The Israel of God, Part One

In Acts 1:1-3 we read that, for a period of forty days following his resurrection, Jesus appeared to his disciples and spoke to them about “that which concerns the kingdom of God.” And as is evident from Acts 1:6-8 (where we find recorded the last exchange to take place between Jesus and his disciples before Jesus’ ascension to heaven), the disciples’ thoughts were very much on the kingdom about which Christ had been speaking to them during the previous forty days:

Those, indeed, then, who are coming together, asked Him, saying, “Lord, art Thou at this time restoring the kingdom to Israel?” Yet He said to them, “Not yours is it to know times or eras which the Father placed in His own jurisdiction. But you shall be obtaining power at the coming of the holy spirit on you, and you shall be My witnesses both in Jerusalem and in entire Judea and Samaria, and as far as the limits of the earth.”

The disciples’ question suggests that the restoration of the kingdom to Israel was one of the very subjects on which Christ had been instructing them during the forty days leading up to his ascension. It’s also worth noting that Christ didn’t say anything to correct their belief that he was going to restore the kingdom to Israel. He simply told them that it was not theirs “to know times or eras which the Father placed in his own jurisdiction.” Christ’s response to his disciples implies that he is going to restore the kingdom to Israel, but that it was simply not God’s will for them to know when this time would come.

Now, when the disciples asked Christ their question concerning the restoration of the kingdom to Israel in Acts 1:6, what did they mean by “Israel”? At the very least, the disciples had in mind an ethnically distinct people descended from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, whose existence and identity is inseparably tied to, and based on, the covenants that God has made with them. In Romans 11:1-2, Paul twice referred to Israel as “[God’s] people.” And in Romans 9:4 we read that the “covenants” belong to Israel (making Israel – and no other nation on earth – God’s covenant people). Simply put, “Israel” is a nation defined by its unique covenantal relationship with God.

In Genesis 17:1-14, we discover how the formation of Israel began: God appeared to Abraham (then named Abram) and made a covenant – i.e., a binding, contractual agreement – with him and his physical descendants. This “Abrahamic covenant” – which can be understood as comprised of several related covenants – promised Abraham’s descendants a special and unique relationship with God. It also promised his descendants a land (Gen. 15:18), the boundaries of which would be specified in greater detail later (Num. 34:1-15).

In Genesis 17:9-14 (Concordant Literal Old Testament), we read the following:

Then Elohim spoke to Abraham: As for you, you shall keep My covenant, you and your seed after you, throughout their generations. This is My covenant that you shall keep between Me and yourselves and your seed after you: Every male among you is to be circumcised. Namely you will be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskin; and this will be the covenant sign between Me and yourselves. Throughout your generations, every male among you shall be circumcised when he is eight days old, anyone born in the household or acquired with money from any foreigner’s son who is not of your seed. He shall be circumcised, yea circumcised, the manservant born in your household or acquired with your money. Thus will My covenant be marked in your flesh as an eonian covenant. As for the uncircumcised male who is not circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin, this soul will be cut off from his people; he has annulled My covenant. 

After receiving the sign of God’s covenant with Israel – i.e., circumcision – Abraham became the first “father” or “patriarch” of the nation of Israel. The Abrahamic covenant was confirmed to his son Isaac and grandson Jacob (Genesis 28:13-15), and the covenant sign of circumcision was later incorporated into the law given to Moses (Leviticus 12:3). Other covenants between God and Israel followed the Abrahamic covenant, and each subsequent covenant was built upon the one(s) preceding it (which means that an understanding and appreciation of each subsequent covenant with Israel requires an understanding of the covenants preceding it).

