The Gifts and Calling of God are Irrevocable

[00:00:00] I do hope you'll be able to stay awake. [00:00:03] These afternoon sessions are the most terrible sessions of all, and especially those that are near to lunch. [00:00:12] But we will trust the Lord to keep us awake. [00:00:18] I would like to read once again from the letter of the apostle Paul, the roman letter in chapter eleven. Im going to read from verse eleven. [00:00:34] I say then did they the jewish people stumble, that they might fall? God forbid. But by therefore salvation has come unto the gentiles to provoke them, the jewish people, to jealousy. Now if their fall is the riches of the world, and their loss the riches of the gentiles, how much more their fulness. But I speak to you that are gentiles, inasmuch then, as I am an apostle of gentiles, I glorify my ministry. If by any means I may provoke to jealousy them that are my flesh and may save some of them. For if the casting away of them is the reconciling of the world, what will the receiving of them be but life from the dead? Verse 24 for if thou wast cut out of that which is by nature a wild olive tree, and wast grafted contrary to nature into a good olive tree, how much more shall these, which are the natural branches, be grafted into their own olives? [00:01:49] For I would not, brethren, have you ignorant of this mystery, lest ye be wise in your own conceits, that a hardening in part have befallen Israel, until the fulness of the gentiles be come in. And so all Israel shall be saved, even as it is written there shall come out of Zion the deliverer, he shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob. And this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins, as touching the gospel, they are enemies for your sake, but as touching the election, they are beloved for the fathers sake. For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. For as ye in time pass were disobedient to God, but now, now have obtained mercy by their disobedience. Even so have these the jewish people also now been disobedient, that by the mercy shown to you, they also may now obtain mercy. For God hath shut up all unto disobedience, that he might have mercy upon all. O the depth of the riches, birth, of the wisdom and the knowledge of God. How unsearchable are his judgments and his ways past tracing out for who hath known the mind of the Lord, or who hath been his counsel, or who hath first given to him? And it shall be recompensed unto him again, for of him and through him and unto him are all things. To him be the glory forever. [00:03:45] Amen. [00:03:48] This is the second session that is my responsibility, and I took this one verse in this chapter 25. I would not, brothers, have you ignorant of this mystery. [00:04:13] I will not say too much about our former time, otherwise we will not be able to cover the ground this afternoon that we need to cover. [00:04:23] But the apostle Paul had a burden, and this burden he was communicating not to Jews, interestingly, but to gentiles. Gentiles saved by the grace of God. A large portion of the church in Rome were of gentile origin. And this burden that he has is very interesting because it comes in the greatest exposition of the Gospel, in my estimation, in the Bible, the roman letter. [00:05:01] And when he comes to the end of his theme, as it were, with Romans, chapter eight, he stops for a moment as if the Holy Spirit says, you cannot go on now. We have to go behind history. We have to go behind all the choice of the jewish people and the birth of the church and ask, what is it that lies behind all of this? And romans 910 and eleven. These remarkable chapters deal with this tremendous subject. He calls it a mystery, a secret. He uses this term. [00:05:53] He illustrates it, as it were, from these secret hellenistic societies into which you were initiated and the initiated. Certain secrets belonging to those societies were, as it were, expounded or revealed to the Initiates. And he is really saying that every born again child of God has a birthright, and that birthright is to know the mysteries of God. He speaks even of the apostles as stewards of the mysteries or secrets of God. Of course, the Holy Spirit is the one who has to reveal these things to us. But nevertheless, here in these three chapters, he deals with the secret or mystery of Israel. There are many other mysteries, and in our first session, I spoke for a while about a number of these mysteries of God. The humblest, most unsophisticated child of God is able to understand what sometimes a theologian doesn't seem to grasp. When the Holy Spirit reveals one of these mysteries, Israel is a mystery. It is entirely confusing to normal human intelligence. It is hard to follow if you understand salvation, if you understand the necessity of being born again, how God can still, still use and care for a people who are not born of God, who are described in these chapters as blind and deaf. So I spent the last session talking about Romans chapter nine and ten, because if we take those two chapters, we have pure replacement theology. [00:08:07] We have nothing less than the simple fact that Israel was gainsaying, obstinate, blind and deaf. And God said about the gentiles that where they are, it is said, they are not my people. There they shall be called sons of the living God. Now I'm not going to go over all that again, but it is. I have enormous sympathy with those who see that the church is in the very heart of God, that God, God's heart and mind for the church is tremendous, that when you look at the whole Bible you will find it everywhere. So it is perfectly understandable to me that if you do not understand the mystery of Israel, then it is the conclusion is that God has finished with the jewish