the ministry of Paul and Barnabas was the fulfillment of prophesy. In these verses we read the following:

Being bold, both Paul and Barnabas say, “To you first was it necessary that the word of God be spoken. Yet, since, in fact, you are thrusting it away, and are judging yourselves not worthy of eonian life, lo! we are turning to the nations. For thus the Lord has directed us: I have appointed Thee for ‘a light of the nations; for Thee to be for salvation as far as the limits of the earth.’”

As is evident from what’s said in the verse that Paul and Barnabas were quoting (i.e., Isaiah 49:6), it’s not the ministry of these two men that’s being prophesied here. The twice-used pronoun “Thee” (or “You”) is singular, and refers to Christ alone (rather than to Paul and Barnabas, whom Paul referred to previously as “we” and “us”). In accord with this fact, the prophecy concerns Christ alone (see Luke 2:32; cf. Acts 26:23), and the words of the prophecy are being addressed to Christ alone. Moreover, it’s clear from the context that this prophecy has to do with what Christ will be doing in the future (i.e., during the eon to come, after the kingdom has been restored to Israel and Israel has been re-gathered to the land), and not during the time when Paul and Barnabas were heralding the evangel of the grace of God among the nations.

The reason Paul appealed to Isaiah 49:6 on this occasion is because it provided scriptural justification for his and Barnabas’ decision to be “turning to the nations” (v. 46). Had Paul wanted to, he could’ve simply appealed to the words of Christ himself (as recorded in Acts 26:16-18, for example); instead, however, he appealed to what he knew those to whom he spoke would see as authoritative (i.e., the inspired words of the prophet Isaiah). But how does a prophetic statement concerning Christ justify the decision of Paul and Barnabas to turn to the nations? Answer: Paul and Barnabas were Christ’s authorized ambassadors (2 Cor. 5:20); thus, by appealing to a verse in which it’s clear that Christ had been appointed by God to bring light and salvation to the nations, Paul and Barnabas justified their own ministry among the nations (which was in accord with what Christ himself will be doing in the future).

With regard to Romans 15:15-16, here’s how these verses read in the CLNT:

Yet more daringly do I write to you, in part, as prompting you, because of the grace being given to me from God, for me to be the minister of Christ Jesus for the nations, acting as a priest of the evangel of God, that the approach present of the nations may be becoming well received, having been hallowed by holy spirit.

Notice, first, what Paul didn’t say in Romans 15:16. He didn’t say he was “a priest of God” for the nations (or even “acting as a priest of God”). Instead, Paul said that he was “acting as a priest of the evangel of God” (and not merely “acting as a priest,” as Clyde incompletely quotes him as having said).

There is a big difference between what Paul wrote here and what we read in, for example, 1 Peter 2:5 and 9 (where the Jewish believers to whom Peter wrote are collectively referred to as “a holy priesthood” and “a chosen race, a ‘royal priesthood,’ a ‘holy nation,’ a procured people”), or in Rev. 20:6 (where we read of Jewish believers being “priests of God and of Christ”). What Paul wrote in these verses has nothing to do with the nations being blessed through, or on account of, the nation of Israel. As noted earlier, the salvation of those among the nations who believed the evangel heralded by Paul was a result of the “casting away” of Israel (and not “Israel’s restoration”). The ministry to which Paul was referring in these verses involved heralding the evangel of the grace of God among the nations so that they would, through faith in this evangel, become “hallowed” (consecrated or set apart) by the holy spirit, and thus made acceptable to God. This continued to take place during (and after) the two years referred to in Acts 28:30.

The assumption by Acts 28 theorists is that, in these verses, Paul was referring to a temporary state of affairs that ended at some point after Paul arrived in Rome. However, it’s clear that Paul wasn’t claiming to be a literal priest. Paul was speaking metaphorically here, and using imagery that was drawn from his religious background as an Israelite. Paul’s work in heralding the evangel among the nations (so that they would, by faith in the truth, become acceptable to God) was like a priest’s work in offering up sacrifices to God. By referring to himself as “acting as a priest of the evangel,” Paul was simply expressing the idea that his role as the “apostle of the nations” involved heralding the evangel by which the nations (i.e., those among the nations who believed) became “hallowed” (consecrated or set apart) by the holy spirit (hence, Paul referred to himself as “acting as a priest of the evangel of God”). This is in accord with his original commission from Christ (Acts 26:14-18).

Paul’s reference to those among the nations who’d believed his evangel as an “approach present” (i.e., something consecrated and offered to God) who’d been “hallowed by holy spirit” and thus “well received” by God is simply an extension of the metaphorical, priestly imagery previously used by him. It also echoes the language Paul had used previously in Romans 12:1-2. In these verses we read the following: 

“I am entreating you, then, brethren, by the pities of God, to present your bodies a sacrifice, living, holy, well pleasing to God, your logical divine service, and not to be configured to this eon, but to be transformed by the renewing of your mind, for you to be testing what is the will of God, good and well pleasing and perfect.” 

Through Paul’s apostolic ministry, the evangel through which the nations could be saved was being heralded, and those among the nations who believed were being “hallowed [set apart] by holy spirit.” And having been thus “set apart” by God, they were able to engage in the “divine service” of which Paul wrote in this verse, and thereby do that which was “well pleasing to God” (2 Cor. 5:9). But their status and expectation was, at the time that Paul wrote, just as distinct from Israel’s as it was during and after the time of Paul’s house arrest in Rome.

Paul’s use of this figurative, priestly imagery in no way means or implies that he was laboring under a different “dispensation” or administration at this time. If such figurative imagery is to be understood as entailing that Paul’s ministry was in accord with Israel’s prophesied program (and that he was laboring “under the auspices of Israel”), then we would have just as much reason to think that Paul was laboring under the same “Jewish economy” when he wrote to the saints in Philippi! For in Philippians 3:3 Paul wrote concerning those in the body of Christ, “For we are the circumcision who are offering divine service in the spirit of God.”

