THE PLACE OF THE JEW

By William Chalfant

WHAT ADVANTAGE HATH THE JEW?

The apostle Paul (Rom. 3.1) asked an important question concerning the place of the Jew in God's overall scheme and program. He asked this question even after the apostolic church had been established. "What advantage then hath the Jew? or what profit is there of circumcision"? It seems that the apostle Paul still saw an advantage in being a Jew. There are those today who abominate circumcision and see the Jew as an embarrassment to the church. But Paul saw a profit (a factor or a circumstance of benefit to its possessor) in being a circumcised Jew. The word "advantage" also means "superiority of position or condition".

The inspired word of God admits that there is still and advantage or a profit in being a Jew. Obviously, this potential advantage does the present Jew little good spiritually (other than still being in the program of God as to the future of his people). Without salvation, Jews are filling Hell. Moreover, they remain under the curse of the blood of Jesus, whom they continue, as a people, to repudiate.

Nevertheless, Paul says they have an advantage. Paul answers that this advantage is "much" in "every way". The "chief", or main reason, which Paul gave, was that the sayings (the oracles or scriptures) were committed to the Jews. There must have also been other reasons also, which Paul could have presented.

THE ORACLES OF GOD

I think it is always well to remember that Paul himself was a circumcised Jew. In spite of Paul's battles with those Jews, which were called "Judaizers", Paul reminded his Gentile readers that the scriptures were committed to the Jews. All of the writers of the 66 books of the Bible were Jews (it is likely that Luke was at least half-Jew).

The founder of the Christian religion was Himself a Jew (John 4.22), born of a Jewish mother, and raised as a circumcised Jew. He kept the law and fulfilled the law (Matthew 5.17). Paul called Jesus "a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers" (Romans 15.8).

In the early church (and there would continue to exist such today) there was a division of missions. The Jewish church elders saw that "the gospel of uncircumcision was committed unto (Paul), as the gospel of circumcision was unto Peter". Peter had the "apostleship of the circumcison" (Galatians 2.7,8). The elders, James, Peter, and John, agreed that Paul and Barnabas would go to the Gentiles, while they themselves would go to the circumcision (the Jews) (Galatians 2.9). The expanded missions to the newly converted Gentiles was given especially to the direction of the Jewish apostle, Paul.

THE IMPORTANCE OF CIRCUMCISION CONTINUED IN THE CASE OF THE JEWS

When Paul was in Lystra, he had Timothy circumcised because, as Luke says, "his father was a Greek". Why didn't Luke say "because his mother was a Jewess" (Acts 16.1-3)? She was indeed a Jewess. Did Paul cave in to the "Judaizers"? Or was it that Paul had no problem with continuing to circumcise Jewish Christians?

Paul's attitude to the Gentile Christians was that they did not need to be circumcised. To this decision, the leaders of the apostolic church concurred. Paul told the Galatians, "if ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing" (Galatians 5.2). Why was that? Because, as Paul explained, a circumcised man was a debtor to do the whole law. If the Gentile Christians tried to do like the fallen Jews tried to do-justify themselves by keeping the law-then, said Paul, they were "fallen from grace". YET PAUL HAD TIMOTHY CIRCUMCISED because he was half-Jew (one was considered a Jew if his mother was a Jewess). On the other hand, Titus was a Gentile, and they could not "compel" Paul to get him circumcised (Galatians 2.3).

I am pointing this out to demonstrate that the Jewish apostles made a difference between a Jew and a Gentile in their approach to spreading the gospel. Even the apostle Paul circumcised Jewish Christians, while he resisted circumcising Gentile Christians. Paul was the apostle to the Gentiles (Rom. 11.13), and thus he had a stake in protecting the liberty that Gentile Christians obtained through the New Birth. However, he made no effort to undo the practice of circumcising Jews, nor is there any evidence that he was opposed to this practice for Jews.

THE APOSTLES CONTINUED TO KEEP THE LAW OF MOSES

I am always shocked at the ignorance of some Gentile Christians at the history of their own church. It was founded by a Jew, and it was early evangelized by Jews. The guiding scriptures were written by, and under the direction of Jews inspired by the Holy Ghost. It is amazing to me to see the anti-semitism that still holds among the converted Gentiles who, with an amazing CHUTZPAH, seem to think that the church was founded just for them, and that the New Covenant was established just for them, and that the moment the Jews of that day rejected Christ and His New Covenant, God washed His hands of the children of Abraham, and cast aside all of His prophecies concerning the nation of the Jews in favor of the newly acquired Gentiles!

