A True Follower of Christ Can Never Hate Jews – All Israel Will Be Saved

By John Earp

Romans 11:22 NIV Consider therefore the kindness and sternness of God: sternness to those who fell, but kindness to you, provided that you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off. 23 And if they do not persist in unbelief, they will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. 24 After all, if you were cut out of an olive tree that is wild by nature, and contrary to nature were grafted into a cultivated olive tree, how much more readily will these, the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree!

All Israel Will Be Saved

25 I do not want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brothers and sisters, so that you may not be conceited: Israel has experienced a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in, 26 and in this way all Israel will be saved. As it is written:

“The deliverer will come from Zion;

he will turn godlessness away from Jacob.

27 And this is my covenant with them

when I take away their sins.”

28 As far as the gospel is concerned, they are enemies for your sake; but as far as election is concerned, they are loved on account of the patriarchs, 29 for God’s gifts and his call are irrevocable. 30 Just as you who were at one time disobedient to God have now received mercy as a result of their disobedience, 31 so they too have now become disobedient in order that they too may now receive mercy as a result of God’s mercy to you. 32 For God has bound everyone over to disobedience so that he may have mercy on them all.

The conditionality of God’s promises under both the old and the new covenant in Scripture is plainly shown. Just being born of Abraham’s descendants never guaranteed acceptance by God in His chosen, special, holy people. This is true in both the Law of Moses as well as under the Gospel of Jesus Christ.

Unfortunately, down through the centuries, even to our day, many who considered themselves Christians have adopted antisemitism. Indeed, Martin Luther, the notable Reformer of the 1500s, became infamous for his hateful words against the Jews after they refused to hear his message of justification by faith. So-called ‘Saint’ Augustine, in the 400s, held similar anti-Jewish sentiment. Unfortunately, he became the single-most influential theologian in Western Christianity, both Catholic and Protestant.

To be sure, the people of Israel have in large part rejected their Messiah, Jesus, who came to His own people, but was not received by them for the most part. In Romans 9, 10, and 11, Paul, who himself was of Jewish lineage, a former teacher of the Law who persecuted the church in its early days but was gloriously saved by Christ after his encounter with Him on the Damascus Road, makes it clear that yes, the people of Israel have in large part rejected their Messiah, Jesus, but never once in these inspired writings do we find anything like, “And now God has nothing further to do with Israel,” much less, something like, “Jews need to be exterminated from the Earth,” as Adolf Hitler wickedly tried to do.

To the contrary, the inspired writings of the New Testament, while making clear that Gentiles are not required to become Jewish and keep the Law of Moses in order to receive the Messiah (Christ) as Lord and Savior, and while firmly warning against any teaching of “the works of the Law” as necessary to anyone’s salvation under the New Covenant, always presents Israel as still called by God to himself, for God’s gifts and callings are without repentance, meaning, God hasn’t changed his mind about his calling of Israel to Himself, and that once the fullness of the Gentiles (non-Jews) is saved, there will be a large number of Jews who believe on Jesus as Messiah and Lord, and thus, “All Israel shall be saved.”

Paul said his heart’s desire is that Israel would be saved, acknowledged that a hardening in large measure against the gospel had occurred to them, but that God yet has a divine calling and plan of salvation waiting for them, when they look to the One whom they pierced, and mourn for Him as an only Son.