people, has transferred everything to the church, and that there is no divine destiny for the jewish people and Israel. [00:09:23] That's how you would think if you did not have Romans. Chapter eleven. [00:09:28] So powerful is the line that the apostle Paul has been taking and explaining this wonderful purpose of God to save the Gentiles, and at the same time explaining the stubbornness and intransigence and blindness of Israel, that he asks the question in chapter eleven, verse one. Has God finished with the jewish people? Has he cast them off? Meaning that he has turned his back on them? [00:10:10] He has no more purpose for the jewish people. [00:10:16] He then begins from that chapter onwards to qualify everything that he has said before. But just wait, just wait. From chapter eleven, verse one he speaks about a remnant of the jewish people according to the election of grace. [00:10:42] And then it dawns upon us that this remnant of the jewish people, according to the election of grace is the early church, the apostles, all the early church leaders, all the writers of the New Testament. Bar to the work of one author, Luke, I mean, it is. You still have replacement theology because in fact you could say, this is the Israel of God. This is the new Israel. This is the Israel that first began, as it were, in Jerusalem and then went to Samaria and has now gone from Caesarea to the ends of the Israel. The Lord Jesus said, jerusalem, Judea, Samaria to the uttermost parts of the earth, full stop. [00:11:39] His purpose for the jewish people is over. They were a stage in God's redemptive purpose. [00:11:46] A means, an agency, merely a stepping stone. It has been fulfilled. So if you take only these first ten verses of chapter eleven, you're still left with replacement theology. He then asks his second question, as inescapable as the first. If God has saved a remnant of the jewish people according to the election of grace, then did he deliberately trip up the rest? [00:12:23] Did he arrange for them to fall? Did he ensnare them. [00:12:32] The apostle has a problem. He says, God forbid, but he says, without putting it into so many words, but by their fall, salvation has come to the Gentleman Gentiles to provoke the jewish people to jealousy. [00:12:52] Now, from verse eleven of chapter eleven of Romans, the apostle begins step by step, stage by stage, to answer every question we might have about the future of the jewish people. People. [00:13:13] He qualifies everything that he has said. If you are left with Romans chapter nine and ten, you might think God has finished with the jewish people, that there was only an election, a remnant, according to that election of his grace. [00:13:32] But now he begins to confuse us. [00:13:37] Here is in essence the mystery of Israel. [00:13:44] I will start with the way he sums up the thing and then work backwards. Very wrong way of doing it. But still, because I don't know whether it's being jewish or what it is, I always look at the last chapter. I get so many books given to me to read and I can't read them all, so many manuscripts sent to me. [00:14:08] I don't know whether people think that I spend my whole time with nothing to do except read and read other people's manuscripts. But I normally will look at the last chapter and the last paragraphs, because I reckon that most people will sum up everything in that last thing. And from that I understand whether it's worth reading the whole book. [00:14:36] Its like the Bible. [00:14:38] You read the last couple of chapters and youve really got the heart of the matter. [00:14:44] You know what the Lord is driving at you. You see his goal. [00:14:50] Well, here we have it. Listen very carefully. I know many of you may have heard this before, even from my lips, but listen very carefully. As touching the gospel, they, the jewish people are enemies. That's a strong word. For your sake. [00:15:12] That is a mystery. [00:15:15] For your sake. They are enemies of the Gospel. For the calling out of the gentiles in some way that is beyond our comprehension. Entry. [00:15:30] They are enemies for the sake of the Gentile. [00:15:35] But listen to the but as touching the election, that is the predestinating counsel and will of God. As touching the election. [00:15:49] They are not. They were. They are beloved for the patriarchs, for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. I always get them excited in the front row about this. Irrevocable, you know, it gets. Yes. [00:16:06] So worked up. [00:16:10] Irrevocable. [00:16:13] It is a much better way of saying than irrevocable. [00:16:17] It's got a feeling in it. The gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. Listen, listen. As touching the election, these people described. I will go through it so that we are absolutely clear on this. As blind, deaf, hardened, fallen, lost, cast away, laid aside, broken off, enemies of the gospel, disobedient. [00:16:56] These, these same people described by this catalogue of negatives, we are told that their election still stands. Now that is a mystery. [00:17:16] No wonder many christians have a problem here. Blind, dead, hardened, disobedient, enemies of the gospel, cast away, cut off and as touching the predestinating counsel and will of God. [00:17:39] Their gifts and their calling are irrevocable. [00:17:45] They have not been nullified. Their gifts and their calling, it has not been cancelled. It has not been revoked. It stands. [00:18:05] I have been a believer for now I don't know how many years, not a hundred, but it's getting on that way. [00:18:20] At least that's how I feel. But I mean I have been a believer since in my teens from my bar mitzvah day. [00:18:31] Not that I had a bumming, but I'm saying that's when I would have had