What does Tribe teach about replacement theology?
Drawn from the messages where it was actually addressed: the words said from the front, the passages taught, and where to hear the whole thing.
At Tribe, the teaching on replacement theology is direct and unambiguous. Brian Hunter names it plainly, the idea that the church has replaced Israel and that God is finished with the Jewish people, and calls it a big load of horse pucky. He grounds that rejection in Scripture, not in sentiment. Zechariah 8:2, where God says his love for Mount Zion is passionate and strong and that he is consumed with passion for Jerusalem, serves as the baseline. God's covenant commitment to Israel has not been transferred, and no amount of church history changes that.
Brian builds the positive case from Ezekiel 16 and Romans 11. The Ezekiel passage is deliberately unflattering: Israel at birth was abandoned, unwanted, nobody to take her in. Brian returns to this image because it cuts against the temptation to treat Israel as a nation that can do no wrong. There is nothing intrinsically special about her that earned God's affection. God passed by anyway, said live, and made a covenant, not because of anything in Israel but because of who God is. Romans 11 carries that same logic forward, with the image of Gentile believers grafted into a cultivated olive tree, making Israel and the church genuinely family rather than rivals or replacements.
The congregation's own story is woven into this. Brian draws the line clearly: the pattern God followed with Israel, choosing the unchosen, speaking life over the abandoned, is the same pattern he follows in every human heart. As Brian puts it, the story of Israel is our story. That connection is why replacement theology is not just a theological error at Tribe; it is also a failure of humility. If Christians share in a covenant they did nothing to earn, they have no grounds for the idea that Israel has been set aside.
Taught from Zechariah 8:2 · Romans 11:1-36 · Ezekiel 16:1-15 · Genesis 12:1-3 · Romans 11:24
“Apart from god's sovereign hand, Israel stands no chance of living.”
From My Love for Israel Is Passionate and Strong
The passage taught · Ezekiel 16:1-15
1 Again Yahweh’s word came to me, saying,
2 “Son of man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations;
3 and say, ‘Thus says the Lord Yahweh to Jerusalem: “Your origin and your birth is of the land of the Canaanite. An Amorite was your father, and your mother was a Hittite.
4 As for your birth, in the day you were born your navel was not cut. You weren’t washed in water to cleanse you. You weren’t salted at all, nor swaddled at all.
World English Bible
Messages that go deeper
- March 4, 2024 My Love for Israel Is Passionate and Strong Brian Hunter sets aside his planned message to lead Tribe Church in an honest conversation about Israel, the October 7 attacks, and why Christians are called to care.
- March 3, 2024 Our Relationship With Israel Brian Hunter leads Tribe Church through an open conversation about why Christians should care about Israel, drawing from Zechariah, Ezekiel, and Romans to ground the discussion in scripture.
- August 21, 2023 Pack Your Bags Brian Hunter opens a three-week journey into God's heart for Israel, reading Genesis, Ezekiel, Hosea, and Romans 11 together as a congregation in Jackson Hole, Wyoming.