iSRAEL MY people

    THROUGH ABRAHAM ALL NATIONS OF THE WORLD WOULD BE BLESSED

      Genesis 12: 1-3 Now the LORD said to Abram: "Get out of your country, and from your father's house to a land that I will show you. I will make you a great nation; I will bless you and make your name great; and you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you; and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed." These verses mark a pivotal point in Genesis and redemptive history as God begins to establish a covenant people for Himself in fulfillment in the promise, He made in Genesis 3:15. "And I will put enmity between you and the women, and between your seed and her Seed; and He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel." In this prophesy Satan would wound the future Messiah but ultimately be crushed by Him.

       The progress of God's redemptive plan is evident in His setting Abraham apart and making Israel a great nation. It climaxes in Jesus Christ the true seed of Abraham who brings salvation to the world. The builders of Babel sought to make their name great. Here God promises to make Abraham's name great along with land and blessing. (1) 

       Genesis 17:5, God says to Abram "No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham; for I will make you the father of a multitude of nations." Abraham is the physical father of several nations, Israel through Isaac, Ishmaelites through Ishmael, and the Edomites through his grandson Esau. But this promise finds final fulfilment in the multitude of people from every tribe, language and nation who share the faith of Abraham and are baptized into Jesus Christ. (2) 

       Genesis 32: 27-28 and 30, So He said to him. "What is your name?" And he said "Jacob." And He said, "Your name shall no longer be Jacob but Israel; for you have striven with God and men and have prevailed." So Jacob named the place Peniel, for he said, "I have seen God face to face, yet my life has been preserved." The "Man" is implicitly identified as God Himself, a pre-incarnate appearance of Jesus Christ. (3)

       Moses writes of Israel in Deuteronomy 14: 1a and 2 "You are the sons of the LORD your God...For you are a holy people to the LORD your God; and the LORD has chosen you to be a people of His own possession out of all the people who are on the face of the earth." The conception of a father-son relationship between God and Israel had been used to illustrate God's provision and care for His people and the reason underlying His disciplining of them. (4) 

      The Song of Moses, Deuteronomy 32: 7-10, "Remember the days of old, consider the years of all generations, ask your father and he will inform you, your elders, and they will tell you. When the Most High gave the nations their inheritance, when He separated the sons of man, He set the boundaries of the peoples, according to the number of the sons of Israel. For the LORD'S portion is His people: Jacob is the allotment of His inheritance. He found him in a desert land, and the howling waste of a wilderness; He encircled him, He cared for him, He guarded him as the pupil of His eye." For Israel the historical events of the past were like a map, on which the movements of God could be traced. But the significance of history lay not in antiquarian interest, but in the conviction that the God who had acted in the past would continue to act in the lives and affairs of His people, and that His acts in the past were of continuing significance for the present and the future. The sovereignty of God over all men and nations is expressed, but it is stated in such a way as to emphasize His particular concern for His chosen people. (5) 

       Moses also warned the people of Israel, Deuteronomy 4: 25-27, "When you become the father of children and children's children and have remained long in the land, and act corruptly, and make an idol in the form of anything, and do that which is evil in the sight of the LORD so as to provoke Him to anger, I call heaven and earth to witness against you today, that you shall surely perish quickly from the land where you are going over the Jordan to possess it. You shall not live long on it but shall be utterly destroyed. And the LORD will scatter you among the peoples, and you shall be few in number among the nations where the LORD shall drive you." After the glory of Solomon's reign, the people fell into idolatry and immorality. After the kingdom was divided in two, between northern Israel and southern Judah, Moses's prophesy came true. The northern kingdom was driven into exile by the Assyrians in 722 B.C. and the southern kingdom of Judah in 586 B.C. was taken to Babylon. After a 70-year exile prophesied by Jeremiah, they returned to Jerusalem to rebuild their city, Jeremiah 25: 9-13.

      Moses also prophesied the coming of the Messiah, Deuteronomy 18: 18-19, "I will raise up a prophet from among their countrymen like you, and I will put my words in His mouth, and he shall speak to them all that I command Him. And it shall come about that whoever will not listen to My words that He shall speak in My name, I Myself will require it of Him." Jesus was like Moses in several ways. He was spared death as a baby, Matthew 2: 13-23; He renounced a royal court, Philippians 2: 5-8 and Hebrews 11: 24-27; He had compassion on His people, Numbers 27:17 and Matthew 9:36; He made intersession for the people, Deuteronomy 9: 18 and Hebrews 7: 25; He spoke with God face to face, Exodus 34:29 and 2 Corinthians 3:7. He was the mediator of a covenant, Deuteronomy 29:1 and Hebrews 8:6-7. (6) He also like Moses, did signs and wonders. Besides healing the sick and casting out demons, there is no greater wonder than raising the dead, which Jesus did three occasions according to the gospels. The raising of the son of the widow of Nain in Luke 7: 11-17 of Jairus daughter in Mark 5:21-24 and the raising of Lazarus in John 11: 1-44. The Jews of Jesus day had a mixed reaction to Him. Some thought He was the Prophet, (John the Babtist) others thought Him to be the Christ, while some wanted to arrest Him. 

