Christians are the future in God’s time tables, and they today are solely God’s people. Galatians 3:28-29 says there are no Jews in Christ…
Galatians 3:28-29, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither bond nor free, there is neither male nor female: for ye are all one in Christ Jesus. And if ye be Christ’s, then are ye Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.”
Many even first-century Jews could identify with the phrase “kingdom of God.” made by Jesus Christ.. They the Jews In this cultural longing for national restoration, eagerly wanted God to send them a leader who would throw off Roman rule and make Judea an independent nation again—a chosen, superior nation of righteousness, glory and blessings, a nation everyone would be attracted to. There was a variety of speculations about how this would be done. The concept was attractive, although it was not Biblical… mere human expectation… But Jesus’ in his earthly ministry, He told his disciples to preach “The kingdom of heaven has come near” and to heal the sick (Matt. 10:7; cf. Luke 10:9, 11). Not what the Jews wanted to hear.. But the kingdom most Jewish people hoped for did not happen. The Jewish nation was not restored. Even worse, the temple was rather even destroyed with all it’s records too, and the Jews were scattered. dispersed, exiled rather but why? . Even now, 2000 years later, these past Jewish hopes are still unfulfilled. Was Jesus even still predicting a national Jewish kingdom? Rather, the popular hopes and speculations were wrong. Jesus’ kingdom was not like the popular expectation—as we might guess from the fact that many Jews wanted to kill him. His kingdom was “not of this world” (John 18:36).
“Repent, for the kingdom of God is at hand.” John the Baptist and Jesus proclaimed the nearness of God’s kingdom (Matthew 3:2; 4:17; Mark 1:15). A literal translation is “has come near.” The long-awaited rule of God was near.
When he talked about the “kingdom of God,” Jesus used a phrase the people knew, but he was giving it a different meaning. He told Nicodemus that God’s kingdom was invisible to most people (John 3:3)—to understand it or experience it, a person must be renewed by God’s Spirit (verse 6). The kingdom of God was a spiritual kingdom, not a civil and physical organization. Jesus rather indicated that His kingdom was. is already functioning. After casting out demons, Jesus said, “If I cast out demons by the Spirit of God [and he did], then the kingdom of heaven has come to you” (Matt. 12:28; Luke 11:20). “ Jesus told a parable about a man who went to a foreign country to receive a kingdom (Luke 19:12). He went not to receive the territory and bring it back with him. Rather, he went to receive the authority to rule. He then returned to the territory and had to exert that authority. The Jews were well acquainted with a historical example: Herod had gone to Rome, seeking to be appointed king. He was so appointed, but when he returned to Judea he had to raise an army and conquer the territory. What he was given in Rome was not the territory, but the permission to be its king. The Greek word basileia is focused on authority, not on territory. “
When Jesus talked about the kingdom, he didn’t emphasize its physical blessings or clarify its chronology. He focused instead on how people get in that kingdom, and how they live. We enter the kingdom when we respond to God with faith and allegiance, when we come under his authority; we then seek to live in way that is reflective of that kingdom. The kingdom is here, he said, and the proof is in the exorcisms. The power of God is invading the domain of evil, expelling the powers of evil. This proof continues in the church today, because the church is doing even greater works than Jesus did (John 14:12). We can also say, “If we cast out demons by the Spirit of God, then the kingdom of God is working here.” The kingdom of God, by the power of the Holy Spirit, is continuing to demonstrate its power over the kingdom of Satan – and that power is shown not just in expelling evil spirits, but in many other activities that undo what the devil has done.Satan still exerts some influence, but he has been defeated, and “the prince of this world now stands condemned” (John 16:11). He has been partially restrained — tied up (Mark 3:27).