Now, when Jesus’ disciples referred to “Israel” in Acts 1:6, did they have in mind a nation that will be comprised of every descendant of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob who has ever lived (or ever will live)? I don’t think so. As early as the time of John the Baptizer’s prophetic ministry, we find it emphasized that being a circumcised descendant of Abraham was not, by itself, sufficient for an Israelite to qualify for entrance into the kingdom that’s going to be restored to Israel. For example, in Luke 3:7-9 we read that John warned the crowds who came out to be baptized by him as follows:

“You brood of vipers! Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bear fruits in keeping with repentance. And do not begin to say to yourselves, ‘We have Abraham as our father.’ For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now the axe is laid to the root of the trees. Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the fire.”

Jesus placed a similar emphasis on purity of heart/motive, obedience to God’s will, and faith in him as determining whether or not an Israelite will enter the future kingdom (see, for example, Matthew 5:17-30; Matt. 7:12-27; 10:34-39; 12:33-37, 48-50; 18:1-9; 19:16-19; 23:1-3, 23-27; John 3:1-8; 8:31-47; 13:17; 14:15, 23-27). In light of these considerations, I believe that, by “Israel,” the disciples had in mind the believing, “fruit-bearing” members of God’s covenant people only.

It is this class of Israelites that I believe Christ had in mind when he declared the following to a group of chief priests and Pharisees:

“Did you never read in the scriptures, ‘The stone which is rejected by the builders, This came to be for the head of the corner. From the Lord came this, and it is marvelous in our eyes’? Therefore am I saying to you that the kingdom of God shall be taken away from you and shall be given to a nation producing its fruits. And he who is falling on this stone shall be shattered, yet on whomever it should be falling, it will be scattering him like chaff.” Matthew 21:42-44

The most commonly-held Christian view is that the “nation” to which Christ was referring is “the Christian church” (understood as a company of people comprised primarily of Gentiles). For example, in his remarks on Jesus’ words in Matt. 20:43, Albert Barnes expressed this view as follows:

“[The Jews] had been the children of the kingdom, or under the reign of God; having his law and acknowledging him as King. They had been his chosen and special people, but he says that now this privilege would be taken away; that they would cease to be the special people of God, and that the blessing would be given to a nation who would bring forth the fruits thereof, or "be righteous" that is, to the Gentiles…”

According to many Christians who subscribe to this view, the transfer of the kingdom from “the Jews” to “the Gentiles” took place sometimes after the collapse of the Jewish state in AD 70 (others see this historical event as simply manifesting a change that occurred earlier). Regardless of when the supposed transfer of the kingdom of God from “the Jews” to “the Gentiles” is thought to have occurred, however, this state of affairs would mean that God’s covenant people no longer have the key role to play in God’s redemptive plan for the world that they are prophesied as having (and that God has, in the words of Paul in Rom. 11:1-2, “thrust away” his people, Israel). However, Paul was adamant that God had not thrust away his covenant people, and went on to appeal to the existence of a divinely-preserved, faithful remnant within Israel as evidence of this. In fact, Paul – foreseeing that Israel’s current “calloused” state would lead to some in the body of Christ thinking that Israel, as a nation, no longer had a central role to play in God’s redemptive plan for the world – stated in Rom. 11:25 that his reason for revealing the future destiny of Israel was so that believing Gentiles would not be “wise in [their] own conceits” (ESV) or “passing for prudent among [themselves]” (CLNT). I think there is a good deal of this going on in the body of Christ today, unfortunately.

In contrast with the view of Albert Barnes and other like-minded Christians, I do not believe that the “nation producing its fruits” referred to by Christ in Matt. 21:43 is a Gentile-dominated body of people (e.g., the Christian church). Instead, I believe that Christ had in mind the future nation of Israel that we find referred to in prophecies such as Ezekiel 37:20-28:

Behold, I shall take the sons of Israel from among the nations where they have gone, and I will convene them from all around and bring them to their own ground. I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel, and one king shall be king for them all. They shall no longer be two nations, nor shall they be divided into two kingdoms any longer. They shall not defile themselves any longer with their idol clods, with their abominations and with all their transgressions. I will save them from all their backslidings in which they have sinned and will cleanse them. They will become My people, and I Myself shall become their Elohim.