One would be hard-pressed to find more “Jewish” imagery in Paul’s letters than we find here. And in the very next chapter, Paul referred to the financial contribution of the saints in Philippi as “an odor fragrant, a sacrifice acceptable, well pleasing to God” (4:18). This is an allusion to the fragrant incense that was burnt in the temple (Ex. 30:7; Luke 1:9) and to the sacrifices offered there by the priests (thus making Paul’s imagery in this verse just as “priestly” and “Levitical” in nature as that used in Romans 15:16). According to the reasoning of Acts 28 proponents, the obviously “Jewish” nature of this imagery should lead the reader to conclude that Paul must’ve been laboring under the same “prophetic, Jewish economy” when he wrote his letter to the Philippians as he supposedly was when he wrote to the saints in Rome!

Surely the Acts 28 theorist would agree that, during Paul’s imprisonment in Rome, he continued to be “the minister of Christ Jesus for the nations” (which involved heralding the “evangel of the uncircumcision” to the nations), and that salvation continued to be “dispatched” to the nations during this time (Acts 28:30-31). If this is the case (and it is), then one cannot consistently affirm that Paul’s “acting as a priest of the evangel of God” – and the resulting “hallowing” (setting apart) of those among the nations who believed Paul’s evangel – was something that was limited to Paul’s ministry prior to his imprisonment in Rome.

With regard to Clyde’s appeal to Acts 26:22, the view that Paul didn’t say anything during the entirety of the “Acts period” that can’t be found in the Law and the Prophets is contradicted by Paul himself. Here are some examples of truths revealed by Paul in his “earlier epistles” that were not revealed in the Hebrew Scriptures:

1. Salvation has come to the nations through the “tripping,” “offense” and “casting away” of Israel (Rom. 11:11-15, 19), and this state of affairs is to continue “until the complement of the nations may be entering” (vv. 25-26).

2. All who believe Paul’s evangel – whether “Jew or Greek” – are spiritually baptized into one body (1 Cor. 12:12-13), which is the body of Christ (v. 27), and have become a “new creation” in Christ (2 Cor. 5:17).

3. The last generation of those in the body of Christ will “not be put to repose” (die), but will “put on immortality” at the same time that the deceased saints in the body of Christ will be “roused in incorruption” (1 Cor. 15:50-53).

4. The Lord is going to descend to an atmospheric location in the clouds above the earth, and then both categories of saints in the body of Christ (the still-living and the recently resurrected) will be “snatched away together” by the “Lord himself” to meet Christ in the air (1 Thess. 4:13-18).

5. All who are in the body of Christ will, at this time, become “celestials” and will “wear the image of Christ, the “Celestial One” (1 Cor. 15:47-49).

6. Related to the last point, the location of the kingdom of God in which we will be enjoying our eonian life after we’ve “put on incorruption” is one in which “flesh and blood is not able to enjoy an allotment” (1 Cor. 15:50) – that is, it is not on the earth but rather “in the heavens” (2 Cor. 5:1-2), and our future “home” is where the Lord is, presently (vv. 6-9).

7. Every human being is going to be vivified in Christ (1 Cor. 15:20-22), and thus all mankind will be justified and saved (Rom. 5:18-19; 1 Tim. 2:4-7; 4:10).

8. After death has been abolished and every being in the universe has been subjected to Christ, Christ will be “giving up the kingdom to His God and Father” and “shall be subjected to Him Who subjects all to Him, that God may be All in all” (1 Cor. 15:24-28).

Having noted some truths revealed by Paul concerning which “the prophets and Moses” were completely silent, let’s now consider what Paul meant in Acts 26:22. Oftentimes when this verse is quoted by Acts 28 theorists, they leave out the very next verse. However, it is in the next verse that we find Paul specifying what “things” he had in mind when he declared that he was “saying none other things that those which the prophets and Moses did say should come.”

Here is how Acts 26:22-23 reads in the CLNT:

Happening, then, on assistance from God, until this day I stand attesting both to small and to great, saying nothing outside of what both the prophets and Moses speak of impending occurrences -- if it be the suffering Christ -- if He, the first out of a resurrection of the dead, is about to be announcing light both to the people and to the nations.

Other Bible versions communicate the same idea in their translation of Acts 26:22-23 (see, for example, the New English Translation, the Holman Christian Standard Bible and the English Standard Version). The fact is that Paul’s words in verse 23 put a significant restriction on the “things” that Paul had in view in verse 22. Paul was simply saying that, whenever he spoke concerning “the suffering Christ” and Christ’s resurrection (and his subsequent announcement of “light both to the people and to the nations”), he wasn’t saying anything that was outside of what “both the prophets and Moses speak of impending occurrences.”

“To the Jew first”

In Romans 1:16 Paul declared, “For not ashamed am I of the evangel, for it is God’s power for salvation to everyone who is believing–to the Jew first, and to the Greek as well.”

Some appeal to this statement (along with what Paul wrote in Rom. 2:9-10) in support of the view that, when Paul wrote his letter to the saints in Rome (which was prior to his arrival to Rome), Israel had not yet been “set aside.” However, we know that, when Paul wrote this letter, the “casting away” of the majority of Israelites who comprised the nation of Israel in Paul’s day had already occurred. So whatever Paul had in mind here must be consistent with this fact.

When Paul wrote “to the Jew first,” he was not referring to what has ever been true for Jews and Greeks within the body of Christ. It is outside of the body of Christ that God’s covenant people have certain privileges that those of the nations don’t have. And among these privileges was, during the time of Paul’s apostolic ministry, evangelistic priority. It is this that Paul had in mind when he wrote “to the Jew first, and to the Greek as well.”

Paul was, of course, an Israelite (2 Cor. 11:22; Phil.3:4-6). And being the first to receive and believe the evangel to which he was referring in Romans 1:16, he was the first to encounter “God’s power for salvation to everyone who is believing.” Barnabas – another Jew – was evidently the second individual to believe the evangel that was entrusted to Paul. Only after Paul and Barnabas had received salvation through faith in this evangel was this same divine “power for salvation” later encountered by a gentile (i.e., Sergius Paul).

Moreover, throughout Paul’s ministry as recorded in Acts, it was Paul’s manner to speak the word of God to Israelites first. In fact, in Acts 13:46, Paul said that it was “necessary” that he bring the word of God to the Jews first before he turned to the gentiles. In doing this, however, Paul wasn’t showing favoritism to believing Jews within the body of Christ, or indicating that Jews within the body of Christ had any advantage over their gentile brethren (for, of course, the synagogue-attending Jews to whom Paul brought the word of God weren’t in the body of Christ). Similarly, those among the nations to whom Paul subsequently turned (after his message was largely rejected by the Jews) weren’t in the body of Christ, either – at least, not until after they actually believed the evangel that was heralded to them.

