The Living Church of God, like most other COG's claims to keep ALL the laws, yet they and the rest of the COG's pick and choose which laws they want to keep and make excuses for the rest of them. Every group has its own special set of laws they follow while not keeping others. They just never seem to grasp the condemnation that comes from law-keeping as they should. Break just one little law and you break them all. It is an impossibility to keep them all. No one and I repeat NO ONE in ANY Church of God has ever kept the law completely. Not even Rod Meredith who said he had never committed a major sin since baptism. To say they have is to prove themselves liars.
Do You Love God’s Law? We live in an age when many professing Christians believe God’s laws are a burden or out of date. Many in our secular world have no knowledge of God’s laws. Few today understand that God gave His laws to the Israelites so they could be lights and examples to the world (Deuteronomy 4:1–10). Yet Bible prophecy reveals the time would come when future Israelites would reject God’s laws and view them as “a strange thing” (Hosea 8:1, 12)—which is where we are today. However, David loved and meditated on God’s laws (Psalm 119:16–18, 97–104, 129), and David will rule over the tribes of Israel in the coming Kingdom and teach them God’s ways (Ezekiel 37:24–25; Hosea 3:5). Many professing Christians and peoples in our secular societies today will be surprised when Jesus Christ and His saints return to teach the world the laws of God (Isaiah 2:2–4). This is the future for those who love God’s law.
Have a profitable Sabbath, Douglas S. Winnail
It never ceases to amaze me. For people who claim to BELIEVE GOD, and know their Bibles, how they can be so oblivious to the difference between law and commandments is beyond me. Entole vs nomous (spelled wrong, sorry) is all the difference in the world. The article is EXACTLY correct. Jesus said keep My teachings, not the 10 Mosaic commandments. You would think the explanations for this change, gone into great depth by Paul and the author of Hebrews, would make this as plain to cog members, but apparently not. You might also think the Books of Romans, Hebrews and Galatians are totally missing in their Bibles, to hear them cry, law, law, and more law all the time. I think when they see the word commandment, they automatically think it is a reference to the big 10.
ReplyDeleteI have said in comments before, trying to help people see that difference and trust the fact that we are not under the law (whether Jew or Gentile), can sometimes feel like getting bruised and beaten at the end of the day. But, if just one person can see the light and the veil of Moses is lifted, I will keep trying to my dying breath. If you believe you are saved by law keeping, you are wrong. As Paul wrote, you have made the Cross of Christ none effect to you and fallen from the grace of God. Please, please study your Bibles again and read these Books, in context, if you think you must keep the law to be, or because you are saved. The liberty that is in Christ is not license to sin as adversaries claim. The born again, Holy Spirit indwelled believer has His teachings in their hearts and loves to keep them.
Millions of good and decent people are going to go to hell with Bibles in their hands, because they would not believe what the words say. That breaks my heart every single day.
Pal, there is a difference between the ten commandments and mosaic laws.
DeleteOf all people to CLAIM to love the law, Doug Winnail should be the last, as he shows us an example of loving his Southern Baptist wife more than he loves the OT regulation that would have forbidden him from remarrying her after her marriage and divorce to another man.
ReplyDeleteBecause Jesus didn't mention all 10 of the commandments in Matthew 19:17-19 the lawless can wiggle out of keeping some of the 10, particularly the 4th.
ReplyDeleteTo DW,
ReplyDeleteLooks to me like if you want the reward that God offers you have to do as He says.
Rev 21:7 He that overcometh shall inherit all things, and I will be his God, and he shall be my son.
Rev 21:8 But the fearful, and unbelieving, and the abominable, and murderers,((5th comm')) and whoremongers, and sorcerers, and idolaters,((1st comm')) and all liars,((6th comm')) shall have their part in the lake which burneth with fire and brimstone: which is the second death. Item from the 10 still being mentioned in the last book written.
Exo 20:1 And ((God)) spake all these words, saying,...(not Moses)
1Jn_3:4 Whosoever committeth sin transgresseth also the law: for ((sin is the transgression of the law.))
Jesus did not sin, therefore He kept the law. If we are disciples, then we must follow His example.
The law is based on our love for our Creator , and our love for our fellow man. It is just the basics of how we ourselves would like to be treated by others. Unless of course your only objection like many others is a rejection of the commandment to rest on the Sabbath. Which is not a mosaic law. That dates back to the 7th day in the history of our world. A day to rest from work, which God said would be a sign that would identify His people to be the ones that are worshiping the true God of creation. Not some devil-inspired counterfeit god.
