I realize I’ve said as much many times before, but feel this needs more urgently to be stressed now than ever. By its nature, my calling and part in the Body has exposed me, far more than I could wish, to the inner workings of many strong and compelling lies that powerfully oppose and threaten the church’s readiness to escape the unparalleled deception that Jesus said would both precede and accompany the unequaled tribulation.

Even now, throughout the far greater part of professing Christendom, the tribulation without parallel or equal is believed to be past. The tribulation has come and gone with the Roman destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. A fast-growing (two related words like this become one hyphenated adjective) community called ‘preterist’ believes that Jesus’ promised return “immediately after the tribulation of those days” has also come and gone, some stoutly affirming that the resurrection is also past. This, since Dan 12:1-2 so unequivocally connects the resurrection to the unequaled tribulation.

A less popular but still thriving view, particularly among Adventist groups, is the so-called ‘historicist’ view of Revelation. This view sees the ‘great tribulation’, not as a brief period of time at the the end, but as stretching out to include either all or most of the inter-advent period. Many historic premillennialists (an accepted prefix – no need for a hyphen) view the half week (the 3 1/2 years of Daniel and Revelation) (delete comma – parentheses function as commas) as beginning with the ascension, basing their view on Rev. 12’s imagery of the catching up of the man-child, followed immediately in vision by the great tribulation.

Many, perhaps most, (add comma) evangelical lovers of Israel who see a future Antichrist invasion of Israel (delete comma between long subject and the verb) do not expect to be directly impacted by the last great deception. This is because they expect to be raptured to heaven where they will be celebrating the marriage supper while the Jewish people are experiencing their greatest hour of anguish without the church’s witness. This means that those living on this side of the rapture will not be so critically and decisively benefited by taking close heed to Jesus’ directive to read and understand Daniel in order to escape the deception that would imperil the very elect.

But if the church is exempt from the great tribulation, who then are the persecuted saints described in Daniel and Revelation? We are told these do not belong to the body of Christ, nor do they become part of the body of Christ when they are saved. Rather, it is supposed that the persecuted believers of the tribulation belong to another people of God altogether, with a different hope and destiny that is distinct from the hope and destiny of the church.

On this view, Jesus’ directive to carefully search out the meaning of Daniel’s prophecy will only be of vital relevance to those ‘left behind’ to face the dangers of those days. However, if this view is in error, it threatens to rob God’s people of vital preparation and protection from a deception so great as to threaten the very elect. Regardless then of one’s view, any fair-minded student of scripture should at least appreciate the reasonable cause for concern, at least taking stock of what is ultimately at stake in one’s perspective on the time and meaning of the tribulation and the question of the church’s relation to it.

Of all the competing views, the one that most insults and slights the sacred trust of the canon, and the Reformed doctrine of the perspicuity of scripture, is the lazy indifference that comfortably proclaims that it is impossible to know much that is definite or certain when it comes to eschatology. But it is Jesus Himself that prescribes with utmost clarity and simplicity what I like to call, “the plain man’s plain path through the millennial maze.”

Even before understanding the ‘what’ or the ‘when’ of the great tribulation, before discovering its approximate duration and then, most importantly, its meaning and purpose – even before knowing what the abomination of desolation might be – there is one simple directive that Jesus gives towards escaping the great deception that would threaten, “if possible”, the very elect. In Mt 24:15, Jesus is basically shouting, “pay attention to Daniel!” But much more particularly, He directs His sheep to one specific event that Daniel describes in considerable detail. In sum, He commands us to go to Daniel, find this particular event, “the abomination of desolation”, and to be careful that we understand what we read.

The reasons for this simple obedience will prove most crucial, not only towards escaping the great deception, but to a glorious unfolding of the whole sweep of God’s costly investment in scripture and history by which His Name is most fully glorified in all the earth. A knowledge of the relation of final things to the seedbed of covenant and promise is crucial for the church’s greater vision of God.
Jesus well knew this signal event to be the key to understanding the unsealed vision, which those with understanding (the maskilim of Dan 11:32-33, 35, 12:3, 9-10) would be proclaiming to Israel and the nations during the last persecution. According to Rev 7:9, 13-14, the testimony of tribulation saints will result in the evangelization of a vast number that will be saved out of ‘the tribulation, the great one’ (Rev 7:9, 13-14). The use of the double definite article in the Greek text is strong evidence that this is not tribulation in general, the common experience of all Christians in this age (Jn 16:33; Acts 14:22), but much more specifically, the great tribulation in particular.

Moreover, when one traces the oft-recurring theme of a final, unequaled tribulation and its centrality in the plan of God, beginning with Moses’ first mention in Deut 4:29-30, so much opens up concerning the nature and goals of God’s covenantal structure of history, and the conflict that rages over the authority of the Word, not only as to the moral and spiritual claims of the covenant, but particularly that greatest of all offenses, most calculated to test and reveal the heart, namely, God’s sovereign prerogative to choose as He will choose. This deep-seated protest and presumption of entitlement traces all the way back to Satan’s original envy (Ps 2; 48:2; Isa 14; note esp, verse 13; Eze 28). It is the basis of all antisemitism. It is why the Antichrist will be encamped on Mount Zion when the Lord returns (Dan 11:45).

I believe that at least part of the problem lies in what we bring to the scripture. When many read the Lord’s plain directive in Mt 24:15, they do not read it with virginal simplicity. “I will go to Daniel and read of this event and pray to understand”. Too often, there are already preconceived notions that have predetermined what one will find, and even much more, by what one must NOT find.

When we obey this all-too-neglected directive (“let the reader understand”) with an honest and open heart, uninfluenced by preconceived notions, we are only part way there. It is here we learn that revelation, skill, and insight came to Daniel when he “set his heart to understand” (Dan 10:12), just as the prophets before and after him would “inquire and search diligently” (1Pet 1:11). We are called into the fellowship of mysteries that require searching out with intense, holy desire, not for pragmatic self-interest, not even only for the purpose of avoiding deception. We are to have the attitude of “come and see” regarding the place of His dwelling, the beauty of His courts, and the secrets He has reserved for His friends. Our passion must be His glory, His wondrous handiwork, His costly investment, His manifold wisdom — and His greater glory in the fellowship of a ‘hidden wisdom’ ordained to our glory.

It is therefore most interesting how the mysteries of God can be so well hidden in such plain sight. It is not that they are intellectually obscure. On the contrary, there are basic protections built right in by the way that scripture interprets scripture. We will take for our best example what we find when we very simply obey Jesus by going to Daniel to look for the abomination of desolation. Jesus well knew that by so doing, we would discover, not only the meaning of this particular event, but very importantly, add comma what precedes and what follows.

By setting this initially strange, but ultimately strategic prophetic signpost at the end of Israel’s long history of covenant and promise, so much more of the overarching plan of God comes into much clearer light. It is no wonder then, comma that Daniel is situated at the center of the seven millennia of God’s prophetic schema of history, the “middle of the week”, so to speak. Interestingly, when Daniel asks, “How long till the end of these wonders?”, we understand the primary application will be the final 3.5 years, but another viable, perhaps dual, comma application would be that from Daniel’s place in history, there would be 3 1/2 millennia till “all these things would be finished”. On that view, which I think compelling, this would include the thousand-year reign of Christ and His saints.

Jesus well knew that this simple obedience would be the key that opens up, not only the order of the signal events of the end, but delete comma as noted, Daniel’s prophecy establishes the eschatological framework for the whole sweep of redemptive history from Genesis to Revelation. So, what do we find concerning this event that will prove such a protection against deception and a key to opening up and setting in right order the greater framework of prophecy? I submit it is by a simple refusal to separate what God has joined.

I cannot here begin to confirm by example, but in all my study, every system of prophetic interpretation (no comma) of which I’m aware (no comma) very obviously goes off at one of three places. Each of these is an example of separating what God has joined, but only by great violence to the text. I can only show a couple of examples.

The abomination of desolation is mentioned four times in Daniel (Dan 8:11; 9:27: 11:31; 12:11). In all four places it is accompanied by the removal of the regular, daily sacrifice. In Dan 12:11, the sacrifice is taken away 1290 days from the time that Daniel and all the righteous are raised from the dead (Dan 12:1-2). In Dan 9:27, the sacrifice is caused to stop at the midpoint of Daniel’s final week. This is 3 1/2 years from the end.

We must remember that Daniel was looking for the end of exile and the coming of the kingdom promised in the prophets before him. He is desperately seeking to understand when this tragic history would give way to kingdom glory. He is asking, “How long to the end of these wonders?” (Dan 12:7).

In Dan 9:24-27, Daniel had learned of the 70 weeks (for the readers unfamiliar with the shorthand) that Israel would be required to wait for the “coming in of the everlasting righteousness”, which would be the righteousness of the promised kingdom of David. This is the righteousness of the New Covenant that Jeremiah anticipates to come at the end of the period that he calls, “the time of Jacob’s trouble” (Jer 30:6-7).

This is the tribulation without equal, which the earlier prophets so commonly associate with the day of the Lord that ends a brief time of unparalleled national affliction and travail. Daniel will put the unequaled time of trouble at the end of the 70th 7, more particularly the second half of the last seven. In keeping with Jeremiah and the earlier prophets, Daniel puts the great transition between this age of covenant wrath and the coming age of kingdom peace and righteousness. He manifestly did not see the age between. This belonged to the mystery that would not be fully revealed and understood until the Spirit would be poured out at Pentecost (Rom 16:25-26; 1Pet 1:11-12)

But here’s what is too seldom observed or considered. In order for Jesus’ prophecy of the end to be fulfilled according to Daniel’s reference to the abomination of desolation, there MUST be a sacrifice that is stopped approximately 3 1/2 years before the final persecutor is destroyed and the dead are raised (Dan 12:1-2, 7, 11).
Likewise, in Dan 9:27 the half week begins when the sacrifice is stopped. Is the “end” that ends the half week of Dan 9:27 the same “end” that brings the deliverance of Daniel’s people and the resurrection of the righteous in Dan 12:1-2, 7, 11, 13? That is a question to be decided, but you can see how God has wisely given us pieces to a puzzle, but not without also providing us a plain path through it.

What and where is this sacrifice? Neither Jesus nor Paul specifically mentions the sacrifice, but both speak of a great violation and desecration that takes place in the temple in Jerusalem (Mt 24:15-16; 2Thes 2:4), as John will associate the temple to the final treading down of Jerusalem in Rev 11:1-2, again describing the half week of Daniel’s prophecy. There is no need to specify the sacrifice since Daniel has supplied this at every mention of the abomination. And it is clear that a temple service in the ‘holy place’ in Jerusalem is not going to exist without a sacrifice, which, of course, cannot continue beyond the point that the Antichrist imposes himself.

Stubbornness enters in when such things as presuppositions and preferences, even fears induced by taunts and the gross caricatures of a convenient ‘guilt by association’, are permitted to bias an objective handling of the evidence. All of this works to hinder us from making the otherwise obvious connections. The Lord sets a wise and perfect trap, particularly in the Word itself, for the pride of self-reliance and the momentum of uncrucified presumption. The interpretation of scripture is itself a test of the heart.
It is the power of our presumption that short circuits our objectivity, breaking the otherwise obvious connections. For example, where in 52 A.D. (add comma), when Paul is writing his second epistle, would the ‘temple of God’ be understood to be standing? It is preposterous to imagine that apart from any qualification to the contrary, Paul would have expected the Thessalonians to have any other kind of edifice in mind but the one in Jerusalem, particularly since he is so plainly ‘re’-establishing the same order of events revealed in Daniel, rehearsed during his earlier visit, and referenced by Jesus. This is even further confirmed by noting Paul’s use of language taken over from the Lord’s Olivet prophecy (compare, “our gathering together unto Him” 2Thes 2:1) where Paul is quite obviously citing Jesus’ well-known reference to the “gathering together of His elect” (Mt 24:31).

Particularly in view of all that both testaments affirm of the climactic day of the Lord, it becomes quite impossible, even exegetically dishonest, to try to separate the resurrection of the righteous from the tribulation of the half week in Daniel and Revelation. This is why those who believe the tribulation passed with 70 A.D., but believe the resurrection is yet future, are called ‘partial preterist’. In contrast, those who believe delete comma not only that the tribulation is past but that the resurrection is also past, call themselves “consistent preterist”, for good reason.
But before all the confusion and debate, it is plain for all to see what Daniel would have understood from his own prophecy. Go and learn what Daniel had inherited from the prophets that went before him, (add comma) who prophesied of these same events and goals of covenant and promise. For Daniel, the end of the 70 7’s could only mean one thing: add colon the end of gentile domination over captive Israel and the long expected (rightly expected) “post-tribulational” kingdom of God on earth. To suppose otherwise exposes a interested (unobjective?) bias, apparently formed by presumptive prior conclusions. It is not enough to say that this was merely the immature hope of OT believers, since the basic order is clearly re-affirmed in the NT (Mt 24; Mk 13; Lk 21: Acts 3:18-21; Ro 11:25-29; 2Thes 2; Rev 6-20).

This has gotten too long for any but the most patient and determined, but you see my point. The neglect to follow through on the Lord’s prescribed means of ‘understanding’ is not, of course, a blanket panacea against every possible form of deception, but it is going to be necessary. It is necessary now, not only for preparation against the ultimate deception, but for the much fuller picture of the overall context of the gospel, what I like to call, “the glory of the story”.

It will be required of the church….or will it?. This raises the crucial question of the relation of the rapture to the resurrection of the OT saints, another example of separating what God has joined. This squabble of comparatively recent origins significantly appears just in time to stand between a complacent Laodicean church and readiness to be those ‘maskilim’ who have the key of interpretation that can instruct many and turn many to righteousness (Dan 11:32-33; 12:3).

That this task should be delegated to a company that has only recently come to faith (no need for elders?) defies the biblical conception and definition of the body of Christ. It especially defies Paul’s definition of the church (defined as the corporate assembly of regenerate saints), as “the pillar and ground of truth”.

Once the context has been restored, we can begin to ask the very important question of the church’s role, and of what God has invested in granting the last sufferers a very certain and definite knowledge of the time. This will be a merciful provision intended to get the church to the place it needs to be for the ultimate witness. Thankfully, prophecy assures us that “those having understanding” (the body?, of course the body!) will be ready.

Anyway, you get the idea. It’s a burden I have. I fear we get too taken up with all the details, as there are indeed crucial details, but not to the neglect of the more critical, life-saving basics, the plum line of holy simplicity that will bring us to an otherwise impossible unity, as we become more and more constrained, searched, pruned, and emptied by the ever clearer light of fulfillment that does not depend on getting it all right.

The great falling away is greatly facilitated by the church’s dereliction precisely here. For all the wrong reasons, though ordained as judgment, the church will not awaken to the truth of these things until the end is very near. But because judgment “must” begin at the house of God, and in no small part because of the testimony of the Spirit of prophecy, the sleeping Bride will awaken, and when she does, hallelujah, what a glory! It will be the sweetest bitter, as the Jew will see his Messiah shining through weak jars of clay, a sight they’ll not forget for a thousand years.

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Have you come across the hermeneutic that this author advocates? If you spend some time reading his stuff (not just this link) there are some interesting nuggets that I think are very helpful relating to his Israel centricity and eschatological focus. However, what is completely shocking to me is that, like N.T. Wright, he ends up in replacement theology and partial preterism after making powerful arguments for the New Testament’s eschatological lens and Israel-centric message. It’s so weird how he seems to recover key parts of the message and then lose everything…

I‘ve not looked into this beyond the one article and the follow up points by his readers. I know a little of this perspective from other things I’ve read along this line.

I am always careful of the natural tendency to over-correct. When an error or misplaced emphasis is detected, the tendency is to over-correct so that the proverbial baby goes out with the bathwater. This happened to some extent with the new perspective on Paul, and it’s happening now again with the new emphasis on the corporate / community emphasis that aims to turn the church from its tendency towards individualism and inwardness to engage the culture as salt and light with a greater militancy towards social justice. In terms of eschatology, it would tend to fit a more post-millennial optimistic orientation. It’s the old tension between historical progressivism (the gradual leavening of the dough) versus apocalyptic transformation through travail and new birth, judgement, crisis, death and resurrection.

Criticisms and proposals for keeping the ship on course and “relevant” to the changing (more enlightened?) intellectual climate seem endless. That is why I despair of anything short of a full restoration of a lost apocalyptic context. That is why I proposed the analogy of a diamond to its appropriate setting. Even out of its setting, the gospel is powerful and beautiful. It continues to have a faithful working in every generation. But much of the glory is lost when the diamond is not viewed in its proper (divinely ordained) setting. That setting is the apocalyptic vision. It is apocalyptic, not only because it is set in the context of judgment and restoration, but because it depends entirely on the Spirit of revelation. Part of the scandal of the gospel is that Christ has indeed come, but the world, at least in its outward structures, remains unchanged. That’s the challenge of the apocalyptic mystery of the gospel presented to first century Israel. As correctly expected, it is the day of the Lord that will change the world, but the scandal of the gospel is that Christ has come and brought the power of that coming age into the life of the believing community, even while the world continues in its rebellion.

It is the presence and power of that still coming future that has come in unexpected advance of the day of the Lord by the Spirit of revelation. The presence of the kingdom is powerfully witnessed by the acts of the Holy Spirit. The proof of the kingdom’s hidden presence (“mystery of the kingdom”) is in the evidence and demonstration of a life, a love, a wisdom, and a power that defies natural explanation. This changes everything, even while the outward structures and norms of this present evil age remain. The world’s boast of impunity in the face apparent ‘non-fulfillment’ is the scandal that the preacher of an apocalyptic gospel must bear, in patient waiting for the PUBLIC and visible vindication of the Word of God. In the meantime, the church gives witness to the miracle of fulfilled prophecy, as “the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.” In other words, things are right on course; nothing has failed, but God is hiding His mystery from the wisdom of this age, even while He reveals it to babes. It pleased God that the gospel ‘as a revealed secret contained in the writings of the prophets’ (Ro 16:25-26; 1Cor 2:7-8) should be fully verifiable by comparing scripture with scripture, here a little and there a little. Christ decodes the OT with such compelling evidence as to leave the hearer without excuse.

With Israel’s restoration as a nation and the developing Mid-East conflict running exactly according to the path predicted in prophecy, we have come full circle. With some important differences, we are where the sectarians of the Qumran communities were in the century before the fall of Jerusalem, and that is why I find knowledge of their perspective so helpful for NT background, that in turn opens to better view the NT’s approach to a revelation of an OT mystery that has come to light in Christ, as pieces to a prophetic puzzle. In their outlook, they anticipated the view early church’s expectation of an imminent tribulation that would climax in the world changing day of the Lord. This perspective was all but lost after the fall of Jerusalem, and not much revived until the resurgence of historic premillennialism in the late 19th century.

The “given” of an impending unequaled tribulation centered upon Jerusalem and climaxing in the great and notable day of the Lord formed the backdrop to an apocalyptic mystery that reveals the manifold wisdom of an eternal purpose that frees the heart, even as it magnifies the glory of God in His wise use of the falling and rising again of Israel to effect the inter-advent salvation of the gentiles (Ro 9:11; 11:25 – 12:2). Therefore our occupation with the apocalyptic perspective of the NT is no new swing of the theological pendulum; it is the recovery of the original expectation and vision of the glory of God.

There is evidence, even in the NT, that the hope of a soon return of Christ began to erode with what scholars call the ‘crisis of the delay of the parousia.’ When Jesus did not come, personally and finally, in immediate connection with the fall of Jerusalem, many began to be troubled. Some believe this is what Peter is addressing in his second epistle when he says “one day is with the Lord as a thousand years.”

After the collapse of Jerusalem and the complete eviction of the Jews from the city by the Romans, to interpret the prophecy literally after this would mean that Christ’s coming could no longer be expected as potentially very soon. During the long centuries of Jewish absence from the land, we may expect that it was very attractive to interpret prophecy in a way that dispensed with the preliminary signs connected with an Antichrist invasion of a literal Jewish Jerusalem. Still, we can document that a rare few vigorously held forth for the literal interpretation of prophecy, despite what appeared at that time seemed very remote.

Of course, ever since the modern miracle of the Jewish repatriation of the Land, the obstacles for the literal interpretation are fast disappearing. Except for the presence of a Jewish temple and restored sacrifice, we are now where they were then. The only difference is that the early disciples could not conceive of a generation passing before a presumably final judgment on Jerusalem, which was naturally associated with the end of the age and the Lord’s return. Whereas today, and precisely because of the apparent failure the Lord’s return in connection with the destruction of Jerusalem, we have modern preterism in both its partial and complete forms. Of course, liberal theology is completely unimpressed with preterism’s effort to save Jesus’ infallibility as a prophet. In their view, He simply missed it. On the other hand, the world is completely emboldened by the church’s divisions over questions of eschatology to dismiss the subject entirely. Modern “apocalyptic movements” are lightly dismissed as eccentric fringe groups with a history of disappointed and often destructive false alarms. Yet, for all of this, we are on the threshold of the most abundant fulfillment of prophecy the world has ever seen.

As they were then, so now are we living under the looming cloud of an impending world crisis over the trembling cup of Jerusalem. But this time, the virgins are more asleep than ever, as the church is completely disunited in its voice. For some two hundred years before the advent of Jesus, the sectarians of the recently discovered Qumran communities lived in the Judean desert in expectation of an imminent Roman destruction of Jerusalem. They considered the city doomed for reasons of covenant defilement and disobedience. They weren’t wrong. The power of the fourth kingdom was about to descend on Jerusalem with all its force. This is precisely where we are today but the world and the church could hardly be more fast asleep, exactly as prophecy said it would be. Though partly fulfilled, the now revealed mystery in its latter stage is having again the same profound effect of being hidden from the wisdom of this age, even while it is being confirmed to His sheep.

As Dalton Thomas well said, “it’s Germany 1929” (some would say much closer to 39). I fear for any view of the faith that is so blind to the place and role of Israel that it cannot see in current trends the inexorable build up to the final world rebellion against the holy covenant. Who will sound the mid-night call? Who will be found giving the master’s household their “meat” in due season? Who will prepare the way of the Lord? That’s the call, or at least a central part of the church’s stewardship for this hour.

Not the progressivism of modernity but a Christ centered gospel that is strategically set in the context of God’s everlasting covenant with Israel, which cannot attain completion apart from a final crisis over Jerusalem that is destined to ensnare and drag all nations into its vortex. That’s where I believe the Spirit is laying renewed emphasis. An ethic and a faith that is not apocalyptic in its orientation is not the faith of the NT, and should not wonder if it lacks the urgency and power of the early church. Apart from that original context, the quest to make the gospel relevant becomes irrelevant.

A view of scripture that is so blind to the terms and conditions of the everlasting covenant as to deny prophetic significance to the modern presence of the Jewish state is inexcusable. It raises the question of when our wranglings over questions of interpretation become more than academic, but take on a moral and spiritual component that will be greatly required of the last generation, as neglect of the mystery has taken a serious toll on all past generations of the church, known to Jews of the middle ages as “the arrogant kingdom” (Ro 11:25).

Reggie

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With nearly exactly the same language that Jeremiah uses to describe the time of unequaled trouble that ends in Israel’s salvation (Jer 30:7), Daniel speaks of the same time of unequaled trouble in connection with the resurrection (Dan 12:1-2, 13). Hence, Daniel has given us the decisive interpretation of the time of Jacob’s trouble. It is the unequaled tribulation that occurs just before the dead are raised. It begins with the removal of a sacrifice (Dan 9:27; 12:11) and ends with Messiah’s return to destroy the self exalting prince, whom Paul will name, ‘the Man of Sin” (Dan 11:36-37 with 2Thes 2:4).

There can be no mistake. The connection of things is clear. Daniel applies Isaiah’s, Micah’s, and Jeremiah’s description of an age ending ‘travail of Zion’ to the last half of the seventieth seven (Dan 7:25; 9:27; 12: 7, 11). Regardless of whether the tribulation is interpreted as symbolic or literal, its duration is represented as brief, ending in the deliverance and resurrection of Israel (Isa 25:7-9; 26:16-21; Dan 12:1; Hos 5:15; 6:1-2; Eze 37:12-14; 39:8, 22, 28-29). If scripture is diligently compared with scripture, the result, at least the basic result, is plain for all to see.

What could be plainer than the simple observance that the time unequaled trouble ends with the resurrection? Jesus uses the same language of Daniel, almost verbatim, to speak of the unprecedented tribulation that must precede His return (Dan 12:1 with Mt 24:21-22, 29). The sign that marks the beginning of the tribulation is “the abomination of desolation which was spoken of by Daniel the prophet” (Mt 24:15). Significantly, Jesus Himself (not an editorial remark by Matthew) instructs His disciples to read of this sign in Daniel’s prophecy and to take care that they understand it. Clearly, this desolating sacrilege can happen in only one place, namely, the ‘holy place’ in Jerusalem. (Dan 11:31; 12:11; Mt 24:15-16; 2Thes 2:4).

In Daniel, the great tribulation ends with the resurrection. In Matthew’s account of Jesus’s Olivet prophecy, it ends with the Lord’s return in clouds of glory (Mt 24:29; Rev 1:7). In Paul’s little apocalypse, the day of the Lord comes only AFTER the self-exalting ‘man of sin’ (of Daniel’s vision) is revealed by his entrance into the temple of God (Dan 11:36-37 with 2Thes 2:3-4). The Thessalonian believers of 51 A.D. needed no further explanation to understand that Paul’s reference to the “temple of God” could only mean the ‘holy place’ in Jerusalem where Jesus had so plainly located the event that starts the tribulation. Jesus describes the event. Paul describes the man. Both are clearly referring to Daniel’s account of the act and the man who performs it. The believer who will obey the Lord’s directive to refer to Daniel’s prophecy will see the connection and the general outline of events that lead up to and follow upon the abomination of desolation.

(Note: Since the final destruction of Jerusalem in 132 A.D., interpreters began to look for ways to spiritualize Paul’s reference to the temple of God in order to conceive of a return of Christ that would not require the restoration of a Jewish Jerusalem with temple and sacrifice, but we have come full circle, and against all odds, all but a few remaining parts are in now place for the plain meaning of scripture to take place in all of its literal detail.)

Who can fairly deny that the last 3 1/2 years (the second half) of Daniel’s final week is bounded by the violation of the holy place by the self exalting prince (Dan 8:11; 9:27; 11:31; 12:11; 2Thes 2:4) at its beginning, and the deliverance of Daniel’s people and the resurrection of the saints at its end? What could be plainer than that? Moreover, Daniel’s mention of the standing up of Michael in Dan 12 is very significantly repeated in Rev 12. In both places, we have the last great persecution of the saints during the time of unequaled woe for the earth dwellers. Clearly, Satan’s “short time” begins when he is dejected from heaven by Michael (Dan 12:1; Rev 12:7-14) and this is the last 3 1/2 years, the second half of Daniel’s last seventieth seven (Rev 11:2-3; 12:6, 14; 13:5 with Dan 7:25; 9:27; 12:7).

It could hardly be plainer that the unequaled tribulation that is set in motion in both Dan 12 and Rev 12 with the standing up of Michael. This begins Satan’s ‘short time’ (Rev 12:12), which will mean unprecedented woe for the earth dwellers and persecution of the woman (Israel and the saints). Clearly, this is the 3 1/2 years of unequaled tribulation that begins with the removal of the daily sacrifice and the placing of the abomination (Dan 11:31; 12:1, 7, 11; Mt 24:15, 21) and ends with Christ’s return and the resurrection of the dead (Dan 12:2, Mt 24:29, 31). If these specific events are not held in inseparable relation to one another, then we are deprived of the protection from deception that Jesus invested in the definite details of His prophecy (Mt 24:25; Mk 13:23).

As to the much debated severity of the period, what is not to understand about the word, “unequaled?” It is a time like no other, without precedent or repeat. Of course, this is not to be understood strictly in terms of Jewish suffering, since all of nature will be in magnificent turmoil. What is clear is that the unequaled tribulation starts in Jerusalem and that the Antichrist will especially target Jews wherever he can find them. What’s not to understand about a 3 1/2 year flight into the wilderness from the face of an Antichrist? What kind of captivity is in view when the Antichrist is able to employ an implacable Islam hatred that will tread down Jerusalem for a continual period of 42 months? And will such an invading flood of hate filled Muslims be confined to the city of Jerusalem? Miraculous protection of a remnant within the city (probably under the supernatural protection of the two witnesses) does not too much extenuate the terrible implications for the greater population of Israel, particularly since the preservation of the remnant will depend in no small part on the wakefulness of believers to know the time and conduct many to prepared places of refuge according to the plainness of the scripture on this matter.

