12/1/23
Israel is a bush burning with fire, yet not consumed. Let’s begin with a short summation of Jewish history, then work toward God’s curses and blessings upon these people. Biblical evidence will show why the Muslim mindset to destroy the Jews and drive them into the Mediterranean Sea will fail.
The gathering of the Jews to their land began soon after World War II. In 1948, after some 1900 years, the Jews’ became a sovereign state called Israel.
In almost every case, the first-century Jews led persecutions against the Christian church. What they could not accomplish themselves, they urged others to do. They instigated trouble and spread false rumors against the apostles, the people, and the Gospel. Paul’s response to a letter from Timothy sets the tone for the calamities that had befallen the Jews.
1 Thessalonians 2:15-16, “Who (the Jewish leaders, and the people) both killed the Lord Jesus, and their own prophets, and have persecuted us; and they please not God, and are contrary = (opposed) to all men: Forbidding us to speak to the Gentiles that they might be saved, to fill up their sins always: for the wrath is come upon them TO THE UTTERMOST.”
The Jews were responsible for slaying their prophets, underscored by the murder of their Messiah.
Josephus, the Jewish first-century historian, writes of his people. They = (the Jews) are “Atheists and the dullest of barbarians.” Tacitus, another historian, writes, “They = (the Jews) have a hostile hatred of all other races and religions,” This was the true nature of the Jews in the time of Jesus and the apostles.
Ezekiel 36:18-19, “I (God) poured my fury upon them = (the Jews) for the blood that they had shed upon the land, and for their idols wherewith they had polluted it: I = (God) scattered them = (the Jews) among the heathen (Gentiles), and they were dispersed through the countries: according to their way and according to their doings I judged them.”
Amos 5:21-22, “I (God) hate, I despise your feast days, and I will not smell (savor) in your solemn assemblies. Though ye offer me burnt offerings and your meat (food) offerings, I will not accept them: neither will I regard the peace offerings of your fat beasts. Take away from me the noise of thy songs, for I will not hear the melody of thy viols,” let judgment run down as waters, and righteousness as a mighty stream.”
From Amos 786 B.C. to 70 A.D., the Jews continued in a useless sacrificial system of worship that had no value whatsoever. No history of any people or nation can compare with the calamities, hardships, and miseries that have come upon these people. Calamities fell upon their heads like great hail stones. Two thousand years have passed since Christ’s death, yet God’s curse remains. They have suffered wars, murder, genocide, and every terror known to humankind.
A curse was pronounced upon them by God, having only themselves to blame; from their own words and actions came destruction. They accused, then cursed, and killed their own Messiah.
The words of the Jewish people to Pilate were Matthew 27:23-25, “Let Him (Jesus) be crucified,” — and “His blood be on us and on our children.”
How literal the curse has been. One calamity piled upon another, having no precedence in world history. The descendants of the unsaved Jews, the children of their children, and their children having the curse of their fathers imposed upon them, the innocence of Jesus Christ and the power of God. What Jehovah promises, He fulfills.
Jesus is speaking to His disciples.
Matthew 23:38, “Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.”
The temple is always called “the Lord’s house,” where the LORD made His presence known. Jesus said that this house of God had been abandoned and made desolate.
John 1:11, “He (Jesus) came unto His own, and His own (the Jews) received Him not.”
The Hub of their political, educational, scientific, and military economy centered around religion. The system collapsed when the Hub of their faith was crushed in 70 A.D. by the Roman legions.
Matthew 23:21 may further explain the meaning of verse 23:38. “Whosoever shall swear by the temple, sweareth by it, and by all things therein.”
In the first temple built by Solomon, God promised to manifest Himself. He dwelled between the cherubim at each end of the Ark of the Covenant. Between them was the mercy seat; on this was the splendor and glory of God exhibited.
In the second temple, the one enlarged and adorned by Herod, five things were missing that were instructed by God to be in the first temple: the Ark of the Covenant, the Holy Spirit of prophecy, the Urim and Thummin, the sacred fire, and God’s Divine presence.
Jehovah had long ago abandoned this second temple built by Herod. No prophet then spoke to the Jews for more than 400 years. Christ but was rejected.
2 Corinthians 4:6, “For God (the Father,) who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.”
John 1:14, “And the Word = (Jesus) was made flesh and dwelt among us = (the Jews), and we = (the people) beheld
His glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth.”
He told them, “I am the Way, the Truth, and the Light.” No man comes to the Father but by me.
Jesus visited the literal temple many times, teaching. After being rejected, He pronounced sentence upon them,
Matthew 23:38, “Behold, your house is left unto you desolate.”
Matthew 23:39, Jesus said, “Ye shall NOT see me henceforth, till ye shall say, blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord.”
And so, the fate of the nation was sealed by the Lord, but the prophets Malachi and Haggai wrote,
Haggai 2:9, “The glory of this latter house shall be greater than of the former (Solomon’s temple) saith the LORD of hosts.” The glory was to be Jesus Christ.
Malachi 3:1-2-3, “The Lord whom ye seek, shall suddenly come to His temple.” — Who shall stand when He appeareth? for He is like a refiner’s fire, — He shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver.”
Our Lord will sit as King over the whole house of Israel.
Zechariah 12:10, “I will pour upon the house of David (the Jews) and upon the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the Spirit of grace (Holy Spirit) and of supplications: and they shall look upon me whom they have pierced, and they shall mourn for Him, as one mourneth for his only son, and shall be in bitterness for Him, as one that is in bitterness for his firstborn.”
