In Thee Shall All Families of the Earth Be Blessed

[illinoisguy]

Do you deny that modern day Israel has anything to do with Bible prophecy concerning the regathering of the Jews as a nation in 1948?

"There is no prophetic significance in the present partial worldly establishment of a Jewish state in Israel. . . . The present small and partial establishment of the nation Israel in unbelief is an entirely different matter from the tremendous miraculous event which is foretold in the Bible." (Evangelist John R. Rice, "Christ is Coming, Signs Or No Signs," Sword of the Lord Press, pp. 17-18).

“Some think that the little nation over there now, established after the War of 1948, is the promised restoration of Israel. It is not. Zionism and Christianity are two entirely different things. ZIONISM IS JEWISH PATRIOTISM WITHOUT ANY REFERENCE TO THE BIBLE… A bunch of infidel Jews turning down the Gospel, and going on in their infidelity and sin is NOT the restoration promised in the Bible.” (Evangelist John R. Rice, "God's Covenants and Christ's Coming," Sword of the Lord Press, 1979, p. 13)

“The present nation Israel and Palestine have no place in Bible prophecy. It is not the fulfillment of the Scriptures about the restoration of Israel. . . . In 1948 when Palestine was under the mandate of the British, a group of Jews started the rebellion. A war began to seize part of the country. A new Israel, a part of Palestine, was started. The Jews took away from the Arabs their homes and lands by murder and whatever else was necessary. In war and rebellion they took part of the land now called Israel. These Jews say that God has given that country to Israel, and many Christians back them up… But this is not the Bible restoration of Israel… The promises cannot be fulfilled to any Jew while he remains an unconverted rebel against God.” (Evangelist John R. Rice, ibid, pp. 20-21)

 

[Ekklesian]

"There is no prophetic significance in the present partial worldly establishment of a Jewish state in Israel. . . . The present small and partial establishment of the nation Israel in unbelief is an entirely different matter from the tremendous miraculous event which is foretold in the Bible." (Evangelist John R. Rice, "Christ is Coming, Signs Or No Signs," Sword of the Lord Press, pp. 17-18).

“Some think that the little nation over there now, established after the War of 1948, is the promised restoration of Israel. It is not. Zionism and Christianity are two entirely different things. ZIONISM IS JEWISH PATRIOTISM WITHOUT ANY REFERENCE TO THE BIBLE… A bunch of infidel Jews turning down the Gospel, and going on in their infidelity and sin is NOT the restoration promised in the Bible.” (Evangelist John R. Rice, "God's Covenants and Christ's Coming," Sword of the Lord Press, 1979, p. 13)

“The present nation Israel and Palestine have no place in Bible prophecy. It is not the fulfillment of the Scriptures about the restoration of Israel. . . . In 1948 when Palestine was under the mandate of the British, a group of Jews started the rebellion. A war began to seize part of the country. A new Israel, a part of Palestine, was started. The Jews took away from the Arabs their homes and lands by murder and whatever else was necessary. In war and rebellion they took part of the land now called Israel. These Jews say that God has given that country to Israel, and many Christians back them up… But this is not the Bible restoration of Israel… The promises cannot be fulfilled to any Jew while he remains an unconverted rebel against God.” (Evangelist John R. Rice, ibid, pp. 20-21)

 

[illinoisguy]

"We dispensationalists believe that the church has superseded Israel during the current church age, but God has a future time in which He will restore national Israel as the institution for the administration of divine blessings to the world." - Thomas Ice

"There are a number of ways in which this present age differs from all the ages that preceded. . . . The nation Israel has been set aside as the particular object of God's dealing and can not expect the fulfillment of her promises during this age." - Dwight Pentecost, Dallas Theological Seminary, in "Things To Come," p. 132

"The Bible does not teach us to be partial to Israel or to the Palestinians because either has a special divine status. . . . A non-covenant-keeping people does not have a divine right to hold the land of promise. Both the blessed status of the people and the privileged right to the land are conditional on Israel's keeping the covenant God made with her. . . . Until that great day when both Jewish and Gentile followers of King Jesus inherit the earth (not just the land), without lifting sword or gun, the rights of the nations should be decided by the principles of compassionate and public justice, not claims to national divine right or status." - John Piper

"Is the present state of Israel fulfilling Bible prophecy? . . . No. . . . A Jew is not a Jew by the circumcision of the flesh but by the circumcision of the heart. So, let us say, then that no unconverted Jew has any claim on the land of Palestine now. . . . That means that Zionism is not the same as Christianity. Many fundamental Bible teachers have done wrong in putting this on a fleshly basis and not on the spiritual basis. They talk about Israel in the flesh when they ought to be talking about Israel in the spirit. They talk about the fleshly seed of Abraham when they ought to be talking about Abraham's one Seed, Christ, particularly, as the Scripture says." - Evangelist John R. Rice, "Dr. Rice, Here Are More Questions," Sword of the Lord Publishers, pp. 310, 313

 

[Ekklesian]

They're pointing in the right direction, but they're still missing the mark. The Church, the bride of Christ, was always the addressee of the prophecies--not Israel as people, even the antizionists quoted above, think of Israel.

