THE HOPE OF ISRAEL - The Preterist Archive

202 The Hope of Israel: What Is It?
By this we learn that God's promise to Abraham was
much larger than He chose to reveal in 0. T. times. It
embraced the whole world. And now that we know the
full breadth of the promise, we clearly recognize that
God, by giving the whole world to the seed of Abraham
would literally fulfil this promise; for the greater includes
the less.
The apostle then goes on to show that it is impossible
that the promise to
Abraham could be fulfilled
to those who .were merely his natural descendants :
"For if they which are of the law be heirs, faith is made void,
and the promise made of none effect" (Rom. 4:14).
In other words, the bestowal of the promised land
upon the nation of Israel ("they which are of the law")
would be not the fulfilling of "the promise," but
the nullification of it.
And the passage continues
"Therefore it is of faith that it might be by grace, to the
end the promise might be sure to all seed; not to that (seed)
only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith
of Abraham, who is the father of us all. (As it is written, I
have made thee a father of many nations)".
By this we are given to know that the promise to
Abraham, recorded in Genesis 17:1-8, runs to Abraham
and his spiritual seed, those who are of the faith of
Abraham, and that the clause "I have made thee a
father of many nations" (Gen. 17:5), means that
saved Gentiles were to be among the heirs of this
promise.
The subject is still further elucidated in Galatians;
where we read :
"Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He
saith not, And to SEEDS, as of many; but as of one, And to thy
SEED, which is CHRIST (Gal. 3:16).