Israel, the Church, and the Promises of God (Class 05)

Well good evening everyone. And welcome to class four in our study. I'm sorry class five in our study of Israel the church and the promises of God. This is an Academy study which means this is an eight-week course.

And if you take all eight classes and do your notebook read the accompanying textbook and turn in a paper at the end you are able to earn the certificate those certificates. After you earn eight of those you get a diploma through the Academy.

This is something our church started a few years ago to offer basic ministry training to folks. And we have our core classes. And then we have of course our higher up classes and this is one of our higher classes.

Four Views of Israel and the Church

This is a 301 class on the continuity and discontinuity of scripture. And so far in our lessons we have looked at the question of how do we understand the relationship of the promises that God made to Israel.

And and how do we understand those promises as they relate to the church. In our first class we talked about four different positions that are held by different Christian traditions or four different groups.

The first is dispensationalism. What word. If you were here and you remember what word distinguishes dispensationalism. Distinction. And I kind of said it so what word distinguishes this kind of yeah distinction.

Because dispensationalism makes a distinction between Israel and the church. The second was supersessionism. What's the one word that supersessionism is described. Supersessionism. Not that replacement.

So in the in the dispensational scheme Israel and the church are held distinct. In the supersessionist scheme the church replaces Israel in covenant theology or what we might call classical reform covenant theology.

What's the word that we said describes that best. Its continuity is the word and it's the idea that there is one people Israel is the church and the church is Israel. It's a it's two administrations one covenant.

That's the idea of covenant theology. And then finally the position that we would teach or you know you always save the best. For last the one that you would agree with what's the we call it new covenant fulfillment theology.

And of course the word there is fulfillment. We believe that the church or the all the promises of God are fulfilled in Jesus Christ and through union with him we experience we become co-heirs of those promises.

So that that's the position that we hold and we teach. And the position ultimately of this class and classes two and three brother Mike went through how the Old Testament points to Jesus Christ and how the New Testament shows direct fulfillment of those Old Testament.

So we had class two was on the Old Testament. Class three was on the New Testament. And then last week I taught on how the promises that were given to Abraham were always intended for the nations was was not intended only ever just for Abraham seed but it was always intended to go from Abraham to the nations.

And so I'm actually gonna be preaching on that a version of that same message this Sunday because Jesus alludes to that when he says specifically that that he has sheep that are not of this fold and that he must bring them in also.

And there's going to be one flock one shepherd. That's the title of my sermon for Sunday's one flock one shepherd. And we all the people of God are brought together in union together through the Lord Jesus Christ.

Jesus as the True and Faithful Israel

So that brings us up to tonight and tonight the title of our lesson is Jesus as the true and faithful Israel. Jesus as the true and faithful Israel. This comes from chapters 4 5 of your textbooks. If you haven't read chapters 4 5 yet please do that this week.

And if you have your set up for the lesson because we're going to be diving into that. But before we do brother Mike would you please pray that we have a good lesson. If you brought along your copy of tonight of the textbook I would ask you to open it up to chapter 4.

I just want you to see the opening of chapter 4. I know brother you're new with us tonight so you don't have a copy but I'm going to read it and I just want you to see the idea that we're getting at tonight.

I think he gives a succinct understanding in the first chapter of the first two paragraphs of chapter 4 he says having established in chapter 3 how Israel's promises extend to all nations through Christ.

And that was our lesson last week. We now examine the theological foundation that makes this extension possible. Jesus's identity as the true Israel. The synoptic Gospels Matthew Mark and Luke present Jesus not merely as Israel's Messiah but as the embodiment of Israel itself the faithful son who succeeds where the nation failed fulfills Israel's covenant calling and creates a new covenant community that includes both Jews and Gentiles.

This understanding builds directly on our previous chapters. The Old Testament promises we surveyed in chapter 1 were given to Israel as God's son and servant. The explicit fulfillments we examined in chapter 2 show Jesus accomplishing what Israel was called to do.

Now we see how this works. Jesus doesn't simply benefit Israel or extend blessings beyond Israel. He is the true Israel through whom God's purposes are achieved and made available to all nations as we saw in chapter 3.

