Natural Israel Not My Glory (3 of 5)

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Part Three: What God’s Word Maintains

A lot of part three in this section of Showers’ thesis is a repeat of what has already been stated above, so I won’t belabor those topics anymore. And a lot of what he says isn’t even worth arguing over at all. Like the JW’s, Showers just loves to keep taking us down many little insignificant tributaries and paths that are of no benefit or value to the hearers.

He continues his argument that Replacement Theology insists God has “replaced or superseded ethnic Israel with the church.”[1] But as already stated, God’s plan has never been about an “ethnic” race of people, but a race of people and one “holy nation” (1Pet. 2:9) who all have faith in Christ irrespective of one’s ethnicity. This is what all dispensationalists such as Showers for the likes of themselves just cannot perceive. Israel, according to the flesh, was a vehicle that God used to manifest His Christ, nothing more and nothing less. And any benefit they may have had in God sovereignly electing and choosing some of them from among them was only secondary to Christ being a blood-line descendant through David back to Abraham; and even as far back as Adam and Eve through Seth, Enosh, Kenan, Mahalalel, Jared, Enoch, Methusalah, Lamech and Noah, etc.

Showers also argues that,

Replacement Theology teaches there is no future for national Israel: God has thoroughly rejected Israel and no longer has a place for it in His plan for eternity apart from the salvation of individual Jewish people.[2]

It is amazing to me how that dispensationalists like Showers can possibly believe that God could have any other plan for natural Jews separate and distinct “from the salvation of individual Jewish people”! The salvation of individuals or an elect remnant out of the Jewish nation has been God’s plan all along! Again, all this is according to the biblical doctrine of election in which such men as Showers just do not seem to get or understand (not so dissimilar to all unsaved Jews, Mormons and JW’s. And like I said, until one crosses over this hurdle, they will always inevitably be talking like this about all natural Jews apart from God’s election and salvation of individual Jewish (or Gentile) people. The natural Jews in Christ’s and His apostles’ days stumbled over this truth, just as they do to this day. And all unsuspecting Christians are following after the same Jewish myths and fables—hook, line and sinker. Like I said before, it is Judaism being revisited in the Church all over again. Only now coming more from within the Church rather than from without, as even Paul declared, “Even some men from your own group will rise up and distort the truth” (Acts 20:30, NLT). As if it isn’t bad enough that natural thinking and reasoning Jews would believe in such things and even infiltrate the Church back in the days of the apostles, we now have those from among our very own selves who are following after the same dissipation. The doctrines and traditions of Judaism have not left us. They have just entered the Church through another medium―from those among our own selves! And, honestly, it makes one wonder if they are even brethren at all! As I have said all along: they are folks of a different stroke. They are birds of a different feather that don't fly together with us. They may look like a duck, but they truly don't quack like a duck.

Showers and all dispensationalists seem to forget, due to their seemingly very short retention spans, that Paul addressed all of these very same issues for us in Romans 9:6ff and 11:1ff, by stating: “It is not as though God’s word has failed” concerning Israel, or: “Did God reject His people? By no means! I am an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin. God did not reject His people whom He foreknew.” This word “foreknew” is very important to Paul’s thesis in understanding if there is to be any place in God’s singular plan of a people of faith that would be inclusive of any naturally born Jews. In Romans 9, Paul first of all says that being a “child of promise” is not contingent on natural descent. But unless anyone should think that God has abandoned His promises to Israel, Paul notes how that God chose Isaac, Jacob and even himself; and how that even in the Old Testament times God had reserved for Himself a remnant of 7,000 in Elijah’s day from out of natural Israel. This is the way that it has always been, and always will be, right up until Christ comes for all of us the second time. It is for these, and these alone, that God is concerned with. The rest are left to themselves only to become hardened (cp. Rom. 11:7). All such “children of promise” God has foreknown (or even foreloved) and elected to be saved, He has predetermined before the foundation of the world to call, justify and glorify (Rom. 8:29–30). All of these Greek verbs: “predestined,” “called,” “justified” and “glorified” are all aorist passive indicatives, meaning, that God in the past decided to do this irrespective of us (thus, the reason for the “passive” voice). Thus it is easily to be deduced according to Paul’s words that God has not rejected any of “these” whom He foreknew in love to redeem by the blood of His Lamb, and that the Bible also says were chosen in Christ before the very foundation of the world (Mat. 25:34; Eph. 1:5–14; Rev. 13:8; 17:8). This is all about those “in Christ,” not those outside of Christ who are separate and distinct from the Church here on earth. It is not a “heavenly” people verses an “earthly” people. It is one “holy nation” under God from both Jews and Gentiles—bar none!

Another one of the small and insignificant tributaries that Showers wants to take us all down is the idea that,

Replacement Theology also conveniently manages to uncouple God’s covenant promises from His covenantal curses. The church inherits all of the promises to Israel, but the Jewish people (ethnic Israel) keep all of the covenantal curses.[3]

Additionally, Showers again entirely misses the point. “The church,” comprised of ethnic Jews and Gentiles who are God's “children of promise,” does indeed inherit all the promises to Israel; but to spiritual Israel, mind you, not natural Israel. In both the Old and New Testaments the promises are guaranteed to all the faithful in the land. And what was promised naturally in the past has been fulfilled, only to be realized now on a spiritual and heavenly level both now and in the future. And any promises that Showers and all dispensationalists interpret “literally” to still be fulfilled in the future are to be interpreted spiritually now that Christ has come. Everything in Christ supersedes the natural for the spiritual, as I have already articulated with many verses that dispensationalists use to say that many things must still “literally” occur only with ethnic Israel, thus creating two groups of people and not just one. That in itself should tell you something about what these so-called brethren are teaching. Indeed, as Paul has stated, Israel according to the flesh is in fact “cursed” and only to be “cast out” as Hagar and Ishmael. Only those like Isaac, who are “children of promise” are blessed with Isaac, Jacob and all of God's holy prophets and saints. All others are hardened. They are children of wrath. They are a brood of vipers. They are the “subjects” of the kingdom that Christ also said are to be “cast out” into “outer darkness” where there shall be “weeping and gnashing of teeth.” Indeed, they are “cursed children” whose god is their belly and Satan is their father.

Like I said, just as the unbelieving Jews in Christ's day, Showers and all dispensationalists just do not get it. They are looking at everything through natural eyeglasses, rather than through spiritual eyeglasses.

In contradistinction to what I and all covenant theologians are saying, it is dispensationalists like Showers who in fact want to claim “everlasting” covenants and promises to all natural Israelites according to the flesh, and yet ignore all the verses that claim, “Therefore, I will surely forget you and cast you out of my presence along with the city I gave to you and your fathers. I will bring upon you everlasting disgrace―everlasting shame that will not be forgotten” (Jer. 23:39–40). Or, Jer. 25:9, which says, “I will summon all the peoples of the north and My servant Nebuchadnezzar king of Babylon, declares the Lord, and I will bring them against this land and its inhabitants and against all the surrounding nations. I will completely destroy them and make them an object of horror and scorn, and an everlasting ruin.” Whatever the word “everlasting” means here, must mean the same elsewhere. And we either take these words literally, or conditionally based upon natural Israel’s disobedience or obedience as outlined in the Law of Moses. This is how Solomon understood an everlasting promise from God to him and to his seed as always having a king ruling and reigning upon his throne: “If you walk before Me in integrity of heart…I will establish your royal throne over Israel forever….But if you or your sons turn away from Me…then I will cut off Israel from the land” (1Kings 9:4–7). The same was said concerning Eli the High Priest: “I promised that your house and your father’s house would minister before Me forever. But now the Lord declares: ‘Far be it from Me!’” (1Sam. 2:30). Clearly, “everlasting” in everyone of these contexts doesn’t mean “everlasting” regardless of any conditions being met. Dispensationalists can’t claim that the blessings for natural Israel according to the flesh are to be unconditional and everlasting when other verses counter that they won’t be if they are disobedient. And if anything “everlasting” is to be understood through Abraham, or even through David, as being unconditional, it is only through Christ and for all of His “children of promise,” not with those born only according to the flesh.