The best way to show that no past precedent or partial fulfillment could have been the fulfillment of Jeremiah’s, Daniel’s and Jesus’s words about the time like no other is to show that it ends in nothing short of the resurrection of the righteous (Isa 25:8; 26:19; Dan 12:1-2, 13; Mt 24:31; 2Thes 2:1). The eschatology of the OT is the eschatology of the covenant; and Jacob’s trouble, or the “great tribulation,” is simply the last phase of the ‘discipline of the covenant’ before the great transition that the orthodox have always referred to as “the Redemption.”

To conceive of the modern return as superseded by another shattering loss of nation and temple seems unthinkable in view of all the prophets said concerning the return to the Land, a modern miracle of truly ‘biblical proportions’. What is often overlooked is that the prophets saw both a long exile and a brief episode of unequalled affliction just before the end. Failure to recognize this necessary distinction has led some to dismiss the thought of a future dispersion under the reign of Antichrist. The prophets did not always distinguish clearly between these two distinct episodes of Jewish dispersion and return, but their prophecies, duly compared and considered, demand it.

The prophets recognized that not all Jews would return to the Land until after the tribulation. The far greater aliyah from the countries of sojourn awaits the end of Zion’s travail with the Lord’s return. Eze 38 & 39 is very good to distinguish between the two stages of Jewish return, one that is partial and before the battle of God and Magog (Eze 38:8), and one that is complete and to the last person at the war’s end (Eze 39:22, 28-29). The apocalyptic vision a yet further exile of brief duration is distinguished by noting the stages of return. First there is the return from the “desolations of many generations” (Isa 61:4; Eze 38:8). Then follows the final desolation of a restored city and sanctuary.

In addition to the very clear reference in Rev 12, a number of other scriptures show a flight into the wilderness where God has determined to meet with Israel face to face in a final pleading of judgement and mercy. There are references in the OT (I’d have to find them) that not only speak of a future trek through the wilderness, but of the very specific lands on the other side of the Jordan where Jews will flee and seek refuge. Among them are some of the same territory that the first Israelites under Moses traversed on their way to the Land. One specific name for this territory is “the wilderness of the peoples.”

Whereas there will be significant survival in Jerusalem itself (Zech 14:2), scripture is equally clear that survival will depend on urgent flight to prepared places of refuge and hiding, as the far greater part of the population will be trapped by the unexpected invasion of Antichrist. Certainly some will be able to be miraculously shielded from the wrath of the Antichrist inside even the city itself (the two witnesses?), but it is only reasonable, in view of the Lord’s clear warning, that the greater prospect of survival will be outside the Land, as inferred also from such passages as Isa 11:12; 27:12-13; also compare Dan 11:41 with Isa 16:3-4; 26:20; 42:11 (Masoretic text).

In any event, scripture is clear that Jews will be returning from the very desert places that their fathers travelled through on their way to the Land. Scripture is very specific of the trek back home through that particular wilderness, which is today a barren wasteland. Why through that region? It is because Jews have fled from the face of the Antichrist and will return with His destruction in the day when the great trumpet of Jubilee is blown (Isa 27:13 with Mt 24:31). This assumes, of course, that we take the prophecies of a second exodus with all the literalness of the first, and not as most scholars who see these prophecies as merely metaphorical of the spiritual restoration of the gospel.

It is moot question whether a future time of affliction and wilderness flight should be called another captivity or dispersion. Scripture is clear that Jerusalem will be a desolation and that the cities of Israel will be restored after a great and final devastation. We must not quibble over words or the question of the severity of this sure and certain siege of the Land and the world wide persecution of the Antichrist. Our concern is that many will be caught off guard with no realistic expectation. It is enough if a tribulation of flight and world wide persecution beginning in Jerusalem is soberly acknowledged.

But what does flight into the wilderness mean? What does the treading down of the city for 42 months of terrific desolation imply? It is interesting that modern scholars such as N.T. Wright have only echoed in recent days the view of the rabbis that have long held that Jewish presence in the Land should not be understood as the end of the exile. In their view, the exile has not ended until an all righteous nation can finally and forever, “lie down safely and none make them afraid.” This is how prophets understood the end of the exile. Israel remains in covenant jeopardy until the coming in of the ‘everlasting righteousness’ of the ‘everlasting covenant’ (Jer 32:40; Dan 9:24). This explains why Jeremiah would see the return from Babylon as coming clearly short of the promise, requiring a further time of unequaled trouble. It is why Daniel shows that the ultimate deliverance of his people would await a further seventy sevens. Quite clearly, Daniel puts the final trouble seen by Jeremiah, and the travail seen by Isaiah and Micah, at the very end of seventy sevens, the last half of the last seven to be exact.

The fuller data of all that scripture reveals concerning exile and return will confirm this distinction between the long exile of many years and a short time of unequaled desolation and dispersion that occupies the time immediately preceding deliverance of Israel. It is the tendency to confuse these distinct phases of the exile that has created the illusion that the present return will never be superseded by another disruption of national continuity, a dangerously misleading and disarming conclusion that those living in the Land can least afford! Failure to make this distinction has been a principal source of much passionate defense of Israel’s future security.

How can anyone read the covenant of Lev 26 and Deut 28-32 and suppose that peace in the Land can long endure independently of the obedience of faith? Regardless of our love for Israel, the natural branches are under the curse of the law until they are “in Christ!” It is an axiom of the covenant that “Until the Spirit be poured upon us from on high … desolations are determined” (Isa 32:15; Dan 9:26). Regardless of how many survive in or out of the Land during the great tribulation, what is not to understand about 42 months of desolation for Jerusalem, flight into the wilderness, and unequaled tribulation?

I believe it was the revelation that the return from exile would be superseded by another time of unprecedented trouble that so astonished Jeremiah. This was a great anomaly to behold, as it contradicted all that would have been expected from the glorious prophecies of return found all throughout Isaiah and the earlier prophets. However, even there, Isaiah and the earlier prophets uniformly spoke of an ultimate time of travail in the Land that would precede the birth of the nation and transition into the kingdom of God on earth with a final, and now complete, return from the Diaspora.

I am suggesting that Jeremiah himself was astonished by this very disjuncture between the longer exile and the short time of unequaled travail on the eve of the nation’s final deliverance. The tribulation was seen as the last stage of the discipline of the covenant (Deut 4:30; 32:36; Dan 12:7). It is likely that Jeremiah would have naturally conceived that the return would bring in the everlasting righteousness of covenant promise with its guarantee of abiding permanence in the Land. Instead of the hoped for golden age of everlasting peace and righteousness, he sees instead every man’s hands on his loins and all faces turned to paleness, words remarkably similar to Isaiah’s description of the great day of the Lord in Isa 13.

Daniel follows Jeremiah’s vision with his own revelation that the ultimate deliverance of his people would be delayed until the end of an additional seventy sevens. Note too that Zechariah sees the Day of the Lord as coming upon a people who have already returned to the Land. This day of ultimate judgment and deliverance is preceded by a capture of Jerusalem that results in a further captivity of many of the city’s inhabitants (Zech 14:2). There is no evidence that the prophets were able to distinguish the further, much longer exile that has followed the Roman destruction, but they did see that the Redemption would not come until the final chastisement of the Antichrist (Isa 10:27; 14:25; Jer 30:8, 14). After the destruction of the Antichrist at the day of the Lord, the penitent survivors of Israel would then return from every country. Much to be distinguished from any earlier return, this will leave none behind (Eze 39:28). Contrary to replacement arguments that would limit the return prophecies to the return from Babylon, it is of great significance that the post-exilic prophet Zechariah continued to prophesy of this further, post-day of the Lord return (Zech 8:7-8, 23; 10:8-10). This is the plain order of events that is crucial for all those who wait for the consolation of Israel to understand.

Whether we call this short time of wilderness flight a further captivity, expulsion, or dispersion from the Land makes little difference. A disaster of unthinkable proportions is destined for the city of Jerusalem and the Jewish people as far as the long arm of the Antichrist may reach. That much is sure; and our readiness and response to the clarity of scripture on this question will be a matter of great personal accountability, most particularly where the leadership of the church in the Land is concerned.

This brings the final question of how far the events of 70 A.D fulfilled, even partially, the demands of the context of Mt 24:15-31, since some have suggested that the worst of the great tribulation may be behind us, leaving only some kind of lesser tribulation to precede the Lord’s return. Will the Olivet prophecy bear this kind of division? Is the tribulation to be realized in different installments, the greatest and most terrific in 70 A.D. and another crisis of lesser intensity in the days just preceding Messiah’s return? Again, Dan 12:1-2 is the decisive turn key of interpretation on this question.

If the abomination of desolation and the removal of the regular sacrifice marks the beginning of the last half of Daniel’s seventieth week (Dan 12:11; Mt 24:15-16, 21, 29, 31), and if the standing up of Michael in both Dan 12 and Rev 12 marks the last 3 1/2 years before the resurrection and the kingdom, then one must either spiritualize, not only the Lord’s post-tribulational return in Mt 24:29, but also Daniel’s post-tribulational resurrection in Dan 12:2, 13. Else, the whole must be acknowledged as future. The very important connecting phrase, “THOSE DAYS,” in Mt 24:19, 22, 29 simply will NOT permit the dividing up of the Olivet prophecy, distributing its parts, rather vaguely between the events of 70 A.D. and the eschatological future. This will NOT work without great violence to the clear meaning of the text! No, wherever one sees the beginning of the tribulation of THOSE DAYS,” there is no break in the unequaled severity of THOSE DAYS until the Lord returns in clouds of glory “immediately AFTER the tribulation of THOSE DAYS” (Mt 24:29; Rev 1:7). What could be plainer?

This is precisely what drives the school of interpretation that call themselves, “consistence preterism,” to postulate a past resurrection of Daniel and the saints at the end of the 70 A.D. destruction of Jerusalem. This should tell us what extremes one is compelled to go to avoid the clear connection of these events. Such is the cost of “consistency.”

We would very much like to accommodate the appeals that we show a more modest reserve in our opinions. To earn for ourselves the stigma of dogmatism is constructive of nothing. However, to suggest that scripture is not clear at this point would be to undermine the very words that Jesus gave to save many alive and to deliver His sheep from the unequaled deception of those days (Mt 24:15-16, 21 with Mk 13:23). No, the scripture is very clear. No special aptitude for interpretation is required, just that disposition of spirit that was in Daniel when he ‘set his heart to understand,’ as Jesus instructs us in Mt 24:15. It is a plainness of clear meaning that will make many, particularly those in authority, greatly accountable before the Lord for their measure of care and their unwillingness to consider hard things.

We are not to suppose that because the Lord’s Olivet prophecy proved serviceable and applicable to those believers of first century Judea who would flee to Pella that it will be any less vital to those who will escape being trapped by the Antichrist. Not only this, but the Lord’s instruction to read of this event in Daniel’s prophecy with understanding would prove to be the key that opens, not only Daniel, but all the prophets for the preparation of the end time remnant and the finishing of the mystery that brings the kingdom (2Thes 2:7; Rev 10:7; 11:15). This, however, will not be local and confined to Jerusalem, as in the first century, but world-wide.

For the last two centuries of premillennial scholarship, it has been considered a ‘given’ of prophecy that a restored Israel would suffer a final 42 months of domination by the Antichrist. There would be a momentary loss of nationhood as the invading forces of the Antichrist would over-run the city of Jerusalem and desecrate the ‘recently’ restored holy places (Isa 63:18; 64:10-11). Jacob’s trouble was seen to be the unequaled tribulation of affliction and travail that would be the prelude the Day of the Lord deliverance of Israel (Paul’s ‘natural branches’). It is only in recent decades that this axiom of the premillennial faith has been mixed with various shades of preterism, such as to call two centuries of premillennial scholarship into question. I ask you; who’s being novel here? The really novel view, at least for premillennial scholarship, is that Jacob’s trouble is past with the events of antiquity, or more recently with the Holocuast of WWII Europe.

This means that Jacob’s trouble has passed into history with only a return that continues to expose Israel to the vengeance of her enemies round about. No, Jacob’s trouble, as Jeremiah uses the term, cannot end with anything short of Israel’s salvation and the promised righteousness that will preserve them in the Land forever, because of the messianic (“everlasting”) righteousness (Jer 23:5-6; 32:40; Dan 9:24). Sadly, the view that the time of Jacob’s trouble is already past has found appeal (at least until very recently) among many of the church in the Land. It is a view they can least of all afford. Because it is so comparatively new among premillennial writers, this is hard to explain on strictly academic grounds. We must be frank in saying that we believe it is a blindness that is supernatural, as it threatens to disarm those living in the Land of vital, life saving insight that is crucial to their perspective and readiness. In the words of a famous Jewish poet, “it’s time to stop talking softly now; the hour’s getting late.”

There are some things that are clearly happening at the same time there, such as the mourning of the tribes, really many things that just don’t add up to the kind of military-like resurgence that they see in those few passages. This is a nation that has just been spiritually raised from the dead, and any fighting will be done by God without the use of carnal weapons (‘Spirit of His mouth” etc.). If there’s anywhere I see some “over-literalization” to the point of the ridiculous, it’s there. What do you think?

With affection and much appreciation, Reggie

The post Israel’s Wilderness Flight and the Short But Unequaled Tribulation appeared first on Mystery of Israel.

I can’t find a verse in the NT that describes sacrifices during the millennium?

Indeed, we look in vain to find millennial sacrifices mentioned in the NT, but it is also not surprising. The NT is not interested to repeat all the great detail that the prophets describe of the age to come, precisely because it already stood written. It is only the erroneous assumption that the NT corrects the OT that would require us to see every detail repeated again before it can be believed.

We note that mention of the ”the age to come” in the NT is not usually attended with much elaboration. It is mostly used as a kind of ‘short hand’ to reference the time of the great transition from this age to the next. By itself, the term neither affirms nor denies millennial distinctions. The millennium is mentioned only once in what many would remind us is a ‘highly symbolical’ book.

On the contrary, the further revelation of a distinct millennial stage of fulfillment between the day of the Lord and the final perfection solves the riddle of OT prophecy. For those inclined to respect the literal details of prophecy, it helps to reconcile so much that would otherwise have been a hopeless puzzle.

Whereas many of the promises that were thought to belong strictly to the time after the great tribulation were now being experienced in unexpected advance of that day, the early church would not have seen this as an occasion to call in question any of those promises that remained to be fulfilled to Israel in a still coming day of the Lord, understood now to be the time of Jesus’ post-tribulational return. That the yet future ‘restoration of all things’ must necessarily include the plenary fulfillment of all that prophets have spoken was never in doubt (Mt 19:28; 23:39; Acts 1:6; 3:21; Ro 11:25-27; Rev 1:7).

So we say that what the prophets put on the other side of the day of the Lord still belongs there, a measure of present fulfillment notwithstanding. The NT does not correct or change anything that stands written in the OT. Rather, it reveals a mystery that discovers a hidden, albeit foretold age that must supervene between the present age and the age to come.

Whereas it is true that some of what the prophets connect to the day of the Lord has come already, it is also true that the tribulation is still future and certainly the day of the Lord is still future. What presumption then to so confidently deny to the natural branches the full covenantal vindication of all that the prophets describe of that coming day?

Therefore, to ascribe equal authority to both testaments means that we do not require repetition of every detail of prophecy. Progressive revelation expands and amplifies the vision of OT eschatology, but this does not call for correction or change of the plain meaning of words in their native context.

That said, however, the NT certainly is clear that Christ has fulfilled the many types and shadows of tabernacle and the alter. This brings the question; does fulfillment of a type necessarily mark its end? Jesus is the ‘teleos’ (goal) of the law, but does this mean that the law is without further significance, or that it is no longer in force, particularly where one is still ‘under’ its curse? Christ was the great anti-type to the blood sacrifices, but they continued to be offered until the destruction of the temple, as Jewish believers would continue to center their activities in the temple and continue to make annual pilgrimage (Acts 21:26; 24:17).

Notwithstanding, it is what the NT reveals of the final sufficiency of Christ’s blood, particularly in the apologetic presented in the book of Hebrews (see especially Heb 10:2) that raises serious questions concerning a resumption of sacrifices in the millennium. Indeed, no question is more difficult for those who would defend the literal view of OT prophecy. What are we to make of this? Are millennial sacrifices indeed irreconcilable with Christ’s once and for all sacrifice?

One thing is clear: Interpreted literally, the prophecies definitely predict sacrifices and a renewed temple service in the millennium (Isa 56:5-7; 60:7, 13; 66:20-23; Jer 33:15-22; Zech 14:16-21). The context is plainly post-tribulational / post- day of the Lord Israel, which is to say, millennial.

Regardless of our answer to this question, it cannot be denied that Ezekiel’s vision of a new temple is pictured in the setting of a topographically transformed and elevated temple mount in a newly liberated Jerusalem (Zech 14″9-11). This temple has never existed before in any literal sense, and it is clearly AFTER the day of the Lord described in Eze 39:8, 22-29.

So the larger implication of our approach to this question will not only bear on the question of a future millennium, but particularly how we should interpret its purpose and nature in light of what scripture reveals will distinguish and characterize that unique time. For example, will the millennium include such distinctly ‘Jewish’ features as a literal inheritance of the Land by an entirely saved Jewish nation? (Isa 4:3; 45:17, 25; 54:13; 59:21; 60:21; 66:22; Jer 31:34; Eze 39:22, 28-29; Zeph 3:13 etc.).

Can we rightly conceive of a time on this earth when evangelism will not be necessary among the Jewish inhabitants of the Land? (Jer 31:34). Many competent interpreters have said no. Such an extravagant promise can only be fulfilled in heaven. But the greatest crisis for interpretation seems indeed to be the question of whether the future reestablishment of Israel as theocratic head of the nations will also feature another temple with a worship that includes sacrifices.

How should such this language be interpreted? All are agreed concerning what these texts mean in their native context and intention. The question is whether the NT states anything definitely that forces us to spiritualize or re-interpret this aspect of OT prophecy?

If reconciliation is not possible without spiritualizing temple and sacrifices, then certainly later NT revelation must take precedence, but I believe there is a better explanation and that failure to make needful distinctions between the dispensations have created the illusion of a false choice. I am reminded of the old ‘black and white fallacy’ in logic, which assumes that the alternatives thus far considered are the only ones that exist.

I can only give where I stand currently and tentatively on this question, but my answer would be incomplete if I did not give first place to the more easily demonstrated proofs that strongly incline me in the direction of the literal view. Firstly, we know from Heb 10:4 that no sacrifice, whether past or future, was ever efficacious to the actual taking away of sin. Therefore, we can be certain that if there is a future literal sacrifice, it can only be of a memorial nature, much the way that the more portable ordinance of the Lord’s Table functions now for a pilgrim church scattered throughout the nations.

A fully regenerate Israel will most certainly NOT confuse any temporal structure, or emblematic ordinance as a means of justification. How could they? They will have a new heart of divinely guaranteed continuance. Even the godly remnant of the OT, as in the case of David, showed their knowledge that the ordinances of the law counted for nothing unless the heart was first broken and contrite (Ps 40:6; 51:16).

But when this inward reality will first be secured by true repentance, ‘then’ may the worshiper offer sacrifices extravagantly, in jubilant assurance of divine acceptance (Ps 51:19). That is always the order. It is so now with the use of the sacraments of baptism and the Lord’s Supper, and it will be so in the millennium, regardless of which ordinances God has deemed appropriate to that unique time and circumstance.

There is much that could be said on this subject that time does not permit, but the question of millennial sacrifices is admittedly very difficult for those who are committed to a consistently literal hermeneutic. This is why no other question is more exploited against a millennial future for Israel than this.

It is the seemingly impossible thought that sacrifices might be re-instituted in the millennium that is most often and most effectively invoked to dismiss a future literal millennium and to justify the ‘re-interpretation’ (spiritualization) of a large volume of Old Testament texts that speak of the post-tribulational restoration of Israel. The argument goes that the millennial headship of a Jewish Israel would imply a regression from the unity of Jew and gentile in the one new man (a ‘re-erection’ of the middle wall of partition).

This would furthermore imply a return to legal ordinances (another grossly misrepresented topic). The solution is typically to deny a millennium altogether, and if not to deny the millennium, certainly its specifically Jewish character. Of course this can only be done by the wholesale spiritualization of a considerable volume of OT prophecy.

Even if we allow full place for all the normal conventions of prophetic and apocalyptic literature, as the common use of figure, type, metaphor, poetic symbolism, and even so-called ‘cosmic language,’ still, there is an enormous amount of prophetic detail that is hard to fit with any spiritual counterpart in the NT, whether for this age or the eternal state of the new heavens and earth.

In order for the Scripture to be fulfilled in every jot and tittle, the details of prophecy demand an age between this age and the final perfection of the new heavens and earth. That further installment of the ‘age to come’ is the millennium. It begins only AFTER the destruction of the last beast of the last persecution (Dan 2:44; 7:11; Rev 6:10-11; 17:12; 19:20; 20:4-6; 2Thes 2:3-4, 8).

One can see at once the kind of problems that such re-interpretation and spiritualization of such a large body of specific prophetic detail would pose for the church’s apologetic towards Jews that are knowledgeable of the scriptures. So the question of the relationship and harmony of the two testaments is a problem that has great bearing on how we talk to Israel, certainly now, but most critically in the coming time of Jacob’s trouble.

We are often reminded that the only clear reference to a future millennium is found in a highly symbolic and pictorial book of beasts and dragons and cubed numbers in multiples of 12 and 7. Many also point out that the promise of the Land recedes in the NT into a heavenly country, with no specific reference to an “earthly” (sometimes called ‘carnal’ or ‘Jewish’) millennium.

Even Paul, in his argument for a necessary future covenant fulfillment for the natural branches makes no particular mention of the Land. Some see this as evidence that Paul has ‘re-interpreted’ the Land promise. Others note the connection of Paul’s language to clear OT references to the the day of the Lord (compare Isa 27:9; 59:13-21 with Isa 63:3-7; Jer 31:31-34; see esp. Eze 30:3 with Lk 21:24; Ro 11:25-27).

Against such clear evidence that Paul has in mind the post-tribulational day of the Lord in Ro 11:26, non-millennial interpreters tend to understand the Deliverer’s return to Zion as a reference to the Lord’s first advent. It is really quite the contrary. Furthermore, unless we accept the view of preterism (that all NT prophecy concerning Jerusalem is past), we find that the NT is not at all silent about the Land, as the entire drama that concludes the age is set in the context of a final Antichrist assault on Jerusalem (Mt 24:15-29; 2Thes 2:4; Rev 11:2 etc.). This is in full accord with the eschatology of the covenant in the OT.

It is the tendency of the supercessionist view to transfer everything that the prophets depict as following the day of the Lord into the present age. Of course, this removes any need for a millennial interim between this age and the perfect state. This is done by a process they call ‘re-interpretation’, which they believe can be justified by certain instances where the NT will apply some future (post-day of the Lord) promise to the church of the present age.

Certainly this is partly true, since the church is indeed the ‘first-fruits’ of the eschatological promise. But the present spiritual fulfillment does not detract from its more literal and exhaustive fulfillment at the day of the Lord. One example would be Peter’s application of Joel’s prophecy of the day of the Lord to the present outpouring of the Spirit on Pentecost (Acts 2:20). We can be sure that Peter is NOT announcing the arrival of the day of the Lord, since he would have been aware that Jesus used the very same language of Joel’s prophecy to speak of His return after the tribulation (Joel 2:31; Mt 24:29).

Notwithstanding, Acts 2:16-20 has been a favorite text to defend the view that all the OT prophecies of the day of the Lord should be transferred entirely to the church of the present age. It is to assume that whenever an OT prophecy is applied to the present, it has been exhaustively fulfilled in every part. If the presence of the kingdom can anticipate a greater realization in the future, how can a present ‘first-fruits’ of the messianic redemption be thought to nullify the day of the Lord restoration of Israel? (Mt 23:39; Acts 3:21; Ro 11:26). By what logic does a partial fulfillment on this side of the Lord’s return nullify a fuller future fulfillment on this earth after the last tribulation?

While it is true that the mystery reveals that the church of the present age appropriates some (not all) of the first fruits of that coming age, this does nothing to change or disappoint God’s determination to publicly vindicate His irrevocable covenant in the sight of all nations. As shown above, we believe that Paul’s reading of the covenant requires a time on this earth when there will not be found a single Jew on the earth that is not saved (see above).

This would not be nearly so astonishing if this referred only to resurrected Jews, but many scriptures combine to show that the salvation of the surviving Jewish remnant go into the millennium in natural bodies. Evidently, the surviving remnant of Israel is “born in one day” as they look upon Him whom they pierced (Isa 59:21; 66:8; Eze 39:22; Zech 3:9; 12:10; 14:7; Mt 23:39; Acts 3:21; Ro 11:26; Rev 1:7) at the same the church is being translated at the last trump (Isa 27:13; Mt 24:31; 1Cor 15:52; 2Thes 2:1; Rev 10:7; 11:15).

In marked contrast to the rapture, the Jewish survivors of the last tribulation return to the Land by natural means of transport with the assistance of gentile survivors (see Isa 49:22; Isa 60:9; 66:20; Zech 8:23). With the Deliverer’s return to Zion, the surviving remnant is regenerated in an instant, first to mourn apart (Zech 12:11-12) and then to begin the last world wide return to the Land (compare Isa 11:15-16 with Isa 27:12-13).

Notice that this return is distinguished from all others in that not a single Jewish survivor is left behind (Eze 39:28).  If such promises can be conceived to happen in literal actuality, it means that this earth is yet to witness the unprecedented spectacle of an entirely saved Jewish population. Significantly, the public fulfillment of the covenant of Jer 31:34 also finishes the mystery of God (Rev 10:7).

Not only does the millennium begin with a fully regenerate Jewish population, this astonish burning bush of divine testimony is promised everlasting continuance. The promise of an all saved nation is extended to include the future children that will be born to Jewish parents (see Isa 54:13; 59:21; 66:22). No wonder interpreters tend to put this in heaven, as they are hard pressed to find fulfillment in the visible church. That something like this could be fulfilled on this earth, especially by Jews that have not yet been resurrected may seem incredible, but none of this is any more incredible than the bodily resurrection of Jesus?

It is this reading of the covenant that makes perfect sense of a future millennium. It is also the only reading that can make sense of the way that God has chosen that the age should end over the ‘controversy of Zion’ (Isa 34:8) and ‘the time of Jacob’s trouble’ (Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1; Mt 24:21). Can it really be that God will hold all nations accountable to know and understand such an ancient promise? Indeed, it will be the test that will embroil all nations over the Jerusalem question (Zech 12:2-3). It is the question of an abiding and irrevocable covenant election that still stands with the natural branches (Ro 11:27, 29).

The theology of replacement tends to believe that before something of OT revelation can be applied to Israel in the future, they would first need to see it reiterated in the NT. They argue that progressive revelation requires us to abandon the narrow, “nationalistic” orientation of the limited and culture-bound foreview of the OT prophets.

They would have us see that all of this has all been “transcended” (changed?) by a kind of metamorphosis. You may notice that what some justify as ‘progressive revelation’ has much in common with the evolutionary view of scripture embraced by theological liberalism. That is a view that certainly has no problem at all with the unfulfilled details of prophecy.

Here is the decisive question that will ultimately determine our view of the end: The prophets place everything of Israel’s covenanted hope into the context of a future post-tribulational day of the Lord. Should the present fulfillment of some (some say all) of these promises mean that all the prophecies that picture an earthly fulfillment after the tribulation are no longer to be expected, particularly if this would mean a special place of preeminence of the ‘natural Jewish branches?

If these prophecies are to be fulfilled on earth in a future millennium, does this mean we should interpret their meaning in strict conformity to the original intention of the biblical writers, or does NT revelation constrain us to adapt them to some higher spiritual fulfillment? If so, what would this be, and would it be sufficient to account for the great volume of detail that the prophets use in their descriptions?