So that's that's all we're gonna read from the book. I just wanted to kind of bring you up to the this idea because this is this is sort of an awkward idea for some people with all the arguments of what is Israel and the arguments of who is Israel or what constitutes Israel.

And you know that the arguments go out a lot and folks who want to talk about the national current nation-state of Israel there's a lot of debate about that politically. I'm going to talk a little bit about this in my sermon Sunday about how so much division is caused even in our own nation over how we recognize who is Israel what is Israel.

What is what do we mean when we talk about Israel what did Paul mean. We talked about the Israel of God and the argument of the book and I think it makes a good argument is that it's not just that Jesus fulfills the the promises of God to Israel but that Jesus in his life actually demonstrates himself to be the true Israel.

We're going to see how this works out as we go through our points tonight we're going to see this summarized in and if you want to hear the summary it can be seen in four different ways. First we're going to see that Jesus retraces Israel's history.

That's number one. So this is all under Jesus. Jesus retraces Israel's history. He succeeds where Israel failed. He fulfills Israel's mission. And finally he embodies Israel's identity. So this is what we mean when we talk about Jesus is true Israel we're saying because there's no question that Jesus is Israel's Messiah.

And this is not discounting that truth or eliminating that truth. The Gospels present Jesus not only as Israel's Messiah but they present him in such a way that he has seen to be the fulfillment of what Israel was supposed to be.

If that helps it Jesus is what Israel was supposed to be. Jesus is the embodiment of what Israel was supposed to be. And we're going to see this play out as we walk through the text. What Israel was called to do and called to be finds its fulfillment in Christ.

Those who are united to Christ by faith participate in the blessings fulfilled in him. That's the whole point of this whole class is us to see we who are united to Christ are the recipients of the promises of God because we're united to him who is in fact the object of those promises.

Jesus Retraces Israel’s History from Egypt to the Wilderness

So how does this work out biblically. First place I want you to turn in your Bibles is to Matthew chapter 2. Matthew chapter 2 the first thing we see is Jesus is the son called out of Egypt. We're going to begin reading at verse 13 it says.

Now when they had departed behold an angel the Lord appeared to Joseph in a dream and said rise take the child and his mother and flee to Egypt and remain there until I tell you. For Herod is about to search for the child to destroy him.

We all we all know this story. We're familiar with this story especially almost every Christmas. This story is reminded of us of the flight to Egypt when Herod was going to seek out the the children of Bethlehem of two years old and younger to destroy all of them.

And this was God's provision in protecting Jesus from the wicked Herod who was going to destroy the children. We remember this story. Remember the narrative. Verse 14 says. And he rose and took the child and his mother by night and departed to Egypt and remained there until the death of Herod.

This was to fulfill what the Lord had spoken by the prophet out of Egypt I called my son now out of Egypt. I called my son is a direct reference to a prophetic announcement from Hosea. It is Hosea chapter 11 and verse 1.

But I want you to turn in your Bibles and you know you don't have to keep your finger in Matthew. If you want to you can. But I want you to look at what Hosea actually says in Hosea chapter 11. Good evening Larry.

It's good to see you brother. So so just turn over to it's a Hosea 11. If you got a moment I want you to see what Hosea 11 one says. So we looked at Matthew 2 13 through 15. Now we're in Hosea 11 1. Notice what.

Good evening. It's good to see you. Notice what Hosea 11 1 says. When Israel was a child I loved him and out of Egypt I called my son. Now from a purely reasonable perspective who is the Sun in reference here Israel would say Israel is the referent.

That makes sense. Right. He says when Israel was a child I loved him and out of Egypt I called my son. So that the immediate referent to the Sun there is referring to Israel. However when we go to Matthew and Matthew is interpreting this through the inspiration of the Holy Spirit he interprets this as related to Jesus.

Hosea is looking backward to the Exodus. So why is Matthew looking at Jesus as a fulfillment of this particular prophecy. And I believe the answer is because Matthew is identifying Jesus with Israel in Israel was God's Son.