Jesus overcame Satan’s world (John 16:33), and with God’s help we are overcoming it, too (1 John 5:4). But not everyone does. In this age, the kingdom contains both good and bad, both wheat and tares (Matthew 13:24-30, 36-43, 47-50; 24:45-51; 25:1-12, 14-30). Satan still has influence; we still look forward to a world and a time in which God’s will is done perfectly rather than partially. In Mark 10:15, Jesus indicates that the kingdom is something we must receive in some way, apparently in this life: “Anyone who will not receive the kingdom of God like a little child will never enter it.” Jesus Christ is in the church today, too, and just as the kingdom was present in the ministry of Jesus, it is present in the ministry of his church.
In Mark 10, a man wanted to inherit eternal life, and Jesus said he should keep the commandments (verses 17-19). This was apparently just a teaser of an answer, because Jesus soon added another command: He told him to give up all his possessions for the heavenly treasure (verse 21). Jesus commented to the disciples, “How hard it is for the rich to enter the kingdom of God!” (verse 23). The disciples asked, “Who then can be saved?” (verse 26).
In Luke 12:31-34, Jesus also indicates that several concepts are similar: seeking the kingdom, being given the kingdom, having a heavenly treasure, giving up trust in physical possessions. We seek God’s kingdom by responding to what Jesus taught, and that is also the way that we enter the kingdom. (We are talking about a metaphor of allegiance here, rather than physical movement to a new territory.) God’s kingdom is the realm in which God’s will is done. In Luke 21:28, 30, the kingdom is parallel to redemption. In Acts 20:21, 24-25, 32, we learn that Paul preached the gospel of the kingdom, and he preached the gospel of God’s grace, repentance and faith.
The kingdom is closely connected with eternal life—the kingdom would not be worth preaching if we couldn’t be part of it, and it wouldn’t make sense to risk our lives for it in this age unless we were promised life in an eternal age. We can enter the kingdom only through faith, repentance and grace, so those are part of any message about God’s kingdom. Salvation is a present-tense reality as well as a promise of future blessings. Acts 28:23, 29, 31 tells us that Paul preached not only the kingdom but also about Jesus and salvation.
The King is among us; his spiritual power is in us, even though the kingdom is not yet operating in its full power. We have already been brought into God’s kingdom (Colossians 1:13). We are already receiving a kingdom, and our proper response is reverence and awe (Hebrews 12:28). Christ “has made us [past tense] to be a kingdom” (Revelation 1:6). We are a holy nation (1 Peter 2:9)—already and currently a holy kingdom—but it does not yet appear what we shall be. God has rescued us from the dominion of sin and transferred us into his kingdom, under his ruling authority. Eternal life with the triune God will be good primarily because of the relationships of love that will be in eternity – honesty and kindness will prevail. That sort of behavior has good results – not just in the future, but in the present age as well. So God invites us into this way of life.
The kingdom is not just a future reality – people are even now entering God’s kingdom by responding to what he offers. He offers not an artificial world in which our enjoyment has no connection with the way we treat other people, but a world or kingdom in which joy is the natural result of love, of treating others the way we wish to be treated.
Jesus is already ruling, and we should be living his way now. We Christians do have now a small foretaste of what we will have in the future. We don’t yet possess a territory, but we do come under the reign of God. The kingdom of God is here now, as Jesus said Not by any means what many Jews still want to or expect to happen sadly.. At the end of the age, the Messiah Jesus Christ will return in his full power and glory, the weeds and tares, Satan now too will be removed, and the kingdom of God will again be transformed in appearance. There will be no separate Jewish Kingdom here too.. The final form of the kingdom in Heaven now too , in which everyone is perfect and spiritual, will be dramatically different from the millennial one. The Holy Spirit himself now is our guarantee of greater blessings (2 Corinthians 5:5, Ephesians 1:14).
Today the church is the true Israel and Christians are God’s true “Jews” today.
