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The question Jesus didn’t correct: Why the book of Acts keeps Israel at the centre.
Israel flag with a view of old city Jerusalem and the Western Wall. | Getty ImagesOne of the quiet assumptions shaping much of modern Christian theology is that Israel has been spiritually eclipsed. The Church, we are told, sometimes subtly, sometimes explicitly, has replaced Israel as the focal point of God’s redemptive purposes. Israel belongs to the past; the Church belongs to the present and future.
And yet, the book of Acts refuses to cooperate with this assumption.
If we allow Acts to speak on its own terms: historically, geographically, and biblically, it presents a far more integrated vision. In Acts, Israel remains central to the Kingdom of God, not as a rival to the Church, but as the covenantal and geographic stage upon which God’s redemptive drama unfolds, past, present, and future.
A question Jesus did not correct
The interpretive key appears immediately after the resurrection.
“Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?” (Acts 1:6).
This question matters far more than many Christians realize. These are not confused outsiders. These are resurrected-Christ-trained apostles, men who have spent forty days being taught by Jesus “about the kingdom of God” (Acts 1:3). If anyone should have had their theology corrected by now, it would have been them.
But Jesus does not rebuke them.
He does not say, “You misunderstand … Israel no longer matters.” He does not say, “The Church is now the true Israel.” He does not say, “There will be no future restoration of Israel.”
Instead, He responds: “It is not for you to know times or seasons which the Father has fixed by His own authority” (Acts 1:7). In other words, the expectation is correct. The timing is not yours to know.
This exchange stands as New Testament proof for the continuation of the promises and prophecies of the Old Testament that God will restore Israel. Jesus affirms the premise of the question while withholding the schedule. The Kingdom will be restored to Israel, but according to the Father’s sovereign timetable.
The ascension locks geography into the future
Acts immediately reinforces this truth through the physical, geographic details of Jesus’ ascension.
Jesus ascends into Heaven from the Mount of Olives, just east of the old city of Jerusalem, the same ridge long associated with Israel’s prophetic future. As the disciples stand staring into the sky, two angels deliver a statement that permanently anchors Christian eschatology to a place:
“Men of Galilee, why do you stand looking into the sky? This Jesus, who has been taken up from you into heaven, will come in the same way as you saw Him go into heaven” (Acts 1:11).
This is not poetic language. It is a directional, locational promise.
Jesus ascended bodily, visibly, and geographically from the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem. The angels declare that He will return in the same manner. This aligns seamlessly with the prophets of Israel, particularly Zechariah, who foretold that the Lord’s feet would stand on the Mount of Olives on the day of His return (Zechariah 14:4).
For Christians, this is decisive.
We do not believe Jesus will return to London. We do not believe He will return to New York. We do not believe He will return to Rome.
We believe He will return to Jerusalem.
Acts refuses to spiritualize the Second Coming. The same book that launches the global mission of the Church also insists that history will culminate in a very specific place. The Kingdom of God may expand to the ends of the earth, but it resolves in Israel.
The Kingdom moves outward but never away from Israel
Jesus’ commissioning statement confirms this pattern: “You will be My witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth” (Acts 1:8).
This is not merely a missions strategy. It is a theological map.
The Gospel does not bypass Jerusalem; it begins there. It does not abandon Judea; it spreads through it. It does not erase Israel; it extends from it.
Acts presents a Kingdom that expands outward without ever severing itself from its covenantal and geographic center.
Pentecost: A Jewish event with global implications
Pentecost reinforces the same truth.
It occurs in Jerusalem. On a Jewish feast day. Among Jewish pilgrims from the nations. With Peter preaching from Jewish Scripture. Proclaiming a Jewish Messiah.
Far from announcing Israel’s replacement, Pentecost confirms Israel’s role as the launching point of God’s end-time purposes. The nations are not saved instead of Israel, but through Israel’s Messiah, in Israel’s city, according to Israel’s Scriptures.
The apostles never preach Israel out of the story
Throughout Acts, the apostles consistently affirm Israel’s covenantal identity.
Peter proclaims that Jesus fulfills “the covenant God made with your fathers” (Acts 3:25). James, at the Jerusalem Council, quotes the prophets to show that Gentile inclusion does not negate Israel’s restoration but accompanies it (Acts 15). Paul preaches the Kingdom while affirming the hope of Israel, not dismissing it.
Gentiles are welcomed fully into the people of God — but Israel is never described as rejected, displaced, or obsolete.
The Church needs Israel to understand itself
Acts presents the Church not as a replacement for Israel, but as a participant in Israel’s story.
When Christians disconnect from Israel, the Bible becomes abstract rather than geographic, the Kingdom becomes spiritualized rather than embodied, and God’s promises become conditional rather than covenantal.
If God can permanently abandon Israel, the Church has no assurance that it will not one day be abandoned as well.
