Just Like Ours, Israel’s Promise Is “Irrevocable”!
➤From Genesis to Revelation, the story of Israel embodies God’s unchanging faithfulness.
If we deny God’s faithful promise to Israel, so clearly recorded in both the Old and New Testaments, how can we trust His promise to us?
The answer to that question should be obvious. We cannot!
But of course, we wholly trust His promise to us; thus, we should trust His promise to Israel, too – a promise that even He calls “irrevocable” (Romans 11:29).
His covenant with Abraham was designated “an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and your descendants after you” (Genesis 17:7). Rooted in divine promise rather than human merit, this covenant remains secure because it rests on the character of the covenant-maker Himself.
Through every exiled, scattered, rebellious, and unbelieving generation, God’s word has not failed.
As Jeremiah reaffirmed, only if the heavens cease to be ordered will Israel cease to be a nation before the Lord.
Jeremiah 31:35–37
35 Thus says the LORD,
Who gives the sun for a light by day,
The ordinances of the moon and the stars for a light by night,
Who disturbs the sea,
And its waves roar
(The LORD of hosts is His name):
36 “If those ordinances depart
From before Me,” says the LORD,
“Then the seed of Israel shall also cease
From being a nation before Me forever.”
37 Thus says the LORD:
“If heaven above can be measured,
And the foundations of the earth searched out beneath,
I will also cast off all the seed of Israel
For all that they have done,” says the LORD.
Their Rejection Was Foretold, but the Purpose Preserved
God’s revelation to His people has always been progressive, and it will be until He comes. He didn’t reveal or explain everything about many prophecies through His Old Covenant prophets, but reserved some parts for the New Testament era. And He’s revealing even more today as we see His prophecies unfolding in real time.
When Jesus lamented over Jerusalem, saying, “You did not know the time of your visitation” (Luke 19:44), He echoed Isaiah’s prophecy when he said:
“Make the heart of this people dull,
And their ears heavy,
And shut their eyes” (Isaiah 6:9–10).
Later, He revealed to the Apostle Paul that:
“Blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in” (Romans 11:25).
Through Paul, we finally learned the rest of the story — that Israel’s rejection served God’s divine purpose: to extend salvation to the Gentiles while not relinquishing His promise to Israel, but putting it on hold to satisfy His righteous judgment for Israel.
Today, Israel is still under that judgment.
But their covenant promise of redemption still stands. Again, it is “irrevocable.”
I really appreciate many scriptural insights given by the late theologian John Walvoord (though I don’t agree with his interpretation of the general timing of the rapture). He wrote that the partial hardening of Israel “demonstrates the integrity of God’s redemptive program.”
Why is that important?
Because it ensures their eventual restoration without removing their everlasting covenant.
The nation’s blindness was not a breach of covenant but the very fulfillment of prophetic anticipation!
The fact that their promise is so clearly seen in scripture from beginning to end should make us all the more sure of God’s promise to us.
Again, if we deny His promise to them, why should we trust His promise to us?
I’m Excited about Their Forthcoming Restoration!
Why would anyone who professes to be a follower of Jesus Christ not be thrilled to know that God has promised a future redemption for Israel?
Some say that those who have believed in Jesus Christ have either fulfilled or replaced Israel’s promise, but that’s not what the Old Testament prophets foretold, nor what the Apostle Paul taught.
Notice the following passages where even our Lord makes a clear distinction between Israel and the Church:
- Jesus promises the twelve apostles they will sit on twelve thrones “judging the twelve tribes of Israel,” implying a continuing identification of Israel alongside the Church (Matthew 19:28).
- Jesus speaks of Jerusalem being “trampled by Gentiles until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled,” again distinguishing Israel’s national/land focus from the predominantly Gentile church age (Luke 21:20–24).
The Apostle Paul could not be clearer in making a distinction several times between the two in his letter to Roman believers, whose churches were composed of both Jews and Gentiles.
For example, the Jews are the “natural branches” broken off of, and believing Gentiles are branches “grafted in to,” the olive tree whose root is Jesus Christ.
He goes on to say that they were broken off because of their unbelief, and so might we be if we do not continue in faith. The distinction between the two is clear.
And what follower of Jesus Christ could condemn the Jews for their sins more than we should rightly condemn ourselves for ours before we believed on Jesus?
Is their sin more egregious than ours? Of course not!
Romans 3:10–12
“There is none righteous, no, not one;
There is none who understands;
There is none who seeks after God.
They have all turned aside;
They have together become unprofitable;
There is none who does good, no, not one.”
Is such an attitude not the same self-righteous attitude that unbelieving but Orthodox Jews have toward us (Gentile believers) for which we readily condemn them?
Of course, it is.
Zechariah Declared Their Coming Redemption Clearly
Zechariah declared a coming day when God will “pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced” (Zechariah 12:10).
He proclaimed that Israel’s cleansing will surely come:
“In that day a fountain shall be opened… for sin and for uncleanness” (Zechariah 13:1).
Both Zechariah and Malachi prophesied that they would offer righteous sacrifices after being purified by a tribulation refiner’s fire. Then they would say again, “The Lord is my God.”
Malachi 3:2–3
“But who can endure the day of His coming?
And who can stand when He appears?
For He is like a refiner’s fire
And like launderers’ soap.
He will sit as a refiner and purifier of silver;
He will purify the sons of Levi,
And purge them as gold and silver,
That they may offer to the LORD
An offering in righteousness.”
This moment will be the consummation of God’s promises to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Who among us would not rejoice to see that day?
Even so, amen!!
Watching His plan unfold,
Mark S. Case
