Book Excerpt | Revelationary Chapter 8 | GRAFTED IN, The Remnant, Repentance, Replacement Theology

“And Saul, yet breathing out threatenings and slaughter against the disciples of the Lord, went unto the high priest, and asked him for letters to Damascus to the synagogues, that if he found any of this Way, whether they were men or women, he might bring them bound unto Jerusalem.  And as he journeyed, he came near Damascus, and suddenly there shined about him a light from heaven; and he fell to the earth, and heard a voice saying unto him, Saul, Saul, why do you persecute Me?  And he said, Who are you Lord?  And the Lord said, I am Yeshua whom you persecute…  And he trembling and astonished said, Lord, what will You have me to do?  And the Lord said unto him, Arise, and go into the city, and it shall be told to you what you must do.”  Acts 9: 1-6

As Saul turned Paul needed a bolt of lightning to stop his persecution of God’s people, so the Church may need this same wake up call for those who believe the replacing of the Jewish people is in the Bible.  This teaching is as dangerous as Paul’s persecution of the true believers in Yeshua.  Saul, a very religious Jewish man, was persecuting his own Jewish brothers and sisters that believed in Jesus.  He was going to the synagogues (because there were no places called churches yet) and taking Jewish believers in Yeshua captive, and murdering many of them.  He thought with all his heart that he was doing God a favor, as many religious non-believing Jews do today who persecute the Jewish people who believe in Yeshua or are searching to know their Messiah.  He thought he was cleansing out people that were dishonoring the true God.  He was wrong, yet sincerely so.  He sincerely believed he was righteous in his actions and thinking yet needed Yeshua Himself to turn him completely around.

 The Church, in many places, has done the same thing.  Many in the Church have persecuted the Jewish people, if not directly through the Crusades, the Holocaust and other violent events, covertly, holding them in disdain, rejected, accountable for killing the Lord Jesus.  Yet we forget or were never taught that the Jewish people by the thousands were the first to believe.  We also forget our own gospel.  We all killed Him.  We all rejected Him and only by His grace, the Holy Spirit, can we receive Him as Lord and Savior.  The reason the very first Gentiles received Jesus as Lord and Savior and the baptism of the Holy Spirit was because of the obedience of the first century Jewish disciples that went out to preach the gospel to the Gentiles as well.  The Church has done much damage to God’s Holy Temple made without human hands, in the preaching of Replacement Theology, Dualism and outright hatred for the very people who brought us the Word of God, protected it through the ages, and brought us our Jewish Messiah, Yeshua (Jesus), the King of the Jews, and the King of all creation.  So what can we do?  We need a wake-up call just as Saul did, no matter how sincerely wrong many have been in our beliefs and in our thinking.

Jeremiah 16:19 says of the Gentiles, in the last days, “O Lord, my strength and my fortress, and my refuge in the Day of Affliction, the Gentiles shall come unto you (the Jewish believers) from the ends of the earth, and shall say, Surely, our fathers have inherited lies, vanity and things wherein there is no profit.”

YAHOVAH God speaks of these last days where the Gentiles will finally see many of us have been wrong, like Saul, and that the God of Israel is the only true God, and we must be re-united with our Jewish brothers and sisters for the building of His tabernacle, the tabernacle of David.  This will take a miracle for some to see this truth.  The lies have been entrenched in the Church for at least 1700 years. 

Let’s Take a Look at History

So what happened? Soon after, exactly 50 days after Yeshua rose from the dead, on the day of Shavuot, or Pentecost, the Jewish disciples were filled with the Holy Spirit.  Something new had happened!  They were filled with joy, gladness, and deep conviction and courage to carry the message of Yeshua and eternal life to all the people in Jerusalem, then to Judaea, then to Samaria, and then (as started in Cornelius’s house) to the four corners of the earth, as Jesus  commanded them.

For the first 10 years or so, Jewish believers in Yeshua only ministered and preached the gospel to other Jewish people.  Thousands of Jewish people came to know the Lord because of their testimony.  Then, as we spoke of before, Peter is called to bring the gospel message to Cornelius and his family and then to all Gentile nations.   Other Jewish disciples, such as Paul and Barnabas, are also called to preach to the Gentiles, as well as their Jewish brothers and sisters.  This time period was full of joy and power as Jews and Gentiles came together as ONE in the Holy Spirit, but also full of persecution and terror.  The enemy of us all, satan, made sure that the unbelievers at the time, persecuted, tortured and murdered the believers in Yeshua, the followers of the Way.

