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Israel's Dispensational Privileges.
Romans 9: 3-5.
A | According to the flesh. KINSMEN.
B | Who are Israelites.
C | To whom pertaineth the adoption.
D | And the glory.
E | And the covenants.
E | And the giving of the law.
D | And the service.
C | And the promises.
B | Whose are the fathers.
A | According to the flesh. CHRIST.
We note at once that this list of privileges is bounded at each end by the words
"According to the flesh". The term "flesh" has a variety of meanings and must always be
interpreted in the light of the context. Perhaps it would not be far wrong to say that in
this one epistle, we can find almost every variety of its usage. Let us notice a few
examples.
(1) The "flesh" considered as equivalent to human nature without any reference
necessarily to sin:
"Which was made of the seed of David according to the flesh" (Rom. 1: 3).
(2) The "flesh" considered as the equivalent of the human body in contrast with the
heart and "the spirit":
"Circumcision which is outward in the flesh" (Rom. 2: 28).
(3) The "flesh" considered as the seat of sin, the characteristic of the natural man who
is not "spiritual" but "carnal":
"Ye are not in the flesh, but in the spirit" (Rom. 8: 9).
(4) The "flesh" considered as the medium of human expression, in contrast with the
"promise of God" which works in another plane:
"They which are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God: but the
children of the promise are counted for the seed" (Rom. 9: 8).
It is evident that the apostle, in Rom. 9: 3 and 5, uses the words "according to the
flesh" in the first of the four senses enumerated above. The Israelites were his brethren,
his kinsmen "according to the flesh". It had been the boast of the apostle that he was a
Hebrew of the Hebrews. If the other apostles could say that they were Israelites, so also
could he (II Cor. 11: 22). In Rom. 11: 1, even though the apostle is a believer in the Lord
Jesus Christ, he sees in his own salvation a pledge that not one Israelite who had been
foreknown of God could be cast away: "For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of
Abraham, of the stock of Benjamin."