Tag: Jesus Is King

Why Good Christians Disagree About Israel’s Future

Why Good Christians Disagree About Israel’s Future

Good Christians disagree about whether the people of Israel have a future in God’s plan because they have very different ways of understanding the bible’s “big story.” Many Christians believe the people of Israel are important to the bible’s story. But not all of them know why, other than to correctly declare “Israel is special” or “they’re God’s chosen people.” These are incomplete answers.

There are at least two reasons why we believe the people of Israel are a key part of the bible’s “big story.”

  • To be a blessing. Israel is special because God plans to use her as a vehicle to preach the gospel to the world during Jesus’ 1,000-year millennial reign. It is during the millennium that God fulfills his three big covenant promises to Abraham (Gen 12:1-3)—a great nation, in a land of their own, being a blessing to the world by spreading the gospel about King Jesus. These covenant promises are about “a geographical platform, a land of promise, to serve as a base of operations for God’s kingdom program on earth.”[1]
  • Millennium as a microcosm of paradise. Israel is not an end in and of itself. The millennium is a microcosm or prototype of what the Lord will do in paradise in eternity[2]—sort of the “spring training” version of the new creation paradise to come. This millennium will feature a great nation of believers, in a new and perfect land, with Jesus (“the son of Abraham,” Mt 1:1) as the penultimate Abrahamic blessing to the world.

But other Christians disagree. They believe there will be no millennium, and a very different fulfillment of those three “big promises” to Abraham. They believe Israel no longer has a unique role to play in reconciling the world to King Jesus. So, rather than seeing the great nation + land + be a blessing promises as means God will use to reach the world for the Messiah, they see them as shadows pointing to the greater realities which Christ makes real, both now and in paradise. Although these good Christians arrive at the same place—Jesus will return to punish the wicked, reward the righteous, and usher in eternity—they take a very different route to get there.

Many Christians believe the New Testament sheds new light on God’s covenant promises. They say this so-called “new light” changes what these promises mean in a way the original audience wouldn’t have understood, and in a way that violates the normal sense of the words God used to make those promises. They believe the bible does this by one thing foreshadowing another—which  is when one thing points to another thing bigger than itself (this is also called “typology”).

  • For example, Adam (our first representative), Moses (the great prophet), and David (the king of Israel) each foreshadow Jesus in complementary ways.
  • The tabernacle is a figure of the real throne room in heaven.
  • Christ also fulfills larger old covenant events in scripture which the prophets heralded; the old Eden v. the new Eden, fall v. atonement; Exodus from Egypt v. exodus from Satan’s grasp, etc.[3]

This is a real thing in scripture. But is it a real thing when it comes to God’s covenant promises? Many Christians wrongly say it is.

  • Their argument is the big three covenant promises to Abraham (a great nation + in a land of their own + to be a blessing to the world; Gen 12:2-3) are signposts which point to a larger fulfillment.[4]
  • So, they say, God does not replace Israel. Instead, Christ fulfills her promises in a larger way.

So, these Christians interpret in a non-literal way old covenant passages that we believe plainly mean more than that. Many do this because they believe the bible’s whole story is all about God’s alleged “covenant of grace” with those chosen for salvation.[5] “In the New Testament all these types reach their fulfilment and therefore cease.”[6]

  • It’s true that God has a big plan to provide salvation to sinners through faith in Christ.
  • But it isn’t true that this means the bible’s “big story” is basically about you and your personal salvation. This viewpoint interprets everything through the lens of the gospel (Jesus’ life and death),[7] when the real “big story” is the new creation paradise God has been bringing about since Genesis 3:15. Yes, Jesus essentially defeats Satan on Easter morning, but the war is not over until Revelation 22.
  • This would be like interpreting the Allied victory in Europe during World War 2 entirely from the standpoint of D-Day on 06 Jun 1944. This would be a flattening of reality. Yes, D-Day was a triumph for the Allied cause that spelled the end for Nazi Germany, but the war in Europe didn’t end for another 10 months!
  • This popular and helpful (but incomplete) “gospel-centered” lens can lead to a tunnel-vision way of reading the bible that has the New Testament flattening many Old Testament covenant promises to fit the “Jesus and individual salvation” mold.

This is why many good Christians wrongly flatten and distort God’s covenant promises to mean only this:

  • Great nation = God’s people, whoever they are (1 Pet 1:9-10)
  • The land of Canaan = Paradise in eternity (Rev 21-22)
  • Israel will be a blessing = Christ will be a blessing (“son of Abraham,” Mt 1:1)
  • King over Israel in Canaan = Jesus over his people in paradise (Rev 21-22)

We agree that, by time we get to Revelation 21-22, all this is true—the endgame truly is paradise regained, in a new creation, with one body of believers in Christ consisting of two peoples: Israel and the church (see Rev 21:10-14).

