Israel And Identity Amid The Nations Essay

Israel Embodies Its Missional Role and Identity Amid the Nations God’s role for Israel was to live apart from their surrounding nations, who led lives full of idolatry. Israel was to personify God’s purpose and intentions. “It is God’s mission in relation to the nations, (emphasis author’s) arguably more than any other theme, that provides the key that unlocks the biblical grand narrative.”(49) If Israel existed as God’s people for the benefit of all nations, we must look at how the Israelites embraced their purpose. The God of Abraham promised a three-fold reward to His chosen people. God vowed that the Israelites would have people, land, and blessings. We must remember these are secondary to God’s ultimate plan of blessings

Christ’s death and resurrection death bespeaks the beginning of new creation in the Bible story. For God’s children to be the promised part of His creation, these two events had to occur. They are more than the axis for the Christian community though; they are the axis of all cosmic history. Looking at Christian faith, we see problems with how believers view and interpret the resurrection. First, modern Christians often view the resurrection only on a personal level, accentuating it as the event that brought about personal salvation, forgetting that Christ’s death and resurrection signifies a much broader event. “consider carefully John's words when he cries out, ‘Look the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!’ (John 1:29)” (102, emphasis author’s). John did not say “…who takes away my sin”. To individualize such a magnificent event trivializes the church, making it simply a community for like-minded