it. And the interesting thing is that I have heard, I must have heard. At least I won't exaggerate as normally I'm told I do. I will just say hundreds of sermons and messages on the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. [00:18:57] And the interesting thing is some of these have been marvelous, absolutely marvelous. Missionary leaders talking about the gifts and the calling of missionaries as irrevocable. The gifts and the calling of missionary societies as irrevocable. I've heard the most wonderful addresses and sermons from vicars and ministers, pastors, preachers of the word about the gifts and the calling of the church. The gifts and the calling of ministers, the gifts and the calling of christian workers. The gifts and the calling of the church itself being irrevocable. And I don't have any problem about it. Absolutely wonderful. I had never once heard a single christian preacher speak of this in its primary relationship to a fallen, blind, deaf, disobedient, laid aside, cut off people. I have not even heard someone say in a kind of little aside, well, you know, this was originally to the jewish people. [00:20:03] I haven't even heard that. Which means it is not only the jewish people that are blind. [00:20:13] It means that many a christian preacher who should know much better has a blind spot. [00:20:20] I was told that when Nelson in his ship there was a signal from the admiral to retire in that great battle. I believe it was of Trafalgar. I think I'm right. And he was told to retire. And when he was told of the signal, he got up. He was resting. He got up, took his telescope, put it to his blind eye and said, I can see no signal. [00:20:52] And I feel there are so many christian leaders and preachers who deliberately put the telescope to their blind eye and look and say, I cannot see this in the word of God. I cannot see it. It is not there. I cannot see it. [00:21:15] How can any child of God come into this subject objectively? Now I know we have cranks in this business. [00:21:29] There are cranks in the charismatic business as well. And there were cranks in the pentecostal business earlier. [00:21:38] And I might say that I, coming when I was, say, from an evangelical background, found many a prank amongst the evangelicals. But it's slightly more decent. [00:21:56] It is quieter amongst evangelicals, more contained, a little more discipline. [00:22:08] At present in Jerusalem we have four Virgin Marys, one John the Baptist, one Jeremiah, three elijahs, one deported recently, and so many of the two witnesses that I could fill this place with just the two witnesses. I could keep you entertained for hours talking about Israel. Nutcases. [00:22:37] That there are so many, it seems to draw such like a magnet. [00:22:45] But that doesn't mean that the truth is not the truth. [00:22:51] Furthermore, it is a tragedy when christian leaders and teachers avoid this subject because of the cranks, leaving the whole field open to the cranks. [00:23:06] The same thing happened with the gifts of the Holy Spirit. [00:23:10] Many a minister avoided the whole subject because they saw such extraordinary things happening in the early days of the charismatic. [00:23:23] Well, I could give you some more stories, but I'm not going to. [00:23:29] I was witness myself to some of the most extraordinary things in those early days. If you wanted to be put off, you could be put off. [00:23:40] But the fact of the matter is you have to approach the truth objectively. What is the truth? [00:23:50] And the truth in this matter that the apostle called the mystery, the mystery of Israel is that God still has a calling for this people. [00:24:08] It is in the book. It is an inescapable conclusion, whether there are thousands of tranks or not. [00:24:19] The fact is that the election of Israel and the jewish people still stands. And if God says it stands, it will be fulfilled. [00:24:37] It does not matter whether the whole world combines to destroy the jewish people, to despise the multivitamin, value them. It doesn't matter if Christendom itself undermines the very foundation upon which they stand. [00:24:52] It does not matter whether this world is filled with a million devils and principalities and powers to boot. [00:25:06] It will be fulfilled. [00:25:09] Because God is God. [00:25:14] He can be no other. [00:25:20] Now if that is the case, you and I have discovered not in the Old Testament. That is, as it were, dismissed as being either fulfilled already in the return from Babylon, or dismissed as exaggeration or hebrew poetry, in which apparently anything goes. [00:25:48] You have it here in the roman letter. The roman letter no less, the roman letter that as touching the election, they are beloved for the patriarchs sake, for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. [00:26:18] I therefore find it quite remarkable when this truth is not understood, I can only explain it. If I am to be kind. [00:26:28] I can only explain it that somehow other these three chapters are looked upon as quite unnecessary, that they are to do with the complex matter of predestination and that apparently we don't have to bother our little hints about. [00:27:01] I think thats incredible that if God wills something, dont bother your little head about it, just do your own thing. [00:27:12] Isnt that incredible? [00:27:15] God preserve us from our own works. [00:27:19] The christian church is cluttered with our own works, but when it is the work of God it is always fulfilled. And for the work of God the grace of God is available. [00:27:36] And the power of God and the wisdom of God, everything is available for the work of God. Better be a co worker with God than a worker for God. [00:27:54] But coming back to this wonderful subject, as