As an ethnic Jew who has accepted Christ, many Christians are all too eager to hear my thoughts on American foreign policy with regards to Israel, particularly when it comes to the future restoration of Israel promised in Romans 11. I actually really hate it when people ask me about this. It makes me extremely uncomfortable on a number of levels. What they usually want is to hear me slander and misrepresent proponents of "replacement theology." Here is a brief summary of some of my thoughts as an issue.
In the words of John Piper:
a covenant-breaking people does not have a present claim on covenant promises. Therefore it is wrong for America or for Christians to be unquestioningly pro-Israel and anti-Palestinian in the political and geographical situation of the Middle East. It may be right to be pro-Israel or pro-Palestinian on any given issue, but while Israel is breaking the covenant with her God by rejecting his Messiah, the criterion for what is right in the Middle East should be equally applied standards of justice and mercy among nations, not divine rights or covenant privileges. Our relation to Jews and Palestinians should be to love them and treat them with mercy and justice, as we do all others. Anti-Semitism is sin. And unquestioning rejection of possible rights of Palestinians is sin.
In my own words, here are my feelings on the relation of theology to American foreign policy regarding Israel and Palestine: If Palestinians do not accept the Gospel, they will go to hell. God hates them. If Israelites do not accept the Gospel, they will go to hell. God hates them. The same is true of Americans and Bulgarians and Chinese.
Unless and until Israel as a nation accepts Christ, they are no less a pagan nation than the Middle Easterners with whom they are at war. Indeed, they are even more accursed than whatever Arabs or Persians they are fighting at any given time. According to Jesus, Israel as a nation is under God's covenant curses until the end of the "time of the Gentiles":
I regard the uncritical support of ANY Christ-rejecting nation with absolute disgust and utter hatred. Uncritical pro-Israelism disgusts me as much as uncritical pro-Palestinianism or uncritical pro-Americanism. God does not love, nor has he ever loved, Israel as a national entity. He loves elect Israelites and elect Gentiles. He hates non-elect "Israelites"(Ps. 95:10)(indeed, Paul denies that non-elect Israelites are actually Israelites at all, Rom. 9:6)) and non-elect Gentiles(Ps. 5:5, 11:5, etc.). It's always been that way, and will always be that way.
The reason dispensationalists ignore the insistence among postmillennialists that there will be a future conversion of Israel is most likely rooted in their dependence on accusations of anti-semitism to compensate for their completely ridiculous exegesis and the oftentimes heretical doctrines that result from it.
I am grateful that the particular theological milieu with which I am associated, that is, historical, non-dispensational Calvinism, regards advocates of uncritical pro-Israelism with contempt, and even typically condemns the theological teaching associated with it as heretical. These fellow Calvinists do not prod me with stupid questions about my feelings on Israeli foreign policy. They simply celebrate the fact that we are one body in Christ, rather than attempting to rebuild the dividing wall of hostility (and awkwardness) with fleshly preoccupation with race, nationality, or ethnicity.
I regard uncritical pro-Israelism as an extremely serious theological error with enormous consequences. In the case of dispensationalists who believe that there will be a literal rebuilt Temple in Jerusalem with a literal restoration of animal sacrifices that cleanse the Jews of their ceremonial defilement, I regard this as an outright heresy and I look forward to its eradication once Christ conquers the nations through the preached Gospel.
I look forward to a mass conversion of individual, elect Israelites, as per Romans 11, though I believe this will entail their ingrafting into the exact same body as that of the Gentiles. Again though, I do not believe there will be a restoration of anything like a Mosaic Law or a Levitical cultus, and I believe that anyone who advocates such a belief preaches heresy.
I do not believe that the body of Christ will be ripped in half, and the Jews once again subjected to the Law, with the sacrifice of Christ insulted and diminished by means of restored animal sacrifices. I regard the teaching of dispensationalism as necessarily entailing it, and it makes me want to vomit. There is a time for reconciliation, building up, compromise, soft, gentle speech, etc. This is not one of them. Condemning such teaching with such harshness does not entail division within the body; it entails defending the body against dangerous false teaching.
11 Therefore remember that at one time you Gentiles in the flesh, called “the uncircumcision” by what is called the circumcision, which is made in the flesh by hands— 12 remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13 But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. 14 For he himself is our peace, who has made us both one and has broken down in his flesh the dividing wall of hostility 15 by abolishing the law of commandments expressed in ordinances, that he might create in himself one new man in place of the two, so making peace, 16 and might reconcile us both to God in one body through the cross, thereby killing the hostility. 17 And he came and preached peace to you who were far off and peace to those who were near. 18 For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19 So then you are no longer strangers and aliens,[d] but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20 built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone, 21 in whom the whole structure, being joined together, grows into a holy temple in the Lord. 22 In him you also are being built together into a dwelling place for God by[e] the Spirit.-Eph. 2:11-22.
Here's a brief, open letter I wrote to this who teach and believe such things:
Dear Dispensationalists,
As an ethnic Jew who has accepted Christ and adopted a postmillennialist eschatology, I consider the idea that the Jews will be placed under the Law during the Millennium and forced once again to offer up animal sacrifices to cleanse themselves from ceremonial defilement as a reward for surviving a 3.5 year holocaust as anti-semitic, heretical, and just plain idiotic. Please stop trying to become my Best Friend by telling me that you look forward to seeing it happen at the end of the Church Age
Yours truly,
A postmillennial calvinist messianic Jew
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