A future still anchored in Jerusalem
Acts begins with a question about the restoration of Israel and follows it immediately with a promise about the return of Jesus to the same place from which He ascended.
The Kingdom has been inaugurated but not completed. The Church has been commissioned but not enthroned. Israel has been regathered into the story but not yet fully restored.
Acts leaves the story open because history itself is still moving toward its appointed climax.
The Kingdom of God has a past rooted in Israel, a present expressed through the Church, and a future that, according to Jesus and His angels, returns to Jerusalem.
Acts does not allow us to choose between Israel and the Church.
It demands that we honor both, under one covenant-keeping King who ascended from Jerusalem, and who will return there again.
Doug Reed is a pastor of over 20 years currently serving at The Tabernacle in Buffalo, NY. He cohosts the Shoulder to Shoulder podcast with Rabbi Pesach Wolicki, engaging global leaders on faith, culture, and Israel. Doug partners with Eagles Wings to lead pilgrimages to Israel and strengthen Christian-Jewish relations. He continues to be a frequent speaker, media guest, and author of several articles.
Could this 84-hour Bible marathon be the spark for America’s next spiritual shift?
Incredibly, many voters assume we are as rich – or richer – than America
There’s a whiff of the 1970s in the current depressing state of Britain: the same gloom, the same sense of economic malaise, the same doubts about politicians’ ability to master our problems. But there is one big difference – where we thought we stood in the world.
Back in the Seventies everyone knew that Britain was the sick man of Europe. Britain’s decline was a commonplace of debate. It was brought viscerally home to me on my first school exchange trip to the then West Germany in 1980.
There the buildings were cleaner, the cars were smarter, the goods in the shops were a world away from the shabby supermarkets I was used to. It was just a wealthier, more successful society. Everyone knew it. And it was that feeling of national failure, a sense that something just had to be done, that helped drive the Thatcher revolution.
Unfortunately our national decline is not so clear to British voters now. You can see that from a report we at the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) are publishing today entitled (with a deliberate question mark) A Growth Mindset? It’s based on a big new poll and focus group studies, conducted by Freshwater Strategy with the support of the John Templeton Foundation, and it tries to gauge voters’ opinions about where Britain stands in the world and what is needed to make us prosperous again.
The report bears a full reading, and we will be briefing all political parties about the results shortly. But one aspect is particularly interesting. We asked participants where they thought Britain stood economically compared to our main competitors. It turns out voters are living in a dreamworld.
Nearly half of British voters think that we are as rich, or richer, than Switzerland. Over half think we are as rich or richer than Australia, Singapore, or Germany. And, incredibly, over half of us think Britain is as rich as, or richer, than the United States.
The truth of course is that we are poorer than all those countries – according to the IMF, we are10 per cent poorer than Germany, 20 per cent poorer than Australia, about 40 per cent poorer than America or Singapore (remember all those “Singapore-on-Thames” scare stories? If only), and only half as rich as the Swiss.
We asked our focus groups what they made of this. The dominant reactions were shock, surprise, disappointment, and embarrassment. “It’s kind of shocking to think actually we’re quite a lot lower down than expected,” said one participant. Another commented: “The UK is quite well known as being quite a wealthy country, so it did surprise me.” Another said: “I was quite surprised and a little bit angry.” People were particularly shocked to hear that Poland was on track to overtake Britain in a few years – a “real eye-opener”, as one put it.
In a way, this is in itself surprising. After all, most voters rightly think that the British economy is going downhill fast. In our poll, two thirds describe the British economy as “poor” and 40 per cent think it has no strengths at all. So why would people believe we were doing better than America?
My explanation is that most people never see the contrast. It’s easy for the establishment class to overestimate how much international travel most people do (one reason, of course, why they keep moaning about post-Brexit passport queues, a matter of sublime indifference to most).
Over half of UK citizens take no flights at all in a given year, and the average number of overseas trips is one or two. Overwhelmingly most go to the European countries comparable to or even slightly poorer than the UK, such as Spain, France and Italy. Hardly anyone visits the wealthier places like Germany, and very few travel outside Europe – a hundred times as many Brits go to Spain every year as to Australia.
The result is that most voters are never directly exposed to the huge contrasts in wealth so apparent in the figures. Very few will have experiences like mine in Germany in 1980. Yet it takes feeling the difference, understanding what a wealthy society looks like, to ram the reality home.
If it can’t happen through travel, then our politicians have to take the lead, just as they had to in the 1970s. The good news for them is that our polling showed that learning the truth shifts the mood among voters. From feeling things were bad but Britain was still respectably placed, participants started to realise the problem and wonder what policies they might accept to achieve faster growth. As one, initially sceptical about free-market policies, put it: “Nice to try something else. Who knows, we might end up being like America”.
Time for our politicians to get with the programme. Who knows, they might end up being able to deliver that change we all voted for.
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Lord Frost led the negotiations that finally took Britain out of the EU in 2020. See more