Page 32 - Prophetic Word Newsletters Archive 2006 by Pastor Randy Shupe

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To whom did Paul write these
words? They were written as
words of admonition to the
church, to you and me as blood-

washed believers in
Jesus Christ.

Read these specific verses and ask yourself whether (Rom. 11:18-23)
they fit perfectly into the framework of what you have
been taught under the banner of being “saved by
grace through faith.” Does this teaching of Paul
endorse the popular phrase, “once saved, always
saved” or “unconditional eternal security?” Not
according to these passages. Israel was “cut off” for
their unbelief. Does not Paul state that this “cutting
off” can happen to the church as well?

What are we, in the church, to do with such severe, negative warnings like “do not boast…do not be
haughty, but fear…He may not spare you either…only if you continue in His goodness…otherwise you
also will be cut off…behold the goodness and the severity of God?” We must fit such sayings into our
system of beliefs!

I am afraid that severity from God has been doctrinally relegated as something that belongs only to the
Jews, the Old Covenant God of “Law”, but has been made null and void by the New Covenant God of
“grace.” No wonder that we do not find in modern-day Christianity this chapter being listed among the
favorite themes of the epistle to the Romans! The contents of this chapter does not fit within the doctrinal
confines of what is being fed to the church today, which is a modern-day manifestation of just what Paul
was warning about: the emergence, in the church, of a high-minded, haughty, boastful presentation of
what God has done for it; things He would not do for Israel.

Today we have doctrines propagating “Replacement Theology” in which the church has replaced Israel as
God’s chosen people. Therefore we have prophetic ministries surfacing with titles like “The Joshua
Generation” and “The Joel Army” whose self-proclaimed destiny is to fulfill all the yet-future promises that
were given to the now-defunct chosen Israel of God. The church becomes a new spiritual Israel; or even
worse, it follows the erroneous Puritan theory that America is God’s New Israel-a manifestation of the
Kingdom of God on earth! The home-school movement has swallowed the theology of Peter Marshall’s
“Light and The Glory” as gospel truth, when in essence it is the erroneous Puritan ideology that stands in
direct opposition to the Word of God! If America has indeed become God’s New Israel, then Jesus, at his
second coming, should set His feet down on perhaps Mt. St. Helens instead of the prophesied Mt. Olivet
in Israel! Does it bother anyone in the church that the Mormon doctrines parallel the false teachings of the
Puritans pertaining to America being God’s “New Israel?” God does not have (or want) a New Israel! He
is not finished with the old one according to Paul’s clear and repetitious statements found in the 11th
Chapter of Romans:

“I SAY THEN, HAS GOD CAST AWAY HIS PEOPLE? CERTAINLY NOT!…GOD HAS NOT CAST AWAY HIS PEOPLE
WHOM HE FOREKNEW…EVEN SO THEN, AT THIS PRESENT TIME THERE IS A REMNANT ACCORDING TO THE

ELECTION OF GRACE…I SAY THEN, HAVE THEY STUMBLED THAT THEY SHOULD FALL? CERTAINLY NOT!
BUT THROUGH THEIR FALL, TO PROVOKE THEM TO JEALOUSY, SALVATION HAS COME TO THE GENTILES…
FOR IF THEIR BEING CAST AWAY IS THE RECONCILIATION OF THE WORLD, WHAT WILL THEIR ACCEPTANCE BE

BUT LIFE FROM THE DEAD?…AND THEY ALSO, IF THEY DO NOT CONTINUE IN UNBELIEF,
WILL BE GRAFTED IN, FOR GOD IS ABLE TO GRAFT THEM IN AGAIN…HOW MUCH MORE WILL THESE,

WHO ARE THE NATURAL BRANCHES, BE GRAFTED INTO THEIR OWN OLIVE TREE?
FOR I DO NOT DESIRE, BRETHREN, THAT YOU SHOULD BE IGNORANT OF THIS MYSTERY,

LEST YOU SHOULD BE WISE IN YOUR OWN OPINION,
THAT HARDENING IN PART HAS HAPPENED TO ISRAEL UNTIL THE FULLNESS OF THE GENTILES HAS COME IN.

AND SO ALL ISRAEL WILL BE SAVED, AS IT IS WRITTEN…” Romans Chapter 11 excerpts