First, many Jewish people, as a whole, were targeted.  As Yeshua told them, their temple would be burnt down, “not one stone left upon the other.”  In 70 A.D., this happened when the Roman soldiers tore down the temple and killed over a million Jewish people, as attested by Josephus, the historian.  By 135 A.D. the last of the Jewish community was killed or dispersed from Israel; Israel itself was renamed Palestina by the Emperor Hadrian, making it clear that the Jewish people were not allowed to return to Israel.

So, the story continues.  The Jewish people were dispersed to the four corners of the earth.  Yet, this was all part of God’s plan.  Their dispersion would lead to the gospel being preached around the world.  The Jewish disciples that were still alive would be sent out to be a light in the midst of a dark world.  This time period, starting with Alexander the Great (333 B.C.), but now escalating to full take over is called the Time of the Gentiles by Jesus in Luke 21:24, alluded to in Daniel 8:13, and Matthew 24:14-15.  It would be a time of trampling by the Gentiles on Jerusalem.  The Jewish people would not be in control of Jerusalem for almost 2000 years. It would be a bitter but necessary trial to endure to bring the gospel to all the world.  Why? 

Dispersion was necessary like seeds blowing far away from a parent plant to bring life everywhere… The people of God must go into all the nations.  God knew that many would not choose to leave Jerusalem, to leave Israel to go into far countries to preach the gospel.  So, He sent them. Some of them were believers in Yeshua and some were not. 

For the next 300 years after the first outpouring of the Holy Spirit, the followers of the Way were true to the Word of God, yet persecution continued and increased.  The believers, both Jewish and Gentile, were thrown to lions, burned at the stake, tortured, murdered, used as entertainment, they were killed in the Colosseum by wild animals, made to fight each other to the death in gladiator fights and any other forms of torture the Roman pagan world could think of.  The pain and sorrow were never ending.  Yet many would not renounce their faith in Jesus.

Then on October 27, 312 A.D., Constantine, the current ruler of the Roman empire, on the eve of the Battle of Milvian, had a vision of a cross and was assured that he would win the victory if he would go in the name of Jesus.  Many of us know the story.  He put crosses on all his soldiers’ shields and he indeed won a great victory.  Constantine’s heart was changed toward the followers of the Way, also now called Christians (Acts 11:26), and he decided to stop all the persecution and murder.  Yet, Constantine’s heart was still very much in the world.  He would stop the persecution, but the followers of the Way would have to make some changes in their beliefs.  It would come with a cost.  Even so, there was a sigh of relief for those being persecuted, at least for the moment.

Constantine and another man Licinius Augustus (who also co-ruled the Roman Empire at the same time as Constantine) proclaimed a new law called the Edict of Milan, which in part said, “It has pleased us to remove all conditions whatsoever… concerning the Christians, and now any one of these who wishes to observe the Christian religion may do so freely and openly without any disturbance or molestation.” [i] (Constantine and the Foundations of Anti-Semitism, article, https://free.messianicbible.com/feature/constantine-foundations-of-anti-semitism/.

This law hereby stopped the fierce persecution and murder of the people who followed Jesus, both Jewish and Gentile believers.  But the enemy had a plan.  In this peace, there would be no peace.  Soon thereafter, the division started by some of the fathers of the Christian Church in the people of the Way, the Truth, and the Life, became a huge gaping breach.  The people of God were at first called the people of “The Way”.  They were distinctly Jewish as Gentile believers were grafted into the original Jewish disciples.  Yet, slowly, at first, as more Greek, Roman and Gentile people came to know of the gospel, while many were true followers, others were wolves in sheep’s clothing.  One of the first of these voices to widen the breach between the Jewish believers and the Gentile believers was a man named Ignatius of Antioch.  In 99 A.D., after John, “the disciple that Jesus loved” and who wrote the Book of Revelation, died, Ignatius made this absurd statement to those who followed him, “It is absurd to profess Jesus Christ (Yeshua Messiah, remember He is Jewish) and to Judaize, (practice Jewish laws and customs).  He was essentially saying the very customs and practices that our Lord and Savior Jesus kept and held dear, it is absurd to do the same thing and follow His example.

In the time between 100-165 A.D., Justin Martyr, considered another church father, accused the Jews of being solely responsible for killing Jesus.  He wrote, “The tribulations were justly imposed on you (Jewish people, believers included), for you have murdered the Just One. [ii]https://www.messianicassociation.org/ezine04-him.

