ISRAEL VS. THE WORLD:

WHOSE GOD IS GREATEST?

• He who shall introduce into public affairs the principles of primitive Christianity will change the face of the world. –Benjamin Franklin

• God's presence is not attached to the land, the nation of Israel, rather, it's attached to believers who are everywhere…because God is reclaiming everything…” There are no sanctified countries in this age. –Dr.Michael Heiser

• “The idea of being accepted by a culture whose ideology is fundamentally at odds with biblical Christianity is not realistic.” –Dr. Voddie Baucham

• Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of ALL God’s promises.

• Making a public stand of spiritual solidarity with a modern nation that rejects Christ, is to suggest to the entire watching world that Christianity is a confused religion that places more value on ethnicity and political land rights than the transcendent Creator and sustainer of the world. 

• Salvation does not come by ethnicity, bloodline, keeping the law, or one’s preoccupation with the building of the third temple or the Talmudic meanderings of apostate rabbis. 

By Brad Ward, Director, Armor of Truth

LOVE OF TRUTH

There is a particular quotation attributed to Benjamin Franklin that is used from time to time to remind Americans of their true religious heritage. Franklin was the first ambassador to France from 1776 to 1785. He had a very close and fruitful relationship with the French, and the French loved Franklin. “Poor Richard” offered much in the way of political advice and recommendations for a better form of government. Five years after Franklin left his post, French journalist and social leader Jacques Mallet Du Pan published his historical memoirs, where he reported:

“Franklin often told his disciples in Paris that whoever should introduce the principles of primitive Christianity into the political state would change the whole order of society.”*

George Bancroft, “The Father of American History,” published a rigorous ten-volume history of the American nation (1854 to 1878). Bancroft records, “He [Franklin] remarked to those in Paris who learned of him the secret of statesmanship: 

“He who shall introduce into public affairs the principles of primitive Christianity will change the face of the world.”**

It has become tediously standard these days to deny America’s Christian heritage. Therefore many will surely dismiss Franklin’s charge, balk at Bancroft, and poo poo Du Pan’s account. However, a person genuinely seeking truth cannot be selective of the facts and must not allow his disordered ambitions on “first things” or matters of ultimate meaning to discolor the author’s intent. 

If an accurate account of religion in the founding of America is to be recovered, the seeker must search out truth on truth’s terms. There isn’t much to be valued in supporting one’s presuppositions apart from the context of the text being studied. Suppose Americans care about preserving the freedom God has afforded us in this age. In that case, we must tear down the idols of “Progressivism” and turn from our disordered love of mammon in the form of accumulated technologies and rediscover our love for truth; only love of truth can preserve freedom.

There is no freedom apart from God, only slavery to sin. The only path to God is through Christ, and the path to Christ is love of truth. The gift of God.

In John 14:6, Thomas said to Jesus, “How do we know the way?” Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father but through Me. If you have come to know Me, you will know My Father also.” 

AMERICAN CHRISTIANITY

Voddie Baucham writes in his book The Ever Loving Truth:

“American Christians have been fortunate. We live in one of the few societies in history that has not persecuted the followers of Jesus. We know nothing of the suffering of our brothers and sisters in southern Sudan, who have been beaten, enslaved, chased from burning churches, or even killed by their predominantly Muslim neighbors. We know nothing of the secrecy that our brothers and sisters in China must maintain; they are forced to meet in underground churches to escape the ire of the Communist government and its anti-Christian policies. We can't imagine the pain of a Coptic Christian woman in Egypt whose fourteen-year-old daughter was kidnapped from her home and raped by Muslim men, who then informed her that her daughter had been converted to Islam and she would not see her again.

The idea of being accepted by a culture whose ideology is fundamentally at odds with biblical Christianity is not realistic. Currently, the only persecution we have seen has been mild at worst. Nevertheless, there are signs that biblical Christianity is losing favor in our society. One is the way Christians are portrayed on television and in the movies. While I admit that there are times when the media should be held accountable for the poison it peddles, I believe there are far more instances when it is merely reflecting the ideology of the age.”

ALL ISRAEL IS NOT ISRAEL 

Christian scholar and author, Dr. Michael Heiser said,

We hear a lot in politics today, that America needs to support Israel because of what the Bible says about Israel. If America doesn't support Israel, then America is tantamount to Babylon…

I think that the thing that trumps that subtext of the question is righteousness. In other words, when Israel does wrong, I feel completely free to say, "you're doing wrong." When Israel does right, we ought to say, "good on you."

