This is totally spot on!!!
If the cross is not enough for Israel then they are damned and doomed for all eternity. But salvation is open to them today in the exact same way as it is for us. It is through the one all-sufficient sacrifice for sin on the cross 2000 years ago alone that men are saved. That is it! If they embrace the cross they will go to heaven, if reject they it they will go to hell. It is that simple! There is no other hope!
Revelation 13:8 tells us that Christ was “the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world.” He was predestined to come into this world as a substitutionary sacrifice, without which no man could be saved. 1 Peter 1:19 confirms that Christ was “a lamb without blemish and without spot: Who verily was foreordained before the foundation of the world, but was manifest in these last times for you.” There was a predetermined blueprint that Christ had to fulfil – He did perfectly.
Calvary was an important part of God's Sovereign plan for fallen-man. Our salvation was secured in eternity because God lives and works in eternity. It was experientially realized in time, because man is born and lives in time. Christ performed the Father's will for our lives - by dying for us. The Holy Spirit applied the Father's will to our lives – by convicting us and regenerating us.
Dispensationalists argue that it is all about the bloodline, and they are right, however, they focus in on the wrong bloodline. They choose the natural bloodline of Abraham instead of the ongoing blood atonement system God has provided as a means of redemption for the penitent sinners. The blood covenant provides a spiritual covering for all those who have entered into a personal experiential covenant relationship with God. This whole arrangement began in the Garden, continued through their righteous son Abel, and continues still today through the cross-work.
The Old Testament prophets predicted the manner of Messiah’s ministry and the focus of His earthly mission. They foretold the time that He would come. They described His assignment and detailed His accomplishments. They depicted a suffering servant coming to redeem Israel from their sin. They portrayed the resistance He would experience. They forecast His rejection and the cross.
The angel of the Lord summed up Christ’s mission on earth when he spoke to Joseph in a dream about the birth of Jesus in Matthew 1:20–21: “Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost. And she shall bring forth a son, and thou shalt call his name JESUS: for he shall save his people from their sins.”
Christ had a task to fulfil and goals to achieve. Everything He encountered and when He encountered it was part of a preordained plan for Him. That plan captivated His whole time on this earth from the cradle to the cross. Jesus testified in Luke 19:10: “For the Son of man is come to seek and to save that which was lost.” Jesus was a man on a mission. He came to help fallen man. 1 Timothy 1:15 declares, “This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.”
Christ actually came to rescue us and save us from our sin. He knew our predicament and He came to help. He came for the broken, the hurting, the broken, the confused and the lost. He came to rescue people in a fallen state. Jesus tells us in John 3:16-17: “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life. For God sent not his Son into the world to condemn the world; but that the world through him might be saved.”
When Jesus came 2000 years ago He was on a mission of love from start to finish. Heaven couldn’t have given mankind a greater gift. His whole life was love: every word He said and every deed He did was saturated in love. His death was the final and eternal seal of that love pertaining to His ministry on this earth.
Those old covenant saints that had eyes to see fully grasped the spiritual assignment of the Messiah Christ. They knew that He was coming to redeem His people from their sins. The song of Mary, the Magnificat, shows that, connecting Christ’s birth to the fulfilment of His mission, to save His people. Mary praises Him: “My soul doth magnify the Lord, And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour” (Luke 1:46-47).
John the Baptist’s father Zacharias, who was filled with the Holy Ghost, prophesied in Luke 1:68-75: “Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; for he hath visited and redeemed his people, And hath raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David; As he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, which have been since the world began: That we should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us; To perform the mercy promised to our fathers, and to remember his holy covenant; The oath which he sware to our father Abraham, That he would grant unto us, that we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear, In holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of our life.”
The elect remnant of Israel had a spiritual awareness of Christ’s mission. Redemption was the central aspect of Messiah’s mission to earth. Israel needed the sin question addressed more than any other issue. This was man’s greatest affliction. Right was His birth redemption was the great spiritual assignment laid upon His shoulders.
The coming redeemer was anticipated by Simeon who faithfully waited for His appearing in Luke 2:30-35, where he acknowledged: “For mine eyes have seen thy salvation, Which thou hast prepared before the face of all people; A light to lighten the Gentiles, and the glory of thy people Israel … Behold, this child is set for the fall and rising again of many in Israel; and for a sign which shall be spoken against; (Yea, a sword shall pierce through thy own soul also,) that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed.”
Redemption was no secondary thought. It was no Plan B. It was the duty Jesus came to realize and He accomplished it perfectly. Anna, the prophetess, announced the same in Luke 2:38: “she coming in that instant gave thanks likewise unto the Lord, and spake of him to all them that looked for redemption in Jerusalem.” Obviously, those who knew the Old Testament Scriptures, and were blessed with eyes to see, were fully aware that redemption was at the forefront of the Messiah’s ministry. The enlightened old covenant saints awaited the promised redeemer with great anticipation. This was central to their faith and necessary for their eternal redemption.
The language of Messianic fulfilment is written throughout the New Testament pages. John the Baptist introduced Christ in John 1:31, as “he that was to be … made manifest to Israel.” Simeon testified He was the “consolation of Israel” (Luke 2:25). Paul describes Him in Acts 28:20 as “the hope of Israel.” He is the eternal fulfilment of the vision and prophecy.