Rom 4:15 for where no law is, there is no transgression. If there is no law now, or if Christ did away with it like some would like to think, then it would be impossible for us to sin. How could we . You cannot break a speed limit if no limit is set, and there is no law against speeding. When there is a law, there must also be a deterrent for those who would break it. Lucky for us Christ paid our penalty, so we are not under the death sentence for being under the law, which means that we have broken the law. But Jesus did not pay our penalty so that we can go break the law some more. He says to us, as he did to this lady Joh_8:11 She said, No man, Lord. And Jesus said unto her, Neither do I condemn thee: go, and ((sin no more.)) Your disagreement is with God , not people.
It is interesting that in the book of Galatians which those who advocate breaking the 10 commandments often refer to, Paul says just the opposite. In chapter 5, in verses 19-21, he states that Christians will not be in the kingdom of God if they are guilty of "adultery, fornication, uncleanness, lasciviousness, idolatry, witchcraft, hatred, variance, emulations, wrath, strife, seditions, hereies, envying, murders, drunkenness, envyings and such like." Sounds as if he is referring to a bunch of the 10 commandmens!
ReplyDeletejezus is the imaginary false friend of the armstrongist and many others
ReplyDeleteAnon320,
ReplyDeleteThe COGs have made you think that living under the New Covenant rather than under the old covenant of Sinai means somehow that you are against the moral teachings of the old covenant. This is entirely untrue. We simply are under the New Covenant which has better terms and better promises (Heb. 8:6-8) and are not under the Old Covenant. Yes, God established the Old Covenant, but He has now instituted the New and Better Covenant for those who believe.
Acts 15 did not just say circumcision. It said circumcision AND the Law. The final saying on the matter illustrates this. If it were simply about circumcision, they would have said, We will instruct the gentiles that they do not need to be circumcised, but need to keep the rest of the Law."
Instead, they said, " Instead we should write to them, telling them to abstain from food polluted by idols, from sexual immorality, from the meat of strangled animals and from blood."
Those things have nothing to do with circumcision. So, it is obvious that the decision was regarding the Law, not just circumcision.
There's one thing that somehow I just can't get past. It's very difficult to beat the absolute peace and tranquility of eternal death.
ReplyDeleteYou know, I'm not going to even listen to anyone talk about keeping the Law when they are not truly keeping the law as they fail in the keeping at times, but further Anon320 is undoubtedly not observing all portions of the Law. Do you wear prayer tassels? Do you build a succoth for tabernacles, do you perform any sacrifices (where explicitly does it say not to), do you support a woman being outside the camp on her period, etc?
ReplyDeleteHow do you reconcile not doing so? If you are guilty in one point, you are guilty in all.
Well, Jim, what would we expect of people who don't even know the Holy Spirit's correct pronouns??? They just can't know much about anything else, right?
ReplyDeleteThe 10 don't mention tassels, sacrifices, succoths. Consider Heb 9:10, Gal 3:19. After Christ's death some laws were done away; some were not. It's not an all law or nothing law issue.
ReplyDeleteAnon709,
ReplyDeleteGal. 3:19 which you reference states the "law", not portions of the law. I think when you talk about the 10 you are really focusing on the sabbath. I spent many years in WCG and the COGs while also knowing many Christians unaffiliated with the COGs. Those Christians lived their faith better and had less divorces, less murders, less lying, less turmoil, more faith, more giving, more actions to help others, more love toward the Father AND the SON, etc.
But, they didn't warm a seat on Saturday but did on Sunday. That seems to be the test for followers of God in the eyes of those in the COGs. It was one of the identifiers in the old testament, but Paul made the point to say that the identifier of a Christian is BELIEF. This was no accident. He was saying that sabbath keeping nor circumcision is the measure. Paul's phrasing is intentional. The New Covenant is Better and has Better Promises. Gal.4 compares the Sinai law to Hagar and the new covenant to Sarah. Paul tells us to put away the handmaid (hagar) or you will not get the best promises of the New Covenant.
That is clear. Continuing in CH.5 it states "5:3 Again I declare to every man who lets himself be circumcised that he is obligated to obey the whole law. 4 You who are trying to be justified by the law have been alienated from Christ; you have fallen away from grace. 5 For through the Spirit we eagerly await by faith the righteousness for which we hope. 6 For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision has any value. The only thing that counts is faith expressing itself through love." Read the whole chapter.