So in light of what Paul actually meant when he wrote concerning the Jew being “first” in Rom. 1:16, we have reason to believe that his letter to the saints in Rome is just as much “for the body of Christ today” as his later letters. It is only for those outside of the body of Christ that any sort of “Jewish priority” exists, or can exist (which accounts for Paul’s decision to prioritize his Jewish brethren when evangelizing, until he was unable to do so). Within the body of Christ – i.e., among those already evangelized and called by God – Jews and Greeks enjoy the same privileged status.

The benefit of circumcision

A similar mistake is made by those who claim that, because Paul believed there was some value in circumcision (Rom. 2:25; 3:1-2), it means that Israelites within the body of Christ had preeminence over their gentile brethren. However, this understanding – as with the view of those who appeal to what Paul said concerning the Jew being “first” – reflects confusion concerning what was true of Jews and gentiles outside of the body of Christ with what’s true concerning Jews and gentiles within the body of Christ.

Writing to the saints in Galatia (many of whom were gentiles with a pagan, idol-worshipping background), Paul declared the following:

“For whoever are baptized into Christ, put on Christ, in Whom there is no Jew nor yet Greek, there is no slave nor yet free, there is no male and female, for you all are one in Christ Jesus” (Gal. 3:27-28; cf. Col. 3:11).

The words “in Whom” (i.e., in Christ) and “in Christ Jesus” indicate that Paul was not referring to what was true of all Jews or all Greeks at the time he wrote. Rather, the words “in Christ” refer to the spiritual union with Christ that the believers to whom he wrote received when they first heard and believed the evangel of the grace of God. That is, Paul was referring exclusively to what is true of all who are in the body of Christ. Within the body of Christ, all “fleshly” distinctions (whether ethnic, sexual or socio-economic) are – and always have been – irrelevant (2 Cor. 5:16).

In accord with the fact that Jews and gentiles (Greeks) within the body of Christ have an equal standing, Paul made it clear that neither circumcision nor uncircumcision was of any consequence for those to whom he wrote. In Galatians 5:1-6 and 6:12-15 we read the following:

For freedom Christ frees us! Stand firm, then, and be not again enthralled with the yoke of slavery. Lo! I, Paul, am saying to you that if you should be circumcising, Christ will benefit you nothing. Now I am attesting again to every man who is circumcising, that he is a debtor to do the whole law. Exempted from Christ were you who are being justified in law. You fall out of grace. For we, in spirit, are awaiting the expectation of righteousness by faith. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision is availing anything, nor uncircumcision, but faith, operating through love.

Whoever are wanting to put on a fair face in the flesh, these are compelling you to circumcise only that they may not be persecuted for the cross of Christ Jesus. For not even they who are circumcising are maintaining law, but they want you to be circumcised that they should be boasting in that flesh of yours. Now may it not be mine to be boasting, except in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world has been crucified to me, and I to the world. For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is anything, but a new creation.

This means that, within the body of Christ during the “Acts era” of Paul’s ministry, circumcision was of no advantage whatsoever, and those who were circumcised had no advantage over those who were uncircumcised. Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has ever counted for anything within the body of Christ. Those within the body of Christ who were circumcised had no preeminence over those who were uncircumcised. Whether Jew or gentile, all who have believed the evangel that was entrusted to Paul to herald among the nations have been reconciled to God through the cross, and have always had equal access to the Father, in one spirit.

The spiritual benefit of being “of Abraham’s seed”

Just as those holding to the Acts 28 view are mistaken about what Paul had in mind when he wrote of the Jew being “first” (and of the value/benefit of circumcision), so they’re mistaken about why Paul referred to those in the body of Christ as being “of Abraham’s seed” in Galatians 3:29. They see this as evidence that the spiritual blessings being received by believing gentiles in the body of Christ was, during the “Acts era,” dependent on Israel (or based on the new covenant that will be concluded between God and Israel). However, this is not the case at all.

In Paul’s day, there were two distinct companies of saints who, for different (but ultimately related) reasons, could both be referred to as “the seed of Abraham” (and who, together, comprised “the entire seed” to whom “the promise” referred to in Rom. 4:13 is being confirmed):

1. The descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob who constitute the promised offspring of Abraham referred to by God in Genesis 13:14-17, 17:7-10 and elsewhere (and to whom God has promised the land of Canaan as an eonian allotment).

2. Those whom Paul referred to collectively as “the nations” (Rom. 1:13; 11:13, 25; 15:16, 18) and who constituted ”all the ecclesias of the nations” (Rom. 16:4) – i.e., the body of Christ.

It is the first company of saints – i.e., the promised seed of Abraham who are “of the law” (Rom. 4:13) – who comprised the chosen remnant within Israel (Romans 9:6-8; 11:5-7), and whom Paul referred to as “the Israel of God” (Gal. 6:16). Among this company of saints were the “many tens of thousands” of believing Jews who were “all inherently zealous for the law” (Acts 21:20).

With regard to the second company of saints referred to above, we read the following in Galatian 3:27-29:

“For whoever are baptized into Christ, put on Christ, in Whom there is no Jew nor yet Greek, there is no slave nor yet free, there is no male and female, for you all are one in Christ Jesus. Now if you are Christ’s, consequently you are of Abraham’s seed, enjoyers of the allotment according to the promise.”

When Paul referred to being “baptized into Christ,” he had in mind the same spiritual “baptism” referred to elsewhere in his letters that is undergone by everyone who, through faith in the evangel of the Uncircumcision, becomes a member of the body of Christ. In 1 Cor. 12:12-13 and v. 27 we read the following:

“For even as the body is one and has many members, yet all the members of the one body, being many, are one body, thus also is the Christ. For in one spirit also we all are baptized into one body, whether Jews or Greeks, whether slaves or free, and all are made to imbibe one spirit…”

“Now you are the body of Christ, and members of a part…”

The reason Paul could refer to a predominantly Gentile company of saints as “Abraham’s seed” in Gal. 3:29 is because, in Genesis 22:17b-18, Christ alone – and not a plurality of Jewish offspring (as referred to in Gen. 13:14-17 or 17:7-10) – was prophetically referred to as the “seed” or offspring of Abraham. And since every member of the body of Christ is “in Christ” (having been spiritually baptized into Christ, and thus sharing a spiritual union with him), we share his status as “the seed of Abraham.”