My servant David will be king over them, and there shall come to be one shepherd for them all. They shall walk in My ordinances and observe My statutes, and they will do them. Thus they will dwell on the land that I gave to My servant Jacob, in which your fathers dwelt; they will dwell on it, they and their sons and their sons’ sons throughout the eon, and David My servant will be their prince for the eon. I will contract with them a covenant of peace; It shall come to be an eonian covenant with them; I will establish them and increase them; I will put My sanctuary in their midst for the eon, And My tabernacle will be over them. Thus I will become their Elohim, And they shall become My people. Then the nations will know that I, Yahweh, am hallowing Israel When My sanctuary comes to be in their midst for the eon.

Isaiah prophesied of the “birth” of this future nation of righteous Israelites as follows:

”Before she was in labor she gave birth; before her pain came upon her she delivered a son. Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things? Shall a land be born in one day? Shall a nation be brought forth in one moment? For as soon as Zion was in labor she brought forth her children. Shall I bring to the point of birth and not cause to bring forth?” says Yahweh; “shall I, who cause to bring forth, shut the womb?” says your God. “Rejoice with Jerusalem, and be glad for her, all you who love her; rejoice with her in joy, all you who mourn over her; that you may nurse and be satisfied from her consoling breast; that you may drink deeply with delight from her glorious abundance.”

The future nation of Israel referred to in these and other prophecies will consist exclusively of believing and faithful Jews/Israelites, and is most likely the “nation producing its fruits” to which Christ declared the kingdom is going to be given in Matt. 21:43.

A holy nation

In his two letters, the apostle Peter wrote to Israelites who will belong to the future nation of Israel referred to in the above prophecies. In the opening verses of his letter, Peter declared that he was writing to “…the chosen expatriates of the dispersion of Pontus, Galatia, Cappadocia, the province of Asia, and Bithynia, according to the foreknowledge of God, the Father, in holiness of spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus Christ…”

The “expatriates of the dispersion” of the various provinces referred to by Peter were Israelites living outside the land of Israel. Peter was, in other words, writing to the same kind of people to whom James wrote his letter (who, in the introduction, are referred to as “the twelve tribes in the dispersion”). Peter’s later reference to the behavior of the recipients of his letter “among the nations” (1 Pet. 2:12) further supports the view that those being addressed in this letter were those of Peter’s own nation who were living outside the land (for those interested in a more in-depth defense of the Jewish identity of those to whom Peter wrote, here’s an article that I found helpful: https://www.oneforisrael.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/02/SWJT.You-Talkin-to-Me.pdf). 

Moreover, the fact that Peter referred to the recipients of his letter as “chosen…according to the foreknowledge of God, the Father, in holiness of spirit, for obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus” means that they are among those believing members of God’s covenant people with whom God will be “concluding a new covenant” (Heb. 8:1-13), and who, by virtue of their faithful obedience and endurance in “doing the will of God,” will be “requited with the promise” and ”obtaining the promise of the eonian enjoyment of the allotment” (Heb. 5:9; 9:15; 10:35-39).[1]

Peter went on to declare the following to the recipients of his letter:

To you, then, who are believing, is the honor, yet to the unbelieving: “A Stone which is rejected by the builders, this came to be for the head of the corner,” and a stumbling stone and a snare rock; who are stumbling also at the word, being stubborn, to which they were appointed also. Yet you are a chosen race, a “royal priesthood,” a “holy nation,” a procured people, so that you should be recounting the virtues of Him Who calls you out of darkness into His marvelous light, who once were “not a people” yet now are the people of God, who “have not enjoyed mercy,” yet now are “being shown mercy.” 1 Peter 2:7-10

Since Peter was writing to believing Israelites, it’s reasonable to conclude that the “chosen race,” “royal priesthood,” “holy nation,” and “procured people” of whom he wrote is comprised exclusively of believing, righteous Israelites. This understanding of the identity of the “holy nation” referred to by Peter is confirmed from the fact that Peter was quoting from Exodus 19:4-6 (which clearly has “the sons of Israel” – and not Gentiles – in view). But what about verse 10? Does Peter’s quotation of the prophet Hosea support the view that the “chosen race” and “holy nation” to which Peter was referring includes all believing Gentiles as well?