  (7)     After Israel's rejection of Jesus as the Messiah by the chief priests, scribes, and soon the people of Jerusalem at Jesus trial, Jesus gave this lament of coming judgment as He drew near to the city. Luke 19: 41-44, And when He approached, He saw the city and wept over it, saying, "If you had known in this day, even you, the things which make for peace! But now they have been hidden from your eyes. For the days shall come upon you when your enemies will throw up a bank before you, and surround you, and hem you in on every side, and level you to the ground and your children within you, and they will not leave in you one stone left upon another, because you did not recognize the time of your visitation." Luke has it that Jerusalem's rejection of Jesus is reminiscent of its historic betrayal of the covenant that led to the first destruction of Jerusalem and the exile. As Israel of old fell to its enemies on account of divine judgment for its unfaithfulness, so Jerusalem will be judged for its inconsistency. The people of Jesus day did not recognize the unique privilege they had of the coming of the Messiah and their visitation by God. (8) John the Apostle said in John 1: 11, "He came unto His own and His own did not receive Him. In Matthew 23: 37-39, Jesus said, "O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling. (9) Behold your house is being left to you desolate! For I say to you from now on, you shall not see me until you say, BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD!" Jerusalem's failure to respond is to have drastic consequences. Gods house is now "your house" and it has been left "to you" because God has abandoned it, as Jesus is about to do. (10) Christ's public teaching ministry is over. He withdraws from national Israel until the time yet future when they will recognize Him as Messiah. Jesus predicted the temple would be destroyed, Matthew 24: 2 "not one stone here shall be left upon another." These words were fulfilled literally in 70 A.D. by the Roman general Titus, who laid siege to Jerusalem and burned the temple. The rubble was then sifted through to get the gold that had adorned the temple, and the remaining ruins were thrown down into the Kidron valley. (11) A second Jewish revolt in 135 A.D. was crushed during the reign of the emperor Hadrian. The Jews were driven out of their land a second time and scattered among the nations as Moses predicted in Deuteronomy 4: 25-27. Most of the Jews were driven out of Israel during this period but they continued to have a presence in Galilee and Hebron. (12)

      After the Jews were exiled, the land was neglected and ruined as a series of invasions by Muslim, Crusader, Mongol, and Turkish armies fought for control.

        Isaiah the prophet predicted God would gather His people back into the land a "second time." Isaiah 11: 11-12, "Then it will happen on that day the LORD will again recover a "second time" with His hand the remnant of His people, who remain, from Assyria, Egypt, Pathros, Cush, Elam Shinar, Hamoth, and from the islands of the sea. And He will lift up a standard for the nations and will assemble the banished ones of Israel, and will gather the dispersed of Judah, from the four corners of the earth. The fulfillment of this prophecy began in 1881 with the migration Jews back to Palestine after a wave of persecution in Europe. (13) Palestine was part of the Ottoman Empire and was mostly desert at that time. In 1867 Mark Twain visited Palestine and gave his description of the land before the Jews returned in his book "Innocents Abroad." "Palestine is monotonous and uninviting. Of all lands there are for dismal scenery, I think Palestine must be a prince. The hills are barren, they are dull of color, the valleys are unsightly deserts. (14) Palestine sits in sackcloth and ashes. Nazareth is forlorn, Jerusalem has lost all its ancient grandeur and is become a pauper's village, the wonderful temple which was the pride and glory of Israel is gone. (15) Capernaum is a shapeless ruin, Bethsaida and Chorzin, have vanished from the earth and the desert places round about them where thousands of men listened to the Saviour's voice and ate miraculous bread, sleep in the hush of solitude that is inhabited only by birds of prey and skulking foxes. Palestine is a shapeless ruin." (16) The Jews began to immigrate legally and set about buying land that was considered worthless by the Turkish authorities. They began to restore the land with irrigation, planting trees, and crops. Ezekiel 36: 24, 25 "For I will take you from the nations, and gather you from all the lands, and bring you into your own land. Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you..." Romans 11: 26-27, The Apostle Paul states one day "all Israel will be saved; just as it is written "THE DELIVERER WILL COME FROM ZION, HE WILL REMOVE UNGODLINESS FROM JACOB, AND THIS IS MY COVENANT WITH THEM, WHEN I TAKE AWAY THEIR SINS." 

        The Ottoman empire lost Palestine at the end of World War I, which was then occupied by the British. Israel became a nation May 14, 1948, and made Jerusalem their capitol. They're still waiting for their Messiah.

      NOTES: (1) R.C. Sproul, The Reformation Study Bible, p. 32, (2) p. 39, (3) p.65; (4) Peter C. Craigie, The New International Commentary of the Old Testament, The Book of Deuteronomy, p.229, (5) p.379; (6) John MacArthur, The MacArthur Bible Commentary, p. 221; (7) J. Ramsey Joel Michaels, The New International Commentary of the New Testament, The Gospel of John, p.470-471; (8) L. Green, The New International Commentary of the New Testament, The Gospel of Luke, p.691; (9) R.C. Sproul, The Reformation Study Bible, 1714, In this verse Jesus claims to be God Himself by alluding to Gods protection of His people; (10) R. T. France, The New International Commentary on the New Testament, The Gospel of Matthew, p.883-884; (11) The MacArthur Study Bible, p. 1171; (12) Cohn-Sherbeck Dan (1996) Atlas of Jewish History, Routledge p.58 ISBN978-0-415 08800-8; (13) Halpern, Ben (1998) Zionism and the Creation of a New Society, Reinarz, Jehuda New York Oxford. University Press. p53-54, ISBN978-0-585-18273-5. OOCLC 49960036; Mark Twain, Innocents Abroad, (14) p.692, (15) p.693, (16) p.694.