Jesus is God's Son. Israel went down to Egypt. Jesus went down into Egypt. Israel is called out of Egypt. Jesus is called out of Egypt. Jesus is beginning to retrace Israel's history even in his own life even outside of his own control.

Jesus is a baby. He's not actively going down to Egypt and bringing himself out. He's being taken down to Egypt and he's being taken out by his father because he's still at this point a toddler's age.

He is going to do something that Israel did but he's also going to do something that Israel never did. He's going to retrace Israel's history. But he's going to do it faithfully. He's going to do it faithfully.

This concept in biblical study is called the concept of recapitulation. Recapitulation now if you don't know what recapitulation is recapitulation is the idea of retelling or retracing a story either from a different perspective or in a different context.

Brother Mike's been teaching through revelation and he will be forever. But he's been preaching through revelation for a while. There's recapitulation in Revelation. It tells us once it tells the story then it starts over tells the story again.

Then it starts over and tells the story again. And sometimes in a different way sometimes with different characters sometimes with different images. He's going to get to the Millennium. And that of course we believe is the starting point of retelling the church.

Church history in ten verses. It's interesting. I can keep that that's a good title. Church history in ten verses of Revelation 21 through 10 we believe is the you know the binding of Satan the the saints reigning with the king and then the the releasing of Satan and the final destruction.

It's all there. That's recapitulation. That's that's telling the story again but in a different way. We say this in Genesis 1 and 2. Genesis 1 gives us creation and at the end of Genesis 1 we have all creations created.

God's rested. But then in Genesis 2 what does he do. He goes back to day 6 and tells us how he created man same creation story. But he's telling it in a different way. Jesus's story especially in Matthew is retelling Israel's story through the life of Christ and showing Christ as the one who is actually being faithful where Israel was unfaithful.

And so this first instance of the flight to Egypt and Hosea's direct referent to the flight to Egypt tells us that there's a connection between Jesus and Israel. And there's something I want to say this is not the same as allegory.

This is not the same as this oracle interpretation means that you you read a story and you read into the story whatever it is. You can find that might make sense in some context. And allegorical interpretation often is what we see in some of the early church fathers.

Actually they were they were known for allegorical interpretation. They would they would they would read a text of scripture and they would they would look for what they called the spiritual meaning. This is why when we teach hermeneutics we teach something called the grammatical historical interpretation meaning we look at the grammar we look at the historical context and we try to arrive at a proper interpretation based upon grammar and history.

Allegorical interpretation is not concerned with grammar not concerned with history. It's concerned with what's the deeper meaning. And what happens when you search for the deeper meaning. Sometimes sometimes you come up with the wrong meaning.

That's right. It's not what it actually means it. I'm not saying there's never any allegories in Scripture. Certainly there are times where Scripture uses allegories. But when we say recapitulation we're not saying Jesus's life is an allegory of Israel.

That's not the point. The point is we're seeing direct references and even citing the prophet direct references to Israel and the life of Christ. This is not something we just picked out of nowhere. This isn't something we created.

This is something they that scripture gave us said Hosea tells us this was about Israel. But it's about Christ. Why. Because Christ is true Israel. He's the one who's going to fulfill what Israel failed.

That's the point. Don't with me so far I've given you enough to be confusing. I hope not. Okay. And here's here's on this. This is I just made one more note. I want to say this. The difference between allegory and recapitulation is the parallel is not imposed upon the text but established by the text allegories.

When you impose a parallel on the text a recapitulation is when it is actually referenced within the text. It's it's specific to the text. We see this here by the Hosea reference. And Matthew continues this because the Sun is called out of Egypt.

And I do have to erase this for my second point. Okay. So the Sun is called out of Egypt which obviously connected to the Exodus. The second thing the Sun is faithful in the wilderness. Now again you may not have ever thought about this before.

You may not have ever made this connection before. But what happened right as Jesus began his ministry right after he went through his baptism. What was the first immediate thing that the Spirit drove him to drove him to a time of testing in the wilderness.