In his remarks on this verse, A.E. Knoch explains why this is not at all the case:

The phrases “not a people” and who “have not been shown mercy” are usually referred to the gentile nations, in contrast with Israel. This passage is then adduced in favor of applying Peter's epistles indiscriminately to all men at all times, especially to the present ecclesia which is Christ's body. But a closer consideration will show that this passage proves the very opposite, for it quotes from the prophecy of Hosea, who speaks of the sons of Israel, and cannot possibly be interpreted of any other people.

After quoting Hosea 1:9-11 and 2:23, Knoch concludes, “By no means may these quotations refer to any people but the chosen nation.” I agree.

Paul’s quotation of Hosea 2:23 and 1:10 in Romans 9:25-26 is sometimes appealed to in support of the view that believing Gentiles (and not just believing members of God’s covenant people Israel) fulfill Hosea’s prophecy. However, in his remarks on Rom. 9:25-26, A.E. Knoch provides us with a more correct view of Paul’s use of Hosea in these verses:

“A comparison of Hos.2:23 with Hos.1:9-11 shows that this is not an interpretation but an illustration. God, in His sovereign mercy, will reverse the sentence which He pronounced against Israel. In the very same place in which they were named "Lo-ammi," there they shall be called sons of the living God. He deals with the nations as this.”

In other words, Paul was simply emphasizing the fact that the manner of the calling of the Gentiles is analogous to the manner of the calling of Israel (both of which are expressions of God's mercy; cf. Rom. 11:28-32). We can, therefore, conclude that the “holy nation” to which Peter was referring in his first letter (as well as the “nation producing its fruits” referred to by Christ in Matt. 21:43) is identical with the Israel to which the kingdom is going to be restored at Christ’s return to earth (Acts 1:6), and will be comprised of righteous, believing Israelites.

A division within Israel

This class of Israelites is basically a subcategory of national Israel, and is referred to by Paul in Romans 9:6-8 as follows:

“It is not as though the word of God had failed. For not all those who are descended from Israel are truly Israel, nor are all the children Abraham’s true descendants; rather “through Isaac will your descendants be counted.” This means it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God; rather, the children of promise are counted as descendants.”

The sense of the term “Israel” in these verses is clearly established by the meaning of the term “Israelites” in v. 4 (where it can only refer to the ethnic members of God’s covenant people, Israel). In fact, throughout the entirety of Romans 9-11, the terms “Israel” and “Jew” – regardless of whether believers or unbelievers are in view – denote ethnic Israelites/members of God’s covenant people (see Rom. 9:24, 27, 30-31; 10:12, 19-21; 11:2, 7, 11, 14, 25). In Rom. 9:6-8, the division of which Paul spoke was one that existed within the nation of Israel. That is, Paul was simply distinguishing between two types of Israelites/Jews: (1) Israelites who are “children of the flesh” and (2) Israelites who, by faith, are “children of the promise.” Those who are “counted as descendants” (or “reckoned for seed”) are simply Israelites who, in Paul’s day, had come to believe that Jesus “is the Christ, the Son of God.” These believing Israelites are later referred to by Paul as the “remnant chosen by grace” and “the elect” (or “the chosen”) in Rom. 11:5-7:

“At the present time there is a remnant chosen by grace. And if it is by grace, it is no longer by works, otherwise grace would no longer be grace. What then? Israel failed to obtain what it was diligently seeking, but the elect obtained it. The rest were hardened…”