These are the questions that interpreters and teachers struggle to understand and explain. By perfect design, God has put before us a profound mystery that requires setting our heart to understand. Not only the church, but ultimate all nations will be forced to wrestle with its implications, so it is not a merely an academic exercise (Ro 11:25, but also Ro 11:33-36).

As Jesus was the stone of stumbling to first century Israel through the mystery of His twofold advent, it seems evident to me that the same mystery is still with us in its essence; now in the form of the question of an abiding election of a particular land and people. I believe God intends to use the last day’s crisis of Israel as a formidable test of the heart concerning its disposition towards God’s free and sovereign right to choose as He will choose.

To what degree then does NT revelation justify re-interpretation of that great volume of prophecy that the prophets put on the far side of the great tribulation? That is the question. I do not believe we should expect, as it was never the purpose of NT revelation to explicitly reiterate the basic contour of OT hope, simply because is has not changed. The revelation of the mystery of the gospel has indeed expanded our vision of the glory of God’s eternal purpose beyond anything the prophets could have conceived, but that glory has not occasioned a radical re-interpretation of Israel’s hope, as presupposed by a-millennialists and replacement theologies of different kinds.

What is new is the revelation of Messiah’s twofold coming, departure, and return to Israel. This discovers an unexpected interim that inserts itself between the unexpected death and resurrection of Messiah and the well known day of the Lord that can now be seen as the time of His return.

Through the gift of the Spirit and the revelation of the mystery of the gospel, many of the mighty powers and spiritual blessings of that coming age have come in unexpected advance of ‘that day.’ This is agreed by all schools. What is not agreed is how far this has changed or cancelled the prophecies and promises of the ‘not yet’ that the prophets put in the future with the still coming day of the Lord.

The principal point of difference is this: How far does the presence of the kingdom justify the cancellation or modification (“re-interpretation”) of the kingdom’s future on earth after the day of the Lord but before the eternal state? This is where the question of how post-tribulational / post-day of the Lord prophecies become the point of great controversy.

It is true that Paul says nothing explicit about Israel’s future relation to the Land in his treatment of Israel’s failure in Ro 9-11, but certainly this was not in question. Paul would have understood that the ‘necessary’ vindication of covenant promise in the restoration of the natural branches is indivisibly connected with inheritance of the Land. Such reiteration would have been completely redundant and unnecessary to anyone believing the literal words of the prophets.

It is the question of what it takes to fulfill the covenant. Does Paul insist on a future salvation of Israel that does not include return to the Land? How one reads the covenant and understands its language to be either figurative or literal will determine how we interpret the grafting in again of the natural branches. In fact, how we see the election of Israel in relation to the modern situation in the Land will determine how we understand the meaning of the last days and the test of hearts that the crisis of Israel is divinely designed to expose.

So, since Paul does not say anything specifically concerning the Land, does this mean that the inextricable relation of the Land to the ‘everlasting covenant’ (Gen 17:7-8; 1Chron 16:17-18; Ps 105:10-11; Isa 61:8-9; Jer 32:40-41; Eze 36:26-28) has now been transferred to heaven? The question of the Land is carried forward to the time of the unequaled tribulation precisely because it is intrinsic to the covenant and the last day’s assault on the covenant by the forces of the Antichrist.

It is the Antichrist’s war against the covenant that is the special subject of such clearly tribulational passages as Dan 11:28, 30-31, 39; Joel 3:2; Zech 14:1-4 etc.). Manifestly, the nations cross a line of no return when they lift themselves up to assault the covenant land and people. Why is this?

Significantly, the prophets show this particular act of covenant defiance to be the ultimate provocation that causes God’s fury to come up in His face (Eze 38:18; Joel 3:2). We should ask, why, in all the generations of divine forbearance of depravity and gospel rejection, is it only now that the nations finally and fatally transgress the bounds of divine tolerance? (Isa 24:5). It is because God has ordained that His  irrevocable covenant with Israel is to become the watershed issue of division and a stone of stumbling at the end of the age that will test and reveal the thoughts of many hearts (Lk 2:34-35).

Our perspective is NOT dispensationalism. Recognition of a special millennial calling and role for Israel does not militate against the unity of the body of Christ. Saved Israel and saved gentiles in the millennium will be no less members of the body of Christ on earth. However, as the man and woman are equals in Christ, but not in authority, it is no regression to understand that God’s will require all nations to honor His special election of Israel (Zech 14:16-19).

Of course, as always, the freedom and right of God to bestow special favor sets up a test of the heart (Gen 37:3-4, 11, also Ps 2:6, 8 with Ps 48:2; Isa 14:13). This was the test that was put before the woman of Canaan in (Mt 15:24-28). May we not expect that as it has pleased God to move the Jew to jealousy through the gentile, He has an intention to prove the hearts of the nations through a restored Israel at the end of the ‘times of the gentiles’? We are sure that He does, not only then, but even now, as we move towards an age ending collision over the question of covenant election.

Regardless then of how literally we are able to conceive of a restored temple and sacrifice, this question cannot be permitted to dominate all others. It does not change the far greater evidence that favors the view that a future millennium awaits the full and open vindication of the covenant in the salvation of ‘all Israel,’ as we believe Paul intends that term.

Therefore, the NT is not occupied with an agenda of ‘re-interpretation,’ but concerns itself with the revelation and application of a mystery that discovers an age between the advents that realizes some (not all) of Israel’s promises, replacing nothing of what remains to be established on earth with the natural branches at a still future day of the Lord. All of this is in perfect keeping with the well established pattern of NT fulfillment that scholars have called, the ‘already and the not yet’ of an ‘inaugurated eschatology.’

This is why I find it a thing to be wondered at that replacement theology can so well assure itself that an admittedly still future day of the Lord cannot include what the prophets so clearly promise to the ‘natural branches’ at that time. That’s what mystifies me.

Even if we allow for the utmost natural difficulty in understanding a ponderous mystery that is calculated to send us to prayer, still, to so assuredly conclude that the day of the Lord will NOT bring a millennium of covenant fulfillment for the natural branches seems to me a colossal presumption.

Yours in the Beloved, Reggie

The post Difficult Millennial Questions appeared first on Mystery of Israel.

Reggie… As you already know, our views have been coming under increasing attack both by the preterists and pre-tribulationists. I am sensing “in the Spirit” with the release of Dalton’s book … we are “hitting a nerve” now as never before and opposition will increase. The timing of this conference could not be better! Yes, these be the days! Bro. Phil

Would not surprise me to see these preterists and pre-tribulationsists continuing to hold their teaching conferences and arguing their case throughout the 70th Week of Daniel … Fred

I am inclined to agree with Fred’s educated pessimism on this. Although I believe we’ve given good and sufficient answers to these popular errors that subvert and threaten the expectation and readiness of the church, it is an open question as to what has been accomplished. Those that were already inclined to agree found welcome confirmation and reinforcement. Those that already had a strong position remained unconvinced, despite the presentation of clear evidence that seemed to us conclusive. One of the reasons I haven’t felt particularly moved to write books is because it is plain enough to see, just from the email exchanges and the feedback that has come over the years, that the old proverb is well demonstrated, which says, “a man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still.”

There was a time when I thought I might have a calling to give an answer to at least some of the end time errors that so seriously undermine the outlook and readiness of the body, but that youthful optimism has taken a serious beating in recent years. I now see these days as only a little time that may be left to us for one great urgency; that is to dig deep down to a recovery of the foundations, which need desperately again to be recovered and defined. But this too will come short unless the “life” is lived outwardly and openly in tangible demonstration before a gainsaying world. The world doesn’t need an argument; it needs a demonstration. That’s how Noah condemned the world; by faith he acted.

Even true and substantial insight and revelation does not save in the day of testing. How often have we seen that even a lot of accurate knowledge can tend to cover over and hide instability in the foundation? According to scriptures like Jn 13:35; 1Cor 13:2-3; Rev 2:2-6, all is vain if we come short of the kind of love that only issues out of the Spirit of Christ through the liberating power of the gospel. If this is the mark, then indeed, the body needs more time to prepare. But then I question what we mean by preparation.

Prophetic certainty may indeed help us to know the time and to some extent accurately anticipate world events, and prepare accordingly. But if perfection in love is the mark, how will mere knowledge that the time is short work to form Christ in us? We have only to look at many of the apocalyptic groups to see the superior and angry attitude that some display, not only towards outsiders, but especially to any within the community that do not conform to the prescribed ideals of an authoritarian leadership.

In order for the godly remnant to be straightened to become that final witness who “loved not their lives unto the death” (Rev 12:11), we may expect that our natural freedoms are going to be greatly limited if not removed entirely. This will happen for Jacob, as he is brought to the end of his power (compare Deut 32:36; Dan 12:7). No less will the church be emptied of every form of carnal power in order that the power of Christ may rest on the godly remnant for the last 3½ years of mighty witness (Dan 11:32-33; Rev 11:3; 12:10-11).

I take the view that the church will be especially straightened through the absolute certainty that the seven years has begun. Through the events of the first half of the week, the godly remnant will be prepared for the great transition that comes when Satan is forced down to fulfill his ‘short time’ (Rev 12:7-12). This will be the time of the church’s greatest break through of Spirit and power for its final witness to Israel and the nations (Dan 11:32-33; 12:3; Rev 7:9, 13-14; 11:3; 12:10-11).

Because I believe the two days of Hos 6:2 speaks of the two thousand years from the time of the cross, and that the ‘third day’ of Israel’s millennial restoration does not come until the end of that time, I personally believe the body has a little time to prepare. However, I’m not as optimistic as I once was about how that time will be used, because even the luxury of more time can be a form of power that the flesh will naturally misappropriate. That is why clear and certain knowledge of the time, particularly when the seven years begins, can be used of God to straighten and empty the godly remnant of the last residue of that great enemy that scripture identifies as “power” (i.e., the power of the flesh).

A body that has been so greatly emptied of its own power is that corporate servant upon whom the Spirit of Christ can rest in fullest measure. As the path of the just shines ever brighter to the perfect day, just so, the outward man of the believer must become weaker and weaker.”

For sure, the eschatological context and framework of the foundations is indeed crucial, but I have seen that even correct knowledge of the times and events does not, by itself, prepare the heart, except, of course, as God may be pleased to use that knowledge to ‘crowd us to Christ’. A true apprehension of the message of prophecy is designed to empty us of us, i.e., of the power and pride of confidence in the flesh. Without this, it is just one more thing to be “right” about, which God hates much more than doctrinal error.

A much younger man used to speak to others about a ‘consummate apologetic’ that could not be gainsaid or resisted by anything of this world’s wisdom. The manifest fulfillment of prophecy would remove the cloak and expose the willfulness of the heart, vindicating God’s truth to a last generation, lifting the destitute, while confounding and overthrowing pride. I surely must have been really “feeling my oats.”

That was my passion and vision; it still is. But unless this is backed up by a radically different kind of lifestyle that demonstrates a fundamentally different kind of economy and dependency, then how are we different in practice from those we oppose in theory? Where is that more excellent way that does not depend on the world’s way and wisdom? Where is the embodiment of the Word in true fellowship and true community, a city set on a hill? It brings the question; what is true witness?

Such demonstration gives hope, even as it moves to emulation. It provides a tangible “come and see”. It is both inward and outward. It finds out whether our lives and practical decisions tell the world that we are taking the prophetic Word seriously. “Come out from among them and be ye separate, says the Spirit of the Lord!”

Of course, such ‘coming out’ in true separation is first and foremost a state of the heart, and does not imply that we abandon witness and necessary relationships with unbelievers, but is there not also a practical call to come out from compromising entanglements and a reprehensible dependency on a world system that is under divine curse and judgment? “The wise foresees the evil and hides”. The Lord will not bless a misplaced dependency, particularly when the warning has gone forth with great clarity and scriptural support. Noah “moved”! Are we moving?

Where is that city on the hill that gives the light of an alternative ‘life orientation’ to a world system that is under judgment? There is such an urgency to be led of the Spirit, and to hear the Lord’s own voice in our deeps. The hour is too late to continue to beat the air with ministerial good intentions that substitute the ‘good things’ of creed and good deeds for the critical obedience of the Spirit.

I am acquiring a profound distrust of religious norms that are accepted uncritically, as not to be questioned. On the other hand, I also distrust even more that jaundiced kind of spiritual pride that thrives on questioning everything and stirring trouble that the Lord is not stirring.

What further evidence do we need to prepare? With none of the amazing details that later prophecy has given the church; with nothing more than the recently recovered book of the law, young Josiah could read and discern plainly enough that the jig was up. Just reading the curses threatened in the Song of Moses was sufficient to move Josiah to call Israel to repentance and reform. But now, with the two days of Hosea 6:2 nearing expiration, and the last pieces of all outstanding prophecy falling so rapidly into place just over the last 6 decades, here we are, arguing about whether the church will even be here, or whether the great tribulation is past or future. Talk about the perfect set up for a “great falling away”!

Even among those that agree concerning the time, there is an intoxicant in the very air that induces sleep, as when Jesus said that all ten of the virgins were sleeping. We are too much children of our times. Many of us who believe these things are nonplussed about what to do of a practical nature. We show in our practical decisions that our dependence is as much resting on the hope that ‘all things continue’, as our unbelieving and comfortably religious neighbors.

The world needs to see that those who speak the truth are able to dwell with their brethren in unity, because that’s where the Lord commanded the blessing. That’s how Jesus said the world would know, not through theoretical agreement on doctrine. Since God is a God of reality and not of theory, a God of incarnation embodiment, and demonstration, how can this be shown in a practical / real way to an on looking world? “Noah, being warned of things not seen as yet, moved with fear…” The rejected Joseph went ahead of his unbelieving brethren to save life, not only spiritual, but physical. At the conference, I hope to make the case that Jewish spiritual regeneration will depend on their physical survival to the end. Let us not separate what God has joined.

In the case of Noah and Joseph, provision was anticipated and made on the basis of clear prophetic faith. Not bare belief, but obedience to the voice of prophecy is the witness to Jew and gentile alike, whether this pertains to things physical or spiritual, as though there was ever the divide that religion has made. It is not mere beliefs, or an introverted occupation with personal salvation, but obedience that is the witness to this generation and to our families.

The question, “how can two walk together except they be agreed,” is going to have to make room for some latitude, so that we don’t “conveniently” divide over every point of doctrine, because the body of Christ is going to need a lot more than gardens in their back yards.

We’ve got to hear the Lord together and move in wisdom together in both practical and spiritual things. There needs to be a network of communication that can speak into each others lives without some new hierarchy of apostles and prophets that love to have the preeminence and exercise dominion over the faith of others. The liberty of the Spirit must be guarded with trembling and fear. As our pastor in Ft. Worth would always say, “Legalism has been the death of every community.”

There needs to be community effort and common sharing and assistance, but with greatest guard of individual liberty, particularly when it comes to the rule of each husband over his own family. If there is any expression of the kingdom on earth this side of the millennium, it must be at heart and reality, a kingdom of friends, who are, in every tangible way, their “brother’s keeper.”

Paul wept concerning those that sought their own things instead of Christ’s. The Lord expressly said that His glory in the church has the form of a servant. There is no other kind of glory that will stand in the judgment. To discern the body means that one waits on the other, and prefers the other, not hastily proceeding before the other.

God is so very jealous for a kingdom that is “without hands.” Because He will not give His glory to another, it cannot be any of our working. It must all be of grace, because a division in the labor implies a division in the glory.

Therefore, we labor to cease from our own labor, because God hates mixture. It will be the issue of moving and obeying out of His rest. All reputation and identity, position, and so-called ‘ministry’ has got to go to the cross; else it is polluted and deadly, always bringing rebuke and judgment.

I’m seeing so many that are convinced of their special importance, but God is not raising up Moses figures, but a body that can discern, and is not at the mercy of charismatic leadership. In fact, this is the very thing that Jesus says will test the hearts of even the very elect.

I see this call to the foundations, as the call and requirement of the hour. As Art used to say, “Lord, save us from the saviors!” We must lay everything down until the Spirit clearly beckons us to take it up again with much clear confirmation, and it had better be the Spirit.

I raise these questions, not because I presume to have the answers, far from it. But I trust the deposit of Christ in the body, that as we look and inquire “together,” the Lord will give clear help and counsel through the many. May we be as one at that conference that the Lord will be pleased to give us a plain path, because certainly, there are many enemies.

May we be to one another in these days, true brothers for adversity, Reggie

The post The True Witness appeared first on Mystery of Israel.

Hi Reggie,
I have a friend in a local church that embraces Dominion theology. I feel that it is a dangerous error. Can you have a look at this material and tell me what you think? How would you recommend I approach this?

I do not exaggerate when I say that I’ve never seen the prophetic portions of scripture handled more irresponsibly. This writer distorts and goes beyond the most extreme forms of non-millennial and anti-futurist viewpoints of preterism and / or amillennialism. At least those schools recognize a great tribulation and some form of Antichrist. Even if they interpret these as past, still, it is understood that any “dominion” that Christ secured by His victorious ascent was not of such a nature as to end the power and dominion of the beast kingdoms of this present evil age.

It is hard to see how anyone could suggest that the dominion of the beast kingdoms, the fourth in particular, could have ended with Christ’s heavenly coronation at the time of the ascension. It is clear that the dominion of the gentile kingdoms is not finally “taken away” (Dan 7:12, 26) until the destruction of the last beast (Dan 7:11; Rev 19:20) who brings the final persecution of the saints (Dan 7:21; Rev 6:11; Rev 13:7) at the end of the “times of the gentiles” (Lk 21:24; Ro 11:25).

Regardless of ones view of prophecy, all schools of eschatology agree that the early church faced a future Antichrist and tribulation of unequaled severity (Dan 12:1;  Mt 24:21; Rev 7:14). The kingdom had indeed come in power with Christ’s first advent, but the saints would not “possess” the kingdom in the way described in Dan 7:13-14, 26, until the destruction of the last persecuting beast (“little horn”) at Christ’s return (Dan 7:11 with Rev 19:20).

Since the beast is not destroyed until Christ’s return (Dn 7:11; 25-27; 12:7;  2Thes 2:8; Rev 19:20), we should understand that the kingdom described in  Dan 7:13-14 does not refer to Christ’s ascension, but to His return. Significantly, the “first resurrection” receives its very designation as “first” in manifest connection with resurrection of the tribulation martyrs of the final beast persecution (Rev 20:4).

According to Rev 17:12, there is a future development of the fourth kingdom in a final stage that is symbolized by ten horns, which is self-interpreted as “ten kings that shall arise” (Dan 7:24). According to Rev 17:12-13, these ten kings had not yet appeared at the time John wrote the Revelation.

“The ten horns which you saw are ten kings who have received no kingdom as yet, but they receive authority for one hour as kings with the beast. These are of one mind, and they will give their power and authority to the beast.”

This beast is clearly the ‘little horn’ of Dan 7:8, 21, 24-25.  Therefore, if these ten are clearly future from the time of John’s writing, it becomes plain that their “dominion” could not have been “taken away” at the time of Christ’s triumphant ascension.

In Dan 2:44, we see that the kingdom envisioned by Daniel comes “in the days of these kings” (i.e., the ten kings of Dan 7:24; Rev 17:12).

“And in the days of these kings shall the God of heaven set up a kingdom, which shall never be destroyed: and the kingdom shall not be left to other people, but it shall break in pieces and consume all these kingdoms, and it shall stand for ever.”

How then can it be supposed that kingdom of Christ has taken this final form of world dominion at the time of the ascension? It is true that in Christ a present from of the kingdom has been revealed, i.e., “the mystery of the kingdom”. In this sense, the kingdom is here. We have been translated into the kingdom of His dear Son (Col 1:13). However, in Lk 21:20-21, 31, we see that “the kingdom of God” is still being represented as future (“near at hand”) in relation to the signs connected with the desolation of Jerusalem. In this sense, the kingdom of God remains a future hope (Rev 10:7; 11:15, 17-18).

It is therefore no denial of the present form of the kingdom to understand that there is a future form or stage of the kingdom that is not set up until ‘the days of the ten kings’. Rev 17:12 is decisive to show that the kingdom spoken of in Dan 2:44 could not have been established at the time of Christ’s first advent, simply because the ten kings that accompany the beast in the final persecution had not yet appeared at the time John’s writing of the Revelation. So whatever victory is signaled by Christ’s post-resurrection investment of “all authority,” it did not relieve the church of the expectation tribulation and a future beast that would “overcome” the saints (Dan 7:21; Rev 13:7).

Who will deny that the blasphemous ‘little horn’ of Dan 7:8, 11, 20-21, 25, is the self exalting king of Dn 11:36-37 that Paul identifies with a future ” man of sin” who will be destroyed at Christ’s return (2Thes 2:3-4, 8)? Now notice how Paul connects the destruction of this man to the time that Christ comes to gather the church to Himself (2Thes 2:1-4, 8; see also Mt 24: 31).  Paul is clear in showing that Christ cannot return until this “man” comes first (2Thes 2:3), and John is clear in showing that when this last beast appears, “he must continue a short space” (Rev 17:10).

A careful observance of the context will show that “kingdom and dominion, and the greatness of the kingdom under the whole heaven” is not “given to the people of the saints of the most High” (Dan 7:27) until AFTER the destruction of the beast (Dan 7:11, 26), who rises AFTER the ten kings (Dan 7: 24). This is the “little horn” of Dan 7:8 who prevails against the saints in Dan 7:21 (compare Rev 13:7). Let it not pass our notice that the kingdom is not given to the saints until after the final persecution of 3 1/2 years (Dan 7:25-27; 12:7; Rev 12:14; 13:5).

The writer of the article appears to arrive at his view that the dominion of the beast kingdoms is taken away at the point of Christ’s ascension on the basis of his reading of  Dan 7:13-14. Like many amillennialists, he assumes that the Christ receives the kingdom upon the event of His ascension attended by the clouds of glory (Acts 1:11). However, even if we grant that Christ receives the kingdom upon His triumphal ascent into glory, we must also say that He brings His kingdom with Him upon His return in clouds of glory (Mt 24:30; 1Thes 4:17; Rev 1:7).

A closer inspection of the context that surrounds Dan 7:13-14 will show that the dominion of the cloud coming Son of Man does not precede, but rather follows the destruction of the beast (Dan 7:11). In Rev 19:20, the same language is applied to the destruction of the beast at Christ’s return. So the dominion and kingdom that is in view in Dan 7:13-14, 27 can only refer to the millennial reign of Christ that follows the tribulation and the destruction of the beast, as the thousand year reign of Christ begins after the destruction of the final beast (Dan 7:11 with Rev 19:20) and the resurrection of martyrs of the last persecution (compare Rev 6:11; 20:4). [Note: If this resurrection is the same as the resurrection described in Dan 12:2, 13, then it is clear that it follows immediately after the great and unequaled tribulation of Dan 12:1 and Mt 24:21, 29).]

Since this writer takes the view of many that the dominion (“the greatness of kingdom under the whole heaven”; Dan 7:18, 27) passes over to the saints at Christ’s ascension, it becomes a matter of utmost concern how those taking this view want us to understand how this “dominion” of alleged present possession is to be understood and applied.

Some speak as though the kingdom secured by Christ is already so completely in the “possession” of the saints, as to imply that all that is waiting is for the saints to “take” or “possess” their possessions in a kind of spiritual warfare, whereby all earthly institutions are subject to be ‘re-claimed’ and transformed by the church.

In this view, anything that has not yielded to the sway of Christ’s dominionwaits only for the church to “possess” that ground or territory by spiritual conquest in the here and now. Such a presumptuous notion is not only opposed by scripture; it is opposed by reality and history. No such dominion passed to the saints at Christ’s first coming.

It is only after the destruction of this final beast (Dan 7:11 with Rev 19:20) that the saints receive dominion upon this earth (Dan 7:25, 26-27). Until then, the spirit of the individual believer is sealed and seated with Christ, but the earthly life of the church is still subject to the Devil’s hatred and persecution to the end (Rev 12:17). On what basis, then, do some say that the church of the present hour will be able to assert a greater “dominion” over the kingdoms of this world than the church of any former generation?

So what do we mean by the saints “possessing” the kingdom under the whole heaven (Dan 7:18, 27)? What do we mean by “dominion” in the sense it is used here in Daniel? Never, in all the centuries since Christ’s ascension, have the saints “possessed the kingdom” and exercised “dominion” in the sense that it is being taught by some today.

Since we are being assured that the tribulation is past, and Satan is already bound, does this mean that our generation will now accomplish what the saints of an earlier time could not? However we may understand Christ’s victory over Satan, one thing is certain. It did not exempt the church from tribulation (Jn 16:33; Acts 14:22; 1Thes 3:4).

Do we now make bold to declare that through a “better” understanding of Christ’s ascension over all principalities and powers, that we may now take back our government? What of the saints in other less advantaged countries, or countries that are increasingly hostile to the faith? Is this their time too? Will they also possess and exercise governmental dominion on this earth too, now that the devil has been so finally bound and defeated? Such presumption calls for a serious reality check as to how, and in what sense, has Satan’s dominion has been destroyed.

I noticed also that the author of the article understands “the end”, as it is used throughout Daniel, to refer to the days of the Roman occupation, which began in 63 B.C. This is simply astonishing. Anyone who will see, can see that the term is used to refer to a final Antichrist and tribulation that ends in nothing short of the resurrection, including Daniel’s personal resurrection (Dan 12:1-2, 13; see also Dan 11:35-36; 12: 4, 6-9).

But if the great tribulation is past, is Christ’s return also past? It surely must be, since His coming is “immediately AFTER the tribulation of those days” (Mt 24:29-31). Because the scripture is so clear that Christ comes after the tribulation, those who see the tribulation as now past say that Christ came in the sense of His spiritual presence in the judgment upon Jerusalem. They argue that Jesus depicted His coming in “cosmic language” or “apocalyptic imagery” familiar to the OT. Examples are sometimes cited to show that the “day of the Lord” imagery, so common to the OT, was intended only to convey an imminent cataclysm, not “the” end, but only “an” end, not “the” day of the Lord, but only “a” day of the Lord. Thus, it is believed that Jesus had reference only to the impending destruction of Jerusalem when He spoke of the “end”.

However, not only does the scripture place Christ’s return after the tribulation, it also places the resurrection at the end of the tribulation (see Dan 12:1-2). So what do we do with the resurrection in Dan 12:2? Consistency would demand that if Christ’s return after the tribulation is spiritual and not literal, then the resurrection of Dan 12:2 must also be spiritual, since it too comes at the end of the tribulation. In other words, if the tribulation of Dan 12:1 and Mt 24:21 is to be reckoned as past, then by the same rule, the resurrection of Dan 12:2 must also be past.

Notice how Paul connects Christ’s return to destroy the Antichrist in 2Thes 2:8 with the believer’s hope of being gathered to Christ at the day of the Lord (“our gathering together unto Him”; compare 2Thes 2:1-3, 8). Notice too how nearly Paul’s language matches the Lord’s reference to the post-tribulational “gathering together of His elect” (Mt 24:29, 31). You see then how these events cannot be separated without great violence to the context and the consistent use of terms that are too similar to dissociate.

If the tribulation is past, then in some sense Christ must have returned “immediately after the tribulation of those days” (Mt 24:29-31). If this is so, then it follows that the resurrection of Dan 12:2 is also past, since it too follows the unequaled tribulation of Dan 12:1 and Mt 24:21. If past, and the church is still here, to what then does such a ‘spiritual’ resurrection have reference?

In view of such ‘exegetical problems’ for those who subscribe to the view the tribulation is past, we must further ask, did this mystical return of Christ in the events of 70 A.D. also accomplish the destruction of Paul’s ‘man of sin’? This would be impossible to maintain, since Paul so clearly connects the believer’s hope of being gathered to Christ at His return (2Thes 2:1) with the destruction of the man of sin at the day of the Lord (2Thes 2:3, 8). Let us not make bold to separate what God has so manifestly joined together, while we boast of attention to context.

I would like to ask this writer what he thinks we are to do with the many scriptures that describe a future Antichrist as contemporary with a final, brief, and unequaled tribulation? In Daniel chapter 7, dominion passes to Christ in Dan 7:13-14 only after the destruction of the beast in Dan 7:11. Only a serious neglect of context can imagine that the dominion of the beast kingdoms has been ‘taken away’ at Christ’s first advent, while the ultimate head of that kingdom (the Antichrist) is not destroyed until His return.

