The First Jewish Mission

Narrator: Chris Genthree
Matthew 10:5‑7  •  1 min. read  •  grade level: 19
It is plain that the Lord, in this chapter, sends the twelve upon a mission specifically Jewish. " Go not into the way of the Gentiles, and into any city of the Samaritans enter ye not: but go rather to the lost sheep of the house of Israel " (Matt. 10) Afterward, in apprising them of the persecutions and treachery they were to expect, he bids them flee from one city to another: "For verily I say unto you, ye shall not have gone over (or finished) the cities of Israel till the Son of man be come." That is, their mission should be broken off, before it was complete, by the coming of their Master. Doubtless, another commission, expressly to the Gentiles, appears at the close of this Gospel, and the development of God's counsels, the mystery of Christ and the church, came out still latex', chiefly through the ministry and writings of the Apostle Paul. Thus the original Jewish mission was interrupted, and what has been aptly styled "the Gentile parenthesis" came in: this over, the Lord will, I doubt not, raise, at a yet future day, servants destined to take up the word and work now left in abeyance, and, ere they will have finished their proclamation of the approaching kingdom throughout all the cities of Israel, the Son of man will come. That work (wherever else the gospel has been carried) was not finished in the Apostolic era, nor will it be, when once more resumed in the latter day, before the Lord's return to establish the kingdom over the earth in power and glory.