How quickly he forgot that he himself, Justin Martyr, also needed his sins forgiven and was just as much responsible for the death of Jesus as everyone else.  Jesus died for all.  We all put Him on that cross because He willingly went for all because of His love for us. 

In Matthew 27:25, the Scripture says, “May His blood be upon us, and on our children.”  The Jewish people proclaimed this as they chose Barabbas instead of Jesus to be set free.  In so saying, they unknowingly were proclaiming what we all need – Jesus’ blood upon us, His blood covering, to wash us clean from our sins.  Yes, may His blood covering be on all that proclaim His name.  Without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sins.  Jesus came to die on the cross.  No one put Him there but He Himself.  The people who actually did that work 2000 years ago, however evil their intent may have been, were only doing the will of the Father so that all who called on Yeshua’s (Jesus’) name could be saved from our sins.  If He had wanted to, He could have called the angels in Heaven, or even with One Word of His own, as fully God, wiped out everyone around Him.  He went to the cross, because that is what He came to do for us ALL.  To hate a particular people for putting Jesus on the cross is absurd theology.  Oh God forgive us, for we are all sinners in need of the blood of Jesus to wash us clean.

In Matthew 16:20-23, Jesus tells His Jewish disciples not to tell anyone that He is Yeshua, the Messiah.  (Again Yeshua literally means Salvation in the Hebrew and that is what He was called as He walked the earth so I used the names interchangeably).  It goes on to say, “From that time forth began Jesus to show unto His disciples, how He must go to Jerusalem, and suffer many things of the elders and chief priests and scribes, and be killed, and be raised again the third day.  Then Peter (a Jewish disciple that loved Him) took Jesus aside, and began to rebuke Him saying, Be it far from You; this shall not happen to You.”  But Jesus turned and said unto Peter, “Get behind Me Satan; you are an offence to Me; for you savor (or desire) not the things of God, but those that be of men.” 

Here, one of Jesus’ closest disciples, a Jewish man, is saying, “No, Yeshua, we will not let this happen to You.  We will defend You.  They will not kill You on my watch.”  We know Peter meant well, but Jesus’ answer is harsh.  He says to Peter, essentially, your words are like Satan’s who would try and tempt Me away from the very thing I came to do.  I came to lay down My life so that My people would be redeemed.  We forget all the Jewish people who loved Him dearly, who cried at the cross for Him, who would have fought for Him.  They were told by Jesus, I came to the earth to do this for you, the Jewish people first, and then for the Samaritans, and then to all the earth.  The self-righteous blaming of the Jewish people is an offense to the very God we love.  Just like Saul, we need to have deeper understanding of the Scriptures; even if our intentions are good, we can be sincerely wrong.

This false conversation about the Jewish people continued to be perpetuated by those who should have known better. 

Another church father named Chrysostom (347-407 A.D.), a Greek, taught against keeping the Lord’s Biblical Holy Days spoken of in Leviticus 23.  There were many others who spoke the same thing and research into this time of history where the breach began is filled with antisemitic sentiments.  Why?  Because Satan knew the House of God, together with Jewish and Gentile believers, was unstoppable, so He needed to cause division.  How else do you make a House fall?  “And if a House be divided against itself, that House cannot stand.”  Mark 3:25

            So, Constantine stopped the persecution and physical warfare. Yet, something more insidious was about to begin.  The tearing away from the true gospel to something mixed with the false religions of the day.  In 315 A.D. Constantine issued a law to stop the dangerous sect of Judaism from persecuting those Jewish people that believed in Yeshua as their Messiah.  This, in itself, may have been good, yet the law became not only a protection for those who believed in Jesus, but soon became an instrument to use against anything Jewish, including the Jewish believers. 

The Way, the first believers, the Acts House of God, was Jewish to its core.  Again, we were grafted into the Jewish disciples of Jesus, of Yeshua, not the other way around.  The new sect of Jewish belief was given a new name; instead of followers of the Way, the people of Yeshua Messiah were given the Greek Name, the followers of Jesus Christ and therefore  called Christians. This happened soon after Cornelius and his family were filled with the Holy Spirit and were joined to the Jewish community of believers.  In Acts 11:26, it says, “And when he (Barnabas, a Jewish disciple) found him (Saul, a Jewish disciple) he brought him unto Antioch. And it came to pass, that a whole year they assembled themselves with the assembly, and taught much people.  And the disciples were called Christians first in Antioch.”

