1422 - Introduction to a new series: "The Place of Jew & Gentile in the Great Plan of Redemption."

Transcript

SPEAKER_01 0:01

Welcome to On the Way with Tony Crisp. Each weekday, Dr. Crisp will be discussing biblical passages, people, places, and prophecies. Tune in daily to start your day right and deepen your understanding of how to better walk the way and enjoy the journey. Here's your host, Dr. Tony Crisp.

SPEAKER_00 0:21

Welcome to On the Way. This is Tony Crisp and this is Podcast 1422. For six years now I have recorded podcasts on a regular basis. Almost 2,000 have been recorded from almost every subject in the Bible. I have covered 365 key chapters that I identified for the 365 Bible reading plan. Every day you can read a chapter of Scripture with me. If you have more time to read more than just that chapter of Scripture, I have written a five to six hundred word commentary that sums up the material that you have just read. And if you want more, there's a fifteen to twenty minute podcast on all of those three hundred and sixty five chapters. So I've covered a lot of material, and yet I've covered in the podcast on the way with Dr. Tony Chris many, many subjects. We've visited many places. We've gone through entire books. But the podcast that you're going to hear in the coming days may be of such critical importance that you will need to hear them over and over again. Not because my voice is worth hearing or not because I am some kind of Euridite scholar that knows everything there is to know, I confess I do not. I confess I know very little in the great scheme of things. But I've been studying the Word of God for fifty one years now, and I have been studying it intentionally, intensely and in structured context. I have been able by God's wonderful, amazing grace to study under some of the greatest men that lived in the last century, and that would be by any evangelical's opinion, because I've studied under men who were covenant theologians, men who would be called fulfillment theologists. I have studied under many who are covenant theologians, and I have studied language under them, I've studied theology under them, I've studied history under them, I've studied ancient history, church history under them. I have studied the medieval fathers and the early fathers, the Nicene Fathers. I have studied Baptist history. I have studied under people from Europe, people from America, and people from Africa. And so God has given me a varied education. And because of that, I want to speak about the Jewish people. And I want to ask some questions and then answer them. I want to give you just a few of the topics we're going to be covering in the coming days. We're going to answer some questions, at least we're going to attempt to together. Look at the history, biblical history, ancient history, and then the last two thousand years of church history, we're going to look at the biblical realities. Because after all, the Bible is the final authority to which we always appeal, not man's opinion, not historical president, not tradition, even good church tradition. But what does the Bible say and do we have a proper method of discovery? A good hermeneutic, a great hermeneutic, a biblical hermeneutic. How do we interpret the Word of God? When do we spiritualize something? And when do we contextualize it and make it to be a literal interpretation? All of these things will make a difference on how we view Israel. And today I can tell you, if you will tell me where you are on the nation of Israel, that is, if you believe the Bible is the Word of God, indeed the Word of God, not just inspired in spots, but inspired in a plenary sense, all of it, from Genesis to Revelation, the Old and New Testament. If we are on those same stones, we are of a belief system that the Bible is the inerrant word of God, it's infallible, it will not lead us astray, it's authoritative. If indeed we believe that and that Jesus is the Son of God, he is virgin born, he is sinless, he died as a substitute to make atonement for our sins, that he was buried, he rose again the third day, and all of that was predicted in Scripture, that he is coming again, whether you believe it's an a millillennial belief system, or whether you believe that is a postmillennial belief system or a premillennial belief system, and those are the lens through which you look, or whether you believe in a pre-tribulation rapture or a tribulation at all, or a post-tribulation, mid-tribulation taking away of the church, what you believe about the church, if we can agree on just the very foundational things about Jesus and who he is and the written word of God, then we've got a foundation upon which to study to show ourselves approved unto God. And so we're going to be answering questions like, is God finished with Israel? The nation of Israel, that is. Not that God can't save Jewish people. That's not what I'm going to answer because that is in golf that'd be called a give me. In other words, that's not even worth putting. That's not even worth dealing with. We're going to answer the question, is God finished with Biblical Israel? Has the church replaced Israel, the Jews, in God's salvation economy? Is the church true Israel or, as Galatians 6.16 says, the Israel of God? Is that the church or is that the Jewish people? The true believers of the Jewish people? Did the disciples believe in replacement theology or supersessionism that the Church now replaces Israel, that the Church supersedes Israel? Is the Bible teaching us in the New Testament, in the Old Testament that God will replace Israel or restore Israel? If indeed the Jews are rejected through disobedience, what was the level of disobedience that caused that? Did God break his promises to Abraham and David because of the disobedience of their descendants? Was the Abrahamic covenant and the Davidic covenant the same kind of covenant, conditional versus