This Jewish remnant is necessarily constituted by the believers among God’s covenant people (i.e., those Israelites on whom callousness had not come). In contrast, the Israelites referred to in the above passage as “Israel” and “the rest” are identical with those previously referred to in Rom. 9:8 as “the children of the flesh.” They are referred to as “children of the flesh” not because they are ethnic descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and belong to the nation of Israel (for the remnant/children of the promise are Israelites as well), but rather because they are solely ethnic descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. That is, they are called “children of the flesh” because of what they lack (which is faith in their Messiah), and not because of their ethnic/covenantal status (which is a status they share with the “children of the promise”). Thus, while everyone who belonged to the group referred to by Paul as “Israel” and “children of the promise” in Rom. 9:6-9 are ethnic Israelites, not all members of God’s covenant people belong to this group. This (much smaller) group is a subcategory of national Israel.

If, on the other hand, we were to understand the words “children of the flesh” as referring to everyone who is an Israelite according to genealogy/bloodline, then Paul would be excluding all ethnic/natural Israelites from being “children of the promise!” But that, of course, is absurd. Thus, we can conclude that Paul wasn’t saying that ethnic (or “fleshly”) distinctions are done away with for Israel in Rom. 9:6-8. Nor was Paul broadening the meaning of “Israel” to include members of the body of Christ. Rather than broadening the meaning of “Israel” in Rom. 9:6-8, Paul was narrowing the meaning: the “Israel” to which God is going to be fulfilling his covenant-based promises during the eon to come (i.e., those who will constitute the group of Israelites referred to in Rom. 11:26 as “all Israel”) is not going to include unbelieving Israelites. Rather, the people whom Paul referred to as “Israel” in Rom. 9:6 (and who are descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob) are comprised of believing Israelites only. It is these Israelites who will constitute the “nation producing its fruits” to which Christ referred in Matt. 21:43 (and to which the kingdom is going to be restored, in accord with the disciples’ question in Acts 1:6).

What Paul went on to write in Rom. 11:25-28 is further confirmation that, when using the term “Israel” in Romans 9-11, he had in mind the people whose very identity as a people is based on their descent from Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and on the covenants that God has made with them (Rom. 9:3-4). In these verses we read the following:

For I am not willing for you to be ignorant of this secret, brethren, lest you may be passing for prudent among yourselves, that callousness, in part, on Israel has come, until the complement of the nations may be entering. And thus all Israel shall be saved, according as it is written,

Arriving out of Zion shall be the Rescuer. He will be turning away irreverence from Jacob. And this is my covenant with them Whenever I should be eliminating their sins.

As to the evangel, indeed, they are enemies because of you, yet, as to choice, they are beloved because of the fathers.

The “fathers” to whom Paul was referring in v. 28 are the patriarchs from whom every Israelite is descended (and with whom Peter said God “covenanted” in Acts 3:25) – i.e., Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. And those whom Paul referred to as ”enemies because of you” can only refer to literal, ethnic Israelites (the majority of whom were, indeed, enemies of the saints to whom Paul wrote). Thus, the “all Israel” that we’re told “shall be saved” must refer to a people who are just as ethnically Jewish as those whom Paul said were ”enemies because of you” while remaining “as to choice…beloved because of the fathers.” In other words, “all Israel” refers to the majority of Israelites who will constitute the Jewish nation at the future time that Paul had in view here (and does not refer to any who will constitute what Paul referred to as “the complement of the nations”).

The Israel of God

In Gal. 6:15-16, Paul – writing to members of the body of Christ – made reference to this holy nation of believing Israelites as follows: 

“For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision is anything, but a new creation. And whoever shall observe the elements of this rule, peace be on them, and mercy, also on the Israel of God.”

Notice how Paul referred to the “Israel of God” as a distinct category of people on whom he desired God’s mercy in connection with what he’d just said concerning the observance of “the elements of this rule” (the “rule” being that which was expressed in v. 15). Who constitutes the “Israel of God” referred to here, and why would Paul specify “mercy” as being that which he desired would be “on” this distinct category of people (instead of simply “peace,” as he desired would be on everyone else referred to)? Most Christians understand the “Israel of God” to be another reference to that class of believers to whom the recipients of Paul’s 13 signed letters belonged (i.e., the company of saints that Paul referred to as “the body of Christ”). However, in order to understand the “Israel of God” as a reference to the body of Christ, one must not only understand the word “Israel” in a way that Paul never used the word elsewhere in his letters (see, for example, Romans 11), but one must also ignore or “explain away” Paul’s use of the word “also” (which indicates that Paul is now referring to a category of people distinct from those whom he had in view previously). 

