Ezra took a great risk to bring Levites and riches to the Temple from Persia. Mixed marriages were suddenly of more concern, which poses a difficult question. Things seem to be heading backwards—away from the New Testament rather than towards it.
“Danger!” the dispensationalist pundits are shouting. “Watch out for replacement theology!” This specter of “replacement theology,” also masquerading under the pseudo-academic moniker “supersessionism,” looms ominously over Christendom. One blogger blogs, “One of the most dangerous and subversive doctrines held by adherents of Preterism, is the view that in A.D. 70, at the destruction of Jerusalem by the Roman armies, God’s covenant nation of Israel was superseded by the Christian church.” A website adds, “There is a demonic cancer coursing through the life blood of the Church of Jesus Christ and its name is REPLACEMENT THEOLOGY.” Yet another puts it bluntly, “This is a heresy . . .” Joel McDermon, Replacing Replacement Theology
Fight terminology with terminology. Throughout the Bible it is clear that God’s priestly nation went through many death-and-resurrection renewals. No one calls those ‘replacements.’ Can you imagine theologians arguing that Ezra’s Temple and Nehemiah’s new Jerusalem were only a temporary parenthesis, and that God would give Israel back their old kingdom?
The same thing exactly happened in the first century. Israel died and was resurrected anew. So, I propose new jargon – ‘Transformation Theology: don’t stay left behind.’
“…and I came to Jerusalem and discovered the evil that Eliashib had done for Tobiah, in preparing a room for him in the courts of the house of God. And it grieved me bitterly; therefore I threw all the household goods of Tobiah out of the room. Then I commanded them to cleanse the rooms; and I brought back into them the articles of the house of God, with the grain offering and the frankincense.” Nehemiah 13:7-9
After the failure of Israel’s kings and their adulterous priesthood, God established new worship in the “wilderness” of Babylon under Daniel and Ezekiel. When Babylon fell, He brought His new Jerusalem, like a pure bride, back to the mountain of God.
Bible Matrix blog
