Blog Archives
The Real Chosen People (Part 2)
“BEHOLD, MY SERVANT WHOM I HAVE CHOSEN; MY BELOVED IN WHOM MY SOUL is WELL-PLEASED; I WILL PUT MY SPIRIT UPON HIM, AND HE SHALL PROCLAIM JUSTICE TO THE GENTILES. HE WILL NOT QUARREL, NOR CRY OUT; NOR WILL ANYONE HEAR HIS VOICE IN THE STREETS. A BATTERED REED HE WILL NOT BREAK OFF, AND A SMOLDERING WICK HE WILL NOT PUT OUT, UNTIL HE LEADS JUSTICE TO VICTORY. AND IN HIS NAME THE GENTILES WILL HOPE.” [Matthew 12:18-21]
In these days when seemingly everyone but the devil is gaining heaven and “Christianity” is watered-down to a consistency barely above water itself, why do we think God even cares about doing any choosing? This is how far fake Christianity has traveled. There is hardly any distinction at all between so many so-called Christians and a world going to hell. And it is the touchy, thin-skinned, aggressively defensive and convicted Unchosen itself that is first to speak out strongly against any perceived judgment, however slight, regarding its perceived standing in God.
The motto of real Christians, on the other hand, is thus:
“Talk about me if you please, but I’ll talk about you on my knees.”
Where in this country is there a voice that represents the real presence of God? Where is the voice that distinguishes truth from error and fake, dry, dead, boring lifeless expressions of faux Christianity from the real thing? Those who have dissolved the life-giving Gospel of the Lord Jesus Christ will have to account for it. All those who have been deceived by their “other gospel” will rise up against them at the Judgment, not that it will matter then.
Why does one think the people in hell will be gnashing at each other with their teeth like a pack of wild dogs? There is the clear indication that the Unchosen do not agree with their ultimate status.
“The kingdom of heaven may be compared to a king who gave a wedding feast for his son. And he sent out his slaves to call those who had been invited to the wedding feast, and they were unwilling to come.
“Again he sent out other slaves saying, ‘Tell those who have been invited, “Behold, I have prepared my dinner; my oxen and my fattened livestock are all butchered and everything is ready; come to the wedding feast.”’ But they paid no attention and went their way, one to his own farm, another to his business, and the rest seized his slaves and mistreated them and killed them.
“But the king was enraged, and he sent his armies and destroyed those murderers and set their city on fire.
“Then he said to his slaves, ‘The wedding is ready, but those who were invited were not worthy. Go therefore to the main highways, and as many as you find there, invite to the wedding feast.’ Those slaves went out into the streets and gathered together all they found, both evil and good; and the wedding hall was filled with dinner guests.
“But when the king came in to look over the dinner guests, he saw a man there who was not dressed in wedding clothes, and he said to him, ‘Friend, how did you come in here without wedding clothes?’ And the man was speechless. Then the king said to the servants, ‘Bind him hand and foot, and throw him into the outer darkness; in that place there will be weeping and gnashing of teeth.’
“For many are called, but few are chosen.” [Matthew 22:2-14]
This is a perfect illustration of God’s selection process. It goes like this:
(1) The first thing the king does is send out invitations. He makes his choices based on his own criteria. But these criteria must be based on those whom he considers His friends, relatives, and select subjects of his kingdom.
(2) What do the invited guests do? They refuse. They ignore him. They ignore the invitation. They treat the king with supreme indifference and disrespect. They are all completely unwilling to attend the wedding feast.
(3) Curious as to why no one wants to come after having been chosen, the king sends out another group to ask the invitees yet again, explaining how much trouble he has gone to, how much He has prepared, and how much he really wants them all to come and share in his joy. The slaves tell everyone what a great time will be had. There will be barbecued oxen and fatted livestock and a great dinner! My son is getting married and I want you all to come!
(4) This time the invitees not only continued to reject the king but some of them actually mistreated the king’s slaves, and they even killed them! What would compel the invited guests to resort to killing the messenger boys sent out by a loving king? (“Hey Joe, check out this story in the paper. Some dude up north was throwing a wedding for his son and one idiot killed the mailman when he got his invitation.”)
(5) The king was enraged! So He sent his army, executed the murderers, and torched their sorry city. I mean, all they had to do was politely decline. Why all the rage and murder about a simple wedding invitation?
(6) Now the king decides He is just going to invite everyone he can find. He no longer makes any judgment whatsoever on who may be qualified to come to the wedding. Those who were qualified, by a particular standard anyway, proved themselves to be completely unworthy. He therefore sends out his slaves to invite one and all, whether good or bad. This time, he ended up with a packed house. His estate was filled to the gills with the rabble of the countryside. They must have thought themselves to be impossibly blessed. No one had ever done anything like this for them before. “Huh? You want little old nobody nothing me to go to a wedding at the king’s estate? Woo Hoo!” They all wasted no time in taking showers and getting their fancy wedding duds on, however humble, and high-tailed it to the big barbecue. The king was most happy!
