HAS ISRAEL BEEN CAST AWAY?

By Pastor Mike  Taylor

Romans 11:1:

11:1 I say then, Hath God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.

The apostle Paul answers the question proposed, “Has God cast Israel away?” in this eleventh chapter of Romans. It would seem the present mainstream churches teach, with an exception of a few enlightened Christians who actually read and believe their bible that God has done away with Israel because of their unbelief. Since the crucifixion of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ, Israel has endured intense persecution for nigh 2000 years. As scripture tells the story of the trial of Jesus before Pontius Pilate, when asked what to do with Jesus, the Jewish authorities and their cohorts spoke prophetically of their coming fate. Matthew chapter 27:

27:24  When Pilate saw that he could prevail nothing, but that rather a tumult was made, he took water, and washed his hands before the multitude, saying, I am innocent of the blood of this just person: see ye to it.

27:25  Then answered all the people, and said, His blood be on us, and on our children.

And so it has been. From that time forward and their refusal to accept their Messiah and the eventual destruction of their nation and Temple, these people were hated by all men around them. The early Roman Catholic church called them “Christ killers” and they were sorely persecuted. The fact is, we are all killers of our Lord, as Jesus came for one purpose and that was to die for the sins of mankind. They are Christ killers, speaking of Israel. You are a Christ killer, I am a Christ killer, and the world is a Christ killer. As it had to be and was planned before the foundation of the world. But realizing that we are all to blame and we all sent our Lord to the cross to die, the question still remains, “Has Israel been cast away” from our Lord and has now been replaced by someone else? You know what I speak of. The misguided doctrine of Replacement Theology would have us believe that Israel is no longer God’s chosen people. That distinction has passed onto the Church in their view. But has it? Let us look at the final authority to that question and look in God’s Holy Word, because truth is found in God, not in men.

WHY IS ISRAEL IN UNBELIEF?

The answer is right there in the pages of your Bible, and Paul addresses here in Romans 11 and gives the reason. It was God’s doing. Why is this so, you may be wondering?

11:7  “What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for; but the election (the church) hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded. (Israel) my emphasis

11:8  (According as it is written, God hath given them the spirit of slumber, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear;) unto this day.”

Did you catch that? God hath given them a spirit of slumber, so they cannot see or hear. Today there are very few that have accepted the knowledge of the truth of Jesus as their Messiah, Lord and Savior, except by God’s grace and the working of the Holy Spirit. But as a nation, (as a people individually) they still are blind and deaf to the realization that they have rejected the Lord of glory to their own error.

Paul goes into great detail of why this is so. The answer? It is for our benefit. That’s right you read that correctly. It is for the Gentile nations to bring them in as first fruits of God’s plan of salvation. God has called for a people who were not His people, because of grace. Romans 11:

11:11  I say then, Have they stumbled that they should fall? God forbid: but rather through their fall salvation is come unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them to jealousy.

11:12  Now if the fall of them be the riches of the world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles; how much more their fullness?

11:13  For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the apostle of the Gentiles, I magnify mine office:

11:14  If by any means I may provoke to emulation them which are my flesh, and might save some of them.

11:15  For if the casting away of them be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them be, but life from the dead?

Paul is saying that in the fullness of time, that God is able to bring Israel in as well. But since that time Paul wrote these words, God has been calling a people who are to be the bride of Christ, in this age of grace, or Church Age. It has been going on now for 2000 years and my friend, that age is drawing to a fast completion. The coming Tribulation will be the period of time when Israel is redeemed through intense persecution.

ISRAEL AS A NATURAL OLIVE TREE

Israel is compared to an olive tree in the following verses of this 11th chapter of Romans. Because of unbelief, they have been broken off, and we, the Church, have been grafted in. How so? By the blood and body of our Lord Jesus Christ and His Holy Sacrifice upon that cross is how we were grafted in. By faith and repentance, we have come to  know Jesus as Savior of our souls. It was all designed by Divine will for one reason and that so God would have mercy on a people who were not His people, and in the end, save all of Israel and they be grafted back into the Olive Tree, which is Jesus Christ, the root of that tree. Paul writes this in Romans 11, continuing on:

11:16  “For if the firstfruit be holy, the lump is also holy: and if the root be holy, so are the branches.

