God condemned the Jews to wander until the Messiah came but blessed all the other tribes of Israel with a national heritage? Makes sense? Is God just? Is Israel much holier than Judah? Or could it be, as Herbert W. Armstrong taught in The United States and Great Britain in Prophecy, that Israel’s punishment was to last 2,520 years (Lev. 26:21)?
After that time, around AD 1800, due to Abraham’s obedience, God decreed that He would bestow His blessings. Did those 2,520 years of punishment apply only to the Northern Kingdom of Israel? Does God have double standards? Once God removed the Kingdom from Judah, wasn’t it His responsibility restore at the appointed time?
Did the Anglo-Saxon and European peoples take these prophecies into their own hands? Were they able to create their countries without divine command, signs and wonders, or prophetic leadership?
For those who have eyes to see, the biblical countries came about by divine command, since only God determines the rise and fall of nations. Many of our founding fathers were inspired by God, in spite of themselves, to achieve our Manifest Destiny. God’s overall plan is bigger than any individual man.
God prompted Theodore Herzl to inspire the Jewish people with the biblical idea of having a Jewish state again. He wrote and spoke extensively about it, planting the seed of the holy imagination in the mind of Judah.
Later, during the British Mandate, the British began to “favour” the establishment of an independent Jewish homeland, watering that sacred seed. The Balfour Declaration was part of a divine mandate to restore Judah to “Palestine” (a satanic word the Romans used in an evil attempt to wipe our father Israel’s name off the map – Ps. 83:4).
God used political Zionism for his purposes, just as he used America’s rebellion against the English throne. On the surface, neither was so special or just, but both were instrumental in fulfilling the prophecy.
As for the treatment of the ancient inhabitants of the lands God ordained for His people, whether they be Arabs or Indians, I am sure the Canaanites would offer a scathing condemnation, but others would see that God’s purpose is being fulfilled, albeit imperfectly. for limited human vision. God addresses any injustice in His own way and in His own time (2 Samuel 21:1-14), but dismisses accusations that exaggerate or exploit them to deny our basic biblical right to the lands He has chosen for us (Acts 17:26).
Just as the Greeks are representatives of all Gentiles, the Jews are representatives of all Israel. It is to Israel, specifically the Jews, that God has committed the “words of God” (Rom. 3:2). The oracles of God include the DIVINE COVENANTS AND PROMISES (Rom. 9:4-5). The Jews hold, in trust, the Biblical title/covenant of the Holy Land for all Twelve Tribes.
GOD MADE A LAND COVENANT WITH ISRAEL (Gen. 12:7; 13:15; 15:18; 17:8; 26:3; 28:13; 35:12). Not once did God promise the Holy Land to the “Palestinians,” so Bible believers must reject their illegitimate claims. Those who attempt to justify foreign occupation of our land or the terrible treatment of our people because of our sins are condemning themselves before God (Isaiah 47:6; Jeremiah 50:7; Zechariah 1:15).
There are many Scriptures that speak of a REPRESENTATIVE NUMBER OF JEWS living in Israel prior to the return of the King Messiah, Yeshua. Shamefully, God’s ministers, and consequently God’s Church, have often been blind to what God is doing in Israel today. We have not been able to see the wonders that God has wrought, the type that herald greater things to come.
We have been ignorant of the biblical principle of duality and have scrutinized the prophecies demanding all or nothing. With that limited view, we would have argued with Peter at Pentecost/Shavuot about the fulfillment of Joel’s prophecy. However, it was certainly partly (Acts 2:16-21).
Consider the following:
God promised to “save Zion and build the cities of Judah” (Ps. 69:35). (He does not refer to them as “Palestinian” cities.) God has faithfully done this by rewarding Jewish efforts (Annuit Coeptus) and respecting their blood, sweat, and tears (Isa. 61:4; Ps. 102:13-14). God has used the Jews to make the desert bloom like the rose and protected them during this conversion process, just as Moses requested (Dt. 33:7).
