Hello and God bless you! I read your “thesis”. Very impressive, but I can hardly understand who, what or why you are against or for covenant??
I know more now why Jesus kept things “simple”! I am afraid if you continue in your ‘on and on and on dissertations.. very little understanding is going to be spread from you unto anyone our Lord might want to reach through you??
Please are you saying there is some kind of covenant that yet’ has to be fulfilled? in Israel? In that Nation?? Lots of words that mean very little! To me anyway! However, I feel that God’s “Everlasting Covenant” IS- Was – and is now Complete; Provided from our Father, by the power of the Holy Spirit [before the foundation of the world] and His name is Jesus!
There is neither Jew, Greek, male or female, white, black etc. etc. What is there that needs done yet? He-Jesus finished the task!! ALL “covenants” Fulfilled in Jesus! He IS’ The Everlasting Covenant.. Jer. 31:31-37.
If I am misunderstanding you I am truly sorry but if you please bring some of that down to laymans terms.. by your long on-going babel it acomplishes very little, in my opinion. Again I am a very simple person. If I am missing something I am VERY sorry.
Thanks for the helpful pointers. Though a bit harsh, perhaps unnecessarily so, the Lord can use this in my life. I can see your frustration, and empathize. I’m reminded that Paul said it is better to use one word in the church that can be understood, and I need to remember that. You’re right; if I’m going to be of any use to the Lord in people’s lives, I need to be careful to simplify things as much as I can. So that’s something I take to heart and will keep my eye on. That is just another thing that’s going to take a lot of help and grace. Paul asked God’s people’s prayers for the grace of utterance. You can’t help someone else to see what you’ve seen if you have no ability to make it plain and clear; that’s for sure.
If you’re really interested, I can share with you why the covenant that has been eternally ratified in the blood of Christ will yet be extended to those whom Paul calls “the natural branches.” If you’ll carefully study Ro 11, particularly in the context of verses 25-27, you might notice that the ‘everlasting covenant’ that is already established in Christ’s blood (and that has come to you and me in unexpected advance of Israel’s restoration through the revelation of the mystery of the gospel), must yet be fulfilled “WITH THEM” (Ro 11:27 with Isa 59:21; 61:8; Jer 32:40; Ezek 37:26). After all, the covenant was not made with us, but with them. We are the unexpected anomaly. We receive the promises only as we are ‘grafted in among THEM’ (Ro 11:17). This future reinstatement of the ‘natural branches’ awaits ‘the set time’ (Ps 102:13; Dan 11:27, 29, 35).
That time of fulfillment is clearly future, as shown in Paul’s reference to Isa 59:21 together with a number of other clear passages that speak of Israel’s restoration at the future day of the Lord, also called the ‘last day’ (see Dan 12:1-2 for the time of Israel’s national “deliverance”). That is the time that the final Antichrist is destroyed (Dan 11:36 -12:2 with 2Thes 2:4-8) when Christ returns to establish His thousand year reign over the nations out of a restored Jerusalem. “In that day” Israel receives the revelation that has already come to you and me through the gospel (compare Isa 8:16-17; 66:8; Ezek 39:22-29 with Zech 12:10 and Mt 23:39). In the future ‘day of God’s power’ (Ps 110:3), the surviving remnant of the unequaled tribulation becomes willing concerning the gospel because it has just passed through the greatest trial in their nation’s history, a time called “Jacob’s trouble” (Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1; Mt 24:21). The church will be here during this time and will be the witness people that God will use to prepare Jewish hearts as we share with them many of the tribulations and persecutions of this final time of judgment and divine pleading (see Ezek 20:33-38; Amos 9:8-15).
God has a special purpose in all this that greatly glorifies His name (Ezek 36:22). Please note that Paul calls this a mystery (Ro 11:25). That means that though a complicated writing style like mine might indeed get in the way and make understanding unnecessarily difficult, still, the question is one that will not be understood without the help of the Holy Spirit. I urge you to pray and ask for light concerning this mystery, lest ignorance of it leaves us ‘wise in our own conceits’ as Paul warns. Paul regarded this mystery a matter of great consequence as to how we see and glorify God. The fulfillment of the covenant (Ro 11:27) with the ‘natural branches’, the ‘enemies’ still ‘beloved’ (11:28), is very important to a deep burden in the Lord’s heart and purpose for this impossible people (are we any less impossible?). Paul saw its accomplishment as abounding to the highest praise of divine glory, as can be seen in the way the chapter ends (33-36). I suggest that the real index of our understanding of ‘this mystery’ will be whether it has had a similar impact on us. For Paul, the revelation of the mystery evoked one of the most ecstatic expressions of praise and worship recorded in all of scripture. If rightly understood and apprehended by the Spirit, it will have the same affect on us.
As to neither Jew nor Greek in Christ, remember that the elect remnant out from among the ‘natural branches’ are not yet ‘in Christ’, but will be. There are necessary distinctions that God has preserved in creation for the very purpose of showing the glory of how grace makes all one in Christ. One of those distinctions is His original and purposeful choice of the Jewish race as a demonstration of both covenant severity throughout history and the glory of covenant mercy at the end. For this end and for this demonstration, He has miraculously preserved the Jewish people as a distinct people, not to be reckoned among the nations (Num 23:9 with Amos 3:2). I hope you will answer the Berean call and give these scriptures due consideration, and don’t throw the baby of these great issues out with the bathwater of my irritating style of writing. Who knows? If the Lord blesses you to see the place and importance of these things, you might even be moved to pray for me in my endeavors.
Yours in Christ, Reggie