Receiving the end of your faith, even the salvation of your souls. Of which salvation the prophets have enquired and searched diligently, who prophesied of the grace that should come unto you: Searching what, or what manner of time the Spirit of Christ which was in them did signify, when it testified beforehand the sufferings of Christ, and the glory that should follow. Unto whom it was revealed, that not unto themselves, but unto us they did minister the things, which are now reported unto you by them that have preached the gospel unto you with the Holy Ghost sent down from heaven; which things the angels desire to look into. - 1 Peter 1:9-12​

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And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise: God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect. - Hebrews 11:39-40​

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The Church is Zion.

But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels, To the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect, - Hebrews 12:22-23​

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Let those refuse to sing who never new our God
But children of the the Heav'nly King
May speak their joys abroad.

 

[illinoisguy]

Agreed - these citations are missing the mark. The point of the quotes is to show that even many dispensationalists and fundamentalists admit that Jews after the flesh do not currently have any divine claim or entitlement on land in Palestine. The corollary of that is that Christians have no mandate to support such claims at this time.

A proper understanding of the Bible takes us beyond this, to understand that the future fulfillment of land promises to all Christian believers, Jewish and Gentiles, will be in heaven, not on earth.

"But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly, wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God; for he hath prepared for them a city." -Hebrews 11:16

"For this Agar is mount Sinai in Arabia, and answereth to Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children. But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all." -Galatians 4:25-26

To those who say that the land promises to Jews after the flesh must be fulfilled literally, I agree with that. According to Joshua 21:43-45 and Nehemiah 9:7-8, 23-24, all the land promises were literally fulfilled, in ancient times, to literal Jews. Been there, done that, now it's time to move on.

Yes, the Church is the Spiritual Israel. "And as many as walk according to this rule, peace be on them, and mercy, and upon the Israel of God." - Galatians 6:16. "Another purpose of the cross was to create a new nation, 'the Israel of God,' (Galatians 6:16). This is one of many names for the Church found in the New Testament." - Warren Wiersbe "Israel of God - not the Israel after the flesh, among whom these teachers wish to enroll you; but the spiritual seed of Abraham." - Jamieson, Fausset and Brown.

 

[Ekklesian]

Agreed - these citations are missing the mark. The point of the quotes is to show that even many dispensationalists and fundamentalists admit that Jews after the flesh do not currently have any divine claim or entitlement on land in Palestine. The corollary of that is that Christians have no mandate to support such claims at this time.

Well done.

 

[Ransom]

And yet, we see the miraculous regathering of a dispersed people who have had no country to call their own since the Babylonian Captivity clearly laid out in Scripture and all of a sudden that should be spiritualized. That is what liberal scholars and skeptics do. I look at the events of 1948 with wonder after reading of the many prophecies in the Old Testament that clearly stated what would happen in the last days and you ask me to not believe my lying eyes.

First, I don't believe the founding of Israel in 1948 was "miraculous." Providential, certainly. It is part of the plans God is working out in history. He promised them land, and he kept every one of those promises, including the ones in which he drove them off the land for disobedience. He sent them their Messiah, and they rejected him, and God again ejected them from the promised land in AD 70. Neither you nor I can know what his purposes are with Israel at the present time. But a secular state founded by secular Jews isn't evidence of covenant faithfulness. Maybe they're there so God can judge them some more.

Second, you said that the founding of Israel is "clearly laid out" or "clearly stated" in Scripture. Twice. I see no such clear statements, so again I ask you to show your work. What specific Old Testament prophecies point to the foundation of the modern state of Israel in 1948?

 

[biscuit1953]

First, I don't believe the founding of Israel in 1948 was "miraculous." Providential, certainly. It is part of the plans God is working out in history. He promised them land, and he kept every one of those promises, including the ones in which he drove them off the land for disobedience. He sent them their Messiah, and they rejected him, and God again ejected them from the promised land in AD 70. Neither you nor I can know what his purposes are with Israel at the present time. But a secular state founded by secular Jews isn't evidence of covenant faithfulness. Maybe they're there so God can judge them some more.

