For it is the day of the LORD’s vengeance,
and the year of recompences for the controversy of Zion. Isaiah 34:8

Unknowingly, the world is waiting for an impossible people (who is not impossible?; Mk 10:26-27) to come to “everlasting salvation” (Isa 45:17), “at once”, “in one day”, at “the set time” (Ps 102:13; Isa 59:20; 66:8; Eze 39:22; Zech 3:9; 12:10; Mt 23:39; Ro 11:26; Rev 1:7) by the same power that raised Jesus (Hos 6:1-2; 13:14; Eze 37:9).

This will be according to the same pattern and by the same miraculous intervention by which Jesus was revealed to Paul on the Damascus road, “when it pleased God” (Ps 102:13; 110:3 with Gal 1:15-16), and not a moment sooner!

The controversy of Zion, as most clearly pronounced in Ps 2, is the united defiance of what God has declared He is determined to do in the face of the most determined opposition, namely, to set My Son on MY holy hill of Zion to judge and rule the nations with a rod of iron.

Paradoxically, Satan’s strategy to set his “son” (2Thes 2:3) on that very hill (Mount Zion “on the sides of the north”; Ps 48:2 with Isa 14:13 & Dan 11:45) is the very thing that God has chosen to use to fully unveil the heart of pride, particularly in its hatred of what He has particularly chosen, and about which He has most specifically spoken.

The controversy of Zion is the ancient contention come to its final head, a climax that was appointed from the beginning. It is the ancient antagonism against God’s election brought to its ultimate boiling point for the long awaited day of “recompense / vengeance” (Isa 34:8).

Why? Because once exposed to the light of what God has clearly and plainly spoken, a test of the heart is set up by which it will be revealed whether God, as self-identified and known by the things He has chosen, will be loved and embraced, or treated with indifference, if not studied hatred and defiance (Jn 3:19).

The controversy of Zion is God’s chosen bone of contention that exposes the pride of man. This is where God has chosen to pitch the final battle (Zeh 14:1-5). By this will all things be shaken and secret things searched out (Joel 3:13-17; Lk 21:35; Rev 3:10).

For this chosen demonstration of the human condition (seen again at the end of the millennium), God has ordained to force unavoidably onto the public stage this particular controversy because it, like nothing else, searches and exposes the presumptions of the heart concerning the rule of God and the justice of His ways in both judgment and unmerited grace.

The increasingly universal question of “Zionism” is being thrust upon the consciousness of the last generation, not incidentally, but because it is the wisely chosen centerpiece of divine testing that evokes all the great issues of the revealed truth of God for which all the world will be made supremely responsible, and universally accountable before the end.

2 Thessalonians 2:10-12

And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie: That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness.

Luke 10:18 (NKJV) And He said to them, “I saw Satan fall like lightning from heaven.”
Without going too much into WHY Jesus said this, it has long intrigued me as to WHEN Jesus saw what He did here and how it fits in the chronology: And how it might be related to the events of Revelation 12. — Question from Eric H

I believe the evidence points in the direction that Jesus sees in the disciple’s jubilant report of success in casting out demons in His name, not only Satan’s present loss of power, but the sign and foretaste that by Jesus’ binding of the strongman (Mk 3:27), Satan’s ultimate downfall has already been set in irresistible motion. With this confirmation of success, Jesus promises yet further success in the future, even power “over all the power of the enemy” (Lk 10:17-20).

Later, when His hour was most immediately at hand, Jesus would say, “NOW is the judgment of this world; NOW shall the prince of this world be cast out” (Jn 12:13). With His proclamation from the cross, “it is finished” (Jn 19:30), and the resurrection as proof of the Father’s full acceptance of His blood as the sin offering (Isa 53:11; Ro 4:25), all that was necessary to set in motion the end of Satan’s tenure as the “god of this age” (2Cor 4:4) was NOW accomplished (“finished” / tetelestai).

The wound to the serpent’s head had been fatally inflicted (Gen 3:15) but the full conquest and subjugation of Satan’s influence would require two more decisive stages. Those being Christ’s return at the end of the unequaled tribulation (Mt 24:29-31; 2Thes 2:8; Rev 19:19-20) and the final and brief revolt at the end of the thousand years (compare Ps 110:1; Acts 2:34-35; 3:21; 1Cor 15:24-25; Heb 2:8-9; Rev 20:4-10 with Isa 24:22).

I think all of this has something to do with what scholars have called, “the already and the not yet”, referring to the mysterious tension between what has been both newly fulfilled and newly revealed versus what remains to be fulfilled in light of the ‘unexpected’ revelation of Messiah’s coming, departure, and return to Jerusalem. It is what Jesus called, “the mystery of the kingdom of God” (Mk 4:11), and Paul called, “the mystery of the gospel” (Ro 16:25-26; Eph 6:19 with 1Pet 1:11-12).

The revelation of the mystery made clear that the ultimate victory over Satan and the full bringing in of the kingdom on THIS present earth would be realized in stages.

Through decisive actions at appointed moments (“in the fullness of time” / “appointed times”), the kingdom is making progress to “that day” when, after the last and unequaled tribulation Jesus will return to assert His rod iron rule over all nations. But even beyond that day is yet another stage towards the ultimate post-millennial “end” when Jesus, having subdued all things, will hand His fully accomplished work over to the Father in final completion (1Cor 15:23-28).

So I agree with what I suspect you’re perceiving, that Jesus sees in the disciple’s power over the devils a foretaste of the future empowerment that will come to the Maskilim of the end at the very same time that Satan will be cast down in the middle of the week to begin his “short time” (Rev 12:12).

It is supremely important to observe that this mighty, unprecedented victory in heaven is seen as tremendous good news. This is the very event in heaven that makes possible the revelation of the mystery of lawlessness on earth that has so long stood in the way of Jesus’ return (2Thes 2:3-9).

It is not only that Satan’s forcible dejection means the kingdom of God may come, but the scripture says, the strength and power of the yet coming kingdom has NOW come (Rev 12:10).

What was in the way of Jesus’ return has now been removed, but with its removal, a new “power and strength” has NOW come upon a people who “love not their lives unto death” (Rev 12:11). This is a very significant correlation.

Immediately, when Michael thrusts Satan out of heaven down to earth, all of heaven breaks out in jubilant rejoicing, with the glad announcement that “Now (not the end but the middle of the week) is come salvation, and strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of his Christ: for the accuser of our brethren is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night. And they overcame him by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death. Therefore rejoice, ye heavens, and ye that dwell in them.”

Note the paradox. The very event they will signal the beginning of the most unprecedented time of woe for the “earth-dwellers” is seen as a high-point of jubilation, not only for the host in heaven, but for the saints on earth who NOW receive power and strength to “love not their lives to the death”.

The final martyrdom appointed to the saints will be met, not with forbidding fear but welcomed with the glorious liberation of that perfection of love that cast out fear. It is this love and the peace of Isa 26:3 that will be their greatest witness to Israel and the nations in the midst of unprecedented deception, cruelty, and chaos.

What Jesus was seeing in the jubilant report of the returning 70 is what will happen in that great transition in the middle of the week when Michael prevails to dislodge Satan from his place in heaven. This decisive removal (compare Dan 10:13 with 2Thes 2:7; Rev 12:9) permits the mystery of lawlessness to be revealed that Paul shows is necessary before Christ can return (2Thes 2:3-9).

We may be sure that just as Daniel’s deep self-abasement and travail of intercession was indispensable to the removal of the mighty demon prince of Persia, even so, it will be the deep intercession of a corporate Daniel that will empower Michael to remove Satan as the great restrainer that holds back the decisive revelation of the mystery of lawlessness that releases the tribulation judgments that bring Jesus back to rule the nations from a restored and fully renewed Jerusalem.

This is when, as “the beast that was, and was not, and yet is”, i.e., the revived and now fully empowered man of sin, will be filled with “all power” (2Thes 2:9) and proceed to enter the temple in Jerusalem of Judea to place the abomination of desolation, as he exalts himself above every other form of deity or worship (2Thes 2:4; Dan 11:36-37.)