Context will not permit the separation of Christ’s return from the post-tribulational day of the Lord that destroys the Antichrist, raises the dead, and gathers the church. Furthermore, the context of the day of the Lord in both testaments is always depicted, as centered around a final siege of Jerusalem.

It may have been the greatest temptation for many living long after the destruction of Jerusalem to interpret the prophecies in an allegorical way. How else could it be maintained that Christ could come soon, since the Olivet prophecy, Paul’s “little apocalypse”, and John’s Revelation had tied the events of Christ’s return so closely to the final desolation of Jerusalem (Mt 24:15-16, 21; 2Thes 2:4; Rev 11:2)? But now, the blessed hope of the church and Israel can be soon enough fulfilled without such spiritualization of scripture. It has returned to its first century apocalyptic context.

Against all odds, veritable mountains have moved in recent history to make possible the literal fulfillment of an end that “shall not come” apart from a last day’s struggle over Jerusalem (Dan 11:31; 12:11; Mt 24:14-16; 2Thes 2:3-4). We have come full circle. The church of today lives again beneath the shadow of an imminent world crisis over Jerusalem, as the covenant city has once again become a cup of trembling to all the nations round about (Zech 12:2-3).

The age will end exactly as the ancient Hebrew prophets said it would, around an international dilemma over Jersualem, called by the prophet Isaiah, “the controversy of Zion” (Isa 34:8). This is why such doctrinal distortions of the kind this writer sets forth are perfectly calculated to blind and disarm the church to what is fast approaching. When interpretation misleads to this degree, it is no more an academic discussion; it is spiritual. It is pastoral abdication.

We fully grant that the NT shows a pattern of fulfillment that some have called “realized”, or still better, “inaugurated eschatology”. It is the recognition that by the revelation and mighty acts of the Spirit, the powers of the coming age have broken into history, in unexpected advance of the day of the Lord. There is the “already” of present fulfillment, but there is also the “not yet” that must await the yet future day of the Lord. In the NT, the phrase, ‘day of the Lord’ or ‘day of God’, is always associated with Christ’s return to gather His church (1Cor 5:5; 2Cor 1:14; 1Thes 5:2; 2Thes 2:1-3; 2Pet 3:10, 12; Rev 16:14-15).

No one doubts that the second epistle of Peter was written after 70 A.D. There, the day of the Lord, or “day of God” (2Pet 3:10, 12), is still seen as the future hope of the church (compare also 1Thes 5:2, 4; Rev 16:14-15). All throughout the OT prophets, the day of the Lord is always depicted as ending a period of unequaled tribulation. Daniel, following the lead of the earlier prophets, sees a final aggressor in connection with an unequaled great tribulation. The tribulation is always depicted as ending with his destruction and Israel’s deliverance and the resurrection of the righteous (Dan 7:11; 11:45; 12:1-2, 13 with Isa 25:8; 26:19-21).

If the passages in Dan 7 concerning the Antichrist (“little horn”, “beast”; “king of fierce countenance”, “vile person”, “willful king” etc) are all past, the question becomes, when were these things fulfilled? It sounds like this writer is saying that when Christ destroyed the works of the Devil (or sealed their destruction; 1Jn 3:8), the power and dominion of the beast kingdoms was finally stripped away and given to the saints. How then do we explain Dan 8:24 with Rev 13:2, where Satan has power to empower a final beast kingdom, which, on any interpretation, was certainly future to the Lord’s heavenly enthronement at His ascension?

I noticed that this writer’s case stands or falls on a single text of disputed meaning, i.e., Dan 7:12: “As concerning the rest of the beasts, they had their dominion taken away: yet their lives were prolonged for a season and time.” However, the surrounding context makes clear that this removal of dominion awaits the destruction of the final “little horn” (Antichrist), who is the farthest extension of the last beast kingdom, and final stage of the kingdom of man, as represented in Daniel’s metallic image in Dan 2.

Therefore, unless one is already predisposed to dismiss a future millennium, it makes much better sense to see that the ten kingdoms are not finally destroyed at the end of the “times of the gentiles” (Lk 21:24), but continue into the millennial age. Their power is broken, but they survive as nations to come under the millennial rule of Christ. Some of these nations become penitently submitted to the rule of God out of Jerusalem, as shown by many OT prophecies (e.g., Isa 19:23-25; Mic 4:2; Zech 2:11; 8:23).

Regardless of how spiritually or literally its duration is interpreted, the scripture makes clear that the millennium does not begin until AFTER the resurrection of the tribulation martyrs (Rev 20:4), who are not raised until AFTER the destruction of the final beast (Rev 19:20), who brings the final persecution against the saints (Dan 7:21 with Rev 6:11; 13:5).

Therefore, to place the removal of the fourth kingdom’s dominion at Christ’s ascension is an overly realized eschatology, to say the least. It is self exposed by the view of the NT that Christ’s victory over death and the Devil has not removed the outward character and progress of a “present evil age” which continues to remain under the sway of the evil one (1Jn 5:19).

If this writer understands that the dominion of the earth (“under the whole heaven”) passed over to the saints with Christ’s ascension, then surely he must see the kind of limits this would put on his concept of dominion. Rather than exercising “dominion” over this world’s kingdoms, the church has always been a people who, for Christ’s sake, are “killed all the day long” (Ro 8:36). So which is it? Did the ascension mark the end of this world’s beast kingdoms, or was it the “end” of Jerusalem in 70 A.D?

If Nero was the beast, and the Roman siege of Jerusalem marked the time of Christ’s mystical return, then what kind of dominion was “taken away” from all the long line of tyrants that have equaled or exceeded the power and cruelty of the Caesars? This doesn’t appear to justify the interpretation that the dominion of the beasts has been taken away. From the time that John wrote his Revelation, a sixth beast was present, and another, the worst of all, was still to come (Rev 17:10).

If we suppose that the post-Constantine church seemed momentarily to bear rule over many of the kingdoms of the earth, we should also remember that the time of the church’s greatest temporal dominion was also the time of its greatest apostasy. This episode of history displayed nothing of the kind of dominion that God promises His persecuted people at the end of a final great tribulation. Sometimes what appears success is really judgment.

No, the “dominion” spoken of in Dan 7 comes to the saints only AFTER the destruction of the beast (compare the nearly identical language in Dan 7:11 with Rev 19:20). In John’s Revelation, the first resurrection follows the destruction of the beast (Rev 20:4). Paul quotes Daniel verbatim to show that the willful king of Dan 11:36-37 is the ‘man of sin’ that Christ destroys at His return (2Thes 2:3-4, 8). In Daniel, he’s the one who brings the tribulation that ends in the resurrection (Dan 7:25; 11:31-36; 12:1-2, 7 with Rev 11:2; 13:5). “This” is when the saints possess the kingdom, and not before. Only then, when “the beast is destroyed and his body given to the burning flame” (Dan 7:11), do the saints rule and reign with Christ for a thousand years (Dan 2:44; 7:13-14; Rev 20:4).

It is true that we have been translated into the kingdom of His dear Son, and “in Him” we are sit down in heavenly places, far above all principality and power. In Him, we have victory over fear and death, despite all kinds of tribulation. But as to the public enforcement of His rule, we must say that “now we see not yet all things put under Him” (Heb 2:8). There is still a “not yet” of future fulfillment that is not fully enforced until His return in glory. That is the blessed hope. It’s not here yet. Only then, at His appearing, will the spirit of Antichrist that has reached final embodiment in the ‘man of sin’, be finally destroyed. Only at the sounding of the last trumpet will the “mystery of God be finished” and “the kingdoms of this world become the kingdom of our God and His Christ” (Rev 10:7; 11:15, 17-18). “Which in His times shall show, who is the blessed and only Potentate, the King of kings, and Lord of lords” (1Tim 6:15).

Dominionism is a fair weather theology that is destined to wither with the blast of real poverty and persecution. It is philosophically bound to find apocalyptic futurism its worst theological nemesis. It requires an overly realized eschatology that emphasizes only the “already” of NT fulfillment, while it neglects or denies the “not yet” of the early church’s well documented expectation of Christ’s post-tribulational return to destroy the Antichrist.

One must remember that even on preterist terms, Christ’s victory over Satan did not relieve the early church of its expectation of a future great tribulation. How then can a kind of dominion be asserted now that could not be asserted then? Is it because that was only the concern of the early church? Can we now safely assure ourselves that nothing of such an apocalyptic disruption need concern us, as we proceed to reclaim the institutions of this world for Christ? The suffering king will reign with His suffering church, but that dominion is of a wholly different kind.

It is well known among historical scholars that the Christian gospel has its roots in the Jewish apocalyptic tradition that flourished in the period between the testaments, and was thoroughly futuristic in its expectation of an apocalyptic end to the present evil age. There was no reading of scripture that opposed the present spiritual truth of the Christian’s ascended position in Christ to the common expectation of suffering and opposition in this present evil age.

The new man in Christ has indeed been delivered from the present evil age (Gal 1:4), or more particularly the power of the powers. Even so, his life in this world continues to be exposed to tribulation, sometimes “great tribulation” (Rev 12:14, 17). This is the tension that remains with the church as a people ‘between the times’. We are sit down with Christ in a finished work, while the structures of this world remain in tact and, in the larger part, under the power of Satan. Restraint is at best momentary.

According to the NT revelation of the mystery of two distinct comings of Jesus, the promised salvation of Israel has been revealed in advance of its future fulfillment to Israel at the post-tribulational day of the Lord. An earnest of that coming day has indeed come, but it is only realized in the “presence of our enemies”. The regenerating revelation of the gospel gives power over the present evil age; it does not end it. Though once and for all defeated, and their rule broken “in Christ” and “in the Spirit,” still, the powers of this age are able to assert their pernicious influence in the world of nature. This will continue until their power is finally removed by the revelation of Christ from heaven. That is the ‘already and not yet’ pattern of NT fulfillment.

Finally, I think this kind of theology is only a symptom of something far more serious. If it goes unchecked, it will exact a heavy toll in days ahead. It shows a serious blindness to the ‘way of the cross’. Where it may not overtly deny, it certainly neglects the cruciform character of the gospel and the nature of the kingdom in its present form. I believe it fails to apprehend “the mystery of the faith”, as a pattern of suffering and death before resurrection and glory (Lk 24:26).

It makes for a great pep rally of religious emotional excitement at all the “boundless possibilities” for the “conquest of faith”, but it ill-prepares its adherents for the shock that will come when this wrong headed presumption concerning the nature of dominion is exposed, not only by apocalyptic events, but by what a friend of mine calls the ‘suddenlies’ of life, yes, even those unexpected intrusions that can turn any Christian’s life into its own “great tribulation”. So it’s very important to distinguish between what has, and what has not been promised to believers, not only in a comparatively free land at this time, but in all lands at all times.

“Here is the patience and the faith of the saints” (Rev 13:10; 14:12).

These are just some of my objections to something that should not be getting to first base (Acts 17:10-11). That it does get to first base is itself a revelation of an humanistic optimism that has been cultivated in this nation in particular, that with the proper teaching, incentive, and strength of resolve, “nothing that they propose to do will be withheld from them” (Gen 6:11).

Yours in the Beloved, Reggie

The post Dominionism appeared first on Mystery of Israel.

Why amillennialism or why no mill?

Any thought of a millennium confirms God’s covenant with the Jewish people. Taking away the millennium takes away God’s promise to the Jew. The protestant reformers (along with the Catholics) were amilllennial. They called the hope of a millennium a “Jewish dream” and “Jewish opinions” (see Wikipedia article on amillennialism) because the Jewish people were looking for the fulfillment of the promises of Jeremiah 31 and the promises given to David. The reformers were saying that the millennium is the church age and that Christ’s return is spiritual. This seems to nullify those promises given to Israel.

We can’t accept this theory especially if we are of the opinion that there really is no church age or “church” as a separately beloved people apart from the Jews. We are thinking the reformers are mistaken in this distinction. There seems to be from the reading of the scriptures to be only one holy people, Jews. There seems to be no mention of any other beloved people. All gentiles that come to Christ the Messiah are really entering into the holy covenant God made with Israel.

-J

What you state is really well put. There are some, however, that see a millennium, but see no special significance for Jews in the millennium. They see a millennium that is simply populated by Christians who inherit the earth in general. But I take your view that the primary purpose of the millennium is to give space for the literal fulfillment of all God promised to Israel.

I’m glad to see you reject the view that the church starts at Pentecost. This is NOT properly called the “church age”. Even though the term has been serviceable to describe the present age, it is not used in scripture. It is a misnomer, because it assumes the church did not exist in the OT, which is patently false. This is a unique dispensation of divine purpose, but it is not the “church age”. Rather, it is the dispensation of the grace of God to the gentiles through the revelation of the mystery of the gospel, whereby gentiles are given an equal standing in the covenants of promise with the saints of Israel.

It is a mistake to assume that because something is newly revealed that it has come newly into existence. It is true that the mystery of Christ reveals the church as the body of Christ, but this does not mean that OT believers born of the Word and the Spirit of Christ (1Pet 1:11, 23) were any less members of Christ than believers of today.

Just as greater revelation of the mystery of the incarnation and the Trinity does not imply new existence, it is incorrect to suppose that new light and new language concerning the body of Christ should necessarily imply a new entity, separate and apart from Israel. This is a fallacy of both dispensationalism and replacement theology that has given rise to much confusion and loss of crucial perspective.

There has always been a true “Israel of God” (the righteous remnant) within the larger nation. The early Jewish disciples did not cease to belong to the elect nation when they became believers in Jesus. There is no thought at all of a new entity called the church. There is no thought of a new Israel that displaces the old. On the contrary, Paul shows that it is the present nation under judgment that is predestined for future grace (Ro 11:25-26), on the basis of a covenant (Isa 59:21; Ro 11:27) that is based on an irrevocable calling and election (Ro 11:29).

Ultimately, there is only one Seed that inherits the promises (Gal 3:16). “For all the promises of God in Him are Yes, and in Him Amen” (2 Cor 1:20). The children of the Spirit are counted for the seed (Ro 9:8), because to be born of “the Word and Spirit of Christ” (Ro 8:9; 1Pet 1:11, 23) is to be “in Him”. Even before the advent of Christ, those who were indwelt by “the Spirit of Christ” (1Pet 1:11) were certainly just as much “in Him,” as any living since the revelation of the of the mystery (Ro 8:8-9; Col 1:27).

According to Paul, the covenant was already confirmed “in Christ”, even before  the law was given (Gal 3:17). There is no other with whom it could have been confirmed, because there is only one righteousness that could stand as surety for “all the seed” (Ro 4:16). From the beginning, the Lamb slain from the foundation of the world (Rev 13:8) stood as surety of a better covenant (Isa 55:3; Heb 7:22).

It is theological error of the first order to suppose that only since Christ’s historical appearance in the first century have persons been made alive by the Spirit of Christ (Jn 3:6; 6:63; Ro 8:9; Eph 2:1), or that the Spirit of Christ did not indwell believers before Pentecost (1Pet 1:11).

The new birth is a self evident necessity for all spiritual life in any age.  Jesus reproved the learned Nicodemus for not recognizing this (Jn 3:10). He should have known that if a nation is dead apart from spiritual resurrection and re-birth (Isa 66:8; Ezek 36:25-27; 37:5 ), it cannot be otherwise for an individual (Jn 3:3). This reproof would make no sense if the new birth was something that would not begin until Pentecost.

It is impossible to be “in Christ” and not be “in Israel”. To belong to Christ is to belong to Israel. To be born into Christ is to be grafted into the Israel of God, the Israel of the new creation.

En-grafted gentiles are equal heirs of Israel’s covenants of promise, since the covenants and promises were not made with any other people. The seed of faith, the children of Abraham, the circumcision of the Spirit etc. are one regenerate people of God, whom Paul calls, “the election” (Ro 11:7).

This is the “holy nation” to whom Jesus said the kingdom would be given (Mt 21:43; 1Pet 2:9). It is the Israel of the new creation, which must extend to an elect number of the natural branches at the coming day of the Lord in fulfillment of the demands of the covenant (Ro 11:26-27). That number is the prophesied “third” that survives the great tribulation (Zech 13:8-9). This is the penitent remnant that will make up the beginnings of a new regenerate nation born in one day (Isa 66:8; Ezek 39:22; Zech 3:9).

Regardless of how many gentiles are added to the church, its essential character is not changed. The church remains an internal phenomenon within the nation of abiding election and calling (Ro 11:29).  Christ is the true Israel of God, and to be in Him is to be in the line of divine election that does not stop short of the salvation of ‘all Israel’ at Christ’s return (Ro 11:26).

The Jewish disciples saw themselves as still belonging to Israel in essential continuity with the godly Jewish remnant, “the election of grace” (Ro 11:5).  Through the gospel, believing gentiles are grafted into the nation to which the Jewish disciples already belonged. Therefore, the one new man of the Spirit is the Israel within Israel, travailing in hope of the salvation of the nation presently under judgment.

As the people of the Spirit and the revealed secret (Ro 16:25-26), the church never conceived of itself as separate from the nation of abiding election and calling (Ro 11:29). They understood that despite its momentary condition of blindness and unbelief, the covenant cannot rest short of the salvation of “all Israel” (i.e., “the natural branches”).

For Paul, this meant the existence on earth of an entirely saved “Jewish” nation (Ro 11:26; Jer 31:34).  Paul desired for believing gentiles to see their part in moving the Jew to jealousy (Ro 11:11, 14) in the knowledge that “their fullness” would mean “life from the dead,” bringing exponential increase of blessing to the nations (Ro 11:12, 15).

The present “Israel after the flesh” will become the Israel of the Spirit in the time that Jesus calls, “the regeneration” (Mt 19:28). This does not mean that Israel supersedes the church, but that the unbelieving nation is renewed to become the church.

As it is false to say that the church replaces Israel, it is equally false to say that Israel replaces the church. Millennial believers will be no less the body of Christ than believers of today. Contrary to dispensational teaching, it is impossible to be born of the Spirit of Christ and not be part of His body (Ro 8:9; 12:5; 1Cor 6:17; 10:17; 12:13; Eph 2:16, 18; 4:4, 7; Col 1:27).

[Note: You may know that dispensationalism teaches a “reversal of Pentecost” at the rapture (John F. Walvoord). In this view, the Holy Spirit did NOT indwell believers in the Old Testament. He was only “with” or “upon”” them, but never permanently “in” them. Since the indwelling is believed to only apply to church saints in this age, it is believed that the Spirit will NOT indwell tribulation believers or any that come to faith during the millennium. Only the body of Christ (a term that dispensationalists limit to believers living between Pentecost and the pre-tribulational rapture) can experience the indwelling of Christ’s Spirit. But according to Jn 7:39, the Spirit would be given on the basis of Christ’s glorification. Therefore, the gift of the Spirit is no more capable of being retracted than the glory of Christ is capable of being reversed. Such alleged reversal of Pentecost is a theological absurdity. On the contrary, the mystery of the incarnation reveals that the same “Spirit of Christ” that now indwells the church (Col 1:27) also indwelt (and filled) the saints of old (Gen 41:38; Ex 28:3; 31:3; Num 14:24; 27:18; Deut 34:9; Neh 9:30; Ps 51:19-11; Isa 63:11; Dan 4:8, 18; 5:11, 14; Mic 3:8; Mt 22:23; Jn 3:6; 6:63;  Ro 8:14; 1Cor 2:12, 14; Gal  4:29; compare especially Ro 8:9 with 1Pet 1:11).]

Hence, the “new spirit” that will be given to Israel “in that day” is the same Spirit that now indwells the church (Ro 8:9; 2Cor 3:17). It is the same Spirit of Christ who indwelt all the righteous of past ages (1Pet 1:11). Only by His Spirit are the dead made to live in any age or dispensation (Mt:12:27; Jn 3:6; 6:6:3; 1Cor 2:14; Gal 4:29). [Note: The righteous remnant of the OT were not strangers to the Spirit and the law written in the heart (Ps 37:31; 40:8; 51:10; 51:10; Isa 51:17), but because they knew that a mere remnant could never establish an abiding inheritance in the Land, the prophets looked on to the day of the Lord when ‘all’ the people would be righteous with an ‘everlasting righteousness’ (Isa 60:21; Jer 31:34; 32:40; Dan 9:24).]

For the moment, we must distinguish between the Israel of the new creation and ‘Israel after the flesh,” but that distinction is only temporary, since the church that has not lost its true identity is a church that groans and travails for the time when every Jewish survivor of the last tribulation will become members of the body of Christ on earth, as an entirely regenerate nation.

The church should know that until the Jewish people are ‘all righteous’ in their appointed place (the Land), Satan will continue, unbound, to ravage the earth. Therefore, to have God’s heart for the nations is to long for the salvation of “all Israel”, since “their fullness” will mean “life from the dead” and unparalleled blessing for the nations (Ro 11:12, 15).

Simply put, all who are born into Christ are born into Israel, but this new creation must extend to include an entirely regenerate Jewish nation. That’s why Paul insists that the covenant cannot rest short of “their fullness”, when “all Israel” shall be saved, meaning the existence on earth of an entirely saved Jewish population (see Isa 4:3; 54:13; 59:21; 60:21; Jer 31:34; Ezek 39:29 etc.)

I see the church as a kind of corporate Jeremiah or Daniel, who, though distinct by reason of regeneration, is no less bound to the fate and fortunes of the beloved nation, even in its “temporary” blindness and apostasy (the righteous remnant always suffered with the nation). Regardless of its apparent numbers, the church is contemplated as belonging to, and remaining within, the elect nation of eschatological destiny, so that what touches that nation touches (or ‘should’ touch) the church in a profound way, as in the case of the prophets (the tears of Jeremiah, Nehemiah etc.).

In this sense, the church is distinct, but NOT separate. Its relationship to Israel is like that of the prophets and the righteous remnant that did not stand apart (boasting in the difference), but regarded themselves as standing in priestly solidarity and identification with the nation, even in its pollution and apostasy. They recognized, as the church has failed to recognize, that the covenant cannot be finally fulfilled, and the world have rest, UNTIL “all Israel” is saved (Ro 11:25-26).

For the prophets this meant the time when every living Jewish survivor of the great tribulation would all “know the Lord from that day and forward” (Ezek 39:22). There would be no exception, since “all” would be uniformly righteous by the Spirit (Isa 60:21; Jer 31:34). Not only at the beginning of the millennium, but all throughout the generations that follow, every child born to Jewish parents is promised the same blessing of everlasting preservation in righteousness (see Isa 44:3; 45:25; 54:13; 59:21; 61:9; 65:9, 23; 66:22). It is the open spectacle of an entirely saved “Jewish” nation.

It is therefore not surprising that non-millennial covenant theologians put the fulfillment of Jer 31:34 in heaven. By applying this promise to the church rather than the to the Jewish survivors of the last tribulation, it is impossible to conceive of a time when there would be no occasion to teach or evangelize within the visible church.

But the promise is even more radical, because it specifies evangelism among the Jews in particular. It does  not say that there will be no further need of evangelism during the millennium. On the contrary, many scriptures show that evangelism will abound to the nations in that day (Isa 2:3; 11:9; 25:7; 27:6; 49:12, 22; 55:5; 60:3, 5, 9: 61:9, 11; 62:2; 66:19; Jer 3:17; Mic 4:2; Hab 2:14; Zech 2:11; 8:22-23, etc.). Rather, the promise predicts a circumstance  when evangelism among the Jewish people will no longer be needed.

Non-millennial presuppositions discount such a scenario, because it would require not only a millennium but an unthinkable Jewish preeminence that God will require the nations to acknowledge (Zech 8:23; 14:16-17). But it shall be so! Because this is the vindication of the covenant, whereby God will be sanctified “in them” (Ezek 28:25; 39:27) in the sight of all nations.

This is the people of the long exile of suffering that have born such hatred and shame among all nations, “for your sakes” (Ro 11:28). To begrudge them of their special calling and election is a great violence to the Spirit of grace. It the ultimate form of “boasting against the branches” (Ro 11:18, 25).

As we see in Num 14, and a host of other scriptures, God will never settle for anything less than the final bringing in of the very same people that He first led out. That is the terms of what the prophets call the “everlasting covenant of peace”. Anything less falls unthinkably short of the glory that will fill the whole earth (Num 14:22).

That the church can conceive otherwise is precisely due to its ignorance of the mystery (Ro 11:25), which has shown itself in the tendency to boast against the branches. Lack of priestly identification with Israel’s tragic plight in history has kept the church from its strategic role towards Israel in God’s purpose to bring the age to its appointed conclusion, particularly in view of the judgments through which the church and Israel must pass toward the fulfillment of the covenant in their return.

Yours in the Beloved, Reggie

The post Why Amillennialism or Why No Millennium? appeared first on Mystery of Israel.

By any fair comparison of these corresponding references, (and so many more that put “Zion’s travail” as immediately preceding the great and awesome day of the Lord), it is readily seen that the phrase, “Jacob’s trouble” is synonymous with the unequaled tribulation climaxing in the day of the Lord (compare Isa 13:6-10; 26:16-19; 66:8; Jer 30:6-7; Hos 5:15-6:1-2; Mic 5:3-4). Nothing could be more consistently attested throughout the whole of scripture than that the long-awaited day of salvation awaits the destruction of the last aggressor who brings the unequaled, never to be repeated time of great tribulation upon Israel and the nations.

In contrast, a-millennialism conceives of the millennium of Rev 20 as a symbolic number representing the entirety of the present age between the Lord’s ascension and return. In this scheme, the present age between the advents is conceived as a time wherein Satan is bound. After the thousand years have expired, Satan is once more unbound for a “little season” (Rev 20:3). It is this “little season” that a-millennialists typically equate with the age ending tribulation.

By dismissing Jesus’ reference to the “great tribulation” of Mt 24:21 as past already in Rome’s 70 A.D. sack of Jerusalem, the otherwise manifest connection between Jer 30:7, Dan 12:1 & Mt 24:21 is curiously disconnected. This evasion removes the final tribulation from any direct relation to literal Israel, but to do this is to overlook the superabundance of specific detail that both testaments attach to the final tribulation and its day of the Lord conclusion.

Another approach to prophecy that gets the tribulation all wrong s called, “Historicism”. It is best known for its often failed ‘year day’ theory that spreads the great tribulation out over a vast span of years (whether 1260, 1290, 1335), with perhaps an intensive resurgence at the end. The view that the church is taken away to heaven during the tribulation, leaves Israel to face the fury of Antichrist without the witness of that entity that Paul calls, “church of the living God, the pillar and ground of truth” (1Tim 3:15).

In this comparatively recent view in the history of interpretation, the innumerable multitude of Rev 7:9, 13-14 is won to Christ by the witness of the 144,000 and the two witnesses in Jerusalem. With the bride of Christ transported to heacen, these, with all who come to faith after the rapture, are not to be reckoned as part of the body of Christ, but belong to another, distinct people of God called, “tribulation saints”.

The position called, ‘historic pre-millennialism’ sees the future great tribulation as primarily concerned with the purification of the church, since there is often little or no focus on the still outstanding covenant contention that will rage over the literal land and people of Israel at the conclusion of the age (Isa 34:8; Zech 12:2-3), nor the unique millennial destiny that follows where a literal reading of scripture presents the newly saved nation as exalted to be the head of the nations during the rod iron rule of the Davidic Messiah.

We agree with historical premillennialism that the church will indeed be tested and purified (Dan 11:35; 12:10; Rev 7:14), but this is common to the church’s persecution throughout history. The primary purpose of the great tribulation like no other is to bring Israel back into the bond of the covenant (Ezek 20:33-34, 35, 37) and to establish on earth the completion of the everlasting covenant that God made with the Patriarchs in all its literal detail.

Hence, ours is a comparatively rare perspective that sees both Israel and the church together in the tribulation, with the godly remnant ‘instructing many’ (Dan 11:33; 12:3), amid a common experience of worldwide flight from the persecuting policies of the Antichrist (Rev 12:6, 17). The time of Jacob’s trouble designs to bring Jacob to the end of his power (Deut 32:36; Dan 12:7) and so prepare the Jewish heart for the removal of the veil that has so long hid the face of God from the larger nation until the predestined, “set time” to favor Zion when the beleagured survivors of Israel will “look upon Me whom they pierced” (compare Ps 102:13; 110:3; Isa 59:20; 66:8; Joel 3:16; Mic 5:3-4; Zech 3:9; 12:10; Mt 23:39; Acts 3:21; Ro 11:26, Rev 1:7).

