THE HOPE OF ISRAEL - The Preterist Archive

The Hope of Israel: What Is It? 91
had He found so many as ten righteous persons
in it.
Note these words :
"Except the Lord of hosts had left unto us a very small
remnant, we should have been as Sodom, and we should have
been like unto Gomorrah.
Hear the word of the Lord, ye rulers of Sodom; give ear
unto the law of our God, ye people of Gomorrah" (w. 9, 10).
This last verse is quoted by Paul in Romans 9 :24-29,
and he combines with it a quotation from Isaiah 10 :21,
22; from which he deduces that, though the number
of the natural Israel were as the sand of the sea, yet
only "a remnant shall be saved"; and further, from
Hosea 2:23, he declares that, to this saved remnant,
God would add believing Gentiles. For thus he applies
the words: "I will call them (i. e. Gentiles) My people,
which were not My people, and her beloved which was
not beloved" (Hos. 2:23).
In Romans 11, Paul traces this saving work of God
still further ;
for he there intimates a working of God's
grace among natural Israelites, after the fulness of
the Gentiles be come in; a divine working whereby a
number of Jews will be converted and added to the
one body of the saved (the one "olive tree") ; "and so
all Israel shall be saved" (Rom. 11:25-27), the "all
Israel" being as the context clearly shows, the whole
company of God's elect.
Returning to Isaiah's prophecy, we observe that, in
the verses immediately following those quoted above,
God proceeds to declare in the strongest terms His
abhorrence of all their assemblies, sacrifices and ceremonies.
Their oblations were "vain," their incense
"an abomination," their new moons and appointed
feasts "My soul hateth," He said; "They are a trouble
to Me, I am weary to bear them." And this is His