Worthy Brief - May 15, 2026

 Worthy Brief - May 15, 2026

Discover the root of the Kingdom!

Romans 11:16-18  For if the firstfruit is holy, the lump is also holy; and if the root is holy, also the branches. 17  And if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them, and became a sharer of the root and the fatness of the olive tree with them, 18  do not boast against the branches. But if you boast, it is not you that bears the root, but the root bears you. 

"If the root is holy, so are the branches" [Romans 11:16]. Paul does not begin Romans 11 with a sentimental picture. He begins with a deep covenant understanding. He is not handing Gentile believers in Rome a lovely metaphor to make them feel included. He is taking them beneath the visible branches and showing them the soil where God's promises have been alive for generations. Before Rome had a congregation, before the gospel crossed the sea, before Gentile believers gathered in homes to break bread and confess Yeshua (Jesus) is Lord, the root was already holy.

The olive tree was not decorative language Paul borrowed loosely from the Scriptures. It already carried the weight of Israel's covenant memory -- blessing, endurance, oil, light, priesthood, and consecration. Jeremiah heard the Lord say of Israel, "The LORD called your name, A green olive tree, lovely and of good fruit" — [Jeremiah 11:16]. Hosea looked beyond judgment into Israel's restoration and said, "His branches shall spread; his beauty shall be like an olive tree" — [Hosea 14:6]. An olive tree can live for centuries. It can survive hard ground. It can be cut back and still send life upward from what remains.

When Paul speaks of the "root," he is not speaking vaguely about spiritual heritage. The Greek word is rhiza, the hidden source that nourishes what is visible. Branches are seen. Fruit is inspected. Leaves can impress from a distance. But the root carries the life in secret. Paul is reaching beneath the surface into the covenant promises given through Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. God had already declared to Abraham, "In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed" [Genesis 22:18]. That promise was not a repair plan. It was the plan from the beginning.

This is where many believers have quietly misread the story. They assume God has finished with Israel -- that the covenant shifted and the promises expired. But God did not abandon the people through whom He chose to reveal Himself to the nations. The covenant was carried through Abraham, confirmed through Isaac, wrestled into Jacob, and from Jacob came Israel -- the vessel through whom Yeshua would come. God's promises to Israel have not been revoked, and the Gentiles who have been grafted in were never hidden outside that promise. They were hidden inside it.

The Tanakh (Old Testament) is not the preface to a Christian book. It is the covenant foundation upon which the New Testament stands. Yeshua did not appear out of nowhere. He came as the Son of David, the Son of Abraham -- born into Israel's story, announced by Israel's prophets, and revealed as the promised King of Israel. Isaiah saw this when he declared, "There shall come forth a Rod from the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots" [Isaiah 11:1]. Yeshua is not detached from the root. He is the holy life of the root revealed in fullness, the promised Branch rising from the covenant soil God had been tending from the beginning.

There is something deeply humbling here: you are not the beginning of the story, your denomination is not the beginning of the story, and even your personal salvation -- precious, costly, and eternal -- is not the beginning of the story. You were brought by mercy into something older than your conversion, deeper than your understanding, stronger than your failures, and holier than the pride that tries to separate blessing from its source.

You were not saved into a rootless faith -- you were grafted into covenant life reaching back to Abraham's tent, Isaac's altar, Jacob's wrestling, David's throne, and the obedience of Yeshua. So receive the promises with reverence, because the root is holy, the promises are alive, and the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob has not forgotten what He swore. The Kingdom is not only coming -- it is already breaking forth through you, because the root still remains.

Your family in the Lord with much agape love,

George & Baht Rivka (Arad, Israel)