While it is true that the New Covenant of Grace superseded the Mosaic Covenant, it is not true that the Jewish Christians abandoned the Mosaic Covenant right away. The writer of Hebrews (whoever he was), writing possibly just before the temple was destroyed in 70 AD, gently reminds his Jewish Christian readers that the New Covenant is in place, but he says, "he (the Lord) hath made the first (covenant) old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away" (Hebrews 8.13).

It is odd that Gentile Christians today do not understand this. The writer of Hebrews did not say outright that the Old Covenant (the Mosaic Covenant) was completely gone! He said that it was "ready to vanish away"! I sincerely doubt that Peter ever stopped observing the law of Moses, as a faithful Jew, during his life.

Peter was called on the carpet for going into the house of the uncircumcised and for eating with them (Acts 11.3). He defended himself as obeying the vision of the Lord. Paul never rebuked Peter for keeping the law of Moses. He rebuked Peter for his hypocrisy concerning the Gentile Christians (Galatians 2.11-15). In this passage, we do find that Peter was noted by Paul to be living "after the manner of the Gentiles", and so we know that Peter, in his missionary status, may have dropped some of petty Pharisaical prohibitions (such as the "washing of pots and pans", or the "washing of hands", when they ate bread, Matthew 15.2), but there is no evidence that he did not continue to keep the law of Moses itself.

The influx of Gentiles into the apostolic church required a general conference (council) to be convened in Jerusalem. The question was not whether circumcision or the keeping of the law should be continued among the Jews, but it was whether the newly converted Gentiles should be required to be also circumcised and to also keep the law. There was no question that the Jewish Christians continued to circumcise their children and to keep the law (although they surely knew that they were not justified by keeping the law, and it was no longer a salvational issue).

The verdict of the elders at Jerusalem concerning the requirements of the Gentile Christians to be circumcised and to keep the law of Moses was a solid "no". The only requirement, in this area, was: (1) that they abstain from meats offered to idols, (2) that they abstain from blood and things strangled, and (3) that they abstain from fornication (Acts 15.28,29).

Moreover, this was confirmed by the Holy Ghost (Acts 15.28). It was not just a political decision of a man-made organization.

ACTS 21 CONFIRMS THAT THE JEWISH APOSTLES CONTINUED TO KEEP THE LAW

This information comes out in a meeting between the apostle Paul and the elders of the apostolic church, led by the apostle James. The apostle James, "and all the elders", were present at this meeting. I would assume this might reflect a body of leaders similar to a modern "general board".

After praising the Lord for the results of Paul's missionary efforts among the Gentiles, the apostle James told Paul, "Thou seest, brother, how many thousands of Jews there are which believe; AND THEY ARE ALL ZEALOUS OF THE LAW" (Acts 21.20). No doubt they had been in large conference service together, or in some way, had shown Paul how many thousands of Jewish apostolics there were. These were not the wicked Judaizers. These were apostolic Jewish Christians. And the apostle James, in front of the elders, told Paul, "And they are informed of thee, that thou teachest all the Jews which are among the Gentiles to forsake Moses, saying that they ought not to circumcise their children, neither to walk after the customs" (Acts 21.21).

Was this true? Was Paul teaching that the Jews no longer had to be circumcised? Was he teaching the Jews that they no longer needed to heed the law of Moses? Apparently, Paul did not think so. Otherwise, there would have been a large split right then and there. Paul would have walked out, and there would have been two apostolic churches (one Jewish and one Gentile).

But Paul agreed with James, and Paul apparently denied that he was trying to keep Jews from circumcising their children or trying to keep them from obeying the law of Moses. The apostle James, in order to let the Jewish Christians understand that Paul was not trying to subvert the practice of circumcision among Jews or to undermine the law of Moses, requested that Paul purify himself with four other Jewish Christian men, who were shaving their heads, and purifying themselves.

