God's Focus on Israel
To have a correct view of prophecy,
we must understand God's
unconditional covenant with the nation Israel.
Here's Gene:
Now again let me say, this is extending
the Principle--broadening the Principle
on the blessings and curses.
Deuteronomy chapter 30, verses 1 through 6:
When all these things happen to you--
the blessings and the curses
[see the relationship?]
...When all these things happen to you--
the blessings and curses I have set
before you--and you come to your
senses while you're in all the nations
where the LORD your God has driven you,
and you and your children return to the
LORD your God and obey Him with all
your heart and all your soul by doing
everything I am giving you today,
then He will restore your fortunes,
have compassion on you, and gather
you again from all the peoples where
the LORD your God has scattered you. ...
Now let me simply say something:
That's never happened.
That hasn't happened to this day.
However, what Moses said was:
You will disobey, and you will be scattered.
In essence, you're going to go into Assyrian captivity.
You're going to go into Babylonian captivity.
That's history. That came after Moses gave them the
statements regarding the blessings and the curses.
Israel disobeyed and the curses came.
And part of that--they were scattered to
the ends of the earth. But notice it says:
...Even if your exiles are at the ends of the earth,
He will gather you and bring you back from there. ...
That's never happened.
That's never happened to Israel.
What does that mean?
Inherent in what Moses is saying
prophetically is that that will happen
someday to Israel as a nation.
...The LORD your God will bring you into
the land your fathers possessed...
Never happened yet.
God hasn't brought them back.
They came back on their own, basically.
Now it may be a part of God's great
scheme for the future but this has never happened.
They have not come back from the
four corners of the earth. And the promise says:
...The Lord your God will bring you into
the land your fathers possessed,
and you will take possession of it. ...
That's never happened!
It didn't even happen when they came
back from Babylonian captivity--
not in the fullest sense. And then:
...He will cause you to prosper and
multiply you more than He did your fathers. ...
That hasn't happened.
...The Lord your God will circumcise your heart. ...
That hasn't happened.
He's talking to Israel as a nation.
You go to Israel today, the majority of
the people in Israel are secular.
Some of them don't even believe in God.
They're ethnic Jews.
Now there are those who do believe in
the Old Testament but there are many who do not.
Many Jewish atheists today.
They're still part of the nation Israel
but their hearts have not been circumcised--as a nation.
...and the hearts of your descendants
[will be circumcised], and you will
love Him with all your heart and all your soul,
so that you will live.
That hasn't happened--not to Israel as a nation.
So you see, here in Deuteronomy, [Moses] is-- here in Deuteronomy, Moses
is actually prophesying something that's
going to happen in the future.
Beyond the return from the Babylonian captivity.
Beyond what we see in Israel today.
Something very significant is going to happen
and we have it outlined very carefully
here in the book of Deuteronomy.
In fact, Jeremiah prophesies--
and listen to his prophecy:
"Look, the days are coming"--
this is the LORD's declaration--
"when I will make a new covenant with the
house of Israel and with the house of Judah.
...I will place My law within them and
write it on their hearts. [Hasn't happened].
I will be their God, [and] they will be My people. ...
Hasn't happened--not as a nation.
...No longer will one teach his neighbor
or his brother saying:
Know the LORD, for they will all know Me,
from the least to the greatest of them"....
Hasn't happened. This is:
...the LORD's declaration.
"For I will forgive their wrongdoing and
never again remember their sin."
Something is going to happen in the
future with the nation Israel.
And Paul makes reference to that in the
book of Romans, in chapter 11, when he says this:
So that you will not be conceited,
brothers, I do not want you to be
unaware of this secret:
a partial hardening has come to Israel
until the full number of the Gentiles has come in.
That's most of us--we have come in
through Jesus Christ to be His children,
a part of the church.
And in this way [in the future] all Israel
will be saved [as a nation], as it is written:
The Liberator will come from Zion;
He will turn away godlessness from Jacob. ...
When Jesus Christ came the first time,
did He turn away godlessness from Jacob?
As a nation, the children Israel.
No, He came to His own, John said,
verse 11, but His own rejected Him.
But to all those who believed--have eternal life.
The Liberator came but they rejected Him.
He was crucified. He died.
He was buried. He rose the third day.
He went back to heaven. Who did He leave?
Believers--both Jew and Gentile.
This is what we call the church.
That's what the Bible calls the church.
And we're waiting for His return.
And someday the Liberator will come
and He will turn away godlessness from Jacob.
See, that's what Moses is talking about.
That's what Jeremiah is talking about.
Projecting into the future. And it reads:
...And this will be My covenant with them,
when I take away their sins.
See, God is going to fulfill His promise,
I believe, to the children of Israel.
The Abrahamic covenant will be fulfilled
in its entirety--the land, multiplication--
which is partially fulfilled but not fully fulfilled.
And the Savior, which has been a
blessing to all of us.
But ultimately He will come and He will
redeem Israel--His people.
And by the way, if you read more of
Scripture, you will see that He redeemed
Israel to once again be a testimony to
the whole world so the Gentiles could be saved--
even in the end times.
So this is a great Principle.
And that's why it's important that we
understand God's focus on Israel.
Now the question for Reflection and
Response is really an extension of what
we looked at in the previous Principle of
the blessings and the curses:
What can happen when we fail to
distinguish properly between
God's future plan for Israel as a nation
and God's present and future plan for the church?
Well one thing can happen is:
if we don't distinguish those things,
we can teach false doctrine.
And what happens when we teach false doctrine?
It can lead to disillusionment.
For example, the "health-and-wealth" theology
that is being taught today.
It leads to incredible disillusionment.
What happens when you give,
and give, and give, but you don't prosper?
Your needs are met but you don't prosper?
What happens to those people?
They lose faith because they've been
taught bad doctrine--false theology.
What happens when they pray for
health and they have incurable diseases
and God doesn't heal them?
It creates guilt. It creates disillusionment.
It leads to incredible, incredible
destruction in the lives of people
because of this false theology.
And that's why it is so important that
we differentiate between what God says
to Israel and what God says to the church.
Now having said that, let's remember
that God has given us many Principles
from the Old Testament that are applicable
when we look at these Principles
through the grid of the New Testament.
To have the whole perspective on God's
will for our lives.
And that's why it's so important that we
look at the whole Bible.
And that, to me, is what is exciting
about this study and looking at
Principles to Live By--in order to
determine a Principle that is truly a
Principle that God has given us.
Then it leads to understanding of God's
total story and God's total redemptive plan.
It doesn't lead to disillusionment.
It leads to freedom and being the
people of God that God wants us to be.