Hi, I'm David Bercot, and tonight we're going to talk about what the early Christians believed concerning Israel. If a person walks into a typical Christian bookstore today and glances through their section on prophecy, he'll find countless books about Israel. These books will describe in great detail how various Old Testament prophecies have been fulfilled in the establishment of the modern country of Israel. They'll also describe in detail exactly what's going to happen to modern Israel in the near future.
But are those books correct? Well, that's what we're going to be talking about tonight and tomorrow night as well. Tonight we're going to be primarily focusing on what the early Christians and the scriptures have to say about Israel. And if time permits, we're also going to look at some of the Old Testament prophecies about Israel. And actually, in the past, that's as far as I went on this subject.
However, in response to my previous messages on Israel, my listeners have asked a lot of questions such as, "Yeah, David, but what about this verse? And what about this passage over here?" So I want to address some of these valid questions that have been asked me. And I also want to go into a little bit of detail. It'll be brief, but at least a sketch somewhat of the establishment of the modern-day country of Israel. Now, most of that will be tomorrow night that we talk about those things.
Okay, to get started, let me just tell you in a nutshell what the early Christians uniformly believed about Israel, which can be summarized in three points. Point number one, because of the Jews' unfaithfulness, God has rejected the fleshly nation of Israel. He has taken their kingdom from them and given it to another. That's point one.
Point two, because of Israel's rejection of God, his prophets, and his son, God has had to raise up children of Abraham from among the Gentiles, as well as from among a remnant of the Jews who do believe. Together, the believing Gentiles and the believing Jews constitute the Israel of God. The kingdom of God has been given to them. That's point two.
Point number three, in some way, in some time in the future, there will be a turning back to God on the part of either the majority of the Jews or at least a remnant of them. Now, if you're like most Bible-believing Christians today, you've already mentally skipped to point number three, and you've tended to ignore points one and two. However, let me tell you this. You're never going to arrive at a proper biblical understanding of Israel unless you grasp all three of these points.
We can never get to point three, which is where everyone seems to want to be, until points one and two have been fulfilled. And I think the witness of the early church can help us considerably in this regard. We can put a lot of the things that are written today maybe in a little bit different perspective. So now I want to read to you some passages from the early Christians that are going to deal with point one, God's rejection of Israel. And perhaps you're going to find these a little grating.
If you've already in your mind just focused on point three, the return of Israel to God, you're going to find what they say very harsh, very irritating. But then we're going to go look at the scriptures that are absolutely just as harsh, just as direct, just as candid as anything the early Christians say. So let's begin. Let's start with Justin Martyr writing about the year 160. Incidentally, you can find these quotations in my work, A Dictionary of Early Christian Beliefs, under two headings.
One is going to be Israel, and one is going to be Jew or Jews. And you'll not only find the ones I'm reading to you, but many more besides. And so I'd encourage you to look there. If you don't have the dictionary, but you have the Ante-Nicene Fathers, I'm going to give you the pages that I'm reading from so you can go and look these up and read the whole context of them.
Okay, now, this passage from Justin Martyr, which is found in volume one, page 269, Justin is speaking to a Jew, and he says, "The Jews beguile and these deceive themselves and you, for they suppose that the everlasting kingdom will be assuredly given to those of the dispersion who are of Abraham after the flesh, even though they are sinners, are faithless, and are disobedient towards God. However, the scriptures have proved this is not the case.
Otherwise, our Lord would not have said, 'They will come from the east and from the west and will sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven.' But the children of the kingdom will be cast out into outer darkness." All right, this next passage is from Irenaeus, written about the year 170, maybe 180.
Volume one, page 515, we read, "Inasmuch as much as the former, talking about the Jews, have rejected the Son of God and cast him out of the vineyard when they slew him, God has justly rejected them. He has given to the Gentiles outside the vineyard the fruits of its cultivation." All right, Clement of Alexandria, writing about the year 195, you can find this in volume two, page 256. Remember, if I gave you the citation on Irenaeus, it's volume one, page 515.
All right, Clement says this, "The Lord was not known by the people who erred, for they were not circumcised in understanding. Their darkness was not enlightened.
They knew not God, and they denied the Lord, so they forfeited the place of the true Israel." Tertullian, writing about the year 197, in volume three, page 152, says, "Thus has the lesser people, that is, the elder people, overcome the greater people, for the lesser have acquired the grace of divine favor from which Israel has been divorced." And again, Tertullian, volume three, page 247, "The Jews had formerly been in covenant with God, but being afterwards cast off on account of their sins, they began to be
without God." Hippolytus, writing about the year 205, from volume five, page 202.
However, he does not say that the Jews are to be cut off. For that reason, their race still subsists and the succession of their children is continued. Okay, so he did not say the Jews would be annihilated and would disappear as a people. However, they continue only as those who have been rejected and cast down from the honor of which of old they were deemed worthy by God. Okay, this next passage is from Origen, written about the year 248. You can find this in volume four, page 508 of the early Christian writings.
Where he says, "We take our stand against the Jews on those scriptures that they believe to be divine, which show that he who was spoken of in prophecy has come and that they have been abandoned on account of the greatness of their sins." And again, he says, volume four, page 614, "Since the coming of Christ, no prophets have arisen among the Jews, for they have confessedly been abandoned by the Holy Spirit because of their impiety towards God and towards him," talking about Jesus, "of whom their prophets spoke." I
know these probably sound a bit repetitive, but I want you to listen to all of these so that you can see for yourselves.
