As we read through this letter to the Romans, we must remember that Paul is writing to a mixed group of both Jews and Gentiles. There would have been a faction of the Jews, as we repeatedly find throughout the New Testament, that did not want to see the Gentiles come under the blessings of God’s covenant. There would have been a faction that would have insisted that Gentiles, in order to truly be a part of God’s covenant people, would need to undergo circumcision, and along with that, diligently keep to the food and Sabbath laws. There would have been Gentiles that thought that the covenant blessings had passed completely from the Jews to the Gentiles, as they could point to Israel’s nearly wholesale rejection of Jesus as Messiah as evidence in favor of such a verdict. These various factions would have eyed each other suspiciously, seeking to draw boundaries where none should rightfully be allowed to exist, and we see Paul dealing with these things throughout this letter.
Paul cuts right across all of these Jew versus Gentile issues, getting right to the heart of the matter when he writes, “if you confess with your mouth that Jesus is Lord and believe in your heart that God raised Him from the dead, you will be saved” (Romans 10:9). That’s it! This salvation was for Jew and Gentile. This was “the word of faith” (10:8) that Paul said was his singular message, and we know this to be true, as effectively, verse nine outlines the message of the Gospel. Belief in this Gospel, and submission to its power that would serve to order one’s life according to God’s purposes (not another man’s purposes) was that which would graft (to use terminology from chapter nine) an individual into the grouping of God’s covenant people, and allow that person to experience the associated blessings.
This also serves to address any Jewish provincialism, along with Gentile high-mindedness, as Paul makes it a point to inform them that all can be saved, which implies that all need to be saved, which implies that all, Jew and Gentile, are in the midst of cursing and exile and in need of salvation from such. For the Jew, the curse and exile was associated with their violations of the law delivered to them through Moses. For the Gentile, the cursing and exile went all the way back to Adam, and the bringing into the creation of the curse of death and exile from God’s presence (which would naturally apply to the Jew as well).
Verse ten of this chapter reads, “For with the heart one believes and thus has righteousness and with the mouth one confesses and thus has salvation” (10:10). Oftentimes, we allow these two concepts to coalesce. However, we have to make a delineation and see that belief on Jesus is a work of the Spirit, owing to the power of the Gospel proclamation, in which the believer is made to experience God’s covenant faithfulness (righteousness), which is represented by the fact of belief and its power to include the believer as part of God’s covenant people. This righteousness is not a moral quality that is given to the believer. The proclamation of submission to the claims of the Gospel---the open confession of Jesus as Lord (a highly-charged and risky proposition in the day in which Caesar himself is declared to be Lord, and claims contrary to this are punishable by death), is what breaks the curse of Adam (death) and ends the exile from pure fellowship with one’s Creator. That is salvation, and it is distinct from righteousness.
So how do we know that Paul is addressing the divisions and claims of Jew and Gentile? Paul goes on to make it quite clear in verse twelve, writing that “there is no distinction between the Jew and the Greek” (10:12a). It’s difficult to be more clear than that. He goes on to write, “for the same Lord is Lord of all, Who richly blesses all who call on Him” (10:12b). With his use of “richly blesses,” Paul seems to be making an unmistakable allusion to the Abrahamic covenant (which would also pass through Isaac and Jacob, on to Israel). It is worthwhile to pay a quick visit to the words of that covenant, as we go to Genesis and read, “I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you, and I will make your name great, so that you will exemplify divine blessing. I will bless those who bless you, but the one who treats you lightly I must curse, and all the families of the earth will bless one another by your name” (12:2-3). Yes, by calling on the name of the Lord, by believing in Jesus as Lord and confessing Him as such, the blessings of Abraham would fall to all, both Jew and Gentiles, with no distinction. Without boundary or work of the law or division or claim to superiority or inferiority, “everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved” (10:13).
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