ST. PAUL SCHOOL OF LEADERSHIP

"Be ye followers of me as I also am of Christ." (I Corinthians 11:1)

(With Frank Eiklor and Walter Contreras)

ISRAEL: GOD'S PROPHETIC TIME CLOCK-PART 3

(Sincere Questions-Scriptural Answers)

LESSON 62 Parts 3

INTRODUCTION

The Jews have survived for 4,000 years.  Today, Israel is once again a nation.  Yet anti-Semitism still occurs worldwide and Israel's enemies call for her destruction.  God's Word is filled with His heart for His ancient people.  From them have come our Savior and Scriptures.

Concerning Jews and Israel, there is a vast difference between the thoughts of God and those of the world and, sadly, the Church.  Since God promises to bless those who bless the Jews and curse those who curse them (Genesis 12:3 and Numbers 24:9), every Christian should know what the Bible teaches on this important subject.  In this lesson, I am answering 20 questions Christians are asking today.  Parts 1 and 2 covered the first eight questions and answers.  Now we shall study four more important questions being asked. 

9.   SHOULD JERUSALEM BE RECOGNIZED AS ISRAEL'S CAPITAL?

Jerusalem is the city claimed by the world's three major monotheistic religions-Judaism, Christianity and Islam. But even Christians who revere his city as special because of Jesus know that no one experiences the heartbeat of Jerusalem like the Jew.

Jerusalem and the Jew are synonymous. Only a Jew experiences the feeling of the Psalmist, "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand forget her cunning. If I do not remember thee, let my tongue cleave to the roof of my mouth; if I prefer not Jerusalem above my chief joy" (Psalm 137:5, 6). Only a Jew (or a Gentile with a very Jewish heart) can feel the pathos of the cry, "Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee" (Psalm 122:6). Only the Jew looked and longed for two millennia toward Jerusalem. He walked through the shame of the Inquisition, the rage of the Pogroms and the fires of Hitler's Holocaust-always with the phrase on his parched and quivering lips, "Next year in Yerushalayim."

"Next year" has become "Now." The Jew has Jerusalem and does not wish to negotiate this holiest of all cities. At the writing of this book, nations and governments are pressuring the Jews to give up a part of Jerusalem to their Arab neighbors. But again, Scripture demonstrates God's linkage of Jews and Jerusalem. "Again the word of the Lord of hosts came to me, saying, Thus saith the Lord of hosts; I was jealous for Zion with great jealousy, and I was jealous for her with great fury. Thus saith the Lord; I am returned unto Zion, and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and Jerusalem shall be called a city of truth; and the mountain of the Lord of hosts the holy mountain...Thus saith the Lord of hosts; Behold, I will save my people from the east country, and from the west country; And I will bring them, and they shall dwell in the midst of Jerusalem: and they shall be my people, and I will be their God, in truth and in righteousness" (Zechariah 8:1-3, 7, 8).

While Micah refers to Babylon, his "last days" scenario of God's anger against those who would persecute Jews and separate them from Jerusalem is interesting. "And many nations shall come, and say, Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, and to the house of the God of Jacob; and he will teach us of his ways, and we will walk in his paths: for the law shall go forth of Zion, and the word of the Lord from Jerusalem… Now also many nations are gathered against thee, that say, Let her be defiled, and let our eye look upon Zion. But they know not the thoughts of the Lord, neither understand they his counsel; for he shall gather them as the sheaves into the floor" (Micah 4:2, 11, 12).

10.   WILL PROTECTING THE JEWS GET COSTLY IN THE FUTURE?

Protecting the Jews has been costly in the past, can be costly in the present, and will no doubt be more costly in the future. However, protecting the Jews reminds me of the Christian who was told by another that he did not have sufficient funds to afford tithing. He answered with a smile, "I can't afford not to tithe." It is much more costly for a Christian not to stand by the apple of God's eye. God's promise to bless those who bless Jews and curse those who curse them is not negotiable. Christian indifference is inexcusable.