This is what they all believed. You're not going to find anybody outside some of the heretical groups who believed anything different. Cyprian, writing about the year 250, volume five, page 451, says, "But the children of the kingdom will be cast out into outer darkness. There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." He's quoting from scripture there. In fact, a lot of what I read to you are quotations from scripture inside these passages from the early church. Anyway, Cyprian continues.
He shows that the Jews were previously children of the kingdom so long as they continued also to be children of God. However, after the name of the Father ceased to be recognized among them, the kingdom also ceased. Just two more. Lactantius, writing in the early 300s, volume seven, page 123, says, "Having suffered death for us, Christ made us heirs of his everlasting kingdom, the people of the Jews being deprived and disinherited.
However, it is plain that the house of Judah does not signify the Jews whom he cast off. Rather, it signifies us who have been called by him out of the Gentiles and have succeeded to their place by adoption, and they are called sons of the Jews." And finally, from the Apostolic Constitutions, compiled around the year 390, this is in volume seven, page 451, says, "The wicked synagogue is now cast off by the Lord God. He has rejected his own house." As he says, quoting from scripture, "I have forsaken my house.
I have left my inheritance." Now, some of you may be thinking to yourselves, "Well, that's awful. That's anti-Semitic, what the early Christians were saying." But we're going to see now that what they said is absolutely no stronger than what's in scripture. They've added nothing to the scriptures at all.
As you've heard me say many times, if you want to know what the early Christians believed on any subject, read the New Testament, take the totality of all verses dealing with that passage in the New Testament, give them a very serious and literal interpretation, and you're going to arrive at what the early Christians believed. And it's no different on the subject of Israel. So now let's look at some of the verses that many churches today just pass over.
They pretend that they're not there, even though they're so plain. Start with Matthew 8, verses 8 through 12, which I believe it was Tertullian cited just in the quotation I read to you just a few minutes ago. We read, "This is the centurion who had a servant who was very ill. The centurion answered and said, 'Lord, I am not worthy that you should come under my roof, but only speak a word and my servant will be healed. For I also am a man under authority, having soldiers under me.
And I say to this one, 'Go,' and he goes. And to another, 'Come,' and he comes. And to my servant, 'Do this,' and he does it." When Jesus heard it, he marveled and said to those who followed, "Assuredly, I say to you, I have not found such great faith, not even in Israel. And I say to you that many will come from east and west," these would be the Gentiles, "and sit down with Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob in the kingdom of heaven. But the sons of the kingdom," that's the Jews, "will be cast out into outer darkness.
There will be weeping and gnashing of teeth." All right, from Jesus again, Matthew 21, verses 33 through 43. It says, "Here another parable. There was a certain landowner who planted a vineyard and set a hedge around it, dug a wine press in it, and built a tower. And he leased it to vinedressers and went into a far country. Now, when vintage time drew near, he sent his servants to the vinedressers that they might receive its fruit. And the vinedressers took his servants, beat one, killed one, and stoned another.
Again, he sent other servants, more than the first, and they did likewise to them. Then last of all, he sent his son to them, saying, 'They will respect my son.' But when the vinedressers saw the son, they said among themselves, 'This is the heir. Come, let us kill him and seize his inheritance.' So they took him and cast him out of the vineyard and killed him. Therefore, when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vinedressers?
They said to him, 'He will destroy those wicked men miserably and lease his vineyard to other vinedressers who will render to him the fruits in their seasons.' Jesus said to them, 'Have you never read in the scriptures, 'The stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone?' This was the Lord's doing, and it is marvelous in our eyes.
Therefore, I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation bearing the fruits of it.'" Now, here we have Jesus himself out of his own mouth telling us in language that is so plain, I don't see how we could not see it, that the kingdom was going to be taken from the Jews and given to another people who would produce the fruits of it, that the sons of the kingdom would be cast into outer darkness.
We're looking at quite a few other passages because this isn't a matter of proof texting, of picking a verse here and there and trying to put something together. It's a matter of looking at what the New Testament says, what all the verses say on this subject.
Okay, Matthew 22, verses 2 through 9, we read, "And Jesus answered and spoke to them again by parables and said, 'The kingdom of heaven is like a certain king who arranged a marriage for his son and sent out his servants to call those who were invited to the wedding, and they were not willing to come.' Again, he sent out other servants saying, 'Tell those who are invited, 'See, I have prepared my dinner. My oxen and fatted cattle are killed, and all things are ready.
Come to the wedding.' But they made light of it and went their way, one to his own farm and other to do to his business. And the rest seized his servants, treated them spitefully, and killed them." Is there any guess who he's talking about there? These, of course, are the Jews, the Israelites, who were the first to receive the invitation. The invitation was given to them. In fact, it was given to them alone during the days of Jesus. But as he said, they didn't want to come to the feast. It was something wonderful.
God was offering them, and they refused to come, and they killed his prophets. Anyway, he continues and says, "But when the king heard about it, he was furious." Now, who's the king? Well, that's God. "And he sent out his armies, destroyed those murderers, and burned up their city." And he questioned what he's talking about there, that Jerusalem was destroyed by the Romans. Tens of hundreds of thousands, maybe as many as a million Jews were put to death or sold into slavery.
