Interpreting Romans 10:4 with Jim Staley

We as Christians have radically butchered up and majorly misunderstood what Paul is saying in Romans 10:4, when he says, "4 Christ is the end of the law for righteousness." We have almost created blasphemy, my friends. It's that serious. The entire Christian Church is wrong on this issue, and we're going to prove it right after this. Hello, everyone. Jim Staley, Passion for Truth Ministries, and welcome to today's broadcast where we are unpacking, layer by layer, verse by verse, every single scripture in the book of Romans, the systematic book of theology according to Christian standards. We are unpacking it, discovering the gap, and trying to narrow the gap from first-century original Hebraic understanding, the way that Paul meant it when he penned it, versus the 21st-century Western, Greco-Roman seminary perspective, where we kind of tend to read into it what we already believe based on the lack of knowledge, quite honestly, of understanding first-century Judaism. And that's what this channel is all about. We are trying to understand the scriptures the way they were written so that we can impute them into our life, absorb the Scriptures, the power of the Word of God, and then live it out. Because, quite frankly, we do what we believe. So if we believe something that's not true, we then will do it. And unfortunately, sometimes we can displease God in the process. And if you are a believer like me that really wants to serve God with all of our heart, mind, soul, and strength, we need to know what He wants from us. And that's what this basic instruction before leaving Earth, the Bible, B-I-B-L-E, is all about. So that's what we're doing here, and we appreciate you coming along for the journey. So let's dive right in. Let's go over to Romans, chapter 10, verse 1, and let's see what Paul has to say today. All right, here we go, “1 Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved. 2 For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. 3 For being ignorant of God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own righteousness, they have not submitted to the righteousness of God." All right, well, we're gonna stop right there for just a moment because we've got a powerhouse of a scripture coming up here in verse 4. I'm even gonna hide it for you so you don't see it because we're going to spend quite a bit of time on chapter 10, verse 4. But before we do, I want you to understand Paul's understanding of these first three verses. He says that his prayer to God is that Israel would be saved. Now he's defining Israel, of course, as the known Israel of the day, which was not all of Israel. It was just the house of Judah . Remember, back in 722 BC, there were two kingdoms. There was the house of Israel in the north, that was the 10 tribes called the House of Ephraim or Jacob, and then the house of Judah in the south, which was Benjamin and Judah, those two tribes with Levites scattered amongst them. And when 722 BC came along and the northern kingdom was divorced, that just left the house of Judah as being called Israel. They went into captivity in Babylon for 70 years and came back under Nehemiah and rebuilt Jerusalem. So, everyone that was in modern-day Jerusalem, or Israel, at the time in the first century, was Jewish. They were not Israelites any longer. They were from the house of Judah. This is critical and very important to understand. If you're going to understand the rest of the scriptures in the New Testament and what the New Covenant is all about, you must understand the two houses of Israel and how they operate as one, what the new man is, how the Gentiles are grafted into all of this, that all of this is not about Gentiles. This is not about a Gentile covenant. There's no such thing as a Gentile covenant. As a matter of fact, I would encourage you, if this is a new concept for you, watch the teaching above called "Identity Crisis." It really is probably one of the best teachings that we have ever put out here that has radically impacted millions of people's lives around the planet in multiple languages, recognizing, or I should say, detailing the two houses of Israel, how they fit together in the new covenant, and how the Gentiles are grafted in. It's really critical that we know this. So what's happening here in verses 1 through 3 is Paul recognizes that he wants his own brethren, the house of Judah that exists in that time period, to be saved. That he knows that the Jewish people in that time period, they understood that there was a righteousness that comes from the law, right? Because God said there is righteousness. You are righteous if you keep the law, but they did not have the concept that there was another righteousness. No matter how righteous they become, no matter how much they keep God's commandments, they cannot pay their debt in full. They will not make it into the kingdom without faith. When we couple faith with keeping God's commandments, we find ourselves inside of covenant. That's true connection to God. So in verse 1, okay, not for one minute did Paul—this is important—not one minute did Paul think that their rejection of Christ somehow closed the door on their status as God's chosen people or that He had now cast away His people. This is a common misunderstanding and an accusation in modern-day Christianity today, that somehow the Jewish people were chosen, not even understanding that the Jewish people weren't chosen. It was Israel, all of Israel, that was chosen, and that somehow, because the southern kingdom of Judah in the first century rejected Christ, that somehow Christ is now canceling the eternal covenant that He made with them. They're no longer His people. They no longer have any promises. There's no longer any connection, and He now chooses these Gentiles. Nothing could be further from the truth. If you go to Jeremiah 31, what you discover in verse 31 is that there is only a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. There is no covenant with the house of Gentiles. So if you hold on to that theology of replacement theology, that God has cast away His people, and now He's chosen the Gentiles to be in a new covenant, you're off base because scriptures are very clear that the new covenant is only with Israel, and that becomes problematic for most Christian theologians today. So it's very important that we know that when we move over to verse 3, where it says, "For they, being ignorant of God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God," much of the dilemma that Paul describes on behalf of his fellow Jews involves an inappropriate approach to the righteousness of God. Okay, so let's talk about this for just a couple of minutes before we go into the most important verse, maybe in the entire Book of Romans. It's important that you understand that God told them that you are righteous if you keep My divine commandments. Blessings if you keep My commandments, curses if you don't. Being right in God's eyes was always defined as keeping His commandments. Even in the New Testament, it says the same thing. Paul says in Romans, chapter 8, verses 6 and 7, that if you are carnal, you're not subject to the law of God. In 1 John 5:3, it says that those who love God keep His commandments. Right? The way that we love God is by doing what He wants, and He laid it out by giving us an instruction manual. The problem was never in the instructions. The problem was in the authority that was over the instructions. We've gone over this a couple of different times, but it's important for you to see that there are two components to God's law. There is the instruction itself, the actual code of "Do not steal, do not kill," so on and so forth. And then there is the one that administers judgment if we break it or if we keep it—blessings if we do, and curses if we don't. The judgment was the law itself because the administrator of the law had not come yet. So, it was built into the law that when you commit adultery, you will be killed, right? If you murder, you will be killed. There's capital punishment, and no one can get around it. So, the religious leaders, they were not in charge of the law. They just followed whatever the law said. So when you broke the law, the law condemned you. Period. There's no way out of it. There's no grace. But when the tutor was put aside, as Galatians says, and the new sheriff came into town, and Yeshua showed up, we are no longer under the law, under the authority of the law. That verse does not mean that we're no longer subject to the instructions of the law. That would make us lawless, right? And have no law to point to whatsoever because there's only one law in the entire Bible, and breaking the law is defined as sin, as 1 John 3:4 says. But we're no longer under the condemnation of it. Romans 8:1, "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." So, at the end of the day, what Christ did, He doesn't get rid of the law. He just becomes the one that oversees it. He becomes the judge over it. And that is a beautiful thing because now, where the law says in Romans 7 that as long as you're alive, you're subject to the law, but if