Featured Church vs Israel argument

That day has not yet happened though, as Jesus is not recognized by the Jews as their Messiah!

 

Y1 - did you actually read my post????

Are you suggesting that Jesus has not ascended to his heavenly throne????

Are you claiming that 3,000 Jews who repented & were baptised in Jesus' name & added to the church, and received the Holy Spirit did not recognise Jesus as their Messiah???? And 5,000 a few days later????

Your one-liner posts only show serious ignorance of Scripture.

 

This is not true. Paul says they are under wrath (look at their history) until the end. Ony those who believe in Christ will become Christians.

“forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved, to fill up their sins always: for the wrath is come upon them to the uttermost [the end].” 1 Thessalonians 2:16 (NCPB)

 

That's not true. The wrath against the Jews who rejected Jesus was against "this generation." The "end" prophesied by the Lord (Mat 24) was the destruction of AD 70. The commandments tell us that the wrath of God was limited to 3-4 generations.

The covenant that established Israel was fulfilled by the LORD Jesus Christ. We are now under the New Covenant in Jesus' blood and fellow citizens of the Kingdom with Jew & Gentile as one redeemed people of God.

It is repugnant suggest that God's wrath continues against 60 generations of Jews who were not implicated in the piecing of their Messiah. Jews repented in their thousands, believed in Jesus & formed the church. Unbelieving Jews since are simply sinners who are called by the Gospel, like everyone else.

 

The fact that the article holds dispensationalists believe "The church as the body of Christ does not include Old Testament believer." is problematic. I am a dispensationalist, and I hold at ascenson of Christ all the OT believers were taken from Sheol/Hades to Heaven to be with Christ who died for them showing saved Israel is as much the body of Christ as are all believers, so as also reveled in the Revelation 21:12-14, and Ephesians 2:12. To put it this way, the church as a whole is not Israel and Israel is not the whole church. But Israel being the key part of the church are the one church the one Body of Christ. To believe the whole church is Israel is a false.

 

Jesus' teaching on the spiritual nature of the kingdom makes a physical restoration of Israel Impossible. The restoration takes place in the Resurrection of Israel (the Church) on the last day.

 

Is the point of disagreement. Israel is not the whole church and the whole church is not Israel, though they are the one body of Christ.

 

Only believers are the body of Christ.
“And he is the head of the body, the church: who is the beginning, the firstborn from the dead, that in all things he might have the pre-eminence.” Colossians 1:18 (NCPB)

 

He has ascended to His heavenly throne at the right hand of His Father, there to make intercession for His sheep and to wait until His second coming...
When He will rule from Jerusalem with a rod of iron on the throne of His earthly father David for a thousand years, until all His enemies ( unrepentant mankind, those that are left on the earth after the "great tribulation" ) are made His footstool.

We as believers will rule and reign with Him, for that thousand years.
Then there will be a New Jerusalem that will come down from Heaven, and will rest on a new earth under new heavens ( Revelation 21 ).

Are you suggesting that He will not come again and reign at Jerusalem, as the Bible has prophesied?
I hope not, because I for one am looking forward to going up to the holy city to see Him as often as I can, on His throne and in His temple.

It will be an amazing sight!

 

I didn't make it very far into the article before I began to disagree with the author.
Here are a few statements that struck me as "speedbumps"...

1) "The traditional dispensationalist view maintains that God has not replaced Israel with the church but that God has two programs in history, one for the church and one for Israel."

That's why I'm not a "dispensationalist".

God has not replaced Israel as a nation, but has preserved them.
He has set them aside as a nation and the recipients of His grace and mercy with regard to eternal life, until the fullness of the Gentiles be come in.
God has not replaced Israel with the Church, but there are two "Israels"...

Israel the chosen physical people of God, and Israel the chosen spiritual people of God.
The Church are those of Israel ( Abraham through Isaac through Jacob's lineage ) that God has saved, plus those Gentile believers that are "grafted" into the olive tree ( Romans 11 ).

There are two programs, but they are "programs-within-programs".
God has blinded the nation, but has a remnant within the nation.

He has also allowed the Gentiles to be blinded ( 2 Corinthians 4:3-4 ), but has chosen to reveal Himself to His elect within the nations...
The "world" that He so loved ( John 3:16 ) out of every tongue, tribe and nation ( Revelation 5:8, Revelation 7:8 ).



