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58 results for “Israel”
Clear searchFulfilment in Christ, the inclusion of the Gentiles, and Israel's future mercy
Does the New Testament Reaffirm Israel's Promises? Fulfilment in Christ, the inclusion of the Gentiles, and Israel's future mercy The Old Testament repeatedly promises Israel preservation, regathering, cleansing, the kingd…
Read article →Christ the promised Seed, Gentile inheritance, and Paul's final blessing
Are Abraham's Seed and the Israel of God the Church? Christ the promised Seed, Gentile inheritance, and Paul's final blessing Galatians contains two of the strongest arguments for identifying the Church as Israel. Fir…
Read article →The olive tree, the natural branches, and the limits of the metaphor
Are Gentile Believers Grafted into Israel? The olive tree, the natural branches, and the limits of the metaphor Romans 11 pictures Gentile believers as branches taken from a wild olive tree and grafted into a cultivated olive…
Read article →Conditional blessing, irrevocable promise, and fulfilment in Christ
Has God Abandoned Israel? What Do the Covenants Say? Conditional blessing, irrevocable promise, and fulfilment in Christ Israel broke God's law, rejected the prophets, and nationally refused its Messiah. Jeru…
Read article →Regathering, national rebirth, and the spiritual renewal still to come
The Restoration of the Nation of Israel Regathering, national rebirth, and the spiritual renewal still to come Israel's history contains both judgement and preservation. The Jewish people were conquered, exiled, dispersed a…
Read article →Election within Abraham's family, the believing remnant, and the future of the nation
What Does "They Are Not All Israel, Which Are of Israel" Mean? Election within Abraham's family, the believing remnant, and the future of the nation Romans 9:6 is often used as a definition of spiritual Israel: "For th…
Read article →Unity in Christ and distinction in God's purpose
Are Israel and the Church Really the Same? Unity in Christ and distinction in God's purpose The New Testament teaches a unity so profound that it would have startled the ancient world. In Christ…
Read article →The question reaches beyond prophecy to the faithfulness of God
Israel and the Church: Why This Series Matters The question reaches beyond prophecy to the faithfulness of God Has the Church replaced Israel in the purpose of God? Some Christians answer ye…
Read article →The wicked husbandmen, the fruit-bearing nation, and what Jesus said afterwards
Was the Kingdom Taken from Israel? The wicked husbandmen, the fruit-bearing nation, and what Jesus said afterwards Few statements of Jesus appear to support supersessionism more directly than Matthew 21:43: "Therefore…
Read article →The LORD, Zion, and the meaning of Beulah in Isaiah 62:4–5
Is Israel Married to the Land? The LORD, Zion, and the Meaning of Beulah in Isaiah 62:4–5 “Thou shalt no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall thy land any more be termed Desolate: but thou sh…
Read article →A response to Michael Horton on the land promise, Amos 9, and the people of God
No Holy Land? Covenant Discipline, Gentile Blessing, and Israel's Future A response to Michael Horton on the land promise, Amos 9, and the people of God Michael Horton's essay, “No Holy Land: Does Israel Still Have a Biblical Claim on the Middle E…
Read article →What 'yea and Amen' in Christ means for Israel and the covenants
Do All God's Promises Transfer to the Church? What "yea and Amen" in Christ means for Israel and the covenants Paul makes one of the most comprehensive statements about the promises of God: "For all the promises of God in him are yea, and in him Amen, unto the glory of God by…
Read article →Why Israel's failure cannot make the word of God fail
God's Unfailing Faithfulness Why Israel's failure cannot make the word of God fail Israel's history presents a severe test of theology. God chose the nation, gave it His law, sent it prophets, and brought the Messiah throug…
Read article →What God's faithfulness to Israel means for everyone who trusts His promises
No Shadow of Turning What God's faithfulness to Israel means for everyone who trusts His promises This series has examined covenants, prophecies, apostles, thrones, tribes, branches, seeds, kingdoms, and the difficult words upon which the…
Read article →One Messiah, one gospel, and God's continuing purpose for Israel
…nshaken Truth of God's Promises One Messiah, one gospel, and God's continuing purpose for Israel This series began with a question: has the Church permanently replaced Israel in the purpose of God? The answer cannot be reached by asking whether Christ fulfils the promises. He doe…
Read article →What Jesus promised the apostles about Israel's future