John the Baptist introduced Christ in John 1:29-30: “Behold the Lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world. This is he of whom I said, After me cometh a man which is preferred before me: for he was before me.”
John the Baptist was familiar with Old Testament prophecy, as that is all he had. He recognized that animal sacrifices were coming to an end because Jesus Christ, the ultimate and perfect sacrifice, had arrived. He was the desire of every true Israelite from the beginning.
Christ’s focus and His mission were to redeem His people. This was central to His Gospel message. He told the disciples in Mark 8:27-31 (paralleling Matthew 16:21 and Luke 9:22): “And he began to teach them, that the Son of man must suffer many things, and be rejected of the elders, and of the chief priests, and scribes, and be killed, and after three days rise again.”
Christ perfectly succeeded in His mission. Contrary to false Dispy teaching, Jesus did not come to set up a literal physical earthly Davidic kingdom, He came to die for our sins. This is another of countless fallacies that are attached to Dispensationalism.
sovereigngrace,
1. It is not totally spot on.
Why do you persist on spreading lies about dispensations belief when you know good and well your false accusation that we think the Cross was not enough for Israel.
It is downright insulting to think such a thing lot alone say it over and over again and again like a broken record. You ought to be ashamed of such atrocity.
2. The Cross was the fulfillment of the 1st prophecy in Genesis 3:15.
Spiritually, there is no other way to be saved than the blood of Jesus who died on Calvary Matthew 28:26; Hebrews 9:22.
So you are wrong on this point in what you say dispensationalists believe.
Israel has to be forgiven their sins under the New Covenant as a nation Jeremiah 31:31-34; Romans 11:25-29; Hebrews 8:7-13.
This couldn’t happen under Jesus ministry
3. Since we believe that Calvary was and is enough and will always be enough Romans 1:16.
4. Dispensationalists believe that Israel has the same opportunity to be saved by the New Covenant as anyone else.
Dispensationalists believe if they accept Christ they will go to Heaven and if they reject they will be damned forever. It’s either Heaven or Hell. That’s it. He is the only hope!
5. Revelation 13:8 and 1 Peter 1:19 we believe the same as you that Christ was predestined to become the Savior for the world by the death of the Cross and that he would fulfill just that and he did that.
6. Dispensationalists do not believe that the physical bloodline is the ongoing atonement system. That is your fabrication of the position.
Romans 3:2; Physical Israel was committed with the oracles of God.
Matthew 21:43-44; shows the prophecy of Jesus that the spiritual aspect of the KoG would be taken away from Israel and given to a nation bringing forth the fruits because the nation of Israel rejecting Jesus gospel of the spiritual aspect of the KoG Matthew 6:33;Luke 17:20-21.
This we know is the church of Jew and Gentile Ephesians 2:14-15.
7. We believe in the blood covenant like you.
We believe in the prophets predictions about the manner of Messiah, and the focus of the suffering servant and that he was to redeem Israel.
We don’t spiritually allegorize redeeming Israel like he accomplished that in his ministry which was not true because they rejected him Matthew 23:37-39.
You have to twist scripture and deny this scripture to make your interpretation try and stick, whether in his ministry or the early church. Matthew 1:21-23 is such an example.
Like 19:10 was prophetic to after the cross.
This is why Paul stated 1 Timothy 1:15 after the cross agrees with Luke.
His earthly ministry of the KoH was to Israel only Matthew 10:6-7. The gentiles were strangers to the Covenants Ephesians 2:12.
8. The plan b in Schafer’s context was correct.
Your accusation is that God’s plan with the Son didn’t work so he had to think of another plan and in your words above was a secondary thought.
Dispensationalism does not believe such a thing.
Just as Israel was in the plan of God to bring the Messiah to fruition Galatians 4:4 the Church was predestined before the foundation of the world Ephesians 1:3.
Isaiah 53 shows a picture of Israel rejecting Christ which was the result shown in John 1:11.
9. Matthew 16:21; Mark 8:27:31; and Luke 9:22; dispensationalists believe these scriptures. What you fail to understand is that this was not a part of the KoH and KoG message to the Jews because Israel had already rejected Jesus Matthew 23:37-39. Your time factor is off.
10. We agree in many things spiritually speaking, but like usual your post deny proper context when speaking of the physical KoH that you replace by spiritually allegorizing scriptures . This is why you cannot be consistent with the scriptures.
Jesus focus had to be on the spiritual aspect because without it they would never qualify to rule the physical KoH Luke 17:22-37.
This is clear of the end days but first Christ had to suffer and be rejected of his generation.
11. Yes Israel will be in the KoH in the future Ezekiel 37:16-28.
Isaiah 2:1-4 Isaiah wrote about the last days of Judah and Jerusalem that the mountain of the Lord’s house shall be established in the tops of the mountains and shall be exalted above the hills and all nations shall flow into it. And the Lord will rule out of Zion where the law will go forth.
This is a physical kingdom capital of the earth Isaiah 2:1-4; Zechariah 14:9 King all over the earth.
Quit making up falsehoods and being onesided. The evidence shows that is what you’re posting. Jerry Kelso