Romans 15:8a

"Now I say that Jesus Christ (what's the verb?) was...." Somebody was jumping on my use of the verbs and I had to show them 15:8. It is the verb "was."


Romans 15:8

"Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the (what?) circumcision (and who's circumcision in Scripture? Israel!) for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers:" It wasn't Paul's idea. It was all part of the eternal purposes. Well who were the 'fathers' in Scripture? Israel's forefathers. Abraham. Isaac. Jacob. And on up through Israel's history. So why did Jesus come? "To fulfill the promises made to the Nation of Israel." And what were those promises? That He would come and give them an earthly Kingdom over which there would be no suffering under the Roman Empire. There would be no persecution. There would be no sickness. There would be no death. It would be literally heaven on earth. And He'd be the King.


And then in Matthew what did He promise the Twelve? "That they would sit on twelve thrones ruling the twelve tribes of Israel." That was all part and parcel of the promises made to the fathers. So everything is leading up to this coming of the King, but Israel could not believe it. They could not accept Jesus of Nazareth as that promised King of the Kings, so they fulfilled the purposes of God. They crucified Him.


All right, God raised Him from the dead. Called Him back to Glory (we've gone through this before, at the ascension). But Peter and the Eleven keep right on preaching the Old Testament promises that this One Whom they crucified was alive and, as soon as the horrors of the seven years of Daniel's seventieth week, which we call the Tribulation had passed, the King would yet come and bring in the Kingdom. Now when you follow that whole concept through, Peter in the early Acts and then the little Jewish epistles of James and Peter and John and Jude and Revelation, everything is looking at the unfolding of the Tribulation, the Second Coming and the Kingdom Age.


But there's one thing that wasn't revealed to them. There's nothing in here of the Church Age. Nothing of calling out a body of Gentiles, which we call the Church. But rather it was all fulfilling the promises made to the fathers. And that's why these little Jewish epistles are on that same timeline and as I pointed out when we introduced the little book of James, all of these writers had made a gentleman's agreement with Paul and Barnabas back there at the Jerusalem counsel in about 51 or 52 AD. And at that Jerusalem counsel, you remember, they shook hands. They gave the right hands of fellowship, James and Peter and John with Paul and Barnabas. And what was the agreement? That they would stay with Israel and Paul would go to the Gentiles.