you can see, we always get very excited about it, however much we talk about it. [00:28:02] Is it any wonder that this is called the mystery of Israel? Here is a people whose election still stands, whose gifts and calling are irrevocable and they are called blind, deaf, disobedient, hardened enemies of the gospel, cut off, laid aside, is it any wonder that it's called the mystery? If you approach this thing with your natural mind, it is impossible to understand it. How do you reconcile this then? Lets work back now to the same chapter, verse twelve. [00:28:51] Now if their fall is the riches of the world and their loss the riches of the Gentiles, how much more their fulness? [00:29:00] Will you please notice in one sentence, three words, loss, fullness. [00:29:09] And the apostle only speaks of the fall of the jewish people and the loss to the jewish people in the light of the coming fullness. He says this listen, listen to the if their fall is the riches of the world and there lost the riches of the Gentiles, how much more their fullness. In other words, if the Gentiles have come into the unsearchable riches of the Messiah Jesus, through the fall and loss of the jewish people, if they have come into the fathomless fullness of God through the fall and loss of the jewish people, if they have been saved by the grace of God through the fall and loss of the jewish people. When the jewish people's fullness come, what will it mean to the Gentiles? But more, more riches, infinitely more riches? It is beyond the power of human language to describe. [00:30:25] I would have thought that alone would be a catalyst for the church to work toward the salvation of the jewish people, to pray for their salvation, to lay down our lives for them if necessary. [00:30:52] Is there any solid evidence in this earth today that that fullness has begun? [00:31:07] Or let me put it yet another way, if someone takes exception to my so speaking of the fullness, is there any solid evidence of a prelude to it? [00:31:24] I would say yes. [00:31:28] We have, in the recreation of the state of Israel, solid evidence for something happening in the councils of God that is to do with the fullness of the jewish people. [00:31:53] If their loss was a loss of land, a loss of territory, a loss of national status, a loss of national institutions, a loss of the capital, a loss of the language, do you not think that we already begin to see, as it were, the beginning of the fullness in the recreation, the fertility of the land, in the restoration of the ecology of the land, in the rebuilding of ruined cities, in the recreation of the state of the 14 May 1948 by the roman calendar, the reinstituting of the national institutions, the presidency, the Knesset, the parliament. [00:32:44] We haven't had a parliament for 1700 years. Ever since the Sanhedrin was disbanded, we haven't had a parliament. We've always had to endure the hot air of gentiles in their parliaments when there was a parliament. But now we have our own parliament. With jewish hot air. It is. [00:33:08] We've got our own. [00:33:11] We have our own president, who were always able to complain about dukes and sultans and emperors and kings and queens because they were gentile. [00:33:23] But now we've got our own president. [00:33:26] Now we can complain about our own president. [00:33:29] He comes from ourselves. He is jewish. [00:33:33] It is amazing for us that after so many years of the absence of these institutions, we now have eight universities, all teaching in Hebrew from the north to the south of the land. [00:33:50] We have the police again. We used to always be able to blame everything on the anti semitism of police in whatever country. [00:33:59] But now we have our own place. [00:34:02] It's a little more difficult to speak about our own jewish bliss. I mean, when traffic wardens slapped fines upon your car, you could always say it was anti semitism in action. [00:34:20] But now it is a jewish traffic inspector who places a fine on a jewish car driven by a jewish driver. It is amazing. The army, air force and navy are all institutions that have been recreated in our lifetime. [00:34:44] Is this not solid evidence? Think of the language Hebrew, not spoken as a living language for 1700 years and suddenly being reborn to become the language of three and a half million native born Israelis. Sabra, you will look in vain in the annals of world history, in the chronicles of human history, to find another instance of a language which died for 1700 years, to be born again as the language of a virile, volatile nation. [00:35:33] Is all this coincidence? If it is, it is the most amazing set of coincidences in the history, history of the world. [00:35:43] I think it requires more faith to believe that these are all coincidences than to believe this is simply the hand of God in the history of the nations. [00:35:56] It is God who is at work fulfilling his prophetic agenda. Can anybody understand God's prophetic agenda if they do not understand the mystery of Israel? Of course, in previous centuries it might have been possible, but can anybody understand gods prophetic agenda as it touches our world today and our generation and not understand the mystery of Israel? We are at sea. [00:36:31] There are many other things I could say, but I knew I get carried away by this. It's so, to me, exciting. [00:36:43] Steve Lytle quoted that wonderful word if it is marvelous in the eyes of the remnant, you know, from Zechariah, chapter eight. And he mentioned the word pearl, which comes from the same root as the word miracle, root of the title, one of the glorious titles of our Lord Jesus. [00:37:07] Elie Yuettes, wonderful counselor. [00:37:15] Counselor of miracles, wonderful. [00:37:21] If it is marvelous