“…and you, being a wild olive, were grafted in among them and became partaker with them of the rich root of the olive tree.”  Romans 11:17b

 The eleventh chapter of Romans is my favorite chapter in the whole Bible.  I was more than a little excited when I discovered I would be writing my blog today.  Why is it my favorite?  Because without the truths of this one chapter, because of the kindness of God and His grace I would not be who or where I am today. 

In verse 22 we read, “Behold then the kindness and severity of God; to those who fell, severity, but to you, God’s kindness….”  God had dealt with the nation of Israel severely, He had cut them off for being a “disobedient and obstinate people.” (Romans 10:21) Then God showed His kindness to me, to us.  We were grafted into the vine.  God’s chosen people had been the Jews.  But He set them aside temporarily in order to offer us salvation by grace.  In Colossians 3:12 Paul addresses us, “Therefore as God’s chosen people, holy and dearly loved…”  What an honor, how merciful!

Because they missed the plane, we are invited to sit in their seats in First Class.  A great Bible teacher once said, “I could never be anti-Semitc.  I owe too much to them as a nation.”  You and I are benefiting from the nation of Israel.  Would God have given us a place in His kingdom had the Jews followed after Him?  As Paul says in verse 34, “who has known the mind of the Lord?” 

So I am humble and eternally grateful.  I never want to take my salvation for granted or respond to it with arrogance.  I am a wild olive grafted into the already cultivated, rich and blessed tree. 

I decided to Google “wild olive tree” and what I found was a profound if not prophetic statement:  The wild olive tree is a native North American evergreen.  This small tree is very rarely found and is even reportedly close to extinction.”  May this not be true for us.

This entry was posted on Sunday, June 17th, 2007 at 5:39 am and is filed under Daily Readings. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.