So, in other words, there's no sanctified [condition] for any country. Biblical Israel, the nation of Israel, [does not] get a pass on their behavior, their conduct as a national entity, because they were elect in the Old Testament, because they didn't get a pass in the Old Testament. God judged them – pretty obvious – we have this thing called the exile. That was pretty traumatic [not a blessing].

So the fact that they were God's chosen people then does not exempt them from moral, meaning Scriptural evaluation. That ought to be completely, transparently, biblically obvious, but it often isn't. …What I would hope is that [Christians would view] the historical circumstances [in their proper context].

We know what the historical circumstances were to the rise of Israel as a nation. There were white hats, and there were black hats. That's the way it works in the human world, that we can …cynically call anti-Eden. This is the world, it is not Eden, and it's never going to be Eden despite all the utopian efforts that politicians and political theorists think they can accomplish, because [the world is] filled with people who are unregenerate. And even the ones that are regenerate aren't perfect. …And that is the difference between sacred space being a country the size of New Jersey in the Old Testament, and now, sacred space is defined as the body of Christ and believers. And that matters. It's not tied to geography anymore.

The church, God's presence, is not attached to the nation of Israel, that landmass, rather, it's attached to believers who are everywhere. And that's the plan. They're supposed to be everywhere because God is reclaiming everything.

VIDEO: Michael Heiser

Note: We have chosen to appeal to the scholarship of Dr. Heiser on this point specifically because we come from different Christian traditions. Dr. Heiser affirmed a more Libertarian Free-Will version of soteriology while our position is best described by the London Baptist Confession of 1689. We believe that whenever possible, it is best to utilize the arguments of those outside of our own tradition. We are standing on the immutable truths of Holy Scripture common to faithful, biblical Christianity. 

JESUS CHRIST IS THE FULFILLMENT OF ALL GOD’S PROMISES

The vastly common reflex of Christians today to point to the Jews as the source or fulfillment of God’s promise is to make a grave error. Likewise, those who are drawing attention to the land of Canaan as the signal or fulfillment of God’s promises are missing the point of Scripture and God’s plan in redemptive history. Do we not honor the New Testament as the fulfillment of the Old? The New Testament undeniably, infallibly reveals that Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of God’s promises.

Here is more evidence from the New Testament (the fulfillment of the Old) that our focus must be set upon Jesus and not upon the modern geopolitical entity called Israel: 

Jesus Christ is our atonement (1 John 2:1b-2)

“1b...if anyone sins, we have an Advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ the righteous; 2 and He Himself is the propitiation for our sins, and not for ours only, but also for those of the whole world.

The term “advocate” here refers to one who stands for us, stands in our place at the judgment, and while applied in this context to Jesus, it is also the same term used elsewhere for the Holy Spirit (by Jesus). 

In the context of the Greek New Testament, the term “propitiation" refers to a means of appeasement or satisfaction of a debt. In Christian theology, this term is associated with atonement, particularly the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the cross, which satisfied the righteous wrath of God against sin, and reconciling all who are in Christ with God.

How do we know who is True Israel (in this age)? 1 John 2:29b reads,

“...everyone also who does righteousness has been born of Him.” 

And 1 John 4:7-14 says, 

“7 Beloved, let us love one another, for love is from God; and everyone who loves has been born of God and knows God. 8 The one who does not love does not know God, because God is love.” 

The phrase “born of God” (γεννάω gennáō, pronounced ghen-nah'-o) in the literal sense means procreation. But in the figurative context of this passage, “born of God” means regeneration: to be born again, to be delivered from the bondage of sin, to be made a new creation.

Verse 9-14 continue, 

“By this the love of God was manifested in us, that God has sent His only begotten (completely unique, one-of-a-kind) Son into the world so that we might live through Him. In this is love, not that we have loved God, but that He loved us and sent His Son to be the propitiation for our sins. Beloved, if God so loved us, we also ought to love one another. No one has beheld God at any time; if we love one another, God abides in us, and His love is perfected in us. By this we know that we abide in Him and He in us, because He has given us of His Spirit. We have beheld and bear witness that the Father has sent the Son to be the Savior of the world.”

