The Rest of the Story of Israel - Past and Future

Goal:

To see how God’s promises and prophecies to Israel fit with the New Testament and beyond,

leading to an outburst of praise in our hearts.

The Rest of
the Story of Israel
Past and Future

1. Between the Testaments
2. Jesus takes on the Role of the Nation
3. The Future of Israel
4. Our Response

Daniel 2

31. “You saw, O king, and behold, a great image. This image, mighty and of exceeding brightness, stood before you, and its appearance was frightening.
32. The head of this image was of fine gold, its chest and arms of silver, its middle and thighs of bronze,
33. its legs of iron, its feet partly of iron and partly of clay.

Daniel 2 cont’d

34. As you looked, a stone was cut out by no human hand, and it struck the image on its feet of iron and clay, and broke them in pieces.
35. Then the iron, the clay, the bronze, the silver, and the gold, all together were broken in pieces, and became like the chaff of the summer threshing floors; and the wind carried them away, so that not a trace of them could be found. But the stone that struck the image became a great mountain and filled the whole earth.
36. “This was the dream. Now we will tell the king its interpretation.

Daniel 2 cont’d

37. You, O king, the king of kings, to whom the God of heaven has given the kingdom, the power, and the might, and the glory,
38. and into whose hand he has given, wherever they dwell, the children of man, the beasts of the field, and the birds of the heavens, making you rule over them all—you are the head of gold.
39. Another kingdom inferior to you shall arise after you, and yet a third kingdom of bronze, which shall rule over all the earth.

Daniel 2 cont’d

40. And there shall be a fourth kingdom, strong as iron, because iron breaks to pieces and shatters all things. And like iron that crushes, it shall break and crush all these.
41. And as you saw the feet and toes, partly of potter’s clay and partly of iron, it shall be a divided kingdom, but some of the firmness of iron shall be in it, just as you saw iron mixed with the soft clay.
42. And as the toes of the feet were partly iron and partly clay, so the kingdom shall be partly strong and partly brittle.
    …

Daniel 2 cont’d

44. And in the days of those kings the God of heaven will set up a kingdom that shall never be destroyed, nor shall the kingdom be left to another people. It shall break in pieces all these kingdoms and bring them to an end, and it shall stand forever,
45. just as you saw that a stone was cut from a mountain by no human hand, and that it broke in pieces the iron, the bronze, the clay, the silver, and the gold. A great God has made known to the king what shall be after this. The dream is certain, and its interpretation sure.”

Between the Testaments

N.T. Wright (in Vreeland …the Eyes of N.T.W )

• Israel’s purpose was to bear God’s image and tend to God’s world, a direct echo of Adam’s purpose.
• Adam was given a garden; Israel was given land.
• Adam received commands; Israel received commands.
• Adam disobeyed and was exiled; Israel disobeyed and was exiled.
• The God of Israel came in the person of the Messiah and the Spirit to do what Adam and Israel could not do.
• In this sense, Jesus and the Spirit did not replace Israel, but fulfilled Israel’s vocation.”

Isaiah 42

1. Behold my servant, whom I uphold,
   • my chosen, in whom my soul delights;
   I have put my Spirit upon him;
   • he will bring forth justice to the nations.
6. I am the LORD; I have called you in righteousness;
   
   • I’ll take you by the hand and keep you;
   I’ll give you as a covenant for the people,
   • a light for the nations,
7. to open the eyes that are blind,
   
   • to bring out the prisoners from the dungeon,
   • from the prison those who sit in darkness.

Isaiah 49

1. You are my servant, Israel…
5. And now the Lord says, he who formed me from the womb to be his servant,
   
   to bring Jacob back to him;
   and that Israel might be gathered to him
6. he says: “It is too light a thing that you should be my servant
   
   • to raise up the tribes of Jacob
   and to bring back the preserved of Israel;
   • I will make you as a light for the nations,
   that my salvation may reach to the end of the earth.”

N.T. Wright

He [Jesus] was, in himself, the “true Israel,” formed by Scripture, bringing the Kingdom to birth.

When he spoke of the scripture needing to be fulfilled (e.g., Mark 14:49), he was not simply envisaging himself doing a few scattered and random acts which corresponded to various distant and detached prophetic sayings;

he was thinking of the entire storyline at last coming to fruition, and of an entire world of hints and shadows now coming to plain statement and full light.

N.T. Wright cont’d

This, I take it, is the deep meaning of sayings like Matthew 5:17–18, where Jesus insists that he has come not to abolish the law but to fulfill it.

—God and the Authority of Scripture: How to Read the Bible Today p.42

A Special Future for Ethnic Israel?

Two Extremes

1. Replacement Theology:
   • All the promises to Israel now belong to the church,
   • there is no longer “Jew or Gentile” in God’s eyes
2. Two parallel Peoples of God
   • There will be a new temple & sacrifices
   • All the physical promises (land & wealth) will be fulfilled

Ephesians 2

11. Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands—
12. remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world.
13. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ.

Ephesians 2 cont’d

14. For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility
15. by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace,
16. and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility.

• There are not two peoples of God, but one!

Romans 11 – Ethnic Israel

24. For if you were cut from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and grafted, contrary to nature, into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, the natural branches, be grafted back into their own olive tree.
    …
29. For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable.
31. …so they too have now been disobedient in order that by the mercy shown to you they also may now receive mercy.
32. For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy on all.

The Rest of
the Story of Israel
Past and Future

1. Between the Testaments
2. Jesus takes on the Role of the Nation
3. The Future of Israel
4. Our Response

Goal:

To see how God’s promises
and prophecies to Israel
fit with the New Testament and beyond,

leading to an outburst of praise in our hearts.

Romans 11

32. For God has consigned all to disobedience, that he may have mercy on all.
33. Oh, the depth of the riches and wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are his judgments and how inscrutable his ways!
34. “For who has known the mind of the Lord, or who has been his counselor?”
35. “Or who has given a gift to him that he might be repaid?”
36. For from him and through him and to him are all things. To him be glory forever. Amen.