A view of 70 ad.....

That Israel's been following religion in vain for about 2015 years ? :thumbs:


I do know a lot of RCCers who think Jews who remain observant are saved through the O/T covenant. I tell them the temple curtain was torn.

I've heard a lot of whacky stuff concerning Israel during the tribulation.

Didn't see your second post. I'll chew on it for a bit.

 

I've heard that just about all my life - from Baptists.

However, the more I look at the Old Testament, the more it becomes obvious that the covenant God had with Israel has nothing to do with what we called "personal salvation."

The covenant that God made with the children or Israel was for them to be a kingdom of priests - not about salvation at all (Exodus 19:1-9).

 

I don't know if Brother Iconoclast wants to go here but how would you describe the difference between peace, or fellowship offerings, and burnt offerings ?

 

As the scriptures teach plainly in Genesis 15:6 (and Paul explains in Galatians 3 and Romans 4), Abraham was made right with God because he believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. This came long before circumcision or the Law.

The Law does not bring salvation.

It means that they were called to be a people whom God would use to reconciled all peoples/nations to Himself. They were not to be priests for themselves, but priests for others. Today, Christians are the nation of priests as ambassadors of the Kingdom of God. We have a ministry of reconciliation, where we represent God to others under the authority of Jesus and power of the Holy Spirit.

Of course not, but salvation was not found in the rituals, practices and duties of the Law. And that's a good thing, because it is impossible for those who are not redeemed to keep the spirit of the Law.

 

Thank you for your thoughtful and courteous response.

Yes, but that doesn't mean that all have come to personal faith in God. Just because one is a descendant of Abraham doesn't mean that one has the faith of Abraham. Furthermore, the covenant was NOT made to provide salvation. That's an assumption many people have about the Law. It reveals our sinful nature but expressly does NOT provide faith or offer transformation of character. Keeping of the Law can be a matter of faith (where the spirit and often the letter of the Law is kept), or self (where the letter of the Law - or often, a trimmed-down version - is kept as a matter of social protocol or pride).

Salvation has always been available (some will disagree with this assertion) to those who seek after God. No one seeks after God unless God initiates the search, but that happens in many way - including the evidence of creation. Individuals don't always follow through in their search, so some are lost (lose themselves).

God ordained to do something through Abram/Abraham and created from him a great nation whom He delivered from slavery and made a covenant with them to become a nation of priests to serve the rest of the world (see Exodus 19:1-9). They agreed to the offer and God gave them the Law to set them apart from the lifestyle of all of the other nations. He kept His promise, although, in a corporate sense, the children of Israel failed time and time again. Eventually, through a long process of preparation, teaching, and manipulation of historical events, God the Son became flesh and dwelt among His people. Through His life, death, atonement and resurrection, He demonstrated that the Kingdom of God was open to everyone who is willing to enter. He brought into the Kingdom those who were not descendants of Abraham. Although that had been happening all along to some degree, God did not hold the new non-Jewish believers to the old covenant of circumcision and the Law - demonstrating to us that salvation was never in circumcision, the Law, or in a bloodline to Abraham (the points hammered home in Galatians 3 and Romans 4). We appropriate the righteousness of God by believing as Abraham did - committing ourselves to life with God, now revealed in Christ and empowered by the Holy Spirit.

Does that make sense? I am only skimming the surface here and there are books that can (and have) been written about many of the points I have made. I'm just trying to give you a framework of how I understand the way the Law fits into salvation history. Moreover, I have just knocked this out instead of slaving over it, so I may have missed stating some things. This is not a polished piece of writing that I would submit as a theological standard, so I'm sure people can nitpick it apart if they want to try to win an argument.

 

Would much rather take prophecy in a literal sense and meaning though, and not spiritualize the entire text and read theology back into it!