Now here’s what we do well to observe: It is precisely then, as this is happening, that kingdom power and strength will be coming upon the maskilim of the end, (the Maskilim are simply all the believers who will be believing and “understanding” saints at that time).

Not only do we see power coming on the two witnesses at this time (Rev 11:2-3), but it is immediately after mention of the abomination and removal of the daily sacrifice in Dan 11:31 that Dan 11:32-33 follows with this declaration of power and success in instructing many, which, according to Dan 12:3, results in “turning many to righteousness”.

“And arms shall stand on his part, and they shall pollute the sanctuary of strength, and shall take away the daily sacrifice, and they shall place the abomination that maketh desolate. And such as do wickedly against the covenant shall he corrupt by flatteries: but the people that do know their God shall be strong, and do exploits. And they that understand among the people shall instruct many: yet they shall fall by the sword, and by flame, by captivity, and by spoil, many days.”

This can only refer to the great evangelistic thrust of the final 3 1/2 years that will result in the salvation of a multitude beyond natural ability to count (Rev 7;9, 13-14). It is significant that whereas the gospel has been preached to all nations since Pentecost, Jesus speaks of it as especially reaching is full goal at the time of the end in Mt 24:14, and this is exactly what we find in Rev 14:6 where the gospel is being released in greatest power just as great Babylon is about to be judged fatally and finally at the Lord’s post-tribulation return.

All’s to say, the scripture certainly holds for us, not only a hope, but glorious certainty that a great preparation is coming, yea, is already underway for this great transition and breakthrough of an “open heaven” into full apostolic love and power for the final sending, for the final witness, “WITH SIGNS FOLLOWING”.

“For with God nothing shall be impossible” (Lk 1:37).

________________

* This article is also available on Substack.

I wonder whether the most dangerous aspect of envy is not simply that it wants what another possesses, but that it attempts to transform God’s sovereign generosity into a moral obligation.
Once that happens, the creature is no longer merely dissatisfied with his appointed place. He begins to regard God’s freedom as an offense.

That seems to me to be a fruitful connection between the serpent’s insinuation in Genesis 3, the evil eye in Matthew 20, the accusation in Job, and Paul’s challenge in Romans 9.
And it leaves us with a searching question:

Can a creature truly worship God as sovereign while reserving the right to condemn His choices whenever His mercy is distributed differently from what that creature considers fair? – text from Adam S.

Excepting the perennial “remnant according to the election of grace” (Ro 11:5), the prophets knew that despite regular appeals to turn and live, the nation would never “turn” (teshuva), as a nation, until the future DOL when God Himself would turn them (“turn us and we shall be turned”; Ps 80:3; 85:4; Lam 5:21; Isa 63:17; Jer 31:18; Eze 20:33-44).

If history’s amazing confirmation of the inerrancy of prophetic revelation has taught us anything, it is that if the fulfillment of the promise were waiting on Israel’s compliance, it would be waiting forever. But God has DETERMINED the “set time” to favor Zion (Ps 102:13). He has not left the end to human cooperation, but with unalterable, unavoidable certainty (Dan 11:36), He has “determined” its nature and set the limits of its duration (Dan 7:25; 8:19; 9:24; 11:27, 35; 12:7; 2Thes 2:3, 6-8).

It is only by such an irrevocable divine determinism that every word of God can be guaranteed of certain fulfillment (Mt 5:18; 24:35). Obviously, something much more than mere foreknowledge working with the not so malleable nature of man is at play here.

And while it is true that only a willing people will enter the millennial age with the new heart and new spirit, this prerequisite is made certain, not because Israel finally decided to cooperate with God, but on one basis only: “Your people will be willing in the day of Your power” (Ps 110:3), and not a moment sooner (cf. Ps 102:13; Isa 30:18; Gal 1:15-16).

God has determined to bring the constraints and inducements necessary to incline a deeply disinclined last generation of Jewish tribulation survivors to seek the Lord with a whole heart (Deut 4:29-31; 29:4; 30:1-6). He has said this will be done by His determination to bring them to “the end of their power” (Deut 32:36; Dan 12:7), which is also the place where the veil is removed (Isa 25:7).

When the Holy Spirit has shattered self-reliance, the liberating revelation of grace is not far away.  It will be so with Israel when at the end of power, the veil over the heart gives way to the transforming revelation of their returning Redeemer’s “everlasting love” (Jer 31:3).

Knowing the power that arrested him on the road to Damascus, Paul knew the unlimited power and wisdom necessary to turn the resolutely opposed heart of the most self-assured Pharisee of the Pharisees, and so he asks his gentile readers at Rome, how can it be more difficult for God to graft in the natural branches in their future day of appointed “fullness” (Ro 11:12, 25-27) than it was for him to graft in the wild branches that were contrary to nature? (Ro 11:24).

The analogy of Paul’s own conversion to the sudden DOL revelation of Christ to Israel is clear proof of His power to turn an otherwise unturnable nation “at once, and in one day” (Ps 102:13; 110:3; Isa 66:8; Zech 3:9). God’s abiding “covenant with them” assures him that God will not relent in His pursuit until He has conquered the natural resistance of a judicially blinded nation’s historic resistance to the Spirit and therefore the gospel (Acts 7:51; Ro 11:28).

This is what is being displayed by what God has declared He will accomplish with this particular people, the unique and special heirs of that particular Land at the time He has “set” / “determined”.

Something more profound than we typically tend to contemplate is at work here in the implications of this great, cosmic drama. What, besides a mighty demonstration before nations, and the great controversy that engages the great angelic contest can possibly account for such a plan with such an ending? This is eternal instruction that will reverberate throughout eternity.

Not a mere remnant, but “all Israel” shall be saved despite every conceivable impediment that history, and all the host of hell has thrown up to defy, not only the coming in, but the keeping in of this most miraculously resilient nation. Nothing could possibly be more “against all odds”. I call it God’s self chosen “mission impossible”. And that’s precisely the point!

Grace and mercy is magnified when “this (salvation) is impossible with man.” As surely as the miracle boy, Isaac, would be born at “the set time” (Gen 17:21; 18:14; 21:22), so surely will the nation of promise be “born in one day” (Isa 66:8 with Zech 3:9; Eze 39:22, 25), at the “set / appointed time” (Heb. “moed”; Ps 102:13; Dan 8:19; 11:27, 29; 11:35; 12:7).

On that eternally pre-determined day “all Israel shall be saved”. “It shall be ONE DAY, which shall be known to the Lord” (Zech 14:5-7).This is “the day” when the Deliverer / Redeemer roars out of Zion to turn away ungodliness from Jacob (Isa 27:6, 9; 59:20-21; Joel 3:16).

This great moment of national repentance is NOT a process! It happens “at once”, in “one day” (Isa 66:8; Zech 3:9; 14:7) at the spiritually transforming sight of the One whom they pierced (Zech 12:10; Mt 23:39; Acts 3:19-21; Ro 11:26; Rev 1:7). It is the great day of God Almighty (compare Eze 39:8 with Rev 16:12-17).

The event is sudden and “at once” (Isa 66:8). It is the same moment the Antichrist (pre-typified by the Assyrian) is destroyed in “one moment” / “one hour” by the breath / sword / voice of the Lord’s mouth (compare Isa 9:14; 10:5, 17, 24; 11:4; 14:25; 30:30-31; 31:8; 42:14; 47:9: 66:8; Mic 5:5-6; Dan 7:11; 8:24-25; 11:45; 2Thes 2:3, 8; Rev 13:2; 19:15, 21; Rev 18:8, 10, 17, 19; 19:15, 20-21).

After “that day”, and “from that day and forward” (Eze 39:22), the unprecedentedly large remnant of Jewish survivors begin their trek back to the Land from every land as an entirely regenerate nation (Isa 59:21; 60:21; Jer 31:34). Such uniform salvation of an entire population will not be commonplace among other nations that will still stand in need of ongoing evangelism (Isa 2:3-4; 26:10; 60:5; 66:19-20; Zech 8:23).

This deeply revealing convergence of foretold events designs an eternally instructive spectacle before men and angels of God’s power and faithfulness to keep His irrevocable, unilateral covenant oath to a people devoid of any kind of merit in themselves (Eze 36:22, 31-32).