The COGs would say "we aren't trying to be justified by the law because we also believe that Christ died for our sins." Well, the Judaizers also believed Christ died for our sins and they were being instructed to give up the Mt. Sinai covenant and to stop thinkng the Law requirements were in effect as it was keeping them from grace. Keeping you from grace. Keeping me from grace.
The Judaizers were little different from the COGs. They believed in Christ's redeeming sacrifice AND claimed Law requirements outside of the moral law were necessary for salvation. But, it is BELIEF not Belief and commandment keeping. It is a new covenant. The old covenant does not apply. But, it was still holy and just and good. It just is not the covenant we are under as Believers.
Jesus said in John 14:15, "If you love me keep my commandments"
ReplyDeleteConversely, proof that LCG does not understands what the commandments are under the New Covenant is evidenced by their lack of love for Jesus, as evidenced by their body of work that mostly ignores Jesus.
Jesus said in Matthew 5:18, "Truly I say unto you that not one jot or tittle shall pass from the law until all be fulfilled"
LCG reluctantly agrees that the bloody jot of law concerning animal sacrifices is obsolete, as is the squirmy tittle of the law requiring circumcision.
Confusingly, while making the above concessions about certain laws, LCG continues to insist that nothing has changed from the law.
Doug Winnail and the LCG are committed to burdening the people with the law that has, in its entirety, been fulfilled by Jesus - and thereby they lead the people away from the commands of Jesus, the righteousness of Jesus, and the worship of Jesus.
Can anyone tell me how to love a law? Is it the same as loving your wife? Am I to love a stop sign as I do my wife because it's a law?
ReplyDeleteOK. I am going to put the match to the fuse. There is a real Biblical problem for people who want to believe that the Law in the OT is God's eternal moral law, is written on their hearts, was kept by Jesus and must be kept by us. An example statement from the comments above:
ReplyDelete"Jesus did not sin, therefore He kept the law. If we are disciples, then we must follow His example."
Lots of luck. There is an illogic to the statement quoted above that has been hashed and rehashed. But put that aside and consider another highly relevant issue. How do fans of law-keeping accurately know what the Law is? By the term Law, I mean the OT Torah. The Documentary Hypothesis posits that the Torah is derived from four different sources. The Hypothesis has been challenged based on dating, but the replacement models also posit different sources. We can deride this as liberal scholastic theology but if you want to invalidate the theory, you must bring a better game than just talk. Because here is what God says about the Torah in the time of Jeremiah:
“How can you say, ‘We are wise, and the Torah of the LORD is with us’? But behold, the lying pen of the scribes has made it into a lie.” (Jeremiah 8:8)
The curation and editing of the Torah by scribes after centuries seems to have gone awry. Jesus kept the Torah flawlessly, but he knew accurately what the Torah was – he was the one who gave it to Israel. Jesus kept every jot and tittle, but he knew what was valid and what was not. This scribal curation is not a problem for Christians because we have received the Law of Christ as defined in the NT. Further, we understand Jesus as the animated Word of God. The Law of Christ contains a distillation of the Torah but not the Torah itself. So, Christians do not stress over what pericopes included in the Torah are God given and which are editorial. And Jesus did not find it necessary to echo Jeremiah when he was on earth because he knew the full arc of the Torah for his own keeping as he intended it and knew it would not be carried forward into the NT era.
It is the modern-day Torah-keepers who are caught in a dilemma of believing that keeping the full Torah, every jot and every tittle, is required for salvation when they don’t know for sure what it is. Maybe some scribe interjected something into the Torah that goes against the grain of what God really intended. You can label me a “liberal” (actually am expressing a very conservative view) who is “trashing” the Bible, but I did not write Jeremiah 8:8. And I do believe most ardently in the Law of Christ. The exegetical ball is in the court of the would-be Torah keepers.
Scriptor
By any "deminimis" standard, the 10 Commandments, which were written by the direct finger of God, and were at the center of the Ark of the Covenant, and exist in Heaven today, and are certainly valid standards for upholding Christian living.
ReplyDeleteTonto: The Ten Commandments, as written by the hand of God, no longer stand as the standard of Christian Living.
DeleteJesus continually magnifies them, as he magnified the command not murder by commanding us not to hate.
