Author PHILIP MAURO
Publisher GRACE ABOUNDING MINISTRIES
Here is a book, written almost eighty years ago when the majority of evangelical Christians were heavily influenced by the dispensational teachings popularized in the Schofield Reference Bible. Two authors sought to point out the errors and dangers in what has more lately been taught by the vehicle of the “Left Behind” series of books written by Tim Lahaye, these two men, were A.W.Pink and the author of this particular book Philip Mauro. He was an American lawyer and a very able and famous one too. He brings his sanctified mind to bear on this subject showing how the idea that focuses our attention upon the earthly Jerusalem and the prominence of the Jewish nation is really reading the New Testament from the Old rather than, as should be done, reading the Old Testament from the New. The notion that certain scriptures foretell the restoration, at some future day, of the earthly temple where the worship of God would be carried on with a priesthood and sacrificial system headquarters of the earthly Israel is currently popularized in the Messianic churches and all would do well to read carefully this particular small volume and examine the scriptures with care along with the Mauro’s arguments. He points out that the error promulgated by the teachers of Israel who confronted Jesus two thousand years ago was an unspiritual interpretation of their own scriptures, they were looking for an earthly kingdom, a political one where the Jew was lord and master of all, this was ‘the hope of Israel” as they viewed it. An earthly land, a physical temple and rule over all the earth were their false hope. Jesus spoke of another kingdom, one not of this world, He showed that the hope of Israel and of all mankind lay in Himself, in a heavenly land, that would in the end be also earthly, He pointed to the New Jerusalem that is above and is free and these things His apostles also taught in their letters. Paul went so far as saying that the Jerusalem that is now upon the earth, by which he also meant the system of worship associated with the earthly temple was actually in bondage and spawned children that were similarly bound in an earthly hope. There is much food for thought in the way Mauro handles these matters. Many in the churches need to hear again the emphasis that the Lord Jesus died for both Jew and Gentile in order to make in Himself of the two one new man. In Him there is no Jew nor Gentile, neither is there some special time when the Jewish nation shall have some other access to the heavenly by some special appearing of the Lord Jesus; there is one olive tree and both natural and unnatural branches are grafted in by the Father to His Son and all stand by faith alone. Probably many will not see eye to eye with all that Mauro writes but it is vital to seriously examine these matters and see if the commonly held pre-millennial views are as sound as many assume them to be.