How else, in light of the biblical doctrine of regeneration, could it be expected that Israel would ever become willing (certainly never on such a scale), unless powerfully induced by “a mighty hand, and with a stretched out arm, and with fury poured out” (Eze 20:33). But why has the Lord been required to “wait” till this set time (Ps 102:13) to do what all of history has waited for Him to do?

Isaiah 30:18
And therefore will the Lord WAIT, that he may be gracious unto you, and therefore will he be exalted, that he may have mercy upon you: for the LORD is a God of judgment: blessed are all they that wait for him.

Why has divine success in bringing Israel back required, not one but two comings of the King to Jerusalem? (Isa 49:4-7 KJV). What hath God wrought? Why has the gap between the comings lasted nearly two thousand years? (Mic 5:1-4; Hos 5:15-6:2, Mt 23:39; Ro 11:11-12, 15).

Could Israel have ever come by any lesser exertion of divine power, such as never before taken to such a degree, to secure such an end at the very time He had “determined” from the beginning? (Isa 46:10; Acts 3:21; 15:8).

If it was marvelous in our eyes to see the Jewish people become a nation again after 19 centuries of absence, how much more when the onlooking nations are required to see and acknowledge and honor (Isa 60; Zech 14) that the God who miraculously preserved this people against all odds, has brought them back again, yet again, another cruel invasion and scattering (Joel 3:2), this time with many penitent suppliants and worshippers from among the nations being joined to them (Isa 55:5; 56:8; 60:10; 61:5; Zech 8:23).

Unlike the return from Babylon and the modern return, the full and final return after the tribulation will leave none behind. (Eze 39:28). Unlike times past when the return home left them still exposed to the danger of apostasy and the abiding threat of covenant judgement, this time they will not only be home, but “home free”, never again to be plucked up out of their Land, or harassed by surrounding enemies (2Sam 7:10; Am 9:15: Isa 32:15-18; 60:18). This is because they will “never again” depart from the everlasting righteousness of the new covenant (Isa 59:21; Jer 31:31-34; 32:40).

Abiding peace and prosperity in the Land could never be secure when only a remnant is obedient while the larger nation slips back into apostasy and covenant jeopardy. For this cause, the prophets recognized that only an intervention on the scale of a great day of the Lord would ever be sufficient to rectify this habitual tendency to test the threshold of divine tolerance.

This is why the prophets looked to “that day” when “all Israel” would be “all righteous” (Isa 59:21; 60:21; Jer 31:34) with the promised continuance in the very righteousness of the Lord Himself (Isa 45:24; 54:17; 59:21; Jer 23:5-6), since only the “everlasting” righteousness of the everlasting covenant, (not of a few, but of “all Israel”), could ever be certain of finally secure enduring continuance in the Land.

That a Spirit filled people, yet in their natural bodies, having children, building and planting, and ministering to the nations can only be securely sustained in the Land forever if there is a righteousness that is forever. This will be the great miracle of history on a scale with the birth of the miracle child, Isaac.

For a thousand years of visible, verifiable embodiment, God is making an ultimately revealing statement by a demonstration on this present earth that is calculated to silence every tongue.

As much as God could say to Satan, “have you considered My servant Job?”, in the millennium God will still be instructing principalities and powers by the church (Eph 3:10), because all the saved of the millennium will be no less the body of Christ baptized into the one body by the same Spirit that was promised to come upon all Israel in that day (Joel 2:27-32; Eze 39:29; Zech 12:10).

Since we do not subscribe to dispensationalism’s ecclesiology that separates the saved of millennial Israel, we see no discrepancy if Israel’s millennial stewardship is purposefully distinct. This does nothing to obstruct or hinder the unity of the Spirit among the living members of the body of Christ gathered in assemblies throughout the millennial earth.

This being so, it follows that the re-engrafted saved from among the natural branches in the coming salvation of all Israel will be no less a further stage in the history of the body of Christ. Why should it be any less “glory in the church by Jesus Christ throughout all ages, world without end? (Eph 3:21). Is it not glory upon glory when the long estranged chosen nation will be in the chosen Land, witnessing and serving with the the gentile members of the same body among the nations in the unity and fellowship of the Spirit with all who call on the name of the Lord? (Isa 2:2-3; 19:20, 23-25; Am 9:11-12 with Acts 15:17 and others).

God is putting on public display, here on this present earth (the “scene of the crime”), an open and manifest embodiment of His power to not only bring an intractable people into the Land, but through the glory of the grace promised in the New Covenant and gift of the outpoured Holy Spirit, to KEEP them in the Land, forever safe and secure throughout the thousand years of fully witnessed  covenant vindication by nations that will be required to acknowledge and honor the despised claim of Israel’s special election and object of irrevocable divine love, the very thing that has been so opposed and under siege by the demonic realm.

This goes far to explain the meaning behind God’s covenant resolve to set this astonishing demonstration before all nations in the weakness of frail jars of clay for a thousand years of open, visible witness, and rebuke of every gainsaying spirit. Then comes the end, the final, post-millennial perfection of the new heavens and earth that will include the resurrection of all who were not raised at the first resurrection.

But first, for a thousand years of sustained, invincible security (Isa 54:17), “all Israel” will abide in undisturbed “safety” and “security” in the Land (Lev 26:40-42; Jer 23:6; 31:40; 32:37; 33:16; Eze 34:25, 28; 38:8, 11, 14; Hos 2:18-19; Zech 14:11), eternally secure in the “everlasting righteousness” (Dan 9:24) of the “everlasting covenant” (Jer 32:40).

“From that day and forward”, not a mere remnant, but “ALL” will know Him, with all the children that will be born to them throughout the thousand years of continued child bearing (Isa 44:3; 54:13; 59:21; 60:21; 65:23; 66:22; Jer 31:34; 32:38-40; Eze 37:25; 39:22, 28-29; Zeph 3:13, etc.). Not one of their number will ever again depart from the power that keeps them in the grace of the new covenant, “world without end” (Isa 45:17; 54:13; 59:21; 60:21).

Contrary to popular conception, due in no small part to the tragic neglect of the OT, the scripture is clear that un-raptured but deeply humbled (Isa 26:9) gentile survivors will assist the Jews in their post-tribulational return to the Land from all nations (Isa 14:2; 49:22; 60:9; 66:20).

As the dust of the great world upheaval is starting settle after the Lord’s return, it is said that “ten men shall take hold out of all languages of the nations, even shall take hold of the skirt of him that is a Jew, saying, we will go with you: for we have heard that God is with you (Zech 8:23 with Eze 28:5; 39:23, 27 and many).

These are gentile survivors who were obviously not translated at the last trump, and manifestly did not take the mark. Gentiles assist the “escaped / preserved / outcasts of Israel” in their post-tribulational return to the Land (Ps 147:2; Isa 4:2; 11:12; 16:3-4; 27:12-13; 49:6; 56:8). Notice this is not relocation by rapture or translation into glorified immortality.

The post-tribulation revelation of Jesus to the surviving remnant is the moment of their initial salvation. They were not translated at the last trumpet with the living saints who were already born again at the time of the rapture. With the Lord’s bodily appearance in manifest glory, the   surviving remnant is only now seeing Him whom they pierced and repenting, as person of every family goes apart to mourn (Zech 12:10).

So some short while after the Lord’s return in the clouds of glory (Mt 24:27, 29-31; Rev 1:7), a newly born again, Spirit filled nation of Jewish survivors begin their journey home, assisted by gentile survivors who count it an offering to the Lord to lend their ships, and every accessible mode of natural transport (Isa 49:22; 60:9; 66:20). Obviously, if literal, non-metaphorical language is to have any meaning, this is not a return to the Land by means of rapture and translation.

It cannot be without purpose that the scripture makes it a point to inform us that the penitent Jewish survivors of the great tribulation will return home over the dried up river beds of some of the great waterways of the middle east (Isa 11:15-16; 19:4-10; 27:12:13; Zech 10:9-11). This implies the great natural disasters that both testaments show take place during the great tribulation, especially at its close (Isa 2:2:21; 24; Joel 2:30; DAn 11:45; Mt 24:22; Rev 11:18-19; 16:12, 18).

