"All Israel:" An Additional Witness

Re-reading through some sections from Continuity and Discontinuity (Wheaton, IL: Crossway, 1988) earlier this evening, I came across the following quote from Marten H. Woudstra. Woudstra was closely associated with the production of the original New International Version of the Bible. For this reason, if you Google Woudstra’s name, you will find numerous attacks against him by KJV-only advocates, who charge him with theological liberalism [and worse], but–doing further research into his life (through on-line articles from the Journal of the Evangelical Theological Society [Woudstra was a president of ETS]), I believe that there is no reason to give credence to these attacks. [Also: all of the contributors to Crossway’s Continuity and Discontinuity seem to have been theological conservatives.]

            At the time that he wrote “Israel and the Church: A Case for Continuity” for Continuity and Discontinuity, Woudstra taught at Calvin Theological Seminary. Woudstra interpreted “all Israel” Romans 11:26 in the same manner as the theologian for which his school was named. Woudstra wrote:

The quote from Isaiah 59 which follows in Rom 11:26 refers to a deliverer who shall come out of Zion. He it is who takes away Israel’s sin. This deliverer has already come when Paul writes these words. The taking away of sins has been accomplished by Christ, and this for both Gentiles and Jews. As the fullness of the Gentiles is brought in and “until” this time is finished, so, in this manner, “all Israel” will be saved. In this manner the twofold OT emphasis upon particularism and universalism will have merged. There will be one body of the redeemed, Christ’s flock, known to him by name and distinguished from those who are not his sheep. This body of Christ will exclude those who are not truly Christ’s own; yet it will also call all men to repentance. The saving of “all Israel” is still going on, for the fullness of the Gentiles is also still being brought in. But at all events some of the Jews who are now hardened in part will be grafted into the one olive tree. They will not form a separate program or a separate entity next to the church.

"Israel's Fruition"

The following is from Paul R. Williamson, Sealed With An Oath: Covenant is God’s Unfolding Promise (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2007), 190-192.

 

“[T]he emphasis in Romans 9-11 is surely on the fact that God’s covenant promises vis-à-vis Israel will indeed be fulfilled, but only in the genuine heirs of the covenant(s): Abraham’s spiritual descendants (whether Jew or Gentile; cf. Eph 2:11-12). Thus, Paul highlights the fact that–although ethnic Israel enjoyed some tremendous spiritual privileges (Rom 9:4-5)–God had never promised that all Abraham’s physical posterity would inherit the covenant promises (Rom 9:6-13). Rather, through Jesus, God has done exactly what he promised Abraham (Gen 12:3) and later reiterated through the prophets: namely, extending blessing to all the nations of the earth. Thus, Romans 9-11 graphically reinforces the point that Paul made earlier in this epistle (cf. Rom 4:16-19)–that the gospel is the means by which the covenant promise made to Abraham is realized–Abraham’s ‘fatherhood of many nations’ and multitudinous descendants relates to the extension (beyond ethnic Israel) of the people of God.

“However, Paul is also at pains to stress in Romans 9-11 that the extension of the people of God to include Gentiles did not negate or abrogate the fulfillment of the covenant promises in relation to ethnic Israelites. Unfortunately, this important caveat has been implicitly denied in many supercessionist readings of Scripture, which suggest that Israel has been entirely replaced by the church as the people of God. As Horton has recently argued (2006:131-132), rather than seeing the church as simply replacing Israel, it is more in keeping with Scripture to see the church ‘as Israel’s fruition’. Thus understood, the church is the continuation and extension of Israel as the people of God, encompassing both elect Jews and elect Gentiles who, together, make up ‘the Israel of God’ (Gal 6:16). Therefore, biological descendants of Abraham were in no way disadvantaged under the new covenant, as some of Paul’s protagonists were apparently suggesting (cf. Rom 11:13-22). Rather, they (like the Gentiles) could respond positively to the gospel message–

….

“Hence the covenant promises had been inherited not by Israel in an exclusively ethnic or biological sense, but by all Abraham’s true descendants: those united to Abraham through faith in Jesus Christ.

“Significantly, the inheritance of the latter appears to include even the territorial promise, albeit in a cosmic sense (Rom 4:13; cf. Matt 5:5). Thus understood, the promise of land, while including the territory of Canaan, ultimately encompasses much more: namely, the ‘new heaven and the new earth’ anticipated by the prophets (Rom 8:17-25; cf. 2 Pet 3:13).

“In any case, Paul’s discussion of covenant in Romans serves primarily to bolster confidence in God’s faithfulness to his ancient promises and the fulfillment of these in an Israel that, while not encompassing every biological descendant of Abraham, certainly incorporates all ethnic Israelites who, whether in the present or in the future, turn from their unbelief, and thus, along with their Gentile brothers, enter into the promised inheritance.”

The New Israel: Christ and His Church

The following is from Stephen G. Dempster, Dominion and Dynasty: A Theology of the Hebrew Bible (Downers Grove, IL: InterVarsity Press, 2003), 232-234.

“Jesus is the David, the culmination of Israel’s history, who will bring about an end to the exile. Yet his birth also brings light to the Gentiles; a star is seen rising in the east (Matt 2:2), which means the crushing of the enemy’s head (Num 24:17). Thus, when Jesus begins his ministry, he–as the new Adam and new Israel–succeeds where the old Adam and old Israel failed (Matt 4:1-11). Hence he recapitulates in his life the history of Adam and Israel. He triumphs over the satanic enemy and announces the kingdom of God, a domain that includes geography and which will one day encompass the entire earth. And this is the emphasis at the end of Matthew’s Gospel, in which a suffering Davidic Messiah has been exalted and given authority over not just an Israelite kingdom but the globe. He commands his subjects to go into this domain and disciple all nations (Matt 28:18-20; cf. Dan 7:13-14).

….

“Paul’s commentary on this narrative storyline [found in the Gospels and Acts] is that the burgeoning church composed of all nations is a fulfillment of the promise to Abraham, and the entire world is theirs for an inheritance, not just one country (Rom 4:13). Sinai was powerless to save in a positive way, but presses the need for a Savior who can redeem from the curse of the law. Jesus is the obedient Son who is sentenced to hang on a tree for the disobedient (Gal 3:10-14; cf. Deut 21:18-23). The new Israel, comprising all nations and peoples, emerges and continues the final conquest of the serpent (Gal 3:28-29; Rom 16:20).”