For how many days. 40 days now. How many years was the Israel. Were the Israelites in the wilderness. 40 years of testing. What distinguishes the Sun and Israel faithful and unfaithful. Now here's a thought.

In fact if you want to look at this let's look at this together. Go to go to Matthew 4. That's why I said you could hold your place in Matthew 2 because we're going to kind of walk through these texts.

Go back to Matthew 4 and most of us are really familiar with this. I I read it rather quickly just to get us just as a reminder says. Then Jesus was led up by the Spirit into the wilderness to be tempted by the devil.

And after fasting 40 days and 40 nights he was hungry and the tempter came and said to him if you are the Son of God command these stones to become loaves of bread. But he answered it is written man shall not live by bread alone but by every word that comes from the mouth of God.

That is a direct reference to Deuteronomy. He is quoting Deuteronomy 8. Then the devil took him to the Holy City set him on the pinnacle of the temple and said to him if you are the Son of God throw yourself down.

For it is written he will command his angels concerning you and on their hands that will bear you up lest they strike lest you strike your foot against the stone. And Jesus said to him again it is written you shall not put the Lord your God to the test.

That is in Deuteronomy 6 same book Jesus is quoting Deuteronomy all three times. Here he's going to quote the same section of Deuteronomy as well and we'll see why. In a moment the verse 8 and again the devil took him to a very high mountain showed him the kingdoms of the world and their glory and said all these I will give to you if you'll fall down and worship me.

Jesus said to him begone Satan. For it is written you shall worship the Lord your God and him only shall you serve. Then the devil left him and behold angels came and were ministering to him. Deuteronomy 6 is where we are told you shall worship the Lord your God only.

And then in Deuteronomy 7 we are told about the danger of idols. The worshiping of idols. This again is a prohibition against worshiping any other God except the one true God. So in Deuteronomy 6 we have the command to love and obey God.

And Deuteronomy 7 we have the command to remain faithful and to be separate from idolatry. And Deuteronomy 8 we are told to remember God's provision. You don't live by bread alone but by every word that proceeds from the mouth of God.

Jesus literally takes these passages from Deuteronomy and he uses them to respond to the temptations of the devil. And these temptations are very specifically the things that Israel failed in in the wilderness.

They failed to trust God. Think about how many times they're murmuring and arguing and and fussing and and complaining was a lack of trust in God's provision. They also failed to worship him alone. Mike preached on this a couple months ago when he preached about the golden calf.

What did they do. They made an idol and they worshiped it. And Jesus is here saying no you worship God and him only shall you serve. And they also failed to remain faithful during the time of testing which is precisely why Jesus is quoting these passages during his wilderness temptation in Matthew chapter 4 is so significant.

Jesus succeeds where Israel failed. So again we see explicit parallels. Israel is called God's Son. Jesus is declared God's Son. Israel comes out of Egypt. Jesus comes out of Egypt. Israel passes through the sea.

This one's a little interesting. Jesus before he goes in the wilderness. Where does he go. He goes through baptism and into the wilderness. So we see at least a tangential parallel in that 40 years in the wilderness 40 days in the wilderness.

Tested tested failed. Faithful Jesus is the faithful and true Israel. This becomes even more persuasive when we notice that all of these responses again come from the same portion of Deuteronomy where they are being reminded of their unfaithfulness.

Jesus is calling to mind these things. He's reliving that experience and succeeding where Israel failed all right. So Jesus first is the son called out of Egypt. Second he is the faithful witness in the faithful son in the wilderness.

Jesus Fulfills Israel’s Mission as Light to the Nations

Now we go to the third point and that is that Jesus is or Jesus fulfills Israel's mission to be the light of the world. He said light of the world or light to the nation. That's just a light to the nations.

Up with that now in our message last week if you remember in our in our study last week what did we say. Was the portion of Abraham's promise that related to everyone. Yeah. And you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.

We're told that that's Genesis chapter 12 and verse 3. That's the end of the Abrahamic promise. Right. Go out of your land. Go to the land that I'll show you. And I'll bless those who bless you. I'll curse those who curse you.