Honestly, it is the dispensationalists who want only “blessings” for all natural Jews according to the flesh without any conditions attached whatsoever―not curses! Natural Israel cannot expect to enter the land in unbelief and expect to be blessed. And when they tried to go in and take the promised land in unbelief, they were met with harsh opposition, and even death, and all by the hand of God at that (cf. Num. 14:40-45). And this will no doubt continue to be their demise in the future. The more they fight, the more they will be met with harsh opposition and resistance. And if history is any teacher, they will be met with a holocaust in the future of an unprecedented nature unlike anything they experienced in World War II. As with any other nation, unbelieving Israel’s sins will catch up with them sooner or later and they will all be overthrown as everyone else. As with all nations that are formed or continue in unbelief, a curse will only hang over their lives unless they all turn in faith to Christ. The United States of America is no different. We have seen this repeated throughout history with nations throughout the world over and over again. Natural Israel today forming as a nation is to be considered no differently than any other people throughout the world that God has allowed to form as a nation. In fact, if the truth were really known, natural Israel today isn’t even anything like natural Israel of the past. And even the 1973 Encyclopedia Britannica states with regards to the Jews as being a pure race any longer: “The findings of physical anthropology show that, contrary to popular view, there is no Jewish race.”[4] And just listen to what the present-day Jews have to say in their own encyclopedia:

It is a common assumption, and one that sometimes seems ineradicable even in the face of evidence to the contrary, that the Jews of today constitute a race, a homogeneous entity easily recognizable. From the preceding discussion of the origin and early history of the Jews, it should be clear that in the course of their formation as a people and a nation they had already assimilated a variety of racial strains from people moving into the general area they occupied. This had taken place by interbreeding and then by conversion to Judaism of a considerable number of communities….Thus, the diversity of the racial and genetic attributes of various Jewish colonies of today renders any unified racial classification of them a contradiction of terms. Despite this, many people readily accept the notion that they are a distinct race. This is probably reinforced by the fact that some Jews are recognizably different in appearance from the surrounding population. That many cannot be easily identified is overlooked and the stereotype for some is extended to all—a not uncommon phenomenon.[5]

Who are these people today that “readily accept the notion that they are a distinct race” and are “overlooked” with the “stereotype for some” being “extended to all”? Why, by none other than those who are in the Church. Note that not even the Jews themselves recognize themselves as a pure race of people. And there are no genealogical records anymore to prove such a thing. And we of all people in the Church should know better and recognize and acknowledge this. But a majority in the Church don't! And it is only because of a misinterpretation and misapplication of many Scriptures in the Bible that many in the Church hold out to the Israel of today that which should not be held out to them. Which is the idea that they are to be a theocratic nation under God again made up of only natural Jews, separate and distinct from the Church. All this is blasphemous and absolutely heretical. And anyone in the Church who does not see this for what it really is, is no more blind than every natural Jew who believes and upholds the very same things. It is simply amazing to me that we have those in the Church today who believe and teach what they are teaching with regards to ethnic Jews.

The Encyclopedia Americana likewise adds with regards to what has been stated above:

Some theorists [such as Showers, I imagine] have considered the Jews a distinct race, although this has no factual basis. In every country in which the Jews lived for a considerable time, their physical traits came to approximated those of the indigenous people. Hence the Jews belong to several distinct racial types, ranging, for example, from fair to dark. Among the reasons for this phenomenon are voluntary or involuntary miscegenation and the conversion of Gentiles to Judaism.[6]

Mind you, it's not the Jews who consider themselves “a distinct race,” but all “theorists” such as dispensationalists and those who don't know any better.

And, finally, Collier’s Encyclopedia also writes:

A common error and persistent modern myth is the designation of the Jews as a “race.” This is scientifically fallacious, from the standpoint of both physical and historical tradition.[7]

The Jews today are like Catholics or Protestants: they can be of any race or color. And in Israel they have a law which defines what their government says is a Jew. Funk and Wagnall’s New Encyclopedia records this for us, by stating: “In 1970 the Israeli Knesset adopted legislation defining a Jew as one born of a Jewish mother or convert.”[8] It matters no longer who the father is, nor to what race the child belongs. And a convert can be someone from any race. Clearly, Israel as a race no longer exists. The Israel of the flesh today is not the Israel of the flesh of yesteryears gone by. Over 90% of them are said to be either Ashkenazim or Sephardim Jews. The former being from the bloodline of the Khazars in the southwest regions of the Soviet Union next to the Caspian Sea, and that converted to the Jewish religion around the 10th century and who formed the beginnings of what is today known as the Zionist movement that began to reoccupy Palestine, the latter (the Sephardim Jews) are a mixture from the regions of Spain.

In 1991, it is well documented that the government of Israel air-lifted 14,087 so-called natural “Jews” from Ethiopia. Months before, 15,000 or so had also been brought to Palestine. These were all a black-skinned people who called themselves Beta Israel or House of Israel “whose ancestors had intermarried with the natives, as the black skin of the modern Falashes indicated.”[9] They are like the Jews of North Africa, the Jews of Yemen, the Jews of Persia, the Jews of India, the Jews of China, and the Jews of the Pacific Lands, of Japan, of the Phillipines, of the Dutch East Indies, New Zealand, Latin America and the like. At least the Jews in Christ’s day who said they were natural Jews were indeed pureblood authentic natural Jews. But even of these Christ said, “I know the slander of those who say they are Jews and are not, but are of the synagogue of Satan” (Rev. 2:9). And John the Baptist likewise said, “Do not say to yourselves we have Abraham as our father.” And as I said before, Christ even said their father was the Devil (Jhn. 8:44). I didn't say it, Christ did! There is no “private interpretation” here. There is no such thing as “replacement theology” here. It is the dispensationalists who have “replaced” a true theology for a false theology; a doctrine of demons for the true doctrine of God.

So, for all dispensationalists such as Thomas Ice who says, “the fact that ethnic Israel has been reestablished as a nation and now controls Jerusalem is a strong indicator that we are near the end of the church age,”[10] who is he kidding? If by “ethnic” Israel he means the present-day racial Israel made up of a mixed breed from all over the world, then in no way, shape, manner or form can it be said that “ethnic” Israel has been reestablished as a nation. Just the opposite is known to be historically to be the case.

It has been overwhelming asserted by those cited above and who have studied Jewish anthropology that there is no Jewish race today. And if the Israel of today is of no pure-blood natural descent then their being a “sign” of the end of the Church age is an error in judgment and in doctrine that must be discounted as just not true. And let it be also noted that, “the most remarkable fact of all is [this], that those who held the premillennial theory in the second and third centuries, seem not to have believed in any literal, territorial restoration of the Jews at all,—much less in their [the Jews] millennial supremacy over all nations, and the re-establishment of their religious peculiarities.”[11]

Today is the day of salvation for all peoples in all nations throughout all the world, not later in some future seven year tribulation or earthly millennium of second chances for some so-called natural Jews, which is a wholesale fabrication and lie conjured up by the imaginations of mere carnal thinking and reasoning men.