He says, "Then he said to his servants, 'The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. Therefore, go into the highways and as many as you find, invite to the wedding.'" So those servants went out into the highways and gathered together all whom they found, both bad and good, and the wedding hall was filled with guests. Do you see how plain the scriptures are on this?
And we see we can never get to the point where we can talk about the restoration of Israel until we see very plainly how completely and strongly that God rejected them, how heinous their crime was against God. All right, Matthew 23, verses 31 through 39. And again, I'm sorry if this gets a little tedious.
I know it's hard to just sit and listen to one scripture after another being read, but I want this point to be driven home so firmly that you're not going to be able to walk away tonight and say, "Well, I don't know if that's really what the scriptures say." Matthew 23, 31 through 39, here Jesus is talking to the primarily to the religious leaders of the Jews. He says, "You are witnesses against yourselves that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up then the measure of your father's guilt.
Serpents, brood of vipers, how can you escape the condemnation of hell?" Now, the early Christians never spoke that frankly, did they? "Therefore indeed, I send you prophets, wise men, and scribes. Some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues and persecute from city to city. That on you may come all the righteous blood shed on the earth from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, son of Barachiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.
Assuredly, I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation. O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her. How often I wanted to gather your children together as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing. See, your house is left to you desolate.
For I say to you, you shall see me no more till you say, 'Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.'" Okay, let's move on to John 8, verses 20 through 24, where we read, "The Jews said, 'Will he kill himself because he says, 'Where I go, you cannot come?'" And he said to them, "You are from beneath. I am from above. You are of this world. I am not of this world. Therefore, I said to you that you will die in your sins.
For if you do not believe that I am he, you will die in your sins." They answered and said to him, "Abraham is our father." I've moved up to now verse 39. I'm going to read just a few select verses to 47. Jesus said to them, "If you were Abraham's children, you would do the works of Abraham, but now you seek to kill me. If God were your father, you would love me. For I proceeded forth and came from God, nor have I come of myself, but he sent me.
You are of your father the devil, and the desires of your father you want to do. He who is of God hears God's words. Therefore, you do not hear because you are not of God." So Jesus was very direct on this point. Can anyone hear those passages and still believe that God did not reject the fleshly nation of Israel, did not cast them out of the kingdom, that condemnation did not come upon them? Let's go to the book of Romans.
And we're going to go back to Romans later on and look at the passages about a return to faith on the part of Israel. But we can't get to those passages until we read what came before it. Romans 9, verses 30 through chapter 10, verse 4, we read, "What shall we say then? That Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have attained to righteousness, even the righteousness of faith. But Israel, pursuing the law of righteousness, has not attained to the law of righteousness. Why?
Because they did not seek it by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stumbled at that stumbling stone, as it is written, 'Behold, I lay in Zion a stumbling stone and rock of offense, and whoever believes on him will not be put to shame.'" Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they may be saved. For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge.
For they being ignorant of God's righteousness and seeking to establish their own righteousness have not submitted to the righteousness of God. For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes. Romans 10, verses 20 and 21. But Isaiah is very bold and says, "I was found by those who did not seek me. I was made manifest to those who did not ask for me." That's talking about the Gentiles.
But to Israel, he says, "All day long, I have stretched out my hands to a disobedient and contrary people." Finally, I want to read 1 Thessalonians 2, verses 14 through 16. And again, this is Paul. "You, brethren, also suffered the same things from your own countrymen, just as they did from the Judeans, who killed both the Lord Jesus and their own prophets and have persecuted us.
And they do not please God and are contrary to all men, forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they may be saved, so as always to fill up the measure of their sins. But wrath has come upon them to the uttermost." It's not a matter of being anti-Semitic, of hating Jews or anything like that. It's a matter of being honest. What are the scriptures saying? They say that wrath has come upon them to the uttermost.
So the early Christians were right on target in believing that God had rejected the Jews and taken the kingdom from them. So where is the kingdom of God now? Well, if you haven't already done so, I would encourage you to listen to my message on the two kingdoms that I delivered some time back. Because unless you grasp the fundamental Christian truth about the two kingdoms, the kingdom of God and the kingdom of this world, you'll never grasp what I'm about to share with you concerning the Israel of God.
And I think that's why there's so much confusion today and why so many professing Bible-believing Christians have such a skewed view of Israel because they've never grasped the fundamental teaching of the two kingdoms. Now, I want to read to you what the early Christians had to say about the true Israel, the Israel of God, the kingdom that Jesus said would be taken from the Jews and given to a people willing to produce its fruit. And this is the Israel of God. So I'm going to read to you some passages.
I'll start with Barnabas, which may be the earliest writing we have outside of the New Testament. It's one of the earliest, for sure. Some date it as early as the year 70. No one dates it later than 130 that I'm aware of. Find this in volume 1, page 145 of the early Christian writings. It says, "Let us see if this people, the Christians, are the heirs, or if it is the former, the Jews. Let us see if the covenant belongs to us or to them." And then he goes on to show that it belongs to us.
We are the people of the covenant, all of us who have faith in Jesus Christ, whether we are Gentiles or Jews in the flesh. The earliest sermon we have that's usually called Second Clement, dating to about the year 150, says this: "When he said, 'Rejoice, you barren one who bears not,' he referred to us, some of the Gentiles. For our church was barren before children were given to her.
And when he said, 'For she that is desolate has many more children than she that has a husband,' quoting him from scripture, he meant that our people seemed to be outcasts from God, but now, through believing, have become more numerous than those who are considered to possess God." It's in volume 7, page 517.