What was the reason for this purification? James said, "that all may know that those things, whereof they were informed concerning thee, are nothing; BUT THAT THOU THYSELF ALSO WALKEST ORDERLY, AND KEEPEST THE LAW" (Acts 21.24).

James and the elders wanted the Jewish Christians in Jerusalem to know that the apostle Paul: (1) did not teach that Jews should not circumcise their children, (2) did not teach that they should forsake Moses and the customs, and (3) that Paul himself walked "orderly" and "kept the law".

This Paul was willing to do. The Bible says that he took the four men, and "the next day purifying himself with them entered into the temple, to signify the accomplishment of the days of purification, until that an offering should be offered for every one of them" (Acts 21.26).

I asked a brother what he thought that verse 26 meant: they went into the temple "to signify the accomplishment of the days of purification, until that AN OFFERING SHOULD BE OFFERED FOR EVERY ONE OF THEM". HE BECAME VERY UPSET. He cried "blasphemy" because I had brought up this passage of scripture. I do not know that the "offering", which was made for Paul and the four men, was an "animal sacrifice". I do not know what kind of an offering it was. I only know what the scripture says! But what are we supposed to think? Is all of the book of Acts inspired? Do we just accept those portions that we like? Is Acts 2.38 alright, but other portions are not?

What conclusions can we draw from this? (1) That the Jewish apostolics of Jerusalem were ignorant and that they forced Paul into doing something that he knew was not needful?, or (2) That there was still a difference between the Jew due to his special relationship with God-a difference that Paul, in his commitment to the God of Israel continued to dutifully honor, even though he knew more about the grace of God?

I feel like conclusion number 2 is more likely. I feel like the New Covenant is applied somewhat differently (not in terms of salvation or righteous living) to the Gentiles than it is to the Jews. Not to understand this is to misunderstand the program of God for his people, the Jews.

DID THE TEMPLE CONTINUE TO PLAY SOME KIND OF ROLE IN THE LIFE OF THE APOSTLES?

I think it might be profitable for some Gentile Christians, who are caught up in what I would call "gentilocentric" thinking, to realize that this apostolic church was founded by a kosher Jew, and was established under the preaching and leadership of kosher Jews.

The 120 in the Upper Room, who were baptized in Jesus' Name and who received the baptism of the Holy Ghost in the Upper Room, were all Jews. The mighty outpouring of the Spirit so affected the city of Jerusalem that, after hearing Peter's great sermon on Acts 2.38, 3000 Jews received the baptism of the Spirit and were baptized in Jesus' Name that same day.

A powerful church was born in Jerusalem, and the Bible says this about them:

And they, continuing daily with one accord IN THE TEMPLE, and breaking bread from house to house, did eat their meat with gladness and singleness of heart. Praising God, and having favor with all the people. And the Lord added to the church daily such as should be saved (Acts 2.46,47).

Notice that they were meeting every day in the temple! You can never take the temple out of the heart of a Jew-because God put it there in his heart. It does not matter that Paul told the heathen Athenians, "(God) dwelleth not in temples made with hands" (Acts 17.24). And even in spite of the fact that God told the Gentile Corinthians, "know ye not that your body is the temple of the Holy Ghost" (1 Corinthians 6.19). While all of this is true, it has nothing to do with the place of the temple in the heart of the Jew. The apostles, even after they had received the baptism of the Holy Ghost, met in the temple every day after the church was born on the day of Pentecost!

I think what deceives Gentile Christians is that they read about what Paul has to say about the trouble he has with the group of Judaizers. They are not reading the epistles that James and Peter wrote to the Jewish Christians. They do not realize that Paul did not mean to blame all Jews. They are not looking at the overall picture, the overall program that God has with his people, the Jews. They have become what I call "gentilocentric" (centered on the Gentiles, thinking that the everything revolves around them, as the church, and that they have replaced the Jews as a nation). The church is indeed a "holy nation", but the structure of the church is an organism, a "body"

You cannot keep a Jew away from his temple! In Acts 3.1, it states, "Now Peter and John went up together into the temple at the hour of prayer, being the ninth hour". Peter and John had the Holy Ghost. What in the world were they still doing in the temple? You would think, after listening to some Gentile teachers, that the temple was an abomination to God, and that Peter and John would not have even darkened its doors!