Once again Showers claims:

Since Israel did not reject Christ until the Gospels, we would expect Replacement Theology to be taught in the New Testament. Using the literal-historical-grammatical method of interpretation, we would expect to find:

• Clear, concise statements that God has rejected Israel. 

• Definitive passages that teach that the church has replaced Israel.

• God’s declaration that He has excluded Israel from the Old Testament covenants.

• A total lack of New Testament verses that speak of Israel’s future in God’s plan. [12]

Again, short answer: As already said in everything above and, eventually below, God has neither “rejected,” “replaced,” “excluded” or held back a future for those whom He foreknew as His “children of promise” and who have faith in Him like our father Abraham. Israel, according to the flesh, are not the inheritors of God’s promises made to Abraham. Only Israel according to the Spirit was, and is. Any “future” for Israel is now, not later; in Christ and in His Church; not exclusive but inclusive of the Church. And like Israel that came out of Egypt as a “mixed multitude,” along with God’s chosen people like Moses, Miriam, Joshua and Caleb who were all Abraham’s children of faith, what was common grace to one was common grace to all. Rain fell on the just and on the unjust alike. And natural Jews who obeyed the Law benefited from the Law, as did their unbelieving children under them (not so dissimilar to unbelieving children even under a believing parent today; cp. 1Cor. 7:14), but this in no way guaranteed to any of these individuals eternal life in Christ or as benefactors of “the everlasting covenant” promised to Abraham and all of his spiritual seed.

And just as all God’s “children of promise” in the Old Testament looked forward in faith to Christ, we now all look backwards in faith to Christ. And all those who died in faith in the Old Testament were not made perfect without us, God having planned something better for us “so that only together with us would be made perfect” (Heb. 11:40). All Old Testament saints (who were for the most part natural Jews) are formed “together with us” who are New Testament saints as an assembly of “called-out” ones (or the “church”), coming all together to Mt. Zion and to the city of the living God, even to the heavenly Jerusalem; even to a myriad of angels and to the assembly and church of the firstborn-ones whose names are enrolled in heaven (cf. Heb. 12:22–23). Not enrolled here on earth, mind you, in a Jewish registry made with men’s hands in an earthly Jerusalem that is of no value to the hearers, but enrolled by God himself “in heaven.” Our citizenship is “in heaven” in Christ, not here on earth in and through natural men born only of the flesh. This is the heavenly city of God everywhere in the New Testament called “Jerusalem” or “New Jerusalem” (Gal. 4:26; Rev. 21:2, 9–10) that Abraham and all of the Old Testament saints envisioned and looked forward to, and whose architect and builder is God (Heb. 11:10). God's plan is not with an earthly city made of natural stones and with men’s hands. His plan is with a heavenly city made with “living stones” (1Pet. 2:5) by His hands. The Rock (or Christ) cut out of a mountain (spiritually speaking) not by men's hands, is become a huge mountain (again, spiritually speaking) that fills the whole earth (Dan. 2:35, 45). It is “the mountain of the Lord's temple” that is now being “established as chief among the mountains” and now “raised above the hills” with “all nations streaming into it.” And “many peoples” now “come and say, 'Come, let us go to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob...” (Isa. 2:2-3). What “temple,” “mountain” and “house” may I ask? His temple, mountain and house made without men's hands. This alone has been the “eternal” and “everlasting” plan of God all along. It is a mountain that cannot be touched, a house that cannot be physically built, and temple that is not of this world and where indeed “the twain shall never meet.”

Showers states that “Israel did not reject Christ until the Gospels.” Seriously? They were doing this long before the gospels with God or Christ, unlike Abraham and all of his children of faith and of promise. For even Christ had stated to these Christ-rejecters and murderers, “If you were Abraham’s children, then you would do the things Abraham did. As it is, you are determined to kill me, a man who has told you the truth that I heard from God. Abraham did not do such things” (Jhn. 8:39–40). Abraham was not a Christ-rejecter as these men were, thus proving that they were not Abraham’s true children of faith; and that their father was not God, but indeed actually the Devil. The gospel was preached just as much to Abraham as it is to us today (cf. Gal. 3:8). And the reason why many fell in the wilderness was because they did not have faith: “For unto us was the gospel preached, as well as unto them: but the word preached did not profit them, not being mixed with faith in them that heard it” (Heb. 4:2). Additionally, the Spirit of Christ was just as much in the prophets of old as He is in us today, albeit in a limited form and way. And Paul also affirms that they all drank from that spiritual Rock that accompanied them, and that, “that Rock was Christ” (1Cor. 10:4). Paul also speaks of the righteousness that is by faith in God and in Christ that was first formulated in Deuteronomy:

But the righteousness that is by faith says: “Do not say in your heart, ‘Who will ascend into heaven?’” (that is, to bring Christ down) “or ‘Who will descend into the deep?’” (that is, to bring Christ up from the dead). But what does it say? “The word is near you; it is in your mouth and in your heart,” that is, the word of faith we are proclaiming…” (Rom. 10:6–8).

And then Paul adds, “But not all the Israelites accepted the good news [or the gospel]. For Isaiah says, ‘Lord, who has believed our message’” (v. 16). So don’t say “Israel did not reject Christ until the Gospels.” They rejected Christ long before He ever arrived on the scene. And this is seen even as far back as in the first sin of Cain in murdering Abel and in the murdering of all God’s prophets that He had sent unto them. And the Jews in Christ’s day were only filling up the sins of their fathers (Mat. 23:29–39). All of these “snakes and brood of vipers” that Christ referred to them as, in Mat. 23:33, are the seed of the Serpent foretold by Him long ago in Genesis 3:15, as opposed to all children of faith in Christ and in God.

In Showers reference to Galatians 6:16 in this third part of his five-part series, in his usual and customary non-enlightened manner says “Israel” here is only a natural Israelite who believes in Christ, irrespective of any Gentile believers. But as we have already discussed earlier, this testimony just isn’t true. And he further states in order to substantiate this claim, that, “In all other Pauline passages, the word Israel refers to national or ethnic Israel.”[13] Oh, really! What Bible is he reading? As we have already determined, “all Israel” in Rom. 9:6 is not all Jews or Israelites based upon any natural ethnicity. Paul says so in verses 7–9! And St. John confirms this in his gospel in chapter one, verse thirteen. Paul is in no way, shape, manner or form saying that all those who are called “Israel” here in Romans, or in Galatians, are only those who are naturally born Jews who believe in Christ, but are all peoples who are designated as “children of promise,” just like Isaac, and thus called “Israel” irrespective of any natural ethnicity at all. And not to sound redundant, but Paul in Gal. 4:28 includes Gentiles who are hand-picked by God, like Isaac, calling them likewise “children of promise.” The point that both God and Paul are making is that the choice is totally dependent on God in deciding that, instead of choosing Ishmael, He would choose to create Isaac and set him apart for Himself; instead of choosing Esau, He would choose to set aside Jacob for Himself. And even since the time of Adam and Eve God has been doing this from both Jews and Gentiles alike. And this is also why Paul could say that “God, who set me apart from birth and called me by His grace, was pleased to reveal His Son in me so that I might preach among the Gentiles” (Gal. 1:15). And of these Gentiles where it was said of them that they were not God’s people, “they will be called the sons of the Living God” (Rom. 9:26). It is just like Christ said: “All the Father has given unto Me, will indeed come unto Me; and I will lose none of them.”