Justin Martyr, volume 1, page 180, says, "Christians from among the Gentiles are both more numerous and more true than those from among the Jews and Samaritans." So the kingdom is made up of Gentiles, Samaritans, and Jews alike, but the majority were Gentiles.
He said they're more true because one of the early Christian heresies, one of the heresies that affected the early church, were the Ebionites and other groups similar to them who were Jews who accepted Jesus only as their Messiah, but not as the divine Son of God. All right, Justin Martyr again, volume 1, page 200.
"For the true spiritual Israel and descendants of Judah, Jacob, Isaac, and Abraham, who in uncircumcision was approved of and blessed by God on account of his faith and called the father of many nations, are we who have been led to God through this crucified Christ." Volume 1, page 264. "By these words, he declares that we, the nations, rejoice with his people. For his people are Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and the prophets, and in short, all people who are well-pleasing to God." There is neither Jew nor Greek.
All people who believe in Jesus Christ are now the people of God. They make up the kingdom of God. They are the Israel of God. It's Justin Martyr says on page 265 of volume 1, "Those who were selected out of every nation have obeyed his will through Christ." So then, as I mentioned fully before, these persons must be Jacob and Israel. It's not a matter of giving it a figurative interpretation. It's a matter of giving it a literal one. We are Israel. We who believe in Jesus Christ.
Irenaeus, volume 1, page 471, "God introduces Abraham to the kingdom of heaven through Jesus Christ. He also introduces Abraham's seed, that is the church. For upon it were conferred the adoption and the inheritance promised to Abraham." Now again, when we get through with these passages, we're going to see what the scriptures say. And I'm going to show to you that they're saying absolutely nothing different than what the scriptures say.
If these concepts are new to you that you're hearing from the early church, it's because wherever you have been hearing the gospel preached, there are a lot of passages that apparently have never been taught to you because just like the passages on rejection that are so plain, the passages that we all make up the Israel of God, the true Israel, are just as plain. On page 484, Irenaeus again writes. Malachi, who was among the 12 prophets, meaning the 12 minor prophets, spoke beforehand in this manner.
"I have no pleasure in you, says the Lord Omnipotent, and I will not accept sacrifice at your hands. For from the rising of the sun until the going down, my name is glorified among the Gentiles. And in every place, incense is offered to my name and a pure sacrifice. For great is my name among the Gentiles, says the Lord Omnipotent." That's quoting from scripture from Malachi.
Okay, Irenaeus says, "Here he stated in the plainest manner by these words that the former people, the Jews, will indeed cease to make offerings to God, but that in every place, sacrifice will be offered to him, and it will be a pure sacrifice." All right, Origen writing about the year 225, it's in volume 4, page 327.
"Many of the present Egyptians and Idumeans who came near to Israel will enter into the church of the Lord, being no longer considered as Egyptians and Idumeans, but as having become Israelites." So they so identified with being the seed of Abraham that they thought of themselves as Israelites. And when you read the early Christian writings, you notice that they generally refer to the world, to the unbelieving ones in the population, as being Gentiles.
In other words, they were Israel, and these unbelievers were Gentiles is how they understood and saw things. Cyprian writing about the year 250 writes, "In the gospel, we find that children of Abraham are raised from stones. That is, gathered from the Gentiles." You can find that in volume 5, page 359. Two more, one short one. "Our ancestors were the patriarchs of the Hebrews." This is from Lactantius, "By flesh a Gentile, but like other Christians, he saw himself as being of the seed of Abraham.
And he looked at them not as the ancestors of somebody else, but as his ancestor. This is my ancestor. I'm from Abraham." I don't know if I gave you the cite on that. It's volume 7, page 108, if I didn't. Okay, and finally, from the Apostolic Constitutions, volume 7, page 445, we read, "To you, the converted Gentiles is opened the gate of life.
You were formerly not loved, but you are now beloved, a people ordained for the possession of God." So I think it's clear how they saw things, that they saw themselves as being the true Israel, being the Israel of God. Now let's look at the scriptures. Why did they believe this way? What do the scriptures have to say? Now, a lot of the passages I just read to you were quoting from the Old Testament.
And I want to read three of the prophecies that they make mention of quite often, not just in the quotes that I've read here, but all throughout their writings. One is Haggai 2:7, which says, "I will shake all nations, and they will come to the desire of all nations, and I will fill this temple with glory." Now, when the scriptures talk about the nations, it's always referring to the Gentile nations, the non-Jewish nations, that they would come in and fill the temple.
Micah 4:1-2 is quoted many times by the early Christians. "Now it shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the Lord's house shall be established on the top of the mountains and shall be exalted above the hills, and people shall flow to it. Many nations shall come and say, 'Come and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways, and we will walk in his paths.
For out of Zion the law shall go forth and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.'" And they saw this being fulfilled, that the apostles had come out from Jerusalem. They had been sent out from Jerusalem to all the nations and invited people to come up to the house of the Lord.
And in Malachi 1:11, "From the rising of the sun even to its going down, my name will be great among the Gentiles." So those were the Old Testament prophecies that they universally understood to be being fulfilled in them, the Gentiles, the Israel of God. Now let's see what the New Testament says about any such thing, about Gentiles being able to be the Israel of God. Is that possible or is that something the early Christians made up?
