The Foolish Nation
If the Apostle Paul were alive on the earth today, he would surely be considered either a heretic, or a dangerous extremist, or both. You see, his understanding of the primary mission of the church, and the means of attaining it, and the consequences of failing, was vastly different from what most Christians believe today. You may be shocked to hear of it, although it has been right there on the pages of your Bible all along.
Let’s start with this passionate cry of Paul’s heart:
I tell the truth in Christ, I am not lying, my conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Spirit, that I have great sorrow and continual grief in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh, who are Israelites, to whom pertain the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the service of God, and the promises. (Romans 9:1-4)
If Paul could have personally traded places with his cut-off countrymen, he would have done so, knowing that God Himself had made a self-cursing oath to fulfill His promise to Abraham and his offspring (see also God’s Self-Cursing Oath). But Paul knew that they could not obtain the promise unless they had the faith of their father Abraham, which would cause them to do the deeds of Abraham.1 Finding himself helpless to persuade them by force of argument,2 Paul latched upon a secret hidden in the words of the prophets that filled his soul with hope and determination. That secret lies in the connection between these two verses:
They have provoked Me to jealousy by what is not God; they have moved Me to anger by their foolish idols. But I will provoke them to jealousy by those who are not a nation; I will move them to anger by a foolish nation. (Deuteronomy 32:21)
It is too small a thing that You should be My Servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved ones of Israel; I will also give You as a light to the Gentiles, that You should be My salvation to the ends of the earth. (Isaiah 49:6)
Did you grasp it? God’s plan to win back a remnant of Abraham’s wayward descendants, so as to be able to give them the Promised Land, was to raise up a spiritual Israel of twelve tribes from among the Gentiles — a “foolish nation” in the eyes of Abraham’s natural descendants. They would be like a spiritual “Jacob” seizing the heritage for themselves.3 Their vibrant life of love and unity, which fulfills the righteous requirements of the Law4 in the liberty of the Spirit, would make the Jews jealous.
If you find it hard to accept that the “church” or the “Body of Christ” ought to be composed of twelve tribes, or that its mission has anything to do with God’s promise to Abraham, consider Paul’s position on the matter:
1) In Acts 13:47 Paul took his stand on Isaiah 49:6 (quoted above) to justify his ministry to the Gentiles; and
2) In Acts 26:6-7 Paul took his stand with that twelve-tribed “foolish nation” and its mission:
And now I stand here on trial on account of my hope in the promise made by God to our fathers, a promise that our twelve tribes hope to attain, as they earnestly serve God day and night. And it is for this hope, O King, that I am accused by the Jews! (Acts 26:6-7)
Surely Paul was not speaking of the twelve tribes of natural Israel, long ago fallen away and dispersed because of their unfaithfulness.5 Only a remnant had returned to the land after the Babylonian captivity, and Paul would not describe them as “earnestly serving God day and night” when they were the very ones persecuting him. No, it was the twelve tribes of the “foolish nation” he was laboring with the other apostles to establish,6 mostly composed of Gentiles beyond the borders of natural Israel, in fulfillment of the words of the prophet Malachi:
“Your eyes shall see, and you shall say, ‘The LORD is magnified beyond the border of Israel.’ For from the rising of the sun, even to its going down, My name shall be great among the Gentiles; in every place incense shall be offered to My name, and a pure offering; for My name shall be great among the nations,” says the LORD of hosts. (Malachi 1:5,11)
It was unthinkable to the Jews that God would accept offerings in any other place than the Temple in Jerusalem, and from Gentiles at that! But as Malachi describes,7 God was weary of natural Israel’s defiled offerings, their stale ritual observances that did not come from their hearts in response to His love. Of course every one of them could quote from memory:
Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God, the LORD is one! You shall love the LORD your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. (Deuteronomy 6:4-5)
But they did not bear the fruit of that love they professed.8 The fruit God was looking for was the same as what He expected and received from their father Abraham:
For I have known him, in order that he may command his children and his household after him, to keep the way of the LORD, to do righteousness and justice, that the LORD may bring to Abraham what He has promised him. (Genesis 18:19)
Every parent of Israel was to train up their children in the Way of the LORD,9 thereby the whole nation would be secure to bear the fruit of the Kingdom. The failure of Israel to produce the fruit of the Kingdom was disobedience to their God. It was not because they did not hear the message or because they could not understand it. The last words of the last prophet sent to warn them were these:
Behold, I will send you Elijah the prophet before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the LORD. And he will turn the hearts of the fathers to the children, and the hearts of the children to their fathers, lest I come and strike the land with a curse. (Malachi 4:5-6)
