Are the Jews Israel, or is the church Israel? Or does it depend on the context of the passage?

Daniel Martinovich said:

Why can't it be through normal gospel means which obviously includes revivals and the providence of God like I said in the OP? Why do people always lean towards fantasticism in regards to the future when the future has already been happening?

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There is plenty of scripture speaking of Jews returning to the land as believers.

This has not happened given the rejection of Jesus which prevails among them.

Guojing said:

When they are undergoing the great tribulation, there will be

144,000 brethren preaching to them
Moses and Elijah preaching to them
Angels preaching to them
Their signs and wonders will be on full display

With all these, I am sure there will be a great revivial for them, as Paul predicted in Romans 11:25-29

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Do you think Moses and Elijah are the two witnesses?

Carl Emerson said:

Do you think Moses and Elijah are the two witnesses?

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Yes, but others may have different views of course.

Daniel Martinovich said:

That is kind of a cultural opinion but not some iron clad fact of life The first church I was a member of was half Jewish. I cut my teeth in ministry among Jewish people. They were by far my favorite unbelievers to minister to. Have you ever seen one for Israel salvation testimony video’s? Very uplifting and faith building. You aught to watch a few. I just picked a random one here.

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I have ministered in Israel also and have a deep love for the Jewish people.

However their religious orthodoxy is staunchly anti-Jesus.

Daniel Martinovich said:

If you’re talking about the dudes dressed in black with silly hats and pigtails yes. But they even irritate normal Jews. The percentage of them in comparison to the Jewish population worldwide is negligible enough to say they don’t represent Jews.

I have not found that crowd has enough influence among Jews in general to not be able to effectively minster to Jews.

I think I can safely say. Who isn’t anti-Jesus until they run into Jesus?

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Wearing a cross tends to make the air turn blue - there is a definite anti-Christ attitude among average Jews.

There are also secret believers and many genuinely open to the Gospel.

I was supporting new believers who lost their jobs and families when they committed to Jesus.

Daniel Martinovich said:

I think I can safely say. Who isn’t anti-Jesus until they run into Jesus?

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Me...

I was aware of Him by the age of 3 and somehow knew I belonged.

Daniel Martinovich said:

Well, I have certainly seen that. But if it were my business witnessing to Jews or Muslims. I would not lead off wearing a cross.

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Agreed - I didn't - but I witnessed it when others did.

Ivan Hlavanda said:

The Church is not Israel, neither it has replaced Israel. I don't know how Christians can read Romans 11 and came to the conclusion that the Church has replaced Israel

Romans 11 13 Now I am speaking to you Gentiles. Inasmuch then as I am an apostle to the Gentiles, I magnify my ministry 14 in order somehow to make my fellow Jews jealous, and thus save some of them. 15 For if their rejection means the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance mean but life from the dead?

25 Lest you be wise in your own sight, I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers:[d] a partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. 26 And in this way all Israel will be saved, as it is written,

“The Deliverer will come from Zion,
he will banish ungodliness from Jacob”;
27 “and this will be my covenant with them
when I take away their sins.”

28 As regards the gospel, they are enemies for your sake. But as regards election, they are beloved for the sake of their forefathers

Isaiah 66 8 Who has heard such a thing? Who has seen such things? Shall a land be born in one day? Shall a nation be brought forth in one moment? For as soon as Zion was in labor she brought forth her children.

God asked, can a nation be created in 1 day? Then He answered yes by establishing Israel in 1948.

This was prophesied by Ezekiel also. Ezekiel 36:19 I scattered them among the nations, and they were dispersed through the countries. In accordance with their ways and their deeds I judged them. - this happened in 70AD. Israel was scattered across the world, with no land, no army, no government. But let's take a look what God says in verse 24 'I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land.' And this indeed happened in may 1948.
We can then surely say that the modern Israel is the same Israel in OT.

The people of Israel are cut apart because God chose them to be His Holy, Exodus 19:6 and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you shall speak to the people of Israel.”

They are special for the sole reason that God has declared them to be special. They are the physical fulfilment of the extraordinary promese God made thousands of years ago to Abraham and his wife Sara.

It is for this reason Paul says in Romans 11: I ask, then, has God rejected his people? By no means! For I myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin. 2 God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew.

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Exactly. God has made irrevocable promises to Israel, which make no sense when people try applying them to the church or ignore altogether. I think it’s very important for Christians to rightly divide the scriptures and understand that there are three groups of people; Jews (Israel), Gentiles (non-Jews), and the church (born again believers-Jews and Gentiles).

“After the Cross a new entity came into existence—the church that Jesus Christ promised He would build (Mt 16:18). As a result, there are now three divisions of mankind: Jews, Gentiles and the church. Paul tells us that we are to “Give none offence, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God” (1 Cor 10:32). It is absolutely essential to understand that these three groups exist side by side in today’s world, to distinguish between them, and to recognize that God deals with each differently.”

RisenInJesus said:

Exactly. God has made irrevocable promises to Israel, which make no sense when people try applying them to the church or ignore altogether. I think it’s very important for Christians to rightly divide the scriptures and understand that there are three groups of people; Jews (Israel), Gentiles (non-Jews), and the church (born again believers-Jews and Gentiles).

“After the Cross a new entity came into existence—the church that Jesus Christ promised He would build (Mt 16:18). As a result, there are now three divisions of mankind: Jews, Gentiles and the church. Paul tells us that we are to “Give none offence, neither to the Jews, nor to the Gentiles, nor to the church of God” (1 Cor 10:32). It is absolutely essential to understand that these three groups exist side by side in today’s world, to distinguish between them, and to recognize that God deals with each differently.”

