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natural and wild branches.

but one vine..one root system....I always thought of me being ingrafted into Israel through Christ ...

Is there scripture on Israel and the church being seperate?

As I understand it, the tree is the people of God.

This has been debated ad nauseum before and I am not inclined to repeat. As an aside, I have a good treatment that unfortunately isn't published. It was John H. Walton's master's thesis at Westminster Seminary defending the distinction between Israel and the Church. (He did the chronological charts of the OT and NT published by Zondervan). It is quite good and was done at a school holding the opposite position.

John was an elder in the church I attended in Philly. A great guy.

One analogy, for fun. We have two children. One via natural birth and one via adoption. Both are Johnsons. Both are heir to the Johnson fortune (such as it is). We are one family. Yet these two are distinct and participate in the blessings of the Johnson family through different routes. Our family tree has a natural and an adopted branch. We love them both dearly.