The returning remnant of Israel is obviously not caught up in Elijah-like translation as the church at the last trumpet, but church’s translation will mark the time the surviving remnant sees Jesus and repents in deep contrition.

This seeing cannot be only natural eyes, but of necessity, the transformative revelation of the Spirit. A careful comparison of Isa 27:12-13 with Zech 12:10; Mt 23:39; 24:29-31; Acts 3:21; Ro 11:26; 1Cor 15:52; Rev 1:7; 10:7; 11:15 will make clear that the revelation of Jesus to the beleaguered survivors of the tribulation takes place in immediate connection with the Lord’s post-tribulational return.

After a short time of repentance, “the redeemed of the Lord” (Isa 51:11; 62:12) begin their return home from all places of hiding and refuge “with everlasting joy upon their heads”.

The great question in all of this is why? What is God’s investment in such a demonstration in the sight of nations and the angels?

What does our God mean to say through such an extravagant drama, that has chosen to showcase a deeply strategic purpose? That the blessing of the nations should be mediated through a chosen people, whose very fall would be turned to the salvation of many gentiles, and whose appointed national resurrection would surpass all that went before it in bringing the blessing of Abraham to the nations, so that “the earth shall be filled with the knowledge of the glory of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea” (Hab 2:14).

Such a Divinely determined demonstration, both of the just severity and the sovereign mercy of God, can only be intended as a two-edged sword to humble pride, and encourage even the chief of sinners that with God, nothing shall be impossible.

*This article is also available on Substack.

From a January 2016 GFW Saturday night Bible Study, this Session was on Isaiah 17.

_____________________
Full Transcript below:

Tom, it would be an interesting exercise to go through the prophets. Of course, actually, not just the Old Testament, because the New Testament is very clear that Jerusalem is the special object of Antichrist’s hatred, the treading under foot for 42 months. So this is not some Old Testament thing that a bunch of, you know, hyper literalists are latching on to here.

But this is everywhere. This is everywhere you read about the Day of the Lord. Everywhere.

Not only when that name, that word is particularly used, and it’s close associated terms in that day and in those days, etc. And then often the things that will be accomplished at that day are mentioned that have fulfillment in no other time. I mean, I know there’s some partial fulfillment throughout history, but.

So all roads lead to the Day of the Lord. And I just want to give a little story. It had to do with something that John Piper wrote some years back, and Art gave it to me, and Art was impressed with it, and I somewhat was, too.

Art said, what do you think of this? In other words, is he right? My answer was yes and no. Well, that was tentative at the time. Right now it would be a resounding no.

But it was very appealing because it asked this question, does Israel, in their present unbelief on this side of new covenant righteousness, do they have, and he used this term, talk about a slippery term. I don’t suggest at all that he did it consciously, of course, but it’s a disarming term. The word is, and some of you all may have heard this, does Israel in their present state have a quote-unquote divine right to the land? Well, first of all, that’s disarming, because how can you at once speak of grace and right? You know, there is no right, yet, you know, God has put his whole big picture together around one nation.

That’s the nation that gives the framework and the context, not only of the past, but of the future. And let’s see, where I want to go with this is this, so the idea is, is that Israel’s pretty much fair game. They’re like any other nation.

I heard one leading pastor use such a crass term as, there’s no more significance to modern Israel or to the to the Middle East conflict, biblically, than a border war between, I think he said Paraguay and Uruguay, but I don’t think those nations are actually, there’s not a natural border there. I don’t know what, but you get the point. In other words, he reduces it to a non-significance that has all to do with the Jewish apocalyptic dream, they’re back in the land.

And yet, Phil, I believe it was, one of you just a moment ago, read Joel chapter 3, verses 1, 2, and 3 there, and that clearly is the day of the Lord. And all through the scriptures, the day of the Lord is all about the the climax to a ultimate showdown in the Middle East between Israel and her neighbors most immediately, but a trembling Jerusalem, a burdensome stone that has brought all the nations into a vortex and entangled and engaged all nations in a way that they cannot disentangle themselves from. And so, you know, God is flushing something to the surface here.

And so I began to think about that, and I thought, well, when has Israel ever been in New Covenant righteousness? There is always, as June was just saying, there’s only ever been a remnant like Joshua and Caleb who had a different spirit. Moses himself knew for himself the circumcised heart, but he said to his Jewish compatriots, to his people, he says, but I know you guys, I know that you will not prolong your days in the land. You will go into the land, and you will possess it.

And be very sure, Deuteronomy chapter 9, that this is not about your righteousness, because you’re like this and not like that, and so on. In other words, this is nothing to do with any merit on your part. But it’s true that, now, and I didn’t let you go in until the iniquity of the Amorites had been fully fulfilled.

And by the way, he will bear in that land a largely unbelieving Jewish nation, as he has many times over and through many generations, so long as their iniquity has not reached a certain intolerable threshold with God. God is all, he’s very well aware that he’s only got a remnant, and for the sake of that remnant, and for the sake of his larger purpose, he bears that nation with much long-suffering. And he blesses them with common grace, and more than common grace, he blesses them with families, with a measure, but they’re always under the looming, hanging, you know, jeopardy of the covenant.

They’re under the threat of a covenant that, okay, God will be patient, he will bear, he will send prophets, but there is a threshold, just like the Amorites had a threshold of iniquity, that when you reach that threshold, Tom, you’re frozen there. Is there something going on technologically here that, I mean, can you guys hear me? I can hear you. I don’t want to get in too deep here, I’ve been enjoying, I don’t want to, but so the great, they’re coming into the land, yet Moses says, you will not be able to keep the land until I see ahead to a future time.

It’s in the latter days, and he gives it the name that the prophets are going to carry and develop the great tribulation. Now, the prophets will call it trouble, affliction, distress, many names, calamity, but it’s the great tribulation, and only at that time of great tribulation, at that time of transitioning crisis, will all the nation know him, because until then, there’ll only be a remnant, and that remnant that is righteous will, may, as we’ve often pointed out, may forestall, may give a moment of revival, may forestall captivity and exile, but can never finally prevent it. They can be assault and a lie, but they can never finally prevent the ever-present threat of the covenant and the cycles of judgment and of exile.

As you know, Daniel and Ezekiel and others went right down into exile and suffered with their nation, but always they were aware, they knew they had a new heart, they knew they even had the sure mercies of David, they would speak about the peace and the righteousness that they had by the Spirit, they had the Spirit, but they knew that was never enough. Only when all of Israel, after a time of final purging and final discipline, at the end of their power, when they would all have at that time a circumcised heart, what the later prophets will call a new heart or a sprinkled heart, only then would the Kingdom of God be able to come on earth, because it cannot come on earth unless that people and not another, I want to stress that, that people and not another are able to inherit that land and keep it forever. Now, the point I’m making against Piper’s thesis and many of these others who have joined in, is that they’re saying, well, Israel can’t really have a divine right to the land until they qualify under the new covenant, but never in their history did they qualify as a nation that was for the larger part, even for the larger part, let alone in that new covenant righteousness, in that righteousness, of course, that, and this is difficult because, you know, well, the new covenant wasn’t here until Jews was here.

Yes, in a way, the regenerating work of the Spirit was certainly here, it was on the basis of what Jews would accomplish in history, in His blood, but all of history has waited for this nation to be altogether righteous in that land, no longer subject to the threat of their enemies, no longer subject to be uprooted and put out into the nations, or even in a way where that, now, by the way, that does not mean, and the scriptures are very clear, that millennial Israel will be without sin. There’s a sin offering right in the midst of the land, there’s a continual reminder, just like we have, we’re reminded continually of our continual need of cleansing. They will have that.

The terms of the new covenant existed before Jeremiah would particularly call it new, and it was given in Psalm 89, 2 Samuel 7, you know, verse 10, a lot of places, 1 Chronicles 16, other places, where this everlasting covenant was something that was presented as present and active, but it would not, it would not be fully secure to Israel until the coming in of the everlasting righteousness, which would come at the great day of the Lord, for them, for them. It’s come already for the church, it’s come already in Christ, but this, there is an outstanding abiding not yet, and what the age is waiting for is for that nation, for ungodliness to be turned away from Jacob. So God has put all of his marbles, so to speak, all of his investment, with the bringing in of that historically impossible people, you know, intractable, you can’t, you know, you can plead with them, but for the larger part, Israel would always tend to backslide.

