Steve Conover: Thank you so much for joining us for the Friends of Israel Today. I'm Steve Conover. With me, is Chris Katulka. And I'd like to encourage you to take note of our web address. It's foiradio.org. You can listen to nine years worth of content that we have on the site, featuring Chris Katulka's teaching and insightful interviews with a host of great guests. Again, that's foiradio.org.

Chris Katulka: And Steve, when our guests are at our website, foiradio.org, they can also subscribe to our award-winning Christian magazine, Israel My Glory, and receive a one-year free subscription if they've never subscribed before. And the reason I bring that up is because today is our Israel M Glory In-Depth episode, and we're actually going to have a special guest, Dr. Jim Showers, who is the Executive Director of the Friends of Israel Gospel Ministry. And he wrote an article that's all about Israel's reconciliation and what it means for us as Christians. And I just want to read this verse really quick because this comes from Romans 11, verse 15. It says, "For if their rejection," that's Israel, "Means the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance mean, but life from the dead?" Jim will help unpack that as we look into his article.

Jim, great to have you on this Israel My Glory In-Depth.

Jim Showers: It's my pleasure to be here, Chris. Thanks for inviting me.

Chris Katulka: Jim, the issue that we're looking at is who can know sins, reach, depth and remedy? And part of that remedy is Israel's reconciliation, but I don't think most people think about that. What does Israel have to do with this idea of the remedy of God's sin and the curse on earth? And so really, we think of this as God's redemptive plan. And actually, it all started with Genesis 12 as you wrote about, and it focuses exclusively on Israel.

So how do you think that this plan, particularly through the covenants made with Israel, should really shape our understanding of how we see God's plan of redemption and how we should also read the Bible?

Jim Showers: Our salvation, Chris, comes through the covenants that God made with Israel. God raised Israel up for a particular purpose to be his nation through whom he was going to work his plan of redemption. Jesus tells us in the book of John that salvation is of the Jews, it comes through the Jewish people. And we understand that when we open up the Old Testament and begin reading about these covenants that begins in Genesis 12:3, God's covenant with Abraham and how not only was he going to raise Abram's seed up to be a nation, a unique nation, a special nation that would be blessed by God and that he would bless those who bless Israel and curse those who curse Abraham's descendants. But he also tacked on this additional sentence that says, "And through you." Later on in Genesis, he repeats that and says, "Through your seed," singular, "He's going to bless the world."

Paul tells us in Galatians Three that when God said that he was looking ahead to the gospel being shared with Gentiles, that Gentiles would come to faith, not just Jewish people. So salvation comes through Israel, Messiah is Jewish, all the scriptures come through the Jewish people, but it's these covenants that define all that. So think about it this way, Chris. If Jesus had come to earth and done everything that he did and went to the cross and died, but there were no covenants, you and I would not be able to take advantage of what Jesus did. It's the covenants that say that redemption is available to mankind and not just to the Jewish people, but also to the world. Our salvation particularly is rooted in the new covenant. Jesus, when he instituted the Lord's supper, what's he say about the cup? "This is my blood of the new covenant."

And so it's a Jewish covenant that our salvation is based in. If those covenants, which some people say today that God's rejected Israel and replaced Israel with a church and those covenants in effect broken the covenants with Israel, if the new covenant doesn't apply, then we're in trouble because that's what our salvation is based in. And as you know, God made these covenants irrevocable, which means that he could not cancel them, he will fulfill them just as he said, and that Israel's behavior could not cause him to cancel or substitute somebody else in for it. We have a lot of scripture that talks about these being forever covenants, that they are everlasting and that's good for us because God's purpose in raising Israel up, you remember the first 11 chapters, we see how human conscience fails. Man living by his conscience alone leads him into not just evil, but extreme evil, gross evil, to a point where God has to start over, do a reset through Noah.

And so God now says, "We're not going to go through that again." But right away we see by the time we get to Genesis 11, we have the Tower of Babel man, instead of following God's command to fill the earth and multiply, they gathered together pursuing a false worship. And God says, "Here we go again. We're not going to let this happen." So he confuses man with languages. And right after that, you turn the page and here is God saying, "Now I'm going to make my own nation through whom I can bring my redemptive plan."

And by the way, Chris, if you study the redemptive plan, it's not complete. It's been partially fulfilled. Jesus came and paid the redemption price and that's wonderful, but completing the process of redemption is yet future, and that goes through Israel. So our future blessings come through God's fulfillment of those covenant promises through Israel, and that will happen once Israel accepts their Messiah.

Chris Katulka: And you're routing all this back to Genesis Chapter 12, which talks about the fact that God chose a nation to give the nation of Israel through Abraham's line, a land, the land of Israel, descendants-

Jim Showers: Yes.