in our eyes, it is miraculous. [00:37:29] Only God could have worked all this. I'm not going to take time to illustrate some of these evidences, which would be very lively, but I can only underline it. I want to give you this foundation if God enables me and empowers me, so that you realize that this prophetic agenda of God has a solid foundation in the mystery of Israel. [00:38:05] Well, my dear friends, I could mention just in passing, but Johannes will undoubtedly say something more about it if I know him. And already Steve Lytle has already said quite a bit. But I find it quite interesting that in the prophecy of Jeremiah contained in Jeremiah 31, apart from many others, he says, behold, I will gather you from the north country. [00:38:33] Why the north country? At the back of your Bible you have maps. Nobody ever looks at those maps. I've often wondered why they're ever put there. But in the back of every decent Bible, you have a whole. If you look, if you're intelligent enough to look. You will see that Jerusalem is near the Mediterranean and a thousand kilometers east is Babylon. Why did the Lord say, behold, I will bring them from the north country? Well, someone says, you see, it's poetry. Oh, very good. So that means every time you read north, read east, which means the mockery of God's word. Why does God say, behold? Oh, someone now very clever says, you see, all the major troops, major trade routes, went from Babylon in the east to the north and entered the land from the north. So why does the Lord say, I will say to the north, give up? Does the Lord speak to a trade route? [00:39:33] Where was the headquarters? I mean, these gentlemen tell me that this is all, but don't look for any of these newfangled notions and ideas that these kind of preachers like Lance Lambert and Johannes Perseus and Steve Lytle and a few others are ridiculous. [00:39:53] I mean, it's all fulfilled. [00:39:55] Your Old Testament is an antique, very little relevance from one day. You've got lessons from it, but nothing that is relevant in a realistic way to the situation in which we're living. [00:40:13] Ha ha. [00:40:14] So the Lord says, I will say to the north, give up, and to the south, keep not back. [00:40:20] You know that. Where was the headquarters of this great monolithic empire, invincible, insuperable, immovable, that held the jewish people in an exile and would not let them go. It was east, a thousand kilometres east. Why did the Lord say, I will say to the north, give up, unless he had in mind another monolithic empire, as invincible, as insuperable, as immovable as the babylonian, in which one of the largest jewish communities in the world would be held in its grip for 70 years, their jewish heart torn out of their jewish soul, not allowed to keep festivals or sabbaths, not allowed to study Hebrew or teach Judaism to their children. [00:41:06] So important is this matter to God in his prophetic agenda that he is prepared to turn upside down and inside out huge ideologies, huge empires, if they touch the jewish people and his purpose for them, of course, some of you will say, well, what about christians? Yes, absolutely, absolutely right. Those believers in these countries are linked in some incredible way to the jewish people and the jewish people to them. [00:41:46] 70 years to the day that the marxist covenant was signed in the Kremlin palace, it was cancelled. And one of the old tsarist flags, white, blue and red, came back as the flag instead of the hammer and sickle. [00:42:07] And one of the old tsarist hymns came back as the national anthem of the Russian Federation in place of the international and if you watch television and you see next time you see Mister Putin, look above his head, if it's in the cabinet room of the russian government, and to your amazement, you will see on the wall the double haired eagle with the two crowns, one on either head. Who would have believed it? Only one single statesman said it would happen. Zbigniew Brzezinski. [00:42:43] Every secret service in the world. The British, mi whatever, five and six. And the French, which is a very good one. And the South African, which is also a very good service. And the american CIA, which is a very dirty service. [00:43:01] And the Mossad of Israel, I have to say this brilliant secret service, every one of these secret services had not an inkling that the Kremlin was about to hold. In one single year, it collapsed. And as Steve said, yes, the iron curtain went with it and the divided Berlin went with it. [00:43:28] It is unbelievable. [00:43:30] We are all so used to it now, we hardly think about it in our lifetime. It happened. God spoke a word and the whole thing crumbled before him. [00:43:45] So powerful is God and so ready, according to his prophetic agenda, to, by his word, bring light out of darkness and things that are not into being. [00:44:09] Some people say to me, well, you know, that Jeremiah 31, of course, that's all fulfilled. [00:44:18] So north doesn't mean north. But even more interestingly, it says there again, shall you plant vineyards upon the mountains of Samaria? Don't these dear people know of a woman called the woman of Samaria? Don't they know that the Samaritans and Jews had nothing whatsoever to do with them? That when the jewish people came back from exile, they never colonized Samaria because they found it full of a hotchpotch among the Greek? They wouldn't touch them. Do they not know what it says in Nehemiah when he said, I will not allow the Samaritans to join in the building of the wall? They have no part with us. Do they not know that nobody would go to Samaria? How come they say it's fulfilled when it says again, shall you plant vineyard? Well, I suppose it's poetry. [00:45:06] I mean, Samaria doesn't mean