Day 121 - 1 Chronicles 17-20

ONE-YEAR JOURNEY OF THE BIBLE
Day 121 - 1 Chronicles 17-20 (Is God Done With His Program for Israel?)
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"And who is like Your people Israel, the one nation on the earth whom God went to redeem for Himself as a people--to make for Yourself a name by great and awesome deeds, by driving out nations from before Your people whom You redeemed from Egypt?  For You have made Your people Israel Your very own people forever; and You, LORD, have become their God."  (1 Chronicles 17:21-22)

I would say that there are only two small groups of people in the world today who believe that God is not yet done with His program for Israel - the religious conservatives among the Jews and the religious conservatives among Christians.  Only these two groups really believe what the Bible says, as David in our text above stated, that God has chosen Israel as His very own people forever.

What any person or group believes about Israel doesn't really matter because what matters is what God says about Israel.  All throughout the Old Testament, God has declared His everlasting covenant with Israel as His chosen people:

         "He remembers His covenant forever, 
        The word which He commanded, for a thousand generations, 
        The covenant which He made with Abraham, 
        And His oath to Isaac, 
        And confirmed it to Jacob for a statute, 
        To Israel as an everlasting covenant, 
        Saying, "To you I will give the land of Canaan 
        As the allotment of your inheritance,"  
        (Psalm 105:8-11)

There is nothing in the New Testament that nullifies God's covenant with the Jews.  What we find throughout the New Testament is the confirmation that God is not done with His Israel even though they have rejected their Messiah Jesus. Perhaps the strongest argument regarding this comes from the apostle Paul in his treatise in Romans chapter 11 on this very subject: 

         "I say then, has God cast away His people? Certainly not! For I also am an          Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.  God has not            cast away His people whom He foreknew. ...I say then, have they                      stumbled that they should fall? Certainly not! But through their fall, to                provoke them to jealousy, salvation has come to the Gentiles."  (Romans          11:1-2)

Paul begins his long treatise with a definitive answer no to the question of whether God has cast away His people.  He then continues to brilliantly argue about how Israel's fall is temporary and that God will once again restore them to their faith in their true Messiah, Jesus Christ.

God said that those who love and bless His people Israel He will also bless.  I choose to love and bless Israel and the Jews because it is what God wants me to do and because God loves them as His very own chosen people.  I have included the rest of Romans 11 below should you want to read it for yourself:

¹²Now if their fall is riches for the world, and their failure riches for the Gentiles, how much more their fullness! ¹³For I speak to you Gentiles; inasmuch as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry, ¹⁴if by any means I may provoke to jealousy those who are my flesh and save some of them. ¹⁵For if their being cast away is the reconciling of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead? ¹⁶For if the firstfruit is holy, the lump is also holy; and if the root is holy, so are the branches. ¹⁷And if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive tree, were grafted in among them, and with them became a partaker of the root and fatness of the olive tree, ¹⁸do not boast against the branches. But if you do boast, remember that you do not support the root, but the root supports you. ¹⁹You will say then, "Branches were broken off that I might be grafted in." ²⁰Well said. Because of unbelief they were broken off, and you stand by faith. Do not be haughty, but fear. ²¹For if God did not spare the natural branches, He may not spare you either.²²Therefore consider the goodness and severity of God: on those who fell, severity; but toward you, goodness, ^F58 if you continue in His goodness. Otherwise you also will be cut off. ²³And they also, if they do not continue in unbelief, will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again. ²⁴For if you were cut out of the olive tree which is wild by nature, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, who are natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree? ²⁵For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. ²⁶And so all Israel will be saved, ^F59 as it is written: 
        "The Deliverer will come out of Zion, 
        And He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob; 
        ²⁷For this is My covenant with them, 
        When I take away their sins." ^F60 
28Concerning the gospel they are enemies for your sake, but concerning the election they are beloved for the sake of the fathers. ²⁹For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. ³⁰For as you were once disobedient to God, yet have now obtained mercy through their disobedience, ³¹even so these also have now been disobedient, that through the mercy shown you they also may obtain mercy. ³²For God has committed them all to disobedience, that He might have mercy on all. ³³Oh, the depth of the riches both of the wisdom and knowledge of God! How unsearchable are His judgments and His ways past finding out! 
        ³⁴"For who has known the mind of the LORD? 
        Or who has become His counselor?" ^{F61 
        35}"Or who has first given to Him 
        And it shall be repaid to him?" ^F62 
36For of Him and through Him and to Him are all things, to whom be glory forever. Amen.