Well, first let's go to Matthew 3:9 that Cyprian alluded to in the quote I just read to you. There John the Baptist says, "Do not think to say to yourselves, 'We have Abraham as our father.' For I say to you that God is able to raise up children to Abraham from these stones." So God wasn't limited to raising up children to Abraham from the fleshly Jews because John the Baptist said he could even do it from the stones if he wanted to. If he could do it from stones, he can certainly do it from Gentile people.
So any thought we would have that, oh, God is limited, that the only descendants of Abraham have to be people genetically descended from Abraham, well, the scriptures show that that's not true. In fact, when we read the Old Testament, we find that quite a lot of the people who came in and joined Israel were not descendants of Abraham in the flesh, but they became people of the faith and became Jews even though they were not natural descendants of Abraham.
So if they could become Jews then in the Old Testament, they can certainly become so today that we Gentiles can become Jews. We can become Israelites in being the seed of Abraham. And then I read to you earlier from Jesus where he told the Jews, "You say," well, they told him, "We have Abraham as our father." He said, "No, your father is the devil." So let's get that clear right from the outset.
The scriptures make that, I think, very clear that God is not limited to the fleshly Israelites to fulfill his promises to Abraham, that he can and has raised up children to Abraham from people outside of Israel, of fleshly Israel. Paul brings this about and explains this further in Romans. Romans 2:28-29, he said, "For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is that circumcision which is outward in the flesh.
But he is a Jew who is one inwardly." So he shows that being a Jew doesn't have anything to do with being circumcised, doesn't have anything to do with the flesh, with anything outward. It has to do with something inward, having the same faith that Abraham did. Now, the New International Version is not even a mistranslation. To me, it's being very dishonest with God's word.
It says, "For he is not a Jew who is merely one outwardly," making it say, "Oh, well, to be a Jew, you have to first be a Jew, but then you have to be one inwardly as well." See, Paul doesn't say that, that who is one merely outwardly or outwardly only, but rather that he is not one who is one outward. So what we're seeing is the early Christians didn't make something up.
They had every right to think of themselves as Jews, to think of Abraham as being their patriarch, their forefather, because Paul tells us that he is a Jew who is one inwardly. Again, Paul says in Romans 9:6-7, he says, "They are not all Israel who are of Israel," that would be of the flesh, "nor are they all children because they are the seed of Abraham." So again, he makes it clear that Israel is not limited to fleshly descendants of Abraham. Again, in Galatians, he says, "There is neither Jew nor Greek.
There is neither slave nor free. There is neither male nor female. For you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ, then you are Abraham's seed." See, if we are Christ, then we are the seed of Abraham. We are Israel. We are Jews. He says, "And heirs according to the promise." So we're the ones who receive that promise.
Again, in Galatians 3:28-29, again in Galatians 4:24-31, he says, "For these are the two covenants, the one from Mount Sinai, which gives birth to bondage, that would be from Hagar, which is Hagar. For this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia and corresponds to Jerusalem, which now is and is in bondage with her children. But the Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all." Oh, now he tells us there's another Jerusalem, one that is free. We shouldn't be looking at the earthly Jerusalem.
It's in bondage, he says. No, there's a heavenly one. That's what we should be concerned with. He says, "For it is written, 'Rejoice, rejoice, O barren, you who do not bear. Break forth and shout. You who are not in labor. For the desolate has many more children than she who has a husband.'" Quoting from scripture. Now he says, "Now we, brethren, as Isaac was, are children of promise." And he's talking to Gentiles.
"But as he who was born according to the flesh then persecuted him who was born according to the Spirit," that is, Ishmael persecuting Isaac. He says, "Even so, it is now." Because the ones from the flesh, the Jews, were persecuting God's people of the Spirit. Nevertheless, Paul continues, what does the scripture say? He says, "Cast out the bondwoman and her son, for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the free woman." So then, brethren, we are not children of the bondwoman, but of the free.
He says, "The fleshly Jews are the children of the bondwoman. They're in bondage." So you see how what appears with the eyes has changed, that the ones who boast of being Abraham's seed are in fact not Abraham's seed, he says. And those who were cast off formerly are now beloved. And they're the heirs of the promise. Again, he says in Galatians 6:15-16, "In Christ Jesus, neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything." In other words, it doesn't matter if you're Jew or Gentile. It doesn't mean anything.
But a new creation, that's what counts. "And as many as walk according to this rule, peace and mercy be upon them and upon the Israel of God." So he makes a distinction there between fleshly Israel that he has described as being in bondage. He talks about the Israel of God. So see, the early Christians weren't off base when they believed they were the Israel of God. In fact, the whole book of Hebrews, and we're not going to read it tonight, but I encourage you to go back and read that.
It shows how this new Israel, the Israel of God, it has its own high priest. It doesn't need priests any longer, earthly priests, because it has a high priest who is immortal. It has one sacrifice for all time. We don't need to go back and offer sacrifices anymore. That's all done with. And everything else that was in old Israel, all of that, he says, were shadows of the things to come. The reality is now. None of that was real. It was only pointing towards realities that would come later.
And that book makes it so clear that the old covenant has passed away. For example, Hebrews 8:13 says, "In that he says a new covenant, he has made the first obsolete." So it's obsolete. We shouldn't be looking back for the old covenant to be revived ever again. It's gone. It's been surpassed by something new, something better. And in Hebrews, once more we read about this heavenly Jerusalem.