a man dies, he's not subject to the law anymore. And that is exactly what's happening. We are dead in Christ, so when the law comes to condemn us for our sin, we literally hold up the blood of Christ, and we plead the blood of Christ, and it sees the death of Christ, which is what we deserve, and it backs away. It no longer has jurisdiction over us. So that is literally probably one of the most important concepts that you could possibly understand in the New Testament, as it relates to God's law, His people, and why Christ came. I encourage you to rewind this, watch it several times in this section, so that you can fully understand that God's law is instructions and its authority. Christ came not to get rid of His instructions. He came to take over the authority. He's the new judge, and He pardons based on those who trust in Him. Okay, so the dilemma in verse 3 is that the Jews, his fellow companions, had an inappropriate approach to righteousness. They believed that if they could keep the law, they would please God, and they would enter into the kingdom. What they didn't understand is you can never please God enough to where you could pay what you owe from the death gene that Adam put into all of us. So Paul was trying to explain to them that what bridges the gap from your righteousness to salvific righteousness, which is what is needed to enter the kingdom of heaven, is the blood of Christ. Okay, and so now we can move into this concept. Take this concept in Judaism, I should say, where they believed that their works of the law, which is defined— we've defined this before—that phrase in Greek literally is talking about the rabbinic laws, all the traditions and doctrines of the rabbis, not keeping the Torah. But they believed that if you keep all of the traditions of the elders, that you would become righteous. That that is the law of God. They had mixed the written law of God, that God gave Moses, and they mixed their oral traditions, and they called that the law of God. And they believed that all of that made them righteous. They were in the club just because they were part of that club, and they had the Torah. Paul was saying no. So now that we fully understand the backdrop of Judaism and their theology on this subject, let me go to Philippians, chapter 3, verses 8 and 9, and show you what Paul already said about this righteousness thing, okay, and how it's obtained. He says, read on your screen with me, "9 And be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; 10 that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, 11 if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead." What he's trying to explain here is there is a righteousness that comes from the law, but there is another righteousness that's required to enter the kingdom. One is for your rewards. That's the righteousness that comes from God's law. That's for doing the right thing. Then there's another righteousness that gets you into the kingdom. Without the one that gets you into the kingdom, the one that gets you the rewards is worthless, and that is Paul's dilemma in trying to explain this to his people. All right, so now let's go to the most important verse, probably in the entire New Testament, as it relates to Paul and this subject, and it is verse 4. Read it with me, "4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes." All right, we're going to take a breath. We're going to unpack this. We're going to slow down a little bit. There is much to discover and to discuss as it relates to one single word. This word teloss, okay, now the end of the law. So this word right here, this word "end," this word "telos," does not mean get rid of. It doesn't mean it's the termination of it. The majority of the times of how this was used in the first century, including Greek philosophy at the time, it meant the goal of. All right, so let's break this down and go over the Greek word itself, then we'll show you some examples in scripture of how this is used, and I think it'll all come together by itself. All right, so the Greek word here that is used in the English for "end" is actually the word "telos," which literally carries a deep and multifaceted meaning. It's often translated as "end," "goal," "purpose," or "completion." Now check this out. In philosophy, especially Aristotle's, "telos" refers to the inherent goal or purpose of a thing. It's literally called teleology. Teleology is the study of the goal of something. It's the goal, it's the end, purpose. It's the study of a goal, right? An example would be the telos of a seed is to become a tree. The telos of a battle is victory or defeat. In other words, it's the end of something. What happens at the very end? What's the point of life? Is Christ right to live? Is Christ to die? The telos of death is gain, is what Paul would say. In 1 Peter, chapter 1, verse 9, it says this, "9 Receiving the end [that word is telos] of your faith, the salvation of your souls." So unfortunately, this particular scripture in chapter 10, verse 4, has been used so out of context because we're reading into it what we already believe. So if we already believe that the law of God has done away with and has no value for Christians today, then we're going to read this as, "Christ is the end of the law. There is no law now that Christ has come." That's how we're going to read it. But that's not what the word means. It literally means goal. So the way it should be read is exactly the way 1 Peter 1:9 is read, "Receiving the end of your faith, the salvation of your souls." He's not saying that you have no more faith. He's simply saying that the goal of your faith is the salvation of your souls. That's the way that that word was used in the first century. So we take that back to Romans chapter 10. The way that it should be read is this, "For Christ is the point, the purpose, and the goal of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes." In other words, they're misunderstanding what the law is all about. They're misunderstanding the point of the law. The point of the law is not to get you salvation. The point of the law is to bring you to Christ. Not that you don't have to keep the law anymore. It's just that when you do, every single commandment, every instruction, every prohibition, is all about Christ. He is the point of all of it. Even if you wanted the word "telos" to mean destroyed or the end of, that would also make sense based on the context of what Paul is saying. So for those of you out there that might say, "Oh, but the word 'telos' does mean destruction or the end of, the termination of," absolutely, I'll give it to you. In any case, you have to go by the context. And the context is, you could read it that way, but it would be reading it this way: "Christ is the end of the law for righteousness." In other words, for those of you that believe that the keeping of the law gets you into heaven and your salvation is resting on your works righteousness, Christ is putting an end to that concept, not an end to the law, an end to the law for salvation righteousness. You see the difference? Paul didn't stop at the word "law." He didn't say, "For Christ is the end of the law." He didn't say that. He says, "Christ is the end of the law for righteousness." Let me read it this way, "For Christ, for those of you that believe or want to believe that 'telos' is literally meaning termination here, you still have to read it this way: For Christ is the termination of the concept of using the law for salvation." That's what he's talking about here, for righteousness, for righteousness that leads to salvation. But that, I don't believe that's what it means at all. My only point is, no matter how you interpret the word "telos," whether termination or goal, Paul is not saying that the law is terminated. It's how they're using the law. The concept of the law for righteousness for salvation righteousness is now terminated. But I believe more, in context, the law is simply the point of the law. The goal of the law is Christ. Christ is the goal. He's the purpose of the law for righteousness. And that simply makes a lot more sense, and further proof that there's no way that Paul could be saying that Christ is literally destroying the law. Here is because not only Christ, but he himself, has already said the opposite, that it can't be destroyed. We've gone through many of these several times. Let's take a look at them real quickly. Matthew 5:17, he says that Christ did not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it and give it its true meaning. That's what the word "pleroo" means. It means to fill up something and give it its full purpose and meaning. Romans 3:31, Paul already solves this problem. When he says, "Just because Christ came, that doesn't mean that the law is made void." He establishes the law. He says, "I uphold the law." You can't have Paul saying he upholds the law and also saying that he's getting rid of it. That's a contradiction in terms. Romans 7:14, Paul says that the law is spiritual. In 7:25, he says that he wants to keep it. And the inner man, he said, "I want to keep God's law. The very thing I want to do, I don't do because