Second, you said that the founding of Israel is "clearly laid out" or "clearly stated" in Scripture. Twice. I see no such clear statements, so again I ask you to show your work. What specific Old Testament prophecies point to the foundation of the modern state of Israel in 1948?

It comes down to accepting the prophecies concerning Israel as being literal or spiritual. I laid out my beliefs and don't need to rehash them. Whether you call the regathering of Israel "providential" or "miraculous" it doesn't matter. The Jews are outnumbered 100 to 1 and there are countless examples of unexplained events that have prevented the genocide of modern day Israel. The worldwide condemnation and hatred of the Jews is Satanic but just as God's promise to us as Christians will not be broken, the same is true of the descendants of the Hebrew people. John Gill and Charles Spurgeon couldn't be called "dispensationalists" but they recognized the prophecies concerning physical Israel as being a future event to be fulfilled literally. The Jews are in unbelief today but one day "they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him, as one weeps over a firstborn" (Zech 12:10). The Messiah "will come with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also who pierced him (the house of Israel) and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him." Even so, Amen" (Rev 1:7). I respect your belief but I simply disagree with it.

 

[abcaines]

It comes down to accepting the prophecies concerning Israel as being literal or spiritual. I laid out my beliefs and don't need to rehash them. Whether you call the regathering of Israel "providential" or "miraculous" it doesn't matter. The Jews are outnumbered 100 to 1 and there are countless examples of unexplained events that have prevented the genocide of modern day Israel. The worldwide condemnation and hatred of the Jews is Satanic but just as God's promise to us as Christians will not be broken, the same is true of the descendants of the Hebrew people. John Gill and Charles Spurgeon couldn't be called "dispensationalists" but they recognized the prophecies concerning physical Israel as being a future event to be fulfilled literally. The Jews are in unbelief today but one day "they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him, as one weeps over a firstborn" (Zech 12:10). The Messiah "will come with clouds; and every eye shall see him, and they also who pierced him (the house of Israel) and all kindreds of the earth shall wail because of him." Even so, Amen" (Rev 1:7). I respect your belief but I simply disagree with it.

AMEN. I would classify the views in this thread as "Replacement Theology Lite".

 

[Ransom]

OK, so I see that you actually did previously quote some prophecies that you say have to do with the regathering of Israel in 1948. That's what I get for reading the thread backwards.

Anyway, let's look at your list and see whether they say ("clearly") what you assert.

Amo 9:14-15 "I will restore the fortunes of my people Israel, and they shall rebuild the ruined cities and inhabit them; they shall plant vineyards and drink their wine, and they shall make gardens and eat their fruit. I will plant them on their land, and they shall never again be uprooted out of the land that I have given them,” says the LORD your God."

But to understand these verses, we need to go back farther.

Verse 1-10 prophesy the destruction of Israel, for whom there is no escape (1-4). Yet the destruction is not total (8): the nation will be sifted like grain, and some, the remnant of the faithful, will remain safe in the sieve. But all the sinners, who deny their danger, will die.

But then Amos turns to a message of hope:

“In that day I will raise up
the booth of David that is fallen
and repair its breaches,
and raise up its ruins
and rebuild it as in the days of old,
that they may possess the remnant of Edom
and all the nations who are called by my name,”
declares the Lord who does this.

“Behold, the days are coming,” declares the Lord,
“when the plowman shall overtake the reaper
and the treader of grapes him who sows the seed;
the mountains shall drip sweet wine,
and all the hills shall flow with it. (10:11-13)​

God will rebuild his nation from his faithful remnant. He will rebuild the tabernacle of David. In Amos's day the house of David had fallen so low that instead of dwelling in a kingly palace, it was as though it dwelt in a tent or a ruin. But God would rebuild the ruins--which is to say, he would restore the dynasty.

Has this happened? No, the final Davidic king was Zedekiah, before the Babylonian exile of the southern kingdom. After the exile, the monarchy was restored, but not to the house of David. The modern state of Israel is a secular republic, not a theocratic monarchy. They are holding their own against their enemies at present, but it remains to be seen if they will be "uprooted" (15) in the future. If the reference to the house of David is to an earthly kingdom, it did not come to pass in 1948. Amos's fulfillment must still be in the future.

At the assembly in Jerusalem, James takes Peter's experience with the Gentiles as the fulfillment of this passage, saying, "Simeon has related how God first visited the Gentiles, to take from them a people for his name. And with this the words of the prophets agree, just as it is written"--quoting Amos 9:11-12. So the Apostles see the fulfillment of this prophecy in the word of God being given to the Gentiles as well as the Jews: in all nations there are those "called by my name." So this passage isn't properly applied to the restoration of the ethnostate of Israel. Rather, it foretells God pouring out his blessing on Jew and Gentile alike and rebuilding Israel into what it was meant to be: the nation of the faithful, ruled by the Lord Jesus Christ, son of David, and the King of the Jews. In other words: the church.

