Are the Jews still God’s chosen people? That question has divided churches, shaped political alliances, and sparked some of the bitterest arguments in so-called Christianity today. People hold their views on this with fierce conviction—on both sides.
But what does the Bible say?
That is the only question we are going to answer in this study. Not what tradition says, not what politics demands, but only what God actually says. The answer may challenge what you have always assumed and what your church teaches, so proceed with caution.
We recently studied the difference between the terms Hebrew, Israelite, and Jew. We may use those terms somewhat interchangeably here, and that study will explain why.
But before we get to the answer of whether or not the Jews are still God’s chosen people today, we need to do something most people skip: define our terms. A lot of the confusion on this topic starts at how people use certain words.
Defining Our Terms
When we talk about “Jews” today, the word can mean more than one thing. And when we talk about “Israel,” the same is true.
In the ethnic sense, a Jew is someone physically descended from Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—a matter of ancestry and heritage. In the religious sense, a Jew is someone who practices Judaism as a faith. Those two things often overlap, but they are not the same. A person can be ethnically Jewish without practicing Judaism at all. At the same time, a person can convert to Judaism without that ancestral lineage.
And then there is a third distinction that is just as important between biblical Israel and modern Israel. Biblical Israel was the covenant nation chosen by God in the Bible (hence the phrase biblical Israel): descendants of Abraham, set apart under the Mosaic Covenant, with the Law, the temple, and the promises.
Modern Israel is the nation-state established in 1948 in the Middle East: a political entity made up largely of ethnic Jews from around the world, governed as a secular democracy.
Those two are obviously not identical. And failing to distinguish between them is where so much confusion in this discussion comes from.
The Promises to Israel
People sometimes say, “God made promises to Israel forever.” And that’s true…in one sense. God made real promises to the nation of Israel in the Bible. He promised land and covenant blessings. He chose Israel out of all the nations for a special purpose. No serious Bible student denies any of that.
In Genesis 12, God begins making promises to Abraham. In Genesis 15, He speaks of the land. In Exodus 19, He tells Israel that if they obey His voice and keep His covenant, they will be His treasured possession among all peoples, a kingdom of priests, and a holy nation. God, who cannot lie, made those promises.
But one of the biggest mistakes people make is this: they read those Old Testament promises as if they were unconditional in every sense, permanent in their national form, and directly transferable to the modern political state of Israel.
When you actually read those promises in context, many of them were conditional on covenant faithfulness. That little word “if” matters. In Exodus 19, God says, “If you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant…” God was not writing Israel a blank check for endless rebellion, as if to say, “No matter what you do, no matter whether you reject Me, no matter whether you harden your hearts, these blessings will remain on you exactly the same way forever.” That is not what the text says.
Spoiler alert for those who haven’t read the Old Testament: Israel was not faithful.
That is one of the great themes of the Old Testament. They broke covenant and turned to the false gods of other nations. They rejected the prophets God sent to correct them. Again and again, God showed patience and mercy. But the nation as a whole failed to be what God called them to be. When people today say, “The promises to Israel are still theirs forever in the exact same national sense,” they skip right over Israel’s covenant unfaithfulness, but the Bible doesn’t.
Jesus: The Fulfillment of God’s Plan for Israel
Even as Israel failed, God never abandoned His plan. That is where Jesus comes in. He did what Israel failed to do. He fulfilled what they could not fulfill. He was the faithful Son, the true Servant of God. So if you ask, “What happened to God’s promises to Israel?”, the answer is not that God failed. The answer is that those promises reach their fulfillment in Jesus Christ. The book of Galatians really helps us understand this. Paul, by inspiration, says:
Now to Abraham and his Seed were the promises made. He does not say, “And to seeds,” as of many, but as of one, “And to your Seed,” who is Christ.
Galatians 3:16
The fulfillment of the covenant promise is centered in Christ, not in the nation of Israel. The Law of Moses served its purpose. It was a temporary tutor to prepare Israel for the coming of Christ (for more information, read all of Galatians 3). But now that Christ has come, the promised Seed has arrived. And the people who belong to God are those who belong to Christ.
For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.
Galatians 3:26–29
To those who depend on physical lineage, that passage is scandalous. Paul does not say that Jews are one covenant people and Gentile Christians are another. He does not say God has two peoples with two separate futures and two separate ways of relating to Him. He says those who are in Christ are Abraham’s seed, whether they’re Jews or Greeks. The defining line is no longer Jew and Gentile. It is in Christ or outside of Christ.
To Christians, borrowing from Old Testament wording, Peter writes:
But you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.