As another commenter said, if you stick with the Old Covenant, you will miss out on the richness of the New Covenant and its commands and benefits,
I encourage you to look into how Jesus magnified your beloved Sabbath commandment.
How does he know King David wrote Psalm 119?
ReplyDeleteTonto,
ReplyDeleteWas it not part of Sinai law which is to be put away as Gal. 4 states explicitly? I am proud to display the Ten Commandments in my own home, but I know that they are not the codified rules of the New Covenant which is what Believers are under. For instance, there is no command to love your neighbor as yourself. There is no command to BELIEVE that by trusting in Christ's sacrifice we will be saved. There is no command for if someone asks that you walk a mile with them, that you instead walk two.
The Ten are all part of most Christian's teachings. BUT...most Christians do not observe the saturday sabbath and instead worship on Sunday. So, really, when you say the 10 Commandments you are focusing on the sabbath...basically.
The COGs make the sabbath the litmus test rather than Belief in the Salvation given in Christ. It's a concern. We are not under the Law. Paul is obviously stating that being under the law is undesirable.
Gal. 4:21 "Tell me, you who desire to be under the law, do you not hear the law? 22For it is written that Abraham had two sons: the one by a bondwoman, the other by a freewoman. 23But he who was of the bondwoman was born according to the flesh, and he of the freewoman through promise, 24which things are symbolic. For these are [g]the two covenants: the one from Mount Sinai which gives birth to bondage, which is Hagar— 25for this Hagar is Mount Sinai in Arabia, and corresponds to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children— 26but the Jerusalem above is free, which is the mother of us all."
And Finally Gal. 4:30-31:
"30 But what does Scripture say? “Get rid of the slave woman and her son, for the slave woman’s son will never share in the inheritance with the free woman’s son.”[f] 31 Therefore, brothers and sisters, we are not children of the slave woman, but of the free woman.
Hanging onto the Old Covenant could result in your missing out on the better Promises.
Awesome to see so many grasp the transition from law to grace. I am so sorry for those who don't. But, all things are possible with God and maybe more can come to understand what some of us, commenting above, see. If you disagree, that is entirely your privilege. I just believe after 20 years of studying Scripture, researching Greek and Hebrew and taking the entirety of Genesis to Revelation into account, in its context, the Word reveals a huge difference in law keeping, after the Cross. Jesus is not my example in how to keep the Commandments. He is my Savior and I follow His teachings and keep His Words. So many great points brought out above!
ReplyDeleteAnd to ANON @3:20. My quarrel is indeed with some people and NEVER with God. He is my Creator and my Savior and the One to whom I give thanks daily for everything. He gave the law to Israel to increase sin, to show our need for a Savior. But now, it's a very different system. He came to fulfill the law and make a better Covenant, based on better promises. It is that Covenant to which I adhere. All the best to you and thanks for not being unkind!
Jer 31:33 “But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the Lord, “I will put My LAW within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people."
ReplyDeleteAnon704,
ReplyDeletePaul in Gal. 4 refers to it as the Sinai Law. That is not just what you are calling the Mosaic law. It is the law and covenant given at Sinai which includes the 10 commandments. Also, the Ten commandments say nothing about the Holy Days, Unclean foods, circumcision, walking the extra mile, loving your neighbor as yourself, tithing, Jesus as our Atoning sacrifice, etc.
Are you suggesting that it is the 10 Commandments that is the law that will be written on the heart of the House of Israel? Or does it include the rest of what you, I believe, refer to as mosaic law?
With intention, Paul and James spoke of new law: the Law of Love, the Law of Christ, the Law of Faith, the Law of Liberty, the Law of Righteousness, the Law of the Spirit of life in Christ Jesus. These are likely the Laws the Lord will put in one's heart and mind because those are the eternal laws, not the Sinai Laws. These Laws save while the Sinai Laws lead to bondage (explicitly stated).
Further, Jeremiah is giving a prophesy. Prophesies are more open to interpretation than are the word of Paul and the apostles. You really do not know the Law that Jeremiah is inspired to prophesy on. But, Gal. 4 is completely clear that the Sinai law is to be put away as Hagar and Ishmael were put away. The New Covenant provides the greater promises.
"Was it not part of Sinai law which is to be put away as Gal. 4 states explicitly? I am proud to display the Ten Commandments in my own home, but I know that they are not the codified rules of the New Covenant which is what Believers are under. For instance, there is no command to love your neighbor as yourself."
