The Fullness of God’s Salvation (Romans 11:25–27)
Romans 11:25–27 provokes many questions for students of the Bible, including the phrase “And in this way all Israel will be saved” (Rom 11:26), which one commentator calls “the storm center in the interpretation of Rom. 9–11.”1
The following is but one attempt to summarize these questions and provide some answers.
Romans 11:25
- What is the mystery?
- What is the nature of Israel’s partial hardening?
- What is the fullness of the Gentiles?
- When will this fullness come in?
Romans 11:26a
- What is the meaning of “in this way”?
- Who is Israel?
- Who is all of Israel?
- When exactly will all Israel be saved?
Romans 11:26b–27
- What verses are being quoted?
- Who is the Deliverer?
- Why does Paul change Isaiah’s preposition to say that the Deliverer comes “from” instead of “to” Zion?
An article of roughly 500 words can barely explain its conclusions. Nonetheless, the conclusions that follow seem, at least to me, to be fairly clear if one has worked hard to understand Romans 11 up to this point. (And even then, good men disagree.) The whole chapter is primarily about how God will save Israel in the future.
Romans 11:25
If the “mystery” here is something new, we already know that part of Israel is hardened (cf. Rom 11:7) and that the Gentiles are being saved (cf. Rom 11:11, 15. 22) until God has achieved their salvation “fullness” (quantitatively and qualitatively; cf. Rom 11:12 with 9:4–5). The mystery has to do with something else—timing, namely, that God will not save all of national Israel “until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.” When God’s salvation fullness for the Gentiles is complete, the mystery is that then, after that, God will save national Israel.
Romans 11:26a
“In this way” refers to God’s manner of saving Israel, but this “way” refers to the timeframe of Romans 11:25. “In this way,” then, means that God saves Gentiles first, then “all Israel will be saved.” And “All Israel” is national Israel—not every single Israelite from all time, every Israelite that makes up the remnant, every “true, spiritual Israelite” who might be an ethnic Gentile or ethnic Jew, and definitely not national Israelites who have a special way to God apart from Jesus Christ. Just as Paul has already referred to national Israel ten times in Romans 9–11 (Rom 9:6, 27, 31; 10:19, 21; 11:2, 7, 25), one instance being in the verse immediately prior to this verse, so also this verse refers to Israel as corporate, national Israel. This Israel will be saved at Christ’s return.
Romans 11:26b–27
Paul grounds the truth of Israel’s salvation and its future timing in a combination of Isaiah 27:9 (“when I take away their sins”), Isaiah 59:20–21 (the rest of the quotation in Romans 11:26b–27), and maybe Psalm 14:7 or Psalm 110:2 (because Paul changes Isaiah’s “to Zion” to “from Zion”). In context, the Deliverer is Christ who, at His second coming, saves the entirety of national Israel in fulfillment of the New Covenant (cf. Jer 31:31–34). He and His salvation either come from earthly Zion (Jerusalem) because that is there where He died and arose, or He comes from heavenly Zion (heaven) as He descends to save His nation (cf. Heb 12:22).
The manner and method of God’s salvation for Jews and Gentiles is beyond our capability to plan or comprehend. To God be all the glory! (Romans 11:33–36)
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- Douglas J. Moo, The Epistle to the Romans (NICNT; Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1996), 719. [↩]