The new covenant promises a final victory over that tendency, the tendency to slide away backwards. The new covenant promises that, and that is given, that will come to Israel, it’s already come to the church, to the masculine, to the believing remnant, but it waits to the time when it would come to Israel, when the face of God would no longer be hidden from that nation again forever, and when they would possess that land from the Euphrates. So it’s all about, it’s all about God’s original word and his original promise that he would bring that people in, and they would be able to keep that land forever, but that would only come at the end of a final tribulation in the latter days, when not just a few of them had the circumcised heart, because there was always a remnant, but where now, all of them would have the circumcised heart, and they would no longer need to teach everyone his neighbor, but they would all know him, speaking particularly of Jewish families, would all know him from the least to the greatest, and all their children after that would be taught of God, and his spirit that was upon Isaiah, and would be upon Israel in that day, would never again depart, not only from them, but not even from their children’s children.

So now you have real security in the land by a nation who has been brought into a righteousness, not just of a few, but of a whole nation, but that righteousness, and back to what you’re saying, Tom, was never the righteousness of even the best of well-intentioned man, it was the righteousness of God. It could not be any other righteousness than the righteousness of the Spirit, working, quickening and working in the believer, and that’s why I like to talk about this point about stumbling. Adam was talking about stumbling at this thing where how we see the Jew in the last day.

What we do with these, his brethren, when they’re in their beleaguered, imperiled, in flight, you know, what we do with them in that day being very telling of our eternal destiny. I mean, he says, as you did it to them, you’ve done it to me, as you overlooked and neglected to do it to them, and while that’s true in principle of anyone, you know, of mercy and of whatever, but this is particularly, we talked about this before, this is particularly true of how people view Israel. Now, we know that we’re not saved on the basis of how we view Israel, let’s be very clear, nor are we saved by some end-time righteous work of hiding Jews.

No. What’s clear, though, is that these things are a manifestation of a disposition and bent of the heart, that we love what God loves, that we are in touch and even in fellowship with what God is doing and what he has chosen to do, and we’re in sync and we’re in step with the Holy Spirit and with the intentions and purposes and goals of God and in union with God. So, the Jew then becomes very telling.

Art would call him a litmus test. They become very telling of our true relationship with God. How we really, what kind of knowledge of God do we really have? Do we have a knowledge of God where his word is just as true and if Israel remains in exile forever, if they’re never brought in, if ungodliness is never turned away from the natural branches, is that going to be okay? Or are we really looking to God to vindicate his word and to avenge his great covenant promise and to know that we’re in the thick of it with God, like the prophets of old.

We may indict Israel, we may call Israel’s hand on their neglect of God and of his covenant and their need of a new heart, but we love Israel. We are completely in travail, like a midwife, till Christ be formed. Our heads are full of tears, God helping us.

Our heads are full of the sorrow of Paul, not because Paul warned his countrymen, say, but because God, Paul wanted the glory of God in his name vindicated and famous throughout the earth. And that the principalities and powers that began this whole war on the word that goes all the way back to Eden, they began by asking, has God really said? That’s what they’re still asking. And what significance is an unbelieving Jewish people in the land? And why does God, at the great day of God, take it out on the nations and avenge himself so absolutely, fiercely, when the people of Israel were absolutely the objects of Hitler, they were sitting ducks for divine discipline.

They had really brought upon them, through their provocation of God, through their making a covenant with death that held with very Antichrist, they had brought upon them the final throes of Jacob’s trouble itself, the greatest and most unequal time of Jewish suffering, dispersion, and throughout, you know, of history, another Holocaust. So yet, the people that are under that, by their own deserving, by their own provocation of divine wrath, and the nations, like the Assyrian being the very instrument of that wrath, yet God says, you know, woe to you who are the instruments. Woe to you who are the unwitting and willing despisers of Israel, because in your despising them, you’ve despised me.

When you laid hands upon them, and this is not just true of the last days, it’s true of all days, when you laid hands upon them, humanistic, unknowing, undiscerning hands, you were laying them on me, just like they laid them on me when they manhandled my own son. And so, Israel stumbled before Jesus came. Before Jesus came, before they stumbled at the stumbling block, Paul says they had already stumbled.

Where is that? That’s Romans 9. It says Israel stumbled at the stumbling block, and he didn’t just give that stumbling the name Jesus. Jesus would be the perfect and ultimate embodiment of an ongoing condition of truth. And that condition was summed up this way.

They had the right standard, but they had the wrong approach. They sought the righteousness that was represented in the law as if, when it never was, but as if it was a righteousness of works, when in fact it was a righteousness of faith. How they perceived and how they sought it, it was very telling of the condition of their heart.

So Jesus came and exposed an already existing condition. Now, what I submit is that what’s going to happen with Israel, and just this week I’ve learned of close friends and families and sterling homeschool families that already some of their more academic sons and so forth, they’re actually entertaining and buying in to anti-Zionist, pro-Palestinian. I mean, it’s sad.

And at the same time, European Jews are feeling increasingly unsafe all over the world. There’s this circulating doctrine throughout the church that, oh yeah, the natural branches may come in someday, but they have no right to that present land. They’re nothing until Jesus comes back.

They have signified nothing but Jewish dreams and Jewish aggressions and Jewish occupation. That’s going on all throughout evangelicalism. Do you see what’s the writing on the wall? The rising tide of anti-Semitism and its resurgence.

I mean, these things should sober and make us understand. We’ve got to tell the church that, you know, I once heard a very well beloved and reputable minister who, and I know he meant well, but he says, you know, Jehovah is not in covenant with Ahab. I was a young guy when I heard that. It’s very respected that I look up to this guy.

I go, wait a minute, something’s wrong with that. You know what? Jehovah is not in a new covenant relationship with Ahab. That’s so true. But Jehovah is in covenant with Ahab, and that’s why Ahab gets a double discipline.

The Jewish people are in covenant even when they’re outside of Christ, as witness history and their exposure to a double discipline that someday will meet with a double glory. But right now and until that day, they remain under a double discipline of God. The scriptures are very clear.

You only have I known among the nations. Amos 3:2. Therefore I will punish you. Well, anyhow, so I’m talking about a couple things.

This war on the word. Has God really said? That’s what’s at stake. In Numbers 14, when God said to Moses, step aside.

The great question was, can I and will I and have I spoken concerning this people? And Moses reminds God, of course God fully knows that he would be stirring the intercessor Christ and Moses would then plead. God had already ordained he would answer that prayer. So God says, you know, indeed I’ve heard your prayer and I will forgive this people.

I will not desert them or sign off on them or go to another more cooperative people or make a nation out of a godly Moses. I will not relinquish or relent on my pursuit to bring this people in. The people that I brought out, though they be ever so recalcitrant, ever so, you know, corrupting of themselves, I will not sign off.

I will persist until my glory fills all the earth. Why? Because when the Jews return and they look upon them and unbelief is purged away forever from Israel, it will be like the parting of the Red Sea. Certainly Jesus will be back.

He will crack the sky. His feet is touched down. But at the same time, that seismic event is still happening.

The Jewish people, the heart of the Jewish people are being rent. At the same time, the Mount of Olives is dividing. Their heart is being rent as they look upon Him.

And it’s an absolute end. Now the collective veil is taken away from the Jewish people and God’s name is vindicated. So my point is, Israel stumbled at Jesus.

Jesus exposed an already existing condition. He embodied a principle. Did they know God? People knew God.

Nathaniel was an Israelite indeed. People knew God and they would prove that they knew God by hearing this carpenter’s, this prophet’s words and recognizing who he was by the Spirit. They would, whether they knew God or not, would be found out by this stumbling block in their midst.

Whether people know God or have they true Jesus. You know, there’s another Jesus. Paul speaks about another Jesus, another spirit.

That will be proven, not made one way or the other so much as proven and exposed, found out and revealed by how they will respond to the crisis of Israel. How they will understand the the controversy of Zion and what God is doing. God is closing in on the Jew.