Thus, in contrast with those who are among the promised offspring of Abraham referred to by God in Genesis 13:14-17 and elsewhere (and to whom God has promised the land of Canaan as an eonian allotment), our status as “Abraham’s seed” – and the related blessing of being “enjoyers of the allotment according to the promise” (i.e., the blessing referred to in Gen. 22:18, and which Paul identifies as justification by faith) – has nothing to do with our ethnicity/lineage or covenantal standing. Rather, as those who have been “baptized into Christ” (and who are thus members of his body and “one in Christ Jesus”), our status as “Abraham’s seed” comes to us directly through our inseparable, spiritual union with Christ, the singular Seed of Abraham referred to by Paul in Gal. 3:16 and prophesied in Gen. 22:17-18.

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[i] Consider the following sequence of events: 

1. Paul travelled to Jerusalem to become personally acquainted with Peter and the other apostles (as well as James), and stayed with Peter for fifteen days (Acts 9:26-29; Gal. 1:18-19). By this time, the twelve apostles and James were well aware of Paul’s conversion and of the fact that, in Damascus, he’d been heralding the evangel which they’d been heralding since the events of Pentecost in 30 AD. 

2. Paul then left Jerusalem and travelled to Syria and Cilicia, during which time it became well-known among “the ecclesias in Judea” that Paul was “evangelizing the faith which once he ravaged” (Gal. 1:23-24). 

3. Approximately ten to twelve years later, Paul – “in accord with a revelation” – went up to Jerusalem (with Barnabas and Titus) to submit to the apostles and elders there (“those of repute,” e.g., Peter, John and James) the evangel which he had been heralding among the nations since the time of the events referred to in Acts 13:47-49 (Gal. 2:1-2). Evidently, this was done privately, prior to the Jerusalem Conference. 

Based on these facts, we can conclude that the evangel Paul and Barnabas had been heralding among the nations – and which they privately submitted to “those of repute” in Jerusalem – was distinct from the evangel that Paul had been heralding among the Jews prior to the events of Acts 13:47-49 (for it was already well-known to Peter, James and John – as well as among “the ecclesias in Judea” – that Paul believed that Jesus is “the Son of God” and “the Christ,” and had been heralding this truth among the Jews). The reason Paul had to submit the evangel that had been entrusted to him (the evangel of the Uncircumcision) to Peter, James and John is because it was different than (and went beyond) the evangel that God had revealed to Peter (Matt. 16:15-17), and which Paul himself had been heralding exclusively prior to his being “severed” for his ministry to the nations.

Was Israel “set aside” by God at the end of the “Acts period”? (Part one)

According to the doctrinal system known as the “Acts 28” position, the nation of Israel was “set aside” by God when Paul declared the words that we find recorded in Acts 28:25-28. Consider, for example, the following claim by Tom Ballinger:

“In Acts 28:25-28, the Apostle Paul pronounced blindness upon Israel. With this profound pronouncement, God set Israel aside and ceased dealing with them.”[i]

According to Otis Sellers, Paul’s declaration (as recorded in Acts 28:28) “brought about a new dispensation and a radical change in administration.”

In accord with these remarks, Adlai Loudy stated the following:

With the Kingdom door locked and Israel set aside nationally, the Pentecostal Administration, with its Kingdom hope and blessings – the evidential signs, miracles and wonders – “the powers of the future eon” (Hebrews 6:5), and the Readjustment Administration, with its “spiritual endowments” ceased (I Corinthians 13:8-13).[ii]

Another proponent of the Acts 28 theory (Vincent Bennett) referred to Paul’s declaration in Acts 28:25-28 as marking a “crisis” point for Israel. Bennett went on to add that it’s a ”great blunder” to believe that Israel was “set aside before Acts 28:25-28.”[iii]

A.E. Knoch even went so far as to claim that, prior to the time of Paul’s house arrest in Rome, “Israel’s fate was still in the balance.”[iv]

To better understand what’s wrong with this position, let’s consider what Paul actually declared in Acts 28:25-28. Here’s how these verses read in the Concordant Literal New Testament:

Now there being disagreements one with another, they were dismissed, Paul making one declaration, that, “Ideally the holy spirit speaks through Isaiah the prophet, to your fathers, saying,

‘Go to this people and say, “In hearing, you will be hearing, and may by no means be understanding, And observing, you will be observing, and may by no means be perceiving,” For stoutened is the heart of this people, And with their ears heavily they hear, And with their eyes they squint, Lest at some time they may be perceiving with their eyes, And with their ears should be hearing, And with their heart may be understanding, And should be turning about, And I shall be healing them.’

“Let it be known to you, then, that to the nations was dispatched this salvation of God, and they will hear.”

Contrary to the claims of Acts 28 theorists, Paul didn’t say that anything new was taking place (or had taken place) involving Israel as a nation when he quoted from the prophet Isaiah. Rather, Paul’s quotation of Isaiah 6:9-10 simply re-affirmed what had been true of most Israelites for the entirety of his ministry to the nations up to this point. As such, Paul’s words provided further validation of his past and ongoing ministry to the nations (it should also be noted that the prophetic words of Isaiah 6 are said by Paul to have been “ideally” spoken by the holy spirit to the “fathers” of the Jews to whom Paul spoke; only implicitly, or by extension, can the words spoken by Paul be understood as applicable to the Jews of Rome to whom Paul spoke).