With the new name, slowly yet persistently, came separation of anything Jewish from increasingly Greek, Gentile influenced assembly of believers.  The original Jewish community was severely persecuted in the early years as they were completely driven from their homeland by 135 A.D.  The Gentile believers continued to increase in number, but the Jewish community decreased significantly by the Roman Empire clearing out Israel of the Jews.  By the time Constantine came, in 312 A.D., although the House of God was still very much Jewish and Gentile believers together, it was decidedly more Gentile believers than Jewish only because many of the Jewish community had been murdered or dispersed.  So, the separation of anything Jewish would be much easier now, as Constantine would stop persecution of the Christians based on his changing a few things first.

This leads us to the Council of Nicaea called to order by Constantine in 325 A.D.  The council had 300 bishops to determine what would be true Christianity and what would not.  Sadly, there were no Jewish believers in this Council.  Although the Council itself brought forth a strong belief in Jesus Christ (Yeshua Messiah) as the Son of God and as the same substance as the Father and Holy Spirit, it also began the process, of distinguishing Judaism from Christianity, which in later councils was officially codified.   One of the first things determined was to set a new day to celebrate the resurrection of Jesus; it would be called Easter.  Passover and First Fruits would no longer be observed.  This was in distinct opposition to the way the followers of Jesus had celebrated His Resurrection the first 300 years from the outpouring of the Holy Spirit.  Passover, the Feast of Unleavened Bread, and First Fruits, this week of celebration and remembrance was replaced with Easter (a mix of the celebration of Jesus with the pagan practices of the day).  Constantine was trying to find a way to appease non-believers in the Roman Empire with the now official religion of the land, Christianity. 

But Christianity began to look more and more like a completely different belief system than what Yeshua had set into motion at Shavuot (Pentecost) 50 days after His resurrection.  First at the Council of Nicaea, Constantine sent out a letter to all churches everywhere saying,

“When the question arose concerning the most holy day of Easter, it was decreed by common consent to be expedient, that this festival should be celebrated on the same day by all in every place; and truly, in the first place, it seemed to everyone a most unworthy thing that we should follow the custom of the Jews in the celebration of this most holy solemnity, who polluted wretches, having stained their hands with a nefarious crime, are justly blinded in their minds…”It is therefore, that rejecting the practice of this people we should perpetuate to all future ages the celebration of this rite, in a more legitimate order… Let us then have nothing in common with the most hostile rabble of the Jews.”[iii]  (How the Church Lost the Way, by Steve Maltz, Saffron Planet, 2009).  

The breach was almost complete.  The following councils of Antioch and Laodicea solidified the break, the tear, the gaping hole in God’s true House.  In 345 A.D., Christians were no longer allowed to celebrate the Passover seder with the Jewish believers, their Jewish friends and neighbors.  At the Council of Laodicea, in 364 A.D. the Biblical Sabbath day called Shabbat (which was celebrated from Friday at sundown to Saturday at sundown for thousands of years) was outlawed and Christians were told that they MUST WORK on that day and if they can, rather rest on the new Sabbath which would be Sunday.  Man had decided to change God’s Laws and the times.  He would be the one to say what would be the law.  The Law of God, the Word of God, handed down by the Jewish people, their feasts commanded by YAHOVAH, their sabbath commanded by YAHOVAH, would now be changed to man’s ways.  The Jewish faith, the Way, was completely separated from this new belief system, Christianity.  And a new thought became prevalent among Gentile believers – we have taken over.  The promises made to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob now belong solely to us.  We are the new Israel.

Replacement Theology has long reared its ugly head in the Church.  It has kept us from caring about the Jewish people and has kept many of them from knowing their Jewish Messiah, our Jewish Messiah because they have been cast out from their very House.  These words may be very difficult for some to accept.  WE have been taught wrong.  In many cases, YAHOVAH God extends mercy in our wrong understanding, and has done so through the centuries, yet now with Israel back on the map in fulfillment of prophecy, and Bibles in every home in the United States and in other places around the world, or very easily accessible, we, as God’s people, have no excuse to allow this heinous lie to continue.  We are in a new dispensation of time.  The blinders are coming off the Jewish people and they MUST come off the Gentile believers as well.  The breach MUST be healed.  We are the generation that is being held to account to heal this breach.