He’s not, He cannot, His name and in words is at stake. He cannot leave them in that condition. So the issue of the Jew is the issue of a righteousness that is God’s alone.

They can build a Tower of Babel, they can have, you know, they could, they can, they can reconstruct their temple, have all their sacrifice, they can do everything. But unless they have come into what’s called the righteousness of the Lord Himself, the righteousness that is everlasting, that is to say the righteousness of the Holy Spirit. Until they come into that righteousness and seeing that unsealed, revealed mystery, the gospel, they are condemned to continue the cycle of judgment.

They remain completely vulnerable and exposed to further covenant discipline, which will in the tribulation include another dispersal. I mean, you can’t, they come down to scatter my people. I tell you, they accomplish it.

They don’t just come down there with intentions to scatter the Jewish people, they accomplish to scatter the Jewish people. And everything waits on that people coming to the end of that power and to the end of that veil that’s over their hearts, and knowing Him, not just a few, but that remaining remnant, so that every one of them that goes in the Millennium know Him from the least to greatest. What does the end of the covenant really, therefore, say? That God cannot rest until Jerusalem is appraised in the whole earth.

And what does that mean? That means the Jews have come into such a righteousness as that they will never again depart. Jeremiah 32 verse 40. To such a righteousness that no enemy can ever threaten their peace again, that they lie down safely and none can ever again make them afraid.

That’s the day when the present boast of never again will become a true fulfillment of divine promise. And so, God, the war, it’s on the Word. That’s what Israel is all about.

That’s why Satan goes after the woman with such a vehemence, because his time is short. If they come into that land and possess it as an all-righteous nation, it’s over. His tenure over the nations is utterly broken, and God’s name and Word is openly, publicly vindicated.

And so, God is the proof of the pudding. It’s not just, you know, we know and believe in Christ’s resurrection, but He was seen of chosen witnesses. His resurrection was not a public event.

It was in the sight of heaven, but it was known of hell, but it was only known of witnesses and those who would believe through their word. The resurrection of national Israel will be open and public to the confounding of every gainsaying spirit, because the mystery of God will be finished and the veil that covers the nations will be removed. When? In one day.

That’s why we get here at the end of Isaiah 17:14. Behold, an evening in trouble. You know, the Assyrian that was contemporary, that was local, that was threatening Israel, that made Isaiah’s contemporary prophecy have contemporary relevance, that guy went home after he was frustrated at the walls of Jerusalem and lived several more years.

Now, his kingdom began to decline and would later give way to Babylon, but all the prophecies that talk about this Assyrian, who, by the way, we’ve made a great case in our other gatherings, this is the Antichrist. He’s cut off in one hour, just like Israel was born in one day, this guy is destroyed in one hour, and it’s repeated many places. This evening time sounds very much like Zechariah 14, in, you know, it shall not be evening.

In other words, that one day that’s known to the Lord is the day of the Antichrist’s destruction, is the day when the Lord appears to destroy him with the brightness of his mouth, and I believe there’s a great case to be made that that’s the same day that Israel was born again, not as a secular nation, largely secular, but as a holy nation in one day. This is the Antichrist. This is not the contemporary Assyrian.

He passed off the scene, you know, and he went back home and survived a number of years, but this guy, the one that he was a mere, you know, he was a mere type of this ultimate anti-type, he is cut off in one day. So, before Jesus can come, the mystery of iniquity’s got to be fulfilled. Think with me now.

Go to 2 Thessalonians 2. Christ cannot come back right now. Why can’t he come back right now, Paul? Let no man deceive you by any means. That day will not come, except there come a falling away first, the man of sin be revealed.

Now, why? Because the mystery of iniquity has all together to do with this final man of sin who will embody this principle that was in some measure shown in all these former great aggressors and oppressors of Israel. But this guy is the ultimate embodiment of this principle, of this Lucifer, this king of Babylon, this Assyrian, same, different guys with same spirit, same essence, must come to a final climactic embodiment in this Antichrist who’s destroyed in one day. Why? Because he’s the one that’s the rod of God through which Israel is smitten and brought down to the end of their power.

And his destruction is their resurrection, is their revelation of the gospel and of the mystery of the gospel. They see Jesus like Paul saw him on the road to Damascus in one day. And I wish we had a little time, you know, if you check it sometime, just look up the word hour and you’ll see how often this Antichrist is destroyed by the voice of the Lord in one hour, in one moment.

It’s the same moment that Israel is looking upon it. It’s from that day and forward they know him, for the iniquity of that land will be cleansed in one day, and so on we could continue. But this is a crisis critical moment.

Israel is at the end of their power. This man has ruled oppressively, you know, ruled the nations for 42 months and he’s trampled Israel down for 42 months. This is what we’re looking at and his destruction is a picture of all those who have this ancient anti-semitic hatred in their heart.

God is going to use the issue of Israel and the end times to flush this out, to bring this out in the open and hearts are going to be divided and exposed over the issue of Israel. In some cases more clearly than the issue of Christ. Christ would come and expose who really knew God and who knew him not.

Israel is going to expose the hearts of those who call themselves Christians and are not. I better quit, but you see what you see that this is this is the big picture. There is this commitment of God to bring this people in because it’s his ultimate vindication against the continual hatred and opposition of Satan.

His name is at stake. That’s what Israel means and Israel is showing that no other righteousness than the righteousness that raises the dead and and preserves someone in a holiness and a righteousness that is not their own. Only a righteousness of that kind of perpetuity, of that kind of continuance can see an all-saved nation and that salvation extend to children’s children.

No wonder the commentators and theologians say that has to happen. Why? Because they can’t conceive of literal Jews on this literal planet having literal children born with natural fallen natures who before they’re of any mature age already know the Lord and that every one of them know the Lord from the least to greatest and every one of their children born to them for a thousand years of divine demonstration, of burning bush testimony and witness to every spirit that says, oh he can’t bring them in. They’re too much for him.

I tell you the Jews not too much for God any more than Paul in the road to Damascus was too much for God. For in the day of his power, the scripture says, they will be made willing. When the time to come and the time to favor Zion, yes, the set time has come.

God knows how to bring the people to their end and quicken them in a resurrection authority and power, not literal. There’ll be literal resurrection but there’ll be a spiritual resurrection for the Jews that go into the kingdom in their natural bodies and that resurrection life will show itself in that people for a thousand years. They won’t be perfect and they won’t be sinless but they will be holy and they will keep covenant and therefore the covenant will be so kept by the power of the new nature, by the power of the the outpoured spirit that they’ll never go back again or slide back and become exposed again to the threat of the broken covenant.

So those are the things that we need to simplify, clarify, make plain on tables, show the case, make the case and then put it before the nations because God will not come back and judge a world that has not become very, very accountable through the prophetic anointing and authority of clearly spoken witnesses. Like Travis’s loves that word, the credible witness of the church. That church has got to come to fullness.

Thank you, June, for that. It’s got to come to fullness. Everything waits on the church.

It’s got to come to fullness. Everything waits on the church and yet the church also waits on God because only God can take us where we corporately would not have gone. He is the one who must intervene and straighten us with a straightening of his own wise choosing that we could never get it together with all of our brilliant, you know, there’s never been a time when I’ve seen a greater dearth for the word, yet there’s a glut, simultaneously a glut of every kind of wonderful, even evangelical, even sound and accurate.

I mean, it looks like anything but a dearth for the word and yet subtly and there’s a hidden holocaust almost of a dearth for the true prophetic Word of God in its cutting-edge holiness and calling and preparation of a people unto death for the sake of this worldwide witness that must go out because the nations come down against Israel are coming down there over the dead body, so to speak, of chosen witnesses that will have spoken very clearly and confronted them. They will be confronted. They will know or have opportunity to know what they’re doing and we won’t just go out and say, oh, God loves Jews.

He chose the Jews. We’re going to be giving them the reasons why God chose the Jews. What’s at issue? What is God’s great point? Now, first of all, it’s certainly just enough that he did choose them and that’s his word.