It is obvious that the apostles were using the temple to reach those Jews who loved God, and who were trying to be faithful to God. But, if we believed the gentilocentric writers today, there were no Jews faithful to God anymore! They were all rejected as Christ haters!

Peter and John went into the temple to "pray". They felt at home in the temple. They felt close to God. They went there to "pray". But, according to modern "gentilocentric" writers, God had departed from the temple entirely. The veil was after all "ripped from top to bottom". But there come those Jewish apostolics anyhow to pray. What if a temple were re-built today by sincere Jews and dedicated to God? Would that have any meaning at all? Or do "gentilocentric" Christians think that they have to be here for God to move at all?

I know that God was still dealing with Jews in the first century. He was still moving among those Jews in Jerusalem. There was a mighty revival among them. It was not, however, done at the expense of their customs or at the expense of their special relationship to God.

Peter and John met a lame man at the temple gate called "Beautiful", and God healed him right at the gate of the temple. The Bible says, "And he leaping up stood, and walked, and entered with them into the temple, walking, and leaping, and praising God" (Acts 3.8). Now I don't know how that hits most Gentile Christians, but it thrills me! This lame man had laid at the gate of that temple for years, watching others walk on in (since he was forbidden by the law from entering in because he was lame). We Gentiles build our large thousand seat churches, with high spires, and stained glass windows. We spend millions of dollars on imposing edifices, and we rejoice in them. We spend less on evangelistic outreach (but that is another story). And then we turn around and make fun of the Jews for wanting their temple back! We mock at their ignorant, stubborn efforts to re-institute animal sacrifices under the Mosaic Covenant. We become like Sanballat and Tobiah!

We have our large edifices (we do not call them "temples" usually), but we reject the idea that the Jews might want their temple back. Sometimes, I honestly believe, that some Gentile Christians actually "taunt" and "mock" the Jews for their rejected condition. Nothing that they could do as a nation could ever please God. All of their efforts to rebuild their temple and to re-constitute their priesthood, to regather their tribes, and to worship their God (the God of Israel) is in vain! This blindly in the face of all the multitude of prophecies concerning the restoration of the nation of Israel and the restoration of the land and the temple! Many Gentile Christians try to fruitlessly move all of this over into the millennium period. But they cannot do that and stay scriptural.

My whole point concerning the temple is to demonstrate the continuing love of the Jewish apostles for the temple and for circumcision and the law of Moses. I am sure they realized that this could no longer save anyone under the New Covenant, but they continued to respect these things.

The writer of Hebrews tells us that there is a temple of God in heaven, and that the temples down here are just "figures of the true" (Heb. 9.24). And he says cryptically, "It was therefore necessary that the patterns of things in the heavens should be purified with these; but the HEAVENLY THINGS THEMSELVES with better sacrifices than these" (Heb. 9.23). The temple is built after the pattern of a temple in heaven.

Jesus did not take the blood into the holy of holies in Jerusalem, but rather He took the blood of the sacrifice into heaven. "By his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us" (Heb. 9.12)..

What I am saying about the temple is this: that as long as there is a temple in heaven, there will be a representation here on earth. We know there will be a temple in the millennium. We also know that, according to prophecy, the Jews will rebuild a temple into which the anti-christ will enter and proclaim himself to be God (Matt. 24, 2 Thess. 2, Daniel 7,9,11, etc.).

CIRCUMCISION IS ACTUALLY THE SIGN OF AN EARLIER COVENANT

It is a mistake to think that circumcision (in relation to a Jew) is simply pertaiing to the law of Moses and the Mosaic Covenant. Jesus said otherwise. Jesus pointed out, "Moses...gave you circumcision; (not because it is of Moses, but OF THE FATHERS;), and ye on the sabbath day circumcise a man" (John 7.22). Circumcision actually goes back to the Abrahamic Covenant. The New Covenant did not "disannul" the Abrahamic Covenant. Paul wrote that the Mosaic Covenant (the law), which was 430 years after the Abrahamic Covenant, was not able to "disannul" the Abrahamic Covenant, "that it should make the promise of none effect" (Galatians 3.17).

