Messianic Perspectives

Liz Iello: Stay with us as Dr. Gary Hedrick discusses the question, is God finished with Israel? Today, right here on Messianic Perspectives. Shalom and welcome to Messianic Perspectives, a daily program where we look into the scriptures from a distinctive first century Jewish point of view. This is Liz Iello. On today's edition of Messianic Perspectives, Dr. Gary Hedrick is discussing the question, is God finished with Israel? I'll be back a little later with information about a special offer, so have your pencil and paper ready. Now with today's study, here is Dr. Gary Hedrick.

Dr. Gary Hedrick: All right, thank you and welcome listening friend to another edition of the program. It's good to have you with us today as we continue this series of studies on the question, is God finished with Israel? And what we've been doing here on the program for the past few days is working our way through a series of distinctions that set premillennialism apart from any other system of theology. It's like what Paul was talking about when he told Timothy that he should learn to rightly divide the word of truth. Literally, it's learning to cut a straight line, learning to make distinctions, learning to divide the word accurately, line upon line, precept upon precept.

And by the way, this admonition to rightly divide the word implies that it's also possible to wrongly divide the word. You see, that's where the cults go wrong. They don't believe what they believe because they don't know the Bible. If you've ever talked with a Jehovah's Witness, for example, or a Mormon, or a Christadelphian, they've got scriptures running out of their ears. They have tons of scripture and all kinds of proof texts for what they believe. Problem is it's wrongly divided. Instead of cutting a straight line, they're cutting a crooked line. So the key is understanding these biblical distinctions.

And last time, for example, we were talking about the fact that one of the distinctives of premillennialism is that it recognizes that Abraham has both spiritual and physical descendants. There's a physical seed of Abraham and he also has spiritual seed or spiritual descendants according to Romans chapter four. That's one distinction. Then we talked about a second distinction and that's the one between soteriology and eschatology. In other words, just because God has one plan of salvation, soteriologically speaking, that doesn't mean he has only one prophetic schedule, eschatologically speaking. You see, everyone is saved the same way, but not everyone is saved at the same time.

Then the third distinction that we talked about is the one between individual salvation and national salvation. And we talked about a little experiment you can offer to do. If you ever need to prove to someone the difference between individual and national salvation, we won't get into that again here today, but I'll give you a clue. In order to perform the experiment, you need a wolf and a lamb. And it would help if it was a lamb you didn't have any more use for. Now today, we want to talk about a fourth biblical distinction and that's the distinction between God's plan for Israel and God's plan for the church.

And again, this is extremely important. Now I know what you're thinking. Gary, you sound like a broken record. I know I do. But do you think I'd be this persistent if I didn't think it was important? Can we talk turkey? Do you realize all the grief and misery that has been inflicted on the Jewish people throughout history by so-called Christians? Did you know that the people who drove the Jewish people out of Spain and Portugal during the expulsions in the 15th century? Did you know those were people who called themselves Christians? Did you know that the people who murdered thousands of Jewish people during the medieval Crusades called themselves Christians and marched under the banner of the cross?

You say, how could someone be a Christian and persecute God's people Israel? Well, let me tell you how they justified it. They justified it by saying that the Jews are no longer God's chosen people and that the church has replaced Israel in the economy of God. Even Martin Luther, who had been very cordial toward the Jewish people earlier in his life, became strongly anti-Semitic in his last few years. And in pre-World War I Germany, a young artist read voraciously, devouring the anti-Semitic writings of Martin Luther and others. He developed a political philosophy that was strongly anti-Semitic.

His name Adolf Hitler, the man who would later be responsible for the systematic extermination of some 6 million Jews and at least that many more Gypsies, Belarusians, and others. That's why this is so important. It's not just some gray doctrinal area where it doesn't really matter which side you come down on. The implications of replacement theology can be very, very serious. You say, Gary, are you suggesting that everyone who believes the church has replaced Israel is anti-Semitic? Absolutely not. I would never suggest such a thing. In fact, I'm convinced that most people who believe that way have never even thought about its anti-Semitic implications, which is one reason we're talking about it right now to get people to start thinking this through.

Now let's turn to the book of Romans and see if we can rightly divide what the word says about Israel and the church. Romans chapter 11 beginning in verse 25. Paul says, for I would not, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own conceits, that blindness or hardness in part hath happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles shall become in. Now let's stop there. First of all, notice that word mystery. Now we've talked about this before. What is a mystery in the New Testament? It's a spiritual truth that was hidden or concealed in the Old Testament, but has been revealed in the New Testament.

Even the Jewish sages of old were very much aware that many things are simply not revealed in the Old Testament or what they would call the Tanakh. That 's why they have the oral Torah or what most of us know as the Talmud. The purpose of the Talmud was to explain the Torah or the Jewish Bible. So the idea that there are certain mysteries in the Old Testament that require further illumination is certainly not unique to Christianity. What is unique to Christianity is our belief that those mysteries are explained not in the Talmud, not in the Midrashim, not in the traditional writings of Judaism, but in the New Testament or the New Covenant.