Moreover, this isn’t even the first time the prophecy had been quoted since first being spoken through Isaiah. Nearly thirty years before Paul arrived in Rome, Christ had quoted this exact prophecy during his earthly ministry, and declared it to have been “filled up” in all except those few Israelites to whom the “secrets of the kingdom of the heavens” were being given. In Matthew 13:10-15 we read the following:

And, approaching, the disciples say to Him, “Wherefore art Thou speaking in parables to them?” Now, answering, He said to them that “To you has it been given to know the secrets of the kingdom of the heavens, yet to those it has not been given. For anyone who has, to him shall be given, and he shall have a superfluity. Yet anyone who has not, that also which he has shall be taken away from him. Therefore in parables am I speaking to them, seeing that, observing, they are not observing, and hearing, they are not hearing, neither are they understanding. And filled up in them is the prophecy of Isaiah, that is saying,

“‘In hearing, you will be hearing, and may by no means be understanding, and observing, you will be observing, and may by no means be perceiving. For stoutened is the heart of this people, And with their ears heavily they hear, And with their eyes they squint, Lest at some time they may be perceiving with their eyes, And with their ears should be hearing, And with their heart may be understanding, And should be turning about, And I shall be healing them.’

Note the words, “And filled up in them is the prophecy of Isaiah.” The state of affairs that Christ had in mind here was present and ongoing when Christ was speaking (this is indicated by the fact that the word translated “filled up” is in the present indicative). The fact that the words of Isaiah had been “filled up” in the unbelieving Jews of Christ’s day means that the “callousness” and “blindness” that had come upon Israel had already reached a crisis point beyond which there would be no national recovery until sometime after the national judgment of which Christ prophesied elsewhere had come upon Israel. For example, in Matthew 23:32-39 we read that Christ declared the following concerning the unbelieving scribes and Pharisees of his day:

And you! Fill full the measure of your fathers! Serpents! Progeny of vipers! How may you be fleeing from the judging of Gehenna? Therefore, lo! I am dispatching to you prophets and wise men and scribes. Of them, some you will be killing and crucifying, and of them, some you will be scourging in your synagogues and persecuting from city to city, so that on you should be coming all the just blood shed on the earth, from the blood of just Abel until the blood of Zechariah, son of Berechiah, whom you murder between the temple and the altar. Verily, I am saying to you: All these things will be arriving on this generation.

Jerusalem! Jerusalem! who art killing the prophets and pelting with stones those who have been dispatched to her! How many times do I want to assemble your children in the manner a hen is assembling her brood under her wings-and you will not! Lo! left is your house to you desolate. For I am saying to you: You may by no means be perceiving Me henceforth, till you should be saying, ‘Blessed is He Who is coming in the name of the Lord!’

In Luke 19:41-44 we read that Christ declared the following concerning Israel’s impending national judgment:

And as He draws near, perceiving the city, He laments over it, saying that, “If you knew, even you, and surely in this day, what is for your peace-! Yet now it was hid from your eyes, for the days will be arriving on you, and your enemies will be casting up a rampart about you, and will be surrounding you, and will be pressing you everywhere, and will be leveling you and your children in you, and they will not be leaving a stone on a stone in you, because you knew not the era of your visitation.”

From these verses it’s clear that there would be no national repentance or national recovery for Israel until sometime after the judgment of which Christ spoke had taken place. Thus, contrary to A.E. Knoch’s perplexing claim that “Israel’s fate was still in the balance” before Paul arrived to Rome (or began writing letters from Rome), Christ himself made it known nearly 30 years earlier what Israel’s “fate” would be: the nation was going to be severely judged before being saved at the time of his return.

Paul, too, understood that future judgment for the nation of Israel was inevitable. For example, in 1 Thess. 2:14-16 we read the following:

For you became imitators, brethren, of the ecclesias of God which are in Judea in Christ Jesus. For you suffered the same, even you by your own fellowtribesmen, according as they also by the Jews, who kill the Lord Jesus as well as the prophets, and banish us, and are not pleasing to God, and are contrary to all men, forbidding us to speak to the nations that they may be saved, to fill up their sins always. Yet the indignation outstrips to them to a consummation.

When Paul referred to “the Jews” in this passage, he was referring to the Jewish people in a general sense – i.e., the majority of those who comprised the nation of Israel in his day. It was to them that “the indignation outstrips…to a consummation” (the word translated “outstrips” means “comes before” or “arrives ahead of time”).

At the time that Paul wrote these words, he knew that a divine judgment was soon going to come upon the nation of Israel (and which, like Israel’s previous national judgment, would be in accord with God’s covenant with Israel). And we know that, in 70 AD – which was approximately 20 years after Paul wrote the above words – God’s indignation was poured out on the nation of Israel through the instrumentality of Rome.[v]

Thus, the very fact that Paul got the lukewarm response that he did when speaking to “the foremost of the Jews” in Rome presupposes that Isaiah’s prophecy had already been “filled up” concerning the majority of Israelites. Paul’s declaration in Acts 28:25-28 did not affect or manifest any “dispensational change” for Israel; rather, it was simply a re-affirmation of the truth that Christ had made known concerning Israel approximately three decades prior. For approximately 30 years it had been a revealed fact that judgment awaited the nation of Israel (and that, therefore, no amount of apostolic evangelism would “turn the tide” and prevent this judgment from taking place).

The casting away of Israel

Now, as is evident from the claims made by the three men I quoted at the start of this article, it’s common for proponents of the Acts 28 theory to refer to Israel as having been “set aside” at the time referred to in Acts 28:25-28. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever read a defense or explanation of the Acts 28 position in which Israel isn’t referred to as having been “set aside,” “put aside” or “placed in abeyance” by God at this time. What makes the frequent use of these expressions by Acts 28 proponents so puzzling is the fact that none of these expressions actually occur anywhere in the Greek Scriptures.

The only scriptural expression that even comes close to the expressions used by the authors quoted earlier is found in Romans 11:15, and is translated “their casting away” in the Concordant Literal New Testament. To better understand who Paul had in mind by his use of the word “their,” let’s consider the immediate context in which the expression “their casting away” is found. In Romans 11:7-15 we read the following:

What then? What Israel is seeking for, this she did not encounter, yet the chosen encountered it. Now the rest were calloused, even as it is written, God gives them a spirit of stupor, eyes not to be observing, and ears not to be hearing, till this very day.

And David is saying, Let their table become a trap and a mesh, and a snare and a repayment to them: Darkened be their eyes, not to be observing, and their backs bow together continually.

I am saying, then, Do they not trip that they should be falling? May it not be coming to that! But in their offense is salvation to the nations, to provoke them to jealousy.

