Jesus acknowledged that the Jews were the descendants of Abraham, but that they weren’t the “children of Abraham” or the “children of God” anymore, but the “children of the devil”. Since Abraham is not their father, but the devil is, the promises that God gave to Abraham of those blessing Abrahams children being blessed does not apply to the Jews. They rejected Christ and are the children of the devil and not Abraham.
In John 8:37 Jesus said “I know you are Abraham’s descendants”.
in vs. 38, “If you were Abraham’s children,” said Jesus, “then you would[c] do what Abraham did.”
In vs 42, “If God were your Father, you would love me, for I have come here from God.
In vs 44, “You belong to your father, the devil, and you want to carry out your father’s desires.“
That's the only part you have wrong.
Salvation was never based on race.
I never said salvation was, but the privileges the biological Jews had with inheriting Canaan and being the “chosen” people no longer belong to them. The Jews don’t have Canaan as an inheritance because they don’t have any special status anymore.
You can only be the “children of Abraham” through salvation in Jesus, being a descendant of any person doesn’t make you more special than anybody else in God’s eyes.
You're conflating two different realms. Salvation is in the Spiritual realm, while land covenant pertains only to the physical.
When you say things like "there are no two senses," you deny this basic reality; do you have no body? Do you have no soul? Of course you have both. The Bible addresses both.
Don't pretend they're the same.
When looking into Salvation, land covenant is irrelevant.
You could only be a “child of Abraham” by being a biological descendant in the Old Testament. Jesus told the Jews that descent didn’t matter anymore and that they could only be a “child of Abraham” by believing in him. He specifically told him that they were a “child of the devil” and not of God by rejecting him. You are literally arguing with Jesus here over this.
The promised land covenant doesn’t apply to the biological jews anymore, but to the “children of Abraham”. The people who accept Christ regardless of their genealogy.
See, there you fall into a natural consequence of your refusal to allow any other definitions but your own. If this were true, why don't the Christians run the Levant? The standard answer is, oh, we must also spiritualize away the meaning of "promised land". When Abraham's family was told over and over that the land was promised to them without condition, you'd believe that there was really a time condition and the real and only permanent meaning is that believers are promised a spiritual kingdom. The fact that the spiritual kingdom is true doesn't negate that the land promises referring to particular geography are unconditional. Reading literally, they will be fulfilled again, and, since belief is a necessary part of remaining in the land (even though Ezekiel prophesies, as happened in the 20th century, that Israel will return to the land in unbelief), evangelists to Jews have great hope. But cutting Jews out of their own beliefs when they need not be cut out (because they don't contradict the gospel) is not seriously giving good news to them and thereby belies the great commission to the Jew first.
And His very clear context is Salvation. Entrance to the Kingdom. Eternal Salvation, and also more abundant life now. I'm not arguing for any land covenants bestowed by God as valid now, but you should recognize that's a completely different realm.
In terms of Israel the Country? It existed before I was born, I don't see a reason I should try to change that.
I'm not "arguing over that" at all. Maybe you should learn how to read.
Land covenant is distinct from Eternal Salvation yet there you go conflating the two again 🙄
Jesus never Promised physical Israel to the Gentiles. It's not why He came down from heaven. It's not what He gave His body to be broken for. You should have no difficulty comprehending this.
The privileges Egypt has with retaining Egypt still belong to them, as per Isaiah 19, Zechariah 14, etc. It's true of any biological nation in Scripture.
The privileges the covenant people had were wholly different and always continued with the covenant people, which were largely undifferentiated, then largely Jewish, then largely Gentile (Romans 9-11).
No it doesn’t, Egypt isn’t a divine inheritance given to the Egyptians by God.If Egypt got conquered and the people were forcibly moved out of the land like the native Americans or Jews. They wouldn’t have a right to come back 2,000 years later and displace everybody already in it in the name of God. The Jews aren’t the “children of Abraham” anymore, therefore they don’t have a inheritance.
Again, the “children of Abraham” specifically referred to those blessed by God and with the inheritance of the land of Canaan in the Old Testament. The Jews aren’t the “children of Abraham” anymore and you can only be the “children of Abraham” by believing in Jesus.
Actually, according to Is. 19:25 and context, God calls Egypt "my people" and promises they will be blessed in the end. If they were conquered and displaced they could indeed cite that promise and others to come back. If that promise were to fail God would be a liar. Arab peoples generally have tremendous promises in Ishmael, and these have been fulfilled, in fact their oil discoveries can be said to be a fulfillment of their becoming a giant family of nations.
The fact is that many nations in the Bible are given blessings and cursings and their destinies always align with the text. Nations prophesied for destruction always fall, nations prophesied for retention always return (despite displacements). The Jews may have no spiritual inheritance at large, but they retain the same rights of national self-determination as any nation, and they determine the same Biblical blessings as any other nation that explicitly has them. And the Jews IMHO get the best of the blessings and the worst of the cursings both at different times. People's inability to separate spiritual blessing for spiritual people from various national blessings for various national peoples is the whole problem.
You can't tell someone descended from Abraham that they're not descended from Abraham. You can tell them they're not doing what Abraham did (as Jesus said). But if Americans can tell Jews they're not Jews (as some do) then Jews can tell Americans they're not Americans (as some do).
No, as you quote, the text is "I know that ye are Abraham's seed" (John 8:37). The context indicates that this is one meaning of two.
Now, we could apply Greek logic to the passage when it's based on Near East nuance instead, but if we did we'd only arrive at the conclusion they are "seed" but are not "children". You don't even apply that conclusion from the plain words you quoted. But the actual text is more intended as, let's leave it ambiguous for now what you are out of respect for you, and let's challenge you that if you aspire to be children of Abraham you do what he did and you're not doing that yet. In any scenario we don't get to contradict verse 37.
I know it's a paradigm shift to get over, as it was when I got over it. But peoples have equal self-determination rights. Over 110 years Arabs and Jews have been working out their rights in the land more directly, and, funny thing, no system denying another people's rights has ever succeeded, only those that start from equal rights.