This is long so I'm going to split it here and continue in my subsequent post.

 

[Ekklesian]

ethnostate

That's a succinct way to put it.

 

[Ransom]

Isaiah 11:11 says the Lord will set his hand the second time – not from the east but from all over the world and the islands of the sea.

And Isaiah 11 begins with a messianic prophecy:

There shall come forth a shoot from the stump of Jesse,
and a branch from his roots shall bear fruit.
And the Spirit of the Lord shall rest upon him,
the Spirit of wisdom and understanding,
the Spirit of counsel and might,
the Spirit of knowledge and the fear of the Lord....

In that day the root of Jesse, who shall stand as a signal for the peoples—of him shall the nations inquire, and his resting place shall be glorious. (Isa. 11:1-2, 10)​

Who is the "root of Jesse"? Would anyone on this forum deny that it is the Lord Jesus?

We can't divorce vv. 11ff from vv. 1-10. The Messiah is the one raising his flag in vv. 10 and 12--the one in whose name the remnant gathers. Again, was the nation of Israel gathered under the name of Christ in 1948? Obviously not. Has it brought about the kind of peace we see in vv. 6-9? Very obviously not. If this passage is about the regathering of the nation of Israel, its fulfillment is still in the future.

Jeremiah 16:15 says God will bring them back from the north and all the lands. The march from Egypt to Canaan was not a restoration. You cannot have anything restored to you unless it has been in your possession before, and Palestine was never in possession of the children of Israel until after the conquest by Joshua.

Jeremiah foretold judgment on Judah in the Babylonian exile. Verses 14-15 say that just as God brought the people out of Israel into the promised land, so will he bring them back from the "north" (Assyria) and the other lands where they had been driven. Some were exiled to Babylon, others fled to Egypt (and dragged Jeremiah with him against his will). Hence, yes, the Israelites were restored to their land from all sides. This came to pass in the late 6th century BC. It is not about the state of Israel founded in 1948, or a future one.

Ezekiel 36:21-24 declares that God will take the Jews from among the heathen, gather them out of all countries, and will bring them back into their land, not for their sakes but for the His holy name’s sake “that the heathen shall know that I am the Lord, saith the Lord God, when I shall be sanctified in you before their eyes.”

Again, obviously, the context here is the exile: see vv 19-20, in which the pagans profane the name of the Lord because his people no longer possess their land. Thus in verses 21ff, God promises to return them--not for their sake, but for his sake, because his name and reputation are bound to theirs by covenant.

This is, again, a prophecy of the restoration after the exile, not of a future state of Israel, in 1948 or otherwise.

I haven't seen anyone here deny that God still has a future for the children of Israel. But you can't interchange that with the establishment of the state of Israel in 1948 and say they were the same thing. At best, what your proof-texts prove is that the restoration of Israel will be realized eschatologically--not that it's a present reality.

 

[Ransom]

It comes down to accepting the prophecies concerning Israel as being literal or spiritual.

Not really. The issue is whether a specific prophecy was intended to have a literal or spiritual meaning. We see instances in the New Testament of an apostle declaring a prophecy or promise, given to Israel, being fulfilled in the church. If a writer infallibly declares a prophecy fulfilled, that is a literal fulfillment. And because of the authority of the person declaring it so, that settles the question.

Furthermore, it's simply false to say, as Dispensational scholars like to, that they read the Scriptures literally while other schools do so "spiritually" or "allegorically." Every conservative school uses the grammatical-historical method of interpretation. The issue is not that this school uses literalism, and that school uses spiritualization. The issue is where each school does so, and why.

If from time to time interpreters must resort to "spiritualizing" a particular passage--if I ever do that--it is because a New Testament author has done so with that passage, and if we want to remain faithful to the way the Old Testament is used in the New, then we are compelled to follow suit.

 

[Ransom]

AMEN. I would classify the views in this thread as "Replacement Theology Lite".

*shrug* Call it what you will. It's simply a name for mainstream Christian theology, up until the time that the Dispensationalists declared ex cathedra that Israel and the Church really have nothing to do with each other.

 

[Ekklesian]

Also, saying something was an allegory, or that there is a spiritual reality to it, isn't saying the narrative isn't historical. The narrative of Isaac and Ishmael and Sarah and Hagar is both historical and allegorical.