Abraham Joshua Herschel said, "Indifference to evil is more insidious then evil itself." He was right. God reserves no special love for the lukewarm. To be a "neutersemite" in time of crisis (one who is merely silent in the midst of Jewish suffering) is to stand on the side of the anti-Semites' and invite the judgment of God. We are to love Jews and Arabs with no partiality. However, there are plans being put into action-in the name "justice for the Palistinians" that will reduce the tiny size of Israel even further and make the nation vulnerable to final destruction. This is simply a fact.

The book of Esther demonstrates that protecting the Jews can be costly-but that it pays to protect them. Queen Esther was tempted toward silence when her people were doomed to die in a planned "Haman's Holocaust." Mordecai would have none of it and gave her both a warning and a promise that thousands of Christians take seriously today: "For if thou altogether holdest thy peace at this time, then shall their enlargement and deliverance arise to the Jews from another place; but thou and thy father's house shall be destroyed: and who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as this?" (Esther 4:14).

If Esther kept silent, God would save the Jews through another vessel but she and her father's house would be destroyed. That question of destiny, "Who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for such a time as this?" is what motivates a growing number of Christians today as hate increases against Jews and Israel.

How costly might it get some day? Judging from Hitler's Europe, costly enough to lose one's life. However, there is nothing noble about fighting anti-Semitism. It is simply living out the teachings of Jesus and paying a debt of love Christians owe the Jews.

11.   WERE THE JEWS EVER THREATENED WITH A HOLOCAUST PRIOR TO

         NAZI GERMANY?

The answer would be yes-although none ever succeeded like Hitler's. One is immediately reminded of the Hebrew people under Pharaoh after Joseph's death. To attempt to kill off a race by murdering Jewish boy babies would certainly have qualified as "the final solution to the Jewish problem" (see Exodus 1:15, 16). Perhaps the closest thing to a possible Holocaust in Israel's history was the time of Queen Esther and the rule of the Medes and Persians. Haman planned to wipe out the Jews in one day. He was frustrated by Mordecai, confronted by Esther, and cornered and destroyed by a trap laid by God Himself. The book of Esther is still read during the Jewish Feast of Purim, and Jewish children still boo each time the detested name of "Haman" is mentioned in the story.

A demon-possessed Hitler nearly succeeded in wiping out European Jewry-one third of the Jews living on earth. Today, many of Israel's neighbors would gladly finish what Hitler attempted. The plans of men willing to be tools of Satan in harming the Jews have not changed since the time of Pharaoh.

12.   WHAT IS THE BOTTOM LINE ON ANTISEMITISM?

While Jews have suffered vicious anti-Semitic hatred over the centuries, they have often asked with pleading eyes, "But why do people hate us?"

The psalmist bears out a scriptural answer. "They have said, Come, and let us cut them off from being a nation, that the name of Israel may be no more in remembrance.  For they have consulted together with one consent: they are confederate against thee" (Psalm 83:4, 5). These verses indicate that those who unite in their attempt to destroy Israel as a nation have in reality declared war against God.

Scripture is very clear concerning the terrible sentence that awaits one who chooses to hate the Jews. It bears repeating that the Jews are the people whom the Bible decrees as having a life-time guaranteed survival. Their very existence is God's visible proof that the Bible is true and that He rules His universe. I'm convinced that is why men attempt to get rid of this evidence of God-the Jews-hoping to say to the world, "See, God guaranteed their survival; but the Jews are no more. Therefore, there is no God and the Bible is not to be trusted."

Maurice Samuels, a Jew observing the rise of Nazism in the 1930's, said, "They spit on Jews as the Christ-killers because they long to spit on Jews as the Christ-givers." Jewish journalist, Dennis Prager, pointed out the similarity of two Hebrew words "seenah" (hate) and "seenai" (Sinai). The world has never forgiven the Jews for being God's vehicles to introduce the Bible, morality, law, and Jesus Himself to the planet that would prefer rebellion against God.

(TO BE CONTINUED)