Now if their offense is the world's riches and their discomfiture the nations' riches, how much rather that which fills them! Now to you am I saying, to the nations, in as much as, indeed, then, I am the apostle of the nations, I am glorifying my dispensation, if somehow I should be provoking those of my flesh to jealousy and should be saving some of them. For if their casting away is the conciliation of the world, what will the taking back be if not life from among the dead?[vi]

Notice how, in verses 7-8, Paul had two groups of Israelites in view. The first group that’s mentioned (and which Paul referred to as “Israel,” “she” and “the rest”) was comprised of the majority of those who constituted the nation of Israel in Paul’s day. This group of Israelites is contrasted with a smaller group who are referred to as “the chosen” (in v. 5, Paul referred to this smaller group of Israelites as “a remnant according to the choice of grace”). It is these un-calloused, believing Israelites whom Christ had earlier referred to as the “little flock” (Luke 12:32; cf. Matt. 10:6 and 15:24, where Christ referred to unbelieving Israelites collectively as “the lost sheep of the house of Israel”).

The larger, un-chosen group of Israelites (i.e., “the rest”) are said to have been “calloused” and given “a spirit of stupor, eyes not observing, and ears not to be hearing, till this very day” (this “calloused” condition was one in which an Israelite had been made insensitive and unreceptive to the truth concerning Jesus’ Messianic identity). Paul went on to refer to the calloused, “non-remnant” group of Israelites – who, again, constituted the majority of Israelites in Paul’s day – with the words “they” and “their” in the next verses, all the way to verse 15. Thus, when Paul wrote of “their casting away” in v. 15, he had in view the “casting away” of the majority of Israelites that constituted the nation of Israel in his day.

We can therefore conclude that, by the time Paul wrote to the saints in Rome, the majority of Israelites (being “calloused” and in unbelief) had been “cast away” by God.

But what, exactly, does it mean for Israel to be cast away? In a past article I argued that the state of affairs that Paul associates with the casting away of Israel – i.e., “the conciliation of the world” – is a state of affairs that involves the nations, collectively, being placed in a position of divine favor (where God’s kindness is being enjoyed). Conversely, the “casting away” of Israel can be understood as a state of affairs that involves the majority of Israelites being in a position of divine disfavor. In Paul’s day, this meant that divine judgment upon the nation of Israel was imminent (as is expressed in the words of 1 Thess. 2:16: “Yet the indignation outstrips to them to a consummation”).

This understanding of both “the conciliation of the world” and the “casting away” of Israel is confirmed by what Paul went on to write in Rom. 11:16-24. In these verses, both of these states of affairs are figuratively represented in an olive tree parable. The “cultivated olive tree” represents a position of divine favor (for it’s in the olive tree that God’s “kindness” – rather than his “severity” – is being experienced; see Rom. 11:22). The “natural boughs” that remained in the olive tree represent the believing Jewish remnant (the “chosen” Israelites referred to in Rom. 11:5-7), while the boughs that were “broken out” represent the majority of Israelites. In contrast with both the broken-out boughs and the remaining boughs, the “wild olive” bough that was “grafted into the cultivated olive tree” represents the nations, collectively (who, while grafted in, are experiencing God’s kindness, and being spared from the judgments that will come upon the world after the body of Christ has been removed from the earth).

Now, just as we read in Rom. 11:15 that “their casting away is the conciliation of the world,” so Paul is clear that the broken-out natural boughs were removed in order that the wild olive bough could be grafted in (Paul has the wild olive bough make this point in v. 19: “Boughs are broken out that I may be grafted in”). Had the “natural boughs” not been “broken out,” the “wild olive” bough couldn’t have been “grafted in.” Thus, the grafting in of the “wild olive” bough (the nations) into the “cultivated olive tree” (the position of divine favor) represents “the conciliation of the world,” and necessarily depended on (and began after) the “casting away” of Israel. Since the removal of some of the natural boughs undoubtedly represents what Paul earlier called “their [non-remnant Israel’s] casting away,” we can conclude the following: the state of affairs involving the nations that is being figuratively represented in Paul’s olive tree parable was made possible by the casting away of non-remnant Israel. It therefore follows that the casting away of non-remnant Israel took place before Paul wrote his letter to the saints in Rome.

This understanding is actually evident from the very expression “their casting away is the conciliation of the world.” The wording here indicates that the conciliation of the world is a state of affairs that resulted from the casting away of Israel (and that it will continue only for as long as the casting away of Israel continues/remains in effect). And since the conciliation of the world coincided with Paul’s ministry to and among the nations, it follows that the casting away of the majority of Israelites had to have taken place before Paul’s ministry among the nations began.

This understanding is further confirmed by what Paul went on to write in Romans 11:28, where we read the following: “As to the evangel, indeed, they are enemies because of you…”  By “they” Paul meant the majority of Israelites. By “you” Paul meant the nations. But in what sense were the majority of Israelites enemies because of the nations? Answer: their calloused and “cast away” condition – which is what made them “enemies…as to the evangel” – was what made “the conciliation of the world” possible.

Now, as noted earlier, Acts 28 theorists believe that Israel was not “set aside” until after Paul arrived in Rome. However, according to Paul’s olive tree parable, the “natural boughs” that represent non-remnant Israel (the majority of Israelites) had already been “broken out” of the olive tree (and the “wild olive” bough representing the nations had already been “grafted in”) before Paul even stepped foot in Rome. Thus, with regard to this state of affairs involving the status of Israel, nothing changed after Paul arrived in Rome as a prisoner. “Callousness, in part” continued on Israel, and continues to this day. The only “part” of Israel that wasn’t calloused (and hadn’t been cast away by God) at the time when Paul wrote Romans was the chosen remnant.

This means that, if any part of Israel was “set aside” by God after Paul arrived in Rome, it would have to have been this group of chosen, believing Israelites. But there is no indication that the declaration of Paul recorded in Acts 28:25-28 had any effect at all on the believing Israelites who constituted the chosen, believing remnant in Paul’s day. Even after the words of Acts 28:25-28 were spoken by Paul, the believing Jewish remnant – i.e., those who comprised what Paul referred to in Galatians 6:16 as “the Israel of God” – continued to exist as a chosen, set-apart people, and everything written about them elsewhere in the Greek Scriptures (e.g., in the letter to the Hebrews or Peter’s two letters) remained true. This company of saints was by no means “cast away” by God. Whatever status this company of saints had just before the words of Acts 28:25-28 were spoken is the same status this company of saints had immediately after these words were spoken.