So Paul says, I don't want you to be ignorant of this mystery, brethren, lest you should be wise in your own conceits. You see, all through this section of Romans, he's been talking about Israel's unbelief and how the Jewish people have been set aside and how the gospel has been offered to the Gentiles so that Gentile believers could be grafted into the olive tree. But he anticipates the problem of Gentile believers getting puffed up and thinking, you know, we must be smarter than those Jewish people. They just didn't get it, did they? I mean, you talk about missing the boat.

They missed it big time. So before he concludes this discussion, Paul, anticipating this problem, says, there's something you need to understand, you Gentiles, lest you get too big for your britches. That's the literal meaning of the Greek. No, not really. I'm just kidding you. So what is it they need to understand that blindness in part hath happened to Israel, he says, until the fullness of the Gentiles shall come in? He says Israel has been blinded or literally hardened to the gospel. It's like Pharaoh whose heart was hardened in the days of Moses and the Exodus.

But notice two things he says about that blindness or hardness. First of all, it's only partial. He says blindness in part has happened to Israel. In other words, there's a remnant of Jewish believers. This ministry was founded by a Jewish believer, Charles Halff. About half of our field personnel are Jewish believers. So Israel's blindness is only partial. It's not total. And number two, Israel's blindness is only temporary. He says it's only until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. In other words, once the full number of God's elect from among the Gentiles has come into the family of God, then God lifts the veil and Israel is able to see once again.

Here's the end result, verse 26. And so all Israel shall be saved. As it is written, there shall come out of Zion the deliverer and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob. Now this is what I call the Achilles heel of replacement theology or any brand of theology that says God is finished with his people Israel. This is a verse that those guys wish had never been written and you should hear them trying to explain it away, but it can only mean one thing, my friend, and that's exactly what it says. Look at it. And so all Israel, not just part of Israel, not just the believers, but all Israel, that's talking about national Israel collectively as a group.

All Israel shall be saved, it says. He didn't say all Israel is being saved, which could easily have been expressed in the Greek with the present tense. So it's not all Israel is being saved, but it's all Israel shall be saved. If you're a Greek buff, that's the future passive indicative form of the verb sozo. The translation is shall be saved, just like the King James says. There are all kinds of ways Paul could have said it in the Greek. There's the perfect tense, there's the imperfect, the pluperfect, the aorist, the present, and a bunch of others.

Interestingly however, Paul used the Greek future tense which describes something that has not yet occurred. So that knocks another prop out from under the theory that Paul was talking about Jewish believers who were being added to the church because that was happening even as Paul penned those words. But here it's the future tense. All Israel shall be saved. The passive voice shows that the subject is the recipient of the action. That is the Messiah is the one who does the saving. The indicative mood expresses a simple statement of fact. So it 's not all Israel might be saved or they could be saved if they met certain conditions, but that all Israel shall be saved.

A statement not of possibility or even probability, but a simple statement of fact. They will be saved. Well, that's all of our time. We'll pick it up right here on the next program and that'll be the last program in this series. So join us, won't you? Until then, this is Gary Hedrick saying, God bless you. Take care. Bye-bye.

Liz Iello: Thank you, Gary, and thank you listening friends for joining us today. It's always good to have you with us here on Messianic Perspectives. If you'd like your own copy of Gary's series or would like a copy for a friend, you'll be glad to know that it's available on CD for the suggested gift of just $6. Just ask for the series entitled, Is God finished with Israel? By Gary Hedrick. If you'd like the companion booklet also entitled, Is God finished with Israel? That booklet can be yours simply by enclosing an additional $7. This booklet is especially helpful because it includes a word-for-word transcript of an internet debate between Gary Hedrick and an amillenialist.

This is someone who very definitely believes that God is finished with Israel and of course Gary very definitely believes that he is not. So it made for quite a lively discussion. It's all here in the booklet, Is God finished with Israel? Just visit our secure online store at messianicspecialties.com to place your order. If you would prefer to order by mail, just address your requests to Messianic Perspectives, PO Box 345, San Antonio, Texas 78292. To order by phone, use our toll-free order line. The number is 1-800-926-5397. Have you enjoyed this edition of Messianic Perspectives? Why not continue to learn about the Jewish roots of your Christian faith by inviting a speaker from CJF Ministries?

Call our toll-free number 1-800-926-5397 and we'll be happy to handle all of the details. And as always, when you're in touch with us, please mention the call letters of this station. If you're listening to our webcast or podcast, we need to know that too. I'm Liz Iello. Join us next time, won't you? As Dr. Gary Hedrick continues our series of studies on, Is God finished with Israel? Right here on Messianic Perspectives. Messianic Perspectives is sponsored by CJF Ministries of San Antonio, Texas and is made possible on this station by the free will contributions of our listeners in this area.