Some are teaching today that Christians will keep on attempting to do good until the Kingdom of God is established on the earth. This is not scriptural. The Kingdom of God will be installed suddenly and with violence, totally overpowering the wicked in a moment of time.

Because of the entrance of numerous Gentiles into the Body of Christ the concept has arisen that the Christian Church is Gentile; that in order to become a Christian a Jew must become a Gentile. This is a tremendous and destructive error in Christian thinking.

We have two concepts of Israel today, both of which are erroneous.

The one error is that the Christian (Gentile) Church is true Israel and that God is finished with the physical land and people of Israel.

The other error is that true Israel, the Israel mentioned by the Prophets of the Old Testament, consists only of the physical land and people of Israel. Wherever "Israel" is mentioned in the Old Testament (it is conjectured), the text is designated as being for the physical Jews. This is to cut off the greater part of the Scriptures from the Christians, to exclude the Gentiles from the elect, from the Kingdom of God, and to leave the Gentile Christians with no scriptural description of their destiny in God.

The Israelis are being courted today by many sincere Christians. These devout lovers of Israel do not regard the "Jewishness" of the Gentile members of the Body of Christ with enough seriousness. They are considering Gentile Christians to be something less than true members of Israel.

Both of these lines of thought may contain some truth, but also enough error to prevent a genuine understanding of the Kingdom of God.

The true Jew is the one who has been born again of Christ. Circumcision is of the heart. Jerusalem on earth is "Hagar" while the Jerusalem in Heaven is "Sarah"—the mother of us all (Galatians 4:25,26).

There only is one true Seed of Abraham by promise. That one Seed is Christ and all of those who are part of Christ. There is no other seed of Abraham that will inherit the Kingdom of God. The believer who deviates from this position is going contrary to the Apostle Paul.

Paul, a Jew, spoke from the mouth of Christ. Paul's writings are as binding on the Church as are the inspired utterances of the Hebrew Prophets. Paul's writings are Scripture. They are the inspired Word of God.

In addition, it is true that physical Israel is loved of God because of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. The Kingdom of God has a material, earthly component. That component always will be the nation of Israel. The Bride of the Lamb always will be Jerusalem. To depart from this understanding is to depart from the Prophets and to cast one's self adrift in a sea of guesswork.

How are these two truths reconciled, one might ask?

The answer is found in the eleventh chapter of the Book of Romans. There is but one olive tree. That tree is Christ. The Jews were broken off from their tree because of their unbelief. We Gentiles are being grafted on that one tree.

To be continued.