I find another law inside of me, the law of sin and death, fighting against what his desire to keep the law that he says he's upholding. In Romans 8:7, he says that those who are carnal are not subject to it. So we cannot have Paul throughout his entire book, already, in the first nine chapters, telling us that those that are hearers of the law are not justified, but those that are doers are justified. He cannot say all of these things and literally, in one stroke of the pen, say, "Christ, by the way, guys, Christ did away with the very law that I just said was good, holy, spiritual. It's what I want to do. I uphold it. All these things are justified by keeping it, not by looking at it, but now it's gone." No, that's not what he's saying. All of these things synergistically come together when you put it in context, that the word "end" is goal. That's what's really going on. And if we take a look at Strong's just to go first on this, because I need to spend the time on this. It's so needed because it's been so misunderstood. In Strong's, it says that the usage of this word "telos" in the New Testament is used to denote the end or completion of a process, the ultimate purpose or goal, and sometimes the result or outcome. In cultural and historical background, it says in ancient Greek culture, "telos" was a philosophical term used to describe the ultimate purpose or aim of an object or action. In the context of the New Testament, it carries the idea of divine purpose and fulfillment, reflecting the Jewish understanding of history as a linear progression towards a divinely ordained goal. The concept of "telos" is integral to understanding the eschatological hope of early Christians who believed in the imminent return of Christ and the establishment of God's Kingdom. In other words, the entire point of the Scriptures, the end of the entire Bible, is Christ. It doesn't mean the Bible ends. It means the point of all of the scriptures is Christ. Amen. All right. And lastly, we can see this in Romans 6:21, which absolutely proves that the word "telos" in Paul's understanding means goal and not termination. It's found in a few chapters earlier in Romans, chapter 6, verses 21 through 23. Read it with me, "21 What fruit did you have then in the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death." A point, the goal of those, the end result of those things, is death. Here, listen, "22 But now, having been set free from sin and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end is everlasting life." Not the termination, the goal of all of those things, the point, the purpose, the end result, is eternal life. "23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." Amen. And last but not least, because there's just so many different ways that you can take this, in 1 Timothy, chapter 1, verse 5, we have the same exact word again. "5 Now the purpose [which is that word 'telos'], the purpose of the commandment is love from a pure heart, from a good conscience, and from a sincere faith." So we can see from all of these different scriptures and concepts within first-century Judaism, even in Greek philosophy, that there is no way that the word "telos" could mean termination. That's not what's in Paul's mind. It's the purpose. It's the goal. And every time that Paul uses that word, as we just showed and demonstrated, every single time, his point was just that. It was the point, it was the purpose, it was the goal. What's the end of your life? What's the purpose and goal of your life? What are you trying to accomplish right now? I hope that your goal is to glorify God, to increase the kingdom of God. What are you doing with your talents? What are you doing with your finances? Where is your heart at? Are you investing in the kingdom as much as you're investing in your 401K, as much as you're investing in crypto? How much are you investing in Him and His Kingdom? What is your return going to be? What is your balance going to be? What is your heavenly 401K going to look like? Are you the one that gave the talent and you buried it? What's the end goal for you? It's very important when you want to accomplish something that you start off with, what is the end first? That's why He knows the end from the beginning. God knows. I start with the end, and then I build everything from that goal. The goal was to take the earth by storm with the Son of the living God. Everything up to this is leading to that point. Amen. All right, let's go back to verse 5 and continue right along here. "5 For Moses writes about the righteousness which is of the law, proving there is a righteousness that's found in the law. The man who does those things shall live by them." Okay, “6 but the righteousness of faith speaks this way: "Do not say in your heart, 'Who will ascend into heaven?' (that is, to bring Christ down from above) 7 or 'Who will descend into the abyss?' (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). 8 But what does it say? 'The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart' (that is, the word of faith which we preach), 9 that if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth, confession is made unto salvation. 11For the Scripture says, 'Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.'" All right, it's important that we know that this entire set of scriptures that we just went through, verses 5 through 10, roughly, is quoting from Deuteronomy chapter 30. Now what he's saying here in context is he's quoting Deuteronomy 30 that says, "Look, all these things that your enemies do, that the pagans do, that the Gentiles do, all the sexual immorality. If you do those things, it's not going to be good for you, but if you follow My commandments, if you follow My instructions, it will bring life to you. There's blessings. It doesn't matter if you believe in God, an atheist can follow the commandment of being faithful to his wife, and there's a blessing, and it's coming from God. It's not coming from him, because God says there's blessings for following Him and doing righteousness." So, Paul is simply saying that, look, there is a righteousness that Moses talks about. It's real simple. If you do what God says to do, you're going to be blessed. But he goes on to say that there is another righteousness that's higher, that all you have to do to actually fulfill all of the law for the purpose of salvation, not for life on this earth, but for salvation, which is simply confessing with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, that He is your Adonai, that He is your master and your king. He is the King of kings and Lord of lords. If you confess that with your mouth and you believe it with your heart, God will give you eternal life. I'm just going to throw that out there to anybody that might not be in the place where you are questioning whether or not you're saved. If you died right now, where would you go? Do you know for sure that you would be called in the resurrection of the just, and you would be given eternal life? Or do you not know where you're going if you were to die right now? If you find yourself in the latter, it's as simple as believing that Jesus Christ, Yeshua, the Messiah, is your King, that you no longer have your own mind, will, and emotions. You follow the King of kings, and you do what He says, and you follow His commandments the best that you can. But you believe that your entire eternal life is built up in His blood, because there's not a commandment that you can keep good enough to make Him pleased enough to pay your own price. You can't do it. We simply keep His commandments out of love and relationship, but our belief is in His blood and His relationship and that He kept it perfectly. You see, He did not keep the law perfectly so that I could break it. He kept it perfectly so that I could hold on to the tzitzit, His tallit, that righteous robe, and make it in the kingdom. I keep the commandments so that I can be blessed both here on this earth and have a righteousness that can be found on judgment day to qualify to be great in the kingdom of heaven. That's why He said, "If you don't keep the commandments and you teach others likewise, you'll be least in the kingdom."a So, at the end of the day, the power of God is found in the blood of Christ. The rewards and the blessings of God are found in what you do, and that's why even James says, "Don't be a hearer of the word. Be a doer.”b You'll be blessed in everything that you do. All right, let's go back to the scriptures and continue. And we'll start in verse 10, even though we read it already. "For with the heart one believes unto righteousness." So the very righteousness, Mr. Jew friend in the first century that you're looking for, is found simply through belief. When were the Israelites saved? When they got to the mountain, or when they believed Moses and they put the blood over the doorpost of their homes? They were saved by their faith. Nothing happened. They had no proof, no background with this God. They just believed, and they backed up their belief by what they did. So their belief was in the Word, and then their actual salvation came from the proof of their belief, which