So now to the question: Who or what is the “Great Nation” first promised to Abraham in Genesis 12? Clearly, from a materialistic perspective and as the immediate context defines, they are Abraham's children. In Romans 4:11-16, 9:6-8, 11:1-5, and Galatians 3:7 we're given a very critical revelation on this subject, which turns this kind of thinking completely on its head.
The mystery that these verses reveal to us is that the “Great Nation” can be organized logically into two groups; the earthly descendants through physical birth, the physical seed, and the spiritual descendants through faith, the spiritual seed.
In the grand view of God's revealed plan (and here is where our initial understanding gets turned upside down) the physical descendants are actually a sub-set of the spiritual even though the physical would appear to have come first!
Before we get to far ahead of ourselves, however, let's first look at the each group and determine how they are defined and what makes them unique; what makes them distinct from one another as well as from all else.
As to the physical descendants, God has formally declared that He will be the God of Abraham's biological children in the land of Abraham's sojourning, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession (Gen 17:8). There is no condition placed on this and God has never said this about any other people or nation that has ever existed in on earth.
To help put that statement into perspective let's take a moment to consider our home country, the United States of America. Our geographical boundaries have been defined and it is possible for us, if we so desire, to declare that God is nationally recognized as the one true God. That, of course, does not necessarily make it so.
While our country's existence is clearly in accordance with His will, in so far as it exists at all, God has never formally defined our borders for us nor has He told us that He will be our God at a national level. God went to Israel of His own will, as it pleased Him. Israel did not bring Him to them.
While it may seem obvious already, it is never-the-less important to point out that the physical seed is strictly limited to the biological offspring of Abraham. The nation started with Abraham and their biological children are physically marked by circumcision when they are eight days old, according to the direct commandment of God. Anyone born from Abraham not carrying the mark of circumcision has been specifically excluded from being called a descendant of Abraham (Gen 17:9-14).
To further refine the physical offspring, not all biological descendants of Abraham, even if they carry the mark of circumcision, can be considered part of The Great Nation promised of God. In order to be considered a member of that particular nation, a person must be descended from Jacob (Gen 25:23, 32:24-32, 48:16; 2Ki 17:34).
Abraham had eight children in total (Gen 16:15, 21:2-3, 25:1-4; 1Ch 1:32-34). The descendants of Ishmael, his first son, went on to become a nation for sure, but clearly not the Great Nation (Gen 21:18). Isaac, Abraham's second son, bore Jacob and Esau. Like Ishmael, Esau became the father of a lesser nation of his own, which is called Edom (Gen 36). Of Abraham's other six children, nothing more is said other than that they were born to Keturah, given gifts by Abraham and then sent away “eastward to the east country” before Abraham died in order that they would be far from Isaac and his inheritance (Gen 25:1-6).
As to their title and organization, the citizens of the biological “Great Nation” can be referred to as Hebrews, Israelites, or Jews (Gen 14:3, 25:23, 32:28, 48:16; 2Ki 17:34, Zec 8:23 John 4:9, 18:35) and have been divided into twelve tribes by Jacob, each one of his twelve sons serving as the head of each tribe (Gen 49). Each of those tribes were further divided in families, which were each designated a chief (Num 25:14, 26:1-65, 36:1; Jos 7:14; 1 Chr 4:1-8:40). These tribes, families, and chiefs have also been further given a formal system of government (Exo 19:3-8; Deu 1:9-17).
Though they are dreaded and feared by all nations (Deu 2:25) and will strive with both God and men (Gen 32:28), being a blessing to those who bless them and a curse to those who curse them (Gen 27:29), God providentially cares for (Deu 8:3-4, 29:5-6; Neh 9:21; Psa 105:37) and has established an everlasting covenant with Israel (Gen 17:7, 32:28).
In a final and very important note of distinction, Israel has rejected and crucified their promised Messiah, Jesus (Acts 2:36).
Of course, before Abraham and the earthly nation of Israel existed God had called men to serve and worship Him. Where the citizens of the physical nation of Israel have been marked in the flesh through circumcision, as having been set aside for God, we now know by the later revelation of the New Testament, given to us by God through His chosen apostles, that from the very beginning of our creation men have been given a mark of circumcision by God; the circumcision of the heart. This inward mark is made evident through the outward working of faith and righteousness (Act 7:51; Rom 2:25-29; Col 2:11; Mar 7:20-23; Luk 6:43-49).
