THE HOPE OF ISRAEL - The Preterist Archive

138 The Hope of Israel: What Is It?
Needless to say, this unparalleled crime brought
about an entirely different situation from that which
had previously existed respecting the relationship between
God and that people. Not that God was taken
by surprise, and therefore constrained to re-shape His
plans ;
for all had been foreseen ;
and all that happened
was in strict accordance with the determinate counsel
and foreknowledge of God, and for the furtherance
of the eternal purpose, which He had purposed in
Christ Jesus our Lord.
As to this there is no disagreement amongst those
who hold the fundamentals of the Christian faith;
and I think it is also generally agreed that, with the
first coming of Christ, and with His death, resurrection
and ascension, and the coming of the Holy Spirit,
the era began which had been foretold by the prophets,
the era when God would have another "people";
when He would say to them which were not His people,
"Thou art My people" ;
and they should say, "Thou
art My God" (Hos. 2:23). Indeed, the apostle Paul
cites this very prophecy of Hosea and expounds it as
referring to the people God is now calling to Himself
out of all nations through the gospel; not from out
"of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles" (Rom.
9:24-26). And this quotation is from the passage in
which Paul explains who the true "Israel" is, to whom
the promises were made; and in which, after stating
in the plainest of words that "They are not all Israel
which are of Israel" (v. 9), he shows that, in fact,
but a few "a remnant" (v. 27) of the naturally
born Israelites, were embraced in the true "Israel,"
and that the full number of the people of God was to
be made up of the saved from among the Gentiles.