11:17  And if some of the branches be broken off, and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert graffed in among them, and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree;

11:18  Boast not against the branches. But if thou boast, thou bearest not the root, but the root thee.

11:19  Thou wilt say then, The branches were broken off, that I might be graffed in.

11:20  Well; because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be not highminded, but fear:

11:21  For if God spared not the natural branches, take heed lest he also spare not thee.”

Paul warns of the church being prideful and thinking that somehow we are special and that Israel is accursed. To believe that is to be misguided at best, and blasphemous at the worst. Because in essence what you are doing is calling God a liar to say that His Word lies. The Bible affords those of us called now not even the slightest room for pride because only God knows the reasons for His mercy toward us. Such scriptures as I Corinthians 1:26-29, make it plain that it is certainly not because we are better than others are. God has called the weak, the poor, and the humble, not the mighty, the proud, or the noble has God called. God intends that we be humbled by understanding our privilege in having such an awesome gift fall into our laps, and be motivated to respond to Him in submission to His commandments, because we love Him who first loved us.

JACOBS TROUBLES

I wish to turn  your attention for a moment to a time that is rapidly approaching and that I have written extensively about. The coming 7 year period called the Tribulation, and the Great Tribulation, are also referred to as Jacob’s troubles. You can read more about this on my website for part 1 and 2 of that same name here:

http://churchofgod-usa.org/1/post/2014/07/jacobs-trouble-part-1.html

and here:

http://churchofgod-usa.org/1/post/2014/07/jacobs-trouble-part-2.html

This period of time is when God will deal with Israel one on One and bring them to a knowledge of their Savior who they crucified in unbelief 2000 years ago. Zechariah details of the realization that comes to the nation of Israel and it’s heritage scattered around the world. Zechariah:

12:10  “And I will pour upon the house of David, and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the spirit of grace and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn.”

Through persecution and being refined, “as silver is refined in the fire”, Israel will come to realize that their Messiah is/was Jesus Christ, whom they crucified and they shalll weep bitterly and mourn, as Zechariah said by God’s Holy Spirit. Zechariah prophecied in the beginning of the 12th chapter.

12:1  “The burden of the word of the LORD for Israel, saith the LORD, which stretcheth forth the heavens, and layeth the foundation of the earth, and formeth the spirit of man within him.

12:2  Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of trembling unto all the people round about, when they shall be in the siege both against Judah and against Jerusalem.

12:3  And in that day will I make Jerusalem a burdensome stone for all people: all that burden themselves with it shall be cut in pieces, though all the people of the earth be gathered together against it.”

Leading to this fulfillment of prophecy, Israel has cried out to the Messiah that they had rejected and triggered the King of Kings to come and fight for them, by fulfilling what Jesus said when he finished chastising the Pharisees as hypocrites in Matthew 23:

23:37  O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou that killest the prophets, and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathereth her chickens under her wings, and ye would not!

23:38  Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.

23:39  For I say unto you, Ye shall not see me henceforth, till ye shall say, Blessed is he who cometh in the name of the Lord.”

All ISRAEL WILL BE SAVED

The Bible confirms in many passages, that Israel will be grafted back into the Olive Tree which is Christ. Continuing in Romans:

11:22  “Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity; but toward thee, goodness, if thou continue in his goodness: otherwise thou also shalt be cut off.

11:23  And they also, if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be grafted in: for God is able to graft them in again.

11:24  For if thou wert cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and wert graffed contrary to nature into a good olive tree: how much more shall these, which be the natural branches, be graffed into their own olive tree?

11:25  For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.

11:26  And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob:

11:27  For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins.

