The Gospel of the Kingdom was preached by the first apostles “to the Jew first”, then by Philip to the City of Samarita with great results, and by Peter to the household of Cornelius, which received the same experience as the disciples had in the Upper Room on the Day of Pentecost.
The Kingdom Message and invitation rejected by the Jews at Rome and elsewhere would be proclaimed to “both bad and good” so that “the wedding” would be “furnished with guests” (Matthew 22:10). As the Apostle Paul writes: “The salvation of God is sent to the nations, and they will hear it.” (Acts 28:28)
From the many nations to which the Gospel was preached were believers who together formed one new, holy nation: the Church. Not a non-Jewish ecclesiastical entity, as many suppose, but a new one, composed of Jews and non-Jews — all united in Jesus Christ.
This nation, or people, this new “ethnos” (ethnic group), would enjoy privileges disregarded by ancient Israel, which had lost its spiritual but not necessarily cultural) heritage. The “peculiar people” (KJV), the special treasure of God, became a spiritual body, the “body of Christ”. I repeat, not a non-Jewish body but an all-inclusive body of believers from every race, composed of believers in the Lord Jesus Christ.
Believing Jews formed the Church in its infancy, but when Gentiles (non-Jews) accepted Christ in great numbers after the Roman Army destroyed Jerusalem in AD70), the Church was seen as one holy nation and its ethnicity became clearly “Christian” (Acts 11:26). God united both Jew and non-Jews in Jesus Christ (Ephesians 2:11-18).
As Paul writes: “He is not a Jew who is one outwardly…but a Jew who is one inwardly…” This “new creation” in Christ is “the Israel of God” (Romans 2:28, 29; Galatians 6:15,16). People of every nation and race who have believed in Jesus Christ are one in the sight of God.
Those Jews who are Abraham’s natural descendants but who reject Jesus as the promised Messiah are not included in this spiritual body. Yet they are watched over and protected by the LORD due to the covenant God made with Abraham. They are not “saved” in the sense that we are, but are protected and blessed by God because of that everlasting covenant.
What, then, of unbelieving Jews? “To those who are disobedient, ‘the stone that the builders disallowed, the same is made the head of the corner’, and ‘a stone of stumbling and a rock of offense’ to those who stumble at the word, being disobedient…” (I Peter 2:8)
God preserves them due to His promises to the “fathers” — the patriarchs Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Much like children are “sanctified” (set apart) by the faith of believing parents. Protected and preserved for God’s Promise and Purpose!
In his letter to the believers at Rome, Paul refers to the book of Hosea to “us whom He has called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles” (I Peter 2:9; Romans 9:24). This verse proves that the apostles Paul and Peter saw the Church as the new people of God, as “a holy nation”. The cultures of many Christians are many but all who believer are one in their heartfelt love for Jesus. And for one another.
We should remember this when next we see Christians whose manner of dress or style of worship may differ from our own. But those who acknowledge Jesus as their Lord ought to be as acceptable to us as they are to God. Just as Gentiles were to Jews after the Day of Pentecost, and as Jews were to Gentiles after the destruction of the Temple at Jerusalem.
Wait! What? Yes, my point exactly.