is keeping the commandment that Moses said, "Put the blood on the doorpost of your house."c The salvation came from the belief first that was backed up by the action. That's why James says, "Show me your faith without putting the blood on the doorpost, and I'll show you my faith by doing it. Show me your faith without works. I'll show you my faith by what I do."d Amen. All right. "12 For the Scripture says, 'Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.' For there is no distinction between the Jew and the Gentile, for the same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him. 13 For whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved." This is an extraordinary scripture because in Paul's Jewish mindset of his brethren, they don't believe that Gentiles can be saved except through the process of conversion to Judaism, which is strange, because God never called the Jews. He called Israel, which the Jews were part of Israel, but they were only the southern kingdom of Israel. But because there was no northern kingdom anymore, the 10 tribes were gone and no longer in covenant. The house of Judah took control or ownership of all of Israel, and they said, "You have to be one of us in order to be considered Israel." And Paul is saying, "Nope, all they got to do is believe with their heart. They don't have to go through the process of converting to Judaism. There's no conversion. It's just belief." In the same way, it's critical for you to understand a Jew does not need to be converted. I'm gonna say this in person. A Jew does not need to be converted to Christianity to be saved, period. There's no conversion process. The only thing they need to do is believe that Messiah is Yeshua, that Yeshua is Messiah. That's it. As long as they believe that Yeshua is the Messiah, and they cannot enter the kingdom without His righteousness, the blood of the high priest placed on the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies, in the Melchizedek priesthood, that is what creates salvation. So when we talk to Jewish people, when I'm talking, I had a chance to talk to a Jewish rabbi from Israel, and we debated for over an hour on the authenticity of the Messiah and Yeshua being the Messiah. And he said, "Are you trying to convert me?" I said, "No, there's no conversion necessary. Just belief. That's it." For the Jew, the Gentile, belief, and then backing that belief up by what you do. Repentance is doing something different than what you were doing before, and that different is following God His way. All right, let's go back to the scriptures here and finish this up. "14 How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? 15 And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, 'How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, who bring glad tidings of good things!'" He's simply saying, "Guys, we've got to tell the gospel. We've got to get out there. How are they going to know if we don't teach them?" And by the way, how are the Jewish people ever going to see Christ if we keep showing a Greek Jesus that has obliterated the law when the prophets prophesy a Hebrew Messiah that's going to come and show them how to keep it? Why would a Jew even look at Jesus when all we've done is obliterated the very characteristics of what the Messiah was supposed to do—save us from our sins and teach us how to follow Him by faith? “16 But they've not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, ‘Lord, who has believed our report?’ 17 So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.” This is why this broadcast is so important, my friends. This is why it is so critical that you guys partner with us and support us in every possible way, because without people hearing the Word of God the way that it was originally written, it will not affect their lives the way that God intended. It will actually destroy whole parts of their life. If you have a preacher that's out there telling God's people that you don't have to keep God's law, he's causing them to be least in the kingdom. The Gospel comes by hearing, and the way we live our life comes by hearing the Word of God, and we want to make sure that we get the Word of God right. We do what we believe. So thank you for those of you that do support us and stand behind us. “18 But I say, Have they not heard? Yes, indeed, ‘their sound has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world.’ 19 But I say, Did Israel not know?" First, Moses says, ‘I will provoke you to jealousy by those who are not a nation. I will move you to anger by a foolish nation.’" Listen to what he's saying. He's saying, "Look, you Jews, you all of Israel. You knew this day was coming, but you chose to spurn My instructions. You chose to turn your back on My Son. I will bring you to jealousy through the Gentiles." This means that we as Gentiles have a massive responsibility, ladies and gentlemen, a huge responsibility, to do this right, to make them jealous. And right now, I don't know very many Jews that are jealous of anything. The only thing I've ever heard a Jew say to me recently, a rabbi, he said he's jealous of how Christians pray because we're filled with the Holy Spirit. There's a passion that's there, but outside of that, there's no jealousy because we're not doing anything that would cause them to be jealous. I'm going to suggest that when we start doing Bible things in Bible ways, and the power of God shows up, and we start following God's calendar and start doing what He's called us to do out of His commandments, by faith, with the supernatural power of the Spirit of God, there will be a jealousy because we'll be doing what they're doing, but receiving the power of God as we remove the tradition and the doctrine from that doing. Isaiah said the very same thing. He said this. He was very bold. According to Paul, he said, "20 I was found by those who did not seek Me. I was made manifest to those who did not ask for Me." And again, he's making the connection to Gentiles today, but to Israel. So now he turns the conversation from the Gentiles who are going to make them jealous, who they're going to find God, “21 to Israel he says, All day long, I have stretched out My hands to a disobedient and contrary people." Unfortunately, that's the end of this chapter. But it's not the end of God or Paul's thought because he goes on to say, "1 I say then, has God cast away His people? Certainly not!" So why then, in traditional Christianity, do we believe that God has replaced Israel with the Christian Gentiles? Literally, exactly the opposite of what Paul is saying. God has not cast away His people, even though they've cast Him away. “Certainly not! For I am also an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. 2 God has not cast away His people whom He foreknew.”e And we'll pick the rest up in chapter 11 because next week is going to be absolutely mic-dropping, amazing. It's going to pull together chapter 9, chapter 10, and chapter 11. Paul's point is that Christ is the goal of the law. You Jews have got the whole concept of righteousness wrong as it relates to the kingdom. You got it right as it relates to this world. You're blessed if you keep God's commandments, but it's not going to get you into the kingdom. Faith and belief is the only thing that will get you in. That's the only key to that door of salvation righteousness. So, my friends, we've come to the end of this broadcast. I want to thank you so much for being with us. Like I said earlier, for those that financially partner with us to help us get this out, there are some incredibly exciting things that are on the horizon, things that we want to do, but we need your help to do it. So, if you don't have a local church, would you consider partnering with us as part of our extended international congregation? You can donate to our ministry at passionfortruth.com up in the upper right-hand corner, just hit the donate button. It'll walk you through that process. We are so grateful for the smallest amount that you might give. It goes a long way, and God absolutely will bless you for that obedience, for sure. For those of you that are out there that are prayer warriors, we need that more than absolutely anything. There are so many things and darts that the enemy is sending our way. We need prayer, prayer for so many things that are happening in our ministry and lives right now. And we're thankful for those of you that are that kind of prayer warrior that would get up early in the morning and pray for us and this ministry. Lastly, would you do us a favor and subscribe to this channel? If you'd like more content like this, please share this with everybody you know and put in the comments what this ministry is meaning to you, what this series is meaning to you. We're going to be featuring some of these comments up in a video coming up. So we'd love to hear from you how this is changing your life. If you're brand new to these concepts, would you just tell us that in the comments or email us at [email protected]? We'd love to hear your testimony. In the meantime, I'm Jim Staley with Passion for Truth Ministries. I'll see you in the next video.