It should be emphasized that Paul didn’t understand the casting away of Israel to be permanent. Paul’s previous denial that Israel had tripped “that they should be falling” was essentially a denial that Israel’s “offense” would prevent the nation from ever being saved in the future (and that their condition was thus irreversible). This denial by Paul echoes what he wrote at the start of this chapter. In Rom. 11:1 we read the following:

“I am saying, then, Does not God thrust away His people? May it not be coming to that!”

Since Paul would go on to affirm that the “casting away” of the majority of Israelites had already occurred (v. 15), we can conclude that the expression “thrust away” in the above verse implies a permanent rejection of Israel by God. But Paul is clear that this wasn’t (and couldn’t be) the case. Even when the nation of Israel was, in the past, severely judged by God for her sins (i.e., when Jerusalem was overthrown and the temple destroyed in 586 BC by the Babylonians), Israel continued to be God’s chosen nation. And the same was true in Paul’s day (when national judgment for Israel was, once again, an impending event). God’s judgment of Israel – no matter how severe – does not imply a nullification of Israel’s “chosen status,” or of the nation’s prophesied, covenant-based expectation. Paul makes this fact clear in Romans 11:25-29:

For I am not willing for you to be ignorant of this secret, brethren, lest you may be passing for prudent among yourselves, that callousness, in part, on Israel has come, until the complement of the nations may be entering. And thus all Israel shall be saved, according as it is written,

Arriving out of Zion shall be the Rescuer. He will be turning away irreverence from Jacob. And this is my covenant with them Whenever I should be eliminating their sins.

As to the evangel, indeed, they are enemies because of you, yet, as to choice, they are beloved because of the fathers. For unregretted are the graces and the calling of God.

When Paul wrote that “callousness, in part, on Israel has come,” he was referring to Israel as a nation comprised of both a calloused, unbelieving majority and an un-calloused minority (“the chosen”). Although the majority who comprised the nation of Israel were “as to the evangel…enemies because of [the nations],” they remained, “as to choice…beloved because of the fathers.” Note that Israel remains “beloved” by God even during the time of “their casting away.” The unbelief (and resultant “casting away”) of the majority of Israelites didn’t – and couldn’t – change the fact that the nation remains chosen and beloved by God. However, as is evident from what we read in Romans 11:25-27, it’s clear that Paul didn’t foresee any change in the calloused condition of the majority of Israelites “until the complement of the nations” had entered (and there is no indication that Paul had any idea of how long this interval would be).[vii]

Provoking Israel to jealousy

Paul’s words in Romans 11:11-14 concerning the provocation of Israel to jealousy are sometimes appealed to by proponents of the Acts 28 position in support of the view that Israel had not yet been “set aside” at this time in Paul’s ministry. It’s claimed by the Acts 28 proponent that, by provoking Israel to jealousy, Paul’s hope was that the state of affairs referred to by Peter in Acts 3:19-21 – i.e., Israel’s repentance and revival as a nation – would be brought about. However, what Paul wrote concerning the provoking of those of his flesh to jealousy actually presupposes that the casting away of Israel had already occurred, and that divine judgment – and not national repentance and revival – was imminent for Israel.

After denying that Israel’s offense would prevent the nation from being saved in the future, Paul went on to reveal that one of the results of the state of affairs that Israel’s offense had made possible – i.e., salvation coming “to the nations” – was the provoking of Israel (“them” – i.e., the unbelieving majority within the nation) to “jealousy.” In fact, Paul said that he glorified his “dispensation” so that this would happen. But what did Paul mean by provoking Israel “to jealousy?”

Answer: What Paul wrote in Romans 10:19 indicates that the “jealousy” to which he referred in Rom. 11:11 was entirely negative in nature. In this verse we read the following:

“But, I am saying, Did not Israel know at all? First Moses is saying, I shall be provoking you to jealousy over those not a nation; over an unintelligent nation shall I be vexing you.”

Here it’s evident that the “jealousy” to which Israel was being provoked involved their being “vexed” by God. And not only this, but the immediate context of the verse that Paul was quoting (i.e., Deut. 32:21) makes it clear that, at the time when God would be provoking Israel to jealousy and vexing them, their judgment would be imminent. Here’s how Deut. 32:19-28 reads in the CVOT:

Yahweh saw and spurned them because of the vexation caused by His sons and His daughters. And he said: Let Me conceal My face from them; I shall examine what their latter days are to be. For they are a wayward generation, sons with no faithfulness in them. As for them, they make Me jealous with a non-el. They provoke Me to vexation with their idols of vanity. As for Me, I shall make them jealous with a non-people; with a decadent nation shall I cause them vexation. For a fire will be kindled by My anger, and it shall glow unto the unseen beneath; it shall devour the earth and its crop, and it shall set aflame the foundations of the mountains. 

I shall cause evils to sweep up over them; I shall exhaust My arrows among them who are gaunt with famine, fought by pestilence and bitter sting: Even the tooth of beasts shall I send among them along with the venom of skulkers of the soil. From the outside, the sword shall bereave, and from the chambers, the dread of war, even for the man in his prime, even for the virgin, the suckling along with the grey-haired man. I would say: I might blow them away, I might eradicate their remembrance from mortals, unless I shrank away from the vexation of the enemy; lest their foes misconstrue, lest they say: Our hand is high, and it was not Yahweh Who contrived all this. 

Thus, Paul understood his dispensation to the nations as a means through which God’s words in Deut. 32:21 (the context of which concerns the judgment of Israel) would be fulfilled.

What confirms this understanding of the negative nature of the “jealousy” of which we read in Romans 11:11, 14 is that, in the only two instances where we explicitly read of Israelites being provoked to jealousy as a result of Paul’s ministry, the reaction of the Jews is entirely negative and hostile. In Acts 13:44-45 and 49-50 we read the following:

Now on the coming sabbath almost the entire city was gathered to hear the word of the Lord. Yet the Jews, perceiving the throngs, are filled with jealousy, and they contradicted the things spoken by Paul, blaspheming.