A yet future Prophesy for the Jews’, Romans 11:26, “So all Israel shall be saved:”
The preservation of the Jews by God amid the horrible calamities has been ongoing for the past 2000 years. Beyond all imaginable odds, God has preserved the Hebrews because of his Promise to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They have suffered imprisonment, the threat of extermination, torture, and slavery. Gentile nations have committed great outrages against the Jews. Outrageous calamities even beyond what God Himself had placed upon their heads.
The Restoration:
The Portuguese Jews of the 18th and 19th centuries believed they would one day return to their promised land. Also, many Christian writers believed in the Jews’s literal restoration to the land of Promise and the re-establishing of temple worship. The probability was zero, and the future looked bleak for them. The implementation of the Biltmore resolution in 1942 jump-started the return of the Jews to their land. After the war, Jews began a return to the land from every corner of the world. In 1948, they became a recognized country, calling themselves Israel.
The Muslim futility to destroy them! The Arab nations do not fight against the people of Israel; they are fighting against the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
Deuteronomy 30:4-5. A prophecy for the Jews, “If any of thine = (the Jews) be driven out … from thence will the LORD thy God gather thee, and from thence will He fetch thee: And the LORD thy God will bring thee into the land which thy fathers possessed = (Israel), and thou shalt possess it; and He will do thee good and multiply thee above thy fathers.”
Ezekiel 37:21-28, “Thus saith the LORD God; Behold, I will take the children of Israel from among the heathen = (nations) whither they be gone, and will gather them on every side, and bring them into their own land: I will make them one nation — they all shall have one shepherd = (Jesus) they shall also walk in my judgments, and observe my statutes,—–I = (God) will make a covenant of peace with them; it shall be an everlasting covenant — And the nations shall know that I the LORD do sanctify Israel, when my sanctuary shall be in the midst of them for evermore.”
Because the Jews as a nation have not received Jesus as Messiah, God has not yet made peace with them, but He will in due course.
Isaiah 11:10-16, God, “Shall set His hand again the second time to recover the remnant of His people, which shall be left, —- and shall assemble the outcasts of Israel, and gather together the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.”
Amos 9:14-15, “I = (God) will bring again the captivity of my people of Israel, and they shall build the waste cities, and inhabit them; — And I will plant them upon their land, and they shall no more be pulled up out of their land which I have given them, saith the LORD thy God.”
Joel 3:1-7-20, “Behold, in those days, and in that time, when I (God) shall bring again the captivity of Judah and Jerusalem, —- I will raise them out of the place whither ye have sold them, —- Judah (Israel) shall dwell forever, and Jerusalem from generation to generation.”
Hosea 1:10-11, “The number of the children of Israel shall be as the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured not numbered; and it shall come to pass, that in the place where it was said unto them, Ye are not my people, there it shall be said unto them, Ye are the sons of the living God. Then shall the children of Judah (Jews) and the children of Israel (Jews) be gathered together, and appointed themselves on head.”
Hosea 3:4-5, “The children of Israel shall abide many days without a king, and without a prince, and without a sacrifice, —- Afterward shall the children of Israel return, and seek the LORD their God, and David their king = (symbolic of Christ); and shall fear the LORD and His goodness in the Latter days.”
Romans 11:1-2, 8-12, Paul said, “Hath God cast away = (abandoned) His people (the Jews’)? God forbid. God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew.”
It’s written, “God hath given them (the Jews) the spirit of slumber, eyes that they should not see, and ears that they should not hear = (spiritual blindness); unto this day. And David said, “Let their table be made a snare, and a trap and a stumbling block, and a recompense unto them = (the Jews):”
“Let their eyes be darkened, that they may not see, and bow down their back always. Through their fall, salvation came unto the Gentiles to provoke them (the Jews) to jealousy. Now if the fall of them = (the Jews) be riches of the world, and the diminishing = (failure) of them the riches of the Gentiles; how much more their fullness?”
2 Corinthians 3:15-16, “Even unto this day, when (the books) of Moses are read, the veil is upon their = (the Jews) heart.”
Christ is a stone of stumbling because the majority of Jews reject the Lord Jesus. “Nevertheless, when it = (when anyone of them) turn to the Lord, the veil shall be taken away.”
Isaiah 65:17-18-24, “Behold I = (God) create new heavens and new earth: and the former shall not be remembered nor come into mind. … Behold, I create Jerusalem a rejoicing, and her people a joy. … And it shall come to pass that before they (the Jews) call, I will answer; and while they are yet speaking, I will hear.”
Ezekiel 36:21, “I had pity for mine holy name = (Jesus), which the house of Israel had profaned among the heathen, whither they went. I = (God) will sanctify my great name, which was profaned among the heathen, which ye have profaned in the midst of them; and the heathen shall know that I am the LORD, saith the Lord God, when I shall be sanctified = (hollowed) in you before their eyes.”
The preservation of the Jews through 2000 years of awful suffering and disgrace will soon end. They have been and are still a “Reproach and a by-word” among all nations, “A bush burning with fire, yet not consumed.”
We are witnesses today of this remarkable fulfillment of prophecy, giving the world an uncontestable and uncontestable evidence of the truth of Scripture. If anyone can read, hear, and contemplate the truth of Scripture yet reject these prophecies, they must renounce all claims to being Christian and of the Father’s, Son’s, and Holy Spirit’s existence.
Phillip LaSpino www.seekfirstwisdom.com