He says, "You have come to Mount Zion and to the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem." So when we're looking at passages in scriptures talking about Jerusalem, we have to be careful that we take into consideration that there's a heavenly Jerusalem as well. And then Hebrews 12:28 says this, "Since we are receiving a kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us have grace by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear." So he says this, we are now, we are receiving a kingdom.
The same kingdom that Jesus says was taken away from the Israelites. I think the reality of the fact that we Christians are the Israel of God is particularly borne out by Peter's first letter. Let me show you what I mean. It starts off, "Peter, an apostle of Jesus Christ to the pilgrims of the dispersion." The Greek there would be diaspora. Now that was the term that was used to describe the fleshly Jews who were scattered, the ones who were not in Palestine, but were scattered throughout the ancient world.
They're called the Jews of the dispersion or the diaspora. And now Peter is addressing the pilgrims of the diaspora. Now, our first thought would be, okay, so his letter is going to his fellow Jews because Peter himself was a fleshly Jew. However, the rest of the letter makes it clear that no, he's talking to the Gentiles. Let me read to you from chapter 2, verses 5 through 10.
He says, "You also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ. Therefore, it is also contained in the scripture, 'Behold, I lay in Zion a chief cornerstone, elect, precious, and he who believes on him will by no means be put to shame.
Therefore, to you who believe, he is precious, but to those who are disobedient, the stone which the builders rejected has become the chief cornerstone, and a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense. They stumble,' he's talking about the Jews, 'being disobedient to the word to which they also were appointed.' So they were appointed to it, but as a nation, they were disobedient, not as the individuals.
He says, 'But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, his own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light, who once were not a people, but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy, but now have obtained mercy.' Now, when he says, 'You are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation,' those were the words that had been spoken to the ancient Israelites, the fleshly Israelites.
That had been said to them. This is what they were supposed to be. But as a nation, they never fulfilled it. So I don't know how more dramatically Peter could make it clear that Israel now are the people of God, the people who have the faith of Abraham, that they are now the royal priesthood, the holy nation, whether they are Jew or Gentile, it makes no difference. So this is a reality. It's not, oh, figuratively, the church is Israel. No, there's nothing figurative about it.
In reality, those who are truly born again are Israel, are Jews, are the heirs of the promises made to Abraham. And this is, I think, even further brought home by a passage in Revelation that's very interesting. Revelation 3, verse 9, Jesus is speaking. He says, he's talking to one of the seven churches. "Indeed, I will make those of the synagogue of Satan who say they are Jews and are not, but lie.
Indeed, I will make them come and worship before your feet and to know that I have loved you." Boy, how much more dramatic could you say it? They say they are Jews, but they're not. They lie. Well, they were certainly fleshly Jews, but the word Jew means something praised. He says they lied because they are not praised by God. They not only rejected Jesus Christ, but they did everything in their power to prevent the word from going out to other Jews and to the Gentiles. He calls them a synagogue of Satan.
A few years ago, when I was in Honduras, I was driving through a town and I saw a church there and the name was in Spanish. I don't remember the exact name, but it was something about the new Israel. I could read enough to understand what it was saying. And I was kind of curious because I've noted down there, it seems like almost every group that exists anywhere in the United States, you'll find down there in a very small concentration because all the missionaries go there.
I assume it's the same for other Latin American countries. I'd never heard of that church. So I asked the brother I was with, "What kind of group is that?" And he kind of chuckled and said, "Oh, they imagine that they are Israel, that they're the Israel of God." And he's kind of chuckling as he said it. He said, "I guess they've never read their Bible." Well, I wasn't interested in getting into a long debate about that. But I know the chuckling should be the other way. Those people weren't imagining anything.
That this is, in fact, what Christians historically believed. And we've seen it so clear in scripture that we are Israel and that Jesus wasn't even willing to accept the fleshly Jews calling themselves Jews. He said, "They lie because they are not praised of God." Okay, so the first two points I said of what the early church believed, one, that the Jews as a nation had been rejected. Number two, that the people of God, born-again believers, whether Jew or Gentile, are the Israel of God.
They're the heirs of the promise. They're the true seed of Abraham. And I think both of these points we see are solidly founded in scripture. The third point is that there will be, or perhaps will be, at some time in the future, a repentance on the part of Israel and a return to God. Now, I want to read the Bible passages in the New Testament that that view is based on. We're going to look at the scriptures first.
I'm going to show you what the early church had to say about those passages, and we're going to discuss them a bit in detail. The first one is Luke 21, 23, and 24, where Jesus is talking about the destruction of Jerusalem and maybe beyond that. He says there will be great distress in the land and wrath upon this people, talking about the Jews, and they will fall by the edge of the sword and be led away captive into all nations. Well, this is, I think, certainly talking about the destruction of earthly Jerusalem.
He says, "And Jerusalem will be trampled by Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled." Now, everything else that Jesus said, he talked about the Jews being cast off, the kingdom would be taken from them, given to a people producing the fruit of it. But now he mentions something that he never explains, and it's not even in the three other gospels, only in Luke, about until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled that Jerusalem will be trampled on.
So it gives an indication that there is a period called the times of the Gentiles. Now, what will happen when that ends? He doesn't say. He doesn't say the Jews would return to God. He certainly doesn't say the kingdom would return to them or anything like that. He just says it will be trampled by Gentiles until the Gentile times are fulfilled. And of course, one question I think we have to reasonably ask is, is he talking only about earthly Jerusalem? Is this fulfilled in earthly Jerusalem?