Replacement theology, or Supersessionism, is the doctrine held by many in the Christian Church that the Church has replaced Israel in God’s plans.  This is the height of false doctrine that we are warned about.  It has led to much sorrow and persecution and hatred of our Jewish brothers and sisters.  It is the reason for the antisemitism that caused the Holocaust and so many other atrocities in the last 2000 years against the Jewish people.  It has been a war from the beginning, even before Jesus came to the earth.  Satan has used people of the world to attack His holy people in the days of Esther through Haman (483-473 B.C.), in the days of Syrian king Antiochus (168 B.C.), and he will persist in trying to annihilate God’s Chosen people until the day Yeshua returns again, and puts an end to all this apostasy.  We should not be offended at truth, but do everything in our power to proclaim it and heal the gaping hole in the House of God.

There Is a Mystery

We need to repent, and love them for what they did, willingly and unwillingly, to bring us the good news.  Their hearts were hardened for our benefit, again a Mystery (Romans 11:25).  Their hearts are being softened again.  Our doors and our arms should be wide open.

Even in all this pain, there is a Mystery.  Yeshua knew this would happen.  It was even part of His plan.  Much of the antisemitism that later occurred came partly because the Jewish people had hardened their hearts to the gospel message.  Martin Luther (1483-1546 A.D), although venerated rightly so for his courageous fight to bring the Bible to people in their own language and to fight against man-made religion, also sadly perpetuated the hatred with comments like “the Jews are a base, whoring people, that is no people of God, and their boast in lineage, circumcision, and law must be accounted as filth.”[iv] (The Reformation at 500:  Grappling with Martin Luther’s Anti-Semitic Legacy, Michael Coren, October 25, 2017).  He should have known better because of the scriptures, but his own frustration at their blindness and Luther’s humanness (and maybe part insanity in his old age) caused him to blaspheme God’s people and miss the Mystery prophesied in the Bible.  Luther’s “little” book titled, The Jews and their Lies, led to so much horror and pain as later generations used his words to justify their hateful actions and words towards the Jewish people.  Hence, the holocaust.

But the antisemitism started way before Martin Luther and was prophesied many times in the Bible.  In Acts 11, after the people of the Way started to be called Christians in Antioch (sometime after 30 A.D. or 40 A.D), prophets came from Jerusalem.  Acts 11: 27-28 says, And in these days came prophets from Jerusalem unto Antioch.  And there stood Agabus and signified by the Spirit that there should be great dearth (famine) throughout all the world; which came to pass in the days of Claudius Ceasar.”  Then the disciples, determined to send relief unto their brothers which dwelt at Judaea, (and) sent it to the leaders by the hands of Barnabas and Saul.

What I find fascinating in this passage is the prophets proclaim a famine, a dearth in Antioch.  It was a famine of food but also a future prophetic famine of the Word of God.  The famine of the Word of God would start in Antioch, the very place this Word was proclaimed, even in the Council of Antioch when Christians were banned from celebrating the Passover, the very Passover that recalls our deliverance from Egypt by the blood of the lamb and points to the Passover Lamb that takes away the sins of the world.  Again, Amos says there will be a time when it is not just a famine of food but a famine of the Word of God (Amos 8:11). In the next 1000 years, until Martin Luther (1483-1546) brought the Word of God to the common man, there was a great dearth, a great famine of the Word of God.  The people lived in darkness and could only do as the Church of Rome fathers told them.  Whether these men in power told the truth or not was not something most could discern.  They could not read.  They did not have Bibles, even if they could read.  Many were hopelessly at the mercy of those who purported the Truth.  The Church grew rich in the common people’s ignorance, in the sale of indulgences.  Power and wealth were the ambition of most in this false church, not lifting up and glorifying Yeshua and teaching the full Word of God.

As man began to redefine words, replacing the people of the Way with the word Christians (which in itself is not a bad thing but replaces the name Messiah with the Greek word Christ), replacing the sabbath rest with Sunday (which alludes to the worship of the sun god), replacing the Passover with Easter, replacing all the Jewish feasts and holy days with new names and new ways to celebrate on totally different times, the erasing of our Jewish roots, our Jewish history began.  If you can erase history, you can erase identity, purpose, and truth.  The enemy’s tactics do not change much, calling evil good, and good evil.

Yeshua spoke of the time of the Gentiles, but yet also spoke of a time when this would end and the Jewish people would come back to a full knowledge of the Word of God, the Old and the New; a time when true Gentile believers would turn their hearts back to their Jewish brothers and sisters.  Romans 11 is quite a chapter to tackle.  Many times, it is completely ignored.  Yet, we need to look much closer at this chapter and see what God has said would happen in the latter days before His Second Return.