Starting with Abel, we see righteousness of the heart manifested toward God through sacrificial offerings before any religious or moral law had been formally given (Gen 4:4,7). Likewise, Enoch was accepted by and walked with God, eventually being bodily and spiritually taken away to be with the Lord in heaven (Gen 5:24). As a final example, Noah, being judged a righteous man and blameless in his generation, found favor with the Lord was saved from the destruction of the flood (Gen 6:8-22).
As we've seen previously, only one very specific physical race of people has been chosen of God to be called His people and His nation. As can likewise be seen in the examples just given, however, there can also be no doubt that, long before Israel, God had selected individual men in the flesh to be His. These men were identified by their spirit, through their outward faith and righteousness. Even after calling out the nation of Israel, God has made it clear that it's not so much the flesh that He's interested in as the heart, or spirit (Exo 35:5,21; Deu 4:29, 6:5-6; 10:16 Jos 22:5, 24:23; Psa 7:10, 19:14, 32:11; 37:31, 73:1; Pro 11:20, 16:15, 24;12, 28:14; Jer 4:14; Mat 3:9).
Therefore, the spiritual offspring of Abraham are all those who have saving faith in God, whether they can be called, in respect to the flesh, an Israelite or not (Gal 3:7). These descendants of faith are known as Christ's Church, or simply, the Church (Mat 16:18, 18:17).
It is important to keep in mind, however, that when we say here “the Church” we are only using the term in order to most easily identify a select group of individuals. It is not meant to bring to mind what is typically known as “The Church Age”, which identifies the time and activity between the sixty-ninth and seventieth week of Daniel's vision (Dan 9:24-27). As discussed during the introduction, before we can dare begin getting into the specifics of the future times that God has so graciously revealed to us we must first properly identify all those involved, which is our stated goal.
All of Hebrews 11, but particularly verse 16, leaves absolutely no doubt that what God desires is a heart of faith looking either forward or backwards to the hope of Christ and that anyone with this faith, regardless of their ancestry or even the fact that they were born before Abraham, will be considered by God as one of Abraham's offspring and thus granted citizenship into his promised kingdom.
As biological ancestry to Jacob is the key defining attribute of a physical child of Abraham, so faith is the backbone of how a spiritual child of Abraham is to be defined. And like the physical seed, the spiritual seed has other distinct attributes, which uniquely define it.
First, like Israel, they have been called by God (Amos 9:11,12; Acts 2:39, 15:17), but unlike Israel, their lineage is far more diverse as they are made up of many nations and people (Amos 9:12; Acts 15:14).
Israel was given a temple in which God dwelt for a time. Here they could go to worship Him and offer sacrifices for the sins of the nation. The spiritual offspring, however, are actually part of the Holy Temple of the Lord in which the Holy Spirit of God now dwells (1 Cor 3:16; Eph 2:20; Heb 3:6; 1 Pet 2:5).
The Church is not bound to Jewish law or governance, though it has been commanded to abstain from things polluted by Idols, blood, what has been strangled, and sexual immorality (Acts 15: 28-29).
All members of the Church are as precious living stones of the Temple of Christ, He being the chief cornerstone (1 Pet 2:4,5). As a result, all those of the Church are considered members of Christ's body and are cared for by Him as such (Eph 5:29-31). They are also the known as the Children of God and fellow heirs and partakers of the promise of Christ Jesus through the Gospel (Rom 8:17; Eph 3:6).
Through God's Word both Israel and the church, two very distinct entities, have been revealed. While there is clearly a very solid and unbreakable foundation in common between them they each have and will always hold unique distinctions, which will always define them separately.
Simply through their compositional definitions, we can easily see that the spiritual offspringhave existed through faith since the creation of Man. One has not been transformed into the other as a result of judgment or the finishing of a particular work of God. Israel began through the faith of Abraham's heart and the Church begin through the faith of men's individual hearts going back to Adam.
Having made clear distinctions in definition we still haven't discovered enough to help us give adequate weight to any particular eschatological view that we initially reviewed during the introduction. Therefore, we will now look to the distinctions of expectations between the two now defined groups of offspring.