Or what we've just seen later in the New Testament, heavenly Jerusalem, the Jerusalem above. We don't know because there is no explanation given in scripture. The early church, and I've probably commented on this a number of times, they don't dwell a lot on prophecy. They dwell on what is clear in scripture. And the parts that are unclear, they often say very little about, even rarely quote, because we don't know.
Very different from the attitude I see today where people will write big, long books about various books of the Bible, things that aren't the least bit clear, and they pride themselves in the thinking, yeah, they've got it all mapped out. This means this and that. I mean, I grew up a Jehovah's Witness and oh boy, they had every verse in every book of the Bible all mapped out. And of course, every 20 years they had to totally rewrite it and all that because what they said didn't come about.
But that's never slowed them down from going right on thinking that they've got everything mapped out. And I hate to say it, but I think a lot of evangelicals are not a whole lot better. They seem to have that same approach.
The only one I could even find who commented on this times of the Gentiles, Tertullian, volume 3, page 560, he says, "Jerusalem was to be trodden down by the Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles would be fulfilled," meaning, of course, those who were to be chosen of God and gathered in with the remnant of Israel. Doesn't really shed a whole lot of light on it. And again, it's not surprising. The scriptures don't give us anything to really explain it, and the early church didn't venture to speculate.
But where then we would really get any idea of a return of Israel to God in whole or in part would basically be from the chapter 11 of Romans. I don't think there's any other place in the New Testament that any of us would get such an idea. I'm going to read every verse of Romans, but I'm going to read a good part of it. And let's see what he actually says, and we'll read from one of the early Christian writers on it. I'm going to start with Romans chapter 11, verse 1, and read the first five verses.
Paul says, "I say then, has God cast away his people? Certainly not, for I also am an Israelite of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. God has not cast away his people whom he foreknew." Okay, let's just stop there. Now, reading just that part, it might sound like also all of this isn't true of God rejecting Israel. But we've read such plain passages from scripture that tell us the kingdom was taken away from them.
So either we have a contradiction in scripture, or maybe we just need to read a little further and let Paul explain what he's meaning. Okay, he says, "God hasn't cast them away." How do we know he hasn't cast them away? He says, "Or do you not know what the scripture says of Elijah, how he pleads with God against Israel saying, 'Lord, they have killed your prophets and torn down your altars, and I alone am left, and they seek my life?'" But what does the divine response say to him?
This is God talking, "I have reserved for myself 7,000 men who have not bowed the knee to Baal." Paul says, "Even so then, at this present time, there is a remnant according to the election of grace." Okay, so he says, "If God had cast them out, that would mean that nobody from Israel would receive the promise." But he says, "No, that hasn't happened. There is a remnant that has been saved according to the election of grace." So he explains right there what he means.
He's not saying God has not rejected fleshly Israel as his people or raised up another Israel. He hasn't said that at all because I previously read to you from earlier chapters of Romans where he explains not everyone of Israel is really of Israel. And he is a Jew who is one inwardly, not one outwardly. So he explains all of that.
But he's saying, "Now, if none of the Israelites, if none of the Jews had believed, if none of them were allowed to come in, then that would mean God had cast off his people." He hasn't done that. That part of the Israel of God is made up of a remnant of Jews. All right? He says in verse 7, "What then? Israel has not obtained what it seeks, but the elect have obtained it, and the rest were blinded." So again, there's a remnant that has believed. All right?
So again, nothing that contradicts anything that we've said or that makes any promises of the future. Now let's go down to verse 15. Talking about the fleshly Jews, he says, "For if their being cast away is the reconciling of the world, what will their acceptance be? But life from the dead." So he said the offer was extended to the Gentiles because the ones who were first given the invitation rejected it. I mean, that's right from Jesus' parable of the wedding feast.
He says, "For if the first fruit is holy, the lump is also holy, and the root is holy, so are the branches." Or rather, "If the root is holy, so are the branches." He says, "And if some of the branches were broken off, those would be fleshly Jews, and you, talking to Gentiles, being a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them and with them became a partaker of the root and fatness of the olive tree, do not boast against the branches." All right, he says, "Okay, now God didn't create a new tree." Again, showing he
had not cast off Israel.
It's the same rootstock that started with Abraham and went through Isaac and Joseph, rather Jacob or Israel through Moses, through David, the whole line that we Gentiles have to be grafted into that. He hasn't started something new. We're grafted into there, which also shows that we are the real Israel of God, those of us who have been grafted in, Jew or Gentile alike. All right. And we should not get puffy about it and start thinking ourselves superior to the fleshly Jews.
He says, "But if you do boast, remember that you do not support the root, but the root supports you. We got grafted into their tree, not vice versa. You will say then branches were broken off that I might be grafted in." Well said. "Because of unbelief, they were broken off, and you stand by faith. Do not be haughty, but fear. For if God did not spare the natural branches, he may not spare you either." So just like they got broken off, we can get broken off too. We better not get haughty.
He says, "Therefore, consider the goodness and severity of God on those who fell severity, but towards you goodness, if you continue in his goodness. Otherwise, you also will be cut off." Very strong passage against eternal security, isn't it? That just as the Jews were cut off, the individual branches, those of us who were grafted in can get cut right back out again. So we should never think that we've been saved in a way that we can't fall before the end of our lives. Okay. Again, nothing new.