Don’t go against his word, but God wants you to fellowship. He wants you to come on in and understand his thinking. Why he chose the Jew is not so peculiar once you begin to understand the purposes that he’s invested in them so that he could attain those great goals which have all to do with his glory in all the earth through no other means than choosing a people who would show themselves absolutely unable forevermore to get it together and yet for all their inability God would accomplish a miracle that would bring them to a place of apostolic priesthood like Paul and make them the light to the nations they were first called to be.

The age can’t end without that. We can’t just skip a millennium. We can’t just go, you know, straight to new heavens and new earth and be done with this whole Israel thing, divesting the modern state of Israel of any particular significance, making it just a war between aggressive people and victim people and all these other things.

This is God who’s brought them back and the nations are very, very accountable and I think we’ve seen nothing yet. We’ve seen nothing of how very accountable the nations are going to be when this war begins to gel and the strands begin to pull together and we begin to be very clear and this vision is made plain on tables. It will be compact, pressed together, and it will literally really challenge hearts, but it’ll give the hungry and the weary and the willing and it will give them an opportunity for glory, but it’s a costly glory and it’s going to be important that they taste that glory because only a taste of that glory will give them the stamina to be objective and not look for pre-trib raptures or some other, you know, excuse, but to prepare them to go the distance in such incredible difficult times, only it’s going to be by the same means that Jesus went the distance because the joy that was set before Him.

Unless we’ve seen and tasted the glory, it’s not about just a happy life, you know, God gives that in measure, but that’s always something we must leave and sacrifice for the glory. God is in it for the glory. He’s the only being in all the universe who literally must, in consistency with His own nature, seek His own glory because His glory is the best thing for this whole world.

So I love it when He says to Moses, I will forgive this people, this intractable nation, I will not go and find a more compliant people, I will not leave, I knew who they were and what they would be like before I even called them, you know. He called Jacob from the womb. He called him before the womb, that it might be very clear that before the children were born, that his basis for calling and the election of Jacob had nothing to do with Jacob’s merit or works and that’s the issue with Israel.

You hit it right on the head, Tom. It’s the issue of a righteousness that is not our own. And unless we attain to that righteousness, which is only attainable by faith and by the gift of the Spirit, I don’t care what you accomplish, I don’t care how you cultivate, you know, by every studied discipline you can conceive, by every accurate consent to every truth, unless that righteousness is your righteousness, then your righteousness and the best that you can do cannot stand before an infinitely holy God.

It will writhe in retreat because it’s unbearable to stand before that God without the covering that’s only provided through Messiah’s blood. That’s our task. I think we’ve got a task to the church to bring them up to with Israel of what he’s invested, why the end of the age climax is around the Israel, the issue of Israel, and why it’s not a separate issue from the gospel, but it’s intimately related.

And then the next, that’s so educating the church, but we also have to bring to the Jewish attention that anti-semitism is not just assigned to the church, it’s assigned to them, that their calamities must continue, that they must be continually exposed from one cycle of judgment to the other until their proud boast of never again comes down in the dust and they are raised into a righteousness that is not their own. But this issue, in it, Romans 117, in it is the righteousness of God revealed. I was thinking the other day, I’ve talked about the word, I think Art gave the term apocalyptic evangelism.

We’ll see. What we’re really preaching is an apocalyptic righteousness. It’s a righteousness that can only be and is only revealed by the Spirit.

It’s only found in Christ and that alone fulfills the law and it’s all of its demands. And that righteousness must be revealed by the Spirit, not by mere teaching. I mean teaching has its preparatory, preliminary role, but that’s a righteousness that must be quickened.

When Peter said, when Jesus said to Peter, upon this rock I will build my church. He wasn’t just talking about Peter’s accurate confession. He certainly wasn’t talking about Peter the man, like in Roman Catholicism, but he was talking about Peter’s revelation, which the flesh and blood could not mediate or communicate.

You must have a revelation to be alive to God that flesh and blood is powerless to quicken or communicate. You must know God by the Spirit, by the Spirit of revelation. And only when you’ve seen his face are you changed from glory to glory.

And that’s only by the Spirit. Flesh and blood cannot reveal it. The teaching can bring you up to a point and ideally it brings you to the point of crisis.

And crisis brings you to the point of weakness and self despair. And that weakness is the issue of the veil. Then the revelation of God comes.

Where does it come? It comes to those who have been touched by the finger of God that’s brought them to a death that they could never have come to. To a sense of sin and its exceeding simpleness that they could have never known except by the Spirit. So it’s all about the Spirit.

And Israel is the great test that will test the hearts of those that claim they love God and know God when they do not understand the lengths to which God will go and must go to to bring Israel back under the bond of the covenant. He’ll spare nothing. Who hates his child is the one that spares his child.

Israel will not be spared. And for those who know what Israel must go through and not have a broken heart and all they can occupy themselves is with those those immoral Jews who have gay parades in Tel Aviv. That’s all they’ve got.

That’s really knowing Israel after the flesh. That’s not knowing God’s heart. That’s a moralistic self-righteous um you know It misses the whole point.

Part of that very point is these people are helpless to lift themselves out of the quagmire of their own corruptions. They are helpless. The leopard cannot change his spots.

The Ethiopian cannot change his skin. These people that are cut, they cannot. You can count on one thing from the natural man.

That’s the natural man will act naturally. And so certainly Israel’s a bit guilty of aggressions and things that are not that not even in keeping with some of their own ideals and ethics, but that doesn’t change anything of God’s election. And the way that we presume that God is in this thing looking for a few good guys like the marines, that’s completely a misunderstanding of grace and the way it even works.

But Israel exists to demonstrate grace. They are the open public. I’ve always said, you know, they’re the window through which we see ourselves.

But if you just see them, you haven’t seen anything. But in looking at them, if you see yourself and you know that there’s no difference, then you’re seeing something and then you can be instructed. Anyhow, you opened some very rich questions, Tom.

I hope I spoke to some of them and maybe you can call out from some of that. But yeah, God is in covenant with Ahab because Ahab belongs to a corporate entity of which the gifts and calling are never revoked based on behavior. Ahab will die and go to hell without Christ, but Ahab will pay a double price on the way to hell.

That nation endures a special chasing. That is God’s national son. Prodigal? Yes.

But elect and beloved forevermore. They are his eternal nation. Other nations come and go.

And I loved what Adam’s saying, you know, you don’t see God speak of any other nation like people’s very eternal destinies being bound up with their attitude towards other nations. He is, God is born with these nations rising up and swallowing up and whatever. He’s rebuked it.

He’s judged it. He’s prophetically condemned it, but he’s born it. He’s tolerated.

But this time when these nations come down upon a rehabilitated nation of Israel that’s been in the dust of exile for 18 centuries, 19 centuries, and they sweep down like the wolf on the fold, upon that nation they’ve crossed a red line and his fury comes up in his face and says, you’ve gone too far. I’m dealing with my people. I will discipline them.

I will bring them to their end, but there’ll be redemption. But for those of you that win now, you’ll lose forever. And for the Jew that loses now, he’ll win forever.

And there’s a great table-turning thing. And so antisemitism, do we owe it to the world to warn them of the cost and the high price of it? And how come the church is falling under it, making all kinds of adjustments to begin to see, oh, they’ll even say, you know, the Jews will someday be grafted back in in some way into some end-time evangelism. And then when Christ comes and the Christians inherit the earth, the Jews may have some pinch of it and there may be some significance to the land then.

But right now there’s no significance to that land. Right now there’s no particular significance to a people that have come back against all odds for, you know, after centuries of peculiar, strange, divine chastisement, persecution, hatred among the nations. And the Jews know it.

I mean, listen to Bibi Netanyahu. He speaks about this. He says, it’s nothing new to us, this Jew hatred.

It’s nothing new. And you guys are acting like it’s nothing. And you’re letting it go.

It’s building up again. He sees it coming. And all they can do is try to muscle up and answer an insoluble dilemma in the only way they know, through strength.

And yet the only strength that God can receive is His own strength, through faith. So who cannot see Israel as a pitiable race, a byword spoken against and, you know, bowed down always. And, you know, sure, a lot of them are in Hollywood and doing, you know, prospering or whatever.