(7) But all was not perfect. You see, there was this one guy who made no acknowledgement at all of the great thing that happened to him. He didn’t consider himself fortunate and honored to be invited. He didn’t try to get cleaned-up. In fact, he had so little respect for the proceedings that he didn’t even put on a wedding garment. He just kind of wondered in off the street with no expression on his face loosely holding an invitation. The king confronted the man. He even called him his friend. But the man had no answer regarding his lack of proper attire. As a result, he was effectively thrown into hell. To close out the story, the Lord Jesus said:
“For many are called, but few are chosen.”
There are three kinds of people in this parable:
(A) Those who are called and chosen but do not respect the king and reject his invitation, some of whom even kill the king’s servants. By their own decisions, they revoke their called and chosen status.
(B) Those who are called but are not chosen because they do not properly respect the king or his invitation and dress incorrectly.
(C) Those who are called and chosen because they respect the king, honor his invitation, and dress correctly.
The man without the wedding garment was masquerading as a real Christian. The “wedding clothes” represent the robe of righteousness. Righteousness is a gift.[1] It cannot be earned but can be accepted after one shows the proper respect and honor for the King, who made payment for sin. Those who wear the robe are those who properly repent (turn from sin), trust (turn to the Lord), and obey (do His will). To be righteous means to be cleansed of all sin by the sacrifice of the Lamb.
I will rejoice greatly in the LORD, My soul will exult in my God; For He has clothed me with garments of salvation, He has wrapped me with a robe of righteousness, As a bridegroom decks himself with a garland, And as a bride adorns herself with her jewels. [Isaiah 61:10]
The following verses give us an indication of what God requires with reference to the proper wedding clothes:
“But you have a few people in Sardis who have not soiled their garments; and they will walk with Me in white, for they are worthy. He who overcomes will thus be clothed in white garments; and I will not erase his name from the book of life, and I will confess his name before My Father and before His angels. He who has an ear, let him hear what the Spirit says to the churches.” [Revelation 3:4-6]
“Because you say, “I am rich, and have become wealthy, and have need of nothing,” and you do not know that you are wretched and miserable and poor and blind and naked, I advise you to buy from Me gold refined by fire so that you may become rich, and white garments so that you may clothe yourself, and that the shame of your nakedness will not be revealed; and eye salve to anoint your eyes so that you may see. Those whom I love, I reprove and discipline; therefore be zealous and repent. Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if anyone hears My voice and opens the door, I will come in to him and will dine with him, and he with Me. [Revelation 3:14-20] [2]
© 2012 by RJ Dawson. All Rights Reserved. [Part 2]
[1] Romans 5:17
[2] Unless otherwise noted all Scriptures are taken from the New American Standard Bible, © 1960, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.
The Real Chosen People (Part 1)
Many Christians have been conditioned to believe that “The Chosen People” are the Jews, regardless of whether they honor the Lord Jesus as Messiah or not. Christians have been taught that Jews are the only people on Earth who belong to God and will forever belong to God even if they deny that Jesus is their Messiah, if they deny He died to save them from their sins, if they disparage His Name and character, if they actively fight against and oppose real Christianity, especially in Israel, and if they as individuals refuse to repent of their sins and submit to His Lordship.
For some odd reason, Christians have been taught that the New Testament teachings do not apply to the Jewish people. Why? Simply because they are Jews? We are living in a day when Messianic Judaism is very popular and growing. The followers of Messianic Judaism honor Jesus as Messiah. They are still Jews, of course, but believe in and follow the Lord Jesus as did the Messianic Jews of the first century.
Well then, what is a Jew? What is Judaism? Historically, after the complete destruction of what was left of the Jewish homeland in 70AD when Jerusalem was invaded and destroyed by the Romans, and when the Jewish Temple was completely razed to the ground and burned, there was only one segment of traditional Judaism that remained.
The Sadducees ceased to exist, since there was no longer any Jewish state. The Essenes, those likely responsible for the Dead Sea Scrolls, also faded away. Some Jewish nationals held out after Jerusalem was destroyed, comprising segments of the Zealot Party, but committed mass murder against one another and suicide on the heights of Masada in 74AD. There were two other large uprisings against the Romans, the largest and last of which was the Bar Kochba Revolt from 132-135AD. After their defeat, there was no longer any effective and organized Jewish resistance against the Romans. It was the end of the Zealots. The Jewish homeland was lost.
The Pharisees, however, were the one party that lived on. They did not die out as all the other major religious parties had. They continued to exist as the sole religious representatives of the Jewish people. The Pharisees became Judaism, later known as Talmudic or Rabbinic Judaism. The same people who gave the Lord Jesus so much trouble during His ministry and fought the apostles at every turn, especially the apostle Paul, never ceased to exist. They continued teaching as they always had. They continued to deny Jesus as Messiah.