Chris Katulka: The Jewish people, and a blessing, a multifaceted blessing. It's interesting because I think a lot of people when they hear the term, "Chosen people," they understand that's the Jewish people, God's chosen people. But I always like to remind people, that doesn't mean that they're this inclusive club that God was using the Jewish people as you were mentioning in Genesis 12:3, to bring blessing to all the families of the earth. They were chosen with a very, very significant spiritual task, which was to bring blessing, to bring salvation to all the families of the earth. And that is something that becomes important because God's not through with Israel yet. And I think a lot of people think, "Oh, that's the Old Testament."

Jim Showers: Right.

Chris Katulka: But really, that's not what God's doing. He's not through with Israel and their reconciliation does matter to the life of a believer today.

Jim Showers: Yes. So we have the Abrahamic covenant, we have a Davidic covenant in which God promised to David that someday a descendant of his would come to the throne of Israel. And once he rose to the throne of Israel, he would forever be over the nation of Israel. And it becomes further expanded that he would rule over the whole world. That has yet to be fulfilled, right? God in the new covenant talks about how he will pour his spirit out and cleanse and that their hearts will be reconciled to God. And we know that happens individually, but we've not seen that happen to all of Israel. Israel becomes really... If people are wondering, "Is Jesus going to return right away? When's he coming back?" The key to understanding when Jesus returns is the Jewish people coming to faith in their Messiah. And then Paul talks about that in Romans chapter 11.

So yes, everything you said is absolutely correct, and it's through the covenants that we really begin to get definition to God's redemptive plan. Remember, it's not our plan, it's his plan. So it's not that God chose, and he says this in scripture, he didn't choose Israel because they were some great nation. He chose them for his purpose, to work his purpose through them. And so in doing that, they have a privileged position, if you will. That's why we call them uniquely chosen. And yet God intended what he was going to do through them to be shared with the whole world. And since Jesus' first coming, he has been doing that in the period we call the Church Age.

Chris Katulka: This is going to lead to the next question because I love that in your article, Israel's Reconciliation, you highlighted one of my favorite passages, which comes from Acts Chapter Three, which is Peter's sermon-

Jim Showers: Yes.

Chris Katulka: Not just to the church, but actually, to the men of Israel. He's speaking specifically to Israel and this is a dynamic moment because a lot of theologians and scholars will look at what Jesus did in his death, burial, resurrection and ascension and say, "Look, God's done with Israel now." But Peter picks up after Jesus ascends to heaven to sit at the right hand of the father, and he begins to speak to the men of Israel, and he highlights the importance of their corporate repentance that if you, Israel repent, Jesus will return. That's what he's saying. He's waiting now, but he'll return if you corporately repent.

But I think this can be confusing because for me, when I turn to the Lord, I individually repented. How do you reconcile the corporate repentance of Israel and the individual repentance that's required as well?

Jim Showers: Well, it's a situation. It isn't one or the other. It's both. What Peter's teaching there, let's step back for a second. The church we call the church today is pretty much dominated by the Gentile world, and yet the church wasn't begun by Gentiles. It was begun by Messianic believers, Jewish people who came to faith in Messiah. We refer to them as the apostles, but they're all Jewish. And Peter, in Acts Chapter Three, just after the church has begun in Acts Two, we see Peter up on the Temple Mount. It's exclusively Jewish audience he's speaking to.

And also, let's keep in mind as we step back and look at Acts Chapter Three, there is no New Testament. All the apostles preach the gospel from the Old Testament. So we as a ministry, as you know, we teach people that the gospel is in both testaments. You can show somebody the way to belief in Christ through the Old Testament as well as the New.

Chris Katulka: The Jerusalem road and the Romans road.

Jim Showers: Exactly. So he's up there, but he's making this really important point that comes out of the covenants, that in order for Christ, who is not just Lord, but he's also king, to return and sit on David's throne, he has to rule over a kingdom of subjects who are submissive to him, who accept him for who he is and who will be obedient to him. No king can rule a kingdom that's in rebellion. And so the rebellion has to be put down.

So in Acts Chapter Three, Peter makes this point, "You are the ones who sent him to the cross." Now, he's not saying "Exclusively, you sent him to the cross," because everybody who's ever lived put Jesus on the cross and Jesus makes that clear that nobody could send him to the cross unless he surrendered his life in John Chapter 10. But what we have here is Peter reminding the people that God sent the one who proved through his life, through his miracles, through his words, that he was truly the Messiah and you put him on the cross, you rejected him. But if you will repent, then first of all, sins will be forgiven. Secondly, the times of refreshing will come.