Romans 11 – Rightly Dividing the Word of Truth

Romans 11 starts off with a question.  “I say then, Has God cast away His people? God forbid.  For I am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin,” Romans 11:1.  Paul says even though many, maybe half of the Jews or more, have turned away from the Messiah Yeshua, God has not forsaken His people.   Paul goes on to say, I, even I am one of the Israelites, sent to the Gentiles to preach the Word of God, yet I long for my people (the Jewish people) as well. 

In Romans 11:2 Paul answers his own question.  “God has NOT cast away His people which He foreknew.  Do you not know what the scriptures say of Elijah? How he makes intercession to God against Israel saying Lord, they have killed Your prophets, and dug down Your altars; and I am left alone and they seek my life.  But what does God answer him?  I have reserved to Myself seven thousand people, who have not bowed the knee to the image of Ba’al.  Even so then at this present time also there is a REMNANT according to the election of grace.”

The Word of God proclaims there is a REMNANT of thousands of Jewish people that will remain faithful to the full Word of God.  They will be kept by the Holy Spirit, by grace and not of works.  The next question asked, “What then? Israel has not obtained that which it seeks, but the election (the Remnant of Jewish people) has obtained it, and the rest were blinded.”  God speaks that a remnant of Jewish people will always know the Truth and be the first fruit disciples that bless the rest of the world with the gospel message.  The rest of the Jewish people will be blinded for a time. 

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

With this spirit of slumber, is all lost?  No, it is part of a Mystery, a plan.  Romans 11:11 imparts, “I say then, Have they stumbled that they should fall?  God forbid.  But rather through their fall, Salvation has come unto the Gentiles, for to provoke them to jealousy.”  What does that mean?  As the Jewish people carried the Word exclusively for 2000 years and became prideful in many ways and fell away, so too, the Gentiles would carry it for the next 2000 years, and become prideful and fall away.  Yet God has a plan.

Romans 11:12 explains, “Now if the trespass of them (the Jewish people) be the riches of the world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles, how much more (blessings will come) from their fullness (from their restoration)?  In other words, when the spirit of blindness is cast off the Jewish people, how much more will the blessings come to all the world?  It will be a time of great Revival!

Romans 11:13-14 makes a point that now Paul is speaking directly to the Gentiles that are beginning to grow in number and becoming predominant in the House of God.  Paul gives an exhortation to remember. “For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the apostle to the Gentiles…”  but Paul reminds them He is a Jewish disciple and loves his people (the Jewish people) too.  “If by any means I may provoke to emulation (inspire to copy) them which are my flesh, and might save some of them.”  Paul wants the Jewish people that do not yet believe to also see the glory of Yeshua in him and in the rising House of God and become jealous so that they want also what they see in others, the power of the Holy Spirit. 

“For if the casting away of them (Jewish people) be the reconciling of the world, what shall the receiving of them (the Jewish people back into the House of God) be but life from the dead? Romans 11:15 The receiving of the Jewish people, our brothers and sisters, will initiate the greatest Revival we have ever seen!  It is time for the Gentile believers to see we NEED our Jewish brothers and sisters, and always have.

“For if the first fruit (Yeshua) be holy, the lump (the place of origin) is also holy; and if the root be holy (our Jewish roots), so are the branches (Jewish and Gentiles together).  Romans 11:16

“And if some of the branches be broken off (Jewish people), and you, being a wild olive tree (Gentiles), were grafted in among them, and with them (Jewish people) partake of the root and the abundance of the olive tree; BOAST NOT against the branches (original).  But if you boast, you do not bear the root (Jewish history and people), but the root bears you.”  Romans 11:17-18

“You will say then, The (original) branches (the Jewish people) were broken off, that I may be grafted in.”  Romans 11:19 Yes, we say this and stop here.  This is replacement theology.  But God has an answer through his apostle Paul.  Romans 11:20 says, “Well, because of the unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by faith. BE NOT HIGH MINDED, BUT FEAR. For if God did not spare the natural branches (Jewish people that did not believe), take heed that He also not spare you.  Behold, therefore, the goodness and severity of God; on them (Jewish unbelievers) which fell, severity, but on you, goodness, IF you continue in His goodness.  Otherwise, you also shall be cut off.”  Here is a warning.  Do not think you have taken over.  Beware this Replacement theology which is coming to the House of God.  Be careful, I hear Paul emphatically warning and prophesying for the days to come.