Samaria. It must mean the plain of Sharon or Galilee. [00:45:16] If this is the way to treat the word of God, especially the old covenant, you need a guide to explain to you how you understand things. [00:45:31] Well, but we must move on because of our time. [00:45:38] It is not. I see an amazing progression here. You see, to me, I see all this as a prelude to the fullness. It is the first, the first shadowy steps of a coming glorious day. [00:45:57] It is the beginning, the sunrise. [00:46:02] God is not interested in just recreating fertility and ecology and ruin cities and states with all their bureaucracy and everything else that ties us up, all of us up in knots, states that can create taxes so that we all nearly die. [00:46:28] God is not merely interested in this kind of thing, a language being reborn or even the preservation in six wars in 52 years, tremendous as that is. [00:46:41] God has one goal, the salvation of the house of Israel, and he has waited for 2000 years for this goal to be achieved. [00:46:56] It is the appointed or set time for Zion. It is spoken of in psalm 109 two the set time has come. [00:47:10] It is the times and seasons which the Lord Jesus spoke of, set totally within the authority of the Father. Those times and seasons have arrived. Now, dear friends, if you go on in this marvelous 11th chapter, you have fullness. [00:47:32] And obviously that must end in salvation. So I see it in the exact opposite that happened when the loss came. It began with a spiritual, a loss of spiritual significance and status, and then it went slowly to the loss of land and then to the loss of sovereignty, and then to the loss of the capital, and ended with the loss of the language and the loss of parliament and the institutions. Now it seems to me as if it's the other way round. Slowly, step by step from the periphery, coming nearer and nearer to the heart. And that's exactly what the apostle comes back to within a sentence or two. For he says, for if the casting away of them, the jewish people is the reconciliation reconciling of the world, what will the receiving of those same jewish people be but life from the dead? [00:48:33] In other words, what resulted from the casting away of the jewish people? The salvation of innumerable multitudes of gentiles, from every ethnic group, from every nation, from every tongue, they have been redeemed. [00:48:58] Those words, so simple, have been fulfilled by their fall. [00:49:08] Salvation is come to the Gentile. [00:49:14] So gentile is it in many ways that most people think of their salvation as a gentile salvation and as having nothing whatsoever to do with the jewish people. [00:49:37] Listen again. [00:49:38] What if the casting away of them is the reconciling of the world? That's a spiritual thing. [00:49:46] What will the receiving of them be but life from the dead? It will be Ezekiel 37. In a moment of time, all the dead, dry bone, not only relocated, not only sinew and flesh and muscle, but the spirit of God coming into them so that they stand up an exceeding great army. [00:50:29] It's a spiritual thing. It is the salvation of the jewish people. And then he goes on another step, if I may so say, when you come to what he says about the natural branches and the wild olive branches, he speaks of a good olive tree. And he says, it doesn't matter how many are the branches of the gentiles who have been grafted in through the salvation of God and the gift of living faith, into the good olive tree. It is not the branches that bear the tree, but the root that bears the branches. And then he speaks of all these gentiles as wild olive branches. [00:51:13] I always say, some more wild than others. [00:51:18] If you are a gentile, you are a wild olive one. [00:51:21] Have you ever seen a wild olive tree? [00:51:25] The fruit of the wild olive tree is so small. All, all pip. [00:51:35] There's nothing else. [00:51:37] There's one little. You can't even. You can't even cure them. [00:51:46] Who would have ever thought of taking wild olive branches and grafting them into a good olive tree? That is ridiculous. I planted 17 olive trees recently in my little cottage in one of the islands in Greece. [00:52:01] And about at least 1314 of them are natural branches grafted into a wild stock root. [00:52:12] Why? Because the wild olive stock is unbelievably disease free and very virile and strong. Now, this is true of the gentleman. Theyre pretty much like this. [00:52:27] You put that natural branch in them and all the goodness of the soil and the water comes up through the wild olive stock and into the natural branch and bears wonderful fruit. Now, I know the English are not very keen on olives, which is why there's so much disease. [00:52:54] Forgive me, the olive is the basis of so much health. [00:53:02] But have you ever heard of wild olive branches being grafted into a good olive stock? And here, this is the miracle. The life comes up through the natural stock and goes into the wild olive branch and produces magnificent fruit. Youve never heard of such a thing? Of course not, because only God could do this. [00:53:32] And wherever the church has borne fruit and been so magnificently fruitful, it is been a miracle of the grace of God, as always. [00:53:46] But listen to what the apostle says by the spirit. Now, if you were grafted as a wild olive branch, contrary to nature, into a good olive tree, how much more shall these, which are the natural, natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree? Which means that when God does this marvelous, magnificent work, at the end of time, he will take this blind, deaf, disobedient, hardened, cut off, laid aside enemies of the gospel. He will take this disobedient people and he will graft them back into their own olive