What do you do with a future National Israel in the Bible?

Tribulation Forces ^ | Thomas Ice

[TomSmedley]

I understand that millions are coming to Christ in the 3rd world nations.

Wonderful! And may His Name be glorified to the ends of the earth in ever-greater measure!

Question: How does the ongoing success of Christian evangelism pave the way for the global triumph of evil? There seems to be a bit of a disconnect in there somewhere!

[Lead Moderator]

KNOCK OFF THE PERSONAL ATTACKS!

[xzins]

You need to read the article and notice who posted it.

[Buggman]

I would also add that the rigid application of a "40 year generation" that some use in connection with Mat. 24:34 is faulty anyway. Just because it took 40 years (38, really) for a generation of Israelites to pass away in harsh desert conditions doesn't mean that that number applies in all circumstances at all times. "The days of our years are threescore years and ten; and if by strength they are fourscore years . . ." (Psa. 90:10).

Assuming that "this generation" is meant to be marked from the time Israel was founded again as an independant nation or from the retaking of Jerusalem (and that's a major assumption), God could easily wait the better part of a century from that point (another 40-60 years from the present day) before the generation that witnessed the event "passed away."

Of course, it could also be that Yeshua was speaking of the generation that saw "all these things" described through the chapter, or that He was using genea (or whatever Hebrew word Mattityahu [Matthew] was translating) to refer to the Jewish people as a whole. In either case, trying to calculate the time of the end from this statement would be incorrect.

[Quester]

The Lord blesses those who bless Israel. Expect a blessing.

Which Israel? The self-avowed enemies of Jesus Christ, or the Israel that loves, honors, and serves the Lord Jesus Christ?

How about the Isreal which existed at the time of God's statement, ... a blundering, inconsistent, murmuring Israel.

Though they be enemies of the Gospel, are they not yet beloved for their fathers' sakes ?

Romans 11:25 For I would not, brethren, that ye should be ignorant of this mystery, lest ye should be wise in your own conceits; that blindness in part is happened to Israel, until the fulness of the Gentiles be come in.

26 And so all Israel shall be saved: as it is written, There shall come out of Sion the Deliverer, and shall turn away ungodliness from Jacob:

27 For this is my covenant unto them, when I shall take away their sins.

28 As concerning the gospel, they are enemies for your sakes: but as touching the election, they are beloved for the fathers' sakes.

29 For the gifts and calling of God are without repentance.

[Dr. Eckleburg]

"LAST DAYS MADNESS" by Gary DeMar

A wonderful book. Bought it. Read it. Believe it.

Christ reigns today in heaven. Everything else is "just so much fluuuff" (Seinfeld.)

[unspun]

Thanks for the Scriptures. I hope Christians can undertand the "nuance" of the Lord. ;-)

What do you do with a future National Israel in the Bible?

Love them, of course.

[xzins]

2 Thessalonians 2:2....be not soon shaken in mind, or be troubled, neither by spirit, nor by word, nor by letter as from us, as that the day of Christ is at hand.

3 Let no man deceive you by any means: for that day shall not come, except there come a falling away first, and that man of sin be revealed, the son of perdition; 4 Who opposeth and exalteth himself above all that is called God, or that is worshipped; so that he as God sitteth in the temple of God, shewing himself that he is God.

Mr 16:15 - And he said unto them, Go ye into all the world, and preach the gospel to every creature.

Mt 24:14 - And this gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in all the world for a witness unto all nations; and then shall the end come.

As I see it, there is a proclamation with results that takes in the entire world (Jesus.) Jesus will not return until after the apostasy, the great falling away. (Paul)

Paul in verse 7 of 2 Thess 2 says that God will lift His hand of influence at this time of great falling away, and that will provide the opportunity for the man of sin to work his evil.

BTW, do you know what #621 was that got removed with a warning from the mod?

[xzins]

It seems clear to me from the lucan context that he was speaking of the generation that witnessed those things he was referring to at that point in His narration.

[Religion Moderator]

BTW, do you know what #621 was that got removed with a warning from the mod?

There is officially zero tolerance on this thread for making the discussion personal (warning at post 590.)

Non-compliant posts will be pulled, defiant posters are on thin ice and the thread is at risk of being locked if it becomes toxic again.

[Buggman]

Actually, it's the Lukan context which convinces me that either Yeshua wasn't. or that He was engaging in a play-on-words. As you've pointed out, Luke 21 distinctly speaks of the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 AD which began "the times of the Gentiles." It then leaps forward to the Second Coming. It would be impossible for the same generation to witness both before passing away.