And yet … suppose you describe the plot of the 1997 movie Titanic as being “a love story on a ship.” This is true, but very incomplete—you’ve flattened the story into a pancake. This makes Titanic= an episode of The Love Boat. What if you described Harry Potter and the Sorcerer’s Stone as “a wizard kid goes to boarding school”? Or the book of Revelation as “Jesus wins”? These are all true, but really simplistic—so crude they’re wrong even though they’re technically right!

This is why the true disagreement is about the way we think the bible’s “big story” plays out. We believe God made those “big three” promises to Abraham because he determined that Israel will play a key role in reconciling people from all over the world to Jesus, and she will do this during the 1,000-year millennium. During that time, she will be a great nation, in the land of Canaan, being a blessing to the world by spreading the good news about Jesus the King. Here is one example passage from the prophet Micah that speaks of these events:

And it will come about in the last days That the mountain of the house of the LORD Will be established as the chief of the mountains. It will be raised above the hills, And the peoples will stream to it. Many nations will come and say, “Come and let’s go up to the mountain of the LORD And to the house of the God of Jacob, So that He may teach us about His ways, And that we may walk in His paths.” For from Zion will go forth the law, And the word of the LORD from Jerusalem (Micah 4:1-2).

On our interpretation, Jesus’ millennial reign is a lengthy transition period between this present, evil age (Gal 1:4) and paradise to come. That is the disagreement about the big picture.[8] This is why good Christians often talk past one another about the end-times. The other side believes the New Testament, and the apostle Paul in particular,[9] provides new understanding of these old covenant promises, and so their shape of the bible’s “big story” does not include a future mission for the people of Israel, so they see no need for a millennium.

Again, all good Christians have the same finish line: Jesus returns, punishes the wicked, and rewards the righteous. But we have very different ideas about how the big story of the bible gets to the finish line.

In the next article, we’ll discuss how to rightly understand the bible’s “big story.”

[1] Michael Vlach, The Bible Storyline (Cary: Theological Studies Press, 2025), 101.

[2] Eugene Merrill, “A Theology of the Pentateuch,” in A Biblical Theology of the Old Testament, ed. Roy B. Zuck (Chicago: Moody, 1991), 27.

[3] See esp. Graeme Goldsworthy, Gospel-Centered Hermeneutics (Downers Grove: IVP, 2006), 58-66; 245-57. The chart at pp. 253-56 is especially excellent.

[4] “These temporal blessings did not constitute an end in themselves, but served to symbolize and typify spiritual and heavenly things” (Berkhof, Systematic, 296).

[5] Berkhof argues that the second party to the so-called “covenant of grace” are the elect in Christ (Systematic, 272-76).

[6] Berkhof, Systematic, 293.

[7] “[T]he gospel is the hermeneutical norm for all of reality … For the student of the Bible, the gospel becomes the norm by which the whole Old Testament and all the exhortations and other non-gospel aspects of the New Testament are to be understood” (Goldsworthy, Gospel-Centered, 63; emphasis in original).

[8] “The basic issue is the way we understand the historical plan and the goal of that plan through which God will bring eternal glory to himself” (Saucy, Progressive Dispensationalism, 19).

[9] “The best Scriptural exposition of the Abrahamic covenant is contained in Rom. 3 and 4, and Gal. 3” (Berkhof, Systematic, 295-96).

The Cosmic Civil War: A Palm Sunday Reflection

The Cosmic Civil War: A Palm Sunday Reflection

As Easter draws near, the Christian calendar presents us with a sequence of world-altering events—Palm Sunday, Good Friday, Easter Sunday, and later Pentecost. Each day tells a part of the greatest story ever told, and it begins with Palm Sunday: the moment Jesus Christ enters Jerusalem, hailed as a king, setting into motion the fulfillment of divine promises.

In Luke 19:28–44, we find the account of Jesus’ entry into Jerusalem. But to fully grasp what’s happening, we need to step back and understand the broader picture.

The cosmic civil war

From the beginning of Scripture, humanity has been caught in a cosmic civil war. In Genesis 1 and 2, God creates a perfect world and places humanity under his authority. But in Genesis 3, Adam and Eve reject that authority and choose to go their own way. Genesis 4 onward tells the story of how we all, by birth and by choice, follow that path.

Think of the analogy of the American civil war.

Our spiritual rebellion is something like that. Our first parents founded this “confederacy.” This means we’re each born, by default, as citizens of this confederacy. Just as the southern states illegally broke away from the federal government, we have each broken away from God. Each of us, spiritually speaking, is born a citizen of this rebellion—a fraudulent kingdom opposed to its rightful ruler.

So this is the situation:

  • We can remain in the Confederacy (which is going to lose this war), or
  • We can choose to rejoin the Union.

