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| Olive Tree From the Upper Room in Jerusalem |
What a fun and stimulating discussion we had today! Jo Ann, Dan, Karen, Dave, David, Cindy, Odette, and Merrill attended. We missed Diana and Robin.
We studied and discussed Romans Chapter 11.
Chapter 11 of Romans talks about the Jewish people are the original people of God. Paul says that Jewish people that don’t believe in Jesus are like a broken branch on an olive tree and gentiles that believe are like olive branches from wild olive trees that are grafted into the same tree that Jewish people are/were branches of.
The last verse of Romans 11 (verse 36) refers to God as “him” in lower case in the Jewish Annotated New Testament. Jo Ann got sidetracked and asked why some people write in their Zoom box “he, him, his.” Cindy explained that the person who does that wants to be identified as someone of the male gender. Note from Jo Ann: “I learn something new every day from this group!”
Merrill had questions about Christian history and in response David shared a lot of his extensive knowledge of Christian history. We learned that Romans had all kinds of gods. Jews had an exemption from the imperial cult so they didn’t have to worship the emperor. King Herod (a Jew) was raised and educated in Rome.
We noticed that Paul said he was an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham and member of the tribe of Benjamin. We talked about that most Jews are descendants from the tribe of Judah which is where the term Jew comes from.
When we got into where Paul was descended from we began to discuss a bit about Jewish heritage. Karen shared some wonderful stories about where her family came from. Of course she mentioned the Ukraine and Romania. Jo Ann commented that so many Jews in America have stories similar to Karen’s regarding family history.
Merrill asked what Messianic Judaism is. David explained it is Christianity mixed with Jewish terms and practices. There is a essay in the Jewish Annotated New Testament on Messianic Judaism we could perhaps study as a group.
Dan mentioned that many Christians including the Roman Catholic Church at one time said they were the true Israelites. Dan called this “Christian Identity Theft.” Dan also mentioned there is a group of African American Jews who set up displays in New York City claiming they are the true Jews.
Dave shared a photo of a olive branch that is on display that is in Jerusalem where supposedly The Last Supper took place. It was a picture of an olive tree with olive branches in it which represents what is discussed in this chapter.
Odette joined us for the first time. It was great to have her join us. She shared how her co-worker has been sharing his Christian perspective on the New Testament and prophecy,
We will study Romans Chapter 12 next week.
If anyone has anything to add to this summary, please do!
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