Who Really Stands with Israel?

American Vision ^ | 6/07/2006 | Gary DeMar

[topcat54]

David Brog has written Standing with Israel: Why Christians Support the Jewish State. The ten reviews I read on Amazon were quite favorable, and it is being advertised on WorldNetDaily. The fact that the Foreword was written by John Hagee, author of Jerusalem Countdown, From Daniel to Doomsday, Beginning of the End, and Final Dawn over Jerusalem, is a clear indication that the book’s thesis fits with the modern-day prophetic system known as dispensational premillennialism. I doubt that the book covers what this article reveals.

In my debate with Tommy Ice at American Vision’s Worldview Super Conference (May 26, 2006), Ice pointed out that one of the unique features of the dispensational system is that near the end of a future, post-rapture, seven-year tribulation period, Israel will be rescued by God. After nearly 2000 years of delayed promises, God will once again come to the rescue of His favored nation. Ice and other dispensationalists imply by this doctrine that they are Israel’s best friend, and anyone who does not adopt their way of interpreting the Bible is either anti-Semitic (Hal Lindsey) or a methodological naturalist (Tommy Ice).

In the debate, I wanted Tommy to explain how a belief in Israel’s glorious future results in the slaughter of two-thirds of the Jews living at the time the Great Tribulation nears the end of its seven-year run. I quoted the following dispensational writers to show that there is no glorious future for “all Jews who are under siege,” to use Tommy’s words, in the dispensational version of the Great Tribulation.

• According to the Tim LaHaye Prophecy Study Bible, of which Tommy is an editor, “Prior to Israel’s conversion, Zechariah [13:8] predicts that two-thirds (‘two parts’) of the Jewish people in the land will perish during the tribulation period. Only one third of the Jewish population will survive until Christ comes to establish His kingdom on earth” (991).
• In his book The Living End, Charles Ryrie writes the following in a chapter he titles “A Bloodbath for Israel”: “Jacob’s trouble [Great Tribulation] is that coming period of distress described by Jesus as He spoke to His disciples on the Mount of Olives. Jeremiah labeled it ‘Jacob’s trouble’ and said it would be unique in all history (Jeremiah 30:7). Jesus called it a period of unprecedented tribulation (Matthew 24:21). This will be the time of Israel’s greatest bloodbath” (81).
• In his Israel in Prophecy, John Walvoord writes: “The purge of Israel in their time of trouble is described by Zechariah in these words: ‘And it shall come to pass, that in all the land, saith Jehovah, two parts therein shall be cut off and die; but the third shall be left therein. And I will bring the third part into the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried’ (Zechariah 13:8, 9). According to Zechariah’s prophecy, two thirds of the children of Israel in the land will perish, but the one third that are left will be refined and be awaiting the deliverance of God at the second coming of Christ which is described in the next chapter of Zechariah” (108).
• Eugene Merrill, in his Exegetical Commentary: Haggai, Zechariah, Malachi, writes: “The restoration and dominion cannot come until all the forces of evil that seek to subvert it are put down once and for all. Specifically, the redemption of Israel will be accomplished on the ruins of her own suffering and those of the malevolent powers of this world that, in the last day, will consolidate themselves against her and seek to interdict forever any possibility of her success. The nations of the whole earth will come against Jerusalem, and, having defeated her, will divide up their spoils of war in her very midst” (342).

There are geopolitical implications to the dispensational system that some people have picked up on.

Convinced that a nuclear Armageddon is an inevitable event within the divine scheme of things, many evangelical dispensationalists have committed themselves to a course for Israel that, by their own admission, will lead directly to a holocaust indescribably more savage and widespread than any vision of carnage that could have generated in Adolf Hitler’s criminal mind.(1)

Dispensational theology as it relates to Israel is alarming to some Jewish leaders as well. Rabbi David Saperstein, director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism, asks, “To what extent will a theological view that calls for Armageddon in the Middle East lead [evangelicals] to support policies that may move in that direction, rather than toward stability and peaceful coexistence?”(2) The most probable scenario is that prophetic futurists will sit back and do nothing as they see Israel go up in smoke since the Bible predicts an inevitable holocaust. It is time to recognize that these so-called end-time biblical prophecies have been fulfilled, and Zechariah 13:7–9 is certainly one of them. Those Jews living in Judea prior to the destruction of Jerusalem in A.D. 70 and who fled before the assault on the temple were saved (Matt. 24:15–22).

1. Grace Halsell, Prophecy and Politics: Militant Evangelists on the Road to Nuclear War (Westport, CT: Lawrence Hill & Co., 1986), 195.

2. Quoted in Jeffery L. Sheler, “Odd Bedfellows,” U.S. News & World Report (August 12, 2002), 35.

Gary DeMar is president of American Vision and the author of more than 20 books. His latest is Myths, Lies, and Half Truths.