Romans 11:23 speaks of a turning of events.  “And they also if they abide not still in  unbelief (all the Jewish people who would come to know Jesus, (Yeshua) in the future) shall be grafted in; for God is able to graft them in again.”  Again Paul speaks a warning.  “For if you were cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted in contrary to nature into a good olive tree, how much MORE shall these (the Jewish people), which be the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree?”

“For I do not want you, brethren (and sisters), to be ignorant of this MYSTERY; lest you should be wise in your own conceits, that blindness IN PART is happened to Israel until the FULNESS OF THE GENTILES be come in.”  Paul prophesies into the future that this blindness on many Jewish people is part of a Mystery, and the blindness is only in part.  It will end when the time of the Gentile is complete.  Paul does not know this spirit of slumber will last about 2000 years, but we see it.  The gospel has gone around the world and is back in Jerusalem where it started.  The blinders are coming off the Jewish people.  Revival is near!

“And so ALL Israel shall be saved.” Romans 11:26

This is the New Testament folks! And we are not Israel, unless we are grafted into the Jewish people, our Jewish roots.  Jewish and Gentile believers in Yeshua, or as the rest of the world calls Him, Jesus, together.  This is the House of God, the God of Israel.

“As it is written, ‘There shall come out of Zion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob (renamed Israel).  For this is My covenant unto them (Jewish people) when I take away their sins.”  Romans 11: 26-27 A new covenant written on their hearts and on ours (remember Jeremiah 31).

“As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sakes.”  This speaks of the time when the Jewish people, not all, but many, will not listen to the gospel because of the spirit of slumber put on them for a time.   It is also because of the “Church’s” historic evil mistreatment of the Jewish people as a whole.  “But as touching the election, they are beloved for the fathers’ sakes.”  A REMNANT  of Jewish people will be released from this spirit of slumber and have been and will be some of the greatest evangelists, prophets, pastors, teachers, and apostles ever known.  They are with us now and many more will believe in the years ahead!

“For the gift and the calling of God are without repentance.  For in times past you have not believed (remember Acts 10, Ephesians 2), yet now you have obtained mercy through their unbelief.  Even so these also have not believed that through YOUR MERCY, they may also obtain mercy.”  God speaks again through Paul, that in these last days, when the spirit of slumber is taken off and the hearts of the Jewish people as a whole are once again able to receive the message of their Messiah in great numbers, WE, the Gentile believers, are commissioned to love them back into the Kingdom of God, through our mercy, our love, our humility, our understanding of this great Mystery and the times we are living in right now.  Like Peter went to the Gentiles almost 2000 years ago, we are commanded to purposefully, and with passion and humility go back to our Jewish brothers and sisters and bring them back into the House of God by knowing their Messiah and our Messiah Yeshua (Jesus).  Without them, we are not what God intended.  We will either obey this or be in danger of falling into the delusion of the last days and be left behind.  (Esther 4:14, II Thessalonians 2).

“For God has concluded them all in unbelief (both Gentiles for the first 2000 years, and then many of the Jewish people for the next 2000 years) that He might have mercy on all.”  No one can boast.  It is all God’s mercy and His plan from the beginning.

“O the depths of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God!  How unsearchable are His judgments, and His Ways past finding out!  For who has known the mind, the Spirit of YAHOVAH?  Or who has been His counselor?  Or who has first given to Him and it shall be repaid to him again?  For of Him and through Him and to Him, are all things; to Whom be glory forever. Amen.”  Romans 11: 33-36

God will receive ALL the glory.  As we have received the Word of God and our Messiah from the first Jewish disciples, so we must in turn, give back to them the Word of God in its entirety and their Messiah, our Messiah in these last days.  No one can boast.  It is a great Mystery.  God has made us dependent on Him alone and 2000 years ago, He commanded the Jewish disciples to preach Yeshua to the Gentiles.  Today, when more and more Jewish people can now see again clearly, we are commanded to give the gospel message (besorah), the whole Word of God, back to them. 

Many Jewish believers today, Messianic Jewish people, have been positioned, like Paul who desperately wanted to reach his own people as well as the Gentiles, to proclaim the good news to their Jewish brothers and sisters through ministries like One for Israel, shelanu TV, Jewish Voice, and Jews for Jesus, MAOZ Israel, Christians United for Israel, Fellowship of Israel Related Ministries (FIRM) and many others.  A list of more of the ministries is given at the end of this book.  Many Jewish people are receiving Yeshua (Jesus) as their Savior.  It truly is a time of new beginnings (Isaiah 43:19).  Supporting these ministries is a wonderful way to bless Israel and the Jewish people.  It is a way we can help fulfill this end time prophetic word of bringing the gospel back to those who originally gave it to the world.  We will be blessed as we bless Israel (Genesis 12:3).