2) " Traditional dispensationalism also maintains that the church consists only of believers saved between Pentecost and the rapture. The church as the body of Christ does not include Old Testament believers. "

Again I disagree, and that is why I am not a Dispensationalist.

I see that the Church consists of all those saved throughout history... including Abel, Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and every Gentile believer right up until His second coming.
Hebrews 11 gives me many details to base this on.
Also, the remainder of Israel, when He comes, will see Him whom they have pierced and will recognize Who He is and will mourn.

He will be revealed to them as their Messiah, and they will believe on Him.

 

Exactly!

 

I think we can get into difficulties over semantics. I believe the Old Covenant prophecies & promises were fulfilled by Jesus at Calvary & Pentecost. New Covenant believers, both Jew & Gentile receive the OC promises made to Israel, becoming the church and comprising Jew & Gentile as one spiritual body without division.

If Israel, the Jews, want the promises of God made under the Old Covenant, they must repent & receive Jesus as Lord, God & Saviour, the Seed of Abraham. God promised Abram that in him "all families of the earth shall be blessed."

The prefect realisation of those promises will be in the NH&NE which Jesus will establish when he returns for resurrection & judgment.

 

The day of the Lord in OT is the time of Jacob troubles, the great tribulation period!@

 

I am saying that I agree with Apostle Paul. that God has not forgot nor forever cast away the jewish peoples!

 

Believe that when Paul spoke of spiritual Israel, as in not all Israel is really Israel, was talking about the saved Jews who are indeed heirs of Abraham!

 

True Israel... True Church!... Brother Glen

Romans 2:28 For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh:

2:29 But he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the heart, in the spirit, and not in the letter; whose praise is not of men, but of God.

 

Further on in my reading of the article, I get to this:

" Some covenant theologians have adopted a view that many dispensationalists describe as “replacement theology.” This is the idea that the church has completely replaced Israel. Jews may still be saved on an individual basis by coming to Christ, but the nation of Israel and the Jews as a people no longer have any part to play in redemptive history."

Here I disagree with "Covenant Theology", in that Israel has only been set aside for a time, and I agree with the article's statement here:

" A careful study of the New Testament reveals that both of these interpretations of the relationship between Israel and the church are wanting."

And then my eyes fell on this:

" The relationship between the people of God in the Old Testament and the people of God in the New Testament is better described in terms of an organic development rather than either separation or replacement. During most of the Old Testament era, there were essentially three groups of people: the Gentile nations, national Israel, and true Israel (the faithful remnant). Although the nation of Israel was often involved in idolatry, apostasy, and rebellion, God always kept for Himself a faithful remnant—those who trusted in Him and who would not bow the knee to Baal (1 Kings 19:18). This remnant, this true Israel, included men such as David, Joash, Isaiah, and Daniel, as well as women such as Sarah, Deborah, and Hannah. There were those who were circumcised in the flesh and a smaller number who had their hearts circumcised as well. So, even in the Old Testament, not all were Israel who were descended from Israel (Rom. 9:6)."


There it is.

" The true Israel of the Old Testament became the nucleus of the true church on the day of Pentecost. Here the analogy of the olive tree that Paul uses in Romans 11 is instructive. The tree represents the covenant people of God—Israel. Paul compares unbelieving Israel to branches that have been broken off from the olive tree (v. 17a). Believing Gentiles are compared to branches from a wild olive tree that have been grafted in to the cultivated olive tree (vv. 17b–19). The important point to notice is that God does not cut the old tree down and plant a new one (replacement theology). Neither does God plant a second new tree alongside the old tree and then graft branches from the old tree into the new tree (traditional dispensationalism). Instead, the same tree exists across the divide between Old and New Testaments. That which remains after the dead branches are removed is the true Israel. Gentile believers are now grafted into this already existing old tree (true Israel/the true church). There is only one good olive tree, and the same olive tree exists across the covenantal divide."

...and I have to agree with the above based on my studies.

@Marooncat79 :
An interesting article and one I find myself in agreement with, at least in summary.

Thanks for the link.

 

So practically, how does the author's view differ from replacement theology, save in illustration?

 

If they repent, they are no longer Jews but Christians. They remain defrocked Jews who are in fact gentiles unless God brings them to Christ. Hint; Study circumcision and its role. And then consider Christ abolished it on the cross.

 

Paul seems to see as they do, in that spiritual Israel would be saved Jews!