The number one thing the Jewish people were looking for in a Messiah when Jesus came the first time was somebody who would restore the kingdom of God. And even after his death, that's prominent on the minds of particularly his followers in Acts Chapter One, when Jesus meets his disciples on the day of his ascension, their pressing question, the first thing they want to know is, "Are you here to restore the kingdom at this time to Israel?" And Jesus never tells them that that concept is wrong. If God was never going to restore the kingdom to Israel, he would've simply said, "You're wrong. It's not going to be restored to Israel." But he doesn't say that. He says, "It's not your business to know the time, but get busy and build my church." It's basically what he tells them.

So now we get over to Acts Three. And so Peter says, "Your sins will be forgiven," that's redemption, "The times of refreshing will come," that's the restoration of the kingdom, the restoring this world back to the condition it was in before the fall. And Jesus Christ, who is in heaven, waiting for you to repent, will be sent back by God for the restoration of all things, to restore the kingdom here on earth. So as I said earlier, the key to Jesus' return is not your salvation or my salvation. Really, the key is the salvation of the Jewish people.

So in Zechariah 12, for example, we see that it says that they will turn, the Jewish people will turn and look upon him whom they pierced, their Messiah, their savior, and they will repent for him as one repents for an only son who's been killed. And then they begin listing tribal names, family names, which is corporately, they will repent. But it also says each man with his wife, and so it's individual as well, it's family by family, individual by individual. So as the individuals in Israel come to faith, it will comprise the Jewish nation. It'll be a corporate aspect to it.

Chris Katulka: I'm glad that you brought up Zechariah too because it does... When it talks about Israel's repentance, when they look upon him, whom they have pierced, it is their family names, but then also, the strata of Israel's leadership, whether it's their political leadership, their religious leadership, all the way down to the common person, all of them turn, like you said, and their wives, which is unique because normally it was the men who went to the temple to bring the offering. Now it's the whole family is individually and corporately together, repenting and turning to the Lord.

Jim Showers: And that's why I say it's both. It's both individual, but in the individual has all come to believe it becomes a corporate reconciliation as well to God. And Paul picks up on all of that in the wonderful 11th chapter of Romans. He begins with, "First of all, has God rejected his people? Has God cast away his uniquely chosen people?" And his answer is, "Certainly not. That's absurd that God has cast away," and he goes on to describe who he was. He's not talking about has God cast away the church? He's talking about the Jewish people. He begins to identify himself as Jewish from the tribe of Benjamin, the descendant of Abraham, and then he goes on to connect himself with being part of the Jewish remnant. We know that God has promised in every generation to have a remnant of people who do believe in their Messiah, but we have not yet arrived at that point where all the Jewish people who are alive come to that.

But as he develops Chapter 11, he comes to tell us that God has left Israel in unbelief. So the way you and I came to belief is because the Holy Spirit opened our eyes to see who we really were and how we fell short of God's glory and that we needed to repent of our sins and put our faith in the work that Jesus did on the cross, shedding his blood and rising from the grave three days later. We believe all that, that is salvation. That's the essence of salvation, but we would never have gotten there unless God opened our eyes to see that, right?

And so as I would understand, what Paul's saying is he has not done that work for all the Jewish people yet. So that, and he tells the believers there, the Roman believers, "Don't be proud. Don't be arrogant that salvation has come to you because God has done this really amazing thing." We can't really comprehend how God did all that, but that God has done this amazing thing in that he has not brought the Jewish people salvation.

Another way of understanding that is that he could have done that work when Jesus was here the first time or right after he rose from the dead, but he has left most Jewish people in their unbelief so that he could bring Gentiles to faith. Not all Gentiles, most Gentiles are in the same place where they have not come to faith. "But," he goes on the next verse and says, "But," quoting from Isaiah, "All Israel will be safe." There is a day coming when that will be fulfilled in all Israel. And when that day happens, according to Peter in Acts Chapter Three, then Jesus will return to earth. He will restore all things. It will be a time of refreshing this earth and bringing it back to the place it was.

Steve Conover: Hey, Chris, I've got a fun, maybe absurd question for you. What if someone told you that you were going to win a million dollars and then you won a million dollars? Would you believe that person if they predicted it again?

Chris Katulka: Oh, I love this question, Steve, because I actually could use a million dollars right now to help pay for my kids' braces. I'm just kidding. But yes, if someone predicted something that sounded so unbelievable like that, I would definitely believe them if they predicted it would happen again.

Steve Conover: Of course, that is a wild stretch of an idea to help us grasp the messianic prophecies of Jesus. As you know, the Bible is packed with prophecies that foreshadowed Christ's first coming and he came, right? So shouldn't we take a deeper look into the scriptures that prophesy his second coming since we know they will be true too?

