This is a wide ranging, thorough, and deep intellectual conversation I had with Dr. Gerald McDermott, scholar, Anglican priest, and author of dozens of books and papers.

We covered a couple of his books and the implications thereof, including A New History of Redemption, his continuation of Jonathan Edwards' book of a similar name, and The New Christian Zionism.

Dr. McDermott explains how history and theology are inseparable as we look at God's story of redemption for His glory, and then discusses Christian Zionism from many different angles, giving what I think you'll find to be well-reasoned arguments, including a couple of points that I hadn't come across before.

If you're hungry for more truth and understanding about God's plans for the world, for Israel, and for the Jews, this wide-ranging conversation will give you countless threads to explore, and even a challenge at the end: to maintain intellectual and theological humility.

In This Episode:

0:00 Intro

3:18 A New History of Redemption

11:38 Translating the tetragrammaton

15:11 Historical framework

18:06 The Redemption of God

24:51 How Redemption Glorifies God

34:50 The Story Before Time

43:19 God Disinheriting the Nations

47:51 How the Jews and Israel Play A Part In Redemption History

51:12 World Religions Playing a Role In Redemption

53:47 How God Works Through Different Denominations

56:24 The Reformation

59:48 Why Does The Kingdom of God Have To Come Incrementally?

1:02:24 The Church and Israel

1:11:24 The New Christian Zionism

1:16:27 Dispensationalism

1:22:33 Amillenial Theologians and Israel

1:26:27 Is The Modern State of Israel The Same As The Biblical State of Israel?

1:28:46 Covenantal Fidelity

1:33:35 How Should Christians View The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict?

1:36:05 The Greatest Threat To Christian Zionism

Resources:

A New History of Redemption by Gerald McDermott: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0801098548/

The New Christian Zionism by Gerald McDermott: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0830851380/

The God of Israel and Christian Theology by Kendall Soulen: https://www.amazon.com/dp/0800628837/

A History of the Work of Redemption by Jonathan Edwards: https://www.amazon.com/dp/B0923WHRWF/

Other Books By Dr. McDermott: https://www.amazon.com/stores/Gerald-R.-McDermott/author/B001HP188A

Comments? Questions? Encouragement? We are here for it. Shoot us a text and let us know. We’d love to hear from you!

• The Israel Story: https://www.theisraelstory.org/
• Present Witness: https://www.presentwitness.org/
• Israel Story on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheIsraelStoryApp/
• Present Witness on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/apresentwitness/
• Chris's Substack: https://christopherkuehl.substack.com/

John and Chris dive into the first chapter of Chris' upcoming book, "Is God A Zionist?", unpacking the split between the Jews and the Church in the 1st century.

In order to understand the answer to the question the book poses, and even to understand what happens between Christians and Jews after the first couple of centuries AD, it's vital to understand the background, the politics, the demographics, and the history around both Christians and Jews after Christ's ascension.

This episode covers the Jewish response specifically, in the first 150-200 years after Christ, and will give you a stronger understanding of the early church and what happens next.

In This Episode:

0:00 Intro

2:22 The Parting of the Ways

4:33 "The whole of our hope..."

7:23 Israel's demographics blew my mind

10:48 Christianity In Israel

12:30 The early church

16:30 John The Baptist

23:05 Did the Jews reject Jesus?

28:08 The original, "true" church

31:09 Expansion from Jewish to Gentiles

40:41 4 major Jewish sects

46:32 70 and 135 AD

52:25 2 main expressions of Judaism

55:52 The primary takeaway

Resources:

Is God A Zionist? by Chris Kuehl: https://www.presentwitness.org/igaz

Comments? Questions? Encouragement? We are here for it. Shoot us a text and let us know. We’d love to hear from you!

• The Israel Story: https://www.theisraelstory.org/
• Present Witness: https://www.presentwitness.org/
• Israel Story on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheIsraelStoryApp/
• Present Witness on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/apresentwitness/
• Chris's Substack: https://christopherkuehl.substack.com/

Is God a Zionist?

That's the question that Chris' upcoming book seeks to answer, and the one we start to dive into today as we return to the podcast with our first episode of season 3 of One New Man.

This episode was a primer for what's coming up this season, where John and Chris are going to be teasing apart Chris' new book, really going in depth to discuss the answer to the question we think ALL Christians need to answer.

There are enormous theological and cultural consequences to being on the wrong side of this, and with all the noise we're seeing in the media and culture lately, it's vital that Christians are well-informed and know God's word on this topic.

Make sure to listen to this episode to get a solid baseline of understanding so that you can follow along as we continue to unpack each chapter of the book in future podcast episodes.

In This Episode:

0:00 Intro

2:20 Our one annual ask

3:03 Why Chris wrote Is God a Zionist?

14:48 Supporting theology with lived experience

16:25 Biggest surprise about visiting Israel

25:07 Why it's important for ALL Christians to answer this question

31:45 The most influential Christians on this topic

37:48 Deuteronomy 28 and supersessionism

40:25 Launch date

41:33 Inspired by Michael Wyschogrod

Resources:

⭐ Financially Support the One New Man show: https://www.theisraelstory.org/donate

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Is God A Zionist? by Chris Kuehl: https://www.presentwitness.org/igaz

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Comments? Questions? Encouragement? We are here for it. Shoot us a text and let us know. We’d love to hear from you!

• The Israel Story: https://www.theisraelstory.org/
• Present Witness: https://www.presentwitness.org/
• Israel Story on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/TheIsraelStoryApp/
• Present Witness on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/apresentwitness/
• Chris's Substack: https://christopherkuehl.substack.com/