Recovering the Lost Mystery of the Gospel

Unbelief under Light

 

Paul has told us that this present age is the age of the fullness of the Gentiles. When he wrote the Romans about Gentile and Jewish response to his gospel, Paul noted that during the Old Covenant age, Gentiles were held in unbelief while Jews received light through the Law. But now, Gentiles were receiving the light of faith while Jews were being kept in unbelief since rejecting the Messiah:

 

Rom. 11:30-31 For as you were once disobedient to God [i.e., during the time of Israel's light], yet have now obtained mercy [i.e., the light of faith] through their disobedience, even so also these have now been disobedient [i.e., during the time of your light].... 

 

From this Paul shows Jews and Gentiles to each be guilty of unbelief outside their respective "age of light," and that God's mercy alone gives sight to each group in its age of light. That is the gist of his conclusion in Romans 11:32,

 

For God has concluded them all [Jews and Gentiles] in unbelief, that he might have mercy upon all.

 

But now, at the end of this Gentile age, a deeper prophetic meaning to what Paul was saying comes into view--something past what he likely had in mind at the time, but which I believe the Spirit meant to convey through his words. In Romans 11:32, Paul highlights the unbelief each group had outside its age of light. But what about unbelief inside one's own age of light?

 

Think about it. Even under Old Covenant light, most of Israel lived in unbelief. Paul's writings in the chapters preceding this final discussion in chapter 11 are in fact centered on Israel's unbelief during the time of its light. Israel's final rejection of Messiah during its age of light simply climaxed what had been an age defined by continuous unbelief under light--an age of spiritual valleys punctuated only occasionally by peaks of spiritual faithfulness in coming back to the light (or, as we call it, "revival").

 

 

            - Gentile Unbelief under the Light of Faith

 

If so about Israel under its light, what about Gentiles under their light? Do we not suppose there might be a similarity and a pattern? Indeed, is it not utterly plain that under Gentile light--the light of faith in Christ--that conflicts of unbelief over similar issues and idolatries have continued--starting with the first generation! The players and issues have changed across the two ages, but the patterns of unbelief are eerily familiar. In fact, the parallels of Gentile unbelief under New Covenant light and Israel's unbelief under Old Covenant light are absolutely striking.

 

These parallels form the pivotal basis of this article. We'll come back to them later in detail. For now, I just want to submit that the Gentile age continues to prove hampered by unbelief, despite everything it knows about faith.

 

But how can this be? The New Covenant is about faith. It's the one, the only, and the last covenant of faith there will ever be. There is no other faith to be revealed. Yet Gentile stewardship of this faith has been marked by unbelief! Together with Christ's words about little faith and few survivors, the age-long unbeliefs under New Covenant light tell me there must be something basic about the faith itself we have never grasped from the beginning.

 

 

- Paul's Warning Revisited
 

This idea of unbelief-under-light gives greater prophetic meaning to Paul's word that all are "concluded under unbelief." It suggests Gentile unbelief was not limited to the Old Testament time of darkness apart from the Law, but that we are still under unbelief despite our light of faith just as Israel lived in unbelief despite her light under the Law. If so, it brings Paul's warning of Rom. 11:22 into new urgent focus:

 

Behold then the kindness and severity of God; to those who fell, severity, but to you, God's kindness, if you continue in His kindness; otherwise you also will be cut off.

 

At the time Paul said this, he was warning a local church. But could it be Paul was unknowingly issuing a prophetic warning to the entire Gentile age?

 

Could it be that, as an age--despite our basic faith for personal salvation and Spirit manifestations--we, the "christianized" gentile world have been or are about to become cut off due to a stubborn underlying unbelief like as Israel displayed under her time of light? And could that be why--like as Israel was virtually wiped off the map at the first destruction of Jerusalem--that at the end of this Gentile "Age of Faith," there will be few survivors among all mankind?? Are the prophecies of near total human annihilation and Paul's warning one and the same?

 

I believe there is something to these observations. We all grope for more light on the unresolved issues of this present spiritual age. (That's why this and most other prophetic teaching ministries exist.) The question for this immediate article is:

 

Can anything about Paul's original gospel show us where our age has missed the mark of faith under the light of faith, just as badly as Israel missed it under the light of the Law?

 

 

Part 4

Chris Anderson
New Meadow Neck, Rhode Island

First Love Ministry
- a ministry of Anglemar Fellowship
http://www.firstloveministry.org

05/06

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