1 Peter 2:9–10
God’s People Israel
In the Old Testament, were the Hebrew (or Jewish) people genuinely chosen by God? Absolutely. There was a time when the Jews were God’s chosen people. Deuteronomy 7:6 makes this unmistakably clear. The Lord said to the Jewish nation through Moses:
For you are a holy people to the LORD your God; the LORD your God has chosen you to be a people for Himself, a special treasure above all the peoples on the face of the earth.
To understand what that means (and what it does not mean) you have to go all the way back to the beginning. After Adam and Eve sinned in the Garden, God said to the serpent:
And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.
Genesis 3:15
That is a prophecy of Christ, the One born into the world of a woman. Nine chapters later, in Genesis 12:2–3, God made the following promise to Abraham:
I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make your name great; and you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.
That promise is also ultimately about Jesus. He would be born a descendant of Abraham. And Abraham was the father of the Jewish nation. That is the sense in which the Jews were chosen—it was through them that the Messiah would come. Approximately two thousand years later, Jesus was born of a woman, specifically of a virgin, in the city of Bethlehem. Jesus was born a Jew. The chosen people were blessed to be the ones through whom the one and only Redeemer came into the world.
Their purpose was not to be the permanent keepers of covenant status. It was to bring forth the Christ. That purpose has been accomplished.
So when people today treat the modern nation-state of Israel as if it holds the same covenant position as Old Testament biblical Israel, and as if it has a permanent divine claim above all other nations, they are conflating two very different categories. One is a political state in modern history. The other is a covenant people in redemptive history, whose purpose reached its goal in Christ. To look at this another way, to say that the Jews are still God’s chosen people today is to say that God has not fulfilled His promises to defeat sin through the Seed of Abraham, that is, Jesus.
Both Jew and Gentile Guilty
From another angle in the book of Ephesians, Paul makes it clear that God did fulfill His promises. Read this longer passage carefully:
Therefore remember that you, once Gentiles in the flesh—who are called Uncircumcision by what is called the Circumcision made in the flesh by hands—that at that time you were without Christ, being aliens from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ. For He Himself is our peace, who has made both one, and has broken down the middle wall of separation, having abolished in His flesh the enmity, that is, the law of commandments contained in ordinances, so as to create in Himself one new man from the two, thus making peace, and that He might reconcile them both to God in one body through the cross, thereby putting to death the enmity. And He came and preached peace to you who were afar off and to those who were near. For through Him we both have access by one Spirit to the Father.
Ephesians 2:11–18
There are no longer two groups before God. Christ’s sacrifice has made both into one new man—not Jews becoming like Gentiles, not Gentiles becoming like Jews—but both forsaking their previous lives and identities and uniting together in Christ.
The first three chapters of Romans makes the same point, and it is painfully blunt. (“Gentiles,” by the way, simply means “Nations,” those outside the nation of Israel.) The Gentile world is guilty. The Jewish world is guilty. Moral, religious, pagan, covenant-breaking, law-abiding—it does not matter.
All have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
Romans 3:23
That means no one gets to stand before God and say, “I’m safe because of my ancestry.” People tried that very argument on Jesus, and here’s how He responded:
Then Jesus said to those Jews who believed Him, “If you abide in My word, you are My disciples indeed. And you shall know the truth, and the truth shall make you free.” They answered Him, “We are Abraham’s descendants, and have never been in bondage to anyone. How can You say, ‘You will be made free’?” Jesus answered them, “Most assuredly, I say to you, whoever commits sin is a slave of sin.”
John 8:31–34
Paul says in Romans 2:28 that “he is not a Jew who is one outwardly,” and true circumcision is not merely outward in the flesh. (To enter covenant with God in the Law of Moses, all Jewish males were physically circumcised, and overall, Gentiles were not circumcised.) But under the New Testament of Jesus, it’s not about physical circumcision. What matters is whether the heart has been circumcised, which Paul later explains happens by faith in the working of God at baptism (Colossians 2:11–14).
Many Jewish people in the New Testament staked everything on their ethnicity and circumcision. Yet, here’s what God says:
Circumcision is nothing and uncircumcision is nothing, but keeping the commandments of God.
1 Corinthians 7:19
For in Christ Jesus neither circumcision nor uncircumcision avails anything, but a new creation.
Galatians 6:15
If being a physical Jew mattered to the gospel, Paul could not say that circumcision avails nothing. But he does, plainly and repeatedly.
What About Romans 9–11?