Chris Katulka: Yeah, I couldn't agree more, Steve, which is why I am thrilled that the focus of our 2024 Proclaim two-day conferences is the Messianic prophecies of Jesus. We'll take a look back and be pointing toward the grand future that God has for us, so that today we can live in light of his hope that urges us to share the good news.

Steve Conover: Our two-day Proclaim conference has locations all across the United States. You can find the details about dates, locations, and how you can register at proclaim.foi.org.

Chris Katulka: Understanding the Messianic prophecies of Jesus will strengthen your hope, help you understand the warnings that are in place, and provide comfort for your soul as you live in this in-between time of Christ's first coming and his second coming here on earth.

Steve Conover: Really hope we see you there for one of our conferences across the United States. For dates and locations, again, you can visit proclaim.foi.org. That's proclaim.foi.org.

Chris Katulka: The thing I love about your article too is that what it shows is that Israel's reconciliation to God, their salvation, actually impacts the life of a believer. I love that you highlight Romans 11 and Romans 11, 13 and 15, it talks about these if, then statements, and even with the word reconciliation. If their rejection, talking about Israel's rejection of the Messiah, is the world's reconciliation, the entire world's reconciliation, that the gospel goes forth, how much more will it be when they do believe, but life from the dead, this greater thing that's coming, this hope as you talk about that's coming?

In the two minutes that we have remaining, Jim, can you share really quickly, why do you believe Israel's reconciliation should matter to the life of a believer even today?

Jim Showers: Well, we touched on it earlier, Chris. If Israel isn't reconciled to God, then Messiah never returns. It's as simple as that. And if Messiah doesn't return, then all of our future blessings will never happen. In fact, it raises a real doubt about whether we are even truly saved. We may have faith in Jesus, but what leads God to apply Jesus' wonderful work on the cross and his resurrection to our sins is that covenant. If Israel doesn't come to faith, if Israel isn't reconciled to God, then that covenant can never be fulfilled. And if that covenant is not fulfilled, then our salvation will never be fulfilled.

People could say, "Well, no. Jesus fulfilled our salvation in his first coming." Certainly on the side of paying the debt, he took care of everything. But on the side of having that wonderful work done and applied to us individually, we need that covenant. It goes through that covenant and the other covenants that are in the Old Testament. That's why covenants are so important, and it's why understanding the covenants and God's terms of those covenants really is instructional in the plan of redemption.

Chris Katulka: If the prophecies of his first coming in the Old Testament are important, then the prophecies of his second coming are even more, for not only the fact that for Israel's reconciliation, but for us as believers as well.

Jim Showers: And Chris, somebody might say, "Well, is that fair that God hasn't reconciled Israel? He's left them in unbelief," but let's remember, most of the Gentile world is still in unbelief as well. And so this is the part that's hard to comprehend how God works all these things out in determining that salvation during this time is focused on the whole world and not just on Israel. Remember, for the 2000 years from Abraham to Christ, God's attention was solely focused on Israel and not on the world, so we just happen to live on the other side of that.

But we know that Paul tells us when the full measure has come, when all of the Gentiles God has determined will come to faith is reached, then he will turn his attention back to Israel and all Israel will be saved. That's a wonderful promise. It comes from God's words to the prophet Isaiah that he will fulfill his promise to reconcile all of Israel, and we need to take advantage of the times we have to share this with the world before it's too late.

Steve Conover: Thank you so much for joining us for today's episode of The Friends of Israel Today. It was so good to have Dr. Jim Showers with us, and a reminder, you can get your free one-year subscription to Israel My Glory if you haven't subscribed yet before.

Chris Katulka: That's exactly right. Israel My Glory, it's been in publication since 1942, educating, teaching Christians, encouraging Christians to see what's going on in Israel from a biblical worldview. Again, you can get your one-year free subscription - six issues right to your house by going to foiradio.org.

Steve Conover: Our host and teacher is Chris Katulka. Today's program was produced by Tom Gallione, edited by Jeremy Strong, who also composed and performs our theme music, and I'm Steve Conover, executive producer. Our mailing address is FOI Radio, PO Box 914, Bellmawr, New Jersey, 08099. Again, that's FOI Radio, PO Box 914, Bellmawr, New Jersey, 08099. Once again, our web address is foiradio.org. That's foiradio.org, or you can call our listener line. That number is 888-343-6940. Once again, that's 888-343-6940.

The Friends of Israel Today is a production of The Friends of Israel Gospel Ministry. We are a worldwide evangelical ministry, proclaiming biblical truth about Israel and the Messiah, while bringing physical and spiritual comfort to the Jewish people.