We as Christians have radically butchered up and majorly misunderstood what Paul is saying in Romans 10:4, when he says, "4 Christ is the end of the law for righteousness." We have almost created blasphemy, my friends. It's that serious. The entire Christian Church is wrong on this issue, and we're going to prove it right after this. Hello, everyone. Jim Staley, Passion for Truth Ministries, and welcome to today's broadcast where we are unpacking, layer by layer, verse by verse, every single scripture in the book of Romans, the systematic book of theology according to Christian standards. We are unpacking it, discovering the gap, and trying to narrow the gap from first-century original Hebraic understanding, the way that Paul meant it when he penned it, versus the 21st-century Western, Greco-Roman seminary perspective, where we kind of tend to read into it what we already believe based on the lack of knowledge, quite honestly, of understanding first-century Judaism. And that's what this channel is all about. We are trying to understand the scriptures the way they were written so that we can impute them into our life, absorb the Scriptures, the power of the Word of God, and then live it out. Because, quite frankly, we do what we believe. So if we believe something that's not true, we then will do it. And unfortunately, sometimes we can displease God in the process. And if you are a believer like me that really wants to serve God with all of our heart, mind, soul, and strength, we need to know what He wants from us. And that's what this basic instruction before leaving Earth, the Bible, B-I-B-L-E, is all about. So that's what we're doing here, and we appreciate you coming along for the journey. So let's dive right in. Let's go over to Romans, chapter 10, verse 1, and let's see what Paul has to say today. All right, here we go, “1 Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved. 2 For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge. 3 For being ignorant of God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own righteousness, they have not submitted to the righteousness of God." All right, well, we're gonna stop right there for just a moment because we've got a powerhouse of a scripture coming up here in verse 4. I'm even gonna hide it for you so you don't see it because we're going to spend quite a bit of time on chapter 10, verse 4. But before we do, I want you to understand Paul's understanding of these first three verses. He says that his prayer to God is that Israel would be saved. Now he's defining Israel, of course, as the known Israel of the day, which was not all of Israel. It was just the house of Judah . Remember, back in 722 BC, there were two kingdoms. There was the house of Israel in the north, that was the 10 tribes called the House of Ephraim or Jacob, and then the house of Judah in the south, which was Benjamin and Judah, those two tribes with Levites scattered amongst them. And when 722 BC came along and the northern kingdom was divorced, that just left the house of Judah as being called Israel. They went into captivity in Babylon for 70 years and came back under Nehemiah and rebuilt Jerusalem. So, everyone that was in modern-day Jerusalem, or Israel, at the time in the first century, was Jewish. They were not Israelites any longer. They were from the house of Judah. This is critical and very important to understand. If you're going to understand the rest of the scriptures in the New Testament and what the New Covenant is all about, you must understand the two houses of Israel and how they operate as one, what the new man is, how the Gentiles are grafted into all of this, that all of this is not about Gentiles. This is not about a Gentile covenant. There's no such thing as a Gentile covenant. As a matter of fact, I would encourage you, if this is a new concept for you, watch the teaching above called "Identity Crisis." It really is probably one of the best teachings that we have ever put out here that has radically impacted millions of people's lives around the planet in multiple languages, recognizing, or I should say, detailing the two houses of Israel, how they fit together in the new covenant, and how the Gentiles are grafted in. It's really critical that we know this. So what's happening here in verses 1 through 3 is Paul recognizes that he wants his own brethren, the house of Judah that exists in that time period, to be saved. That he knows that the Jewish people in that time period, they understood that there was a righteousness that comes from the law, right? Because God said there is righteousness. You are righteous if you keep the law, but they did not have the concept that there was another righteousness. No matter how righteous they become, no matter how much they keep God's commandments, they cannot pay their debt in full. They will not make it into the kingdom without faith. When we couple faith with keeping God's commandments, we find ourselves inside of covenant. That's true connection to God. So in verse 1, okay, not for one minute did Paul—this is important—not one minute did Paul think that their rejection of Christ somehow closed the door on their status as God's chosen people or that He had now cast away His people. This is a common misunderstanding and an accusation in modern-day Christianity today, that somehow the Jewish people were chosen, not even understanding that the Jewish people weren't chosen. It was Israel, all of Israel, that was chosen, and that somehow, because the southern kingdom of Judah in the first century rejected Christ, that somehow Christ is now canceling the eternal covenant that He made with them. They're no longer His people. They no longer have any promises. There's no longer any connection, and He now chooses these Gentiles. Nothing could be further from the truth. If you go to Jeremiah 31, what you discover in verse 31 is that there is only a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. There is no covenant with the house of Gentiles. So if you hold on to that theology of replacement theology, that God has cast away His people, and now He's chosen the Gentiles to be in a new covenant, you're off base because scriptures are very clear that the new covenant is only with Israel, and that becomes problematic for most Christian theologians today. So it's very important that we know that when we move over to verse 3, where it says, "For they, being ignorant of God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own righteousness, have not submitted to the righteousness of God," much of the dilemma that Paul describes on behalf of his fellow Jews involves an inappropriate approach to the righteousness of God. Okay, so let's talk about this for just a couple of minutes before we go into the most important verse, maybe in the entire Book of Romans. It's important that you understand that God told them that you are righteous if you keep My divine commandments. Blessings if you keep My commandments, curses if you don't. Being right in God's eyes was always defined as keeping His commandments. Even in the New Testament, it says the same thing. Paul says in Romans, chapter 8, verses 6 and 7, that if you are carnal, you're not subject to the law of God. In 1 John 5:3, it says that those who love God keep His commandments. Right? The way that we love God is by doing what He wants, and He laid it out by giving us an instruction manual. The problem was never in the instructions. The problem was in the authority that was over the instructions. We've gone over this a couple of different times, but it's important for you to see that there are two components to God's law. There is the instruction itself, the actual code of "Do not steal, do not kill," so on and so forth. And then there is the one that administers judgment if we break it or if we keep it—blessings if we do, and curses if we don't. The judgment was the law itself because the administrator of the law had not come yet. So, it was built into the law that when you commit adultery, you will be killed, right? If you murder, you will be killed. There's capital punishment, and no one can get around it. So, the religious leaders, they were not in charge of the law. They just followed whatever the law said. So when you broke the law, the law condemned you. Period. There's no way out of it. There's no grace. But when the tutor was put aside, as Galatians says, and the new sheriff came into town, and Yeshua showed up, we are no longer under the law, under the authority of the law. That verse does not mean that we're no longer subject to the instructions of the law. That would make us lawless, right? And have no law to point to whatsoever because there's only one law in the entire Bible, and breaking the law is defined as sin, as 1 John 3:4 says. But we're no longer under the condemnation of it. Romans 8:1, "There is therefore now no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus." So, at the end of the day, what Christ did, He doesn't get rid of the law. He just becomes the one that oversees it. He becomes the judge over it. And that is a beautiful thing because now, where the law says in Romans 7 that as long as you're alive, you're subject to the law, but if a man dies, he's not subject to the law anymore. And that is exactly what's happening. We are