On May 14, 1948, one day after the British Mandate administrators left, an elated but worried Jewish leadership proclaimed the modern State of Israel. Eleven minutes later, at the urging of President Truman and after being certain of the name of the newborn country, the United States recognized the new nation of Israel.
The move was accelerated by the 1947 United Nations partition plan dividing a Palestine area the size of New Jersey into Arab and Jewish sectors. A two-nation settlement was at hand. The Jews accepted it, but the Arabs rejected it, certain that with the British gone, the Jewish state was vulnerable to defeat and demise. In a military wonder of the world, Israel prevailed. By the 1949 armistice, it had gained more land than the UN had prescribed.
The tenuous state of affairs remained static until 1967 when, in a preemptive strike forestalling another vicious attack by Arab League nations, Israel gained the Gaza Strip and Sinai from Egypt, the Golan Heights from Syria, and the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) from Jordan. The Old City of Jerusalem was under exclusive Israeli control for the first time since 587 BC, when the Babylonians leveled the Temple and deported the populace.
Israel has had to contest every minute of its existence. It beat back another incursion in 1973 and blew up nuclear threats in Iran in 1988 and in Syria in 2007. Egypt and Jordan have made modest peace with Israel, but, with endless international pressure, Gaza, Golan and the West Bank have been presumed negotiables in a clamor for a Palestinian State. Withstanding violent Hezbollah to the north in Lebanon and Hamas to the south, Israel walks a political and economic international tightrope after 60 years.
Sixty years ago, literalist Bible scholars could say, "We told you so, because the Bible tells us so." They can still say the same after six decades. God’s covenant with national Israel is as permanent as the sun, moon, stars and tides (Jeremiah 31:35-37).
That this enduring national entity would return to their homeland in the latter days is taught in Ezekiel 37 where the dead nation is forecast to live, coalesce and become a great army. In Ezekiel 38:8 and onward, a "latter day" Israel is seen returned and prosperous but sorely threatened by predatory northern nations.
Christ affirmed an eventual restoration in Luke 21:29-32 speaking about a fig tree and all the trees budding and saying that the generation seeing this would see the Kingdom restored. That the "fig tree" reference is to Israel is clear from Jeremiah 24, where all Israel is likened to two baskets of figs. And "all the trees" in the Middle East are recent buds with modern Egypt and Iraq birthed in 1922 and 1923 respectively, Lebanon in ’43 and Syria and Jordan in ’46. Currently, the nascent Palestinian State is a bud within the bud.
About 90% of modern Israel is religiously liberal. This means that the longed-for Kingdom promised numerous times by the prophets and tacitly affirmed by Christ (Acts 1:7) awaits the national repentance forecast by Zechariah (Zech. 12:10). It will be followed by national deliverance from international attack (Zech. 14:2) and, finally, the glorious Kingdom (Zech. 14:6).
Meanwhile, born-again believers fulfill the mandate of global evangelism as Acts 1:8 commands to build a church that Christ receives at the Rapture—a sudden, unannounced heavenly exodus described in I Thess. 4:16:17. "For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord."
Regarding Israel, Psalm 122:6 enjoins us, "Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee."
Someday, as the old hymn says,
"Jesus shall reign where’re the sun
Does his successive journeys run,
His kingdom stretch from shore to shore
Till moons shall wax and wane no more;"
(Isaac Watts)
"This is a faithful saying: For if we died with Him, we shall also live with Him. If we endure, we shall also reign with Him. If we deny Him, He also will deny us. If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself" (2 Tim 2:11-13).
Dave Virkler
The move was accelerated by the 1947 United Nations partition plan dividing a Palestine area the size of New Jersey into Arab and Jewish sectors. A two-nation settlement was at hand. The Jews accepted it, but the Arabs rejected it, certain that with the British gone, the Jewish state was vulnerable to defeat and demise. In a military wonder of the world, Israel prevailed. By the 1949 armistice, it had gained more land than the UN had prescribed.
The tenuous state of affairs remained static until 1967 when, in a preemptive strike forestalling another vicious attack by Arab League nations, Israel gained the Gaza Strip and Sinai from Egypt, the Golan Heights from Syria, and the West Bank (Judea and Samaria) from Jordan. The Old City of Jerusalem was under exclusive Israeli control for the first time since 587 BC, when the Babylonians leveled the Temple and deported the populace.
Israel has had to contest every minute of its existence. It beat back another incursion in 1973 and blew up nuclear threats in Iran in 1988 and in Syria in 2007. Egypt and Jordan have made modest peace with Israel, but, with endless international pressure, Gaza, Golan and the West Bank have been presumed negotiables in a clamor for a Palestinian State. Withstanding violent Hezbollah to the north in Lebanon and Hamas to the south, Israel walks a political and economic international tightrope after 60 years.
Sixty years ago, literalist Bible scholars could say, "We told you so, because the Bible tells us so." They can still say the same after six decades. God’s covenant with national Israel is as permanent as the sun, moon, stars and tides (Jeremiah 31:35-37).
That this enduring national entity would return to their homeland in the latter days is taught in Ezekiel 37 where the dead nation is forecast to live, coalesce and become a great army. In Ezekiel 38:8 and onward, a "latter day" Israel is seen returned and prosperous but sorely threatened by predatory northern nations.
Christ affirmed an eventual restoration in Luke 21:29-32 speaking about a fig tree and all the trees budding and saying that the generation seeing this would see the Kingdom restored. That the "fig tree" reference is to Israel is clear from Jeremiah 24, where all Israel is likened to two baskets of figs. And "all the trees" in the Middle East are recent buds with modern Egypt and Iraq birthed in 1922 and 1923 respectively, Lebanon in ’43 and Syria and Jordan in ’46. Currently, the nascent Palestinian State is a bud within the bud.
About 90% of modern Israel is religiously liberal. This means that the longed-for Kingdom promised numerous times by the prophets and tacitly affirmed by Christ (Acts 1:7) awaits the national repentance forecast by Zechariah (Zech. 12:10). It will be followed by national deliverance from international attack (Zech. 14:2) and, finally, the glorious Kingdom (Zech. 14:6).
Meanwhile, born-again believers fulfill the mandate of global evangelism as Acts 1:8 commands to build a church that Christ receives at the Rapture—a sudden, unannounced heavenly exodus described in I Thess. 4:16:17. "For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord."
Regarding Israel, Psalm 122:6 enjoins us, "Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee."
Someday, as the old hymn says,
"Jesus shall reign where’re the sun
Does his successive journeys run,
His kingdom stretch from shore to shore
Till moons shall wax and wane no more;"
(Isaac Watts)
"This is a faithful saying: For if we died with Him, we shall also live with Him. If we endure, we shall also reign with Him. If we deny Him, He also will deny us. If we are faithless, He remains faithful; He cannot deny Himself" (2 Tim 2:11-13).
Dave Virkler
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