Even in Rom. 11:26, when Paul says “all Israel,” he has in mind individuals whom God personally chooses and hand picks from among natural Israelites, just like Paul and any other Jewish believer who are a part of God’s “children of promise” that Paul just got through earlier talking about in Rom. 9:8. Not because they are natural Jews, per se, but because of God’s unspeakable grace in His gifts and callings that are irrevocable in setting aside for Himself “a remnant” chosen from not only the Jews, but also from the Gentiles that make up this spiritual “Israel” of God. In Paul narrowing down his definition of “Israel” in Rom. 9:6–8 as those who are “children of promise,” regardless of natural progeny and who have faith in God and in Christ, he has ruled out any idea that all ethnic Jews en-mass will be saved either in the past, the present, or in the future. In Rom. 11:26, Paul specifically has just those in mind whom God sets apart as His “children of promise” from the Jews. But in Rom. 9:6, Gal. 4:28 and Gal. 6:16, he has anyone who is a “child of promise” in Christ in mind.

In summary, in Rom. 9:6ff and Gal. 4:28, again Paul has in mind any individual regardless of natural progeny who are Abraham’s children according to God’s irrevocable promise, and who are designated as such by God calling them his “children of promise.” They are all the “children of promise” that God in Christ designated before any are ever born; even before the foundation of the world. And as the Scriptures also affirm, Christ was designated as a scapegoat and a lamb slain for all those whom God would give to Him before the foundation of the world. Was this a Covenant of Redemption or of Grace that Showers discounts was between the Father and the Son before anything was ever created? You bet it was! Jesus said He came to die for His sheep. And not only for His elect sheep out of the nation of Israel, but for all of the children of God (or Gentiles) scattered abroad throughout all the world (Jhn. 11:52). What this is saying to us is that before any of these people have actually become the “children of God,” they were designated as such just like Isaac, Jacob, John the Baptist, Paul and all of God’s “children of promise” before any were ever born.

In addition, when Paul says in Rom. 11:26: “And so all Israel will be saved,” the words “and so” in the Greek are kai houtos, which literally translated means: “and thus, and [in] this wise, and so, or even so (NIV, 'so too').” A common equivalent given in all lexicons is also, “in this manner.” This is very instructive for us as we will soon just see. But before going any further, it must be understood that the phrase kai houtos is not saying “after that” the fullness of the Gentiles have come in before Christ’s coming for them at the rapture, then all ethnic Jews will thus be saved “after that.” This idea is based upon the misapplication and misappropriation of these words translated “after that” in the KJV and as noted in the Strong’s Concordance that is entirely based upon the KJV. For if one were to read a little further in Strong’s Concordance, it doesn’t give these Greek words this meaning at all, but states that “after that” means: “in this way (referring to what precedes or follows)―after that, after (in) this manner, as, even (so), for all that, like(-wise)…on this fashion(-wise), so (in like manner), thus…” In fact, in the two occurrences where the Strong’s Concordance of the King James Version translation refers to such wording as “after this” or “after that,” in both occurrences this wording is used in the sense of: “after this manner.” The first occurrence, in Mat. 6:9, Jesus says, “after this manner pray”; in other words, based upon what He just got through saying to His disciples how they should pray. It is used again this way one more time in 1Cor. 7:7, where Paul says everyone is said to have his proper gift “after this manner, and another after that,” meaning, in the manner in which he just got through describing for everyone. And, actually, the Greek really reads: ho men houtos, ho de houtos or, “one indeed so, one moreover so” (Marshall’s Inter.); or, again, “one man thus, and another thus” (Darby trans.); and, again, “one indeed thus, and one thus” (Young’s trans.). The Greek demonstrative pronoun houtos never means “that,” but more correctly translated means: “thus,” “this,” or “so.” So, even to translate this Greek word as “that” is a misnomer. The common word for “that” in the Greek is the demonstrative pronoun, ekeinos.

And last but not least, in 1Cor. 14:21, Paul says, “In the law it is written, ‘With men of other tongues and other lips will I speak unto this people; and yet for all that [Gk. kai oud houtos] will they not hear me, saith the Lord.’” Literally, Paul is saying here that, “and not even [for] this,” or in speaking after this manner in a foreign tongue, will the people hear (or listen). The NASB translates this phrase, “even so they will not listen to Me.” The majority of translations translate it: “even then,” or “even thus.” Only one time, in 1Cor. 7:7, is this Greek phrase translated in the KJV as Strong denotes, “after that”; and in no way, shape, manner or form is it to be understood to mean as the dispensationalists would have us to understand it to mean that after one thing has happened, then another thing will begin to occur after that. It unequivocally means “after this manner,” or after the manner just described.

Additionally, for even some dispensationalists to argue that the Greek “kai” translated “and,” “even,” or “also” in our English translations means “after” here, but then even argue that it can’t mean “even” instead of “and” in Gal. 6:16, is to argue over words in favor of their a priori theological bias rather than upon a literal translation of the Greek. As all Greek lexicons affirm, the Greek “kai” never means “after,” but either “and,” “even,” or “also.” It is a “conjunction of annexation, uniting things strictly co-ordinate.”[14] When Strong remarks that houtos means “after that” he is only meaning by his definition afterward given that it means: “after (in) this manner, as, even (so)…so (in like manner),” etc. Any other meaning other than this is just displaying one’s ignorance of the Greek, or parroting those who unbeknownst to themselves are also displaying the same ignorance. This happens often when one doesn’t study, but just quotes their mentors as if they are authoritative and have the last word to say on an issue. And oft-times these “mentors” are also just saying what they too have only heard what others have said. Thus the reason for the old saying: the blind leading the blind. Those leading have no more of a revelation than those who are being led.

Pertinent to our discussion here of all elect Israelites being saved in the same way or manner as the Gentiles, kai houtos is used again by Paul in verse 31 of Romans chapter 11 where he refers to all Jews having become disobedient “in this manner” (Gk. kai houtos) or in similar fashion to the Gentiles that he just got through talking about in verse 30. And just as God shows mercy on some of the Gentiles who were once disobedient, He can now also “in this manner” or “and so” have mercy on some (or a part) of the Israelites who are also disobedient. And notice how in these verses Paul says, “Just as you [Gentiles] were at one time disobedient to God and have now received mercy as a result of their [or Israel’s] disobedience, so they too [or, in this manner] have now become disobedient in order that they too may now receive mercy as a result of God’s mercy to you.” All of this isn’t occurring sometime later after this gospel dispensation, it is occurring “now,” “now,” “now.” Three times Paul says, “NOW,” not later! The Textus Receptus of the KJV uses “now” twice. Either way, they are both saying the same thing. From the time in Paul’s day, in our own day and even right up until the full number of the Gentiles come in, Paul saw all Israel (or all elect Jews) being saved under Christ’s current rule and reign. “Now” doesn’t mean sometime later. Natural logic would have us believe that it began in Paul’s day (as he says it did) and continues right up until the rapture at Christ’s Second Coming, with no seven-year interval in-between of second chances for those who didn’t get it right the first time. “Now” is the day of salvation for both Jew and Gentile alike, not later. There is no other salvation to be named among us (both then and now), other than that which is now proclaimed through us of one Lord, one faith, one baptism and one new man comprised of both Jews and Gentiles in Christ. Thus, one people belonging to God―not two! Not “two groups” of people separate and distinct from each another, only one. Honestly, if a lot of Christians only knew what the pastors and elders of their churches were really teaching, they wouldn't be a part of them anymore. They “will flee from” them, just as Christ said we would when we hear someone who is not speaking His words (cf. Jhn. 10:5).