11:28  As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sakes: but as touching the election, they are beloved for the father's sakes.”

If Israel has been cast away, then how does God bring them back in and graft them back into their own natural Olive Tree, which is Christ? How plainer can God be, through having Paul write down these passages? Some will say that “we are now the new Israel of God” and have replaced Israel as God’s chosen people. 

Characteristically, God's true church is a spiritual organism whose members, with God's help, will ultimately prevail over their own sinful natures, over the world, and over Satan.

The Israel of God, like Jacob, prevails with God. Christ certainly remembered His wrestling match with the unrelenting Jacob when He inspired Paul to call His church "the Israel of God." But to cast away Israel is not what Paul meant in Galatians 6:16, as the last verse of the preceding passage should destroy that notion.  God does not lie, and He gave a promise to the “fathers” of the nation of Israel. He will not cast away Israel for one reason and one reason only….His Holy Name and the promises He has made to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. God does not change and to cast away Israel would impugn His glorious Name. Israel does not deserve this mercy and grace on God’s part, then again….neither do we, the Church, the Bride of Christ. But the sacrifice of Jesus Christ was accomplished for all mankind, with the offer coming to the Jews first, then to the Gentiles. But I submit to you, that God had a different idea that would accomplish His perfect plan, as He wanted to be the God of the whole world, not just the Jews, as they had proven themselves unreliable to spread the Gospel to other nations.

REPLACEMENT THEOLOGY, DOCTRINE OF DEMONS

Satan the great deceiver, has attempted to make God out a liar. He has filled men of the modern day church with false premises that God has cast away His chosen people. If God can be shown a liar by Satan’s deception, then Satan, in his warped thinking, feels he can unravel his own punishment for sinning against God. Modern “enlightened” evangelist and pastors across the world have fallen into this trap by not supporting the nation of Israel who has been gathered back into her own land. I become angry and a little frustrated at fellow “believers” that profess that God has cast away Israel and that the Zionist regime are occupiers of the Palestinian land. First, there never  was a Palestinian people. It’s a made up title for squatters who were occupying land that was never theirs. The land has always belonged to God Almighty and He gave that title land deed to Israel when He made that promise to Abraham. Genesis chapter 17:

17:7  And I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed after  thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee.

17:8  And I will give unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and I will be their God.

My God said that it would be an “everlasting” covenant..that’s eternal, forever and ever, as long as this world is in existence. For a so called preacher of the Gospel to spew Replacment Theology and support this fictitious group of land squatters called “Palestinians” is to go against God Himself. God plainly said in Genesis 12:3  “And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed.”

And in another passage God says plainly in Zechariah:

2:8  “For thus says the LORD of hosts: 'He sent Me after glory, to the nations which plunder you; for he who touches you touches the apple of His eye.”

You touch Israel, you touch God and if you bless her, He will bless you. You plunder her, abuse her, or not defend her, then you encourage the wrath of God.

This is so what worries my about the USA and this present administration’s so called POTUS. He has turned a blind eye to the needs of Israel. We have always supported Israel since her birth in 1948 and Harry Truman was President, but this nation, this adminstration of Anti-Semites and Muslim sympathizers has taken a crooked path that most assuredly will lead to this nation’s  eventual destruction.

Men of consicious, men and women of faith, and bible believing brethren must pray for the peace of Israel and stand on the side of God Almighty. It is not ours to judge the Jewish people, as that is left solely up to God. He will accomplish all that He has said, and it will be done. God will bring in Jew and Gentile into one big family in the fulfillment of all things. Praise be to our God, the God of Jew and Gentile alike.

This is  Pastor Mike Taylor, praying blessing upon you and your family, as you support Israel in thought and in deed.

If you need counselling, prayer, or just a listening ear, then email me at:

realteam1999@sbcglobal.net, or visit me online at

www.churchofgod-usa.org.

God bless you all , till we meet at Jesus feet.