Jewish wedding

Interestingly at the Messianic-Jewish wedding they always referred to God as 'The God of Israel' which is a helpful way of describing a bit more about who God is since the word 'God' means so much to so many people. I suppose we say 'Jesus' for this reason but I think Paul used the phrase 'The God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ'. Biblical theology is about how God reveals himself to people through the stories of scripture. God isn't a list of theological terms but a set of stories through which we learn how people approached him. That's why I suppose it's important to say 'the God of Israel', well that's one of the reasons I suppose.

Also they used the 'grafted in' analogy as a reminder to the gentiles present in the congregation that it was the Jewish people who were the original people of God. I find this interesting. Paul picks the image up and uses the phrase 'grafted in' but he does it to speak to gentile believers who may fall into the trap of pride and thinking that they are no. 1 since Israel messed it up. What the messianic Jews were doing today was using the metaphor as a way of boasting about their Jewish status. An interesting missing of the point and a falling back into the trap of pride and nationalism that Paul was so keen to speak out against. They would say that they do it to make a break from the negative associations with 'the church'. Paul however seems happy to say 'the dividing wall of hostility has been removed' we have to live with the negativity and move on. The way to break from past sins is to demonstrate a different type of church/people from anything anyone has experienced. Not by changing the wording and introducing new theological terms and a whole new jargon and language that makes some 'in' and some 'out' but by living differently and over time changing perspectives.