In Romans 11:5, the Greek kai houtos is clearly and unequivocally used by Paul again in this chapter as referring to what he had just stated in verse 4. Here he quotes God as saying that He had reserved for Himself 7,000 in Elijah's day who had not bowed their knee to Baal. And it is “in this manner” (“and so” in KJV) that in Paul’s day there is likewise a remnant out of natural Israel who are chosen by God’s grace.

So, in going back to verse 25 of chapter 11 in our discussion here—and before Paul’s actual statement in verse 26—he has just said that natural Israel has experienced “a hardening in part until the full number of the Gentiles has come in,” and that “and so [or, in this manner] all Israel will be saved” (v. 26). As it is logically to be presumed that only a “part” of the Gentiles will remain hardened while the rest of all Gentiles who are God's elect will be saved, it is also “in this manner” all Israelites who are God's elect will be saved right up until the time of the end when God closes the door of opportunity for all Gentiles, when their full and complete number have all come into His fold. Clearly, according to Paul’s overall thesis in Romans 9–11, not all ethnic Jews will be saved; a “part” of them will always remain hardened, while a “part” are shown mercy. “All Israel” in Rom. 11:26 parallels “the full number of the Gentiles” in verse 26 (and the full number of elect Jews in verse 12); and it is in this manner that a portion (or a part) out of each shall be saved.
Additionally, the word “until” in the Bible doesn't always necessarily denote that something will change for Israel “after” all the elect Gentiles are saved. It is often used in Scripture to denote a terminus point where once something is completed, it is over.

For example, 1Sam. 15:35 says that “Samuel came to see Saul no more until his death.” Does this mean Samuel resumed his visits with Saul after his death? How absurd is that? It even states that there was a time when Samuel didn’t visit Saul prior to his death. And, clearly, nothing was to change for Saul upon dying. Matthew 11:13 says, “For all the Prophets and the Law prophesied until (heos) John.” Did any more persons from that era prophesy afterward? The Law and the Prophets concluded their prophecies at that time. No further prophecies were given concerning Israel or Christ through those mediums. Luke 17:27 says, “People were eating, drinking, marrying and being given in marriage up until (achri) the day Noah entered the ark.” Were they eating, drinking and marrying afterward? In fact, when Noah entered the ark this terminated those people altogether. Everything as they knew it ended for them. In 1Cor. 16:8, Paul says, “But I will stay on at Ephesus until (heos) Pentecost.” Did Paul stay after Pentecost? Gal. 3:17 and 19 says, “…the law was introduced 430 years later…What then was the purpose of the law? It was added because of transgressions until (achris) the Seed…had come.” Is this word “until” here to infer that the Mosaic law was to continue after, or once the Seed came? Not at all, it was terminated at the cross. So too, all Israel will be saved right up “until” the full number of the Gentiles has come in. Both are saved simultaneously to become one stick, not two. We are all to be one fold with one Shepherd.

It should come as no surprise to us by now that God is not concerned about saving all the world, or even all the Jews for that matter, but in saving and setting apart His elect chosen people in Christ who were chosen in Him before the very foundation of the world—just like Isaac, Jacob, John the Baptist and even Paul before they were ever born. This is the biblical doctrine of election beloved. And whether we like it or not, it is all nevertheless true. And all of us who have been saved as such should be thankful that God would have mercy on such sinners as ourselves. For “unless the Lord Almighty had left us descendants, we would have all become like Sodom, we would have all become like Gomorrah.” Unless God in Christ hadn’t awakened us from our former dead state and had made us alive or quickened us by His Holy Spirit, we would all be going to hell in a hand-basket, as all deserving sinners should be. A Christian should rejoice and exult over the fact that God has so sovereignly saved them and elected them, not bemoan or be repulsed by the idea. If God has so graciously saved you, then what are you so angry about? To argue as such makes you no different than those Jews in Christ’s day who heard the same things coming from Christ’s lips and wanted to gnash on Him with their teeth for having said such things about them. Could it be that you, who similarly reason as such with the Jews, are possibly no more different than they, and that maybe you too are not even saved, being party to them and in league with them rather than with all of Christ’s true brethren? Because if you were truly God’s elect, you wouldn’t be bemoaning over such an election, but rather rejoicing over the great love wherewith He has bestowed upon you!

So, in getting back again to Rom. 11:25–26, verses 30–31 actually further explain to us what Paul has just said to us in verses 25–26ff. That just as us Gentiles who were one time disobedient with a part of us being shown mercy due to natural Israel’s unbelief (or disobedience), so too (or “in this manner”) Israelites have also become disobedient in order that they too in a part of them might be shown mercy. Paul says God has bound all Jews and Gentiles over to disobedience so that He might have mercy on all of them whom He has chosen to be a part of His remnant saved by His mercy and grace. All Jews and Gentiles have been “hardened in part,” meaning, through this hardening God will mercifully save a part (or a remnant) out of each group. As such, their “hardening” will not continue, like that of Pharaoh’s. Thus the reason for the saying of Paul: “Therefore, God has mercy on whom He wants to have mercy, and He hardens whom He wants to hardens” (Rom. 9:18).

Now with regards to all of these “children of promise” of Abraham and of Christ being called “Israel,” in Isaiah 49 the Suffering Servant (or Christ) is likewise referred to as “Israel” in verse three. And so it stands to reason that all those who are born in Christ would also surname themselves with His name “Israel,” right? Why shouldn’t they be able to subscribe to themselves His name, being that they are His children? And this in fact is exactly what God through Isaiah the prophet predicts would occur in chapter 44, verse 5. In verse 3, God says He will pour out His Spirit on Jacob’s seed, His blessing upon his descendants―the “descendants” of which we should all know by now are all those who are in Christ and designated as the true and spiritual Israel of God that “will spring up like grass in a meadow, like poplar trees by flowing streams” (v. 4). In verse 3, they are likened to a dry and barren land in which God “will pour water on the thirsty land, and streams on the dry ground” (v. 3). And in verse 5, all of this “seed” of Jacob that will be watered and sprout up out of dry ground will say, “I am the LORD’s; and another shall call himself by the name of Jacob; and another shall subscribe with his hand to the LORD, and surname himself by the name of ISRAEL” (AKJV). Even in the natural, not all natural Israelites could say, “I am the Lord’s,” let alone with the Lord affirming this of all of those spoken of here, if it were not for the fact of them having a broken and contrite heart. And if the Lord was talking about a natural Israelite, no natural Israelite would have to say this, for they were already born with the moniker or name of “Israel” over their heads. No, all of these particular “descendants,” that are said to be the Lord’s, are the only ones here who would be calling themselves “Israel.” And this includes any natural born Jew who believes in Christ, as Paul has articulated for us in Rom. 9:6. This is “the Israel of God” that both God and Paul are talking about who are not “Israel” according to the flesh. They (all natural Israelites) are not spiritual Israel, but only those who are faithful and elect “children of promise” in Christ are denoted as this Israel of God. Natural unbelieving Jews cannot in any way, shape, manner or form call themselves by this name; just as they cannot refer to themselves as the new and spiritual Jerusalem from above as opposed to all those who are in league with the natural and earthly Jerusalem from below; or even as being the children of Sarah as opposed to being likened unto the children of Hagar; or being the temple of God made with living stones and without men’s hands as opposed to being associated with a temple made of literal stones and with men’s hands. All such “descendants” that God is describing through Isaiah are the same “descendants” that both Christ and Paul spoke of as all children of faith, as opposed to all children born only of the flesh and without faith in Christ at all. And it is along this same line of thinking that Jesus likewise proclaimed: “I know...those who say they are Jews, and are not,” or even as Paul says: “For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly...but he is a Jew who is one inwardly.” So Paul could have very well of said, “they are not all Jews who are of the Jews.” It is one and the selfsame thing. There is a spiritual temple and a spiritual city called New Jerusalem that is comprised of spiritual Israelites, or Jews, and whose “Praise” is of God. There is an Israel or Jew according to the flesh, and there is an Israel or Jew according to the Spirit. Israel born of the flesh and set apart as a nation by God was a type of Israel born of the Spirit and set apart as nation by God. Both are born irrespective of their own decision or choice; but only one is born from above, the other from below.