This is how we know who we are, how to identify one another in a hostile world, and what our character must reflect as Christians. Here is more Scriptural evidence that Christ is the fulfillment of God’s promises:

Jesus Christ is the fulfillment of the promise of blessing to Abraham (Acts 3:24-26, Gal. 3:10-14).
Jesus Christ is our better Moses or Covenant giver (Matt. 17:1-8; John 5:37-47).
Jesus Christ is our fulfillment of the promises (2 Cor. 1:20).
Jesus Christ is our debt Jubilee (Col. 2:13-14, cf. Luke 4).
Jesus Christ is our rest (Hebrews 3-4). 
Jesus Christ is our manna (John 6:35).
Jesus Christ is the Chief Shepherd (1 Peter 5:4).
Jesus Christ is our vine (John 15:1-10).
Jesus Christ is our temple (John 2:18-22).
Jesus Christ is our high priest (Heb. 4:14-15).
Jesus Christ is our Passover lamb (1 Cor. 5:7).
Jesus Christ is our David, our giant slayer (Rev. 22:14).
Jesus Christ is our king (Matthew 2:2, 27:11; Rev. 19:11-16).
Jesus Christ is our mediator (1 Tim. 2:5, Heb. 12:24).
Jesus Christ is our God (Isaiah 9:1-7, cf. John 12:36-43, John 20:28).
Jesus Christ is our light (Matt. 4:12:17).
Jesus Christ is our hope for the kingdom of God (Luke 17:21).
Jesus Christ is our gateway to the promise land (John 14:1-6).
Jesus Christ is our way to the Father (John 14:6).
Jesus Christ is the True Israel (Matt. 2:13-15).
Note: This is only a partial list.***

Everything the Jews longed for is fulfilled in Jesus. Everything that Gentiles/non-Jews need and long for is fulfilled in Jesus. There is no hope of fulfillment of God’s promises in the land of Canaan. To place your hope in the modern nation of Israel by equating their geopolitical intrigue with God’s promises is to waste time with false hope.

At this point in redemptive history, or any other, the only hope any Christian has for the fulfillment of prophecy or, most importantly, salvation is in Christ and Christ alone. There is only ONE true religion, and God has only ever had ONE people or tree/vine with branches that have been either broken off or grafted into the tree. Our hope is in Jesus alone.

As Christians, the land we should be particularly concerned with right now is the whole kingdom of God, all the earth, over which Christ has all authority and Christ’s triumphant and victorious physical return when He restores the kingdom of God to this world in its fullness and rules over it as our king and where we will live forever with Christ our King, which will come in His timing and not on our schedule.

So, what is a Christian to do right now in light of all these exciting world developments, Israel’s war with its neighbors, and the looming possibility of a third World War? It’s simple and involves no speculation on prophecy: 

We must call the world to repentance and point them to the Savior. We must constantly be pointing people to Jesus — not Israel, not our pet prophecies, or our favorite internet prophets.

When events in the Middle East ramp up and when Israel moves to the center of the geopolitical stage, that is our opportunity to magnify the name of Christ, and Israel must be evangelized the same as the rest of the world. They do not know Christ. They have rejected their own Messiah. If you love God’s covenant people, then call them to repentance and, through evangelizing the Jews, point the world to Jesus. Why would you point unrepentant singers in any other direction?

To make a public stand of spiritual solidarity with a modern nation that rejects Christ, has an open hatred of Christ’s sheep, has more in common with the spirit of antichrist, and as a people group is still under judgment to this very day (pronounced by Christ [Matthew 23:38; Romans 11:8]), is to suggest to the entire watching world that Christianity is a confused religion that places more value on ethnicity and political land rights than the transcendent Creator and sustainer of the world.

To place such spiritual and prophetic significance on modern Israel is to point the people of the world away from Christ and away from their only hope. Salvation does not come by one’s ethnicity, bloodline, keeping the law, or one’s preoccupation with the building of the third temple or the Talmudic meanderings of apostate rabbis.

Salvation comes only by God’s grace alone, through faith alone, in Jesus Christ alone, and this is to the glory of God alone — it is not to the glory of modern or ancient Israel. Jesus is the True Israel, and therefore, you cannot stand with apostate Israel, who hates Christ and Christians, and stand with the Lord Jesus at the same time.

IS GOD FINISHED WITH ISRAEL? 

We do not make that claim. You’re welcome to draw from Scripture for yourself what God’s intentions for Israel are in the future. Some Covenant theologians say that John’s Apocalyptic text in the Book of Revelation, Matthew 24, and other texts describe the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D. and, therefore, the end of national Israel. Some dispensational theologians teach that national Israel will be grafted back into the tree and used to evangelize the world during the Tribulation.