This transitional time is also referred to as ‘Zion’s travail’ (Isa 13:6-8; 26:16-19; 66:8; Mic 5:3; Jer 30:6-7), which ends in the sudden and supernatural birth of the nation “at once … in one day” (Isa 66:8; Eze 39:22; Zech 3:9). The millennium begins with Christ’s return to destroy the Antichrist, translate those who belong to Christ at the last trump, and deliver the the elect remnant of Israel on the brink of extermination (Isa 27:12-13 with Mt 24:22, 31; 1Cor 15:52; Rev 10:7; 11:15).¹

In speaking of the future desolation and ‘treading down’ of Jerusalem (Isa 28:3, 18; 63:18; Dan 8:13; Lk 21:24; Rev 11:2), Jesus will use a term that Ezekiel uses as a synonym for the day of the Lord (i.e., “the time of the gentiles;” Ezek 30:1-3). It is usually thought that Jesus’ use of this term in its plural form, “the ‘times’ of the gentiles” (Lk 21:24), is intended to describe the entire time of gentile control over Jerusalem from the Babylonian captivity until Jerusalem passed back into Jewish hands after the Arab Israeli war of 1967. Others see the time in view as reaching to the return of Christ when the times of the gentiles will end with a final treading down of Jersualem that ends when the Deliverer returns and the kingdom is restored to Israel (Lk 21:24; Acts 1:6; 3:21; Ro 11:12, 25-26; Rev 11:2).

In keeping with the pattern of past instances when Jerusalem was “trodden down” by the Assyrian and Babylonian invaders (Isa 10:6; Mic 5:5), the prophets, Jesus, and the NT writers expect a final “treading down” of the Holy City by the Antichrist (Rev 11:2). He is seen as the eschatological anti-type of all of Israel’s ancient oppressors (Eze 38:17). This final treading down of Jerusalem will be in progress when the day of deliverance arrives (Isa 28:5, 18; 63:18; Dan 8:13; Zech 14:1-4; Lk 21:24; Rev 11:2).

Although quite unjustifiably disputed, it can hardly be denied that the apocalyptic books of Daniel and Revelation apply the treading down of Jerusalem, not to the long period between 70 A.D and the present return, but to a short period, i.e., the second half of Daniel’s seventieth week, which is the last 3 1/2 years (Dan  9:27; 12:7, 11; Rev 11:2). Throughout the prophets beginning with Moses, the tribulation of the “latter days” was conceived of as a very brief transition between the present age and the great day of the Lord of final judgement and salvation (Deut 4:30; Isa 13:6-8; Jer 30:6-7; Eze 38:8, 16-23; 39:8; Dan 12:1-2, 7, 11)

In some places, the day of the Lord is spoken of as inclusive of this short period beginning with Israel’s pre-tribulational return to the Land in unbelief and ending with Israel’s post-tribulational deliverance accompanied by the resurrection of the just (Job 19:25-27; Isa 25:7-8; 26:1617, 19, 21; 59:20; Joel 2:32; 3:16; Obad 1:17; Dan 12:1-2). A comparison of passages in their context of final tribulation makes it very evident that before the final desolator invades the Land to bring on the final desolations, the Land is depicted as flourishing in Edenic beauty (Joel 2:1-3; Eze 38:12-13). This pre-tribulatonal prosperity of the Land appears to be taking place during a time of false security.

This can be inferred from Isa 28:14-15. 18, 22; Eze 38:8, 11, 14; 39:26; Dan 8:25; 11:21, 23-24, 31; 12:1-2, 11; 1Thes 5:3. Taken together, these passages lead us to assume that pre-tribulational Israel is dwelling under the illusion of a peace that has been entered into with the one who will bring the final desolation (Dan 9:27; 11:21, 23-24, 31; 12:11; Mt 24:15-16, 21, 2Thes 2:4, 8; Rev 11:2; 13:5). In this light, it is remarkable that Jesus’ use of Daniel’s term for a final desolation of Jerusalem applies equally well to both the long and the short periods of desolation and captivity. A further captivity after Israel is regathered is clearly anticipated in Zech 14:2. Though mercifully brief in duration (Dan 7:25; 9:27; 12:7, 11; Lk 21:24; Rev 11:2-3; 12:6, 14; 13:5), it is nonetheless described as a time like no other. “Alas! for that day is great so that none is like it …” (Jer 30:7 with Dan 12:1; Joel 2:2, with Mt 24:21-22).

Since the above passages show clearly that the holy city is in the process of being ‘trodden down of the gentiles’ when the Lord returns (Zech 14:1-5; Rev 11:2), it cannot be imagined that the ‘times of the gentiles can end anytime short of the post-tribulational day of the Lord. Furthermore, Paul speaks of the “the fullness of the gentiles” (Ro 11:25), as coterminous with Israel’s national deliverance at the post-tribulational day of the Lord (compare Ro 11:25-27; Isa 59:16-21; 63:3-7; Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1). Only after this future desolation and treading down of Jerusalem of very brief duration (Isa 63:18; Dan 7:25; 8:13; 9:27; 11:31; 12:1, 7, 11; Mt 24:15; Rev 11:2) will Jerusalem dwell securely “from that day and forward” (Eze 39:22, 25, 28 with Jer 30:10; 32:37; Eze 34:27-28; Hos 2:18, 23; Mic 4:4; Zeph 3:13; Zech 14:11).

Since it is clear that the last 3 1/2 years envision a further treading down of the holy city, we must distinguish between a return after the long exile of “many generations” (Deut 28:59, 63; Isa 32:10-15; 58:12; 61:4; Eze 38:8; Hos 3:3-4) and another very short time of desolation, captivity, and wilderness flight that takes place during the unequaled tribulation of the last 3 ½ years (Jer 30:7; 31:2; Ezek 20:35-36; 22:19-22; 38:8; Dan 11:31; 12:1-2, 11; Hos 2:14, 18; Joel 3:1-2; Zeph 3:1-2; Zech 12:2-3; 14:1-2, with Mt 24:15-16; Rev 11:2; 12:6, 14. In contrast to the present return, the return that follows the great tribulation will be in faith. It will be complete and final and to the last man (Deut 30:1-5; Isa 27:12-13; Eze 39:22, 28-29; Zech 10:10-11; 12:10-13:1).

This means that the Antichrist invasion from the north (Eze 38-39, Joel 2:20; Dan 8:9; 11:21) is launched against a nation that has only lately returned from the long exile of ‘many days’ (Eze 38:8). This is further corroborated by the evidence of scripture (Isa 63:18; 64:10-11; Dan 8:13-14) that suggests that the ‘sanctuary’ that the Antichrist will violate has only ‘recently’ been recovered to Jewish possession (notice the language, “a little while;” Isa 63:18).

Daniel is equally clear that a short desolation of just 3 1/2 years begins when the regular sacrifice is taken away by the Antichrist (Dan 8:11; 9:27; 11:31, 12:11). This anticipates the restored presence of the ‘sanctuary’ on the hotly disputed temple mount. It is exegetically impossible to separate the removal of the sacrifice and the placing of the abomination from the last 3 1/2 years of  unequaled tribulation “of those days” (Mt 24:19, 22, 29) that ends in Jesus’ return, the destruction of Antichrist, Israel’s deliverance, and the resurrection (Dan 7:11, 25; 11:31, 35-36; 12:1-2, 7, 9-11; Mt 24:15, 21, 29, 31; 2Thes 2:1-4, 8; Rev 10:7; 11:2, 15; 12:6, 14; 13:5; 16:14-15; 19:20. ²

Therefore, from the broad range perspective of the Hebrew prophets, Israel’s long captivity is not considered as finally ended until the day of national repentance and deliverance. The time is clear. The surviving remnant of the down trodden nation are born into holy nationhood at once and in one day at the end of Zion’s travail, the great tribulation that reaches its climax in the great day of the Lord (Isa 66:8; Eze 39:22; Zech 3:9; 12:10; 14:7; Joel 3:21; Mt 23:39; 24:29; Acts 2:20; 3:21; Ro 11:26; Rev 1:7).

The significant ’tills’ and ‘untils’ of OT prophecy invariably place Israel’s national deliverance and full return at the end of a time of great travail and affliction (Deut 4:30-31; Isa 13:7-9; 26:16-17; 32:15-18; 66:8; Jer 30:6-7; Hos 5:15; 6:1-2; Mic 5:3-4). Zion’s travail ends with the day of the Lord (Isa 66:8; Eze 39:22). Although he does not use the term, day of the Lord, Daniel will place the deliverance of Israel at the end of the unequaled trouble that he will identify with the last 3 1/2 years (Dan 12:1, 7, 11). A careful comparison of contexts, considered in light of attending detail, will reveal that MOST of the return passages have in view this final post-tribulational return from the Diaspora (Deut 30:1-5; Jer 30:10, 18; 33:7-9, 11, 14-16; 46:27-28; Eze 39:22-23, 25, 28-29; Zeph 3:8-9, 13-15, 19-20; Joel 2:27; 3:1-2, 20-21; Zech 14:2-5). ³

So both testaments give witness of a long captivity followed by final captivity of very brief duration  (Zech 14:2). It is from this latter captivity that “the ‘redeemed of the Lord’ shall return, and come with singing unto Zion; and everlasting joy shall be upon their heads …” (Isa 51:11; 62:11-12). Failure to distinguish between a partial and preliminary return ‘after many days … many generations’ and a further and complete return after a further captivity of only short duration has left many with a misguided optimism concerning the future of the modern state.

I will never forget the first time that I heard believers call Israel, “the Ark of Safety”. I was with Art visiting the Corrie Ten Boom house in Haarlem near Amsterdam. The view expressed was that if such a disaster was not to be repeated, Christians should unite to do all in their power to help Jews from every country return to Israel, as the divinely protected, “Ark of Safety”. There was no doubting the sincerity of concern for the people of the ancient witness, but I could hardly believe my ears. Were these dear believers unaware that the Antichrist reign of terror begins in the Land and makes Jerusalem its first target? It made me to wonder, not only how such an error could survive the plain sense of scripture, but why has this found such widespread acceptance among the friends of Israel, the very ones that should have been the prophetic watchmen on her walls?

It is the return of an ancient heresy that scholars of Jewish history call, “the inviolability of Zion.” It is the presumption that God has pledged unconditionally to protect the nation from the success of her enemies. The enemy may assail, but he can never prevail. However, the enemy has prevailed many times before (not ultimately, of course), and how, apart from the only righteousness that fulfills the covenant, can the present secular state claim immunity from ‘the discipline of the covenant,’ as recorded in Lev 26 and Deut 28-32? Until the coming in of the ‘everlasting righteousness’ (Jer 32:40 and Dan 9:24), the Jewish people, as a whole, remain under what we might call, ‘covenant jeopardy.’ This means that the threatened curses of the broken covenant remain outstanding and threatening until their final resolution in the promised messianic righteousness of the New Covenant.

The ill-fated doctrine of Zion’s inviolability suffered its first death in the fulfillment of Jeremiah’s prophecy (Jer 25:11; Dan 9:2). It was revived after the successful Maccabean resistance against the Syrian tyrant, Antiochus IV (Epiphanes). This formed a new precedent that emboldened Jewish resistance in three successive, but futile revolts against Rome (66-70, 115-117, 132-135 A.D.)

The modern revival of belief in the “inviolability of Zion” is defended by three basic arguments:

1) The modern re-birth of the nation in 1948.

2) The belief that the “time of Jacob’s trouble” was the Holocaust of Nazi Europe.

3) The amazing succession of military victories that have, against all odds, saved the fledgling nation from almost certain destruction.

The first argument confuses May 14, 1948, with the spiritual birth of the nation at the post-tribulational day of the Lord (compare Isa 66:8 with Ezek 39:8, 22, 28-29; Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1; Zech 12:10). As the surrounding context confirms, the sudden regeneration of the nation “in one day” happens after Zion’s travail, and marks the beginning of the nation’s millennial glory with the pouring out of the Holy Spirit on the surviving remnant (Ezek 39:29 with Joel 2:28-32; Zech 12:10). “From that day and forward” (Ezek 39:22), there will be no more remnant, because every Jewish survivor and all the children born throughout the future generations will all know the Lord (Isa 4:3; 54:13; 59:21; 60:21; 66:22;  Jer 31:34; Ezek 20:40; 39:22, 28-29). With the Deliverer’s return to Zion (Isa 59:19-21; Ro 11:26), the Antichrist is destroyed (Dan 7:11; 2Thes 2:8) and the millennium begins (Ezek 39:22-29). It is then that Israel will be the all righteous nation of covenant promise that enjoys final and uninterrupted security in the Land (Jer 23:6; 30:10; 32:37; Ezek 34:25, 28).

[Note: In the perspective of the prophets, Paul’s much disputed phrase, “and so all Israel shall be saved,” envisions this time when there will be no further need for evangelism among the Jewish inhabitants of the Land (Jer 31:34), thus assuring the abiding continuance of unfailing obedience through the promise of the new heart.]

The second argument is refuted by the fact that Jacob’s trouble and all the passages that deal with Israel’s last suffering are set ‘in the Land.’ It begins in the Land (Ezek 22:19-22; Zech 13:8-9; Dan 12:11; Mt 24:15-16, 21) and ends in nothing short of Israel’s final and ‘complete’ deliverance (Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1), Christ’s return, the destruction of the ‘Man of Sin’ (2Thes 2:8), and the resurrection of the righteous dead (compare Mt 24:21, 29-31; with Dan 12:1-2).

As to the third argument, there can be no doubt that Israel’s return to nationhood is a remarkable and necessary fulfillment of prophecy (Ezek 38:8; Dan 12:1). Before the judgment of the tribulation and Antichrist, and before the day of national repentance, Israel is granted a gracious, albeit probationary return to the Land BEFORE the final crisis that ends in the redemption (Ezek 38:8; 39:26). This gathering is indeed a gracious fulfillment of covenant promise (Jer 30:3; Eze 38:8), but it does not accomplish the final salvation of ‘all Israel.’ Rather, it sees ahead to the yet future time of Jacob’s trouble (Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1), which does indeed end in final salvation of the day of the Lord and the further and final re-gathering of all Israel (Eze 39:28; Zech 8:7-8, 22-23; 10:9-12; 12:10-13:1; 14:3-4).

Significantly, Daniel will apply Jeremiah’s language of a time like no other (Jer 30:7 with Dan 12:1) to the last 3 1/2 years that begins with the abomination of desolation and the removal of the daily sacrifice that ends with Israel’s deliverance and the resurrection (Dan 9:27; 12:1-2, 7, 11). Jesus will use the same language (Mt 24:21) to describe the unequaled tribulation that begins with the abomination and ends with His return (Mt 24:15-16, 21, 29). Thus, we see that the present return is a probationary time of divine pleading that must, at some point, climax in the great tribulation that reaches its climax in the great and notable day of the Lord (Mt 24:29; Acts 2:20; Rev 16:14-17; note especially the similarity of language between Ezek 39:8 and Rev 16:17).

Therefore, so long as the larger part of the nation remains estranged from the “bond of the covenant” (as only fulfilled in Christ), the judgments of the broken covenant will continue to threaten Israel’s peace in the Land. And while covenant jeopardy threatens Jewish safety in any land at all times, it is particularly “in the Land” that the prophet Zechariah says that two thirds will be cut off (Zech 13:8-9) in the tribulation. Therefore, if we believe that Jews will be facing the fury of Antichrist, as first directed against those living in the Land, what should be our prophetic responsibility? (Ezek 33:6).

The victories of the past do not guarantee that the enemy will not terribly prevail for a season (Dan 7:21, 25; 12:7; Rev 11:2; 13:5). While it is certainly true that Israel will be abundantly saved at the “set time” (Ps 102:13; Dan 11:35), it is not before she has passed through “what has been determined” (Dan 11:36; 12:7). It is no mere matter of interpretation, but only the greatest sorrow that constrains us to face the plain language of scripture of a last days’ siege and desolation of Jerusalem. We must not shrink from the lengths that God will go to arrest His elect and beloved nation on its predestined path to resurrection and glory.

It is only Scripture that compels us to point out that great affliction and another exodus of wilderness flight awaits Jews all over the world, both in the Land and in the nations (Jer 30:7 with Dan 12:1 Mt 24:16; with Rev 12:7, 14). The same awaits all who will expose themselves to peril through costly identification with this hunted people (Rev 12:16-17). The true church will be distinguished from the false in no small measure by its willingness to lay down its life to lend succor and aid to despised and now abandoned nation. This, since scripture leads us to infer that it will be the Antichrist’s first objective to eliminate the Jewish race (Rev 12:6, 13-14). In all probability, it is the church’s part in hiding the woman that will bring upon the saints the hatred and fury of the Antichrist (Rev 12:16-17)

We are very near the ancient doctrine of Zion’s inviolability when we hold an unjustified optimism concerning Israel’s future that ignores what all the prophets see as necessary for the self-reliant Jacob (supplanter) to become the broken and contrite Israel (one who perseveres with God). It is the principle of the cross, of death before resurrection. The nation must mirror Messiah’s tragic passage from degradation to exoneration. A naive view of the cost of Israel’s return risks being offended at the lengths that God will go in order to bring His people into the bond of the covenant. Perhaps we are ignorant of this for them, because we’ve not sufficiently known this process for ourselves. Paul understood this when he speaks of a necessary travail in order for Christ to be formed in the hearts of the Galatians (Gal 4:19). It is the principle behind his statement, “So then death works in us, but life in you” (2Cor 4:12). That is why Israel’s deliverance is often depicted as a birth that is preceded by travail (Isa 13:8; 26:16-17; 66:8; Mic 5:3; Jer 30:6)

The reason for such tribulation is manifest (Acts 14:22). Fallen human nature cannot be conquered except by the inward work of the cross applied by the Spirit, through the quickening of divine revelation. This is why Jacob must be brought to the end of his power (Deut 32:36; Dan 12:7) before the veil can be taken away (2Cor 3:16; Zech 12:10). How can it be different for the church? The veil is lifted and Christ revealed at the end of strength (“confidence in the flesh”). That is the pattern for all the true “Israel of God”. It is death before resurrection and travail before birth.

It is the plain reading of the covenant that ‘until’ the Jewish people possess the “everlasting righteousness” of the New Covenant (Jer 32:40; Dan 9:24), not by a few, but by ‘all’ (Isa 4:3; 54:13; 59:21; 60:21; Jer 31:34; Jer 32:40; Eze 20:40; 39:22), there can be no lasting security in the Land. Until then, there will always remain “the quarrel (vengeance) of My covenant” (Lev 26:25; Mic 6:2). The broken covenant, the coming short of the glory of God in Christ, will always be a liability that leaves open the peril of further judgment, yes, even momentary captivity into the nations (Zech 14:2 with Lk 21:21-27; Rev 11:2; 12:6).

Since the covenant requirement is met nowhere but in Christ, to suppose that Israel is not subject to further exile, even if very brief (3 ½ years), is a humanistic presumption that is in great danger of being offended at the lengths God must go to accomplish the resurrection of a nation, whether it be out of the death of exile, or an hour of unsurpassed affliction and travail (Deut 4:30-31; Ezek 37:11; Ro 11:15). Although no enemy can ever have final success in accomplishing Satan’s futile desire to eliminate the Jewish race, biblical history is full of examples of severe chastisement that have ended in exile. If another expulsion and exile of brief duration (the last 3 1/2 years) is considered a term too extreme to describe Israel’s experience under the Antichrist, who will deny that Jesus describes a final desolation of Jerusalem before His return (Mt 24:15-16, 21), and that John sees a final treading down of Jerusalem and flight into the wilderness? (Rev 11:2; 12:6, 14). Is this not enough to prepare ourselves to warn and escort fleeing survivors to places of safety in the day of Jacob’s calamity? (Eze 35:5; Obad 13)

If the Assyrian who was a type of the coming Antichrist was called by Isaiah, “the rod of my chastisement” (Isa 10:5), why should it be different with the final anti-type? The Antichrist functions under God’s sovereignty as the rod of His discipline. And while God has set definite limits, it is foolish to imagine that the covenant chastisement that will come through the final Antichrist will be less severe than any of the other cruel oppressors of Jewish history. If Jewish writers can call the modern Holocaust, the “tremendum”, what will be “the time of Jacob’s trouble”, so that none is like it? (Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1; Mt 24:21).

The ancient Jewish sages and rabbis confess with one voice that salvation comes to Israel in the hour of his greatest extremity. This is far from supposing that the enemy will not have cruel success and prevail for “a season and a time” (Dan 7:21, 25; Rev 11:2; 13:5). The final desolation of Jerusalem is a constant theme of Old Testament prophecy, confirmed and understood as literal by Jesus and the apostles (Isa 63:18; 64:10-11; Ezek 22:19-22; Dan 9:27; 11:31; 12:11; Mt 24:15-16; Rev 11:2).

Even before the New Testament revelation of the mystery of the gospel (Ro 16:25; Eph 6:19), the Old Testament was clear in its witness that God would accomplish His unconditional promise by pouring out His Spirit on the broken and contrite survivors of the final trial (Isa 59:21; Ezek 39:29; Zech 12:10). The ancient Rabbis described Israel’s last woes by such terms as, “the birth pangs of Messiah,” or, “the footsteps of Messiah.” Throughout the writings of the sectaries of Qumran (the people of the Dead Sea Scrolls) and many of the Rabbinical writings of the Christian period, the view was commonplace that the final redemption comes only at the end of a brief but unequaled time of severity (Jer 30:7; Dan 7:25; 9:27; 12:1, 11).

This will be the time when God will once again bring the fleeing remnant into the wilderness to “plead with them there” through great judgments, mighty signs in nature, and also tender appeals (Isa 35:6; 40:3; 41:19; 42:11; 43:19; Hos 2:18; Jer 31:2; Ezek 20:35). [Note: Scholars see that the final redemption is set in the context of a second exodus out into the wilderness and back again, but tend to interpret this as poetic metaphor of Christ as the new exodus. In the literal view, Israel is driven into the wilderness by the Antichrist, to return again from all lands when he is destroyed at the Lord’s return.]

The New Testament confirms the Old Testament’s witness to a final wilderness experience for the people of God that begins with the descent of the nations upon unsuspecting Jerusalem (Isa 34:8; 63:18; 64:10-11; Joel 3:2; Zech 12:2-3; Mt 24:15-16; Lk 21:24; Rev 11:2). A careful comparison of related passages will show that after this, when the “great trumpet” sounds (Isa 27:13), the surviving remnant of Israel begins their long trek back home, not only from specifically mentioned neighboring countries (Isa 11:15-16; 27:12-13), but from places of hiding such as the neighboring wilderness of Edom (Isa 16:1-4; 26:20; 35:1; 42:11; Ezek 20:35-37; Jer 31:2; Hos 2:14; Dan 11:41 ASV).

When the abomination is placed in the holy place in Jerusalem, speedy flight from that area will be a matter of life or death (Mt 24:15-16, 21). A remnant will escape into the outlying regions, such as the wilderness of Petra in southern Jordan (Isa 16:1-4; 26:20; 42:11; Dan 11:41). It is significant to observe that the Jews that are returning to the Land after the day of the Lord are called, “the outcasts” (Isa 11:12; 16:3-4; Isa 27:13), “the escaped of Israel” (Isa 4:2; 10:20; 66:19), “those who were ready to perish” (Isa 27:13), and “those who were left of the sword” (Jer 31:2).

Manifestly, the modern return, though prophetically significant, cannot be the return that Isaiah calls, “the second time” (Isa 11:11). A careful comparison of Isa 11:11-12, 15-16; 19:4-6 with Isa 27:12-13; Zech 10:10-11 will show that this return must be accompanied by a miraculous crossing of ‘the river of Egypt’ on dry land. Moreover, this return is signaled by the sounding of the “great trumpet” (Isa 27:13). Since the time is the same, it can hardly be doubted that this is the post-tribulational trumpet that Jesus refers to in Mt 24:31, and that Paul calls, the “last” (1Cor 15:52)? Note that Paul’s citation of Isa 25:8 in 1Cor 15:54 (“then shall be brought to pass the saying that is written”) demonstrates that the time in view is the time that the OT righteous are raised from the dead, clearly AFTER the unequaled tribulation (Job 19:25-26; Isa 26:19; Dan 12:1-2).

Therefore, since it is clear that the return of Isa 11:11-12, 15-16 is the same return that begins with the post-tribulational trumpet of Isa 27:12-13, it follows that the modern return is not the return that Isaiah calls “the second time.” We may see the present return as a first stage, but we must distinguish between the present partial return and the full and final return that follows the national regeneration that comes only at the end of the last tribulation.

Not only throughout the nations of the Diaspora (compare the term “outcasts” in Isa 11:12; 16:3-4; 27:13), but even more locally and regionally in the neighboring countries adjacent to Israel (Dan 11:41 with Isa 16:3-4; 42:11 NKJV), Jews will be driven into places of hiding (Isa 16:3-4; 26:20; 27:13 {“ready to perish”}; Rev 12:6, 14).

[Note: The word translated rock in Isa 42:11 is not the usual Hebrew word for rock. It is Petra in Edom / modern Transjordan, see 2Kings 14:7; Isa 16:1; 26:20; with Dan 11:41]

These and a number of parallel passages combine to show that the day of salvation will find many in the wilderness. The reason is clear. It is because Jerusalem has very recently become a wilderness of desolation through the assault of the Antichrist (see Isa 4:2-4; 63:18; 64:10-11; Ezek 22:19-22; with Dan 11:31; 12:11; Mt 24:15; Rev 11:2; 13:5).

Therefore, it is a great error to confuse the present return and re-establishment of the unbelieving nation with the complete return that comes only after Israel’s post-tribulational deliverance and spiritual transformation (Ezek 39:22, 28-29). Until then, they are a chosen and ever beloved people (Ro 11:28-29), albeit under the abiding threat of the curses of the covenant (Lev 26; Deut 28-32). Nevertheless, the preliminary return that we see today was absolutely foretold. It was necessary to the complete return that follows the end of the tribulation. All of prophecy presupposes and requires a substantial Jewish presence in the Land, existing again as a nation (Dan 12:1), albeit under covenant judgment (Ezek 20:35-37; 22:19-22; Dan 12:1; Zeph 2:1-2). To make light of the modern miracle of Israel is not merely an issue of interpretation, it is an issue of the heart.

After the conference, I plan to work with a friend and colleague from New Zealand (Dalton Lifsey) on a joint writing project that aims to present the full case from scripture for this crucial distinction concerning the order of the return. Manifestly, the present return, though very gracious, is probationary at best (Ezek 38:8; 39:26), since it anticipates the unequaled tribulation that MUST precede the nation’s repentance at the day of the Lord. Only then, “from that day and forward” (Ezek 39:22), will God’s face never again be hidden from the prodigal nation (Deut 31:17-18; 32:20; Isa 8:17; 64:7; Ezek 39:23-24, 29).

We must see that there is a return that precedes the trouble, and another return that follows it. The first is partial and in unbelief. The second is in penitent faith and includes every Jewish survivor (Zech 13:8-9), to the last man (Deut 30:4; Eze 39:28).

Much has been made of the passage in Ezek 36:24-25 where great stress is put on the word “then” that seems to imply that Israel is “first” gathered to the Land before the time of national cleansing. The same may be said of Ezek 37 where a case can made for the prior resurrection of the nation before the breath of the Spirit effects the promised regeneration. However, just as much stress should be put on the wording of verse 33, which says, “In ‘the day’ that I shall have cleansed you from all your iniquities (past tense), I will also cause you to dwell in the cities, and the wastes shall be built. And the desolate land shall be tilled, whereas it lay desolate in the sight of all that passed by. And they shall say, ‘This land that was desolate is become like the garden of Eden;’ and the waste and desolate and ruined cities are become fenced, and are inhabited. Then the heathen that are left round about you shall know that I the Lord build the ruined places, and plant that that was desolate: I the Lord have spoken it, and I will do it” (Ezek 36:33-36).

There is a mystery here that is the cause of much of the puzzlement. It is solved when we understand that there is an age long exile of desolation and depopulation of the Land that is followed by a re-gathering that precedes the desolations of the great tribulation (Jer 30:3; Ezek 38:8; 22:19-22; Zeph 2:1-2). Though unsurpassed in severity and apocalyptic devastation extending to all nations, this time of desolation and flight into the wilderness is thankfully very short (Dan 12:7; Mt 24:16; Rev 11:2; 12:6, 14; 13:5).