tree with the most glorious results. [00:54:48] No wonder the apostle says, I would not. Brothers, have you ignorant of this mystery, lest you be wise in your own conceit. [00:55:10] But I must begin to close now. [00:55:17] The interesting thing is that when you come to verses 30, 31 and 33 do he speaks about the mercy shown to you gentiles through the disobedience of the jewish people. And then he says that they may also now obtain mercy through the mercy shown to you. Which means that all these nutty ideas that the Jews are going to be saved in a special way, in an elitist way, a different way to you gentiles who've been saved by the grace of God, they're all nonsense. [00:55:58] God is going to save the jewish people in the same way he saved you, through the same blood of the Messiah, through the same finished work of the same messiah, through the same work of the Holy Spirit, through the same process, process by living faith, they will also come into the salvation of God. [00:56:27] In that early church they prayed for the Gentiles. [00:56:32] Not all. [00:56:36] There was a minority within the church that disapproved entirely of the Gentiles coming in. [00:56:43] They felt that they should become first Jews and then be saved. [00:56:52] We have the same problem because very sadly, there are those who are saved by the grace of God who make themselves more jewish than we are. [00:57:13] My beloved friend, you cannot be more jewish than you are if you are saved by the blood of the Lord Jesus and born of the spirit of God. And if you have been brought into the household of faith with all the saints, if you are a fellow heir and a fellow member and a fellow, how do you imagine you can become more jewish? [00:57:45] I was glad what Derek said when he said, I'm a gentile. God chose me and you'll have to put up with it. [00:57:56] I think that was the way he more or less put it. [00:58:02] That's absolutely right. The Gentiles have an enormous contribution to make and can only make it as gentiles. It is the middle wall of petition that's gone. It's a tragedy that the church lost the Sabbath. It's a tragedy that the church lost the real festivals. It is a tragedy that many of these things that mean so much to us and are filled with divine significance have been lost to the church by Constantine. [00:58:31] But I'm not sure that we can just return back to it. Now. Those of you who are jewish, that's different, because I think you should prepare yourself for coming home now. I'm not going to say you all ought to come home immediately. But you should prepare yourself for coming home then there's a place for understanding so much and keeping so much. I myself have a kosher kitchen at home. How can I be kosher when I come amongst you lot? I mean, it's almost impossible to be kosher. I mean, you drive most households, you go into world. I mean, yeah, there are people there. I won't eat pork, I won't eat bacon. I won't have ham, I won't have shellfish. That's only the least part of being kosher. You've got a gentile in the kitchen that's unkoshered the whole thing from the start. [00:59:38] You put milk in with meat, you're finished. [00:59:42] All those lovely sauces you have, you say, well, we haven't given you any ham. We've kept the bacon out and everything else. You can't do it. You have to be like Paul. He was so clear in his understanding of these things. I am to the jew a jew, and I am to the Greek, a Greek you could be to the Roman, a Roman you can be no other. [01:00:07] I don't want to cause any more confusion than there already is. [01:00:13] All I'm trying to say is, you gentiles don't feel that you're second class citizens. If you're saved by the grace of God, you have something to give that comes from your background, which only you can give. [01:00:28] To judaize you is a tragedy. But on the other hand, for you to understand your jewish roots, for you to return to your jewish roots, that's another matter, that you understand something of what it really means to be jew. Why do you think the lord, in his omnipotence and in his wisdom, willed that it was the New Testament was in Greek. [01:00:56] I know there was probably a hebrew beginning of the gospels and possibly acts. [01:01:02] Why do you think the Lord willed it that it should be Greek? It's a good question, because it is an impossible Greek. It is Hebrew thinking and greek language. [01:01:14] Why wouldn't it have been better to keep it in Hebrew? And then we would have had a Hebrew old Testament, Hebrew new. I would have thought that wonderful myself. [01:01:25] But the lord did not, so will it. [01:01:28] Why? Because the fulness of the Gentiles had to come in, and somehow our hebrew thinking had to go through the prism of the Greek. [01:01:47] Some 70 gentlemen in Alexandria, and that, of course, is like California or Florida. I mean, every wild thing comes from it. [01:01:59] Alexandria. 70 of these jewish scholars got together 300 years before the Lord Jesus, and they put the whole old Testament into Greek. It was a scandal in hebrew circles that they had taken the holy word of God and put it into Greek. No less greek. [01:02:25] But the early church and all those early church leaders were hellenistic Jews, greek speaking Jews. [01:02:37] They read their old Testament in Greek and their New Testament in Greek. [01:02:43] The Lord knew exactly what he was doing. [01:02:46] Dear child of God, whoever you are, be proud of your background. God willed you to come from the people you come from. Your genetic history is an open book to the Lord. You dont need all these new discoveries. The Lord knew it all long before they found it out. [01:03:09] He knows your genetic history. [01:03:13] Dont throw it away. [01:03:15] But now listen, dont despise the