When Jesus’ ministry begins—when he says that the kingdom of heaven is at hand, and that everyone ought to repent and believe the gospel (Mk 1:15), he’s basically asking: “what’s it gonna be?”

When Jesus enters Jerusalem one week before Passover, his three years of ministry nearly finished, he is asking: “Here I am. I’m your king. Will you choose to love me and swear an oath of allegiance to me and end this stupid war?”

This question is much more important than the American civil war, because this is a cosmic war—your very soul is at stake.

Jesus and the donkey

The turning point comes on Palm Sunday. Jesus approaches Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives, and he tells his disciples to find a donkey. This detail might seem odd, but it’s loaded with significance. Jesus is deliberately fulfilling the prophecy from Zechariah 9:9:

Rejoice greatly, Daughter Zion! Shout, Daughter Jerusalem! See, your king comes to you, righteous and victorious, lowly and riding on a donkey … (Zech 9:9).

A donkey is not exactly the image of power and might. It emphasizes Jesus’ humility—his lowly status. He isn’t a warrior. He comes not to crush enemies but to extend a hand of grace. He is the King foretold in ancient Scripture, arriving not with overwhelming force, but with a gentle invitation. He’s come to proclaim peace to the nations, and to free prisoners from a waterless pit because of the blood-oath of the new covenant he’s come to launch (Zech 9:10-11).

The donkey is not a trivial detail. It’s Jesus’ way of showing the kind of king He is: one who offers peace, not coercion.

Jesus and the palm branches

As Jesus enters the city, people begin to respond. Crowds gather, laying their cloaks on the road and waving palm branches—an ancient sign of honor and victory. They shout:

Blessed is the king who comes in the name of the Lord! Peace in heaven and glory in the highest!” (Luke 19:38; quoting Ps 118:26).

This isn’t spontaneous enthusiasm; it’s deliberate. They’re quoting Psalm 118, a psalm used in royal processions to the Jerusalem temple. This song is a well-known cultural cue, like the national anthem may be to us. They know what it means. They know what they’re singing and why. They’re acknowledging Jesus not just as a teacher or prophet, but as the rightful King of Israel. “[T]he whole crowd of disciples began joyfully to praise God in loud voices for all the miracles they had seen” (Lk 19:37). They recall His miracles: raising Lazarus, healing the sick, casting out demons. Everything Jesus has done points to this moment. He is the Messish and the king.

But not everyone is pleased.

Jesus weeps over Jerusalem

The Pharisees, standing in the crowd, hear the chants and understand their meaning. They demand that Jesus rebuke his followers. They know what this singing means—that Jesus is the fulfillment of all prophecy, the King who brings God’s kingdom. Jesus responds: “I tell you, if they keep quiet, the stones will cry out” (Luke 19:40)

But  Jesus knows the celebration is less than honest. This same crowd is nowhere to be found later in the week, on Good Friday. So as he draws near to Jerusalem, Jesus does something unexpected: he weeps. “If you, even you, had only known on this day what would bring you peace—but now it is hidden from your eyes” (Luke 19:42).

Jesus offers peace with God. Peace for your soul. Peace for your heart. The apostle Paul wrote: “Therefore, since we have been justified through faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ” (Rom 5:1). This is the same peace the angels offered on Christmas morning: “Glory to God in the highest heaven, and on earth peace to those on whom his favor rests” (Lk 2:14). His favor rests on those who come in from the cold and choose to love him.

The King who comes in peace now mourns, knowing that many will reject him. Within days, the same crowds shouting “Hosanna” will yell “Crucify him!” (Mk 15:13). Though peace is within their reach, they will choose rebellion. The city that celebrates him will soon betray him.

The Cosmic Amnesty

After the American civil war, President Andrew Johnson offered amnesty to any Confederate who wanted it.

Johnson specifically says this amnesty was a pardon. His proclamation said that to suppress the rebellion, to convince people to be loyal to the true government once again, and to restore Federal authority, he was offering a pardon if you swore a particular oath and sincerely mean it. Pardon does not mean you’re innocent—it means you’re released from legal liability.

This is exactly what Jesus is offering. We’re so-called “citizens” of a fraudulent nation in rebellion against lawful authority. To suppress this rebellion, to convince people to be loyal to the true government once again, and to restore his divine authority, God is offering a pardon if you swear an oath to his Son—if you repent and believe the good news and sincerely mean it.

As Jesus looks down upon Jerusalem from the Mount of Olives, he’s making an offer: “Swear an oath of allegiance from your heart, and let’s get this done.” But it does not happen. Jerusalem will soon say: “I’ll take Option B.”

So, what will we do? You can do nothing and remain in the Confederacy (which will lose this war), or you can choose to rejoin the Union.