dead in Christ, so when the law comes to condemn us for our sin, we literally hold up the blood of Christ, and we plead the blood of Christ, and it sees the death of Christ, which is what we deserve, and it backs away. It no longer has jurisdiction over us. So that is literally probably one of the most important concepts that you could possibly understand in the New Testament, as it relates to God's law, His people, and why Christ came. I encourage you to rewind this, watch it several times in this section, so that you can fully understand that God's law is instructions and its authority. Christ came not to get rid of His instructions. He came to take over the authority. He's the new judge, and He pardons based on those who trust in Him. Okay, so the dilemma in verse 3 is that the Jews, his fellow companions, had an inappropriate approach to righteousness. They believed that if they could keep the law, they would please God, and they would enter into the kingdom. What they didn't understand is you can never please God enough to where you could pay what you owe from the death gene that Adam put into all of us. So Paul was trying to explain to them that what bridges the gap from your righteousness to salvific righteousness, which is what is needed to enter the kingdom of heaven, is the blood of Christ. Okay, and so now we can move into this concept. Take this concept in Judaism, I should say, where they believed that their works of the law, which is defined— we've defined this before—that phrase in Greek literally is talking about the rabbinic laws, all the traditions and doctrines of the rabbis, not keeping the Torah. But they believed that if you keep all of the traditions of the elders, that you would become righteous. That that is the law of God. They had mixed the written law of God, that God gave Moses, and they mixed their oral traditions, and they called that the law of God. And they believed that all of that made them righteous. They were in the club just because they were part of that club, and they had the Torah. Paul was saying no. So now that we fully understand the backdrop of Judaism and their theology on this subject, let me go to Philippians, chapter 3, verses 8 and 9, and show you what Paul already said about this righteousness thing, okay, and how it's obtained. He says, read on your screen with me, "9 And be found in Him, not having my own righteousness, which is from the law, but that which is through faith in Christ, the righteousness which is from God by faith; 10 that I may know Him and the power of His resurrection, and the fellowship of His sufferings, being conformed to His death, 11 if, by any means, I may attain to the resurrection from the dead." What he's trying to explain here is there is a righteousness that comes from the law, but there is another righteousness that's required to enter the kingdom. One is for your rewards. That's the righteousness that comes from God's law. That's for doing the right thing. Then there's another righteousness that gets you into the kingdom. Without the one that gets you into the kingdom, the one that gets you the rewards is worthless, and that is Paul's dilemma in trying to explain this to his people. All right, so now let's go to the most important verse, probably in the entire New Testament, as it relates to Paul and this subject, and it is verse 4. Read it with me, "4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes." All right, we're going to take a breath. We're going to unpack this. We're going to slow down a little bit. There is much to discover and to discuss as it relates to one single word. This word teloss, okay, now the end of the law. So this word right here, this word "end," this word "telos," does not mean get rid of. It doesn't mean it's the termination of it. The majority of the times of how this was used in the first century, including Greek philosophy at the time, it meant the goal of. All right, so let's break this down and go over the Greek word itself, then we'll show you some examples in scripture of how this is used, and I think it'll all come together by itself. All right, so the Greek word here that is used in the English for "end" is actually the word "telos," which literally carries a deep and multifaceted meaning. It's often translated as "end," "goal," "purpose," or "completion." Now check this out. In philosophy, especially Aristotle's, "telos" refers to the inherent goal or purpose of a thing. It's literally called teleology. Teleology is the study of the goal of something. It's the goal, it's the end, purpose. It's the study of a goal, right? An example would be the telos of a seed is to become a tree. The telos of a battle is victory or defeat. In other words, it's the end of something. What happens at the very end? What's the point of life? Is Christ right to live? Is Christ to die? The telos of death is gain, is what Paul would say. In 1 Peter, chapter 1, verse 9, it says this, "9 Receiving the end [that word is telos] of your faith, the salvation of your souls." So unfortunately, this particular scripture in chapter 10, verse 4, has been used so out of context because we're reading into it what we already believe. So if we already believe that the law of God has done away with and has no value for Christians today, then we're going to read this as, "Christ is the end of the law. There is no law now that Christ has come." That's how we're going to read it. But that's not what the word means. It literally means goal. So the way it should be read is exactly the way 1 Peter 1:9 is read, "Receiving the end of your faith, the salvation of your souls." He's not saying that you have no more faith. He's simply saying that the goal of your faith is the salvation of your souls. That's the way that that word was used in the first century. So we take that back to Romans chapter 10. The way that it should be read is this, "For Christ is the point, the purpose, and the goal of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes." In other words, they're misunderstanding what the law is all about. They're misunderstanding the point of the law. The point of the law is not to get you salvation. The point of the law is to bring you to Christ. Not that you don't have to keep the law anymore. It's just that when you do, every single commandment, every instruction, every prohibition, is all about Christ. He is the point of all of it. Even if you wanted the word "telos" to mean destroyed or the end of, that would also make sense based on the context of what Paul is saying. So for those of you out there that might say, "Oh, but the word 'telos' does mean destruction or the end of, the termination of," absolutely, I'll give it to you. In any case, you have to go by the context. And the context is, you could read it that way, but it would be reading it this way: "Christ is the end of the law for righteousness." In other words, for those of you that believe that the keeping of the law gets you into heaven and your salvation is resting on your works righteousness, Christ is putting an end to that concept, not an end to the law, an end to the law for salvation righteousness. You see the difference? Paul didn't stop at the word "law." He didn't say, "For Christ is the end of the law." He didn't say that. He says, "Christ is the end of the law for righteousness." Let me read it this way, "For Christ, for those of you that believe or want to believe that 'telos' is literally meaning termination here, you still have to read it this way: For Christ is the termination of the concept of using the law for salvation." That's what he's talking about here, for righteousness, for righteousness that leads to salvation. But that, I don't believe that's what it means at all. My only point is, no matter how you interpret the word "telos," whether termination or goal, Paul is not saying that the law is terminated. It's how they're using the law. The concept of the law for righteousness for salvation righteousness is now terminated. But I believe more, in context, the law is simply the point of the law. The goal of the law is Christ. Christ is the goal. He's the purpose of the law for righteousness. And that simply makes a lot more sense, and further proof that there's no way that Paul could be saying that Christ is literally destroying the law. Here is because not only Christ, but he himself, has already said the opposite, that it can't be destroyed. We've gone through many of these several times. Let's take a look at them real quickly. Matthew 5:17, he says that Christ did not come to abolish the law, but to fulfill it and give it its true meaning. That's what the word "pleroo" means. It means to fill up something and give it its full purpose and meaning. Romans 3:31, Paul already solves this problem. When he says, "Just because Christ came, that doesn't mean that the law is made void." He establishes the law. He says, "I uphold the law." You can't have Paul saying he upholds the law and also saying that he's getting rid of it. That's a contradiction in terms. Romans 7:14, Paul says that the law is spiritual. In 7:25, he says that he wants to keep it. And the inner man, he said, "I want to keep God's law. The very thing I want to do, I don't do because I find another law inside of me, the law of sin and death, fighting against