ReplyDeleteWhile not in the Big Ten, the Golden Rule is buried deep in Lev 19:18. Jesus dug it out of obscurity and placed it second to the top- Mark 12:29-31.
Right. Nicely stated. And the first great commandment is just mentioned in at least deuteronomy. The Ten were inextricable from the broader Sinai law that Paul compared to the handmaid that must be put away.
ReplyDeleteThe New Covenant has better terms and better promises for the believer: The Savior, redemption from sin, and the mortal taking on immortality.
Anonymous 4:00 wrote the following:
ReplyDelete"Jer 31:33 “But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel after those days,” declares the Lord, “I will put My LAW within them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God, and they shall be My people."
My impression is that this was a stab at being elegant but only resulted in an oversimplification. And the difference between elegance and oversimplification, to paraphrase Mark Twain, is the "difference between lightning and the lightning bug." There is much more to this than what your brief statement suggests.
No doubt Jeremiah was referring to the whole halakhic package as it was stated during his time. And consider that Jeremiah was not a NT writer or Apostle. But this verse was cited in the NT and was received into Christian doctrine much differently than Jeremiah's statement would imply in its ancient context. It is a long and well documented theological arc and there is no need for me to revisit it here. Let me just say that what one needs to do is to consider the canonical case of circumcision as it is explained by Paul. Circumcision was not "done away with" but was transformed from a physical/spiritual principle to a spiritual principle. And the people who opposed this, the Circumcision Party, earned the undying enmity of the Apostle Paul. But this controversy gave us a model for how we are to handle the Torah. You can read about this in many sources.
In brief, both the Torah and the Law of Christ are instantiations of the eternal, moral, spiritual law of God. And these instantiations are adaptations for human beings. God is the source of his own law and abides by it. God is the absolute Good. And you can be sure that his eternal spiritual law does not contain regulations governing how to treat Hebrew slaves versus Goy slaves. That is a downstream application for this world, if, in fact, such regulations are not a social/political gloss inserted by scribes anciently. Why would God need such laws in his eternal existential state? So naturally there are similarities between the two legislations, Torah and Law of Christ, but they are different packages spiritually and in implementation details.
One of the largest mistakes that Armstrong and Hoeh made was to believe that the Torah was God's eternal, moral, spiritual law. As a significant aside, the people who believe in an anthropomorphic God are the same people who believe that the Torah, designed for humans, is the eternal, moral, spiritual law of God. If you are an Armstrongist, this is something that you seriously need to address before you return to the land of presumption.
Skepsou
Jesus magnified the sabbath by His actions......Luke 4:16 And he came to Nazareth, where he had been brought up: and, as his custom was, he went into the synagogue on the sabbath day, and stood up for to read.......but that verse and the eight verses in Acts referring to the sabbath day as existing after Christ's resurrection will not dissuade the sabbath haters who have spiritualized away the sabbath while yet still physical beings.
ReplyDeleteWhat a silly thing to call people that recognize the New Covenant "sabbath haters". I do not hate the sabbath.
ReplyDeleteThere seemed to be a time when there were no "sabbath haters". Before Mount Sinai, there was no mention of those that broke or profaned the sabbath. Cain apparently didn't, Tubal Cain didn't, Lamech didn't. None that thought evil constantly before the flood are listed as having broken or hated the sabbath. Noah's sons were not listed as sabbath breakers. Nimrod was not criticized for sabbath breaking. Those working on Babel in their zeal also were not accused of breaking the Sabbath. Abraham, Isaac, Esau, and Jacob were not said to break the sabbath. Even once. Were these people, even those right before the flood, just better at Sabbath keeping?
The Children of Israel after Sinai seemed to have had great trouble with the sabbath. Many of the Prophets spoke of their profaning the sabbath. Apparently, sabbath keeping was not a problem before Sinai. But, afterwards it certainly was. The Judges speak of sabbath breaking. Israel fell into captivity multiple times in part due to it. Even Jesus and His disciples were accused of Sabbath breaking.
But, Jesus also said He was our Rest. After His Resurrection, the Gospel goes out to the Gentiles. Guess what? Never again was there a problem with sabbath breaking recorded in the Bible. Ex-Pagan gentile Christians apparently just got the sabbath down perfectly. No problems at all. No epistles were ever written about their not observing the sabbath properly. In fact, these ex-pagan Christians did it so well that the Sabbath was never discussed again (sabbatismos notwithstanding), save for the time in Colossians when you are not to be judged regarding the sabbath which is a shadow.