Twelve Thrones and Twelve Tribes What Jesus promised the apostles about Israel's future Peter once asked the question which many faithful disciples have quietly wondered: what will those who sacrifice for Christ receive? Jesus answered with a promise larger than…
Read article →A sign of Israel's renewal, not Israel's disappearance
Why Did Jesus Choose Twelve Apostles? A sign of Israel's renewal, not Israel's disappearance Jesus did not choose twelve apostles because twelve happened to be a convenient number. He could have appointed seven, seventy, or any other numb…
Read article →El, the Exodus, and the God Who Came from Sinai
Did Israel Invent Yahweh? El, the Exodus, and the God Who Came from Sinai Yesterday I found myself discussing claims about the origins of Israel’s God with my son. He seemed to regard the essent…
Read article →Israel's Messiah, Israel's Scriptures, and a gospel for the world
The New Testament Is a Very Jewish Story Israel's Messiah, Israel's Scriptures, and a gospel for the world To many Jewish people, Christianity appears thoroughly foreign. Its historic centres became Rome, Constantinople, Canterbury…
Read article →Circumcision of the heart and the identity of Paul's inward Jew
…d Jew Paul's description of the inward Jew is often treated as a decisive redefinition of Israel: "For he is not a Jew, which is one outwardly; neither is that circumcision, which is outward in the flesh: But he is a Jew, which is one inwardly; and circumcision is that of the hea…
Read article →A history of interpretation, polemic, and forgotten tension
…h communities, interpreted the destruction of Jerusalem as lasting displacement, and read Israel's Scriptures principally through their fulfilment in Christ and the Church. The resulting history is neither simple nor flattering. Some early Christian writers defended essential tru…
Read article →Defining the position before testing it
…nceal important differences. Many Christians accused of teaching that the Church replaced Israel would reject that wording. They believe that the Church is the fulfilment, continuation, or expansion of Israel rather than its substitute. The discussion should therefore begin with…
Read article →Governmental restraint, the final ten kings, and the preparation of the temple
What Restrains the Lawless One? Rome, Israel, and a Working Theory While researching The Kingdom Still to Come, my premillennial sequel to my rapture book, I have been revisiting Paul’s account of the restrainer in 2 Thessalonia…
Read article →A forensic reading of Christ's Olivet Discourse
…w 24, "the elect" most naturally identifies the faithful people of the Tribulation within Israel's prophetic setting, rather than the Church as the Body of Christ. The group may include other redeemed people gathered at Christ's return, but the discourse does not identify this ev…
Read article →Seth D. Postell, Eitan Bar & Erez Soref · Messianic biblical theology · 2017
…s, and commandments as a coherent witness whose goal is found in Yeshua. Their Jewish and Israeli setting makes the discussion especially valuable, while the book's clarity opens questions about law, grace, Messiah, and Christian obedience to readers without specialist training.…
View recommendation →Why the final seven is unfinished, future, and centred upon Israel and Jerusalem
…the New Testament Tribulation Why the final seven is unfinished, future, and centred upon Israel and Jerusalem The seven-year Tribulation is sometimes dismissed as an interval invented to make a prophetic chart work. That criticism begins at the wrong end of the Bible. The case d…
Read article →Responding to five common criticisms without defending what Scripture does not require
…on, the distinct identities named in the text, and the unconditional promises God made to Israel. It affirms one way of salvation by grace through faith, centred in Christ. It distinguishes Israel and the Church without teaching two gospels or two redeemers. The following answers…
Read article →The gathering of the elect, one taken and one left, and Paul's revealed mystery
…the age (Matthew 24:1-3). The discourse then returns repeatedly to the prophetic world of Israel: The abomination of desolation spoken of by Daniel stands in the holy place. Those in Judea must flee to the mountains. Flight on the sabbath day creates a specific difficulty. False…
Read article →The positive argument of the whole series, brought together
…Christ completes and gathers His Church, resumes Daniel's unfinished programme concerning Israel and Jerusalem, judges the beast's world while saving a multitude within it, and later returns with His redeemed people to deliver, judge, and reign. Christ receives His people—and lat…
Read article →E. W. Bullinger · Verse-by-verse commentary · 1902
An extensive journey through Revelation which examines its language, literary structures, Old Testament connections, recurring themes, sequence of visions, and place within the wider prophetic testimony of Scripture.
