By Judgement Day, it will be too late. What they do with Jesus while they’re yet alive is what counts toward their salvation. I wish they would be saved and I pray for the peace of Jerusalem every time I think of the Jews. God loved them no matter what. I’m reading Judges now and am amazed at how He continually rescues them after they did evil in God’s sight. That’s how much He loves them, then and now.
You said — “By Judgement Day, it will be too late. What they do with Jesus while they’re yet alive is what counts toward their salvation. I wish they would be saved and I pray for the peace of Jerusalem every time I think of the Jews. God loved them no matter what. I’m reading Judges now and am amazed at how He continually rescues them after they did evil in God’s sight. That’s how much He loves them, then and now.”
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Certainly by the time someone shows up at the “Great White Throne Judgement” (Revelation 20), then it is definitely too late. That’s for the final judgement. That takes place about 1,000 years after Christ has returned to earth and has been in His Millennial Reign, the Kingdom of God on this earth.
But, there is another event at the beginning of the Millennial Reign of Christ (a 1,000 years earlier than the Great White Throne Judgement), in which “national Israel” — all those Jews who are alive at that particular time) will *all* be saved, because they immediately recognize Jesus as the Messiah of Israel, as He is returning at that moment.
However, even though “all Israel” will be saved at that time — for the last 7 years *prior* to that time — about 2/3 of Israel was killed. What is left, is that “remnant” and that represents just 1/3 of Israel, when Jesus returns, setting up the Kingdom.
Thus, those 2/3 who perished, of those, whoever did not accept Jesus as the Messiah of Israel, before they perished, would be lost forever at that point in time.
So, there are several things going on around this time period.
And since no one knows whether they will personally (individually) survive, or be one of those 2/3 who will perish, one cannot count on being alive to welcome the return of the Messiah at that time. If they “guess wrong” and they perish first, while thinking that they will, instead — “wait and see first” — then that would be a big mistake for them.
That’s why it’s important for all of them to know about the true Messiah of Israel, along with all the Gentiles, too.
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In terms of what it actually represents, in that God goes to such extreme measures to save Israel and also to have preserved it over the many, many centuries — is not simply love. Of course, He did love the entire human race, enough to reach out to us all, first, in offering the Savior, the Messiah of Israel for a sacrifice and a payment for our sins, even though we did not necessarily want it. That’s true for all, Jews and Gentiles.
However, with Israel, the reason why God preserves it and has protected it so much, as He has — is basically God chose them to *show the world* who He was and to use them for that example. That’s a *negative* and a *positive* example.
And since God had already declared what He would do in showing who He was (to the world) through the people He picked (namely the Jews) — God was simply keeping to His word — primarily, as His *highest goal*. In other words, God’s honor and righteousness and holiness is *paramount* — above all else, including who Israel is — simply because God’s word stated what He was going to do and He would always remain true to His word, regardless of who Israel was.
In fact, God tells Israel that they are actually “nothing special”. He says that He did not pick them because of any special attributes that they had. He simply picked them as a “chosen people” to be the “display” to the world of who *God* was (and is) — and not who Israel was (and is).
Even though He loves Israel, He loves them as much as He does the rest of the world. God’s main concern is to show Himself righteous and holy and that what He says is going to be — *will be* — just as He says.
Israel’s evil deeds (or their good deeds) have nothing to do with God’s holiness or righteousness, or His plan of Salvation. He accomplishes that, in spite of Israel — not *because* of Israel.
Israel does have a special place in God’s plan and we recognize that. However, it’s only because God picked them to be the example, to show that God can *sovereignly pick* anyone — as much as He picked Israel. This shows much more about God, than it does about Israel.