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CHURCH LETTER
` Through all the changing scenes of life '
So says the opening line of a hymn from the now largely forgotten `Hymns Ancient and Modern', a rich repository of hymns of praise and worship expressing many Christians' intimacy with a personal God. Change in any society is of course a never-ending phenonenon, but rapid and continuous change can ferment unrest which can lead to civil disobedience and even revolution - and we have certainly seen this in nearly a century of world-wide unrest and conflict! We recall writing a short article some 40 years ago, using a line from a once popular song: `Far away places with strange sounding names, far away over the sea', but the countries' names we used then have been changed and largely forgotten through a `torrent' of new and even more strange sounding names to our Western ears. One positive thing has happened, even through appalling circumstances, in that Christians have been made aware that Christianity is not limited to Western nations and that their brothers and sisters in Christ in many parts of the world are enduring persecution and death not known since the medieval religious wars in the West. It is reported by Christian ministries that this has increased dramatically over the past 20 years, and even more rapidly over the past five years where in some countries Christian communities which have had a relatively peaceful time in the past have been all but totally destroyed.
Not all these atrocities can be laid at the door of militant Islam for this destruction of Christian communities has occurred in Hindu and Buddhist countries also. Once a people of any country feel their traditional cultures are threatened they will turn to violence against any minority groups not perceived by them as being loyal to the majority of that country. Such is the increasing violence towards Christians in the Middle and Far East where they are considered to be traitors and therefore persecution and violent death follows. In the West Christians face a more insiduous but equally dangerous force which takes the form of osmosis - a scientific word used for when a high-value fluid leaches slowly through a semi-porous membrane into a lower-value fluid, thus raising that fluid to a higher value whilst lowering the value of the first fluid. In simple terms both fluids are equalised to the same level, to the detriment of the higher-value fluid. In Christian terms this means that its spiritual life slowly leaches into the worldly secular life around it, to its detriment. In the Western nations it takes the form of the `spiritual Church' leaching slowly through the cultural life of the people, raising the nations' religious/social/moral life and producing a civic religion whilst diluting the spiritual life of the Church into moral inertia.
This is a slow process spread over many decades - indeed many centuries. In modern terms it started with the so-called Enlightenment, the Age of Reason, through such men as the 18th century philosopher Rousseau in his writings in which he sought to replace God's Law with the Law of Nature, and this has largely entered the Christian Church. To this day Rousseau is honoured and his remains are buried in the Pantheon in Paris, the heart of France. Indeed it stands in the heart of Enlightened Europe as a memorial, not to man's wisdom but to man's folly! Philosophers such as Rousseau sought not a substitute for religion, for that would make such a substitute atheist. Instead they sought a substitute religion, that is, a Civic Religion based on natural laws, looking similar to Christianity but totally humanist. It elevated man as god, thereby introducing a religion other than Christianity into the public realm.
Earlier we mentioned social changes that will lead to unrest in a settled community, and now we would fill out the constituency of any settled community: It must include all who live in its accepted social area whether they are the monarchy and aristocracy, the Commons of Parliament (with its various establishments), settled religious orders and churches of all believers, univerities and guilds of the cities, the great trading concerns, instruments of local government, the armed forces, legal and judiciary orders, the social orders and traditions of the common people, its theatres and public houses, All of these contribute to a settled order and sense of community and spill out into an awareness of being a country, and if necessary calling for the defense of that country. Disturb these and the social order becomes fragile and nervous for they give shape to life in a community. Such a nation becomes a repositry of shared knowledge and inherited wisdom, and good government should be an invisible hand upholding social order and not an active part of it. Each generation has a responsibility to preserve and pass on that which it inherited, enhancing whilst not changing it. Social order becomes a responsibility to preserve, enhance and pass on to future generations, but not as a fixed, unchangeable order due to the ever-present enhancing element in it. Would-be Reformers need to understand the effect of the destruction of established order which gives life and meaning to the communities of a nation!
We now turn to another more contemporary person who had a violent desire to overthrow the established social order. He had a deep-seated hatred of Christianity, which he believed needed to be destroyed before his ideology of a World Order could be brought in. He is unknown to most people, but he is equally well known in Western political circles. Antonio Gramansci appeared on the political scene during the early 20th century, having been born in Sardinia in the late 19th century. Gramansci studied philosophy and history in Turin, and by 1913 he was a member of the Italian Socialist Party. By 1919 he had founded a newspaper under the banner of `The New Order', and by natural progression he joined the Italian Communist Party in 1921. Within two years Mussolini had come to power and Gramaski quickly left Italy, and as a convinced and dedicated Marxist/Leninist he went to Russia - the `New Eutopia'. By this time Gramansci had become convinced that Lenin was wrong in his approach to establishing the New World Order of Communism. He was convinced that the world was not divided into the oppressed poor and the Capitalist rich; the real barriet holding back a Communist Europe was the deeply ingrained religious Christianity which held the `masses' in thrall, and this was the real class struggle. There had to be a change in the social consciousness of the people which would pave the way for the New World Order.