Surely one can see that the teaching fundamentally changed with the New Covenant. The Sinai Covenant was given to the Children of Israel and was not given to their forefathers (Deut. 5). this is why there is no record of sabbath keeping or breaking. With the new Covenant the Old Covenant is no longer in effect. Thus, there is no record of sabbath breaking or a teaching of the sabbath with the New Covenant.
Observing the sabbath can show reverence and be of benefit, but we can't believe it is the litmus test separating out who the real Christians are.
12:38 writes:
ReplyDelete“With the new Covenant the Old Covenant is no longer in effect. Thus, there is no record of sabbath breaking or a teaching of the sabbath with the New Covenant.”
Those who regard Isaiah and Ezekiel, see below, as applying to the New Covenant with the House of Israel and Judah of the Messianic Age would disagree with "there is not record of ... a teaching of the sababth with the New Covenant.
Isa 56:6 Also the sons of the stranger, that join themselves to the LORD, to serve him, and to love the name of the LORD, to be his servants, every one that keepeth the sabbath from polluting it, and taketh hold of my covenant;
(Isa 56:7 Even them will I bring to my holy mountain, and make them joyful in my house of prayer: their burnt offerings and their sacrifices shall be accepted upon mine altar; for mine house shall be called an house of prayer for all people).
Isa 66:23 And it shall come to pass, that from one new moon to another, and from one sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the LORD.
Eze 44:24 And in controversy they shall stand in judgment; and they shall judge it according to my judgments: and they shall keep my laws and my statutes in all mine assemblies; and they shall hallow my sabbaths.
Eze 45:17 And it shall be the prince's part to give burnt offerings, and meat offerings, and drink offerings, in the feasts, and in the new moons, and in the sabbaths, in all solemnities of the house of Israel: he shall prepare the sin offering, and the meat offering, and the burnt offering, and the peace offerings, to make reconciliation for the house of Israel.
Eze 46:1 Thus saith the Lord GOD; The gate of the inner court that looketh toward the east shall be shut the six working days; but on the sabbath it shall be opened, and in the day of the new moon it shall be opened.
Eze 46:4 And the burnt offering that the prince shall offer unto the LORD in the sabbath day shall be six lambs without blemish, and a ram without blemish.
Eze 46:12 Now when the prince shall prepare a voluntary burnt offering or peace offerings voluntarily unto the LORD, one shall then open him the gate that looketh toward the east, and he shall prepare his burnt offering and his peace offerings, as he did on the sabbath day: then he shall go forth; and after his going forth one shall shut the gate.
"The Sabbath and the observance of the new moon would be part of the worship ritual during the Millennium" (Ralph H. Alexander, Ezekiel, EBC, Vol.6, p.986).
"The offerings on the Sabbath are larger than those of the Mosaic law, to imply that the worship of God is to be conducted by the prince and people in a more munificent spirit of self-sacrificing liberality than formerly" (A.R. Fausset, Ezekiel, JFB, Vol.2, Pt.2, p.374).
"To whom are the promises given? Just to the people of Israel? Hardly. They are given to those of all flesh who worship from month to month and Sabbath to Sabbath. THIS IS THE ULTIMATE END OF ISRAEL RELIGION, THAT EVERYONE SHOULD HAVE THE OPPORTUNITY OF JOINING ISRAEL IN WORSHIPING THE ONE GOD (cf. Zech. 14:16-21)" (John N. Oswalt, The Book of Isaiah, Chapters 40-66, NICOT, p.691).
Rev 2:5 ... I will come unto thee quickly, and will remove thy candlestick out of his place, except thou repent.
Rev 3:16 So then because thou art lukewarm, and neither cold nor hot, I will spew thee out of my mouth.
Isa 49:6 And he said, It is a light thing that thou shouldest be my servant to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel: I will also give thee for a light to the Gentiles, that thou mayest be my salvation unto the end of the earth.
(Ac 13:47 For so hath the Lord commanded us, saying, I have set thee to be a light of the Gentiles, that thou shouldest be for salvation unto the ends of the earth).
While God’s servant is Jesus Christ, it is Israel the Kingdom that will achieve what Israel the Church could not.