I.　There is the need for the Lord to recover the real Israel of God—6:16:

A.　God's New Testament economy is not only to make us sons of God but also to make us the Israel of God—Eph. 1:5; Heb. 2:10; Rom. 8:14, 19; Gal. 3:26; 4:6-7; 6:16.

B.　Today we need to be such an Israel, a prince, to execute God's government on earth—Matt. 6:9-10.

II.　The apostle Paul considers the many individual believers in Christ collectively the Israel of God—Gal. 6:8, 16:

A.　The Israel of God is the real Israel including all the Gentile and Jewish believers in Christ, who are the true sons of Abraham, who are the household of the faith, and who are those in the new creation—Rom. 9:6b; 2:28-29; Phil. 3:3; Gal. 6:15-16, 10; 3:7, 29.

B.　The real Israel, the spiritual Israel, is the church—6:16; Matt. 16:18.

C.　In God's New Testament economy we have been made both the sons of God and the Israel of God—Gal. 3:26; 6:16:

1.　We are sons of God, members of God's family, for His expression—v. 10.

2.　We are kings-to-be, those destined to be kings; kingship is related to the Israel of God—Rev. 5:10.

3.　Our destiny is to be sons of God expressing God and also kings reigning in the kingdom of God—21:7; 22:5b; 12:5a:

a.　As the sons of God, the new creation, we need to be loving, joyful, peaceful, faithful, and meek—Gal. 3:26; 5:22-23.

b.　As the Israel of God, princes and victors, we need to walk according to the elementary rules of God's New Testament economy—v. 25; 6:16.

D.　Paul's word about the Israel of God implies that we need to live in a kingly way with a kingly walk—Rom. 5:17, 21.

III.　As the Israel of God, we represent God, exercise His authority, and carry out His administration on earth for the fulfillment of His purpose—Gen. 1:26, 28; Luke 10:19; Rev. 12:5, 7-11:

A.　God wants His creature man to deal with His creature Satan in order to bring the earth back to God—Psa. 149:7-9.

B.　God needs man to do the work of God—to reign over His creation, to proclaim His triumph, and to cause Satan to suffer loss—Gen. 1:26.

C.　May God open our eyes to see that His purpose demands that we be wholly and absolutely for Him.

IV.　If we would be the Israel of God, we need to experience the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob—Exo. 3:6, 15-16:

A.　"The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob" is Jehovah Elohim, the Triune God—the Father, the Son, and the Spirit—v. 15; Gen. 2:4-22; Matt. 28:19.

B.　Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are the foundations of the nation of Israel; without them there would not be the nation of Israel—Exo. 3:15-16:

1.　God's people became His people through the experiences of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

2.　The dealings which Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob received before God and the experiences they went through culminated in a people of God.

3.　We all need to have the elements of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob; without these elements we cannot be the people of God, the Israel of God.

C.　In the book of Genesis, the record of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob overlap; Genesis does not portray them as three separate individuals but as constituents of one corporate person:

1.　The experience of Abraham signifies the experience of God the Father, the unique source, in His calling man, justifying man, and equipping man to live by faith and to live in fellowship with Him—12:1; 15:6; chs. 17—18; 19:29; 21:1-13; 22:1-18.

2.　The experience of Isaac signifies the experience of God the Son in His redeeming man and His blessing man with the inheritance of all His riches, with a life of the enjoyment of His abundance, and with a life in peace—22:1-14; 25:5; 26:3-4, 12-33.

3.　The experience of Jacob (with Joseph) signifies the experience of God the Father in His loving man and choosing man (Mal. 1:2; Rom. 9:10-13) and of God the Spirit in His working all things for the good of those who love Him, in His transforming man, and in His making man mature in the divine life that man may be able to bless all the people, rule over all the earth, and satisfy all the people with God the Son as the life supply—Gen. 27:41; 28:1—35:15; chs. 37; 39—49; Rom. 8:28-29.

V.　In order to be the Israel of God representing God, in Christ we "were circumcised with a circumcision not made with hands, in the putting off of the body of the flesh, in the circumcision of Christ"—Col. 2:11:

A.　The spiritual meaning of circumcision is to put off the flesh, to put off the self and the old man, through the crucifixion of Christ—Gen. 17:10-14; Deut. 10:16; Jer. 4:4a; Rom. 2:28-29.

B.　Because we reject our flesh altogether and have no confidence in the flesh, we are the real circumcision—Phil. 3:3.

VI.　There are two kinds of walk by the Spirit, and the second kind of walk constitutes us those who live a new creation and are the Israel of God—Gal. 5:16, 25:

A.　We need to "walk by this rule"—the rule of being a new creation, of having the Triune God as our life and living—6:15-16.

B.　The meaning of the new creation is that the processed and consummated Triune God mingles Himself with us and constitutes us with Himself to make us new—Eph. 4:4-6, 24; Col. 3:10-11.

C.　To live the new creation is to walk by the divine life and divine nature as a governing principle—Gal. 6:15-16.

VII.　Peace reigns upon the real Israel of God, upon those who walk by the rule of living a new creation—vv. 15-16.

VIII.　Today's Israel of God is a miniature of the coming New Jerusalem, which will be the ultimate consummation of the Israel of God—Rev. 21:2.