By 1923 Stalin had come to power in Russia and Gramansci, knowing what would unfold, fled back to Italy, where in 1926 he was arrested and sentenced to twenty years imprisonment, during which time he wrote his nine volumes setting out his vision of how to change the social consciousness of the people and so bring in the New World Order - the Social Eutopia of Marxism. Gramansci died in 1937 but `the spirit of Gramansci' lives on, and in our time his ideology has become a reality! Gramansci had a long-term view of history, and although he knew that he would never see this New World Order he worked tirelessly through his writings to ensure that this Worker's Eutopia would eventually win through - and today, in 2016, those of a political bent will see his name often appearing in political polemics.
In brief, Gramansci sought not to defeat Capitalism - by which the modern Western world is formed - by direct confrontation for he knew that the economic power of Capitalism undergirded by civic Christianity would prevail. His followers were trained to infiltrate every area of Western culture and change its social consciousness from within, with the direct intention of targeting the moral values based on Judaic-Christian principles. We need not elaborate on that! Sufficient to say that the `Human Rights' movement encompasses all moral values! A philosophical title for this would be `Moral Relativism' (the understanding of which title might be `whatever is . . is'). To understand that this `spirit of Gramansci' has done its work we heard the words of the previous Pope Benedict declaring that `moral relativism is destroying the moral base of Western society'. In short, Gramansci's ideology would eventually triumph by infiltrating the numerous `nerve centres' in countries held in sway by Capitalist ideology, changing the social consciousness which for long centuries had been based on a quasi-religious consciousness. In time this change would lead to a Humanist consciousness longing for its Communist Eutopia.
Of course it would be ludicrous to suggest that there was a dedicated organisation propagating the work of Rousseau and Gramansci, for these are but two of many whose thoughts and actions have infiltrated the moral core of Western society. Those who accept a philosophical position will in their social lives seek to persuade others of their beliefs. Others of a more ideological stance, such as Gramansci, understand that offering a substitute Humanist religion would not replace a community's unspoken belief in a Supreme Being but the substitution would be merely absorbed into a more fully developed civic religion. Followers of such men as Gramansci understood this and worked (and still work today) to destroy the civic religion from within. Both schools of thought and action have the same objective - to destroy knowledge of a Supreme Spiritual Being Who is involved in the affairs of the world in this 21st century. That objective is very much in evidence as it breaks down any understanding of a community based on past traditions, present responsibilies and a communal future. As the old, with its `communal memory bank' withers and dies over a period of time there emerges a full-blown hedonistic people with no past and no future, only a life to live in the present. How far down that path Western communities have travelled is for the reader to decide!
Our Letter now turns to that `Supreme Spiritual Being', known to Christians as the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, Who is involved in the affairs of this world and Who reveals Himself through His called-out chosen people, born of the Holy Spirit into the spiritual world of the Kingdom of Heaven yet fully living in this earthly world by witness and proclamation.. That takes us to Scripture and to the Book of Genesis, the first Book of Torah, which is the `seedbed' of all further revelation. In Genesis 12: 2-3 we read of the call of Abraham:
" I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you . . . .
I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will
curse, and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you. "
In the last Book of Torah, the Book of Deuteronomy, we read the words of God, spoken through Moses His servant: (7:6)
" The LORD your God has chosen you out of all the peoples on the
face of the earth to be His people, His treasured possession. "
However in chapter 9 Israel is reminded not to think or say: (verses 4 and 6 in part)
" The LORD has brought me here to take possession of this land
because of my righteousness . . . . Understand, then, that it is
not because of your righteousness that the LORD your God is
giving you this good land to possess, for you are a stiff-necked people. "
Through such Scriptures as these - and there are many more - we understand that there is but one people chosen entirely by God to be His treasured possession, not by any merit of their own but entirely of God for His purpose. This one chosen people is later described as the Olive Tree, that is, Israel, which draws its sap, its enduring life from the Root of the Abrahamic Covenant, given by God and undergirded by the Everlasting Covenant made between God the Father and God the Son. (`It is finished', was the cry of Jesus on the cross, sealing that Everlasting Covenant with His blood at the Closing Feast of Passover to come 50 days later.) After that Feast of Passover, which began with the crucifixion of Jesus as the Sacrificial Lamb, came His resurrection, but the Jews had rejected their Messiah through unbelief, refusing to accept Him as Israel's King who had come to establish the Kingdom of God. This resulted in that Kingdom being held in abeyance for a later Age.