In other words, the Mosaic Covenant did not replace the Abrahamic Covenant. The Abrahamic Covenant remained in effect with the Jews (and it still remains in effect today WITH THE JEWS). That is why, I believe, the apostles did not discontinue circumcision for the Jews. They agreed that it was not necessary for the Gentiles. Why? The Gentiles do not have all the promises of the Abrahamic Covenant. We in the church have received "the promise of the Father" (do not confuse that with the promises made to "the fathers"), which is the Holy Ghost (part of the New Birth). We are not, however, privy to the promises made to the nation of Israel concerning the land, etc.

The Mosaic Covenant did not REPLACE the Abrahamic Covenant. The Mosaic Covenant, according to Paul, was ADDED because of "transgressions" (Galatians 3.19). The law was not given to replace the promises of the Abrahamic Covenant, but the law was added because of "transgressions". Paul says that "the law is holy, and the commandment holy, and just, and good" (Romans 7.12). I am still waiting to see a good study on the tension between the law and grace. It is my opinion that there is a lot for Gentiles to learn concerning this tension and juxtaposition. We think we understand Paul, but he is a very complex and deep writer. He was not anti-semitic. He was not pro-Judaizer either!

It is my understanding that a true Christian Jew will not reject circumcision, while a Gentile Christian has no commandment to be circumcised, and indeed, according to the teaching of Paul, should not be circumcised.

There will be a time, when the lost Jews, who, as a nation, are being re-gathered miraculously, and kept as a nation, by the power of God, will attempt to regain their lost status and relationship with God on their own. They will re-build the temple, they will re-institute the Aaronic priesthood with animal sacrifices and they will keep the feasts. They will have a sort of "revival", as God continues to deal with them. Their danger will come when God lifts the apostolic church out of here, which has been a buffer of sorts. Before the coming of the Holy Spirit "dispensation", only a few Gentiles were saved. You can count them on your hands: Joseph's wife (I assume), Rahab the harlot, Ruth, the Ethiopian eunuch of Jeremiah's day. Not very many at all. The only way to be saved was through the law of Moses, as a proselyte. With the coming of the Holy Spirit period of grace (the church age), God turned with favor upon the Gentiles and opened up salvation to them. This is the Gentile's day. The Jews rejected salvation and were dispersed among the nations of the world. They have suffered terribly. Only in this century has God once more looked their way and began to re-gather them into their own land.

The church age is coming to an end. The mission of the church is to preach the gospel to every nation, and "then shall the end (of the age) come". But Joseph will soon be reconciled to his brethern. He has a gentile bride, but now he will put everyone away from him, as he is reconciled in tears to the sons of Jacob.

No one should mistake that the church has taken the place of the Jew. The church is also the "apple of His eye". The church, composed of both Jews and Gentiles, will rule and reign with Him in the millennium. But He has not forgotten his people Israel. The times of the gentiles shall be over (it is the feet of the image that is smashed by the stone made without hands-not the legs as the preterists desire). The stone does not come down and hit the legs, but rather the stone hits the FEET of the image of the Beast in Daniel 2. The legs represent the ancient Roman empire, but the feet with the ten toes represent the modern day revived Roman empire. Jesus bruised the head of the serpent in 33 AD, but He will smash the feet of Babylon (the Beast) in this time.

Where is the place of the Jew? The Jew is the "woman who gave birth to the manchild (Christ Jesus)", and not the Bride of the Manchild (the Bridegroom)(Rev. 12.5,6).

We Gentile apostolics don't keep the law of Moses, but we obey the word of God, and we don't circumcise our children. The circumcision made without hands (Jesus' Name baptism, Col. 2.10-12) is sufficient for us. But there are too many Christians today mocking Deuteronomy 22.5 as "not for us today". There are too many Christians even saying that 1 Corinthians 11.1-14 is not for us today! Romans 3.31 states, "Do we then make void the law through faith? God forbid: yea, we ESTABLISH THE LAW". I believe the apostle Paul would agree with that since he wrote it!

We want the salvation of the Jews, but we don't want anything to do with the Jews themselves! Let me tell you, my friend, when Joseph put out the Gentiles in order to be reconciled to his Jewish brethern, his Gentile Bride was waiting close by perhaps-but she did not take part in that reconciliation!

-William B. Chalfant