jew. [01:03:23] Because gods purpose is that before the messiah comes, the house of Israel should be saved. [01:03:37] Do you not think that the powers of darkness know the. [01:03:43] I mean, Satan hasnt got infinite intelligence, for which I thank God every day. [01:03:50] He is a created being with finite intelligence, much greater than yours, much greater than mine, and much greater than all of our intelligence put together. But he is a created being. [01:04:04] The powers of darkness have studied the book. [01:04:10] They don't suffer from liberal theology. [01:04:14] Well, they fathered it. [01:04:19] It's seducing spirits, doctrines of demons that have ruined humanism, hellenism again in the guise of Christianity. [01:04:34] But my dear friends, the fact still remains, Satan and those powers of darkness have picked up something. [01:04:46] That the purpose of God cannot be fulfilled without the jewish people. That the purpose of God, even for the church, cannot be fulfilled without the jewish people. The natural branches have to come back into their own olive tree. Therefore, the powers of darkness are mobilizing in all their forces in one last great attempt to destroy the jewish people and frustrate the purpose of God. [01:05:20] It used to be antisemitism. [01:05:23] There is not a government, I think, in Europe or in the western world that would give any support to anything anti semitic. [01:05:33] No, it is not anti semitism. It is anti israelism. [01:05:38] Why? Because the jewish agency and the World Zionist Organization have said in their investigation, the reports and conclusions that have come from their investigations, that the jewish people will be assimilated by the middle of the next millennium. [01:05:59] Only in Israel will they survive. [01:06:05] Satan has picked that one up and he has said, we'll liquidate them. [01:06:12] Gas and fire. [01:06:18] Saddam Hussein was the first in this new breed, and there will be many more to come. [01:06:26] But the marvelous thing is, God will deliver us out of all these problems, because God has a purpose for this people. Listen again to the apostle Paul. [01:06:39] I would not, brothers, have you ignorant of this mystery, lest you be wise in your own conceits that are hardening in part has befallen the jewish people. Meaning, listen, there is a time limit to it. [01:06:57] A hardening in part, a partial hardness has fallen on the jewish people until, o blessed word, until the fullness of the gentiles. [01:07:14] And so all Israel shall be saved, even as it is written. There shall come out of Zion a deliverer. He shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob. When I listen to dear Eliel earlier, talking about the problems that we have in Israel, oh, the ungodliness. [01:07:39] But there will come a day when God will touch the blindness and the deafness and the hardness, and suddenly people will discover the Lord Jesus. [01:07:56] When they discover him, into their hands will come the key of David, which will unlock the whole of jewish history. [01:08:03] They will understand everything. [01:08:06] Well, dear friends, isn't that enough for one afternoon? [01:08:14] I think so. I think I've covered everything. [01:08:21] We are coming to the end of the age. I don't know how long we have to go. Maybe it's a little longer than we think, but were much nearer the end than weve ever been before. [01:08:46] And if that is so, then we are nearer to the salvation of the house of Israel than ever before. And if that is so, the powers of darkness will do everything in their power to destroy the jewish people and Israel in particular. [01:09:03] They will fail. Why? Because of that wonderful word as touching the election. [01:09:14] They are beloved for the patriarchs sake, for the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. [01:09:25] One of these days we shall all come. [01:09:28] We have come from every tongue and kindred and nation and people. Oh, what a day it will be. No middle wall of petition. One new man, the redeemed. When you come to the end of the Bible, you had the holy city, New Jerusalem, and the only way you know that we're all there, jew and gentile, is that there are twelve names of the patriarchs and twelve names of the apostle. [01:10:01] We're all there, twelve plus twelve, the government of God. [01:10:11] For they knew a new world, a new heaven and a new earth, wherein dwells righteousness, a new man with the Messiah himself saying, behold, I make all things new, beloved friends, it's worth suffering. [01:10:36] Is it any wonder that the apostle Paul says, in the light of all this? I beseech you, therefore, brethren, by the mercies of God, to present your bodies a living sacrifice, holy, acceptable to God, which is your spiritually intelligent worship and servant. If we were to lay down our lives, half our problems would be over. [01:11:03] It is that wretched self life in the guise of something spiritual. That is the biggest problem we have in the church and in the work of God and in messianic Judaism. [01:11:18] I probably get roasted for saying that. [01:11:24] But, my beloved friends, lay down your life, and then it will not be hard to act for the jewish people, and it will not be hard to speak for them, and it will not be hard to intercede for them. [01:11:45] Aliyah is the heart of this matter, because these people, they have to be got out of these countries where they will be murdered. [01:11:59] And that's why I think this kind of conference for Ebenezer is so important, because you are actually involved in a practical way in getting these people out of places of danger and back to Israel. Whatever Israel will face, we at least have the word of the Lord that she will be delivered and saved out of all her troubles. Thank you.