Fourty-nine days later from that Passover, on the fiftieth day came the Feast of Pentecost and the release of the promised New Covenant to all who would accept Jesus as Saviour and King, open to both Jew and Gentile, the First Fruits of the Body of Christ. As we have said, at those Feasts, and through the following years, many Jews have been broken off from the Olive Tree, which is Israel, through unbelief in Jesus as Messiah of Israel, leaving believing Jewish and `grafted in' Gentile branches as the spiritual Israel of God, the Body of Christ. The true Israel, the Olive Tree, is the `one new man', Jew and Gentile - and yet with our understanding that God's gifts and calling are irrevocable we see that those broken-off branches are within that irrevocable calling and finally, through `the Day of Jacob's Trouble', those who will receive Jesus as their Messiah will be re-grafted into the Olive Tree, which is Israel - and so `all Israel will be saved'. Therefore, as with any family - and even more so for the Family of God - those who are grafted into the Olive Tree are compelled by love to pray and reach out true hands of love to those broken-off branches for they know the love and grace of the Father Who brought them into His family.
We need to stop and `unpick' some of these comments and Scriptures: God chose Israel and called her into a `Marriage Covenant' for no other reason than that He loved her, for Israel was (and is still today) no better or worse than any other group or nation of people. One Scripture above is concerned with Abraham's call, speaking of blessings for Abraham's family. It goes on to say that although God undoubtably loved `Israel' and intended to bless her it was in order that through Israel His love and blessings would reach out to all peoples and nations! God intended for Israel to be a giving, vital and dynamic channel through which He can reveal His love and blessings to, `all who would receive Him, to those who believe in His Name, (those) He gave the right to be called children of God - children born not of natural descent, nor of human decision or a husband's will, but born of God' (John 1:12).
From the Deuteronomic Scriptures we quoted the words, `whoever curses you (Israel) I will curse', but those stark words are not meant as we often understand them. Just as God chose to bless all peoples through His love and blessings to Israel, those who would not accept that Channel of His love and blessings cut themselves off, curse themselves, unable to hear the message of salvation through a Jewish Messiah. Today that blessing is still channelled through the Israel of God, the re-grafted and grafted-in branches of the Olive Tree. As we have said previously, this Family of God - the re-grafted and grafted-in branches of the Olive Tree - therefore has a Responsibility of Love to reach out to and care for those broken-off branches who were called by an irrevocable gift of God to be His chosen Vessels, for whilst we rejoice in our salvation we always need to pray, work and trust that those broken-off branches will return through acceptance of their Messiah Jesus. As Isaiah said in the vision he received from the LORD: (Isaiah 51:11)
" The ransomed of the LORD will return.
They will enter Zion with singing;
everlasting joy will crown their heads. "
It is this false dichotomy, this separation of chosen Israel into the Old Covenant People of God and the Church as the New Covenant People of God, that has blinded the eyes of both Old and New - a resentment in the Old and an over-exuberance in the New. There is but one chosen and loved people of God - some are broken off `until the fulness of the Gentiles has come in'; the others `no longer foreigners and aliens but fellow-citizens with God's people and members of God's household'. The world may well scoff at `the Good News of the Gospel' when they see the divisions in the Church, but how they would marvel and respond to the sight of the full Glory of the Olive Tree, the true Israel, through whom the love and blessings of God would be channelled into a dying world as they speak their message of salvation!
We have set out briefly the despair of the world through two of the many philosophies and ideologies of the world, but the LORD God has revealed the Hope of the world channelled through and seen in His chosen, loved people, Israel. As `The Time of the Gentiles' comes to its end our sure and certain hope is the full restoration of the whole Family of God by acceptance of God the Father through God the Son and by God the Holy Spirit. Then surely the words given to Isaiah shall be sung: (Isaiah 55:12)
" You will go out in joy and be led forth in peace.