But for the larger part, they’re haunted. Even those that are in Hollywood that are living it up, they’re haunted by what happened only a generation ago to their people and what now is building up again. We have got to exploit the neurosis and fear and the natural concern in the Jewish heart to bring the great issues of the covenant and the claims of the covenant back to their consciousness.

And use that as a crowding, pointing effect to point them to the only righteousness that can ever fulfill the covenant, which is to say, is the Lord our righteousness, Jesus. And God help us. I just hope that we can be clear, because it is a rather multifaceted issue.

And it’s not enough just to say, oh, the Jews are God’s chosen people. You’ve got to show what God is doing with them. He is testing hearts.

He’s saying, what do you do with my people? Just like what do you do with my son? What do you do with them? What do you do with the Jew in your midst will be very telling of what you have done and will do with God. Even in their offensiveness, even in their unbelief and in their opposition and their vexations, God has made them that way so that we’re not loving them on the basis of some impressive morality or high standard of democracy or whatever. In other words, those cannot be the reasons that we love and receive and pray for and intercede and travail for the Jewish people.

The reason has got to be the glory of God and, of course, the mercy upon their souls. And that’s what I… Go ahead, Tom. Take it on.

Amen. Excellent. And I just have a prayer in my heart to ask the Lord to… Lord, send laborers into the harvest and send this message.

Lord, send warning to the nations that are gathering against Israel. Send warning, Lord. And send the gospel to Israel, Lord.

Gospel warning to hide yourself from the wrath to come. Lord, send laborers. Send this message.

Send your heart and speak it forth, Lord, in the earth. Send, oh God, send. You are the great sender.

It’s futile to go unless one is sent, Lord. So invest in that sending and, Lord, hasten your work in us, path in us, till we’re filled with your glory and we’re telling your story over the land and sea. Lord, publish it among the nations.

You said the Lord gave the word and great was the company that published it. That everyone that has truly read by the Spirit, Lord, will have a fire that cannot be quenched until they run and indefatigably run throughout the nations, Lord, with a witness that cannot be easily gain said or resisted, that removes the cloak and the covering and the hiding place. Lord, make us clear as simple as that a child could write it, Lord.

Let us use these complex and difficult issues, but Lord, reduce them to a simplicity that makes it accessible to the wayfaring man. Lord, make it plain. Make it simple.

Make it clear. Make it pure, unadulterated, unmixed, unconfused, and let your own claims and your own challenges be clear so that the world has a clear choice in Jesus’ name. Thank you, Lord.

Come and shut the mouths of those high speeches that are spoken against you daily. Those that lift up themselves in our universities and all throughout the world. Those who know so much and yet they know so little.

And Lord, that you would even give many of them repentance, just like you gave many of those that were official priest and Pharisees repentance. Some of them also believed. Lord, open that wonderful gate, that glorious gate of whosoever will.

But let it, Lord, come so clear that the choice is before us. And let us make that connection, the Jerusalem-Jesus connection. Let us make it clear so that the power of the prophetic scripture to blow away all the hiding place of unbelief, to expose it, and to force the choice.

And Lord, I know that not a hungry, weakened, desperate, needful person, Lord, it will not elude them. But you’ve hidden it from the wisdom of this age, Lord. Even though it’s declared, you said, I will do a work in your day, a work which you shall in no wise believe no man declared to you, Lord.

But it won’t be because it wasn’t clear. It won’t be because you had not spoken and done works which no other one can work, Lord. It won’t be because you did not bring your church to fullness and prepare the way.

Oh God, I pray, Lord, that a great line in the sand will be drawn and that the issue of anti-Semitism, we’ll know in wisdom how to use that issue to save many alive and to turn many to righteousness, Lord, and how to use the issue of God’s relentless covenant pursuit of Israel to bring them to the end of themselves and therefore to an end of the law for righteousness in the face of Jesus Christ. I just pray, God, for wisdom, you were so simple and clear. Your parables were so amazing.

Lord, give us that kind of simplicity. Lord, we don’t care that any one of us have it, but that all of us together contributing and working and laboring and sharing thoughts and helping each other, Lord, would forge and form a clear word that the young people can use with one another and that, you know, housewives and others can use to teach and to share with their loved ones. Lord, something that will be a standard lifted, a clear trumpet sound, Lord, that will go to the nations and, Lord, that many, many, Lord, will instruct many.

Lord, raise up that company. I know it’s not numerical. It is qualitative.

Raise up that company that will instruct the many and let that instruction begin now, Lord. Lord, don’t defer and wait only till the tribulations upon us, but let there be a clear word in the earth so that no one has a truly justified excuse. We just thank you, God.

We just thank you. Come, Lord. It’s you.

You paid for it. Lord, this is your day, Lord. Make your way back, Lord.

Make straight your own way back, Lord. Bring the rest of the outstanding things that you have yet to be fulfilled. Bring them to pass, Lord.

Lord, accomplish it. Fulfill your two days. Lord, bring quickly, Lord, your kingdom.

Lord, not the American dream, not just another day in paradise, but Lord, bring your kingdom, Lord, and let us love your glory more than our own comforts, enough that we will sacrifice and tremble and move with holy fear, and Lord, we repent. We repent. We’ve not been in that kind of place, but you know how to get us there, Lord.

Give us repentance, Lord. Break our hearts, Lord. Make us, Lord, a people who do not—oh, God—who do not hold back.

In Jesus’ name.

“For if what was being brought to an end came with glory, much more will what is permanent have glory.” — 2 Corinthians 3:11

What is the “end” here in mind? This has to be in reference to the law of Moses (as a means of justification!), not the law itself. Am I correct in stating this?

I think the law ends, not as instruction, or its divine use to drive the sinner to Christ, but as a killing letter ministering death.

That has ended by a death, His death, of course, but also our death to the law as an accusing power, threatening the conscience with all the thunderclaps and black terrors of Sinai.

This ministration of death ends with the ministration of the Spirit of liberty!

Until the Spirit comes, until He is given on the sole basis of the gift of faith in Christ’s perfected obedience under the law offered up in His atoning death, we are dead in our sins. Regardless what admirable virtues or piety we may seem to have, we are yet in the flesh, and therefore alive to the law and dead to Christ.

This is the condition of every heart that has not been born again, Christian or Jew, that trusts in anything more or other than Christ’s righteousness and His finished work “ALONE”. To add anything of our own doing is to spoil, rob, and nullify the efficacy of Christ (whole letter to the Galatians).

Romans 7:4, 6

Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God … But now we are delivered from the law, that being dead wherein we were held; that we should serve in newness of spirit, and not in the oldness of the letter.

Galatians 2:19

For I through the law am dead to the law, that I might live unto God.

Also, I do not favor any interpretation that leaves the impression that the OT saints were saved by the law and now that’s all done away as a means of salvation. The law was NEVER a means of salvation! Nor did it contribute towards salvation by any partial obedience to it.

Christ was always the only Savior, since it was impossible at anytime to know Yahweh (born by the Word, union with the divine nature, Spirit of Christ “IN them”, see 1Pet 1:23; 2Pet 1:4, 11) except by the quickening of the Spirit’s revelation of Him to the Word and Spirit-humbled heart. And this is as much true of the born again OT believer as the NT believer, since to know the Father “BY THE SPIRIT” was also to know the Son by the same Spirit because these are one. It is impossible to “know” (intimate experiential union) the one without knowing the other.

So when the spiritually alive OT saints knew God, they necessarily knew the Son (“kiss the Son” – David’s Lord) though not yet revealed in His humanity in history and the full revelation of the mystery of the gospel.

So we’re done with the law ONLY in the sense that we’re done with the flesh, since we now put no confidence in the flesh (human ability) to contribute anything to what Christ has finished once for all, and what the Spirit alone can quicken and reveal to the dead spirit of unregenerate man.

Our object now is to trust not in ourselves but in the God who raises the dead, which is impossible apart from the Spirit’s gift and power.

2 Corinthians 1:9

But we had the sentence of death in ourselves, that we should not trust in ourselves, but in God which raiseth the dead:

That’s impossible for the flesh. Believe me, I’ve tried.

Affectionately yours in the Beloved, Reggie