YAHOVAH God, the God of Israel, is moving in all the earth.  His eyes are focused on Israel and the return of the Jewish people to Him in these prophetic days; our eyes should be too.  He calls us to be the healers of the Breach.

Isaiah 58:12 “And they that shall be of you shall BUILD the old waste places; you shall raise up the foundations of many generations, and you shall be called REPAIRER OF THE BREACH, the Restorer of paths to dwell in.”

Isaiah 60:1 “Arise shine; for your Light has come, and the glory of the Lord YAHOVAH is risen upon you.  For, behold, the darkness shall cover the earth, and gross darkness the people; but the Lord YAHOVAH shall arise upon you, and His glory shall be seen upon you.  And the Gentiles shall come to your Light, and the kings to the brightness of your rising.”  Israel is rising again.

As the physical temples were destroyed, so the spiritual House has been persecuted and divided.  The enemy works on building the third temple (false) where the abomination of desolation will take place; the true third temple (Tabernacle of David – Amos 9:11, Acts 15:14-16, and Haggai 2:9) is the spiritual house of God, the living stones, the Jewish and Gentile believers standing together forever.

Amos 9:11 says, “In that day I will raise up the Tabernacle of David that is fallen, and close up the breaches thereof; and I will raise up his ruins and I will build it as the days of old.”

Acts 15:14-16  - “Simeon has declared how God at the first did visit the Gentiles (the last 2000 years) to take out of them a people for His name, and to this agree the words of the prophets; as it is written, After this I will RETURN, and will build again the Tabernacle of David, which is fallen down; and I will build again the ruins thereof, and I will set it up…”

Haggai 2:9 – “The glory of this latter House shall be greater than the former, says the Lord of hosts (YAHOVAH tsavaot); and in this place I will give peace (shalom), declares YAHOVAH tsavaot.”

This is the true House of God; this is where we build like Nehemiah with our swords by our side (the Word of God) and the instructions of YAHOVAH God through the Holy Spirit in our hearts, to do the work needed for such a time as this…

Romans 12:2 – And be not conformed to this world, but be transformed by the renewing of your mind, that you may prove what is that good, and acceptable, and perfect will of God.

Romans 12:21 – Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.

Romans 13:11-12 And that knowing the time, that now it is high time to awake out of sleep; for now, is our Salvation nearer than we believed.   The night is far spent, the day is at hand; let us therefore cast off the works of darkness and let us put on the armor of Light. 

There is no room for antisemitism in the House of God, overtly or covertly.  The damage has been done; the repairers need to come in and heal the House of YAHOVAH.

This has been a tough chapter for some, yet God disciplines those He loves.  He corrects us because He loves us.  The mistakes of the past, in our misunderstanding, have been held in mercy.  God does not condemn us for not seeing, yet He convicts us and is calling out for us to see.  If you have this book in your hands, it is because God is calling you deeper into His Word.  I hope you will pray about this, if the information in this chapter has been new to you, and ask YAHOVAH God for eyes that see, ears that hear, and a heart that understands.  Healing often requires a breaking of our own hearts, a repentance deep in the recesses of our spirit so that we can cut off false belief and be renewed in our minds.  It is not always easy, but there is great reward in understanding what YAHOVAH God is doing in all the earth, for such a time as this.

“For if you altogether hold your peace at this time, then shall their relief and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place; but you and your father’s house shall be destroyed; and who knows whether you have come to the kingdom for such a time as this?” Esther 4:14

We are the generation to see all these things and to understand them.  We have been born for such a time as this.

[i] Constantine and the Foundations of Anti-Semitism, article, https://free.messianicbible.com/feature/constantine-foundations-of-anti-semitism/.

[ii] https://www.messianicassociation.org/ezine04-him.  Anyone but Him, Christian Antisemitism and Faith in Messiah, by Sam Nadler.

[iii] Maltz, Steve, How the Church Lost the Way, Saffron Planet, 2009.  

[iv] The Reformation at 500:  Grappling with Martin Luther’s Anti-Semitic Legacy, Michael Coren, October 25, 2017.