unconditional as the Mosaic covenant? Or was there a difference in the way that God made those covenants with Abraham and David versus Moses and Mount Sinai with the Jews? Has God cut his people off? Has God cast his people away? Referencing the Jews Romans nine, ten, eleven. And even more to the heart of real questions today that I see from influencers on all different kinds and sorts of social media, preachers that are on TV and radio. Are the Jews of today the Jews of the Bible? Are the modern day Jews not considered the offspring of the descendants of the biblical Jews? Is that because of where they came from or the color of their skin? Or is it because of bias that we have? For instance, the majority of Jews in Israel today did not come from Europe or Western culture, sometimes called Ashkenazi Jews. Most of the Jews, the majority of Jews today are Mizrahi or Sfardi. That's Middle Eastern or North African Jews. Having traveled to Israel now for forty-nine years, this year will be fifty if I make it to Israel, and having spent at least over the last twenty five years, sometimes as high as four months in Israel, 120 days, but many, many years, sixty to a hundred days each year. Not just there with groups going to the same familiar places, not just going up the coast of Caesarea, then to Mount Carmel, then to Megiddo, then to Nazareth, and then over to the Sea of Galilee, take a boat ride, go north, then uh drive down the Jordan Valley and and see a few things and go up to Israel, maybe go to Masada and do that fifty times. Same thing. I'm not talking about that. I have stayed there, researched there, taught there, been a part of Shabbat meals, of Moadim, and the celebrations of all the holidays except Yom Kippur. And I've always come home on that day to let the Jewish people have that day to themselves without bothering with me. But what I am telling you is that I have observed the Jews at close range, and I've worked with them in America. Many of the people that are listening to this are Jews, not followers of Jesus. But they're listening to me because they know they can listen to me in privacy and they can maybe see how the evangelical world truly thinks about them. They know that I love them. They've been in our home. We've broken bread together many times. And we've celebrated holidays together, Jewish and Christian holidays. I've spent Hanukkah with them, they've spent Christmas with us. So I have observed the Jews at close range. And so we're going to talk about modern Jews. I've worked with them in Washington. I've worked with them in Chicago. I've worked with them in New York. I've worked with them in the Miami area. I've worked with them in California. I've worked with them in San Diego and LA. All over America I have worked with Jews. And they have been both Ashkenazi, Mizrahi, or Svardi. And they have sometimes had a mixture of all. And so I want to deal with this from the standpoint of somebody who has been there, done that, someone who has looked at this from a truly biblical and historical perspective. Are the prophecies of the kingdom, that is the kingdom to come, or is there one to come, or are we now in the kingdom? Is this what it is? Are all the promises of the first coming were they literally fulfilled, or just a small percentage of them? What about the early disciples? Were they looking for Israel to be restored literally, physically, nationally? Or was it all just a game to them? If that's the case, we've got a lot of explaining to do. Because the early church was primarily made up of Jews for the first eight to ten years. Almost all scholarship believes that the church was made up of Jews primarily, not to Cornelius in Acts chapter ten, do we have Gentiles coming in? So we're going to walk through these questions together. We're going to answer some biblical questions and some passages that are constantly used and almost flippantly dismiss anyone who would think otherwise. But I want to ask you a question. When you think of the Bible, do you think of Jew or Gentiles? Do you think the Bible was written primarily to you or to the Jews? If you are a Jew, do you understand that the Bible is a Jewish book? It was written by Jews. Only one writer was a Gentile and he was discipled by a Jew by a rabbi named Saul of Tarsus that we know as the Apostle Paul. We're going to look at these questions and we're going to look at them thoroughly. Now we cannot cover everything. I'm preparing now to do a series of five minute videos that will be in detail and more pointed and precise, but on these I can take some time on these podcasts to look back and forth at various views, and then hopefully can arrive at a biblical one. But I think it'll be worth your time. Maybe to not listen every day. I know some of you are very busy, but when you can, do a catch up. I really do not. I was just an ungodly heathen until I was nineteen years of age. And God in his great mercy and grace brought me to himself, and it has been a wonderful experience. I have no regrets with God's dealing with me, many regrets of my own failure, but not the Lord. Even when I have been unfaithful, God has been faithful. I pray that you'll listen in the days to come as we walk on the way and we look at answering the question, is God finished with the Jews? Does the church replace Israel? Will God replace Israel with the church? Is that what He's done? Or will He restore Israel in the days ahead? For on the way, this is Tony Crisp.

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Thanks for listening to On the Way with Tony Crisp. Tune in every weekday for information on biblical passages, people, places, and prophecies. Fridays are for your questions. Email your questions to questions at TonyCrisp.org. Then just listen for your question to be answered on Friday's podcast. That's questions at TonyC R I S P dot org. Thanks for listening and have a blessed day on the way.