Hosea 11:1 (When Israel was a child, then I loved him, and called my son out of Egypt,) is an obvious allusion to the Exodus, yet Matthew says the fulfillment was in the return of Mary and Joseph and Jesus to the land of Israel.

 

[Ransom]

Also, saying something was an allegory, or that there is a spiritual reality to it, isn't saying the narrative isn't historical. The narrative of Isaac and Ishmael and Sarah and Hagar is both historical and allegorical.

The word Paul uses in Gal. 4:24 broadly means speaking figuratively, or by way of analogy. It doesn't necessarily mean allegory, as we understand that literary device. What he does with the Hagar story is more akin to what we call typology--events, persons, etc. in the Old Testament that prefigure something in the New. As you say, Paul doesn't deny or downplay the literal historicity of the Sarah-Hagar story. He just says it foreshadows the relationship between Christ and the Jews or Gentiles that have faith.

Allegory relies on some external key to unlock its meaning. The Hellenistic Jewish philosopher Philo interpreted the Sarah-Hagar story such that Hagar represented basic secular education, while Sarah was the life of the mind. There's nothing in the text to suggest that. Philo imported it from outside.

That's allegory. No one here is doing that. The Roman Church developed a fourfold interpretation of Scripture involving the literal sense and three levels of allegory. The Reformation rejected that, and went back to the grammatical-historical method.

Philo is saying, "This is really that," while Paul's typology is saying, "This is itself, but it's also that." Matthew's use of the Old Testament (such as your Hos. 11:1 example) also leans heavily on typology. I often like to point out his use of Judges 13:5 in Matt. 2:23. The former isn't an announcement of Jesus's birth, but Samson's. There's actually no linguistic connection between the words "Nazarene" and "Nazirite." It's wordplay. But Matthew uses Samson as a type of Christ, and his readers would have understood his meaning: like Samson, Jesus is the strong man who plunders his enemy and sacrifices himself to save his people.

 

[illinoisguy]

. . . quoting Amos 9:11-12. So the Apostles see the fulfillment of this prophecy in the word of God being given to the Gentiles as well as the Jews: in all nations there are those "called by my name." So this passage isn't properly applied to the restoration of the ethnostate of Israel. Rather, it foretells God pouring out his blessing on Jew and Gentile alike and rebuilding Israel into what it was meant to be: the nation of the faithful, ruled by the Lord Jesus Christ, son of David, and the King of the Jews. In other words: the church.

Ransom is correct. The subject of the Jerusalem Conference was the place of Gentiles in God's plan. It was not about the restoration of literal, national Israel - that subject was not even brought up. It was about the Church and the place of the Gentiles in it.

"Now as it refers to Messiah's kingdom, [Amos 9:11-12] is a prophecy of the conversion of the Gentiles, as appears Acts 15:16-17. . . . That this is a prophecy of setting up the kingdom of the Messiah, and bringing in the Gentiles, is very certain." - Matthew Poole

"The remnant shall return . . . shall form themselves into Christian churches and set up pure doctrine, worship, and discipline among them, according to the Gospel charter, by which Christ's cities are incorporation. The kingdom of the Messiah shall take such deep rooting in the world as never to be rooted out of it (v. 15): I will plant them upon their land. God's spiritual Israel shall be planted by the right hand of God Himself upon the land assigned them, and they shall no more be pulled up out of it, as the old Jewish church was." - Matthew Henry

"The words of Amos, 'all the nations upon whom my name is called,' clearly imply that Edom and all the Gentiles are to be incorporated with Israel as the people of the Lord. [That is not "Replacement Theology.]" . . . The words quoted by James apply directly and definitely to the situation under discussion, the status of the Gentiles in the Church, and that this is the reason that James appealed to them. . . . The only natural interpretation of this passage is that it refers to the Church age and to the ingathering of the Gentiles during that age." - Oswald Allis

"All the commentators we have been able to consult on this passage, including Meyer, Wordsworth, Canon Cook, Plumptre, Lechler in Lange, Schaff, A.R. Fausset, Olshausen, Cambridge Bible, Abbot, Howson and Spence, Hackett, and Alford, interpret the prophecy quoted as referring to the reception of the Gentiles to the gospel, and their subsequent salvation and gathering into Christ's spiritual kingdom in the present dispensation." - Calvin Goodspeed, "Messiah's Second Advent."

Those who believe that James was quoting Amos as a prediction of a yet-future national restoration of Israel, at a time when the literal destruction of that nation had just been predicted and decreed (Matthew 21:18-21, 43, 23:37-39, 24:2) are ignoring the historical context of the times. This was not a prophecy conference or "Night to Honor Israel" - it was all about the place of Gentiles in the Church.