On the other hand, when we understand the expression “Israel of God” in a literal and straight-forward way, it becomes clear that Paul was simply referring to the believing remnant among God’s covenant people, Israel (i.e., those believing Israelites who, by virtue of their faith in Christ, will share in Israel’s covenant-based expectation, and will enjoy the new covenant blessings that God has promised to bestow upon Israel after Christ returns). But why would Paul call for mercy upon this particular class of saints? Answer: While some within this category of believing Israelites correctly acknowledged and respected the fact that neither circumcision nor uncircumcision mattered for those within the body of Christ (e.g., Peter, James and John), not all did. In fact, some within this company of believers were very much opposed to what Paul called the “elements of this rule.” Hence – for the sake of those who did “observe the elements of this rule” – Paul expressed his desire for God’s mercy on the entire category of Jewish believers constituting the “Israel of God.”

But who, then, did Paul have in mind by his use of the words “in Christ Jesus?” The very fact that Paul considered circumcision and uncircumcision to be irrelevant for those “in Christ” provides us with the answer. As noted earlier, circumcision is the sign of God’s covenant with Abraham and his descendants through the line of Isaac and Jacob (Israel). Circumcision was (and is) all about becoming a member of that chosen nation to which Christ is going to be restoring the kingdom after he returns to earth. And when Paul wrote to the saints in Galatia, circumcision was still the sign of God’s covenant with Israel, and everything that we’re told God said to Abraham in Genesis 17:9-14 remained just as true and authoritative during Paul’s day as it was when God first spoke these words to Abraham. God has not nullified his covenant with Israel; for God to do so would mean that he has “thrust away” his covenant people (which is the very thing that Paul said God had not done).

With regard to God's redemptive plan for the earth, circumcision was (and continues to be) no trivial or inconsequential matter to God. He himself instituted circumcision as the covenant sign between himself and Israel, and the covenant of circumcision is said to be “throughout [Israel’s] generations” and “an eonian covenant.” Thus, the very fact that Paul considered the sign of God’s covenant with Israel irrelevant for those whom he had in mind when he used the expression “in Christ Jesus” should make it clear to the reader that Paul wasn’t referring to believing members of God’s covenant people here. Rather, Paul had in mind a different company of believers altogether. The company of believers that Paul had in mind by his use of the words “in Christ Jesus” in Gal. 6:15 is that which he referred to elsewhere as “the body of Christ” (1 Cor. 12:12-13, 27; Rom. 12:4-5; cf. 1 Cor. 6:15-19; 10:16-17; 12:12-27) and “the ecclesia which is [Christ’s] body” (Eph. 1:22-23; 4:4, 12-16; 5:23-24, 30; Col. 1:18, 24; 2:19; 3:15).

As used by Paul in his letters, the expression “in Christ Jesus” (or simply “in Christ”) refers to the inseparable spiritual union with Christ that every person who has been called by God through the evangel of the Uncircumcision has (1 Cor. 12:12-13, 27; Eph. 1:13; cf. Rom. 6:3-10). It is this spiritual union that is, in fact, the basis of the “body of Christ” metaphor that Paul alone used in his letters. Moreover – and in contrast with the majority of believing Israelites in Paul’s day – the “in Christ” status of those in the body of Christ is not something that can be lost/forfeited by anything that is done (or not done) by the believer. In Ephesians 1:13-14, the one spirit in which the believers to whom Paul wrote had been “baptized into one body” is referred to as “the holy spirit of promise” with which those in the body of Christ have been “sealed”:

“In Whom you also–on hearing the word of truth, the evangel of your salvation–in Whom on believing also, you are sealed with the holy spirit of promise (which is an earnest of the enjoyment of our allotment, to the deliverance of that which has been procured) for the laud of His glory!”