Our position is simply this: 

Salvation, to be reconciled to God the Father, for a person of any ethnicity or nationality in any age is by faith in Christ alone, and any individual who rejects Christ is lost. The divine right of ownership of the land of Canaan in this age is of no prophetic significance. To be preoccupied with the land and who it “truly” belongs to is to be distracted by the desires of the flesh.

Romans 9:30-33 reads,

“30 What shall we say, then? That Gentiles who did not pursue righteousness have attained it, that is, a righteousness that is by faith; 31 but that Israel who pursued a law that would lead to righteousness did not succeed in reaching that law. 32 Why? Because they did not pursue it by faith, but as if it were based on works. They have stumbled over the stumbling stone,” 

And that this is according to God’s redemptive plan: 

“33 as it is written, “Behold, I am laying in Zion a stone of stumbling, and a rock of offense; and whoever believes in him will not be put to shame.”

That is to say, as Matthew Littlefield writes in his recent post (linked below), only in Christ is there any hope of receiving the promises of God. Nothing outside Christ will be left to stand on or to stand with on the final day. Only the church will be left standing. Revelation 1:12-13:

“Then I turned to see the voice that was speaking with me. And having turned, I saw seven golden lampstands; and in the middle of the lampstands I saw one like the son of man, clothed in a robe reaching to the feet, and girded across His chest with a golden sash.”

The most recognizable Jewish symbol from the ancient world is used to describe the Church of the Lord Jesus Christ in Revelation. Think about the significance of that.

NEED MORE CONVINCING? 

Let’s hear from a Jew that every true Jew (and Christian) writing under the inspiration of God must surely trust. Saul of Tarsus was a Pharisee and the son of a Pharisee (Acts 23:6). He outlines his religious credentials in Philippians 3:5-6 (NIV):

"Circumcised on the eighth day, of the people of Israel, of the tribe of Benjamin, a Hebrew of Hebrews; in regard to the law, a Pharisee; as for zeal, persecuting the church; as for righteousness based on the law, faultless."

This example is significant because it highlights the dramatic change in Saul’s life. A model Jew, he was converted by the Lord Jesus and became known as (as we read in his letter to the church at Rome):

“1 Paul, a slave of Christ Jesus, called as an apostle, having been set apart for the gospel of God, 2 which He promised beforehand through His prophets in the holy Scriptures, 3 concerning His Son, who was born of the seed of David according to the flesh, 4 who was designated as the Son of God in power, according to the Spirit of holiness, by the resurrection from the dead, Jesus Christ our Lord, 5 through whom we received grace and apostleship for the obedience of faith among all the Gentiles for the sake of His name, 6 among whom you also are the called of Jesus Christ; 7 to all who are beloved of God in Rome, called as saints: Grace to you and peace from God our Father and the Lord Jesus Christ.

8 First, I thank my God through Jesus Christ for you all, because your faith is being proclaimed throughout the whole world.

15 …for my part, I am eager to proclaim the gospel to you also who are in Rome.

16 For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. 17 For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith to faith; as it is written, “BUT THE RIGHTEOUS WILL LIVE BY FAITH.”

In Matthew 24:32-35 we read,

“Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: As soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see all these things, you know that it is near, right at the door. Truly I tell you, this generation will certainly not pass away until all these things have happened. Heaven and earth will pass away, but my words will never pass away.”

Whether you believe the prophetic significance of The Fig Tree prophecy or the events recorded in Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21 refers to an event that has happened already (the destruction of the Temple in 70 A.D.) or an event to come in the future, what cannot be denied are the words of Jesus Christ spoken directly to the leaders of Israel (the scribes and Pharisees) about one week after he cleansed the Temple in Jerusalem:

In Matthew 23, Jesus pronounces a list of woes to the scribes and Pharisees, calling them hypocrites for their desecration of the Temple, Blind fools for proselytizing and creating sons of Satan rather than followers of Christ, for exalting the law and the flesh over the Spirit, and calls them a brood of vipers whose actions expose their apostasy, and “upon you may fall the guilt of all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the sanctuary and the altar. Truly I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation” (vv 35-36).

Finally, Jesus says to the leaders of Israel:

“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 did not want it. Behold, your house is being left to you desolate!”

