What The Bible Says.

Fortnightly bible study.

Episode 93 - 13/02/25

Led by Tim Clark

Why was Messiah rejected—especially by the very nation to whom He first came? In Part 2 of Rejected Messiah, we follow the Bible’s own storyline: Israel’s longing for deliverance, the weight of expectation, and the shock of a suffering Redeemer. Luke 24 helps set the scene—“we were hoping…”—and shows how even sincere disciples can misread God’s plan until Christ opens the Scriptures.

Scripture also pulls back the curtain on the spiritual battle beneath the surface. From Genesis 3 onward there is enmity—hatred aimed not merely at people, but at God’s promise and God’s purposes. This matters because so much anti-Jewish hostility across history cannot be explained by politics alone; the Bible treats it as part of a deeper conflict over redemption.

We then address a painfully real obstacle: the sins of “Christendom” have often been used as a reason to reject Christ. Persecution, scapegoating, coercion, and hypocrisy have made the name “Christian” a stumbling block for Jewish hearers. Yet those sins are not the fruit of Jesus’ teaching—Christ commands love, truth, and humility—so we must separate biblical Christianity from the betrayals done in its name.

Next, we return to the obvious fact so often ignored: Jesus is Jewish. Luke 2 reminds us He was born into Israel’s covenant life, and Luke 13 shows His tender lament over Jerusalem. The gospel did not arrive as a Gentile invention; the first witnesses, apostles, and the earliest church were Jewish—God’s salvation going out from Israel to the nations exactly as promised.

Romans 9 and 11 then anchor God’s ongoing faithfulness. Paul’s grief for his “kinsmen according to the flesh” is unmistakable, and Romans 11:28–29 stands like a pillar: God’s gifts and calling are irrevocable. Salvation is only in Christ—yet God has not cancelled His covenant purposes for ethnic Israel, and the church must never become arrogant toward the root that supports it.

That leads into the hope-filled promise: “all Israel will be saved” (Romans 11:26–27). This is not automatic salvation for every Jew of all time, but a future, climactic turning to Messiah—echoing the prophets’ language of national mourning and recognition. The response for believers now is simple and biblical: pray, witness with humility, love without flattery, and refuse both errors—erasing Israel on the one hand, or baptising political agendas on the other.

Finally, we tackle the covenant question head-on. Jeremiah 31 declares that God Himself promised a New Covenant “with the house of Israel and the house of Judah,” not like the broken Sinai covenant—one marked by forgiveness and God’s law written on the heart. Jesus identifies His blood as “the new covenant” (Luke 22:20), and Hebrews 8 shows how Christ fulfils what the prophets foretold. Jew and Gentile alike have one way of salvation—Messiah alone—yet that salvation comes through God’s faithful story that began with Israel and was always meant to bless the nations.