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If you are indeed rightly dividing as you claim, then you should be aware that the "church" that Jesus promised in Matthew is not the same as the Body of Christ that Paul was speaking about.

That "church" is the little flock or the remanent of Israel who believed in Jesus as their Messiah

I think both.

The Church is referred to as the Israel of God, and Paul does say that not all who are ethnically Israel are true Israel. Yet, Romans 11 seems to use Israel to refer to ethnic Jews.

I think it's clear in the Bible that the ethnic Jews will eventually be grafted back into the olive tree that is Israel, but I cannot say what that looks like. Will it be a mass revival among them? Will they retain their cultural heritage like the Messianics? Does this have anything to do with the Holy Land? Idk.

I will say that thinking that the modern state of Israel is part of God's divine plan doesn't require you to subscribe to dispensationalism.

Personally, despite my own doubts about dispensationalism, the modern state of Israel is one of those things that keeps me from completely dismissing dispensationalism. Like, was it all just a coincidence?

The Established Church as the People of God of the New Covenant, isn’t a correct statement as it is only individuals who qualify according to their faith and righteousness.
In the New Testament no emphasis is given to any select group, but only to the whole company of what the NT calls ‘the elect,’ ‘the saints,’ ‘the disciples,’ ‘the brothers and sisters.’ If we recognise that all born again, baptised believers make up the Body of Christ and the People of God, we won’t make the mistake of identifying the true church with the Established Church. The real church is always the whole People of God, the whole ekklesia, the whole Body of Christ, the whole communion (fellowship, koinonia) of the disciples of Jesus. It includes lay persons, clergy and non-church people. All faithful Christian believers make up and belong together to the chosen race, the royal priesthood, the holy nation.

This implies a second conclusion: that as Christians, all members of the Church are fundamentally equal. All equally have been called by God to belong, all equally have been justified by Christ, all equally have been sanctified by the Holy Spirit. All equally have been called to respond to the message, the person and the work of Christ, by their faith, their commitment, their cooperation, their trust and their love. In principle also, all are equally responsible for the Church’s work in the world, its mission to spread to Gospel.

The gifts of the Spirit result in different services, tasks, functions and offices, but they are secondary to the fundamental membership in the Church which is based on true belief, and to the life of discipleship which stems from keeping the Commandments and doing the works according each individual’s situation. What counts more than any ministry or office, however exalted, is whether we live authentically as members of the chosen People of God.

Do we live in faith, hope and love in covenant relationship with God and with our fellow disciples of Jesus?
For, more than anything, the Church is the community of the disciples of Jesus. Everything else is secondary and subordinate to that. The shared call to baptism and discipleship has meant that from the beginning all kinds of people, sometimes persons naturally opposed, have joined the church and belonged to the congregation.

Jews and Gentiles, free citizens and slaves, rich and poor, men and women, have shared with one another in the life of the Church as fellow disciples of Jesus Christ, their Lord. An important point is that only through Jesus, has every Christian become the People of God in the New Covenant.

This has happened ‘in Christ,’ as Paul says. This truth raises two questions, vital questions in Christian-Jewish dialogue and reconciliation today:
1. Has God rejected His ethnic people and been unfaithful to his promises?
2. Have the Jews ceased to be a People of God?
These are difficult questions, which have been debated by Bible scholars and theologians for many years. To both of these questions the Apostle Paul has given a decisive ‘No!’ But as we see today sadly: most Jews continue to reject Jesus.

So; who exactly is the Israel of God now?

We know from Romans 9:27, that Israel is as numerous as the sands of the sea and 1 Peter 1:1 and James 1:1 both send greetings to the Twelve Tribes, scattered abroad.
The Jews alone do not fit either of these criteria.

The truth, that God has kept hidden from general knowledge, is that the ten Northern tribes, taken to the Caucasus region by Assyria did not remain there and they migrated across Europe, Jeremiah 31:21, they now comprise most of the Western peoples and have become the Christian nations.

That God’s Plan to have a people that bear the proper fruit; as the Jews rejected Him, Matthew 21:43, HAS been successful and that Western Christians are mostly Israelites: actual descendants of Jacob, is nothing short of miraculous and shows God’s amazing Plan of sending Jesus to be our Redeemer and Saviour, to be God’s fulfilment of Deuteronomy 18:18-19, Acts 7:37
Note: that Jesus came to be our Redeemer. To redeem someone means to reinstate them, to buy them back again from a fallen state.

Our destiny as born again Christians, is to be the people God has never had, His witnesses, Isaiah 43:10, Acts 1:8 and displaying His Light to the nations. Isaiah 49:8, Matthew 5:14 It will be our privilege and our honour, as He showers His Spirit and His Blessings upon His righteous people, as they live in peace and prosperity in all of the holy Land. Amos 9:13-15, Isaiah 35:1-10, Ezekiel 39:25-29, Revelation 7:9

The acceptance of the Gospel by some Jews like Paul means that their apostasy is not total. But the bulk of the ethnic Christian Israel of God are His people who have forgotten their ancestry. In the end times, their eyes will be opened and their ears unstopped; Isaiah 32:3-4 All the true righteous and faithful Christian people from every tribe, race, nation and language, Revelation 5:9-10, will be citizens of the new nation of Beulah, Isaiah 62:1-5, in all of the holy Land, but in order to fulfil God’s promises to the Patriarchs, the majority will be the actual descendants of Jacob. Amos 9:9, Jeremiah 50:4-7

As Paul asserts: in the end "all Israel will be saved.” That is: every ethnic Israelite faithful to God, will enter the holy Land, accompanied by every true Christian Gentile, all members of the Israel of God, Isaiah 56:1-8, Ephesians 2:1-18, but ALL who reject Him will not. Ezekiel 20:34-38, Hebrews 10:26-27