what his desire to keep the law that he says he's upholding. In Romans 8:7, he says that those who are carnal are not subject to it. So we cannot have Paul throughout his entire book, already, in the first nine chapters, telling us that those that are hearers of the law are not justified, but those that are doers are justified. He cannot say all of these things and literally, in one stroke of the pen, say, "Christ, by the way, guys, Christ did away with the very law that I just said was good, holy, spiritual. It's what I want to do. I uphold it. All these things are justified by keeping it, not by looking at it, but now it's gone." No, that's not what he's saying. All of these things synergistically come together when you put it in context, that the word "end" is goal. That's what's really going on. And if we take a look at Strong's just to go first on this, because I need to spend the time on this. It's so needed because it's been so misunderstood. In Strong's, it says that the usage of this word "telos" in the New Testament is used to denote the end or completion of a process, the ultimate purpose or goal, and sometimes the result or outcome. In cultural and historical background, it says in ancient Greek culture, "telos" was a philosophical term used to describe the ultimate purpose or aim of an object or action. In the context of the New Testament, it carries the idea of divine purpose and fulfillment, reflecting the Jewish understanding of history as a linear progression towards a divinely ordained goal. The concept of "telos" is integral to understanding the eschatological hope of early Christians who believed in the imminent return of Christ and the establishment of God's Kingdom. In other words, the entire point of the Scriptures, the end of the entire Bible, is Christ. It doesn't mean the Bible ends. It means the point of all of the scriptures is Christ. Amen. All right. And lastly, we can see this in Romans 6:21, which absolutely proves that the word "telos" in Paul's understanding means goal and not termination. It's found in a few chapters earlier in Romans, chapter 6, verses 21 through 23. Read it with me, "21 What fruit did you have then in the things of which you are now ashamed? For the end of those things is death." A point, the goal of those, the end result of those things, is death. Here, listen, "22 But now, having been set free from sin and having become slaves of God, you have your fruit to holiness, and the end is everlasting life." Not the termination, the goal of all of those things, the point, the purpose, the end result, is eternal life. "23 For the wages of sin is death, but the gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord." Amen. And last but not least, because there's just so many different ways that you can take this, in 1 Timothy, chapter 1, verse 5, we have the same exact word again. "5 Now the purpose [which is that word 'telos'], the purpose of the commandment is love from a pure heart, from a good conscience, and from a sincere faith." So we can see from all of these different scriptures and concepts within first-century Judaism, even in Greek philosophy, that there is no way that the word "telos" could mean termination. That's not what's in Paul's mind. It's the purpose. It's the goal. And every time that Paul uses that word, as we just showed and demonstrated, every single time, his point was just that. It was the point, it was the purpose, it was the goal. What's the end of your life? What's the purpose and goal of your life? What are you trying to accomplish right now? I hope that your goal is to glorify God, to increase the kingdom of God. What are you doing with your talents? What are you doing with your finances? Where is your heart at? Are you investing in the kingdom as much as you're investing in your 401K, as much as you're investing in crypto? How much are you investing in Him and His Kingdom? What is your return going to be? What is your balance going to be? What is your heavenly 401K going to look like? Are you the one that gave the talent and you buried it? What's the end goal for you? It's very important when you want to accomplish something that you start off with, what is the end first? That's why He knows the end from the beginning. God knows. I start with the end, and then I build everything from that goal. The goal was to take the earth by storm with the Son of the living God. Everything up to this is leading to that point. Amen. All right, let's go back to verse 5 and continue right along here. "5 For Moses writes about the righteousness which is of the law, proving there is a righteousness that's found in the law. The man who does those things shall live by them." Okay, “6 but the righteousness of faith speaks this way: "Do not say in your heart, 'Who will ascend into heaven?' (that is, to bring Christ down from above) 7 or 'Who will descend into the abyss?' (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). 8 But what does it say? 'The word is near you, in your mouth and in your heart' (that is, the word of faith which we preach), 9 that if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you shall be saved. 10 For with the heart one believes unto righteousness, and with the mouth, confession is made unto salvation. 11For the Scripture says, 'Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.'" All right, it's important that we know that this entire set of scriptures that we just went through, verses 5 through 10, roughly, is quoting from Deuteronomy chapter 30. Now what he's saying here in context is he's quoting Deuteronomy 30 that says, "Look, all these things that your enemies do, that the pagans do, that the Gentiles do, all the sexual immorality. If you do those things, it's not going to be good for you, but if you follow My commandments, if you follow My instructions, it will bring life to you. There's blessings. It doesn't matter if you believe in God, an atheist can follow the commandment of being faithful to his wife, and there's a blessing, and it's coming from God. It's not coming from him, because God says there's blessings for following Him and doing righteousness." So, Paul is simply saying that, look, there is a righteousness that Moses talks about. It's real simple. If you do what God says to do, you're going to be blessed. But he goes on to say that there is another righteousness that's higher, that all you have to do to actually fulfill all of the law for the purpose of salvation, not for life on this earth, but for salvation, which is simply confessing with your mouth that Jesus is Lord, that He is your Adonai, that He is your master and your king. He is the King of kings and Lord of lords. If you confess that with your mouth and you believe it with your heart, God will give you eternal life. I'm just going to throw that out there to anybody that might not be in the place where you are questioning whether or not you're saved. If you died right now, where would you go? Do you know for sure that you would be called in the resurrection of the just, and you would be given eternal life? Or do you not know where you're going if you were to die right now? If you find yourself in the latter, it's as simple as believing that Jesus Christ, Yeshua, the Messiah, is your King, that you no longer have your own mind, will, and emotions. You follow the King of kings, and you do what He says, and you follow His commandments the best that you can. But you believe that your entire eternal life is built up in His blood, because there's not a commandment that you can keep good enough to make Him pleased enough to pay your own price. You can't do it. We simply keep His commandments out of love and relationship, but our belief is in His blood and His relationship and that He kept it perfectly. You see, He did not keep the law perfectly so that I could break it. He kept it perfectly so that I could hold on to the tzitzit, His tallit, that righteous robe, and make it in the kingdom. I keep the commandments so that I can be blessed both here on this earth and have a righteousness that can be found on judgment day to qualify to be great in the kingdom of heaven. That's why He said, "If you don't keep the commandments and you teach others likewise, you'll be least in the kingdom."a So, at the end of the day, the power of God is found in the blood of Christ. The rewards and the blessings of God are found in what you do, and that's why even James says, "Don't be a hearer of the word. Be a doer.”b You'll be blessed in everything that you do. All right, let's go back to the scriptures and continue. And we'll start in verse 10, even though we read it already. "For with the heart one believes unto righteousness." So the very righteousness, Mr. Jew friend in the first century that you're looking for, is found simply through belief. When were the Israelites saved? When they got to the mountain, or when they believed Moses and they put the blood over the doorpost of their homes? They were saved by their faith. Nothing happened. They had no proof, no background with this God. They just believed, and they backed up their belief by what they did. So their belief was in the Word, and then their actual salvation came from the proof of their belief, which is keeping the commandment that Moses said, "Put the blood on the doorpost