I suspect that we all know what a remnant is. You can go to the carpet store and purchase remnants of carpets for example. These remnants, as they are called, are pieces of the carpet that are left over after an installation is a home or business. One large roll of carpet was purchased by the homeowner but not all of the roll could be used to carpet the home so the pieces that are left over are sold for others to use. Similarly, a bolt of cloth might be purchased but some of it is left over and sold as remnant. A sheet of plywood is used to build a table and section of the plywood (a remnant) is left over which can be used, perhaps, to build a child’s toy box. The world is full of remnants.
In the Bible there are many examples of remnants. For example, only eight, a remnant, of all mankind, survived the flood. God said he would spare Sodom if there were but 10 righteous, a remnant, of all the inhabitants, (Gen. 18:32). In the end only Lot and his two daughters were saved. The whole nation of Israel was delivered out of Egypt but “afterward God destroyed those who did not believe” (1 Cor. 10:1-5). Ultimately, only two, Joshua and Caleb, trusted God, and were allowed to enter the Promised Land. They became the remnant of all those redeemed that originally left Egypt (Deut. 4:27, Lev. 26:36, 39; Deut 28:54f, Num. 26:65). And from this point on we find that there are two divisions within Israel – those who trust God’s revelation and those who do not. The believers are, of course the remnant. One of the more famous remnants is found in 1Kings. Elijah complained that the children of Israel had forsaken their covenant with God, thrown down the altars, and slain the prophets with the sword. He told God, “I, even I only, am left; and they seek my life, to take it away.” God answered, “I have left me seven thousand in Israel, all the knees which have not bowed unto Baal…” (1Kings 19:18).
“The prophets began to see that there never was a time, and never would be, when the whole nation was true to God; nevertheless, always within the nation a remnant was left who had never forsaken their loyalty or compromised their faith. Prophet after prophet came to see this. Amos (Amo. 9:8-10) thought of God sifting men as corn is in a sieve until only the good are left. Micah (Mic. 2:12; Mic. 5:3) had a vision of God gathering the remnant of Israel. Zephaniah (Zep. 3:12-13) had the same idea. Jeremiah foresaw the remnant being gathered from all the countries throughout which they had been scattered (Jer. 23:3). Ezekiel, the individualist, was convinced that a man could not be saved by either a national or an inherited righteousness; the righteous would deliver their own souls by their righteousness (Eze. 14:14; Eze. 14:20; Eze. 14:22). Above all, this idea dominated the thought of Isaiah. He called his son Shear-Jashub, which means The Salvation of the Remnant. Again and again he returns to this idea of the faithful remnant who will be saved by God (Isa. 7:3; Isa. 8:2; Isa. 8:18; Isa. 9:12; Isa. 6:9-13).”1William Barclay’s Daily Study Bible. Romans 11:1-36
Paul makes use of this situation in his letter to the Romans 9-11. There, he makes the point that, even though the majority of Israel had failed to trust Christ, there was a very small portion of the nation or “a remnant” that had believed and trusted in Jesus as the Messiah.
In the prophecies of Isaiah, the remnant, denotes those, of the nation of Israel, who had, at that time, truly put their trust in the LORD (Isa. 10:20). While the larger part of the nation had become apostate and would parish, the remnant, by faith (Hab. 2:4), were to survive the impending judgment that was to befall the nation in Isiah’s day. These would become the germ of the people of God, being blessed of God. They would be made a blessing (compare Mic. 2:12, 4:7, 5:7-8, 7:18; Zep. 2:7, 3:13; Hag. 1:12, 1:14; Zec. 8:6; Joel 2:32). Paul, in Rom. 9:27, quotes from Isa. 10:22 – “the remnant shall be saved.” He then completes his thought in Romans 11:5…
“Even so, then, at this present time also, there is a remnant according to the election of grace, and if by grace, then, it is no more of works . . . What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for, but the election hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded” (Rom. 11:5).
Paul’s argument is that the Jewish nation has not been rejected; but it is not the nation as a whole, but the faithful remnant within it who are the true Jews.2William Barclay’s Daily Study Bible. Romans 11:1-36
The Bridgeway Bible Dictionary says that, “Although the nation Israel as a whole was God’s people, only a minority of the people ever truly believed. While the majority carried out their rituals without any attitude of genuine repentance or faith, there were always the few who were truly devoted to God. This faithful minority is consistently referred to as the remnant. Israel may have been God’s people in the national sense, but the remnant were God’s people in the spiritual sense. They were the true Israel (Rom. 9:6-7; 9:27).
Time and again the prophets declared that God had rejected his unfaithful people but would preserve the faithful remnant. Because He is a God of justice, He judged unbelieving Israel and punished them with destruction and captivity, so one task of the prophets was to build up and encourage the remnant (1Kin. 19:18; Isa. 1:9; 8:16-19; 10:20-23; 28:5; Jer. 15:19-21). God would still preserve a remnant, so that after a time in captivity, some would return to Jerusalem to rebuild the temple, the city and the nation (Ezra 9:13-15; Isa. 11:11-12; 11:16; Mic. 2:12).
The Scofield Bible notes on the “remnant” has this to say:
In the history of Israel a remnant may be discerned, a spiritual Israel within the national Israel. In Elijah’s time 7000 had not bowed the knee to Baal (1 Kings 19:13). In Isaiah’s time it was the “very small remnant” for whose sake God still forebore to destroy the nation (Isaiah 1:9). During the captivities the remnant appears in Jews like Esther, Mordecai, Ezekiel, Daniel, Shadrach, Meshach, and Abednego. At the end of the seventy years of Babylonian captivity it was the remnant that returned under Ezra and Nehemiah. At the time of our Lord, John the Baptist, Simeon, Anna, and “those who looked for redemption in Jerusalem” (Luke 2:38) were the remnant. During the Church Age the remnant is composed of believing Jews (Romans 11:4-5). But an important aspect of the remnant is prophetic. During the great tribulation a remnant out of all Israel will turn to Jesus as Messiah, the “sealed” Israelites of Revelation 7:3-8. It is inferred by many students of Scripture that the great multitude of Gentiles of Revelation 7:9 will be saved by the witness of the 144,000 of vv. 3-8. Some of these will undergo martyrdom (Revelation 6:9-11), some will be spared to enter the millennial kingdom (Zechariah 12:6-13:9). Many of the Psalm express, prophetically, the joys and sorrows of the tribulation remnant.
Note on Jeremiah 15:11: The remnant, of which Jeremiah is the representative, is carefully distinguished from the unbelieving mass of the people. They must share with the nation the coming captivity, for they too have sinned (v. 13). However the LORD’s judgment upon the nation will be but a purifying chastisement to them, and they receive a special protection (v. 11). Verses 15-18 give the answer of the remnant to vv. 11-14. Two things characterize the believing remnant always-loyalty to the Word of God, and separation from those who mock that Word (vv. 16-17 cf. Rev. 3:8-10). 3Notes, The New Scofield Reference Bible, Oxford University Press, New York, 1967
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