Some people point to Romans 9 through 11 and say, “But what about where Paul says, ‘All Israel will be saved’?” That is one of the most discussed passages in this whole conversation. But whatever that phrase means, there are things it cannot mean.
- It cannot mean that ethnic Jews are saved apart from Christ.
- It cannot mean Jews have a separate covenant track where they do not need the gospel.
- It cannot mean that the modern political nation of Israel enjoys automatic divine favor.
Why? Because that would contradict everything Paul argues leading up to this passage in the book of Romans. His whole message in Romans is that “there is no partiality with God” (Romans 2:11). Jew and Gentile alike are justified the same way. Both need Jesus.
In Romans 11, Paul uses the image of an olive tree. Some branches were broken off because of unbelief. Others were grafted in by faith. His overarching message is: Do not be arrogant. Do not think physical lineage guarantees covenant blessing. The whole chapter is dismantling racial pride, not endorsing it. When people read Romans 11 as if Paul is teaching permanent covenant privilege for unbelieving ethnic Israel, they are reading against the grain of his entire argument. The point is not that Jews can reject Christ and remain secure because of their ancestry. The point is that God has not failed in His promises—because those promises are being fulfilled through Christ, and any Jew who is in Christ can be grafted back in through faith.
Consider what Jesus Himself told Saul of Tarsus on the road to Damascus:
But rise and stand on your feet; for I have appeared to you for this purpose, to make you a minister and a witness both of the things which you have seen and of the things which I will yet reveal to you. I will deliver you from the Jewish people, as well as from the Gentiles, to whom I now send you, to open their eyes, in order to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan to God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins and an inheritance among those who are sanctified by faith in Me.
Acts 26:16–18
The Lord commissioned Saul to open eyes among the Gentiles and the Jewish people. Did you catch it? Jesus was describing Jewish people who were still in darkness, still under the power of Satan, still unsanctified, still without an inheritance, and still unforgiven—until they came to God through faith in Him. Of course, that is equally true of every people group on the planet. But notice that Jesus does not exempt the Jewish people from that description.
The Door Is Open
And isn’t that beautiful? This is not anti-Jewish. The gospel is gloriously open to all people, including modern Jews. Paul says the gospel is “to the Jew first and also to the Greek.” The first-century mission began among the Jews. Jesus came through the Jewish people. The apostles were Jews. The Scriptures were given through their history. Praise God!
But that is not the same thing as saying Jews today remain God’s chosen people apart from Christ. The New Testament never teaches that. It teaches that Jews and Gentiles now come to God on the exact same terms. That is precisely why Acts 10 is such a turning point in the history of the church. Speaking to Gentiles:
Peter opened his mouth and said: “In truth I perceive that God shows no partiality. But in every nation whoever fears Him and works righteousness is accepted by Him.”
Acts 10:34–35
Again, that same Peter takes the language once spoken of Israel and applies it directly to the church:
Coming to Him as to a living stone, rejected indeed by men, but chosen by God and precious, you also, as living stones, are being built up a spiritual house, a holy priesthood, to offer up spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ… you are a chosen generation, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, His own special people, that you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light; who once were not a people but are now the people of God, who had not obtained mercy but now have obtained mercy.
1 Peter 2:4–5, 9–10
So, are the Jews still God’s chosen people?
No. God’s chosen people today are those who are in Christ—both Jew and Gentile. And what is God’s plan for Israel now and in the future? The same as it is for every other people group on earth: that Jews hear the gospel, believe in Jesus the Messiah, die to self, and enter covenant with Him by allowing Christ to cut away the sins of their heart through baptism. There is no second gospel for the Jews. There is no alternate covenant path.
There is one body and one Spirit, just as you were called in one hope of your calling; one Lord, one faith, one baptism; one God and Father of all, who is above all, and through all, and in you all.
Ephesians 4:4–6
No one should look at Jewish people with resentment, superiority, or suspicion. We should look at them the way we look at every person made in the image of God: as souls who need the grace of God in Christ.
Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.
Matthew 28:19–20
When you think about Israel in the context of Bible study, do not think first in terms of politics. Understand Israel in its proper context. Now that faith has come, the great dividing line in Scripture is no longer Jew and Gentile. It is in Christ or outside of Christ. Everything beyond that is the doctrine of man.
Satan loves division. He loves to get us focused on flags instead of souls. He loves to distract us with speculative timelines, national borders, and earthly categories while people all around us are perishing without the hope of the gospel. But the people of God are a holy nation now—a chosen generation, a royal priesthood. Why?
That you may proclaim the praises of Him who called you out of darkness into His marvelous light.
1 Peter 2:9