Colossians 1:27

It is no secret that God favored the Jews. However, it was a secret how much He cared for the Gentiles. When reading the Old Testament, you might begin to think, "Wow, this God is so harsh to the people of those nations," until you start to see that God treated the people of Israel in the same way, if not worse, for their sins.

Then you might say, "But they have all God's promises for restoration." That's a good point, but that is the mystery. 

The prophecies spoke of the restoration of Israel, and we have only small foreshadowings of what that means for other groups of people.

What may have happened is that the small foreshadowings, like the servant being the light to the nations (Isaiah 42:6), have been interpreted from the standpoint of the political power of the Jews as they have known it in their history. The servant is the Messiah.

The writers of the New Testament started showing us a new way of seeing things, with Christ, the Messiah, as the center of it all—Christ as that servant, the Messiah.

They showed that even from the onset, Israel was the proto-church (1 Corinthians 10:11), and the church is not God's afterthought because God sees the end from the beginning.

When you know that God sees the end from the beginning, it becomes clear that Christ's coming was not an afterthought.

So that is the mystery: God had the Gentiles on His mind all along; He had all the world's peoples on His mind.

The book of Genesis spoke of the seed of the woman (Genesis 3), and we come to see that woman in the book of Revelation (Revelation 12). It is clear that this woman is a metaphor and represents more than one woman; she embodies the will of God to bring forth His Son despite and in the midst of all opposition.

That Son will rule all nations, not privileging Israel as a nation but ruling all nations on behalf of God. It starts with Christ in you, establishing His rule in you now so that you will rule with Him in the age to come (2 Timothy 2:12); that is the hope of glory we have now. And yes, there is an age where everything will be right-ended in Christ (Acts 3:21).

The mystery is that there is an interregnum between now and the time Christ has apparent, every-eye-shall-see-it political power.

The Old Testament hides that part. During this interregnum, we are being saved, and our reality is the spiritual version of what was physical for the children of Israel. What they had was the shadow; the reality is Christ (Colossians 2:17).

It spiritualizes the land of promise, which is now heavenly (Hebrews 12:22). It spiritualizes Israel; now, the church is spiritual Israel (Romans 9:6-8). We now have spiritual Zion, spiritual Jerusalem (Hebrews 12:22-24). And then the temple, which is Christ (John 2:21), and us as the temple of the Holy Spirit (1 Corinthians 6:19).

We have the High Priest as Jesus, the ultimate High Priest (Hebrews 4:14). We have the priesthood as everyone in Christ (1 Peter 2:9-10). The mystery is that God would make two into one people of God: Jews and Gentiles. Christ is in the believer, and we now rejoice in the joy God puts in us, hoping for God's glory.