Israel Is The Church!?
After all is said and done in The
Scriptures; JESUS is Israel’s MESSIAH and The Savior and LORD of All the
nations. Remember Paul’s teachings, the gentile Christians are grafted into
Israel! We are part of Israel! Romans 9 through 11 are about Israel’s rejection
of GOD, yet they remain GOD’s Chosen People (Romans 9:30-33, 10:14-21).
In Romans 11 we see that all
Believers are part of the tree and feeding from the root (JESUS Isaiah 11:1-5; Revelation
5:5). Gentile believers are grafted into the Olive Tree, Israel, and subject to
the same Requirements and receive the same Blessings.
JESUS, The Jewish Rabbi, told us
that we have to abide (live our life) in Him and His Word abide (live) in us if
we are to be His Disciples (John 8:27-32, John 14:15-24, John 15:1-17). The
Church is not separate from Israel, the Church started in Israel, in Jerusalem
and it spread to the whole world according to GOD’s Plan and JESUS’ Commission
to the Church (Matthew 28:16-20, Mark 16:14-18, Acts 1:4-8). The first
Believers were all Jewish (Acts 1:1-8:3 it was after persecution by the
religious Jews that The Gospel was taken outside of Judea, Acts 8:3ff. At this
time there were over 13,000 Jewish Believers in Judea).
Study the Acts, the Epistles and the seven letters of
Revelation 2 and 3, all the teachings are about One Church of Jews and Gentiles.
It was not until the third century under Constantine that he distinguished the
Jews (non-believers in CHRIST) from The Church, before that all the Jewish
religious leaders and the Roman emperors had counted them as one group; they
counted the non-messianic Jews and the Christians as one group because they
only believed in The One True GOD JEHOVAH. They considered the Christians as
another sect of Jews, like the Sadducees and Pharisees (Acts 9:1-2, 24:10-15,
22).
In Ephesians 2 and 4:1-8 Paul shows that the Jewish and
non-Jewish Believers in JESUS are One Body!
Peter also talks of the Church being One People, 1 Peter 2:1-17
(Romans 1:16-17; 1 Corinthians 12:1-3, 12-14, 18).
As Gentile Christians we often talk about The Church being
The Bride of The Lamb. Not so according to The Bible! Revelation 21:1-2, 9-10
teaches us that The New Jerusalem is the Bride of The Lamb, nowhere in
Scriptures does it say The Church is The Bride of The Lamb!
In The Old Testament GOD says He
betroths Himself to Israel, that Israel is His Wife several times (Isaiah 54:4-8
The LORD calls Israel His wife; Jeremiah 3:11-15 The LORD calls Israel his
wife; Hosea 2:2, 7,16, 19-20 JEHOVAH and Israel as husband and wife. In the New
Testament Paul implies that The Church is The Bride of The Lamb, 2 Corinthians
11:2; but John sees The New Jerusalem as The Bride of The Lamb!)
Whether you believe that The Church is the Bride of The Lamb
or that The New Jerusalem is The Bride of The Lamb there is only One Body of
Believers! Those, whether of Jewish or Gentile birth, are Born Again in JESUS
CHRIST and become a New Creation, The Church (John 3:1-9, 4:19-26; John 14:6;
Acts 4:11-12; Ephesians 2:4-10; Romans 10:8-13; 2 Corinthians 5:16-17).
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