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Jesus taught that God would take his blessings away from fleshly Israel who rejected him as Christ and give it to the Gentiles. Jesus clearly taught the Gentile believers would replace Jewish non-believers.
a. “Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people, producing the fruit of it. ” (Matthew 21:43)
b. The Jews who heard this understood what Rapture false teachers today refuse to see: “When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard His parables, they understood that He was speaking about them. ” (Matthew 21:45)
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The Bible clearly teaches that God’s true Jews today are Christians:
a. “For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter; and his praise is not from men, but from God. ” (Romans 2:28-29)
b. “Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything; what counts is a new creation. Peace and mercy to all who follow this rule, even to the Israel of God [Christians]. ” (Galatians 6:15-16)
c. “for we are the true circumcision, who worship in the Spirit of God and glory in Christ Jesus and put no confidence in the flesh, ” (Philippians 3:3)
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Even the apostolic fathers of the first and second century believed and taught “replacement theology”:
a. “Christians are the True Israel” (Justin Martyr, Dialogues, Chapter CXXIII, 130 AD)
b. “As therefore from the one man Jacob, who was surnamed Israel, all your nation has been called Jacob and Israel; so we from Christ, who begat us unto God, (like Jacob, and Israel, and Judah, and Joseph, and David,) are called and are the true sons of God, and keep the commandments of Christ” (Justin Martyr, Dialogues, Chapter CXXIII, 130 AD)
c. “Christ is King of Israel, and Christians are the Israelitic Race. (Justin Martyr, Dialogues, Chapter CXXXV, 130 AD)
d. “As, therefore, Christ is the Israel and the Jacob, even so we, who have been quarried out from the bowels of Christ, are the true Israelitic race.” (Justin Martyr, Dialogues, Chapter CXXXV, 130 AD)
e. “For all the nations are uncircumcised, and all the house of Israel are uncircumcised in their hearts.’ … But though a man be a Scythian or a Persian, if he has the knowledge of God and of His Christ, and keeps the everlasting righteous decrees, he is circumcised with the good and useful circumcision, and is a friend of God, and God rejoices in his gifts and offerings.” (Justin Martyr, Dialogues, Chapter XXVIII, 130 AD)
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The Parable of the Landowner: Israel replaced by Church/Christians
Listen to another parable. There was a landowner who PLANTED A VINEYARD AND PUT A WALL AROUND IT AND DUG A WINE PRESS IN IT, AND BUILT A TOWER, and rented it out to vine-growers and went on a journey. “When the harvest time approached, he sent his slaves to the vine-growers to receive his produce. “The vine-growers took his slaves and beat one, and killed another, and stoned a third. “Again he sent another group of slaves larger than the first; and they did the same thing to them. “But afterward he sent his son to them, saying, ‘They will respect my son.’ “But when the vine-growers saw the son, they said among themselves, ‘This is the heir; come, let us kill him and seize his inheritance.’ “They took him, and threw him out of the vineyard and killed him. “Therefore when the owner of the vineyard comes, what will he do to those vine-growers?” They said to Him, “He will bring those wretches to a wretched end, and will rent out the vineyard to other vine-growers who will pay him the proceeds at the proper seasons.” Jesus said to them, “Did you never read in the Scriptures, ‘THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THIS BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone; THIS CAME ABOUT FROM THE LORD, AND IT IS MARVELOUS IN OUR EYES’? “Therefore I say to you, the kingdom of God will be taken away from you and given to a people, producing the fruit of it. “And he who falls on this stone will be broken to pieces; but on whomever it falls, it will scatter him like dust.” When the chief priests and the Pharisees heard His parables, they understood that He was speaking about them. When they sought to seize Him, they feared the people, because they considered Him to be a prophet. ” (Matthew 21:33-46)
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In a parable so crystal clear only a premillennialist could get it wrong, the Jews, as a nation, were going to be replaced by something new, the church.
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“He will bring those wretches to a wretched end” happened in 70 AD.
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Now clearly the entire leadership of the apostolic church and most of the Elders in the churches were Jewish. But they had become Christians who stopped keeping the Sabbath and abandoned the Mosaic system of Judaism. They began immediately worshipping god on the first day of the week, the Lord’s day.
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Jesus went to the Jews first but they rejected Him as the Messiah. The church, (the kingdom) is now open to both Jew and Gentile equally. Both must believe, repent, confess Jesus as Lord and be baptized for the remission of their sins. There is only one way to get saved! Jews have no special route to heaven that gentiles do not have. They all must believe and do the same things to be saved.