You are correct that Art became persona non grata to most of the messianic leaders in Israel for referring to this time as another “expulsion.” I believe this was to “make a man an offender for a word” (Isa 29:21), since many agree that Jews will be required to flee to places of safety, many to outlying regions that will provide hiding from the face of the Antichrist (Isa 16:3-4; 26:20; 42:11; Ezek 20:35; Dan 11:41; Mt 24:16; Rev 12:6, 14).

Art also was understood to teach that there would be no survival for Jews left in the Land. Whether he failed to qualify his remarks on those occasions, I do not know. I do know that there will be a remnant of Jewish life that survives in the Land. The scripture says as much (Zech 14:2; Mt 10:23; Rev 11:13). However, it would be a great presumption to not heed the Lord’s warning to flee into the wilderness (Mt 24:16). Note that Zech 13:8-9 says that a third of those “in the land” escape the sword. Given what the scripture implies of conditions in the Land under the reign of Antichrist, that is a surprisingly high percentage of Jewish survival, for which we can be very thankful. However, are we safe in assuming that this high percentage of Jewish survivors remain in the Land, or will survival depend on successful escape into the wilderness and to places of refuge outside the Land? It is at best a sober inference, but in view of Jesus’ clear warning to flee, it seems more probable that the “third part” that were in the Land when the tribulation began, will survive in so great a number only because the larger part managed to escape to places of refuge in the wilderness. Whether this escape is within or outside the Land, we cannot say with final certainty, but we are safer to follow the lead of the scriptures that show the certainty of survival in wilderness regions outside the Land.

See the following scriptures as evidence that Israel’s flight into the wilderness is concurrent with Jerusalem’s final desolations: Isa 63:18; 64:10-11; Jer 30:7; Dan 9:27; 11:31-35; 12:11; Zech 14:2; Mt 24:16; Rev 11:2; 12:6, 14). Significantly, Jer 30:18 says that the Jerusalem will “be built upon its own heap.” This is the picture that we see in the larger context of Ezek 35-36 and Obadiah. The final return is always AFTER the surrounding nations (Edom in particular) have been humbled for their ‘everlasting hatred’ against the children of Israel (Joel 3:19-21). The time is clear: It is “in the day of their calamity, in the time that their iniquity had an end” (Deut 32:35; Ezek 35:12, 15; 36:2-3; Obad 13).

It is after this final judgment on the persecuting nations (i.e., ‘times of the gentiles’; Ezek 30:2-3; Lk 21:24) that the waste and ruined cities of Israel shall again be built and re-inhabited (Ezek 35:4; 36:3-4, 10, 34-36, 38), never again to be “bereaved of men” through war (Ezek 36:12, 14 with Isa 49:19-20).

Thus, we must distinguish between “the desolations of many generations” (Isa 61:4), and the brief and final desolations of the great tribulation. We must be clear: There is a return before the tribulation (Jer 30:3; Ezek 38:8; Zeph 2:1-2; Dan 12:1) and there is another that is AFTER the tribulation (Isa 11:11-12, 15-16; 27:12-13; 49:19-20; Jer 30:10; 31:8-9, 11-12; 32:37-40; Ezek 34:12-15, 25, 28, 30; 36:33; 39:28-29; Joel 2:18; 3:1-2, 15-16; Zech 8:8-9; 10:6, 10-11; 14:11).

Zephaniah presents the pre-tribulational gathering of Israel as a “self-gathering” BEFORE the day of judgement (Zeph 2:1-2 KJV). In contrast, the final return is attended by great signs of supernatural divine power (Isa 11:15-16; 27:12-13; 35:1, 6; 41:17-18; 43:19-20).

If context is duly considered, it is this post-tribulational return of Israel in penitent faith that is so gladly assisted by gentiles (Isa 49:22; 60:9; 66:20; Zech 8:23). I do not discount the possibility that certain circumstances might justify assisting a Jewish family in their desire to return to the Land. However, to assist Jews back to the Land with no clear warning of what awaits them there is reprehensible in the extreme (Ezek 33:6). These covenants of silence are shameful evidence of the church’s own deep humanism. What an irony that in the interest of recovering our “Jewish roots”, we should so radically depart from our ‘apostolic roots’ (Acts 4:20).

Yours in the Beloved, Reggie

Original Question:

Reggie,

I am teaching a three part series over the next three Sundays, pt 1 The restoration of Israel pt 2 & 3: The Jewish Road to Calvary

Ezek 36 does appear to be referring to ruins during the apocalyptic period just before the return of the Lord. Verse 15 states no less than three times. V 29 “deliver you from all your uncleanness” compares with Zech 12:1. Again V 33 “On the day that I cleanse you from all your iniquities.” Again V 30 “never again to bear the reproach of famine among the nations.” Then in v 36 we have “the nations which are left all around you shall know that I the lord have rebuilt the ruined places.” Ruins being rebuilt are also referred to in 10 & 33.

More than anything else, Art was profoundly disapproved for this one thing: i.e., his suggestion that these ruins are modern day Israel.

In terms of arguing the case against this premise (and I say that because I want to be solid in my arguing the case for Art’s position), can anyone point to any time in history when Ezek 36:36 has been fulfilled? Was there any such demolition during any of the three deportations into Babylon and then into Egypt with poor Jeremiah? There was no such demolition of the nations round about, was there? It was Israel that was being demolished and not the surrounding nations!

What about other periods of history? Could this verse be used in any of those in an attempt to deflect it away from the glaring reality of a coming holocaust? So, can anyone argue that verse V 36 has been fulfilled at a time prior to today? If not, then it does stand, does it not, that much of modern day Israel will yet be turned to rubble? Indeed, the fact that rebuilding is such a prominent feature in this chapter and in other books, such as Isaiah etc., the language of the prophecies are intended to imply the kind of massive building projects we see in the land today, such as never seen in all its history.

As some parts of my knowledge of the whole history of Israel are a bit patchy, would this last statement be correct in your thinking?

Peter

I am sorry to be so long getting to your question, Peter, but its importance is part of the reason I knew it deserved more than a quick reply. Above is part of a reply to some friends in Germany that have expressed concern over the ‘Aliyah’ movement among Christians to assist Jews to return to their Land. Hopefully this will address both questions.

The post The Order of the Return (Part 1) appeared first on Mystery of Israel.

Hello Reggie, thank you for all your answers on the current and coming situation of Israel. Please, let me know why amilliennialists are denying the future of Israel and the church and why they say .. the prophecy of Daniel —-it all has been already its past not future!??

How we read Daniel and Revelation is first an issue of whether we can trust what Luther called, “the priesthood of every believer,” or whether we can only safely follow the tradition of interpretation that has come down to us through many of the church’s theological heroes, such as the famed magisterial Reformers, Luther, Calvin, and Zwingli, and their vast theological progeny, as also the popes and bishops of the church of Rome. For the larger part, all have been Augustinian in their interpretation of Daniel and the Apocalypse. This is why amillennialism has dominated most of Protestant and nearly all Roman Catholic eschatology. It is well known that St. Augustine of Hippo is the father of the a-millennial interpretation of the thousand years (i.e., that the church is the kingdom of God on earth and the millennium is symbolic of the church age).

Augustinian denial of a future millennium is not the only system of interpretation that denies the literal interpretation of the many prophecies that depict the post-tribulational salvation of a surviving remnant of the Jewish people and the restoration of the nation as a distinctly “Jewish” nation (Dan 2:44). Simply put, if there is no millennium, there can be no literal fulfillment of the vast amount of prophecy that depicts a glorious future for benighted and beleaguered Israel after the unequaled tribulation at the coming day of the Lord, which the New Testament equates with the time of Christ’s return.

Exegetically, it all depends on where you locate the unequaled tribulation of Mt 24:21. If Mt 24:21 is the same event described in Dan 12:1, then not only are the righteous raised at Christ’s post-tribulational return, but Daniel’s people (the Jews) are also delivered at the same time (Dan 12:1, 2). Therefore any past tribulation that did not end in the simultaneous events of the return of Christ, the resurrection of the righteous, and the deliverance of Daniel’s people cannot be “the great tribulation” described in Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1, and Mt 24:21. It is that simple. .

Augustinian amillennialism teaches that the first resurrection is either the spiritual new birth or the reign of the martyrs from heaven. But according to Rev 6:10-12, the first resurrection must await the final persecution and the destruction of the beast. In fact, the first resurrection receives its very designation as “first” in direct connection with the tribulation martyrs that were beheaded by the “last” beast (Rev 20:4), and it is clear that this beast is not destroyed until the Lord’s return (Dan 7:11 with Rev 19:20, also 2Thes 2:8) at “the great day of God almighty” (Rev 16:13-16).

Therefore, one cannot consistently put the first resurrection in the past without putting the destruction of the Antichrist in the past. The same position that requires the great tribulation to be in the past, often teaches that the beast of Revelation was Nero. This view is called preterism. Once one starts down that path, there’s no stopping till the return of Christ, the Antichrist, and sometimes even the resurrection of the dead in Dan 12:2 are all put in the past. Amillennialists, which are not all preterists, typically put the tribulation in the past. Not all put the Antichrist in the past, but all put the first resurrection in the past.

The fundamental error of amillennialism is its blindness concerning the mystery of Christ in its relation to the tribulation. The basic apologetic of the New Testament in its Jewish milieu was to show the prophetic necessity that the Messiah should appear, be cut off (Isa 53:8; Dan 9:26) and raised (Isa 53:12) BEFORE the tribulation, also called Zion’s travail, or the time of Jacob’s trouble (Isa 66:7-8; Mic 5:1-4; Rev 12:5-6, 12-14). According to a number of New Testament passages, the day of the Lord, also called the day of God, comes immediately after that great tribulation (compare Joel 2:31 with Mt 24:29; also Ezek 39:8 with Rev 16:14-17). The only day of the Lord that the New Testament knows comes AFTER the darkness that comes immediately AFTER the tribulation of those days (compare Mt 24:29; Acts 2:20).

In both testaments, the day of the Lord is the great dividing point between this age and the age to come. Some of the regenerative powers of that coming day have already broken into (invaded) the present age through the Holy Spirit and the revelation of the mystery of the gospel. But this does nothing to cancel or change what remains to be “literally” fulfilled for Israel and the nations at the still future, post-tribulational, day of the Lord (Acts 3:18-21; 1Thes 5:2; 2Pet 3:10, 12; Rev 16:14-15). This is what amillennialism, and all replacement systems, are forced to deny.

Amillennialists want to say that “ALL” of the glorious promises that should come after the day of the Lord have come already through the Spirit, and that’s it. Nothing else is to be expected other than the new heavens and earth of the final perfection. See how it works? Reformed theology rightly appropriates the fulfillment of the everlasting covenant promised to Israel to the church. The scriptures themselves apply Israel’s covenants and promises to the church, particularly since there are no others. We’ve been “grafted in among THEM” (Ro 11:17).

Amillennialists are quite right to be suspicious of Dispensationalism’s novel doctrine that the church ends at the rapture. Anyone born of the Spirit is a member of Christ’s body, regardless of age or dispensation. But the fundamental error of amillennialism is its failure to see the mystery of Christ’s twofold coming, not as changing what remains to be fulfilled to Israel in the still future day of the Lord, but as bringing the powers of that coming day into the present through the revelation of the gospel.

The revelation of the mystery of the gospel brought to light both a pre and a post tribulational coming of the Messiah, the latter well known and the former unknown until the appointed time of revelation. Whereas it was ordained that the world of the gentiles should receive the gospel through Israel’s fall, this did nothing to cancel the future covenant hope that remains to be established with the nation of the Jews on the “other side” of the tribulation, at the still future day of the Lord.

The post-tribulational salvation of Israel is a constant theme of the prophets. The salvation of that coming day has indeed appeared in unexpected advance through the mystery of a twice coming Messiah. But the mystery does nothing to change what will yet surely follow the tribulation according to the foreview of both testaments (Lk 21:24; Acts 3:21; Ro 11:25). This is the amillennial fallacy. By recognizing the presence of some aspects of that future day through the Spirit and the gospel, it empties the day of the Lord of all its literal content, except, of course, the return of Christ and the immediate destruction of this present earth and creation of the new. Since there is no future for the Jew beyond this age, there is no need for a millennial kingdom on earth. That’s the logic.

Amillennial interpretation rightly applies the “already” of prophetic fulfillment that has come to the church as first-fruits, but denies the “not yet” of future post-tribulational fulfillment to the Jewish natural branches. But for Paul, the covenant is not complete apart from the re-engraftment of the “natural branches” and the full coming in of all Israel as a completely regenerate nation (Isa 54:13; 60:21; 59:21; Jer 31:24; 32:40), born in one day (Isa 66:9; Ezek 39:22-29; Zech 3:9). Their recovery to covenant favor is not a mere addendum. It is a covenant necessity! It is a divine necessity! It is the “without which not” of Christ’s return and the ‘complete’ fulfillment of ‘all’ the provisions and promises of the covenant (“This is My covenant unto THEM;” Ro 11:25-27). God’s very name and glory is at stake (Ezek 36:22, 32).

One is hard pressed to ignore that Jesus’ very language in Mt 24:21 has obvious direct reference to Dan 12:1. The language is virtually identical. That is no accident. Replacement systems are forced to ignore or play this down. It is a great problem for them. Observe: Daniel, being informed of Jeremiah’s prophecy (Dan 9:2), shows that the time of “Jacob’s trouble” (Jer 30:7) comes at the end of an extended time of exile, the seventy sevens (490 years) of Dan 9:24.

Daniel is interested to show an explanation that will help the dejected exiles to understand why the redemption had been delayed. The returning exiles did not find upon their return the beginnings of a glorious golden new age, as many had been led to expect by the great flourishes of prophetic promise connected with the return. Rather, they met with very disappointing circumstances that fell far short of their ‘great expectations’ engendered by the promises of return that were known to them from the eighth century prophets of the pre-exilic period. At best, it was “a day of small things” (Ezr 3:12; Zech 4:10). Hence, Daniel’s prophecy brought the consolation of a reasonable explanation for ‘the dissonance of delay.’ Daniel’s prophecy would show that the final redemption and the resurrection is not destined to come until AFTER an extended exile of seventy more sevens of years.

Furthermore, Daniel sees the unequaled distress described in Jeremiah’s prophecy of return (Jer 30:6-7) as coming at the last half of the last week, i.e., the last 3 1/2 years (compare Dan 9:27; 11:31 with Dan 12:1-2, 7, 11). It is after the final and unequaled trouble that Daniel’s people (the saved among them) will be delivered and the righteous raised from the dust of the earth (Dan 12:1-2). What could be plainer? The undeniable similarity of language with Jesus’ reference to the great tribulation in Mt 24:21 should make the futurity of the tribulation, and the post-tribulational “first resurrection” of the martyred saints, completely beyond dispute.

Of course, this view requires us to recognize a ‘gap’ between the 69th and 70th weeks of Daniel. This is difficult, but it is not out of keeping with the mystery of Christ’s two comings. Furthermore, if we are not to suppose that prophecy has failed, such a gap must be recognized in many prophecies where the near and partial fulfillment is blended with the distant and complete fulfillment. In many places Christ’s first and second comings are combined in the same prophecy without clear distinction. That distinction waited the time of the revelation of the mystery of the gospel (Acts 3:18-21; Ro 16:25-26; Eph 6:19; 1Pet 1:11).

Although a great mystery, belonging to the one time hidden (Ro 16:25; 1Cor 2:7; Eph 3:9; 6:19; Col 1:26), albeit completely foretold (Lk 24:25-27; Acts 3:18-21; 26:22; Ro 16:26; 1Pet 1:11), Old Testament mystery of Christ, a great parenthesis between the 69th and 70th weeks of Daniel is an exegetical necessity.

If the larger context of the book is to be given first priority in deciding the author’s meaning, there can be no doubt that the “prince” that stops the sacrifice in Dan 9:27 is NOT “Messiah the prince” but “the prince that shall come” (Dan 9:26-27). This is clear; because in every other reference in Daniel, the sacrifice is always stopped by the one who exalts himself (see Dan 8:11; 11:31-37; 12:11).

According to Paul, this is the man who finishes the mystery of iniquity that holds back the return of Christ (2Thes 2:7-8). He is the one who sits in the temple proclaiming himself God (compare Dan 11:36-37 with 2Thes 2:4-8). Paul’s man of sin, and Daniel’s self exalting ‘little horn’ and ‘king of fierce countenance’ is manifestly the final beast who treads down Jerusalem and persecutes the saints for the last 3 1/2 years of unequaled trouble (Dan 7:21-25; 9:27; 12:7, 11; Rev 11:2; 13:5).

Amillennialism tends to be notoriously inconsistent in their doctrine of a future Antichrist. They do not typically recognize that Christ’s return awaits the final revelation of the mystery of iniquity (2Thes 2:7), not merely in some ubiquitous system or spirit, but in a very definitely described individual whom Daniel calls the self exalting, ‘willful king’ (Dan 11:36-37), and whom Paul calls, “the man of sin” (2Thes 2:3-4, 7-8). When Paul is writing to the Thessalonians, this figure has not yet come, but must come and be on the scene at the time of Christ’s return (2Thes 2:7-8; Rev 11:2; 13:5).

Though referred to by many names throughout scripture, and pre-typified by all the great God opposing gentile kingdoms of antiquity, this is the personal “king” spoken of all throughout Daniel’s prophecy (Dan 8:23; 11:21; 11:36). A comparison of Dan 11:36 with 2Thes 2:4 will show beyond reasonable dispute that Paul has this particular king in view.

Throughout Daniel’s prophecy, this king is shown making definite geographical movements and military conquests (Dan 8:9; 11:23-45). He performs very specific acts of violence against Jerusalem and the worship of the Jews. All the prophets foretold of this one whom God would bring against Israel in the latter days (Ezek 38:17). According to both Daniel and Jesus, the desolating sacrilege starts the time of Jerusalem’s final desolation, which is the last three and one half years of unequaled tribulation (Dan 7:21, 25; 9:24; 11:31; 12:7, 11; Mt 24:15-16, 21; Rev 11:2; 12:6, 14; 13:5).

You may remember that I wrote on this in a previous email where I showed the exegetical impossibility of putting the ten kings that are allied with the final beast back in the time of Roman Empire. Rev 17:12 makes such a proposal seem forced to say the least (see the article, Dan 2:44 – The Kingdom Shall Not Be Left to Another People). But this is what amillennial interpreters are forced to do in order to keep the kingdom of Dan 2:44 and the first resurrection of Rev 20:4 in the first century. But what about a last persecution by the beast? What about the ten kings who are contemporaries with a beast who is manifestly the willful king of Dan 11:36, whom Paul says has not yet been revealed (2Thes 2:3-6), but who is present to be destroyed at Christ’s return? (2Thes 2:7-8). These are just some of the many kinds of things that must be ignored in order to dismiss a future millennium and to equate the future “blessed hope” of the church, not with the first resurrection of Rev 20:4, but with the second resurrection of Rev 20:12-13. Go figure!

How can such plain language be overlooked? Why? What culpability before God is implicit in such handling of scripture? What does this portend for millions in the church who have inherited this teaching from their mentors and leaders through centuries of ‘church tradition’? There is no reason why any of these plain statements of revealed truth should be spiritualized or “re-interpreted.” It should be clear that Daniel’s prophecy was manifestly read as both literal and future by the Lord and His first century ‘Jewish’, apocalyptic minded, apostles.

Finally, if a future tribulation and Antichrist is indeed ahead for the church and Israel, and if the knowledge of these things are indeed critical for the church’s preparation, as well as marking the time of Satan’s eviction from heaven and the start of the tribulation (compare Dan 12:1 with Rev 12:7-14), then it seems that these things greatly threaten Satan’s place. He’s in no hurry for this time to come, since it will mean he has lost his place and his time is short (Rev 12:12). This helps explain why things so otherwise plain and accessible should be so strangely hidden and opposed.

These be the days, Reggie

The post The Fundamental Error of Amillennialism appeared first on Mystery of Israel.

Reggie,
Returning to our discussion on the position of some the theological leaders that I know in regards to Israel. One recent discussion brought out Galatians 4:21-31 and Revelation 11:8. The concept was that these scriptures coupled with the Lord’s declaration about the Kingdom being taken away from Israel and given to another made a strong case for the replacement Israel. If the Apostles are making the case that Israel/Jerusalem are relatable to Hagar/Ishmael and Sodom/Egypt respectively, then the attention lavished on Israel is misplaced at best. This, they suggested, is supported by the NT emphasis on the New Jerusalem. Therefore regard for, prayer for Israel, blessing Israel etc., is no more important than any other nation. The scriptural comparison of earthly Jerusalem with Sodom, and the citizenship of the believer in the heavenly Jerusalem, forces the conclusion of a covenantal switch in Messiah. It shows that the Israel focused agenda of many believers is nothing more than a symptom of extra-national identity and hope in concepts outside of a Christ-centered theology. It was also put forth that the MO of Christian agencies to bless Israel and the Jews, with the delegates being told to keep their faith in Jesus quiet, was a troubling but general feature among many in whose theology and ministries Israel stands large.

Dear Noel, If I had more time, my response would have been much shorter. :-). As it is, I’m sending a patch-quilt of notes written over several sittings that left no time to edit out some of the repetition. I can see that I’m not going to have time to do that without making your wait too much longer.

Your question was perfectly suited as a catalyst for some things I’ve been wanting to put down for a long time. More than simply give my view in a brief response, I wanted to provide a complete Bible study on the topic. I didn’t have time to plug in many more scripture references that can be added later. For those not familiar with the literature and the polar viewpoints that exist over the relationship of Israel and the church, some of this will seem quite unnecessary. But those who know something of the intense controversy that swirls over these issues will recognize that I’m offering a mediating view between the extremes of replacement theology and dispensationalism. These are close issues that have been the source of a history of impasse and costly confusion. This is only for those who have wrestled and care deeply for what is at stake in these issues. I’m making this available in this preliminary form to our list of friends, but be forewarned, I didn’t have time to adapt it for easy reading. I want to do that in the future with the help of some friends who have offered their help in that direction. [The question is answered in four parts below]:

Part 1 of the original question: Returning to our discussion on the position of some the theological leaders that I know in regards to Israel. One recent discussion brought out Galatians 4:21-31 and Revelation 11:8. The concept was that these scriptures coupled with the Lord’s declaration about the Kingdom being taken away from Israel and given to another made a strong case for the replacement of Israel.

The scriptures that are cited in your question (Mt 21:43; Gal 4:21-31; Rev 11:8), with many more that could be added, only tell us what we already knew, namely, that the larger part of the nation has condemned itself through unbelief to an extended exile of judgment and displacement; but, not forever! The same Paul, who explains the present use that God has made of Israel’s fall, is equally insistent that Israel’s blindness is only partial and temporary. To its shame, the church has confused the nation’s momentary ‘displacement’ with the unthinkable notion of its permanent ‘replacement’. Against any thought of such a violent breach of covenant, Paul raises his resounding, “God forbid!” (Ro 11:1, 11).

“Thus says the Lord, who gives the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar; the Lord of hosts is His name: If this fixed order departs before Me, declares the Lord, then the offspring of Israel also will cease from being a nation before Me forever. Thus says the Lord, if the heavens above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth be searched out below, then I will also cast off all the offspring of Israel for all that they have done, declares the Lord” (Jer 31:35-37).

As to Jesus’ words, “The kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation producing its fruits” (Mt 21:43), there are two possible interpretations, either of which is entirely reasonable. Both are interesting and merit our study; but of the two viable interpretations, neither can be taken to suggest that Israel has been replaced by the church. Though indeed ‘shared’ with others, the promised inheritance of the nation of the Jews has certainly not permanently passed to others. First, it is possible that Jesus meant nothing more than His contemporaries would have readily understood. When Jesus said, “The kingdom of God will be taken from you and given to a nation producing its fruits” (Mt 21:43), there was never the thought that the nation would not be Israel. Jesus had told His disciples that they would rule over the restored nation in ‘the regeneration when the Son of Man sits on His glorious throne’ (Mt 19:28, as to the time in view, compare Mt 16:27; 25:31; Rev 3:21).

[Note: The Lord’s declaration that His own twelve apostles would bear rule over the restored nation certainly militates against the kind of strict dichotomy that dispensational theology posits between Israel and the church, since the apostles belong to both Israel and the church.]

It was well known that the nation of eschatological promise would be a kingdom of saints (Dan 7:22). Therefore, in Jewish hearing, the nation producing the fruits of the kingdom would be understood to signify the regenerated nation of millennial expectation. It is not the identity of the nation that is being replaced, but the character of its population. Jesus’ language would have never been taken by His contemporaries to imply a different nation, but rather a renewed and regenerate Israel. In the same way that a man must be born again before he can enter the kingdom of God, so must a nation. And so it shall, ‘at once’ and ‘in one day’ (Isa 66:8; Zech 3:9).

Jesus regarded the religious rulers of Israel as representative of an ongoing generation of perpetual apostasy, who, in spiritual continuity with their fathers, “always resists the Holy Spirit” (compare Mt 23:30-39; Acts 7:51). They understood very well that He was predicting their rejection from the holy nation of covenant promise. “They perceived that He spoke of them” (Mt 21:45). It was nothing they had not heard before. The fateful line of division within Israel had already been drawn on the basis of fruits, as denounced by John the Baptist (Mt 3:7-10). Just as Paul will make the same distinction when he says, “They are not all Israel, which are ‘of’ Israel” (Ro 9:6). “It is simply the question of who will constitute the true Israel of God (Gal 6:16).

This denies nothing to Jewish election; but it denies everything to Jewish presumption (Mt 3:9 w/ Jn 8:39). Jewish participation in the kingdom would not be determined by mere natural descent nor by external conformity to the law, but by spiritual regeneration through faith in the rejected cornerstone. This is why “the publicans and harlots go into the kingdom of God before you” (Mt 21:31). It is the same thing that is being stated when Jesus says, “Many shall come from the east and west, and shall sit down with Abraham, and Isaac, and Jacob, in the kingdom of heaven. But the ‘children of the kingdom’ (the natural heirs) shall be cast out into outer darkness …” (Mt 8:10-11).

However, I am convinced that Jesus is saying much more than anyone else could have possibly understood at the time. What began as a “little flock” (Lk 12:32) of Jewish disciples would not long remain little nor entirely Jewish, since Jesus had said, “I have other sheep which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one Shepherd” (Jn 10:16). Such language anticipates the unity of Jew and Gentile in what would soon be revealed as the body of Christ, the “one new man” of New Testament revelation (Eph 2:15; 4:24; Col 3:10).

Therefore, it is clear that Jesus’ references to the gathering of the Gentiles go far beyond the limitations of contemporary Jewish expectation. This would not come to full light until the revelation of the mystery hid in other ages (Eph 3:5; Col 1:26). Jesus alone knew the character of the age that would supervene between His two comings. Jesus guarded a mystery that would accomplish the dual purpose of judgment and salvation (Isa 8:14-17; 53:1, 11; Mk 9:9; Mt 11:25; 16:20; 1Cor 2:7). Though completely foretold in the prophets (Acts 26:22; Ro 16:25-26; 1Pet 1:11), the mystery of Christ’s coming, departure, and return to Israel was intentionally kept secret until the time appointed for its public revelation (Mt 10:27; Mk 9:9; Jn 16:12-13, 25; Acts 3:21; 1Pet 1:12).

So the revelation of the mystery of the gospel (Ro 16:25-26; Eph 6:19) discovers an unexpected interim between the first and second comings of Jesus. Israel’s hope of deliverance at the end of a future great tribulation remains fully intact. But the mystery reveals that Israel’s deliverance after the final tribulation (Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1) will be accomplished by the return of the once rejected cornerstone (Zech 12:10; Mt 23:39; Ro 11:25-26). Until that time, the nation of promise is bound over to an age long hardening that continues ‘until’ the Deliverer’s return from heaven at the day of the Lord (Mic 5:3; Hos 5:15; Acts 3:21; Ro 11:26-27 w/ Isa 59:16-21; 63:4-5).