View recommendation →Eitan Bar · Biblical and historical polemic · 2019
…out sufficient knowledge of their Jewish setting. His command of Hebrew, familiarity with Israeli life, and experience discussing Yeshua with Jewish people bring valuable context to questions about messianic prophecy, the New Testament, and rabbinic interpretation. The book is mo…
View recommendation →Isaiah, John, and the Divine Identity of Jesus Christ
…estament writers saying when they place Jesus within that identity? Isaiah does not leave Israel searching for a greater God behind the God who speaks. The One who comforts Jerusalem is the One who made the heavens. The One who pardons Israel is the One who governs the nations. H…
Read article →How the Law reaches its goal and appointed end in Christ
…ghteousness is obtained. Gentiles who had not pursued righteousness attained it by faith. Israel, which pursued "the law of righteousness," did not attain it. Paul explains why: "Wherefore? Because they sought it not by faith, but as it were by the works of the law. For they stum…
Read article →Ezekiel 20, child sacrifice, and the judgement of being given over
…ious answer must consider the whole argument, including what God says about His commands, Israel’s rebellion, and the practices that followed. Read in that setting, the passage is best understood as describing God giving rebellious people over to destructive practices after they…
Read article →Matthew, the Hebrew word almah, and a sign whose meaning reaches beyond Ahaz
…Ahaz Isaiah 7 begins during the Syro-Ephraimite crisis. Syria and the northern kingdom of Israel threaten Judah and seek to replace King Ahaz. The Lord tells Ahaz not to fear and invites him to ask for a sign. Ahaz refuses with pious-sounding words, so Isaiah announces that the L…
Read article →The event is explicit; the real dispute is its timing
…wider evidence: the identity and calling of the Church, Daniel's unfinished programme for Israel and Jerusalem, deliverance from the coming wrath, imminency, Revelation's distinction between earth-dwellers and the company in heaven, and the events which require an interval before…
Read article →History, heresy, and the temptation of private Christianity
…who acts in history, the bodily resurrection of the saints, God's continuing purposes for Israel, territorial promise, Christ's visible return, and an earthly kingdom. These affirmations resist an anti-cosmic escape myth. Yet popular dispensational culture can become gnosticizing…
Read article →Jesus and the fountain of living water
…e feast The setting gives Christ's words their force. The Feast of Tabernacles remembered Israel's wilderness journey and celebrated God's provision. It also carried the hope of future blessing. Water belonged naturally to that world of remembrance and promise: water from the roc…
Read article →Divine judgement, the character of God, and the promise of escape
…ood judgement. Noah is secured before the waters rise. Lot is removed before Sodom burns. Israel is distinguished in Goshen while plagues fall upon Egypt. Rahab is marked and separated before Jericho is destroyed. These examples are not identical. Noah and Israel are preserved wi…
Read article →A response to Hank Hanegraaff on resurrection, Daniel’s final week, and the Tribulation
…s. Pretribulationism does not require Christians to help build a third temple. Nor should Israel’s final trouble be presented as divine retaliation against Jewish people for the crucifixion of Christ. Daniel presents the final week as a period in which God completes His declared…
Read article →The covenant son and the sacrifice that points to Christ
…n Abraham was commanded to offer. The rest of Scripture traces the promise through Jacob, Israel, Judah and David until it reaches Jesus Christ. Islam presents a different Abrahamic framework. The Qur'an associates Abraham and Ishmael with the House at Mecca, while later Muslim t…
Read article →The divine identity of Jesus across the Gospels
…e. They place Jesus within the identity, works, authority, honour and glory of the God of Israel while continuing to distinguish Him personally from the Father. Each strand must be interpreted in context. Some passages establish more than others. Several are capable of a weaker e…
Read article →Why the Trinity is not polytheism—and why Christians confess one God
…ity begins with one God The Bible's starting point is uncompromising monotheism: "Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD." —Deuteronomy 6:4 God says through Isaiah, “I am the LORD, and there is none else, there is no God beside me” (Isaiah 45:5). Jesus affirms Israel's conf…
Read article →Sources behind Qur’anic narratives
…from Ezekiel? Gog appears in Ezekiel 38–39 as the leader of an end-time invasion against Israel: “Son of man, set thy face against Gog, the land of Magog, the chief prince of Meshech and Tubal, and prophesy against him” (Ezekiel 38:2). God defeats the invading armies through ove…