The mountains and hills will burst into song before you,
and all the trees of the fields will clap their hands. "
To leave this Letter at this point would not fully explain that `Hymn of Praise' that leaps from the pages of Paul's Letter to the Romans, where at the end of chapter 11 he says:
" Oh, the depths of the riches of the wisdom and knowledge of God!
how unsearchable His judgements and his paths beyond tracing out . . . "
Through his meeting with Jesus on the road to Damascus Paul had indeed had his understanding of Israel in God's purpose elevated and enhanced: If Israel had been chosen as God's blessing, not only for Israel itself but through their blessings to the whole of God's creation, there must have been One who was the Source of those blessings, that is, the Israel of God, One beyond man's ability to bless. The Hebrew Canon of Scripture abounds with this understanding of One who is called the Shepherd of Israel. Genesis 49 tells of Jacob's blessing his sons, and in particular his blessing to Joseph (verses 22-26), understood by many to be a foreshadowing of Israel's Messiah Jesus. In verse 22 Joseph is described as `a fruitful vine whose branches climb over a wall' - that is, going beyond his original place. Verses 24-25: Joseph's strength and protection lay in the care of:
" the mighty God of Jacob, because of the Shepherd, the Rock of Israel,
even by the God of your father, who shall help you, and by the Almighty
who shall bless you with blessings of Heaven above, the blessings of the
deep that lies below, blessings of the breast and womb . . . They (the
blessings) shall rest on the head of Joseph, on the crown of him that was
separate from his brothers. "
The whole Canon of Scripture, both `Old and New', continually speaks of the Shepherd of Israel, the Rock of Israel, revealing that before time began - as we understand time - the Triune Godhead chose One who would be their Vessel on earth, through whom all God's love and blessings would flow to the earthly chosen vessel of Israel. Then came the Feast of Passover at which would occur the death and resurrection of Jesus, the Lamb of God, but just before that came His High Priestly prayer to His Father, as recorded by John: `Glorify Me in Your Presence with the Glory I had with You before the world began'. As Paul wrote, Jesus is now `seated with Him (the Father) in the heavenly realms, far above all rule and authority, power and dominion'. In his Letter to the Ephesians Paul continues: `to make plain to everyone the fellowship of this mystery, which for all past ages was kept hidden in God'. The profound mystery which Paul wrote about is this: The Israel of God, Jesus, `seated at the right hand of God in heavenly places', is the Source of the Triune Godhead's love and blessings to His earthly chosen vessel Israel, who, in receiving God's love and blessings will be compelled by that love to release God's love and blessings to the whole world as they proclaim the Kingdom of God and its King!
In his Gospel John brings together this understanding of the Shepherd and Vine of Israel when Jesus was speaking to His disciples - who were `Israel' but not yet born into the promise of the New Covenant: (John chapters 10 and 15)
" I am the good Shepherd. The good Shepherd lays down His life for the
sheep . . . . . I am the true Vine (that is, the Heavenly Israel with His
many branches), and My Father is the Gardener . . . . . I am the Vine,
you are the branches . . "
As Paul later wrote in his Letter to the Romans:
" Do not become conceited . . . .so they too (the broken off branches of
Israel) have become disobedient in order that they may now receive mercy
as a result of God's mercy to you . . ."
God's love and blessings are available to all men through belief in His Chosen Israel, that is, Jesus the Messiah, released and overflowing through His earthly Chosen People Israel, those grafted and re-grafted into the Olive Tree, who understand God's total love for those broken-off branches from Israel. He will re-graft them back into the Olive Tree, Jesus, Who is the true Israel of God `and so all Israel will be saved, as it is written' And if for some of His people His compelling love cannot be expressed because of their hardness of heart, a reading of Exodus 28 concerning the High Priest's garments will show that Israel's High Priest Jesus carries in His Garments the Breastplate of Judgement, with all the names of the natural earthly children of Israel on it close to His Heart when in the spiritual Holy Place He makes intercession for all Israel, that in the coming Judgement repentance will bring those broken-off branches back into Himself, the Eternal Olive Tree.
We write this Letter first to show the despair of the kingdom of this world and the love and blessings of God in the Kingdom of His Son Jesus. Secondly, to bring Scriptural understanding of Israel - both to those who reject Israel as having a unique part in God's purposes following the events of those Feasts of Passover and Pentecost some two thousand years ago, culminating (as they erronously claim) in the birth of the Church; but also to those who react, often vehemently, against any criticism of the nation of Israel. Lest there be any lingering conceit in either of these groups they must see the Shepherd and the Vine as the chosen and dearly-loved Israel of the Triune God in the Person of Jesus, now seated at the right hand of God in Heaven, releasing His Father's Love and Blessings through His chosen Vessel on earth, Israel, which is the Body of Christ - the one New Man, both Jew and Gentile, through whom God's blessings flow out to a dying world - and to those broken-off branches, the Jewish people who have rejected Jesus as their Messiah and Saviour who will yet be re-grafted into the Olive Tree.
Selah
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