Introducing God’s Plan For Israel
In the landscape of modern evangelicalism, few topics generate as much confusion and heated debate as the role of Israel. Many sincere Christians hold a view, popularized over the last two centuries, that God’s plan involves two distinct peoples: the Church and national Israel. In this framework, the current “Church Age” is a temporary parenthesis, after which God will “resume” His special program with the ethnic Jewish nation. This belief often comes with a fierce defense against so-called “Replacement Theology.” But what if the New Testament itself presents a more seamless, glorious, and Christ-centered narrative? What if the central issue isn’t about a future political restoration, but about a present spiritual fulfillment that was God’s intention all along? By returning to the Scriptures, we discover that the Church is not Plan B; it is the magnificent culmination of the promises made to Israel, fulfilled in Jesus Christ and expanded to include all who are in Him.
It is deeply respected to those who have a desire to be faithful to Scripture, as that’s a view held and widely taught. As one studys the Scriptures, particularly how the New Testament authors themselves interpret the Old Testament promises, it becomes convincing that this ‘pause and play’ model creates a division in God’s plan where the New Testament presents a glorious culmination and fulfillment.
The central issue is this: The New Testament presents the Church not as a plan B or a parenthesis, but as the fulfillment and expansion of God’s promises to true Israel. Jesus and the Apostles consistently teach that they are fulfilling the story of Israel, not pausing it.
I know the immediate objection to this is often the charge of ‘Replacement Theology’—the idea that God capriciously threw away His promises to Israel and started over. I want to be very clear: I reject that caricature completely. It makes God out to be unfaithful, and Scripture declares He is ever faithful.
The New Testament reveals something far more magnificent: The Church is the fulfillment and expansion of true Israel. This isn’t a rejection of God’s promises; it’s the revelation of how He always intended to keep them. The true, enduring “Israel” was never defined solely by physical descent but by faith. This was true even in the Old Testament, as Romans 9:6-8 (KJV) declares: “For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel… but the children of the promise are counted for the seed.” There was always a believing remnant within ethnic Israel that constituted the true, spiritual Israel.
Let’s see how the New Testament proclaims this fulfillment:
- The Promises Were Fulfilled in the Person of Christ. The Abrahamic Covenant finds its ultimate “seed” in one person: Jesus.
- Galatians 3:16 (KJV): “Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ.”
- The promises weren’t made to a vague, unidentified “nation” forever. They were made to Abraham’s “seed,” which is Christ. We are included only by being in Him.
- The Kingdom Was Transferred to the New Covenant People. Jesus Himself made this explicit, fulfilling the pattern of the remnant.
- Matthew 21:43 (KJV): “Therefore say I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits thereof.”
- This “nation” is the international Church, the “holy nation” Peter describes in 1 Peter 2:9.
- All Believers are Grafted into the Same Olive Tree. This is the master metaphor that destroys the “two peoples” theory.
- Romans 11:17-24 (KJV): Paul says believing Gentiles are wild branches grafted into the cultivated olive tree of God’s covenant people. We don’t replace the natural branches (unbelieving Israel); we are joined to the remnant of believing Jews in the same tree. The tree’s identity is based on its root (the promises to the patriarchs, fulfilled in Christ), not its individual branches.
- Ephesians 2:11-22 (KJV): Christ made “one new man” (the Church) from Jew and Gentile, reconciling both to God in one body.
- The Old Covenant is Obsolete. We Live in the Age of Fulfillment. The book of Hebrews argues that the entire Old Covenant system was a shadow pointing to Christ. Now that the substance has come, the shadow vanishes.
- Hebrews 8:13 (KJV): “In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.”
- To say God will “resume” the Old Covenant system would be a regression from the substance back to the shadow.
- Our Hope is the Heavenly Jerusalem, the True Fulfillment of Prophecy.
- Galatians 4:25-26 (KJV): Contrasts the earthly Jerusalem (in bondage) with the “Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.”
- Revelation 21:2 (KJV): The climax of history is the “holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.” The Bride is the Church.
So, in summary, the biblical picture isn’t God switching between two peoples. It is one unified plan of redemption that finds its fulfillment in Jesus Christ. The “special thing” God has for Israel is the same thing He has for everyone: salvation through faith in Jesus Christ. There is no separate covenant or special national salvation apart from the Cross.
Our hope isn’t in a rapture that allows God to revert to an old covenant; our hope is in the return of our King, who will finally and fully consummate the Kingdom we are already citizens of today. The Church is not an interruption; it is the glorious destination toward which all of Old Testament history was pointing. God didn’t replace Israel; He, in Christ, defined it once and for all: as all those, from every tribe and tongue, who are in the Messiah by faith.”