Later, Paul referred to this spirit as “the holy spirit of God by which [we] are sealed for the day of deliverance” (Eph. 4:30) – i.e., the day when we receive “the deliverance of our body,” and are thus glorified/conformed to the image of Christ (Rom. 8:29-30; see also 2 Cor. 1:22 and 5:1-6, where Paul used the expression “the earnest of the spirit” in connection with our being made immortal). Based on these verses, we can conclude that those who are called by God through the evangel of the grace of God to become members of the body of Christ are given “the holy spirit of promise” as an earnest of our glorification and eonian life. The reception of the spirit of God when we believe the evangel is the event through which we’re “sealed” by God for eonian life. Everyone who receives this spirit will necessarily be vivified by Christ at the appointed future time referred to by Paul in 1 Cor. 15:50-55 and 1 Thess. 4:14-18. And because we are “sealed” with the spirit for this “day of deliverance,” it follows that our justification is permanent. It cannot be undone by anything we do or fail to do.

In contrast with what’s true of all who are members of the body of Christ, the sense in which those to whom every other inspired NT author wrote were “in Christ” was a conditional sense, and dependent on their ongoing faith and righteous conduct. Consider, for example, what the apostle John wrote in his first letter. In 1 John 2:24-25 and 28-29, we read, 

“Let that which you hear from the beginning be remaining in you. If ever that which you hear from the beginning should be remaining in you, you, also, will be remaining in the Son and in the Father. And this is the promise which He promises us: the life eonian…And now, little children, remain in Him, that, if He should be manifested, we should be having boldness and not be put to shame by Him in His presence. If you should be perceiving that He is just, you know that everyone also who is doing righteousness is begotten of Him.”

Notice that the promise of “life eonian” is only said to be for those who are remaining in the Son and the Father, and it is only those who remain in Christ who we’re told will not be “put to shame by him in his presence.” And – based on what’s said in verse 29 – we know that those who remain in Christ are those who are “doing righteousness” and are “begotten of him.” Concerning what it meant to be “remaining in Christ,” John went on to say: “…everyone who is remaining in [Christ] is not sinning...let no one deceive you. He who is doing righteousness is just, according as he is just. Yet he who is doing sin is of the Adversary…everyone who is not doing righteousness is not of God, and who is not loving his brother” (1 John 3:6-7). John also stated that the way in which those to whom he wrote could know that they were “in [Christ’” was that they were “walking according as He walks” (1 John 2:6).

What did John mean by “walking according as He walks?” John was, of course, one of Jesus’ twelve disciples, and had observed Jesus’ “walk” very closely for approximately 3 years. And what did John observe during this time? Did John observe Jesus breaking the precepts of God, and living a life of lawlessness? Or did John observe Jesus faithfully keeping God’s precepts? Obviously, John observed Jesus faithfully keeping the precepts of God as found in Scripture, and living by “every declaration going out through the mouth of God.” And it is according to the “walk” of the One whom John had so closely observed during the time of his earthly ministry that those to whom John wrote were exhorted to walk in order to “remain” in Christ. From these and other verses and considerations, it is clear that John understood being “in Christ” as a conditional state of affairs that involved both the ongoing faith and obedient conduct of those whom John exhorted to “remain in him.”

Everything John wrote in these and other verses is in perfect accord with what John learned from Christ himself during Christ’s earthly ministry. In John 15 we read that Christ provided his disciples with a “grapevine” parable in order to help them better understand their relationship with him. In verses 1-2 we read the following:

“I am the true Grapevine, and My Father is the Farmer. Every branch in Me bringing forth no fruit, He is taking it away, and every one bringing forth fruit, He is cleansing it, that it may be bringing forth more fruit.”