Of all of these spiritual “children of promise” of the barren woman whom Paul quotes from Isaiah 55:1 in Gal. 4:27, these are also the ones whom Isaiah mentions elsewhere that are birthed through the Israel according to the Spirit and as the mother of us all:

“Lift up your eyes and look around; all your sons gather and come to you. As surely as I live,” declares the Lord, “you will wear them all as ornaments; you will put them on, like a bride….The children born during your bereavement will yet say in your hearing, ‘This place is too small for us; give us more space to live in.’ Then you will say in your heart, ‘Who bore me these? I was bereaved and barren; I was exiled and rejected. Who brought these up? I was left alone, but these—where have they come from?’” (49:18, 20–21).

And, again, Isaiah writes:

“Before she goes into labor, she gives birth; before the pains come upon her, she delivers a son. Who has ever heard of such a thing? Who has ever seen such things? Can a country be born in a day or a nation be brought forth in a moment? Yet no sooner is Zion in labor than she gives birth to her children. Do I bring to the moment of birth and not give delivery?” says the Lord. “Do I close up the womb when I bring to delivery?” says your God. “Rejoice with Jerusalem and be glad for her, all you who love her; rejoice greatly with her, all you who mourn over her. For you will nurse and be satisfied at her comforting breasts; you will drink deeply and delight in her overflowing abundance.” For this is what the Lord says: “I will extend peace to her like a river, and the wealth of nations like a flooding stream; you will nurse and be carried on her arm and dandled on her knees. As a mother comforts her child, so will I comfort you; and you will be comforted over Jerusalem.” When you see this, your heart will rejoice and you will flourish like grass; the hand of the Lord will be made known to his servants, but his fury will be shown to his foes (66:8–14).

It is even as the Psalmist declares in Psalm 87, “this one and that one were born in her” (v. 5). Born in who? The Israel of God according to the Spirit! And which “one” or “that” one? All those such as “Rahab,” those of “Babylon,” those of “Philistia,” those of “Tyre” and of “Cush” (v. 4). “They will say, ‘This one was born in Zion’” (v. 4). How so? Not naturally, of course, but spiritually by the breath of God like Isaac. Truly it is as God through Isaiah and even Paul have declared to us, “More are the children of the desolate woman (Jerusalem from above) than of her that could physically have children (Jerusalem below).”

Now it is pretty much the common consensus among all of the older commentators that the verses mentioned in Isaiah 44:3–5 above predict the future outpouring of God’s Spirit presently now upon a remnant out of Israel, along with the ingathering of a remnant out of the Gentiles as well, who publicly profess their allegiance to God and to His people of faith. Keil and Delitzsch make an insightful remark with regards to Isaiah’s words here in verse five. They concur:

The heathen…will count it the greatest honor to belong to Jehovah and His people….The threefold zeh [of one saying I will belong to Jehovah; of a second one who takes on the name of Jacob; and a third one who inscribes himself with Jehovah’s name and even takes upon himself the name of Israel] refers to the heathen, as in Psm. 87:4–5.”[15]

Albert Barnes, in his commentary, likewise remarks with regards to these verses here in Isaiah 44:1–5:

To call one’s self by the same name as another, is indicative of friendship and affection; and is expressive of a purpose to be united with him, and to identify our interests with his. The idea is that which one would express by saying, that he cast in his interest with the people of God, or he became identified with them; as we now say, a man calls himself by the name of Christ, i.e., a Christian.”[16]

Ezekiel too, in a figure and vision, predicts the time in Christ’s temple and kingdom of priests that we are now living in, when land allotments that were formerly prescribed only to the Jews would also be given to the Gentiles “who are settled among you and have children” (47:22). This spiritual Israel of God would, “consider them as native-born Israelites” (ibid); and “in whatever tribe the alien settles, there you are to give him his inheritance, declares the Sovereign Lord” (v. 23). This is all akin to Paul’s words in Ephesians, where the Gentiles who were once “excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of promise” (2:12) have been “brought near” to partake of all of these things “through the blood of Christ” (v. 13). “Consequently, you [Gentiles] are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God’s people and members of God’s household” (v. 19). Citizens of a country have all the rights of native-born citizens, and as such they also have the right to share the same name of those citizens, no longer identifying themselves with their former country in which they use to live but with their new country, just as foreigners who become citizens of America can now call themselves, “Americans!” As already noted, this “Israel” that Ezekiel is describing is not “Israel” according to the flesh, but the Israel of God that has been formed all along through faith in Christ—not to be two separate and distinct groups of citizens, but one citizenry and one household of faith. They are the one fold and one new man in Christ who is the One Chief Shepherd and Chief Bishop over all their souls.

What God is describing through Ezekiel, in a vision, via literal objects and ideas (like the vision given to Peter of literal clean and unclean animals of all kinds brought together on a sheet), never “literally” occurred in the past and will never “literally” occur in the future either. But all of this is actually occurring spiritually right now by Gentiles being received as “native-born Israelites” with all of Christ’s Jewish believers, and with Gentiles no longer being “excluded from citizenship in Israel and foreigners to the covenants of promise.” These are all the one, united people of God called His “children of promise” since the time of Adam and Eve, not two.

Showers’ bone of contention is that God has always had two separate and distinct groups of people that are called “Israel”: one being spiritual, the other natural. And in a nutshell, this is the dispensationalist’s teaching of the Bible in the majority of churches around the world today—even with regards to there being an earthly people made up of only natural Jews, verses a heavenly people made up of believing Jews and Gentiles in Christ. And Showers even attempts to prove that the “spiritual Israel” that Paul refers to in Gal. 6:16 can only be natural Jews who believe in Christ, and not Gentiles at all, but who together do make up what is called: “the Church.” And he does this based upon this idea below:

It is possible to be Abraham’s ‘son’ or ‘seed’ but not be Jewish. Ishmael was Abraham’s son, but he was not Jewish. In Romans 4:11–12 Paul taught that Abraham is the father of both the uncircumcised (Gentiles) and circumcised (Jewish). Some of Abraham’s descendants are Jewish, and others are not.[17]

So, for Showers, Isaac (as well as Jacob) represent all natural Jewish believers, while Ishmael represents all Gentile believers. And according to Showers, both can be Abraham’s spiritual children, but both still represent two entirely different groups or classes of people; one inclusive of Gentiles, the other not. They are both referred to as “the Church,” while the distinction between the two of being “Jewish” or “Gentile” still remains. And this is why I said earlier that many messianic Jews will not even call themselves a “Christian”; for to do so is to be more akin to a Gentile than a Jew, so they avoid calling themselves by this name.

