Free End Times Book (pdf).. - Rapture Notes

When Jesus spoke with the Samaritan woman at the well, He revealed to her that He was Messiah.
The woman said, "I know that Messiah" (called Christ) "is coming. When he comes, he will explain everything
to us." Then Jesus declared, "I who speak to you am he."
Then, leaving her water jar, the woman went back to the town and said to the people, "Come, see a man who
told me everything I ever did. Could this be the Christ?" (John 4:25-26, 28-29)
The Believing Minority - Apostles and Early Christians
It should always be remembered that the entire first church was Jewish. All of the Twelve Apostles were Jewish.
Their first assignment was to preach to "the lost sheep of Israel." (Matthew 10:6) Yeshua was reluctant at first to
even share the Gospel with the Canaanite woman who asked for His help because His focus was also the Jewish
people. (Matthew 25:22-28).
As the nation began to reject their promised King and Messiah (Matthew 12:14-21), Jesus began to conceal truth
from the nation, by speaking in parables (Matthew 13). He focused on training. His disciples for the age which
would follow, and on His primary mission of arriving in Jerusalem at the time appointed for His crucifixion. God's
plan for ultimate blessings promised to the Gentiles came more into view.
On the night of His betrayal at the "Last Supper"--after Judas had left to finalize his plot to betray the Lord--Jesus
brought the 11 disciples, as representatives of true, believing Israel into the "New Covenant" which had been
promised to Israel hundreds of years earlier by the prophets Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Isaiah. This New Covenant was
to be the basis of the spread of the gospel message of Jesus by these same men, after they were made Apostles of the
church. The nation Israel was to be brought back to God under the terms of this New Covenant, though for a period
of time they were to be set aside because of their rejection of Yeshua as Messiah.
Yeshua's official rejection of Israel and His plan for the calling out of a church was announced at Caesarea
Phillippi (Matthew 16:17-19). A few months later, during His final week in Jerusalem, He announced to the
nation and its leaders,
"The stone the builders rejected has become the capstone; the Lord has done this, and it is marvelous in our
eyes' Therefore I tell you that the kingdom of God will be taken away from you [Israel] and given to a people
[the church] who will produce its fruit. He who falls on this stone [Messiah] will be broken to pieces, but he on
whom it falls will be crushed." (Matthew 21:42-44)
Yeshua wept over Jerusalem as He realized the terrible fate that would come upon the nation because of their
rejection of Him. For the second time the conditional provisions of the Covenant of the Land were to be enforced.
This time their exile ("Diaspora") was to last not 70 years but 2000!
O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to
gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but you were not willing. Look, your
house is left to you desolate. For I tell you, you will not see me again until you say, "Blessed is he who comes in
the name of the Lord." (Matthew 23:37-39)
The resurrection of Jesus and His appearances to friends and disciples over the next 40 days, reassured them
considerably--for they had all forsaken Him when He died (Matthew 26:31). Promising to send them "Another
Strengthener" (John 14:1516), He told His followers to wait ten more days.
Gathering in Jerusalem on the appointed day--the Feast of Pentecost following Passover--the Jewish followers of
Yeshua were empowered by the Spirit of God and baptized into a new community of believers known as the church-
-the Body of Christ. (Ephesians 3:1-21)
All of those who first heard the Gospel on the Day of Pentecost (Acts 2) were Jewish (including converts and those
dispersed to other countries).
Thy Kingdom Come, Thy Will be Done… 13