Then Jesus refers to Psalm 118:26,

“For I say to you, from now on you will not see Me until you say, ‘BLESSED IS HE WHO COMES IN THE NAME OF THE LORD!’ (vv. 37-39)”  

The Apostle Paul seeks to clarify this judgment to the church at Rome in chapter 11,

“7 What then? What Israel is seeking, it has not obtained, but the chosen obtained it, and the rest were hardened;
8 just as it is written, (referring to Isaiah 29:10) “(Yahweh) GOD GAVE THEM A SPIRIT OF STUPOR, EYES TO SEE NOT AND EARS TO HEAR NOT, DOWN TO THIS VERY DAY.”

Psalm 69:23 “May their eyes be darkened so they cannot see, and their backs be bent forever.“

Back to Paul’s teaching to the Romans, chapter 9:

2 “I have great sorrow and unceasing grief in my heart. 3 For I could pray that I would be accursed, blotted out, damned, and separated from Christ for the sake of my brothers according to the flesh, 4 who are Israelites, to whom belongs the adoption as sons, and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the Law and the temple service and the promises, 5 whose are the fathers, and from whom is the Messiah/Christ according to the flesh, who is God over all, blessed to the ages. Amen.

6 The word of God has not failed. Because all Israel is not Israel — or they are not all Israel who are ethnically Israel — 7 nor are they all children because they are Abraham’s seed, but: “THROUGH ISAAC YOUR SEED WILL BE NAMED.” 8 That is, the children of the flesh are not the children of God, but the children of the promise are considered as seed. 9 For this is the word of promise: “AT THIS TIME I WILL COME, AND SARAH SHALL HAVE A SON.” 10 And not only this, but there was Rebekah also, when she had conceived twins by one man, our father Isaac; 11for though the twins were not yet born and had not done anything good or bad, so that the purpose of God according to His choice would STAND, not because of works but because of Him who calls, 12 it was said to her, “THE OLDER SHALL SERVE THE YOUNGER.” 13 Just as it is written, “JACOB I LOVED, BUT ESAU I HATED.”

14 What shall we say then? Has God done an unrighteous act? No. Obviously not.
15 For [God] says to Moses,
“I WILL HAVE MERCY ON WHOM I HAVE MERCY, AND I WILL HAVE COMPASSION ON WHOM I HAVE COMPASSION.”
16 So then it does not depend on the one who wills or the one who runs, but on God who has mercy.
17 For the Scripture says to Pharaoh, “FOR THIS VERY PURPOSE I RAISED YOU UP, IN ORDER TO DEMONSTRATE MY POWER IN YOU, AND IN ORDER THAT MY NAME MIGHT BE PROCLAIMED THROUGHOUT THE WHOLE EARTH.”

18 So then God has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.”

Later in the same letter, Romans chapter 11:

“1 I say then, has God rejected His people? May it never be! For I too am an Israelite, a seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. 2 GOD HAS NOT REJECTED HIS PEOPLE whom He foreknew.” 

Psalm 94:14 “For Yahweh will not abandon His people, Nor will He forsake His inheritance.”

The Scripture says Elijah appealed to God against Israel.

“3 Lord, THEY HAVE KILLED YOUR PROPHETS, THEY HAVE TORN DOWN YOUR ALTARS, AND I ALONE AM LEFT, AND THEY WANT TO KILL ME.” 4 But God says to him, “I HAVE LEFT for Myself… at the present time, a remnant [who have not bowed the knee to Ba’al] according to God’s grace.”

And Finally, in Romans chapter 10, Paul says, 

“Brothers, my heart's desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is for their salvation”

That is our concern today as we watch the events of our age play out on the world stage. We must call everyone, including Israel, especially Israel, to repentance and to follow the words of the Lord spoken by the prophet Isaiah,
“Seek (Yahweh) the Lord while He may be found; Call upon Him while He is near” (Isaiah 55:6).

May God bless and keep you all!

Sources:

* M. Mallet Du Pan, Considerations on the Nature of the French Revolution, and on the Causes which Prolong its Duration Translated from the French (London: J. Owen, 1793), p. 31.
(credit to wallbuilders.com for making these sources available)

** George Bancroft, History of the United States, From the Discovery of the American Continent (Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1866), Vol. IX, p. 492.
(credit to wallbuilders.com for making these sources available)

*** Littlefield, Matthew. Israel Needs Jesus. https://caldronpool.com/israel-needs-jesus/ 

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