And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed. So he's that that promise for all nations is made in the Abrahamic promise in Genesis chapter 12. But God promises Abraham you're gonna. You're in you all the families there shall be blessed.

Israel is then the nation through which that blessing is supposed to come. It's supposed to be the instrument that God would bless the nations through. We see in Isaiah 42 verse 6 God appoints Israel as a light for the nations in Israel 49 6.

I said 42 6 before this is 49 6. The servant is. The mission is that my salvation may reach the end of the earth. Israel was called to display God's glory and bring his light to the nations. Yet Israel repeatedly failed in that mission to be the light to the nations.

Then Jesus comes. Then Jesus comes. And in Matthew 12 you don't to turn there. But in Matthew 12 there is an application. This is Matthew 12 18 to 21. There's an application of Isaiah's prophecy directly to Jesus.

Behold my servant whom I have chosen. And notice it what it says. It says in his. In fact let me read it. Let's just read it. Go. We'll go to. I've got it in my notes. But to read the whole thing we'll go over to Matthew 12 beginning at verse 18.

Actually let's go back up to verse 15. Jesus withdrew from there and many followed him. And he healed them all and ordered them not to make him known. This was to fulfill what was spoken by the prophet Isaiah.

Behold my servant whom I have chosen my beloved with whom my soul is well pleased. I will put my spirit upon him and he will proclaim justice to the Gentiles. He will not quarrel or cry aloud. He will not and nor will anyone hear his voice in the streets.

A bruised reedy will not break and a smoldering wick he will not quench until he brings justice to victory. And in his name the Gentiles will hope. He is the light to the Gentiles. He's the one whose name will be proclaimed among the Gentiles.

It'll be in him that the Gentiles will hope. Can't we say that is the absolute truth. Today we think about who is the vast majority of people who believe in Jesus. It's not Jews. It's the Gentiles the gospel Jesus.

The message of Christ has been a light to the Gentiles. Matthew applies the mission of God's servant to Jesus. He's accomplishing what Israel was called to accomplish bringing God's salvation to the nations.

Luke makes this connection even clearer in Luke chapter 2. If you want to turn over in your Bibles to Luke chapter 2 and go down to verse 29. This is actually the meeting. Yeah the meeting meeting of Simeon.

And this was his what he said. It says he took him up in his arms blessed God and said Lord now you are letting your servant depart in peace according to your word. For my eyes have seen your salvation that you prepared in the presence of all peoples.

A light for revelation to who to the Gentiles. And for the glory of your people Israel. Jesus again is the light to the Gentiles. He is doing what Israel was supposed to do. He is fulfilling the mission to be the light to the Gentiles.

And I believe the language here specifically echoes Isaiah's promise. Jesus is both Israel's glory and the light to the Gentiles. But the one who makes this most explicit is got to be John. Because we see this reference to Jesus being the light.

But who is it that says Jesus is the light of the world. John's Gospel focuses specifically on Jesus as the light of the world in John 8 12 that is one of the great I am statements of Jesus. There are seven I am statements of Jesus in John's Gospel and we see this as one of them being John 8 12 I am the light of the world.

So the progression is this. Israel was called to be a light to the nation's. Jesus fulfills the mission of bringing the light to the Gentiles and he declares himself to be the light of the world. Jesus fulfills Israel's mission by becoming in himself the light that Israel was to be to the nation's.

This also demonstrates that Gentile inclusion was not God's backup plan. Gentile inclusion was not God's plan be. Gentile inclusion was God's plan. From the beginning Israel was supposed to be a light to the Gentiles.

Through all of this Jesus comes and he fulfills what wasn't done and reaches his successful fulfillment in him. Now this next portion is very interesting because like last week I'm preaching it this week this next portion I'm going to be preaching.

Well how long before I get to John 15. We think Mike next year. Next year. No doubt. Okay. Yeah. Maybe Christmas. Yeah. If I really work hard I go a little slow. But John 15 everybody turn over to John 15.

Jesus Is the True Vine

This one actually has deep roots. Ha. That's a pun. Because the vine. But this one is Jesus is the true vine. John 15 one. I am the true vine and my father is the vine dresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away.