Jesus is revealed to Israel as the rejected and pierced King of the Jews at the end of what Jeremiah calls, “the time of Jacob’s trouble,” (Jer 30:7; Mic 5:3-4; Zech 12:10 w/ Mt 23:39; Joel 2:31-32; Mt 24:29). A comparison of passages shows this to be the time of the final and unequaled tribulation spoken of specifically by Daniel and Jesus (Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1; Mt 24:21). This is when “the Deliverer comes out of Zion” to re-engraft the ‘natural branches’ back into the life and sap of their own covenant olive tree (Ro 11:26 w/ Isa 59:19-21). “From that day and forward” (Isa 66:8; Ezek 39:22), ‘all Israel’ will exist as a new and living nation with an entirely regenerate Jewish population (Isa 54:13; 59:21; 60:21; Jer 31:34; 32:39-40; Zeph 3:13).

Of course, the replacement position will dispute whether the covenant is fulfilled in the future day of the Lord with a literal Jewish nation. But if not, why not? On what grounds can it be shown with certainty that a Jewish remnant will not be brought to faith at the ‘set time’? (Ps 102:13; Dan 8:19; 11:27, 35)? What precludes their restoration? Can it be that Paul’s anguish for their return is not ours? Are we to suppose that Paul’s unquenchable passion for Israel’s salvation is merely his personal sentiment as a Jew? Or is it a special burden of the Holy Spirit that is related to the glory of God and the vindication of His name and covenant, perhaps more than we have adequately considered?

The manifestation of a hidden parenthesis in the plan of God establishes the time frame in which the prophecy of Moses would be fulfilled concerning God’s threat to provoke faithless Israel to jealousy with a ‘no people’ and to anger them with a ‘foolish nation’ (Deut 32:21). The term ‘foolish nation’ used in such close reference to “those who are no people” leaves no doubt that Israel would be made jealous by Gentiles. According to Paul, it is the anomaly of Gentiles receiving the blessings of the covenant in Israel’s place. This is not the way the prophets usually depict the relationship of the nations to millennial Israel. The contrast is radical. There, the nations are blessed through Israel’s restoration after a great world crisis called the day of the Lord. Whereas, here, the salvation of the Gentiles comes through Israel’s fall. This startling development took Israel by surprise.

It was well known that with the Israel’s deliverance, the Gentiles would come to the light of Israel’s rising (Isa 61:1-11; Zech 8:23). But the incorporation of the Gentiles into the same body with the elect of Israel to a full and equal share in the covenants of promise belongs to the mystery not revealed in other ages (Eph 3:5-6; Col 1:26-27). This stands in remarkable contrast to the blessing of the nations that is usually depicted in connection with Israel’s millennial restoration.

The prophetic mystery of the Old Testament exhibits a remarkable symmetry that can be clearly traced once the key of Messiah’s twice coming is applied. During the time that God is provoking Israel to jealousy by a ‘not a people’, He is also hiding His face from the faithless nation (Deut 31:17-18; 32:20; Isa 8:17; 64:7; Ezek 39:23-24; Mic 3:4). But this too, is represented as a temporary situation. The face of God is hidden from Israel only until the Spirit is poured out on the penitent remnant at the day of the Lord (Isa 8:17; 54:8; Ezek 39:29; Joel 2:28-32; Zech 12:10), which is always depicted as coming at the end of the last and unequaled tribulation (Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1 compare also Joel 2:31-32; w/ Mt 24:29).

So, it is quite clear that Moses’ prophecy of a “foolish nation” can only have reference to the present gathering of the Gentiles between the advents. Although the conditions and means by which the Gentiles would be blessed through Abraham’s seed could not have been understood before the appointed time of revelation, it was foretold nonetheless. Paul will make great use of Moses’ prophecy to show that what has taken so many by surprise was fully anticipated in the prophetic scriptures (Ro 10:19; 11:11).

[Side note: The careful point that the mystery of Christ has its basis in the prophetic writings of the Old Testament (Acts 26:22; Ro 16:25-26) is intended to underscore a significant difference with the dispensational interpretation of the mystery. You may know that classic dispensationalism teaches that persons saved after the rapture do not belong to the body of Christ. This is the theory of ‘two peoples of God’, which I see as a theological error. It is another example of the kind of confusion concerning the relationship of Israel and the church that has reigned throughout most of church history. In the dispensational view, the church is a new mystery organism, which begins at Pentecost and terminates its existence on earth at the rapture. It is a hallmark of dispensationalism that the church belongs to a mystery age, which by definition, is entirely ‘un-anticipated’ by anything foretold in prophecy. In dispensational theology, the mystery of Christ (Eph 3:4) signifies the creation of an entirely new people of God. In this view, the body of Christ constitutes a separate entity from Israel, which consists only of believers living between Pentecost and the rapture. In contrast, our view of the mystery does not see the creation of a new entity, but the revelation of the incarnational relationship of Christ to all saints who have ever been made alive by Spirit and the Word (Mk 12:27; Jn 3:6; Ro 8:9; 1Cor 6:17; Col 1:27; 1Pet 1:11, 23). The revelation of the believer’s mystical union with Christ through the Spirit as members of His one body derives from the central revelation of the mystery of the incarnation and the gospel. The gospel is also called a mystery (Eph 6:19; 1Tim 3:16), but this mystery is completely foretold in prophecy (Acts 26:22; Ro 1:2; 16:26; 1Cor 15:3). This was an important point in the apologetics of the early church, namely, can what is being proclaimed be verified and demonstrated to conform to what stands written in the Old Testament scriptures? (Acts 26:22; Ro 16:25-26). Therefore, the revelation the church as the body of Christ should not be interpreted to mean that an entirely new people of God have been created with no past or future continuity with Israel. This error is based on dispensationalism’s misconception of the mystery.]

With this as background, it is possible that the Lord has the ‘foolish nation’ of Moses’ prophecy in mind in His reference to ‘a nation’ producing fruits worthy of the kingdom. In which case, it would also be a nation that is divinely intended to move Israel to jealousy, which Paul applies to the church of this present age in its predominantly Gentile configuration (Deut 32:21; Ro 10:19; 11:11). So the revelation of the mystery has brought to light the time and circumstance of the fulfillment of Moses’ mysterious prophecy that God would move Israel to jealousy with a ‘not a people’ and provoke them to anger with a ‘foolish nation’ (Deut 32:21; Acts 15:14; Ro 10:19; 11:11). So it is altogether possible that Jesus’ threat to transfer the kingdom to ‘a nation producing its fruits’ has in mind the church of this age.

Whether Jesus intends the church of the present age or Israel of the future regeneration (Mt 19:28), there can be no basis at all to interpret Jesus’ words to imply an end to Israel’s national inheritance. That would be a fantastic leap of presumption, particularly since the very same prophecy that describes the provocation of Israel by a ‘not a people’ and a ‘foolish nation’ belongs to a section of scripture called, the Song of Moses (Deut 32:1-43). The famed prophetic song given as a memorial of witness to Israel’s inevitable future rebellion does not end in final blindness and displacement by another people, but in the revived nation’s everlasting salvation and the greater blessing of the nations of the Gentiles (Deut 32:36, 43).

The unexpected character of this present age is based on the revelation of a mystery that was fully foretold in the prophetic scriptures of the Old Testament (Acts 3:18-21; Acts 26:22; Ro 1:2; 16:25-26; 1Cor 15:3; Eph 6:19; 1Pet 1:11). But the discovery of a hidden age between Messiah’s first coming and return does nothing to change the promises that will yet be fulfilled to Israel in a coming day of the Lord. Nothing of the church’s present appropriation of the blessings of the New Covenant does anything to deny their future fulfillment to Israel. Nor does the present application of some of Israel’s promises to the church justify the ‘reinterpretation’ of Israel’s promises, as advocated by the hermeneutics of amillennialism. The revelation that brings the powers of the ‘age to come’ (Heb 6:5) into the present through the Holy Spirit should not be taken to mean that the original promise has been reinterpreted. The present fulfillment of some of Israel’s covenant promises does not preempt the plenary future fulfillment, which will yet conform to every detail of the context and intent of the original author’s language.

The end of this present age is not the end of historical time. Unless one’s theology has led to the spiritualization or denial of a future millennium, there is another age beyond the present evil age. Scripture is clear that a millennium lies beyond the destruction of the Antichrist, but before the final perfection (Dan 7:11 w/ Rev 19:20; 2Thes 2:2-3, 8; Rev 16:13-15; 20:4). This is the time on which all the prophets hang every outstanding and unfulfilled promise to Israel (Acts 3:21; Ro 11:27).

The church’s misplacement and spiritualization of the millennium, is in keeping with its historic disregard of the Jew, since the millennium exists for the sake of the further fulfillment of the still remaining covenant promises to Israel. For this very purpose, Jewish identity has been miraculously preserved. The early church did not see the present age as the last, but understood itself as the first fruits of a larger eschatological harvest. The restoration of the kingdom to Israel was never a question of whether but when (Acts 1:6; 3:18-21; Ro 11:25-29).

Even before the later revelation of its duration (Rev 20:2-7), an age beyond the present evil age was demanded by the promise of a new and everlasting covenant. The golden age of promise would begin with what the prophets called the day of the Lord. So, the everlasting covenant is the why, the day of the Lord is the when, and the literal Land of promise is the where of all of Israel’s promises of national restoration. There is no prophecy capable of literal fulfillment that is not also capable of millennial fulfillment.

Living before the revelation of the mystery, the prophets were unaware of two distinct comings of the Messiah (1Pet 1:11), and of the relationship of Messiah’s first coming to what can now be seen as the atoning “blood of the everlasting covenant” (Lk 22:20; Heb 13:20). Not seeing the period between the advents, the prophets view the New Covenant as established with Israel AFTER the apocalyptic tribulation (Isa 59:16-21; w/ Isa 63:3-6; Jer 30:6-24; 31:31-34; 32:37-43; w/ Dan 12:1-2). While the first coming of Christ reveals a mystery that opens access to the everlasting salvation promised to Israel in the New Covenant, it changes nothing of the literal fulfillment of the outstanding promises that wait to be established with Israel at the still future day of the Lord. This is why Paul sees the covenant as unfinished until it has reached its goal in the salvation of ‘all Israel’ (Ro 11:26,27).

Therefore, the theologians of replacement are wrong to call Christ’s first coming “the climax of the covenant” (N.T. Wright). According to Paul’s interpretation of the prophets, the covenant reaches beyond Christ’s first coming to its true climax in the restoration of Israel. I see no reason why theologians who recognize the well established ‘already and not yet’ pattern of kingdom fulfillment (‘inaugurated eschatology’), find it so difficult to conceive of Israel’s restoration as a distinctly Jewish nation at the day of the Lord. They have yet to show a compelling theological reason why not.

In the eschatology of the Old Testament, Israel is delivered with the destruction of the Antichrist at the end of the last and unequaled tribulation. This is also the time that the righteous dead are raised (Dan 12:1-2). This is the time that the prophets designate as the day of the Lord. The same order of events is repeated in the New Testament. Only now, it is clearly Jesus who is returning at the day of the Lord to destroy the Antichrist, raise the dead, and deliver Israel (see 2Thes 2:3-8; Ro 11:26; Rev 16:14-15).

The revealed secret has indeed introduced the well known ‘already and not yet’ structure of New Testament eschatology, but there is nothing in that structure that precludes the restoration of the Jewish nation to covenant favor in the ‘not yet’ of a future day of the Lord. Such assured denial cannot be the product of a comprehensive exegesis but of philosophical presuppositions based on isolated texts interpreted out of context.

It is a much later development in church history that began to interpret the warnings directed against apostasy within the nation to mean that Israel was to be finally replaced by the church. As already stated, the revelation of an unexpected parenthesis between the two advents of Christ does nothing to change the time that all the prophets said Israel’s blindness would end, namely, at the day of the Lord. But the abundance of evidence from both testaments could hardly be plainer Israel’s apostasy from covenant favor is never forever; it is only ever “until….” (Acts 3:21; Ro 11:25; Lk 21:24; Mt 23:39; Mic 5:3; Hos 5:15 etc.)

As Jesus would later say to these same Pharisees and principal rulers, “Behold, your house is left unto you desolate. For I tell you, you will not see Me again, UNTIL you shall say, ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord’” (Mt 23:39). Jesus knew that the present ‘generation’ of continual apostasy (Mt 17:17; 23:33, 36) would fulfill the prophets in condemning Him (Acts 13:27). As it is written, “They shall smite the ruler of Israel (the Davidic king from Bethlehem) with a rod upon the cheek … For this cause; He (Yahweh) will give them up …” But note that the ‘giving up’ of Israel is never forever. It is only “until the time when she who travails has given birth (Jacob’s trouble); then the rest of His (Messiah’s) brothers shall return to the people of Israel. And He (Messiah) shall stand and shepherd his flock in the strength of the Lord, in the majesty of the name of the Lord his God. And they shall abide securely, for now He (Messiah) shall be great to the ends of the earth” (Christ’s millennial reign from Jerusalem over all nations; Mic 5:1-4).

So which is the nation that produces the fruits of the kingdom? Is it the church? Or is it the reconstituted nation of covenant promise? In light of the revealed secret, either answer is possible, provided we rightly define the church, and understand its relation to the nation of Israel, not as its replacement, but as grafted into a continuity of covenant heritage that remains incomplete until the return of the Jewish branches.

Our view of Israel and the church will be greatly determined by how we interpret the mystery. Does the mystery not revealed in other ages mean that the covenant with Israel has been completely fulfilled with the church, as the “new Israel” of the Spirit, replacing forever the historical nation? Or does the mystery reveal the church as a separate people of God with its own promises and destiny, as in dispensational thought?

I believe that much of the confusion lies in how we define the church. We need to recover the context of the church’s original self understanding. As a people living ‘between the times’, the early church saw itself as sent on a joyous, but serious and urgent mission of witness to announce the good news of the kingdom and to warn of an imminent ‘wrath to come’ (Mt 3:7; 24:14; Mk 9:1; 1Cor 7:26). The early church understood itself as existing in continuity with the righteous remnant of Israel (Ro 9:23-24; 11:4-5), and as the first fruits of a greater eschatological harvest that anticipates the restoration of Israel at Christ’s return (Acts 1:6; 3:21; Ro 11:25-27).

So regardless of how many Gentiles may be grafted “in among them,” (Ro 11:17) to partake in “the commonwealth of Israel” (Eph 2:12), the essential nature of the church is not changed. It is not an end for itself; it remains a ‘first fruits’ of a larger eschatological harvest that must ‘necessarily’ include the regeneration and restoration of Israel as a distinctly Jewish nation. This shows the true nature of the temporal distinction and essential continuity between Israel and the church. Though momentarily distinct, the church and the nation will ultimately be one, when ‘all Israel’ will finally exist as an entirely regenerate nation (Isa 59:21; 60:21; Jer 31:34).

In this view, the church doesn’t replace Israel; but as a tribulation people witnessing to the prophetic mystery of Christ (Acts 26:22 w/ Ro 16:25-26), it prepares the way for Israel’s sudden rebirth at the post-tribulational day of the Lord. With the national rebirth of Israel, the purpose of the church for this present age is completed. It does not, however, mean the completion of God’s purpose for the church on earth, as in dispensational teaching. The nation of Israel will then be the distinctly Jewish part of the body of Christ in its distinctive millennial arrangement.

[Note: Replacement theology denies continuity with Israel in one way and dispensationalism denies it in another. Replacement theology makes the church the new Israel, as it denies literal fulfillment to the many scriptures that promise the reconstitution of Israel as a distinctly Jewish nation. Dispensationalism, on the other hand, denies continuity with Israel based on its view that the church is a heavenly people, separate in calling and destiny from Israel. This strict dichotomy between the church and Israel is the basis for dispensationalism’s doctrine of a pre-tribulational rapture. The rapture becomes a necessary inference if the church is to be seen as a mystery organism, occupying the gap between the 69th and 70th weeks of Daniel (Dan 9:24). As such, the church is separate and detached from God’s prophetic program for Israel. This is why the so-called church age is considered to end before the resumption of Old Testament prophecy concerning the tribulation. In this way, the church’s hope is distinguished from Israel’s hope. In the dispensational view, the church is looking for an any moment return of Christ that is not signaled by any preceding events of prophecy. In contrast, Israel’s hope awaits the return of Christ after the tribulation. This is the basis for dispensationalism’s theory of two peoples of God]

As first fruits and heirs of Israel’s covenant privileges through the gift of the Spirit, the church personifies all the ideals of Israel’s national calling to be priests, servant, and light to the Gentiles (Isa 42:6; 49:6; 61:6; Acts 13:47; 26:23). Although the point is debated among premillennialists, many believe that nothing is taken from God’s future election of Israel if the church of the interim is appropriately called, “the true circumcision” (Ro 2:26, 28-29; Phil 3:3), or “the Israel of God” (Gal 6:16).

Peter can certainly refer to the church metaphorically as a ‘holy nation’ (1Pet 2:9). As the corporate ‘seed of Abraham’, the church inherits many, certainly the most important, of Israel’s covenant promises. How could it not, since with no other people were the promises made? The specific millennial promises to the nation (as a distinctly Jewish nation), though in some aspects shared with the spiritual seed of Abraham, are not thereby removed from Israel.

The promise that the nations would partake in Israel’s blessings was never imagined to cancel or reinterpret the great number of highly descript and detailed national promises that were never transferred to the church as the so-called, “new Israel” of replacement theology. That is the really misguided reckoning of a church that has historically boasted itself against the branches to its own incalculable loss.

As Paul warned, ignorance of ‘this mystery’ exposes the church to the pride of presumption, as it robs the church of an apprehension of the true nature of the grace by which it stands. But what is worse, it robs God of our fuller appreciation of such an extravagant display of divine glory, and of its unspeakable cost. We have only to see Paul’s enraptured response to such a sweeping vision of glory to imagine what ignorance of this mystery has cost the church throughout the centuries (Ro 11:25-36).

The coming glory of Israel’s return detracts nothing from the revelation of glory in the church (Eph 3:21; 1Tim 3:15). Particularly, when it is understood that it is not a choice between Israel and the church, since to be ‘in Christ’ is to be in His body (Eph 1:22-23). Through the revelation of the gospel, “the powers of the age to come” (Heb 6:5) have appeared in unexpected advance of the day of the Lord, as earnest and first fruits. The kingdom of God is already present in power and revelation through the eschatological promise of the Spirit. However, nothing of this present blessedness that has come ‘already’ to the church should be seen as altering any of the promises that remain to be fulfilled with regards to Israel after the great tribulation and in the millennium beyond. What has come to the church will come to Israel.

An Israel that has come to Christ has become church. The promise that ‘a nation’ will be “born in one day” (Isa 66:8; Zech 3:9; Ezek 39:22), tells us that the same Spirit which now baptizes believers into the one body of Christ, will at that future time, baptize the saved remnant of Israel into the same body, as the Spirit is poured out on the “escaped of Israel” (Isa 4:2) in the coming day of the Lord (compare Isa 59:21; Ezek 36:26-27; 39:29; Joel 2:28-31; Zech 12:10; w/ Zech 13:9).

In the same way, the revelation of the ‘sealed vision’ (see Isa 8:16; 28:9-13; 29:11; 53:1; Dan 9:24; 12:4, 9; Hab 2:2-3), that has come already to the church through the ‘mystery of the gospel’ (Eph 6:19), will break upon the understanding of the penitent remnant ‘in that day’ (compare Isa 8:14-17; w/ Ezek 39:29 and Zech 12:10). [Note: It is instructive to notice the relationship of the Spirit to the revelation of the gospel. First to the pilgrims gathered in Jerusalem at Pentecost (Acts 3:18-21; 1Pet 1:12), and again to the penitent survivors of the last tribulation (Ezek 39:29; Joel 2:28-29; Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1; Zech 12:10 ). It is the significant relationship between revelation and the Spirit in relation to every advance of the kingdom of God.]

As it is false to say that the church replaces Israel, it is equally false to say that Israel replaces the church (assuming we understand the church of God to include all who are born of the Spirit). In that day, believers from other nations will be no less the body of Christ. This is understood, because, contrary to dispensational teaching, it is impossible to be born of the Spirit of Christ and not be part of His body (Ro 8:9; 12:5; 1Cor 6:17; 10:17; 12:13; Eph 2:16, 18; 4:4, 7; Col 1:27).

[Note: You may know that dispensationalism teaches a “reversal of Pentecost” at the rapture (John F. Walvoord). In this view, the Holy Spirit ‘did not’ indwell believers in the Old Testament. He ‘will not’ indwell tribulation believers and those that come to faith in the millennium. Only the body of Christ (a term that dispensationalists limit to believers living between Pentecost and the pre-tribulational rapture) can experience the indwelling of Christ’s Spirit. But the Spirit being given once and for all after Jesus was glorified (Jn 7:39) is no more capable of being retracted than the glory of Christ is capable of being reversed. Such alleged reversal of Pentecost is a theological absurdity. On the contrary, the mystery of the incarnation reveals that the same “Spirit of Christ” that now indwells the church (Col 1:27) also indwelt the saints of old (Gen 41:38; Ex 31:3; Num 27:18; Neh 9:30; Ps 51:10; Isa 63:11 Dan 4:18; Mt 22:23; Jn 3:6; 6:63; Ro 8:14; 1Cor 2:12, 14; Gal 4:29; compare especially Ro 8:9 w/ 1Pet 1:11).]

However, a literal reading of the covenant and prophecy leads to the conclusion that God, for the sake of His own name and testimony, will preserve a distinction (not separation) between the church in the nations, and the Jews in their specially ordained relationship to the Land. The body of Christ is not confined to this dispensation. It will exist in the millennium, but with this difference: Although there will be local assemblies of the body of Christ throughout the millennial earth, only the Jewish population of the nation of Israel will be entirely regenerate (Jer 31:34). This is completely supernatural and without precedent.

The prophetic depictions of post-tribulational Israel show that the restored nation of re-born Jews will serve a unique purpose and special stewardship over the Land during the millennium. Such special election never means superiority (Ro 12:4). It means God has decided something for His own purpose, which often exists to test the heart while it drives home some great point of divine contention. It will be so when in one Land only, one nation, “born in one day” (Isa 66:8; Zech 3:9), will exists “from that day and forward” (Ezek 39:22) as an entirely regenerate people (Isa 4:3; 54:13; 59:21; 60:21; Jer 31:34). (see Isa 4:3; 54:10, 13; 59:21; 60:21; 66:22; Jer 31:34; 32:40; Ezek 39:28-29; Zeph 3:13 et al).

When these required conditions will exist in ‘literal’ fulfillment of the covenant, there will be no further need for evangelism among the Jewish inhabitants of millennial Israel (Jer 31:34). Such uniformity of salvation will be unique to Israel alone (Isa 61:9; 62:12). It is not promised to any other nation, since we know form a number of passages that not all nations will give equal obedience to Christ’s millennial rule (Ps 2:9; Isa 26:10; 60:12; Zech 14:17; Rev 2:27). This amazing demonstration of God’s covenant faithfulness to Israel will be in open display throughout the millennium. “Many shall see it, and fear, and trust in the Lord” (Ps 40:3).

Only the salvation of ‘all Israel’ could ever fulfill the conditions of the ‘everlasting covenant’, because a mere remnant could never guarantee permanent possession of the Land. It is crucial that we recognize the place of the Land in the covenant. Everlasting inheritance of the Land was one of the promises of the everlasting covenant (Gen 13:5; 17:8; Lev 26:42; Deut 30:5-6; 2Sam 7:10; Ps 105:10; Jer 23:6; 31:31-34; 32:39-41; Ezek 34:27; etc.). But a later covenant (“the law, which was four hundred and thirty years after;” Gal 3:17), showed that abiding security in the Land was conditional on continual obedience. This raised the classic tension between the conditional and unconditional elements within the covenant (or between the covenants). How can the Land ever be sure to a people prone to backslide? The answer, of course, is the bringing in of a New Covenant of regeneration, which assures special divine enablement through the gift of the Holy Spirit.

Reading the Land covenant quite literally, and utterly pessimistic concerning what is ‘in man’ (Jer 10:23; Jn 2:25; Ro 7:18), the prophets looked for something far more enduring than another transient revival. This is why the prophets looked for the establishment of the New Covenant in connection with the apocalyptic events of the day of the Lord. Only such a radical divine intervention would be sufficient to “bring in an everlasting righteousness” (Jer 32:40 w/ Dan 9:24). Not merely for a remnant, but for ‘all Israel’. “No more shall every man teach his neighbor, and everyman his brother, saying, ‘Know the Lord,’ for they shall all know Me, from the least to the greatest of them, says the Lord” (Jer 31:34).

Only an unfaltering and enduring righteousness can guarantee that the Land will never be lost again. This is the guiding presupposition behind the eschatology of the Old Testament. The problem of the conditionality of the Land promise finds solution in a New Covenant and a future day of the Lord, because only an apocalyptic transformation of judgment and regeneration can establish the conditions necessary for Israel’s secure permanence in the Land. Take away the literalness of the Land promise and you destroy the logic of the covenant on which the prophets based their view of the future.

The end of the age is compared to a woman’s travail. This suggests that the great themes that have characterized the age in general will reach an unprecedented climactic intensity just before Christ’s return. This is shown by the apocalyptic revelation of the last 3 ½ years (Dan 7:25; 9:24; 12:7, 11; Rev 11:2-3; 12:6, 14; 13:5). Such a convergence of events suggests that he church, as the prophetic people of the Spirit, will have a crucial role of witness to the significance of prophetic events in their relation to the gospel. The same urgent witness that will make its last appeal to the nations will also come into the consciousness of an unwary Jewish people, as preparation for the day of national salvation.

Significantly, with the national rebirth of Israel, the purpose of the church for this present age is completed. [Note: I say the “church of this age,” because unlike dispensational theology, I do not believe the church is confined only to the present dispensation, but is composed of everyone who has ‘the Spirit of Christ’(Ro 8:9) in this or any other age (1Pet 1:11), including the future millennium (Ezek 39:29; Joel 2:28; Zech 12:10). So it is scriptural to speak of the ‘church of this age’, but never does the scripture call this “the church age”, simply because the church is not confined to the inter-advent period).]

However, the purpose of God for the nations is not complete, since with Christ’ return, a newly liberated Jerusalem becomes the beacon of evangelical witness to the nations (Isa 2:3; 11:9, 12; 25:7; 49:12, 22; 55:5; 60:3; 5, 9; 61:9, 11; 62:2; 66:19-10; Zech 2:11; 8:22-23). So far from bringing an end to Gentile salvation, the restoration of Israel at Christ’s return brings an exponential increase. “Now if their fall means riches for the world, and their failure means riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their fullness mean!” (Ro 11:12). “For if their rejection means the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance mean but life from the dead?” (Ro 11:15).

With Christ’s return at the last trumpet (1Cor 15:52), the mystery of God is finished (Rev 10:7; 11:15) and all the surviving seed of Israel is born at once, in one day (Isa 66:8; Ezek 39:22; Zech 3:9). The spiritually alert should take special notice that this significantly related convergence of events has been obscured by both the principal schools of prophetic interpretation. Not only by the view that replaces Israel, but also by the view that removes the church from the tribulation, and thus from any active participation or role in Israel’s restoration. The return of Jesus doesn’t happen in a vacuum. His coming brings the day of the Lord, the destruction of the Antichrist, the resurrection of the dead, and the new birth of the Jewish nation. Significantly, when the Jews believe, the church is glorified.

It must be more than coincidental that the church is translated into glorified immortality at the very instant that the crucified Messiah is being revealed to the penitent survivors of the unequaled tribulation (Isa 59:19-21; Joel 2:31-32; 3:14-16; Jer 30:7; Dan 12:1-2; Zech 12:10; Mt 23:39; 24:29; 2Thes 2:8; Ro 11:25-27). In addition to the new understanding that the day of the Lord is the second coming of the crucified Jesus, the eschatology of the New Testament introduces the revelation of the mystery that living believers do not enter the millennium in natural bodies, but are suddenly ‘caught up’ and translated into glorified immortality “at the last trump” (1Cor 15:52; 1Thes 4:16-17).

Since it is clear that ‘all’ who belong to Christ are either raised from the dead or translated at this time (1Cor 15:23, 51-52; 1Thes 4:14). And since after Christ’s return, the saved Jewish remnant is depicted as entering the millennium in their natural bodies, it should be apparent that Israel’s national repentance and regeneration is simultaneous with the church’s translation at the last trump.