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Paul always began his evangelism in a new city by preaching in the Jewish synagogues. When the Jews rejected the gospel, he turned to the gentiles: “But when the Jews saw the crowds, they were filled with jealousy and began contradicting the things spoken by Paul, and were blaspheming. Paul and Barnabas spoke out boldly and said, “It was necessary that the word of God be spoken to you first; since you repudiate it and judge yourselves unworthy of eternal life, behold, we are turning to the Gentiles. ” (Acts 13:45-46)
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“This precious value, then, is for you who believe; but for those who disbelieve, [Israel] “THE STONE WHICH THE BUILDERS REJECTED, THIS BECAME THE VERY CORNER stone,” and, “A STONE OF STUMBLING AND A ROCK OF OFFENSE”; for they stumble because they are disobedient to the word, and to this doom they were also appointed. But you are A CHOSEN RACE, A royal PRIESTHOOD, A HOLY NATION, A PEOPLE FOR God’s OWN POSSESSION, so that you may proclaim the excellencies of Him who has called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; for you once were NOT A PEOPLE, but now you are THE PEOPLE OF GOD; you had NOT RECEIVED MERCY, but now you have RECEIVED MERCY. ” (1 Peter 2:7-10)
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a. Notice that the “you are a chosen, holy nation of priests”, which was originally applied to fleshly Israel at the foot of Mt. Sinai is now applied to Christians to the exclusion of physical Israel unless they believe.
i. “and you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you shall speak to the sons of Israel.” ” (Exodus 19:6)
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ii. “”For you are a holy people to the Lord your God; the Lord your God has chosen you to be a people for His own possession out of all the peoples who are on the face of the earth. ” (Deuteronomy 7:6)
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b. Notice that the text applies these special blessings of being “you are a chosen, holy nation of priests” to the gentiles and that fleshly Israel was “appointed to doom”
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National Identities are destroyed in Christ:
1. Passages:
a. “For He Himself is our peace, who made both groups into one and broke down the barrier of the dividing wall, by abolishing in His flesh the enmity, which is the Law of commandments contained in ordinances, so that in Himself He might make the two into one new man, thus establishing peace, and might reconcile them both in one body to God through the cross, by it having put to death the enmity. ” (Ephesians 2:14-16)
b. “For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to promise. ” (Galatians 3:26-29)
2. Notice that in fulfilling Isa 2:2-4, Christ brought about peace between all the nations that were at war.
3. When a Jew becomes a Christian, he ceases to be a Jew and becomes a new creature.
4. In Christ there are no national competing identities like there were under the Old Testament.
5. National Jews have no advantage over Americans, Canadians, Egyptians or Iranians.
6. Today Christians are God’s “chosen race” and they can be from any nation on earth.
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Summary
1. “Replacement Theology” or “Fulfillment Theology”, also known as “Supersessionism” is the true Bible doctrine that Christians and the Church of Christ replaced the Jews and the nation of Israel.
2. Jesus taught Replacement Theology.
3. The apostles taught Replacement Theology.
4. The apostolic fathers like Justin Martyr taught Replacement Theology.
5. There is no special plan of salvation today for the Jews. There is one gospel and Jews and Gentiles must obey the same gospel and be saved exactly the same way.
6. There is nothing in the bible that teaches that at the end of time, God will bring Israel back to Canaan and offer them alone a special salvation merely because they are blood descendants of Abraham.
7. There is no distinction in God’s eyes today between Jews and Gentiles. Jews who reject Jesus Christ as their messiah are in exactly the same spiritual state as Hindus, Muslims or atheistic evolutionists.
8. There is not a Jew alive that can prove his Jewish heritage through genealogy. Most Jews in Israel today are Russian proselytes.
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Also The signs of Matthew 24 prophecies the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD not the second coming and certainly not some “Rapture” theology that was invented in 1830 AD by John Darby. When Christians saw the signs, they fled the city and were saved.
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