I praise God for blessing me, from Toledo to Jerusalem, to have lived in eight kibbutzim (collective farms) across Israel that have helped fulfill these groundbreaking prophecies, including during Operation Desert Storm.
God clearly prophesied through Zechariah chapters 12-14 that the Jews again they would be living in their old capital of Jerusalem, with their own rulers, and that the “United Nations” would oppose them and ultimately they would be defeated.
Zechariah also shows the long-awaited recognition of Yeshua by the Jews as the Son of God and the Firstborn of Judah and the sincere repentance of the political (House of David) and religious establishment (House of Levi). In fact, Yeshua said that the Jews in Jerusalem would never see him again. until they had this necessary change of heart (Matt. 23:39).
Zechariah also reveals that the Jews would return to being a tremendous military power in the Middle East with God working in and through them. many israelis to know that God has been his true General and has performed many miracles on his behalf. I have heard Gershon Salomon, president of Temple Mount Faithful, recount many times his miraculous experience of divine protection in the Golan Heights.
It is important to note that God has inspired the holy prophets to write about flesh and blood Jews living in Israel, not Jewish imposters.
Why? Because those who suffer from the disease of anti-Semitism are willing to sow doubt and confusion about the Jewish identity of Israel. They publish slanderous hate literature that attempts to poison anti-Jewish minds by promoting quack racial theories and Nazi propaganda.
It is nothing less than Satan’s desperate efforts to deny that God has the power to fulfill prophecy. Bible believers reject his bitter lies knowing that God’s Word is true.
Zechariah also agrees with the New Testament prophecies that reveal Jerusalem as a prosperous Jewish city that will suffer under harsh Gentile occupation just before the Messiah arrives (Rev. 11:2; Zech. 14:2).
Yeshua will liberate Jerusalem and secure it as His headquarters. Jerusalem, the site of the Throne of David, will be the seat of God’s government. Yeshua, like the prophet Daniel, foresaw that Jewish Christians would live and work in a Jewish state. They will witness the historic restoration of animal sacrifice and its abrupt cessation by an evil European force, quickly followed by the “abomination of desolation” that triggers World War III (Matt. 24:15-16; Dan. 12:11).
In the meantime, the Church of God (or select individuals if the Church continues to shirk its responsibility) must ANNOUNCE TO THE CITIES OF JUDAH (the prophecy no refer to them as “Palestinian” or “Israeli-occupied” cities) that the Messiah is about to appear!
We must boldly offer Judah the hope and comfort that TRUE PEACE is coming and prepare for it (Isaiah 40:1-3). We must help prepare Israel for the impact of a GLORIFIED YESHUA REVEALED AT LAST (vs. 5) and lead them to expect an audience with a DIVINE KING whose ROYAL BRIGHTNESS will illuminate all nations.
We must identify Yeshua as the “Son of Man” from Heaven that Daniel anticipated (Dan. 7:13-14), and emphasize that Zechariah gave an “eyewitness account” of this same DIVINE SAVIOR descending from Heaven to reign as LORD from Jerusalem. over all the earth (Zechariah 14:3-4, 9, 16).
Remember that this is no small task and it is quite controversial as the Jews are still waiting for a human leader to save them from all their troubles.
The Two Witnesses will be the most influential in reaching the cities of Judah from Jerusalem (Isaiah 40:9; 52:7-8), effectively knowing their mindset and culture (unlike so many others), but the Church of God has yet to do what we can now.
These exciting Scriptures clearly prove (they are not assumptions) that with God nothing is impossible: the Jews would once again be living in an independent Israel, risen from the dust of history just before the coming of the Messiah, with Jerusalem as their capital, complete with a effective fighting force, having been restored to their ancient cities and vigorously transforming the land from arid desert to productive fields – all with God’s blessing (Ezekiel 37:1-14).
These Scriptures glorify God as faithful and we should praise Him because His Word is good and true. Amen.