Who are we?
We are "in the Messiah", identified solely by our confession and faith/belief in him as the risen lord. We are the new covenant people, the Torah-fulfilling people, the worldwide family promised to Abraham by the One True God. We both believing Jews and Gentiles have been grafted into the Commonwealth of Israel and now constitute the true Israel of the living God - YHVH.
Where are we?
In the good creation of the One True God; a creation groaning in travail as a result of the failure of Adam to accomplish what he was created to become, as a result the creation is awaiting its own liberation from decay, but is already under the lordship of the risen and ascended Messiah.
What is wrong?
The world, and we ourselves, are not yet redeemed as we will be when we are resurrected. Most people in the world, Gentiles and Jews alike, remain ignorant of what Israel's God has done in Jesus the Messiah.
What's the solution?
In the long term, the Creator's great act of new creaton, through which the cosmos itself will be liberated, true justice and peace will triumph over all enemies, all the righteous will be raised from the dead, and believers alive at the time of Jesus return will be transformed. In the short term, the good new about the soon coming Kingdom of God, Jesus message must be announced to the world, doing its powerful work of challenging, transforming, healing and rescuing, and thus creating "resurrection' people in the metaphorical sense.
What time is it?
The 'age to come' has been inaugurated, but the 'present age' still continues. We live between resurrection and resurrection, that of Jesus and that of ourselves/ between the victory over death by our Passover Lamb Jesus and the final victory when Jesus 'appears' again.
Conclusion:
The basic confession of Messianic faith is that Jesus is lord, and the fundamental belief upon which it is based that the Creator God raised him from among the dead, are the signs that covenant renewal has taken place, and that those who exhibit this faith are its true members and beneficiaries, even if born Gentiles and have never been part of the ethnic family of Israel. For now all Messianic believers Jews and Gentiles have been as a result of their faith in the One whom God has sent been grafted into the Israel of God and will as a result partake in the promises made to Abraham and his 'seed' Jesus the Messiah.
Through baptism in the lord Jesus the Messiah the believer is no longer 'in Adam' no longer 'in the flesh'. The believer still clearly possesses the 'flesh', as we see when Paul warns against living 'according to the flesh'. But Paul increasingly focuses his argument on the 'body', the body which at present is corruptible and doomed to death; and whose 'deeds' can still be aligned with the 'flesh'/ and yet which will be given new life, resurrection life, by the Spirit of the living God - YHVH. As baptised believers in the Messiah Jesus our goal is to look forward to the final resurrection state of the justified, which will mean sharing in the dignity, worth, honour and status that the Messiah's people will enjoy in the coming new age, sharing in the glory of the one who is now the world's true lord and will soon come to exercise that authority over all the nations. So we believers are those who patiently walk through the present wilderness, being led by the equivalent of the pillar of cloud and fire, in other words, by the Spirit of the lord Jesus and in doing so we will receive the 'inheritance' co-rulership and co-inheriting all that the lord Jesus the Messiah will be given at his return from his God and his Father and ours.
In all of this we see God's righteousness in His faithfulness to the covenant He made with Abraham and David. His resurrection bringing about what God had said He would do - give Abraham a Jew-plus-Gentile family; while at the same time dealing with the universal sin that the Adversary brought about, to try and thwart the divine purpose of God. All this has been brought about by the only descendant of David who has been raised from the dead and now sits at the right hand of God - YHVH, which marks out this Jesus as the 'son' of Israel's God, that is the Messiah. What amazing grace!
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