Sermon: Will the Jews be Saved?

10th grade was a real turning point for me. I had always been a rather mediocre student. Like many boys, I had trouble paying attention and staying still. Somehow, largely because of two wonderful teachers Mrs. Evelyn Stopak and Mrs. Christine Weiss who taught English and history, I opened up to the world of learning and knowledge. I got close to these teachers. They were both Jewish. One day at lunch I was talking with a friend about my admiration for them and the friend, a member of a very rigid fundamentalist Christen sect, said to me. “It’s really a shame they won’t be going to heaven”. I felt like I had been kicked in the stomach. My church didn’t talk that way and I felt very uncomfortable with the concept.

Today’s lesson from Romans finds Paul ruminating about the issue too. Paul’s mission always began with the synagogue, the Jewish gathering place, wherever he roamed through out the Mediterranean world. His mission, the mission Jesus gave to his disciples was to the people of Judea first.

I think we forget that the church began as an offshoot of Judaism. The technical term is “sect”, a sect of Judaism. We still read and revere as God’s Holy world the Hebrew Scriptures. Jesus himself was and is still Jewish. Our roots and the roots of Israel are inextricably intertwined. They always will be. In some ways it is a “Gordian Knot” we cannot untie.

In chapter 9-11 of Romans Paul tries to explain the mystery and give Divine reason and purpose to Israel’s refusal to accept the Messiah. Paul notes in chapter 11, verse 25-36 that God isn’t finished with the Jews. Paul writes, “So that you may not claim to be wiser then you are, brothers and sisters, I want you to understand this mystery: a hardening has come upon part of Israel until the full number of the Gentiles has come in. And so all Israel will be saved….” Note well that Paul says “All Israel will be saved”. They are grandfathered in, (to use a modern phrase) because as he says in today’s lesson: “they are Israelites and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenant, the giving of the law, the worship and the promises; to them belong the patriarchs, and from them according to the flesh comes the Messiah…

Jesus manifested God’s ultimate Word to Israel and to the world. Scripture says that Jesus is the fulfilling of the Law. A seminary professor of mine once wrote “Jesus is the fulfillment of God’s ultimate will and purpose. God said “Show the people what Divine love looks like. Love them withhold nothing. even if they kill you.” His words are a thumbnail sketch of exactly what did happen. Jesus showed them what love means and does, and they could not accept it.

The law sets up a dichotomy. It sets a very high standard for ethical behavior and inevitably those who try to adhere to these very high standards feel proud of their achievement and feel disdain and a certain contempt for those who do not. Israel loved the law and the law – because God is spirit and by definition not physical – the law was the expression of God’s will and reality. The law was God to them.

Jesus enters and supplants the law and extends it. The law’s first value is justice; the first value of Jesus is mercy and compassion. Jesus automatically went to the weakest and the most in need of healing right away. Those with palsied arms and legs were healed. The blind given sight, the mute speech, the deaf hearing.

Then Jesus, even more astoundingly, goes to those who are morally weak and in most need of healing. To those who had betrayed their country and their nation by collecting taxes and collaborating with the Roman enemies – he spends time, eats with them (a big social faux pas to pious Jews), pronounces forgiveness to them - thereby healing and restoring them to the community. He treats prostitutes and alcoholics the same way. Whoever and whatever the infirmity Jesus goes right away to the neediest and heals them, One of my favorite of Jesus’ one liners, Jesus’ sound bites are his words of response to those who accuse him of associating with the untouchables: he says, “those who are not sick have no need of a physician.”

His behavior shocked and antagonized many in Israel, yet some got his message. His behavior and his power – the miracle of creating food to feed the multitudes out of five barley loaves and two fish, his healing, his calming of the storm on the sea of Galilee – all these authenticated, for those who saw them that this man and God were somehow uniquely bonded.

Israel can be forgiven if she has trouble accepting Jesus. There are times when all of us have our doubts and moments or period of unbelief.

Jesus also said “the Son of Man did not come into the world to condemn the world but that the world might be saved through him”.

Another favorite seminary professor of mine, Eric Gritsch, who lives here in Baltimore now, wrote these words in 1983:

The Jews are God’s people. God called and loved them from the time of Abraham. God will work out things. We as a Christian community should look for ways to dialogue with them, work with them in acts of charity, mercy and love, and find ways we can worship together. We are one family.

At our best, we Lutherans acknowledge this. There is a beautiful prayer that we say on Good Friday. Let me read it for you.