And every branch that does bear fruit he prunes that it may bear more fruit already. You are clean because of the word that I've spoken to you abide in me and I in you as the branch cannot bear fruit in itself unless it abides in the vine.

Neither can you unless you abide in me. I'm the vine. You're the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him he it is that bears much fruit. For apart from me you can do nothing. So Jesus identifies himself here as the true God.

He identifies himself as the one that you have to be connected to to receive salvation. Outside of him there is no salvation. We know that. But for just a moment this one's easy to miss because this one's not as explicit as some of the others.

The vine was actually something that God referred to Israel as several times in the Old Testament. His vine. We see this first. Not first but the first one we look at is in Psalm chapter 80. In the 80th Psalm verse 8 it says.

You brought a vine out of Egypt. You drove out the nations and planted it now again tying it back. What. What did he bring out of Egypt. He brought Israel out of Egypt. And in bringing Israel out of Egypt he says here I brought a vine out and I planted it.

This is the specific reference to Israel as a vine. We see this reference over and over in the book of Isaiah. It talks about God's vineyard. In fact I'll if if you want to turn there you can. I guess we have times if you want to turn.

Isaiah chapter 5 it says. In verse 1 it says. Let me sing for my beloved my love song. Concerning his vineyard. My beloved had a vineyard on a very fertile hill. He dug it and cleared of it stones and planted it with choice vines.

He built a watchtower in the midst of it and hewn out a wine vat in it. And he looked for it to yield grapes. But it yielded wild grapes. Some some translations say they're sour grapes. Some say they may have anything else other than wild grapes or sour grapes.

The idea is they're not good not good grapes. Instead of producing good fruit it didn't produce good fruit. This is the whole bad fruit bad root situation. And now inhabitants of Jerusalem and men of Judah between me and my vineyard judge between me and my vineyard.

What more was there to do for my vineyard that I have not done in it. When I looked for it to yield grapes. Why did it yield wild grapes. And now I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard. I'll remove its hedge and it shall be devoured.

I will break down its wall and it shall be trampled down. I will make it a waste. It shall not be pruned or hoed and briars and thorns shall grow up. I will also command the clouds that they rain. No rain upon it.

For the vineyard of the Lord of hosts is the house of Israel. See we have to try to interpret it tells us what it means. The vineyard is the house of Israel. The men of Judah are his pleasant planting.

He looked for justice but behold bloodshed for righteousness but behold an outcry. So Israel here referenced as his vineyard and specifically as his unfruitful vineyard. Think about the parable or not the parable living parable.

When Jesus cursed the tree picture of the unfaithful and the curse on the unfaithful fig tree or the unfruitful fig tree. But notice also what Jesus says back in John 15 5. He says. I am the vine. You are the branches.

Why are we the branches. We are the branches. Because we are connected to him. He is the vine. This this goes back to something we talked about. I don't know for his last class or the class before we talked about we have the promises of God.

I mean we can go all the way back to the beginning promises of God begin with the the proto evangelion. You know I'm gonna crush the head of the serpent. Right. So we go all the way back there. But if we want to talk about specific familial covenantal promises we would begin with Abraham.

Right. You have Abraham's promise which extends to Israel to Christ you you are in Christ. Therefore you are co-heirs of the promises of God. God did not fail in his promises to Israel. He fulfilled his promises to Israel in his son who came as the faithful son of God the true and faithful Israel to fulfill what needed to be done.

This is where the argument I think becomes apparent. A little bit more apparent. At least if Jesus is the true vine who constitutes the branches of God's vineyard those who are united to Christ. Jesus said whoever abides in me and I in him he it will be that bears much fruit.

The defining issue becomes our relationship to Christ. Israel was God's vine. Israel failed to produce the desired fruit. Jesus declares I am the true vine. He becomes he or Jesus. I am the true vine.

Those who abide in Jesus become the branches and the branches bear good fruit. In fact what is James tell us. If we have faith we will have works that we will bear fruit. Those who don't bear fruit. What.