• In the Old Testament, a man named Joseph has dreams and goes into Egypt to preserve his family (Genesis 45:5). In the New Testament, another Joseph likewise had dreams and goes into Egypt to preserve his family (Matthew 2:13).

• When the young nation of Israel comes out of Egypt, God calls it “my son” (Exodus 4:22). When Jesus comes out of Egypt, God says “Out of Egypt have I called my son” (Matthew 2:15).

• When Israel leaves Egypt, her people go through the Red Sea. The apostle Paul says they were “baptized unto Moses … in the sea” (1 Corinthians 10:2). Jesus is also baptized “to fulfill all righteousness,” and immediately afterward God proclaims Him, “my beloved Son” (Matthew 3:15-17)

• After the Red Sea crossing, the Israelites spend 40 years in the wilderness—led by the pillar of fire, God’s Spirit. Immediately after baptism, Jesus is “led up of the Spirit into the wilderness” for 40 days (Matthew 4:1, 2).

• At the end of the 40 years, Moses writes Deuteronomy. At the end of Jesus’ 40 days, He resists Satan’s temptations by quoting three Scriptures—all from Deuteronomy!

• In Psalm 80:8, God calls Israel a “vine” that He brought “out of Egypt.” Jesus later declares, “I am the true vine” (John 15:1).

• In the Old Testament, the name “Israel” first applied to one man: Jacob—representing his spiritual victory over sin. Even so, in the New Testament, Jesus Christ is the Israel who came “out of Egypt.” He is the one victorious man who overcame all sin!

Proof that the chosen people of God are in Jesus is further understood in the new covenant outlined in Heb. 8: 8, and 10—“Behold, days are coming, says the Lord, when I will effect a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah…After those days, says the Lord, I will put My laws into their minds, and I will write them on their hearts. I will be their God, and they shall be My people.

Notice that the covenant is made with Israel and Judah (from which the name Jews are derived). Nowhere in the Bible is it found that a covenant is made with Gentiles. The blood that Jesus shed to effect the new covenant applies to all; and all who believe are born again, becoming spiritual Jews, in order to enter into the new spiritual covenant with spiritual Israel.

This gives understanding to the statement Paul made in Rom. 11: 26, in which he said, “And so all Israel shall be saved.” The popular belief in Christendom is that this means eventually all literal Jews will be saved. But there are not two different kinds of salvation—one for ethnic Jews, and one for everyone else.

The only way all Jews will be saved is for them to be spiritual Jews in Christ Jesus.

Conclusion  

All of the foregoing is not meant to demean the Jewish nation. It is meant to set the record straight. God still loves all who live there, as, indeed, He loves all humanity. The door of probation that closed on Israel in Daniel, chap. 9, simply closed on it being God’s chosen instrument to herald to the world the good news about the Messiah. While the nation as a whole is no longer the chosen of God, individual Jews can be; that is, those who accept Jesus as Lord and Savior.

The Christian church, the body of Christ, is composed of spiritual Jews, no matter their earthly nationality. They now are the chosen people of God charged with being the light of the world, illuminating the gospel.