Permission to reprint granted by American Vision P.O. Box 220, Powder Springs, GA 30127, 800-628-9460.

[blue-duncan]

"Even so, come Lord Jesus!"

Now that is a unifying cry we can all rally around!! Thanks for reminding us of what's important.

[1000 silverlings]

Part missing. She was David's what? Grandmother? and a Moabite.

[Alex Murphy]

That is not an accurate portrayal of the pretrib position. The church will not be here when the judgments of the tribulation period fall. There will not be a great apostasy prior to the rapture.

Then in all seriousness, b-d, what "signs of the times" are you expecting to see manifest, if in history the church is winning and Satan is losing right up until the rapture?

You are correct about one thing - not every school of premillennialism believes in a pre-rapture apostacy and general degredation of culture and society, and I should have acknowledged that up front. Keep reminding me, and I'll do my best to get it right next time. You have to admit, however, that your version isn't the popular one, because in yours the world doesn't "get worse and worse" until after the rapture occurs, and without that little bit of speculation, there's no profit in being an end-times prophet writer .

[Invincibly Ignorant]

Part missing. She was David's what? Grandmother? and a Moabite.

Yes David's great grandmother. Born a Moabite.

[1000 silverlings]

Thanks I-squared, :)

[xzins]

To answer the question you have to decide.

[blue-duncan]

"You have to admit, however, that your version isn't the popular one,"

That has been the story of my life. That's why I'm a lawyer, not a Pastor.

[blue-duncan]

"Then in all seriousness, b-d, what "signs of the times" are you expecting to see manifest"

I don't expect any signs. I believe they are for the believing remnant of Israel, not the church. We are told to be ready for at any time He can come. That, I believe, is harder than reading "tea leaves". I don't think any one but god can keep score. He just let's us know the final score. He Wins and we are part of the victory parade.

[1000 silverlings]

We accept the Resurrection: we don't need no stinking signs

[blue-duncan]

"we don't need no stinking signs"

I see you're bilingual too.

[1000 silverlings]

Don't put mouth in my words, blue-duncan! : I'm straight and married, years and years--- :)

[P-Marlowe]

Hey, did we ever ask Buggman about his picks at Santa Anita? Of course it was during Shabbat but it was important.

The horses aren't at Santa Anita right now. There at Del Mar. Then they go to Pomona in September. They won't be back at Santa Anita until October. So if Buggman picked the horses at Santa Anita... he lost.

[blue-duncan]

"So if Buggman picked the horses at Santa Anita... he lost."

Alright Buggman, pay up and don't give us any of that "I forgot my wallet" stuff.

By the way, for a very spiritual man you sure know a lot about the ponies!

[P-Marlowe]

By the way, for a very spiritual man you sure know a lot about the ponies!

They are God's creatures... Unless you own one, then they are the spawn of Satan.

(My old law firm used to represent Santa Anita)

[blue-duncan]

My next door neighbor use to have horses and one of the most beautiful sights was in the winter with the snow on the ground to see him going out in the morning with steam rising from his breath and the horses whinnying him over with the oats and corn. I could sit at the window in my warm kitchen with my coffee and watch that beautiful pastoral scene all morning. And the best part was he was out there in the cold acting out that scene while I sat there warm and comfortable.

Then that son-of-gun got rid of the horses and substituted these dam- goats. Now every morning I have to go out and chase those miserable bastiches away from my gardens and flowering bushes. Of course k is no help. She has to feed the stinking pests 'cause they are soooo cute. God always exquisitely pays us back for our sins.

[Alex Murphy]

God always exquisitely pays us back for our sins.

I agree, which is why I'm a postmillennialist..

[Lee N. Field]

FWIW, I love eschatology threads (at least when all participants are behaving themselves)

How often does that happen? A good part of the time, these things degenerate into a 400+ post DP vs. everyone else flamefest.

[P-Marlowe]

A good part of the time, these things degenerate into a 400+ post DP vs. everyone else flamefest.

What is a DP?

[blue-duncan]

You are just hoping to put off the inevitable, trusting that some one will commit truly egregious sins and God will introduce "winking" again and won't bother with your minor ones. Toughen up and really be adventurous. Become a pretrib and stand at the front of the line for the judgment of works. Be the first to experience the fresh review of what you have done rather than waiting at the end of the line and seeing all the others go before. He might run out of indulgences before He reaches the postmills and surely out of patience before He gets to the amills. If you want I'll see if He has any pretrib places left. They are going fast what with the mid east problems.

[Lee N. Field]

s that what it literally says? Why are you so reluctant to say what many of your dispensationalist friends teach to be true, that 2/3 of the Jews living in the land during the future "great tribulation" will be killed off, even while still in their unbelief?

That by itself is not something that I regard as disproving the DP model. God has show willingness in the past to severely winnow his remnant out of a disbelieving people.