Fall of Israel in the Book of Acts
[Editor:] In the book of Acts there was a threefold digression of Israel’s apostasy, which in turn resulted in the threefold progression of Paul’s ministry – turning, going, sending:
“we turn to the Gentiles”
“henceforth I will go to
the Gentiles”
“the salvation of God is sent
unto the Gentiles.”
Notice these three stages unfolded in
their contexts:
“… seeing ye put it from you, and judge
yourselves unworthy of everlasting life, lo, we turn to the Gentiles” (Acts 13:46).
“… when they opposed themselves, and
blasphemed, he shook his raiment, and said unto them, Your blood be upon your
own heads; I am clean: from henceforth I will go unto the Gentiles” (Acts 18:6).
“… And when they
agreed not among themselves, they departed, after that Paul had spoken one
word, Well spake the Holy Ghost by Esaias the prophet unto our fathers, saying,
‘Go unto this people,
and say, Hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall
see, and not perceive: for the heart of this people is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of
hearing, and their eyes have they closed; lest they should see with their eyes,
and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and should be
converted, and I should heal them.’
Be it known therefore unto you, that the
salvation of God is sent unto the Gentiles, and that they will hear it” (Acts 28:25-28).
Thus, as Vladimir Gelesnoff (1877-1921) wonderfully wrote in the first
volume of the Unsearchable Riches magazine:
“Paul’s ministry passed, as it were, three stages, each based
on a special revelation – each successive revelation coinciding with a new turn
of Israel’s apostasy. The rejection of the Spirit in the land brought forth the
gospel of God or Justification. The hostility of the Dispersion
disclosed the mystery of the gospel, or the secret news – the Reconciliation.
The last thing revealed is a Secret Economy of transcendent favor,
where physical distinctions have no place. …
“As Israel declines, those Israelites and Gentiles who attended Paul’s
ministry were lifted higher and higher. They began in the grace of justification;
they proceeded in the peace of reconciliation; they attained a
culmination, acme and climax in the zenith glory
of heavenly realms. In the
process of disclosure their vision dilates [widens], forward and
backward, and sights on either side lofty peaks of truth beyond the range of other
prophets and seers.
“The retrograde [backward] tendency of Paul’s unfoldings is as
remarkable as the proleptic.
Justification goes back to Abraham in uncircumcision.
Reconciliation reverts to Adam.
The Secret Economy reaches even beyond sin’s entrance.
“One after another the grim shadows of past ages are passed and left
behind, and still their flight continues, onward and upward, to the source and
cause of all – God Himself – and there undisturbed by physical distinctions,
unaffrighted by a law inflexible, justified, reconciled, seated with Christ,
complete in Him, we are left in the presence of our Father in the unalloyed
enjoyment of His love.”
Our readers are highly encouraged to read Gelesnoff’s entire article,
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