Now the word of the Lord was carried through the whole country. Yet the Jews spur on the reverent, respectable women, and the foremost ones of the city, and rouse up persecution for Paul and Barnabas, and they ejected them from their boundaries.

In Acts 17:4-5 we find another example of the Jews being provoked to jealousy:

And some of them are persuaded, and were allotted to Paul and Silas, both a vast multitude of the reverent Greeks, and of the foremost women not a few.

Now the Jews, being jealous and taking to themselves some wicked men of the loafers and making up a mob, made a tumult in the city, and, standing by the house of Jason, they sought to lead them before the populace.

We can therefore conclude that it wasn’t Paul expectation that the majority of those being provoked to jealousy would become more receptive to the evangel he was heralding among the nations. Nor was it Paul’s expectation that the provoking of his Jewish brethren to jealousy would lead to national repentance for Israel. Instead, Paul knew that the fulfillment of Deut. 32:21 pointed to an approaching divine judgment.

But what, then, was the connection between the “jealousy” to which Israel was being provoked in response to Paul’s ministry, and the salvation of which he wrote in Rom. 11:14? For Paul clearly believed that the provoking of “those of his flesh” to jealousy would (or at least had the potential to) result in the salvation of “some of them.” Paul doesn’t explain what, exactly, the connection is. However, it’s possible that Paul expected that some Jews would realize that Israel’s negative reaction to his ministry pointed to an imminent and prophesied divine judgment that was coming upon the nation (in fact, Paul may have appealed to the very state of affairs that his ministry among the nations was bringing about – i.e., the provoking of Israel to jealousy – to call attention to what’s prophesied in Deut. 32 and elsewhere). This sobering realization would, in turn, make some unbelieving Jews more receptive to the truth about Jesus’ Messianic identity that Paul was heralding in the synagogues.

In any case, what needs to be emphasized here is that Paul clearly did not anticipate the majority of Israelites being saved during the time of his apostolic ministry. Paul knew that the state of affairs involving “callousness, in part” being on Israel would not end until the “complement of the nations” had entered (Rom. 11:25-28). Until this time came, Paul evidently saw the un-calloused Jewish remnant as God’s pledge that he had not “thrust away His people” (11:1-2), and that the callousness which was (and remains) upon the nation of Israel would not be permanent.

Although the state of affairs that Paul referred to as “their casting away” in Romans 11:15 was indeed national in scope (since it affected the majority of Israelites), there were still some Jews in Paul’s day whose hearts hadn’t been calloused by God, and who were still receptive to the evangel of the Circumcision when it was heralded to them (and who, by believing, were added to the believing remnant to which Paul referred in Romans 11). It’s these unbelieving (but un-calloused) Jews that Paul had in mind when he spoke of “saving some of them” (Rom. 11:14). 

For part two, click here: https://thathappyexpectation.blogspot.com/2025/02/was-israel-set-aside-by-god-at-end-of_14.html

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[i] https://www.biblestudentsnotebook.com/bsn847.pdf 

[ii] https://www.biblestudentsnotebook.com/bsn497.pdf 

[iii] https://bereanbiblesociety.org/the-dispensation-of-the-mystery/ 

[iv] See Knoch’s remarks on 1 Cor. 13:12 in his Concordant Commentary on the New Testament (page 261). 

[v] A.E. Knoch’s comments on 2 Thess. 2:16 include the following helpful remarks: 

The Jews, with all their advantages and their divine ritual, suffer a foretaste of God's indignation as it will be displayed in the day of the Lord. After the siege of Jerusalem under Titus, their temple was destroyed, their city razed and their whole polity brought to an end. When they go back to their land and establish their religious rites again they are meeting the more disastrous indignation of Jehovah. 

[vi] According to Gunn in his “Exegesis of Romans 11:11-24,” “The γάρ that introduces verse 15 signifies that the following section is an explanation of the salvation that is to come to Israel” (https://www.shasta.edu/uploads/1/6/7/0/16705804/romans11v11-24.pdf). But what is the connection between what Paul wrote in verses 13-14 and verse 15? 

According to some commentaries, Paul’s words in verses 13-14 are to be understood as a digression or parenthetical remark. The Expositor’s Greek Testament, for example, sees verses 13-14 as a digression, and states that it’s in verse 15 that “Paul reverts to the ideas of Romans 11:12” (Romans 11 Expositor's Greek Testament). Another understanding of the connection between verses 13-15 is that Paul was providing his readers with his motivation for attempting to save “some” of his kinsmen. Because there is eventually going to be a “taking back” of Israel by God, Paul knew that his efforts to try and save “some” of those belonging to the calloused nation would not be in vain. In view of God’s future purpose for Israel (which will involve “taking back” the nation), God had preserved a remnant in the “current era.”  

Since Paul knew that not all Israelites had been calloused (but had instead been graciously chosen by God to believe the truth concerning Christ’s identity), he had reason to believe that at least “some” unbelieving Israelites would be receptive to his testimony concerning Christ, and may come to believe the truth and be saved. And given Paul’s own Jewish background and his deep love for his brethren according to the flesh (Romans 9:1-5; 10:1), it’s no surprise that, on the Sabbath, he and Barnabas made it a point to visit the local synagogue of whatever city they were in and testify concerning Christ. 

[vii] The interval of time during which Israel remains calloused and people from among the nations are entering into the body of Christ (and which will end when ”the complement of the nations” has entered, and the body of Christ has thus been completed) is also implied in Romans 9:22-24. In these verses we read the following: 

Now if God, wanting to display His indignation and to make His powerful doings known, carries, with much patience, the vessels of indignation, adapted for destruction, it is that He should also be making known the riches of His glory on the vessels of mercy, which He makes ready before for glory -- us, whom He calls also, not only out of the Jews, but out of the nations also. 

According to what we read in these verses, the reason for God’s delay in displaying his indignation and making “his powerful doings known” to the “vessels of indignation” (as he’ll be doing during the “day of the Lord,” when God resumes his prophesied purpose for Israel) is so that he might reveal “the riches of his glory” to those in the body of Christ (who are being called out of both the Jews and the nations).