of your house."c The salvation came from the belief first that was backed up by the action. That's why James says, "Show me your faith without putting the blood on the doorpost, and I'll show you my faith by doing it. Show me your faith without works. I'll show you my faith by what I do."d Amen. All right. "12 For the Scripture says, 'Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.' For there is no distinction between the Jew and the Gentile, for the same Lord over all is rich to all who call upon Him. 13 For whoever calls on the name of the Lord shall be saved." This is an extraordinary scripture because in Paul's Jewish mindset of his brethren, they don't believe that Gentiles can be saved except through the process of conversion to Judaism, which is strange, because God never called the Jews. He called Israel, which the Jews were part of Israel, but they were only the southern kingdom of Israel. But because there was no northern kingdom anymore, the 10 tribes were gone and no longer in covenant. The house of Judah took control or ownership of all of Israel, and they said, "You have to be one of us in order to be considered Israel." And Paul is saying, "Nope, all they got to do is believe with their heart. They don't have to go through the process of converting to Judaism. There's no conversion. It's just belief." In the same way, it's critical for you to understand a Jew does not need to be converted. I'm gonna say this in person. A Jew does not need to be converted to Christianity to be saved, period. There's no conversion process. The only thing they need to do is believe that Messiah is Yeshua, that Yeshua is Messiah. That's it. As long as they believe that Yeshua is the Messiah, and they cannot enter the kingdom without His righteousness, the blood of the high priest placed on the Ark of the Covenant in the Holy of Holies, in the Melchizedek priesthood, that is what creates salvation. So when we talk to Jewish people, when I'm talking, I had a chance to talk to a Jewish rabbi from Israel, and we debated for over an hour on the authenticity of the Messiah and Yeshua being the Messiah. And he said, "Are you trying to convert me?" I said, "No, there's no conversion necessary. Just belief. That's it." For the Jew, the Gentile, belief, and then backing that belief up by what you do. Repentance is doing something different than what you were doing before, and that different is following God His way. All right, let's go back to the scriptures here and finish this up. "14 How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed? And how shall they believe in Him of whom they have not heard? And how shall they hear without a preacher? 15 And how shall they preach unless they are sent? As it is written, 'How beautiful are the feet of those who preach the gospel of peace, who bring glad tidings of good things!'" He's simply saying, "Guys, we've got to tell the gospel. We've got to get out there. How are they going to know if we don't teach them?" And by the way, how are the Jewish people ever going to see Christ if we keep showing a Greek Jesus that has obliterated the law when the prophets prophesy a Hebrew Messiah that's going to come and show them how to keep it? Why would a Jew even look at Jesus when all we've done is obliterated the very characteristics of what the Messiah was supposed to do—save us from our sins and teach us how to follow Him by faith? “16 But they've not all obeyed the gospel. For Isaiah says, ‘Lord, who has believed our report?’ 17 So then faith comes by hearing, and hearing by the Word of God.” This is why this broadcast is so important, my friends. This is why it is so critical that you guys partner with us and support us in every possible way, because without people hearing the Word of God the way that it was originally written, it will not affect their lives the way that God intended. It will actually destroy whole parts of their life. If you have a preacher that's out there telling God's people that you don't have to keep God's law, he's causing them to be least in the kingdom. The Gospel comes by hearing, and the way we live our life comes by hearing the Word of God, and we want to make sure that we get the Word of God right. We do what we believe. So thank you for those of you that do support us and stand behind us. “18 But I say, Have they not heard? Yes, indeed, ‘their sound has gone out to all the earth, and their words to the ends of the world.’ 19 But I say, Did Israel not know?" First, Moses says, ‘I will provoke you to jealousy by those who are not a nation. I will move you to anger by a foolish nation.’" Listen to what he's saying. He's saying, "Look, you Jews, you all of Israel. You knew this day was coming, but you chose to spurn My instructions. You chose to turn your back on My Son. I will bring you to jealousy through the Gentiles." This means that we as Gentiles have a massive responsibility, ladies and gentlemen, a huge responsibility, to do this right, to make them jealous. And right now, I don't know very many Jews that are jealous of anything. The only thing I've ever heard a Jew say to me recently, a rabbi, he said he's jealous of how Christians pray because we're filled with the Holy Spirit. There's a passion that's there, but outside of that, there's no jealousy because we're not doing anything that would cause them to be jealous. I'm going to suggest that when we start doing Bible things in Bible ways, and the power of God shows up, and we start following God's calendar and start doing what He's called us to do out of His commandments, by faith, with the supernatural power of the Spirit of God, there will be a jealousy because we'll be doing what they're doing, but receiving the power of God as we remove the tradition and the doctrine from that doing. Isaiah said the very same thing. He said this. He was very bold. According to Paul, he said, "20 I was found by those who did not seek Me. I was made manifest to those who did not ask for Me." And again, he's making the connection to Gentiles today, but to Israel. So now he turns the conversation from the Gentiles who are going to make them jealous, who they're going to find God, “21 to Israel he says, All day long, I have stretched out My hands to a disobedient and contrary people." Unfortunately, that's the end of this chapter. But it's not the end of God or Paul's thought because he goes on to say, "1 I say then, has God cast away His people? Certainly not!" So why then, in traditional Christianity, do we believe that God has replaced Israel with the Christian Gentiles? Literally, exactly the opposite of what Paul is saying. God has not cast away His people, even though they've cast Him away. “Certainly not! For I am also an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. 2 God has not cast away His people whom He foreknew.”e And we'll pick the rest up in chapter 11 because next week is going to be absolutely mic-dropping, amazing. It's going to pull together chapter 9, chapter 10, and chapter 11. Paul's point is that Christ is the goal of the law. You Jews have got the whole concept of righteousness wrong as it relates to the kingdom. You got it right as it relates to this world. You're blessed if you keep God's commandments, but it's not going to get you into the kingdom. Faith and belief is the only thing that will get you in. That's the only key to that door of salvation righteousness. So, my friends, we've come to the end of this broadcast. I want to thank you so much for being with us. Like I said earlier, for those that financially partner with us to help us get this out, there are some incredibly exciting things that are on the horizon, things that we want to do, but we need your help to do it. So, if you don't have a local church, would you consider partnering with us as part of our extended international congregation? You can donate to our ministry at passionfortruth.com up in the upper right-hand corner, just hit the donate button. It'll walk you through that process. We are so grateful for the smallest amount that you might give. It goes a long way, and God absolutely will bless you for that obedience, for sure. For those of you that are out there that are prayer warriors, we need that more than absolutely anything. There are so many things and darts that the enemy is sending our way. We need prayer, prayer for so many things that are happening in our ministry and lives right now. And we're thankful for those of you that are that kind of prayer warrior that would get up early in the morning and pray for us and this ministry. Lastly, would you do us a favor and subscribe to this channel? If you'd like more content like this, please share this with everybody you know and put in the comments what this ministry is meaning to you, what this series is meaning to you. We're going to be featuring some of these comments up in a video coming up. So we'd love to hear from you how this is changing your life. If you're brand new to these concepts, would you just tell us that in the comments or email us at info@passionfortruth.com? We'd love to hear your testimony. In the meantime, I'm Jim Staley with Passion for Truth Ministries. I'll see you in the next video.

Transcript for:Interpreting Romans 10:4 with Jim Staley

Transcript for:
Interpreting Romans 10:4 with Jim Staley