Randy Kluth
Well-Known Member
For some reason, the author in your link, under the Abrahamic Covenant, concluded his first quote from Irenaeus immediately before Irenaeus declared the following:
For his seed is the Church, which receives the adoption to God through the Lord, as John the Baptist said: "For God is able from the stones to raise up children to Abraham." Thus also the apostle says in the Epistle to the Galatians: "But ye, brethren, as Isaac was, are the children of the promise." And again, in the same Epistle, he plainly declares that they who have believed in Christ do receive Christ, the promise to Abraham thus saying, "The promises were spoken to Abraham, and to his seed. Now He does not say, And of seeds, as if [He spake] of many, but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ." And again, confirming his former words, he says, "Even as Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness. Know ye therefore, that they which are of faith are the children of Abraham. But the Scripture, fore-seeing that God would justify the heathen through faith, declared to Abraham beforehand, That in thee shall all nations be blessed. So then they which are of faith shall be blessed with faithful Abraham." Thus, then, they who are of faith shall be blessed with faithful Abraham, and these are the children of Abraham. Now God made promise of the earth to Abraham and his seed; yet neither Abraham nor his seed, that is, those who are justified by faith, do now receive any inheritance in it; but they shall receive it at the resurrection of the just. For God is true and faithful; and on this account He said, "Blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth."
Why would that be?
I find the beginning premise of Replacement Theory irrelevant to the question. Irenaeus proposed the popular Sexta Septa Millennial Theory, in which a future Millennium would fulfill the "7th Day." We are, according to him, still in the 1st 6 days, making the 7th day, the Millennium, future.
I am not, myself, a Dispensationalist. Some people focus on Israel in the Millennium and some, like myself, do not. I happen to believe Israel will be restored as a Christian nation, along with many other Christian nations. But I do not see Israel as an "elite nation" like many Dispensationalists.
Again, this has no bearing on the argument as to whether there will be, in fact, a future Millennium. With or without Israel being front and center, Irenaeus and others like him, believed in a future Millennium.