Now, if all this above by Showers is not a “private interpretation” with regards to Isaac and Ishmael, I don't know what is! And as far as “the Israel of God” in Gal. 6:16 being “inclusive” of the Gentiles, I have already spoken my peace earlier on all of this. Have no doubt about it: Gentiles, as well as Jews, are the spiritual Israel of God.

But Showers is right in this respect: both Isaac and Ishmael do represent two entirely different groups of people, but it is not as Showers and many dispensationalists erroneously contend!

First of all, Paul in Romans was not insinuating that there were to be two groups of people that are to be God’s people; but only one group out of both Jews and Gentiles from both the Old and New Testaments that make up God’s one true spiritual people that are called “the children of promise,” not based upon any natural ethnicity at all. As I have said all along, this has always been the case since the time of Adam and Eve. As has been already noted, “children of promise” are all those chosen like Isaac and Jacob, regardless of any “Jewish” ethnicity; while in Gal. 4:22ff “Ishmael” is akin to all Jews who are not God's “children of promise” (which we will discuss some more shortly). The one new man in Christ is spiritually, “Jewish,” with no distinctions between any whatsoever. Such “distinctions” are a “carnal” idea, born of carnally minded men and Jewish sentiment that is not of God.

Secondly, if Showers and all dispensationalists are also going to contend by Paul’s analysis in Romans 9, that God is creating one plan for natural ethnic Jews as God’s “children of promise” apart from Jews and Gentiles who now believe in Christ, and who form two separate and distinct groups of people which belong to God (with one on the earth and the other in heaven), then they are grossly mistaken! They are wrong on all accounts! Again, this is like the JW’s reasoning that there will be 144,000 select JW’s in heaven while the rest of the JW’s live out their lives here on earth. Do you see the futility of such thinking? It is the same story, but with a different twist to it. And is is all utter nonsense! It is in the words of God through Paul, “contrary to sound doctrine.” These are the one’s whom Paul claims lead captive silly women and subvert whole houses filled with those with itching ears who have given themselves over to such Jewish myths and fables, and who are deceived and being deceived thereby (cp. 1Tim. 1:4; 4:7; 2Tim. 4:4; Tit. 1:14; 2Pet. 1:16, KJV).

Now notice something very carefully of what Showers has just said above: For Showers, “Isaac” equals being a natural Jew, while “Ishmael” equals being a Gentile. But, au contraire! says Paul. In Galatians 4:22ff, Paul says “Ishmael” (along with Hagar) equals (allegorically or figuratively speaking) all natural Jews according to the flesh who are only to be “cast out.” Paul in no uncertain terms says that natural Israel born only according to the flesh, like Ishmael born through Hagar, is excluded from the promises associated with “the children of promise” born according to the Spirit, and whom God has set apart for Himself like Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Moses, Joshua, Caleb, Rahab, Samuel, David, Ruth and all the prophets, etc. These are the sole remnant chosen according to the election of grace for which Paul has said God’s gifts and callings are irrevocable for―no one else! All others are irrevocably rejected! They are marked for reprobation. Understand this, and understand it well: if anything at all, Paul is unequivocally stating that all natural Jews who are born only according to the flesh are not linked at all with Abraham and Sarah’s son Isaac who was born according to the Spirit of promise, but with Ishmael! Ishmael doesn’t equal Gentiles; Ishmael, according to Paul, equals ethnic unbelieving Jews (as well as all unbelieving Gentiles) who are born only according to the flesh. As such, neither are given any part or inheritance with the children of the free woman who are Abraham’s true spiritual seed and “children of promise” (Gal. 4:28).

Showers further adds that to be called “Israel” didn’t occur through Ishmael, but through Jacob, and that Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob and all descendants through them are thus the only ones that can be called, “Israel.” He admits that “Abraham himself was not Jewish,”[18] but “was a Gentile from Ur of the Chaldeans,”[19] and that “if he had been Jewish, then all of his descendants would be Jewish.”[20] And so this is why there can be one group inclusive of Gentiles in Christ born according the Spirit that is separate and distinct from natural ethnic Israel born only according to the flesh. For the name “Israel,” Showers contends, didn’t come until afterwards through Jacob, when “God bestowed the title of Israel.”[21] So, by this same logic and reasoning, wouldn’t Abraham and Isaac not be called “Israel” either, but only those born afterward through Jacob? If we are just talking about natural Israelites, then, yes, the name “Israel” was ascribed only to those linked to Jacob. But if we are talking about “spiritual Israel, then, yes, this group is likewise inclusive of whoever is a believer, even as far back as Adam and Eve. All of these people from that time forward will be in heaven with the Church, also now known as the true spiritual Israel of God.

Natural Jews and Israelites are to Palestine today, what Americans are to the United States or the Brits to England, no more and no less. They are a nation just like any other nation. And common grace is extended to all who with a good conscience towards God do what is just, good and right in His sight. There are blessings for good conduct and curses for bad conduct which extend to all nations and ethnic groups across the board, not just to natural Jews. All will be held accountable for the good or bad things that they have done in this life. And all will be rewarded not only in this life for the good or bad they have done, but will also be rewarded in the life to come based upon whether they have had faith in God or not. Natural Israel may have had more required of them, but what was mainly good for the goose has also been good for the gander across all ethnic groups throughout all nations.

If anything, Abraham is associated more with Gentiles in his past than with natural Israelites in the future, as were all of the other former patriarchs before him. As God has said, “Your father was an Amorite and your mother a Hittite” (Ezk. 16:3, 45). Many of Abraham’s closest allies in the land of Canaan, were in fact, Amorites. And upon closer scrutiny, even Melchizedek seems most likely to have been an Amorite, along with the ungodly Amorite king Adonizedek of Jerusalem who came much later after him, and who attempted to overthrow Joshua in that very same region (cf. Josh. 10). So, as the case may be, Abraham in fact represents both ethnic groups of Gentiles in looking back and of Jews looking forward, but only as it pertains to those who are his “children of promise,” and as the father of faith of all the faithful ones.

Again, what does God say through Paul in Galatians concerning natural Israel who is likened unto Ishmael born only according to the flesh, and for which Showers and all dispensationalist’s claim is, “Replacement Theology”? “Cast out” the bond woman with her son which is akin to Jerusalem of the earth; for she shall not be an heir together with the free woman and her son which is akin to Jerusalem from above (cf. Gal. 4:30). Outside of Christ, all natural Jews are likened to nothing more than Ishmaelites in God’s sight. This is God’s word of truth on the matter, not man’s! It is not what Showers and all misguided dispensationalist’s are claiming at all. And it is they who in fact “replace” natural Israel for God's true people of faith who are His “children of promise.” Covenant theologians are not casting out children born only according to the flesh. God is! God is not concerned about ethnicity. He is concerned about choosing whom He will choose, regardless of ethnicity. And that has been the one single focal point of this discussion all along. And if there is to be any future for ethnic Jews, it is now, not later. God's plan for them is inclusive with the Church, not separate and distinct from the Church; otherwise, they remain only children of wrath like the rest of the world, where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth.