Read article →Why a loaded label does not settle the question
…s removed before fire fell upon Sodom. Rahab was marked out before Jericho was destroyed. Israel passed through the Red Sea before it closed upon Egypt's army. Peter draws the moral principle from Noah and Lot: “The Lord knoweth how to deliver the godly out of temptations, and to…
Read article →An unrequited love for the historic Church
…n tradition who make this charge spiritualise some of Scripture’s most concrete promises: Israel, Jerusalem, the nations, the throne of David, the resurrection of the saints followed by their reign with Christ, and the thousand years of Revelation 20. Those who insist upon the or…
Read article →The Messiah cut off before the Temple fell
…o decisions can be held together. What Daniel actually says Daniel has been praying about Israel’s sin and Jerusalem’s desolation. He understands from Jeremiah that the Babylonian desolation would last seventy years, confesses the sins of his people and pleads for mercy upon God’…
Read article →Creation, judgement, and the coming reign of Christ
…w of restrained dominion The law of Moses does not abolish human use of land and animals. Israel may farm, harvest, build, eat meat, own livestock, use working animals, and offer sacrifices. Biblical care is not based upon animal autonomy or the belief that untouched nature is th…
Read article →How the Lord knows His own—and how their lives bear His name
…ion of the life. An echo from the rebellion of Korah The wording recalls a dark moment in Israel's history. Korah, Dathan and Abiram rose against Moses and Aaron, gathering men of reputation around them and challenging the order God had established. Moses answered: "Even to morro…
Read article →Which Gospel does the Qur'an affirm?
…of God of none effect through your tradition" (Mark 7:13). He did not thereby teach that Israel no longer possessed the Scriptures. Later Muslim thought developed more comprehensive theories of textual corruption, with the eleventh-century polemicist Ibn Hazm becoming an especia…
Read article →The near was real. The far is still coming.
…es the connection in verse 8: this is the LORD’s vengeance concerning Zion’s cause. Edom, Israel’s brother nation and persistent antagonist, becomes a particular theatre of the wider reckoning. Its role is representative without ceasing to be geographical. That does not authorise…
Read article →Sir Robert Anderson · Biblical and apologetic argument · 1897
…is closely tied to his dispensational distinctions and to his understanding of miracles, Israel, the Church, and the apostolic age. That framework must itself be tested rather than assumed. The book offers a theological argument, not a complete pastoral answer to every sufferer,…
View recommendation →Christianity, Islam and the verdict of the evidence
…divine beings cooperate in a heavenly society. It teaches that there is one God. “Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD” (Deuteronomy 6:4). The doctrine of the Trinity distinguishes being from person. God is one in divine being and three in personal distinction: Father, So…
Read article →Born, begotten and firstborn in the eternal identity and saving work of the Son
…ship at that point. The sermon has already identified Him as the promised Saviour sent to Israel (Acts 13:23–24), and the wider New Testament calls Him the Son before His incarnation, death and resurrection (John 3:16–17; Galatians 4:4). The force is public appointment and vindic…
Read article →Four popular claims tested in context
…y requirements of responsible reading. Deuteronomy 18: the Prophet like Moses Moses tells Israel: "The LORD thy God will raise up unto thee a Prophet from the midst of thee, of thy brethren, like unto me; unto him ye shall hearken" (Deuteronomy 18:15). God then says: "I will rais…
Read article →Michael Brown, 2 Thessalonians 1, and the public vindication of the saints
…lated the distinction while working through the biblical relationship between the Church, Israel, Christ’s coming and the prophetic future. One reader’s inability to reconstruct that distinction unaided cannot demonstrate that another reader did not derive it from Scripture. Pret…
Read article →Earth-dwellers, heaven-dwellers, and the literary structure of the Apocalypse
…nate the opening chapters. The earthly judgement visions then return to Danielic periods, Israel's tribes, Jerusalem, the temple, the nations, a beastly ruler, and saints persecuted under him. At the same time, redeemed companies worship in heaven, and the book repeatedly contras…
Read article →How Christians can think politically without surrendering conscience to a package deal
…tal: they revealed what God sees when He judges people who exercise power. Moses required Israel's king to live under God's law, refuse self-exaltation and resist the accumulation of power, wives and wealth (Deuteronomy 17:14–20). Samuel warned that government could become an eng…
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