Re: "SALVATION IS OF THE JEWS."
by
Dennis St. John
01/03/2009, 2:45 PM
You are correct in as much as the fact that no salvation is possible without the atoning sacrifice of Jesus, whether Jew or Gentile, and all men of faith see that fact. "Abraham rejoiced to see my day, and he saw it and was glad." Only Jesus of Nazareth kept the Law of Moses perfectly and never sinned. All the rest of mankind, as many as shall be saved, are therefore dependent on him for salvation.
That still does not obviate God's design to raise up a great nation from the loins of Abraham. What God purposes to accomplish will be done. The millennial reign of Christ on earth will complete that work. The six days of creation in Genesis is actually a prophetic overview of the six thousand years allotted to man on the earth (Adam and Eve were not the first humans). In the interim, God still uses the Jews for his divine will. The parable of the laborers who went early into the fields to bear the heat and burden of the day, then resented the laborers who came late and were paid the same wages is a lesson of the Jews and Gentiles. The Jews have born the truth of the only living God and thus earned the enmity of all nations that hate God, thereby being witnesses against those nations.
The last prayer of Jesus regarding the unbelieving Jews was, "Father forgive them, for they know not what they do." Obviously, God heeded his prayer.
Also, don't forget that while something called Christianity was spreading across Europe like a cancer, the church was in fact spirited away into the wilderness for 1,260 years.
All Biblical prophecy is centered on Israel and the Jewish people. The Great Tribulation which so-called Christian churches are looking for has already come and gone. It is commonly called the Holocaust. That, combined with the re-emergence of Israel on the world stage, gives a clear indication of where we stand in the prophetic book of Revelation. Since there is a very significant gap between the Gentile and Jewish records of about 231 years, and since Jesus said that day (1,000 year period) would be cut short, there is no way to pinpoint the exact time these final events will occur. However, there remains the prophecy of John regarding a cataclysmic event of Biblical proportion which may have seemed utterly fantastic in his day, but today scientists are deeply concerned about the possibility of that catastrophe that will end life on earth as we know it.