Again, Jesus was 100% a Jew (Hebrew: Yehudi; Greek: Ioudaios), from the Tribe of Judah, and a direct descendant in the kingly line of David. Every original apostle had Hebrew ancestral roots, and so had every single member of the Community of the Lord we read about in the earliest history of His Movement as recorded in the Book of Acts. For seven to ten years after the Resurrection of the Lord, the entire Qahal of the Lord Jesus was composed entirely of Hebrew descendants, members of the nation of Israel, and of the twelve tribes. It was not until the salvation of Cornelius and his group, as recorded in Acts 10, that the apostles understood that non-Hebrew Gentiles were also to be included among the Lord’s people. Prior to that time, the Hebrew followers of Jesus had somehow assumed that only Hebrews and full proselytes to Judaism would qualify for membership.
So here we see the first great division, especially after the destruction of Jerusalem in 70AD, of the Israeli people. One Hebrew camp saw that Jesus was indeed their long-awaited and hoped-for Messiah. The other Hebrew camp rejected Jesus as Messiah. The camp of rejecters coalesced around the Party of the Pharisees, the lone remaining representatives of overall first century Judaism. The Pharisees have existed throughout history ever since, and continued as the sole Hebrew organized religious force against Jesus the Messiah.
What happened to the first century Jewish believers in Jesus? After Cornelius, more and more Gentiles entered the fold of real Christianity. Indeed, the apostle Paul was called by God to be the first and foremost apostle to the non-Jewish Gentiles. Later, at the Jerusalem Council (Acts 15), it was decided by the Jerusalem Hebrew believers that Gentiles did not have to undergo all things Torah in order to attain official membership in the Body of Christ. As more Gentiles flooded in, ethnic differences between Hebrew and non-Hebrew believers were downplayed over time. This did not mean that Jewish followers of Jesus did not retain their Jewish identity. Such would have been tragic. These first century Jewish believers in Jesus were descended from the great Patriarchs of the distant past and represented the then-current true remnant of Israel.
Paul, a Hebrew in very high standing, both ethnically (of the Tribe of Benjamin) and religiously (a Pharisee)[1], as well as a solid Roman citizen says this:
“For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus.
“And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to promise.” [Galatians 3:26-29]
This is a very powerful statement. From this we know that strict Jewish distinctiveness no longer matters with respect to membership in the kingdom of God. Whether one can trace his or her physical lineage to Abraham is no longer an issue. One can be a descendant of Abraham whether he or she is connected by genealogy, Judaism, or Israeli national identity.
It is not an ancestral link that makes one a seed of Abraham but a spiritual link by faith according to promise.
The Jewish non-believers discount and reject this entire notion. To them, it destroys Jewish identity. As a result, they hated Paul with the same passion they hated the Lord Jesus (How dare these heretics dispose of our status as God’s chosen people!).
Which brings us back to the original point: God’s chosen people are only those who honor the Lord Jesus as Messiah. Yet, even as you read this you probably cringe and think such cannot possibly be true. But it’s right there in your Bible. As is this:
“For he is not a Jew who is one outwardly, nor is circumcision that which is outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew who is one inwardly; and circumcision is that which is of the heart, by the Spirit, not by the letter; and his praise is not from men, but from God.” [Romans 2:28-29]
Throughout the Gospels and New Testament writings we see, then, that the “Chosen People” are those who are in Christ, who embrace the Lord Jesus as the only Messiah and Savior, whose hearts have been circumcised, who are in spiritual relationship with Him, and who submit to His full Lordship.
Though the Hebrew people were originally chosen by God as descendants of Abraham, the majority of the Hebrew people rejected God. All one must do is pick up the Old Testament and read a few pages to find that this is true.
There has always been a believing Hebrew remnant, however, and there were always enough who honored God to keep the ancient nation of Israel intact though diminishing. Israel split in two after Solomon’s death, the ten tribes of the Northern Kingdom went into captivity and never returned, effectively ceasing to exist, and only the Southern Kingdom of Judah remained until the time of our Lord as a national entity, which was originally also comprised of the tribes of Levi and Benjamin. After its destruction by the Romans it was the end of the Jewish nation. The unbelieving and disobedient had so outnumbered the believing remnant who dutifully followed YHWH that the geographic and religio-political nation ceased to exist.
The Community of the Lord, however, began at the same time once the Messiah was revealed. Therefore, there is no hope for those who reject Jesus and look for another. There is no other Messiah and never will be. And without Messiah Jesus, there is no salvation, because He is salvation—it is the very meaning of His Name.
Then Peter, filled with the Holy Spirit, said to them, “Rulers and elders of the people, if we are on trial today for a benefit done to a sick man, as to how this man has been made well, let it be known to all of you and to all the people of Israel, that by the name of Jesus Christ the Nazarene, whom you crucified, whom God raised from the dead—by this name this man stands here before you in good health. He is the STONE WHICH WAS REJECTED by you, THE BUILDERS, but WHICH BECAME THE CHIEF CORNER stone. And there is salvation in no one else; for there is no other name under heaven that has been given among men by which we must be saved.” [Acts 4:8-12] [2]
© 2012 by RJ Dawson. All Rights Reserved. [Part 1]
[1] Philippians 3:5-6
[2] Unless otherwise noted all Scriptures are taken from the New American Standard Bible, © 1960, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.
