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Romans 10:14a
The Apostle Paul now opens the first of a list of questions that challenges our belief in Jesus and our obedience to following His teachings of the Great Commission (Matthew 28:19-20; Mark 16:15; Luke 24:46-47; John 20:21; and Acts 1:8). In Romans 10:11 Paul quotes Isaiah 28:16 proclaiming, “For the Scripture says, ‘Whoever believes on Him will not be put to shame.’” And in Romans 10:13, Paul quotes Joel 2:32 stating, “For ‘whoever calls on the name of the LORD shall be saved.’” And so, it is now only proper to ask the question of Romans 10:14, “How then shall they call on Him in whom they have not believed?”
Paul quotes Scripture from the Old Testament which is to lead us to God’s saving grace. In the Old Testament it was to lead the Israelites to God – to believe in Him as the one true God – to turn them away from worshiping the false man-made gods of the other nations and to be an example to the world that the other nations would see the Almighty God of the Israelites and turn from their evil ways and false gods and join in with the Israelites and believe in our Creator and true God. But before one can call on the LORD to be saved, as Paul quotes from Joel 2:32, they must believe in Him – that He has the power to save.
This is a promise of the saving grace of God for all who will believe.
Paul uses this example from the Old Testament to point us to the culmination of the circulating story of the Old Testament in their failure to believe so we would have our eyes opened to the obvious truth of the Old Testament, which is God showing His chosen people Israel that He is here, waiting and encouraging them to put their faith in Him, and for believing in Him He would save them from the evils of this world and give them eternal blessings. But if you know the story of the Old Testament, this never happens. The nation of Israel continues to turn from the LORD’s saving grace and forgiveness to worshiping the gods of Gentile nations. This does not happen once or twice but is the never-ending cycle of the Israelites in turning away from being God’s example to the other nations. But God would not be defeated as He uses the example of the Israelites in turning away from Him to show us how obvious salvation is if we will simply put our faith in Him and believe in Jesus as the One sent to save the world from sin as the story of the Old Testament proves that we are incapable of saving ourselves – we are prone to sin, and the only way to overcome it is through putting our faith in the One who has overcome it for us. He died with His arms open as if pleading with us to embrace Him in the salvation and forgiveness that He now offers through His sinless death and resurrection. He did this for us, but we cannot call on Him if we do not believe in Him.
Dear LORD,
If we read the Old Testament we will see the tragedy of the Israelites turning away from Your saving grace over and over and over. But we realize that we too are prone to seek our own way for life and only call on You when we see that we have failed. But then we are prone to turn once again back to our own will and put You on the shelf until we see our failure again. Just as the Israelites of old, it is our will and stubborn ways that Satan uses against us to keep us from truly putting our faith in You and seeking Your will for our lives each day. Please help us to open our hearts in sincerity to Jesus that we may truly believe in You and not put You on a shelf for a rainy day, but that You will be our every-day way of life – in Christ. In Jesus name I pray, amen.