[Note: Since it was well known that the Lord’s return “after the tribulation” (Mt 24:29) is connected with “the great sound of a trumpet” (Mt 24:31), it is doubtful that Paul would have called any earlier trumpet, “the last” (1Cor 15:52). The time of the ‘last trump’ could hardly be more evident, since Paul so clearly connects Isaiah’s reference to the post-tribulational resurrection of the Old Testament saints to the time of the church’s resurrection by the words, “Then shall be brought to pass the saying which is written …” (compare Isa 25:7-8 with 1Cor 15:52-54).]

If Paul’s ‘last trump’ is rightly associated with the trumpet that sounds in connection with Jesus’ return after the tribulation (Mt 24:31; 1Cor 15:52 with Rev 10:7; 11:15-18), it should not fail our notice that the Old Testament background for the trumpet that ends one age and begins another is found in Isa 27:13. “And it shall come to pass in that day, that the great trumpet shall be blown, and they shall come, which were ready to perish in the land of Assyria, and the outcasts in the land of Egypt, and shall worship the Lord in the holy mount at Jerusalem.”

It seems evident beyond reasonable dispute that the trumpet that signals the beginning of the new exodus back to the Land (Isa 27:12-13) is also the same trumpet that gathers together the elect (Mt 24:31; 2Thes 2:1), raises the dead in Christ, and translates living believers at Christ’s return (1Cor 15:23, 51-52; 1Thes 4:14-17). This suggests that at the same time the church is being translated, the surviving remnant of Israel, prepared by the sufferings of Jacob’s trouble and by the prophetic witness of the church, is quickened by the Spirit to recognize the returning Jesus as their once rejected King, and to say with one voice, “Blessed is He who cometh …” (Zech 12:10; Mt 23:39; Rev 1:7). The sudden conversion of the Jewish remnant bears a remarkable likeness to God’s sovereign arrest of Paul on the Damascus road. It is also reminiscent of the bitter-sweet glory typified in Joseph’s revelation of himself to his brethren (Mic 5:3-4).

However, the saved remnant of Israel is not translated with the church, but as new born Spirit filled believers, they begin the long trek back to the Land from places of flight and wilderness refuge (Isa 11:11-16 with Isa 27:12-13; 35:1-2, 10; 40:3; 41:18; 42:11; 43:19). They are helped on their way by willing and grateful Gentiles (Isa 49:22; 60:9; 66:20; w/ Zech 8:23). This too is remarkable and without precedent. It suggests that the final tribulation has effected a great humbling of the nations. So that with the finishing of the mystery of God at Christ’s return, the Gentiles survivors of the tribulation judgments will begin to understand the meaning of recent events (Ezek 39:23; Rev 10:7).

This will be the awesome demonstration of God’s sovereignty in judgment and grace that is being set before all nations in vindication of His covenant when this people in particular has been finally turned and brought into the Land, never to slide back again (Ezek 20:41; 36:23; 39:27). So while the transfer of the kingdom to “a nation producing its fruits” does not exclude the church, it certainly does not terminate on the church of this dispensation, but necessarily looks on ahead to “the regeneration” (Mt 19:28) when ‘all Israel’ will be holy (Isa 60:21; 62:12).

The mystery revealed in the New Testament reveals that the “everlasting righteousness” of covenant promise is none other than the righteousness of God in Christ imputed to every justified believer (Isa 45:17, 24-25; Jer 32:40; Dan 9:24 w/ Jer 23:5-6; Ro 1:17; 3:25-26; Phil 3:9). The revelation of this righteousness, which has come already to the church through the gospel, will be revealed to the penitent survivors of Israel at the day of the Lord when the Spirit is poured out on the reborn nation (Isa 59:19-21; 66:8; Ezek 39:22-29; Joel 2:29-31; Zech 12:10).

[Note: It is another discussion, but I believe it can be shown from Daniel’s prophecy of the 70 weeks (Dan (9:24-27), that the ‘everlasting righteousness’ of covenant promise that has come to the church at the end of the 69th week, will come to Israel at the end of the 70th week. This hidden parenthesis between the 69th and 70th weeks of Daniel is in perfect keeping with the profound Old Testament mystery of Christ’s twofold advent. It is a parenthesis that appears in many scriptures where both comings of Christ are blended in the same prophecy without clear distinction. And also in many passages where near and distant aspects of prophecy are combined. So all conservative schools of prophetic interpretation must acknowledge some form of ‘gap’ between the prefiguring events of antiquity and their eschatological antitype.]

In their belief that the covenant promised the literal Land of Israel to the Jewish people for an everlasting possession, the prophets are confronted with a profound problem. We might call it, ‘the dilemma of the covenant’. The question that presents itself is how can permanent inheritance of the Land ever be sure and secure to nation prone to backslide? What would it take to establish the conditions necessary for a particular race of people to lie down in safety in a divinely designated Land, so that never again will the might of the Gentiles make them afraid?

That is the language of the covenant (Lev 25:18-19; 26:5-6; Ezek 34:28; Mic 4:4; Hos 2:18; Zeph 3:13; Zech 14:11). It is also the dilemma of the covenant, what some have called the problem of ‘covenant jeopardy’. The prophets saw the solution in the hope of a climactic apocalyptic transformation that would accomplish at once the breaking of the power of the Gentiles and the spiritual rebirth of the nation (Isa 66:8 with Ezek 39:22-29). The threat of further judgment and dispersion would be abolished forever by the ‘bringing in’ of an unfailing ‘everlasting righteousness’ (Isa 32:17-18; 45:24-25; 46:13; 54:14, 17; 61:3, 10-11; 62:1-2; Jer 23:6; 32:40; Dan 9:24).

The stress is on ‘everlasting’, because, as history has shown, a righteous remnant was never enough to prevent Israel from going into exile. Even the occasional revivals of Israel, with their transient reforms, were never enough. Therefore, the righteousness that is sufficient to preserve the nation in the Land ‘forever’ must itself be everlasting (Isa 45:17). Furthermore, it must extend to all, “from the least to the greatest” (Jer 31:34). But what if a generation should arise that forgets the work of God? Wouldn’t this put the covenant back into jeopardy? Not if the same promise of an irreversible eternal salvation is divinely guaranteed to every child born to Jewish parentage from that time and forward. Listen to the scripture.

“And all thy children shall be taught of the Lord; and great shall be the peace of thy children” (Isa 54:13 w/ Jn 6:45).

“As for me, this is my covenant with them, says the Lord; My spirit that is upon thee, and my words which I have put in thy mouth, shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed’s seed, says the Lord, from henceforth and for ever” (Isa 59:21 w/ Ro 11:27).

“Thy people also shall be all righteous: they shall inherit the land for ever, the branch of my planting, the work of my hands, that I may be glorified” (Isa 60:21).

“And their seed shall be known among the Gentiles, and their offspring among the people: all that see them shall acknowledge them, that they are the seed which the Lord hath blessed” (Isa 61:9).

“For as the new heavens and the new earth, which I will make, shall remain before me, says the Lord, so shall your seed and your name remain.” (Isa 66:22).

“And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor, and every man his brother, saying, Know the Lord: for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, says the Lord; for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more” (Jer 31:34).

“And I will give them one heart, and one way, that they may fear me for ever, for the good of them, and of their children after them: And I will make an everlasting covenant with them, that I will not turn away from them, to do them good; but I will put my fear in their hearts, that they shall not depart from me. Yea, I will rejoice over them to do them good, and I will plant them in this land assuredly with my whole heart and with my whole soul. (Jer 32:39-41).

“The remnant of Israel shall not do iniquity, nor speak lies; neither shall a deceitful tongue be found in their mouth: for they shall feed and lie down, and none shall make them afraid” (Zeph 3:13).

These are just a few of the many passages that define the everlasting covenant that shall stand with Israel forever. This is too fantastic for many to believe for the Jewish nation. But Calvinists have believed it for the church in a spiritualized form. Whereas, the Roman church and most of non-Reformed Christendom sees such extravagant promises as possible of fulfillment only in heaven. But this is how the covenant reads! It reverberates all throughout the NT, particularly in such passages as John 6 and Romans 8.

Of course, if these promises are spiritualized, there is no dilemma, and the whole logic of the covenant breaks down, as also the glory that its miraculous fulfillment intends to display. It is the extravagant boldness of the promise that magnifies the glory of God when it is fulfilled literally, ‘against all odds’, in real space-time history. The covenant and the glory of the God, who swore by Himself alone, can be satisfied with nothing short of such an open vindication of His name and covenant before men and angels. This will be history’s consummate answer to the insidious question, “Has God really said?” (Gen 3:1).

We need to see that this eschatological goal of replanting a fully righteous nation back in the Land, forever beyond the threat of further curse or dispersion (Isa 32:15-18; 54:10), is an integral and inalienable feature of the everlasting covenant (Gen 17:8; Lev 26:42; Ps 102:14; 105:10-11; 2Sam 7:10; Isa 60:21; 65:9, 21-23; Jer 32:37; Ezek 20:42; 36:28; 37:25-26; 39:28; Zech 2:12; 8:7-8). This is the covenant that Paul so earnestly defends as not terminal with Christ’s first advent, but as requiring the yet further restoration of the natural branches (Ro 11:23-29).

Therefore, Israel’s national salvation at the future day of the Lord is not an antiquated doctrine of OT eschatology that has been re-interpreted by the New Testament. Rather, a mystery has been revealed of a necessary first stage of New Covenant fulfillment, but the restoration of Israel at the future day of the Lord remains an established ‘given’ in the theology of both testaments.

However, just as there is a ‘mystery of the kingdom’ as ‘already’ present in the Spirit and Word of Christ, and just as the church now shares in the “Lord’s supper,” as the ‘earnest’ (Greek, ‘aarhabon’; 2Cor 1:22; 5:5; Eph 1:14) of the coming messianic banquet (Isa 25:6 w/ Mt 26:29). Even so, the church constitutes the ‘first fruits’ of the coming salvation of ‘all Israel.’ That is why Peter can speak of the church as “a holy nation” (1Pet 2:9), because the church is the beginning of a larger eschatological harvest that must, at length, include ‘all Israel’ as a resurrected nation (Ezek 37; Hos 6:2). Therefore, Israel’s momentary fall and loss is always looking ahead to a future time that Paul calls, “their fullness” (Ro 11:12).

In this view, the church is in continuity with the godly remnant of Old Testament Israel and the Jewish branches are, ‘at the set time’ (Ps 102:13), grafted back into the corporate lineage of “the election of grace.” The future re-engraftment of the natural branches is no eschatological happenstance; it is not a mere appendage of some extra Jewish branches brought into the church towards the end of time with no particular relationship to Land or nation. No! The national rebirth of Israel as a distinctly Jewish nation is a covenanted necessity! (Isa 59:21; Ro 11:27).

This is why Paul labors to demonstrate that Israel’s fall and hardening is only momentary and partial. The Word of God has failed if Israel remains in unbelief as ‘a nation’ forever! (Ps 83:4; Isa 66:8; Jer 31:36; 32:24-25). Therefore the salvation of ‘all Israel’ means a great deal more than the recovery of some additional Jews to the church at some unknown point in the future. Rather, it speaks more specifically of the Day of the Lord deliverance of the Jewish nation at the end of the great tribulation (Isa 59:19-21; Dan 12:1-2).
“From that day and forward” (Ezek 39:22), ‘all Israel’ will exist in the Land as a holy nation with an entirely regenerate population for a thousand years of testimony before all nations. The age cannot end without this event. The vindication of the covenanted Word of God depends on it. It is significantly coincidental to the finishing of the mystery of God and the binding of Satan (Rev 10:7; 20:2). In divinely appointed conjunction with Christ’s glorious return, the salvation of the Jewish nation stands as the turning point of the age.

Part 2 of the original question: If the Apostles are making the case that Israel/Jerusalem are relatable to Hagar/Ishmael and Sodom/Egypt respectively, then the attention lavished on Israel is misplaced at best. This, they suggested, is supported by the NT emphasis on the New Jerusalem. Therefore regard for, prayer for Israel, blessing Israel etc., is no more important than any other nation.

What?! Are we to suppose that the divinely commanded prayer for the peace of Jerusalem (Ps 122:6; Isa 62:7) has no more significance than attaches equally to all other nations? Such leveling of all distinction suggests that the original divine purpose in Israel’s election has fulfilled its purpose. But Paul sees Israel’s return as the strategic key to a yet greater salvation of the nations. “Now if the fall of them be the riches of the world, and the diminishing of them the riches of the Gentiles; how much more shall their full inclusion mean? … For if their rejection means the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance mean but life from the dead?” (Ro 11:12, 15).

We know that God is pursuing the salvation of an elect number out of every tribe, tongue, and nation, but we must not ignore the wisdom of God’s strategy in how this goal is to be attained. It is through Israel’s fall, but it is also through Israel’s resurrection. Through Israel’s stumbling over the cornerstone, the predestined blood of the everlasting covenant was shed for all men. In this sense, the tragedy of Israel’s national blindness was converted into a provision for all. The revelation of this mystery has opened “a door of faith to the Gentiles” (Acts 14:27). But that door doesn’t close with Israel’s return. Rather, with Israel’s return, salvation among the nations takes a quantum leap! Therefore, to put prayer for the peace of Jerusalem on a par with prayer for any other nation misses entirely the strategic relationship of Israel as the key to the further salvation of the nations.

Despite the present salvation of a multitude amidst the tribulation that is in the world, the nations must continue to languish, and groan with a sin laden creation ‘UNTIL’ Israel comes into its predestined place. When a young ultra-orthodox man (a Holocaust scholar) took his place immediately beside me on a flight home from NYC (to the astonishment of a young lady to whom I had been witnessing and told of my prayer that he would come and sit beside me when he was still at the front of the plane), I opened conversation with the statement: “My grand-children have a vested interest in the destiny of your people, because until your people will come into their appointed place, the world will be a dangerous place to live.” What a blessed time ensued. There wasn’t a moment’s lag in that conversation until we touched down.

So why has God mediated the salvation of the world through a single elect nation? Why is it necessary that Christ be “of the seed of David according to the flesh?” (Acts 2:30; Ro 1:3). Why is Jesus careful to point out that “salvation is of the Jews?” (Jn 4:22). Why does He insist that the blessing of the covenant is appropriately restricted (for the moment) “to the lost sheep of the house of Israel?” (Mt 15:24-26). Why, in his mission to the Gentiles, should Paul still feel compelled to go to the Jew first? Why isn’t it enough that the church appropriate Israel’s ethical standards, dispense with its ‘antiquated nationalism,’ and advance directly into the new universal faith without further thought or obligation towards any abiding special concern for Israel?

I believe it is because God’s plan is based on a profound jealousy that no flesh glory. Israel exists to enforce upon the nations the issue of election as defining the nature of grace in order to exclude natural claim based on merit (Ro 9:11; see my articles: “The Key of the Mystery in the Reign of Grace” and “Why the Jew?”). As Christ is a calculated offense to test the hearts of Jews, just so, Jewish election is a calculated offense designed to test the hearts of Gentiles. Ours is a mediated salvation. The kingdom of God must pass through Israel. Nothing is more calculated to expose the pride, resentment, and envy of the natural heart as the sovereign right of God to choose ‘whom He will’ (Jn 5:21; Ro 9:18). All nations will be required to acknowledge that Jerusalem is God’s choice (Isa 60:12; Zech 8:22-23). “And it shall be, that whoso will not come up of all the families of the earth unto Jerusalem to worship the King, the Lord of hosts, even upon them shall be no rain” (Zech 14:17).

To put prayer for “the peace of Jerusalem” on a par with prayer for any other nation shows a woeful ignorance of the very mystery that might have saved the church from a history of arrogance, particularly towards the Jew. The Jews of the middle ages used to call Christendom, “the arrogant kingdom.” How true! The church’s ignorance of “this mystery” has provided a shield for the freer operation of the spirit of anti-Semitism throughout history, even in, and often most especially through the professing church.

Such an unreflecting statement constitutes a tragic loss of the context that God has set for the fuller revelation of His glory. It forfeits the high vision of glory implicit in Paul’s grand overview of salvation history in Ro 9-11. Significantly, it is “this mystery” that brings Paul to one of scripture’s most awe filled hymns of praise (Ro 11:33-36). It will bring us to the same worshipful apprehension of divine glory, if we will seek God for the grace to see what Paul saw by the same Spirit. May it be!

While the church rightly insists that there is no salvation outside of Christ, it tends to ignore the further truth that there is no salvation outside of Israel, because both Christ and the church are contemplated as born ‘from within’ the elect nation. In coming to Christ, one is coming into the commonwealth of Israel. It is their covenant. We are the anomaly (“wild branches”). We were the strangers that were granted gracious access to the children’s bread (Mt 15:24-26), as Jesus said, “Salvation is of the Jews” (Jn 4:22). If we are debtors to all men, we are certainly debtors “to the Jew first.”

“I have set watchmen upon thy walls, O Jerusalem, which shall never hold their peace day nor night: ye that make mention of the Lord, keep not silence, and give Him no rest, till he establish, and till He make Jerusalem a praise in the earth” (Isa 62:6-7).

“Rejoice ye with Jerusalem, and be glad with her, all ye that love her: rejoice for joy with her, all ye that mourn for her” (Isa 66:10).

“Pray for the peace of Jerusalem: they shall prosper that love thee” (Ps 122:6).

Have we missed Paul’s priestly and prophetic travail for Israel’s salvation, simply because we’ve not seen Israel’s predestined place in God’s plan?

Furthermore, such loss of context puts us ‘out of touch’ with the divine pathos over Israel’s momentary loss for the sake of the Gentiles (“enemies for your sakes;” Ro 11:28). It is an imponderable divine exchange that is essential in God’s pursuit of the salvation of an election out of every nation. Yet God is jealous for how this is achieved. He is as selective of the process as He is of the end. This is the divine strategy that Paul saw in His own mission to the Gentiles. Paul’s aim was to build up the church to a fullness of stature sufficient to move Israel to envy. A fully successful ministry to the Gentiles would have this goal as its secondary result.

Paul knew that the Jew is made jealous if the promised Holy Spirit can be seen resting on Gentile believers in undeniable evidence (“demonstration of the Spirit and of power;” 1Cor 2:4). Such manifest evidence of the Spirit in a church comprised largely of Gentiles designs that Israel see that righteousness does not come by the law. Paul saw this demonstration through the church as a strategic eschatological goal towards Israel’s restoration, which would abound to the yet greater salvation of the nations.

Until recently, the church has, for the larger part, retired in defeat from Jewish evangelism. Yet nothing else is more calculated to prepare and deepen the church in its own faith than its encounter with the formidable Jew, the beloved enemy “for your sakes”. The Jew forces the church to do its homework. The challenge of outreach and witness to the Jew is calculated to deepen the church’s appreciation for the mystery of the faith as nothing else. If the church resigns its calling to go to the Jew first, it surrenders a key component in God’s larger strategy in the evangelism of the nations. Hence, the church that is ineffectual towards Israel is ineffectual in a crucial aspect of its mission, which must be accomplished in order for Christ to return.

Israel is God’s self appointed mission impossible. History has an appointment to keep. The glory of God is demonstrated in His ability to finally bring the very same people that He first brought out of Egypt into the Land to stay (see Num 14:11-21; Dan 2:44. Compare the phrase “other people in Lev 20:24, 26 with Dan 2:44). The divine conquest of Jewish unbelief will be the like the parting of the Red Sea. The birthing of Israel ‘in one day’ (Isa 66:8; Zech 3:9) will be a monument to irresistible grace, comparable to Paul’s sovereign divine arrest on the Damascus road (Gal 1:15-16; w/ Ps 102:13; 110:3). Only this will be public in the sight of all nations. Indeed God has bound the destiny of all nations to the fall and rising again of Israel. If the church knew this, as it once did, it could never pray for the kingdom to come on earth without this consciousness. It would see Israel’s salvation as a special object of its corporate travail (in analogy to Paul’s travail for his Galatians; Gal 4:19 w/ Isa 66:8; Rev 12:2).

Therefore, the church has a crucial mission to witness to Israel, if only to accomplish a kind of ‘pre-evangelism’ that will prepare the penitent remnant for the confession that will come forth in that coming day when “they shall look upon Him whom they have pierced” (Zech 12:10). I believe it is a last martyr witness of the church that will prepare the survivors of Israel to say on that day, “Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord” (Mt 23:39). So to pray for the peace of Jerusalem is the MOST intelligent and effective way to pray for all nations. It is also the most costly, since “we must through much tribulation enter the kingdom of God” (Acts 14:22).

Part 3 of the original question: The scriptural comparison of earthly Jerusalem with Sodom, and the citizenship of the believer in the heavenly Jerusalem, forces the conclusion of a covenantal switch in Messiah. It shows that the Israel focused agenda of many believers is nothing more than a symptom of extra-national identity and hope in concepts outside of a Christ-centered theology.

The NT reveals a mystery that affects everything. The kingdom has come. The promise has been fulfilled, albeit only in part. There is a whole new centrality and emphasis, namely, Jesus and His cross. Something far more glorious came to light in the gospel than anything the human heart might have conceived (1Cor 2:9-10). Even with the advantage of a regenerate and illumined grasp of Old Testament revelation, the mystery of the gospel was kept secret until the appointed time. Hence, nothing could have prepared Israel for the radical shift that came with the revelation of a crucified Messiah.

But I see no ‘covenantal shift’. I see rather the very ground and eternal foundation of the covenant as now revealed in Christ and only ‘partially’ (but not exhaustively) fulfilled in the church of the present interim. The revelation of the mystery of Christ’s twofold advent does nothing to cancel or change anything written in the law and the prophets concerning the specific provisions and features of the everlasting covenant. Nor does it alter any of the plain language that places the time of Israel’s regeneration at the future day of the Lord. “For this is my covenant unto THEM when I shall take away THEIR sin.” Paul places this event of future covenant fulfillment at Christ’s return (Ro 11:27 w/ Isa 59:19-21). So how has the revelation of covenant fulfillment in Christ changed any aspect of the scripturally defined goals of that covenant?

As to the New Testament’s comparison of earthly Jerusalem with the heavenly, the twain will meet! Indeed, the kingdom has passed from Israel for a moment; but not forever! Indeed, Jerusalem is in bondage now with her children, while a host of Abraham’s spiritual children enjoy communion with the heavenly Zion. But one day, the kingdom will ‘return’ to the children of Israel (Mic 5:3) and God will “choose Jerusalem again” (Zech 2:12). Certainly this speaks of the earthly Jerusalem, since the kingdom never left the heavenly.

As to the present Jerusalem, it is much like what is represented by the Pharisee as the ultimate ‘foil’ of divinely intended contrast. If eyes could see what God intends by this contrast, we would tremble. We lose all of the intended affect of such symbolism (Jerusalem in bondage with her children) if we see the Jewish condition of legalistic bondage as just another case of good guys and bad guys. No, the object lesson of Israel is not some caricature of the “perfidious Jew”, so openly placarded throughout the anti-Semitic history of the so-called Christian nations. Rather, it is the far more disturbing picture of the divine rejection of the very best of religious humanity as represented in Saul of Tarsus. It is the rejection of all that falls short of the righteousness of God revealed in the gospel (Ro 10:2; Gal 1:14; Phil 3:4-9). The cross is not only the ultimate revelation of love and grace; it is also the ultimate exposure of what man is, particularly when it is was divinely ordained that God’s self sacrifice should come very significantly at the hands of the most devout within the privileged nation.

But even if the Jewish people were altogether as villainous as our conspiracy chasing informants would have us believe, God’s outstanding and unfulfilled covenant with THEM (‘the natural branches’) has nothing to do with any special virtue resident in the Jewish people. Never did. That would be to miss entirely the very point of Israel’s election and future salvation. “I do not this for your sakes, be it known unto you: be ashamed and confounded for your own ways O house of Israel, but for mine holy name’s sake … And the nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the Lord God, when through you I vindicate my holiness before their eyes” (Ezek 36:22-23, 32). So great is the issue of this public vindication of God’s covenant Word and glory through this dejected race that He has bound His own return up with their return (Acts 3:21).

And does a “Christ centered theology” ease us of the burden of Israel? Did it relieve Paul? “For I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren, my countrymen according to the flesh, who ‘are’ (and remain) Israelites…” (Rom 9:3-4). This is why I said that the replacement view misses entirely the pathos of God in the divine sacrifice that suffered the elect nation to pass into an extended stage of ultimate judgment “for your sakes!”

It is no accident of history that Israel’s rejection of Christ and the nation’s penitent contrition at His return so perfectly answers to the mystery of providence in the story of Joseph. Christ’s death at the hands of ‘His own’ (Jn 1:11) is more profoundly ordained than merely some ready use that God was able to make of Jewish unbelief. No, there is an ultimate divine statement that is being made in this predestined drama. This is why the church has seen its place in the good olive tree as only incidental to Israel’s unbelief and its own superior volunteerism. The Gentile that takes this view is out of touch with the price by which his or her place in the good olive tree was effected. Paul’s argument is so arranged as to make the Gentile believer feel a profound sense of debt to God for choosing to leave Israel in a momentary state of unbelief for the sake of His larger purpose, which only through Israel’s fall “opens the door of faith to the Gentiles” (Acts 14:27; Eph 3:6).

We must not suppose that what has come to us Gentiles (in precisely the way it has come) could have come at any lesser cost in both the death of Christ and the momentary passing over of the elect nation. Paul intends that this understanding should move the church to extend mercy towards Israel (Ro 11:31). The whole dialectical interchange (the ‘turning of the tables’) between Jew and Gentile, and the surprising reversal of place in the good olive tree of covenant promise, designs only to magnify the sovereignty of God’s mercy towards both (Ro 11:32). When it is seen that the covenanted redemption of Israel has been momentarily postponed for our sakes, it works a tenderness of compassion and mercy towards poor blinded Israel, who remains no less “beloved for the Fathers’ sake” (11:28).

Certainly, such a view of Israel’s tragic role in history raises profound questions concerning the relationship of grace and human responsibility, which is precisely why Paul addresses this problem before he comes to his conclusion in chapter 11. This is crucial in Paul’s argument; because if we miss Paul’s point concerning God’s ways in electing mercy, we risk ascribing our place in the covenant (the good olive tree) to some superior virtue of our own. Such an ill conceived presumption exposes us to the same cause for which the natural branches were cut off. But to learn this means that the same grace that has come now to Gentiles through “their fall,” is just as able to arrest a greatly humbled nation (Deut 32:36; Dan 12:7) in the day of His power (Ps 102:13; 110:3), in the same way that He was able to arrest His chosen apostle on the Damascus road (Gal 1:15-16).

If we take the simplistic humanistic attitude, “Oh well, they brought it on themselves!” Or, to put it even more crudely, “They had their shot and blew it!” We utterly fail of the mystery that would have saved us from the pride of our own religious humanism. No, according to Paul, this arrangement of events was completely ordained towards a definite predestined goal.

Part 4 of the original question: It was also put forth that the MO of Christian agencies to bless Israel and the Jews, with the delegates being told to keep their faith in Jesus quiet, was a troubling but general feature among many in whose theology and ministries Israel stands large.

Certainly there is error, and reactionary extremes on both sides of this question. After all, we are dealing with what the Scripture itself calls mystery. I would agree that there can be no defense for the agreements of silence on the part of those that partner with Jewish agencies to return Jews to Israel. Though I know there are considered justifications for this presumed expedience, particularly in cases where Jews are facing peril and persecution. However, it seems to me that the requirement for concession should be on the other foot. Not only are those making the greatest financial sacrifice denied the opportunity to present the gospel to those receiving the benefit, but once again the church is disturbingly silent concerning the impending time of Jacob’s trouble, which has its inception and first concentration in the Land (compare Jer 30:7 w/ Dan 11:31; 12:1, 11; Zech 13:9; Mt 24:15-21; Rev 11:2).

While we are willing to see a larger providence at work in the present process of Jewish return, such covenants of silence seem to us an humanistic accommodation that ought not be indulged any more than Peter could afford to accommodate the demands of silence from the Sanhedrin (see Acts 5:29). How can any enterprise to ‘bless Israel’ neglect the priority of telling them the truth?

Yours in the Beloved, Reggie

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