In Galatians chapter four, Paul isn’t just pitting one covenant (the Old Covenant) against another (the New Covenant),[22] or law verses grace (albeit this is also no less true); he is pitting one people (or seed) along with their literal mountain and their city who are in slavery to sin, against another people with their spiritual mountain[23] and city who are the Lord’s freemen; he is pitting a children born only according to the works of the flesh here on earth who are the work of men’s hands, against a children of faith and of promise who are born from above according to the Spirit and who are the work of God’s hands. Not so dissimilar to the law of Moses, one strives to be accepted by the work of procreation according to the flesh and which only produces slaves to sin; the other doesn’t strive at all like these others, but rests solely on God’s created act by grace and the power of the Spirit which produces slaves of righteousness. The latter owe their lives not to their own efforts, but to the miraculous power of God; while the former rely on their ethnicity and their own self-righteousness. The question here really is: Who is your mother, and in what way are you born? Every believer, like Isaac, is supernaturally conceived and miraculously born of the Spirit to be “the seed” of Abraham according to God’s promise which is realized in Jesus Christ. Again, all the “natural seed” according to the flesh are likened unto Ishmael born of the flesh; all the “spiritual seed” according to promise are likened unto Isaac and Jacob who are children of promise.

Spiritual Israel, according to Showers is simply: only ethnic Israelites who receive Christ. And Gentiles, according to Showers, can be called “the Church,” but they cannot be called “Israel.” All of this smacks right in the face of what both Christ says in John chapter eight, and what Paul says in Galatians and in Romans as repeatedly noted earlier. As was said, Gentiles are not likened unto Ishmael (as Showers claims) but are indeed likened unto “children of promise,” such as Isaac and Jacob, who are all hand-picked by God not according to natural ethnicity, but according to the supernatural birthing of the Holy Spirit from above. But like the Jews in Christ’s day, I suppose none of these individuals such as Showers will ever really understand any of this until enlightened from above, and will always continue to contend along with the Jews in Christ’s day: “Abraham is our father….We are not illegitimate children.... The only Father we have is God himself” (Jhn. 8:39, 41). But Christ countered, “If you were Abraham’s children…then you would do the things Abraham did….You are doing the things your own father does” (vv. 39, 41), who is, “the devil” (v. 44). Thus, they were not Abraham’s true children in the sense that both Jesus and Paul understood who were truly Abraham’s children.

Of a truth, there are two Israel’s, two temple’s, two Mt. Zion’s, two Jerusalem’s, two priesthood’s and so on and so forth. One was a natural carnal type of the spiritual anti-type that is to be realized only through faith in God and in Christ. One is carnal and of this earth, the other is spiritual and from above. One is in bondage with her children, the other is free with her children. And the son of the bond woman will never share in the inheritance with the son of the free woman. The bondwoman and her son (Israel according to the flesh) will never come into the glorious liberty of the sons of God. All such “subjects” of the kingdom, according to Christ, will be “cast out” into “outer darkness where there shall be weeping and gnashing of teeth” (Mat. 12:12; Lke. 13:28; Gal. 4:30).

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Footnotes:

[1] Israel My Glory. The Facts and Flaws of Covenant Theology, Part 3. Jan./Feb. issue 2012, vol. 70, #1. p. 28.

[2] Ibid.

[3] Ibid.

[4] Vol. 12, p. 1,054.

[5] Encyclopaedia Judaica Jerusalem, 1971, vol. 3, p. 50.

[6] 1986, vol. 16, p. 71. Words in brackets mine.

[7] Collier’s Encyclopedia, 1977, vol. 13, p. 573.

[8] Vol. 14, p. 214.

[9] Ibid.

[10] Pre-Trib Perspectives Articles (accessed on 8/27/2112 at: http://www.according2prophecy.org/datesett.html

[11] David Brown. Christ’s Second Coming: Will It Be Premillennial? (Edinburgh: Johnstone & Hunter, 1856), p. 339.

[12] Israel My Glory. The Facts and Flaws of Covenant Theology, Part 3. Jan./Feb. issue 2012, vol. 70, #1. p. 28.

[13] Ibid., p. 29. Italics his.

[14] E. W. Bullinger. A Critical Lexicon and Concordance to the English and Greek New Testament (Grand Rapids: Zondervan, 1978), p. 50.

[15] Commentary on the Old Testament; Isaiah (Grand Rapids: Eerdmans, 1978), vol. 7, p. 204. Words in brackets mine and as also noted in his commentary.

[16] Barnes’ Notes; Isaiah (Grand Rapids: Baker, 1983), p. 130.

[17 Israel My Glory. The Facts and Flaws of Covenant Theology, Part 3. Jan./Feb. issue 2012, vol. 70, #1. p. 29.

[18] Ibid.

[19] Ibid.

[20] Ibid.

[21] Ibid.

[22] It is argued by some reformed brethren that when Paul was describing Sarah and Hagar as representing two covenants in Galatians chapter four, that he is really only denoting one covenant of grace administered in two different ways or forms. This is where I would depart from such notions of some of these men who also adhere to Covenant Theology. Such notions are entirely unwarranted and should be discounted as most definitely not on the side of truth. A gracious covenant of promise or of grace doesn’t produce children who are in bondage as slaves that is being denoted here of Hagar, her son, and all Israelites under the slavery and condemnation of the law of Moses; and a slavery to the law which Paul says elsewhere leads only to the servitude of sin. The Mosaic covenant, which I do not doubt with others to have been graciously given by God, was not a gracious covenant of promise or of grace but a legalistic covenant of works like the Adamic covenant: “do this, and you shall live; don’t do this, and you shall die.” Both of these covenants exemplified work done by the power of the flesh without the Spirit, as opposed to the work of grace by faith alone that is entirely done by the power of the Spirit. And though we too are now in a sense called slaves to God, we at the same time are also considered as the Lord’s freemen. This is not what Paul has in mind of those who are a slave to the law and to sin. One leads to sin, the other to holiness. One is a forced submission, the other is not. The one is bound to do what only his sinful nature (or old man) dictates for him to do, the other is bound no longer to the dictates of the sinful nature or old man (for he's dead [a]); but we freely and willingly from a newly created heart (or new man) serve Christ without any reservations whatsoever. As such, we are in fact, for all practical intents and purpose, His people, and He is our God.

[a] See my book or blog: Created in God’s Image, Not Adam’s! on us no longer being the old man (or having the old nature) according to Rom. 6:6, but a new man and new creation in whom the old things have passed away and all things have become new for us. The new wine of Christ’s Spirit has been place in an absolutely new wine skin; not in a combination of an old wine skin and a new one, but in one new wine skin! See also John Murray’s Principles of Conduct and John MacArthur’s commentaries.

[23] As said before in an earlier endnote, this idea of Paul in Galatians chapter four of pitting the earthly Mt. Sinai (or Horeb) against the heavenly Mt. Zion, though not expressly stated, is alluded to here and expressly stated elsewhere in Scripture: “You have not come to a mountain that can be [physically] touched and that is burning with fire; to darkness, gloom and storm…But you have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God…” (12:18, 22). There are two women representing two covenants of law and of grace; two sons representing slavery and freedom; two cities, one of the earth and one from heaven; and two mountains, one also of the earth and the other from heaven.