In v. 6, we read that Christ concluded the grapevine parable with the following warning to his disciples (and the believing Israelites they represent):

“If anyone should not be remaining in Me, he was cast out as a branch, and it withered. And they are gathering them, and into the fire are they casting them, and they are being burned.”

Both those who are taken away by God (for not bringing forth fruit) and those who are “cast out as a branch” (for not remaining in Christ) are undoubtedly among those who, according to John, will be “put to shame” by Christ in his presence. And what will be the eonian fate of those Israelites who do not remain in Christ and are “cast out?” Christ figuratively described it as one involving both withering and “being burned” (which suggests a fate involving destruction and loss). The author of the letter to the Hebrews described this fate as follows:

For at our sinning voluntarily after obtaining the recognition of the truth, it is no longer leaving a sacrifice concerned with sins, but a certain fearful waiting for judging and fiery jealousy, about to be eating the hostile. Anyone repudiating Moses' law is dying without pity on the testimony of two or three witnesses. Of how much worse punishment, are you supposing, will he be counted worthy who tramples on the Son of God, and deems the blood of the covenant by which he is hallowed contaminating, and outrages the spirit of grace? For we are acquainted with Him Who is saying, Mine is vengeance! I will repay! the Lord is saying, and again, "The Lord will be judging His people." Fearful is it to be falling into the hands of the living God!”  Hebrews 10:26-31

In this passage, the author is warning the believing Israelites to whom he wrote – those who’d obtained the “recognition of the truth” and had been hallowed by the blood of Christ – of the possibility of suffering an even worse punishment than that which was inflicted upon those who repudiated Moses’ law (compare this with the author’s warning in Heb. 12:25). The author goes on to refer to this “much worse punishment” as “destruction,” and contrasted it with the salvation (the “procuring of the soul”) that the Hebrew believers hoped to receive at the coming/arriving of Christ (see Heb. 10:35-39 and compare with 1 Pet. 1:3-9). Given that the salvation in view is that which will be received when Christ arrives and “is seen a second time” (Heb. 9:28), and the “punishment” and “vengeance” of which the author wrote is contrasted with this salvation, we can reasonably conclude that the author had in view the vengeance of God that will be poured out on unbelieving Jews and Gentiles alike during the “day of the Lord.”

But regardless of when, exactly, the Israelites addressed in this letter believed that this “much worse punishment” and “vengeance” would be suffered by those “falling into the hands of the living God,” it is simply not possible to reconcile these words of warning and exhortation with Paul’s words to the body of Christ in Romans 5:9 and 8:1, or with what he wrote in 1 Thess. 1:10 and 4:9-11. If the believing Israelites to whom the letter to the Hebrews was written were “in Christ” in the same sense in which every believer in the body of Christ is “in Christ,” it would not have been remotely possible for them to suffer the divine vengeance and judgment that unbelievers will suffer during the day of the Lord. No one who is a member of the body of Christ is appointed to God's indignation; rather, we are all destined to be rescued by Christ (via the event referred to in 1 Thess. 4:15-18 and elsewhere) from the very time of indignation through which the believers among God’s covenant people must endure in order for them to be saved at the time of Christ’s return to earth (Matt. 10:22; 24:13; Mark 13:13; cf. Rev. 12:17; 13:10; 14:12).

For part two, click here: http://thathappyexpectation.blogspot.com/2021/01/the-israel-of-god-part-two.html

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[1] Those to whom Peter wrote were, in other words, believers among the Circumcision. Believers in what? Answer: believers in the truth that, according to Christ, had been revealed to Peter by the Father himself – i.e., the truth that Jesus is “the Christ, the Son of the living God” (Matt. 16:15-17; cf. John 20:31). And as I’ve argued in greater depth elsewhere (see, for example, http://thathappyexpectation.blogspot.com/2019/10/revisiting-two-evangels-controversy.html), this is the truth that Paul likely had in mind when he referred to “the evangel of the Circumcision” in Gal. 2:7.