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The letter l am now going to read to you is addressed to: Mr. Saved Gentile, Stock of Abraham, Faith Entrance, New Covenant Square, Jerusalem. You were born a Gentile, and also lived during the period covered by the Acts of the
Apostles.
Some of the letters written during that period contain references to you.
As a Gentile you were not present at Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost: it was a “feast of the Jews”. The promise of the outpouring of the Spirit was not given to YOU
, but to Israel (Acts 1). “I send the promise of My Father upon YOU “(Luke 24:49).
It was not until eight years after Pentecost that the “door of faith” was opened to you, and God “granted to the Gentiles repentance unto life” (Acts 11 :18).
You turned to God from idols.
You turned from pagan darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God.
You received the forgiveness of sins, and to the astonishment of the saved Jews, on you, a saved Gentile, was poured
out the gift of the Holy Spirit (Acts 10:45). You became a partaker of Israel's spiritual blessings (Rom.11:17).
You thus have doctrinal blessings, and dispensational privileges in being linked with the covenant people (Israel).
Unlike the proselyte (Mr. Gentile No. 1), you are not under law, but under grace. “If ye be circumcised, Christ shall profit you nothing” (Gal.5:2).
You are members of a body (hands. feet, head, eyes, (1 Cor. 12), but you are not on an equality, dispensationally, with the Jewish believer.
The Jew is "first” for the Gospel (Rom. 1:16) and judgment and blessing (2 :9,10).
The word of repentance and blessing is to the Jew first (Acts 3:26, 13:46, 26:20).
You are only a “wild olive” grafted into the true olive (Israel) (Rom. 11:24), and are reminded that the root (Israel) bears you, and not the other way round (Rom. 11:18).
You are warned that you can be “cut off” from this position (Rom. 11:20-22).
Although you are not under law, there are “decrees” which you must keep – “four necessary things” (Acts 15:28).
This was like the “middle wall of partition” between you and Jewish believers (Eph.2:15). The literal “middle wall” was an inscription on one of the Temple enclosure walls reading as follows:
“No one, being a foreigner (Gentile) may enter in to the enclosure around the Holy Place. Whosoever is apprehended will himself be to blame for his death which will certainly follow".
Your hope is the “hope of Israel” entertained by Mr. Hebrew Christian, as you have become a sharer of his blessings.
If you, as a Gentile, disconnect yourself from the Jew in this Acts period how are you going to have the blessings there described?
Mr. Hebrew Christian was warned about the possibility of turning back to Judaism, and so trampling under foot the blood
of Christ (Heb. l0:29). Such would draw back unto perdition (10:39) and lose any possibility of pleasing God and earning a reward. If on the other hand he went on to perfection (maturity Heb.6:1), and
suffered and endured (Heb. 10:32-35) as those in Hebrews l1:33-40, or as described in Revelation 3:12 (overcomers), then, as a reward, he could look forward to a better country connected with
the Heavenly Jerusalem (Heb.11:16, 12:22,23). In which case the address on the envelope to him would be: Mr. Hebrew Christian, Stock of Abraham, Overcomer’s Entrance, Heavenly City,
Jerusalem. Mr. Saved Gentile if he likewise endured, and was faithful to the end, would also share this reward and
special privilege of a higher sphere of blessing - indeed a “better hope” than the earthly one
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