This is very consistent with what we've been saying, that there is one Israel of God, and that consists of believing Jews and believing Gentiles, and we're all alike the heirs of Abraham. If not, he wouldn't say we were grafted into that rootstock. He'd say there was a second olive tree, but that's not what he has said. Okay.
Okay, then verse 23, he says, "And they also," talking about the Jews, "if they do not continue in unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again." So they have not been rejected in such a way that they can't repent and come back. So God is still merciful to them, just as he has been merciful to us. He has not blocked the way. He has not cast them off in a way that they can never come back again. But he says, "If they do not continue in unbelief." He doesn't say they won't continue.
He says, "If they don't." Verse 24, "For if you were cut out of the olive tree, which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will those who are natural branches be grafted into their own olive tree?" Well, of course, any Jew who's been rejected can easily be grafted back in if he repents, or his offspring, if they believe, can be grafted back in.
If we could, as Gentiles, be grafted in and become heirs of Abraham, well, certainly his fleshly seed can as well. All right. So far, anything that contradicts anything we've said or goes against any of the other verses? No. All fits in. Verse 25, "For I did not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery." Okay, he was going to tell us a mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion. This is it. That blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.
Okay, this maybe is another little thread there that we saw from Jesus about the Gentile times. He says, "The blindness has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in." Doesn't say what happens after that, just that there will be a point where the fullness of the Gentiles has come in, and then things may be different.
Then verse 26, "And so all Israel will be saved as it is written." Now, going down through this whole chapter 11 of Romans, as I pointed out, there's nothing new, nothing different, nothing that contradicts anything that we've read about the rejection of Israel. He explains that their rejection doesn't mean, number one, that there's not even a remnant of them left. And he shows that the fact that there is a remnant shows that God has not completely cast them off.
And number two, it doesn't mean that the invitation has been taken away from them, that they can't repent and come back to Christ the same way that we Gentiles can repent and come to Christ. So the only thing new is when he says that the blindness, he says, is on Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. Doesn't explain anything more in that passage what's going to happen next.
But then verse 26, "And so all Israel will be saved as it is written." Now, some interpret this that, okay, that means all Jews are going to get saved. Now, does that mean every Jew who has lived up until now, up until the second coming of Christ? It wouldn't seem like the verse could possibly mean that because we have very direct words from Jesus himself that seems to indicate that many of them, the ones in his day, were not going to have eternal life. Look at Matthew 11, 21 and 22. He says, "Woe to you, Chorazin!
Woe to you, Bethsaida! For if the mighty works which were done in you had been done in Tyre and Sidon, they would have repented long ago in sackcloth and ashes. But I say to you, it will be more tolerable for Tyre and Sidon—those were Phoenician cities—in the day of judgment than for you." Doesn't sound like to me that they're assured of salvation.
And again, chapter 12, verses 39 and 41, he says, "An evil and adulterous generation seeks after a sign, and no sign will be given to it except the sign of the prophet Jonah." He refers to them as an evil and adulterous generation. Then he says, "The men of Nineveh will rise up in the judgment with this generation and condemn it because they repented at the preaching of Jonah, and indeed a greater than Jonah is here." So he said those Gentiles in Nineveh would rise up and condemn that generation of Jews.
He told the apostles that when they went to a city, and he sent them only to the cities of Israel. He said, "If you go to a city and they don't accept you, shake the dust off your sandals," he said, "it will be more tolerable for Sodom and Gomorrah, which are examples in the Bible of among the most wicked humans that have ever lived." He said, "It'll be more tolerable for them on judgment day than for those Israelites in that city." So I think we can reject that as a reasonable interpretation of that verse.
If that's the case, then it would seem like we'd have to throw out so much of scripture if God is going to save even those who don't believe, even those who openly rejected Jesus Christ, that they can be saved anyway.
Now, another possible explanation, one that's widely believed, is that at the second coming of Christ or sometime before the second coming of Christ, there's going to be a sudden change where the whole nation of Israel, the ones living at that time, or at least perhaps the majority of them or a large part of them, are going to come to Jesus Christ. That's certainly a possibility. Paul doesn't go on to explain it.
You can read the verses after that, and he just says that the election of God is unchangeable, but the election had nothing to do with every Israelite being saved. I mean, salvation is still going to be through the Jews. We're still having to be grafted into the rootstock of Abraham. We have to become Jews in order to be saved. But no further explanation is given. Well, we're about out of time tonight. We'll just kind of leave you dangling.
Tomorrow night, I want to give you a possible explanation that I think fits all of the verses that we've just read. Unfortunately, I'm not going to be able to say, "Oh, the early Christian view of this was such and such," because that passage is only quoted twice that I've been able to find in all of the early Christian writings, or actually three times, and none of them give an explanation. Irenaeus is just quoted in passing without giving any explanation, and he's dealing with another subject altogether.
And Origen quotes it once when he's talking about divorce, again, just mentioned in passing. And then in another work, he quotes it, paraphrases it, basically what Paul has just said there without adding anything that gives any understanding or explanation. But I want to at least share with you a possible theory on that. And then tomorrow night, we're going to look at the Old Testament prophecies. Are there still Old Testament prophecies involving Israel that are yet to be fulfilled?
And we're going to talk about the modern nation of Israel, how it got started, what significance perhaps it means for the world today.