[topcat54]

Peter said, when he noticed scoffers who were impatient and unbelieving toward the Lord's Return, ...

Let's not hide behind a verse. The "scoffers", as you call them, are laughing at the "chicken little" approach of some modern dispensationalists who read the "times and seasons" according to an artifical literalism. They run around with their copy of the Jerusalem Post checking the birth certificate of every "Cohen" and "Levi", or looking for red heifers and granite blocks on the way to the middle east for the futurist rebuilt temple.

We know the Lord will return, "with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God," and we know it will happpen, "at an hour you do not expect." We know that He will return "in like manner" as He went into heaven so that "every eye will see Him". There's nothing magic in that.

What is magic is the attempt by some to create an eschatological jig saw puzzle out of all their supposed "signs" that these things are about to take place, and adding a splash of "date suggesting" for good measure to keep the uninformed interested.

So, we are not really the "scoffers" of whom Peter spoke. We are more like the mocking Elijah when he confronted the prophets of Baal on Mt. Carmel with their false theology.

And dispensationalism is the real "troubler of Israel." As Arthur Pink put it:

But there is further reason, and a pressing one today, why we should write upon our present subject, and that is to expose the modern and pernicious error of Dispensationalism. This is a device of the Enemy, designed to rob the children of no small part of that bread which their heavenly Father has provided for their souls; a device wherein the wily serpent appears as an angel of light, feigning to "make the Bible a new book" by simplifying much in it which perplexes the spiritually unlearned. It is sad to see how widely successful the devil has been by means of this subtle innovation. (A Study of Dispensationalism)

"Lord God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel, let it be known this day that You are God in Israel and I am Your servant, and that I have done all these things at Your word. Hear me, O Lord, hear me, that this people may know that You are the Lord God, and that You have turned their hearts back to You again."

People need to get their eyes off of earthly Israel and back on to Jesus, the real Israel of God, the Root and the Offspring of David.

[TomSmedley]

BTW, do you know what #621 was that got removed with a warning from the mod?

Thanks for the scripture, cordially presented. Ahhh ... no, I'm blissfully ignorant of #621, and probably better off for not knowing! Grace and peace upon your house, brother.

[Dr. Eckleburg]

designed to rob the children of no small part of that bread which their heavenly Father has provided for their souls

Amen! I'm still at a loss as to how Christians can understand salvation through any other name than Jesus Christ.

"And whither I go ye know, and the way ye know.

Thomas saith unto him, Lord, we know not whither thou goest; and how can we know the way?

Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me." -- John 14:4-6

Do some people believe that some men are justified in ignoring the Gospel? That some men have no access to God's word? That some men are righteous of their own accord, and not by Christ within them?

"For I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ: for it is the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth; to the Jew first, and also to the Greek.

For therein is the righteousness of God revealed from faith to faith: as it is written, The just shall live by faith.

For the wrath of God is revealed from heaven against all ungodliness and unrighteousness of men, who hold the truth in unrighteousness;

Because that which may be known of God is manifest in them; for God hath shewed it unto them.

For the invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that are made, even his eternal power and Godhead; so that they are without excuse:

Because that, when they knew God, they glorified him not as God, neither were thankful; but became vain in their imaginations, and their foolish heart was darkened." -- Romans 1:16-21

[1000 silverlings]

I'm still at a loss as to how Christians can understand salvation through any other name than Jesus Christ.

They watch too much Oprah.

[xzins]

I'm speaking of his use of the entire future section as if He were present at the time.

[Dr. Eckleburg]

LOL. Something like that. 8~)

[1000 silverlings]

I am reading thru Dr. Pink's commentary. I've heard of Christian pastors who toss out the OT as irrelevant, and preach only from the New. The problem is probably that they can't understand it and don't try to. This would leave them hog-tied and shackled but then if you give them scripture sliced and diced and tied with a bow, they can deal with it. Just my opinion.

[topcat54]

Here's an interesting perspective on things from Reformed minister Grover Gunn, who was trained at Dallas Seminary:

Sixth, dispensationalism appeals to some philosophical biases. As we have noted, dispensationalism is pessimistic, and pessimism conforms to the existential spirit of our age. Also, there are some striking parallels between empirical philosophy and dispensationalism. They both prefer literal, precise language over figurative poetic expression. They both emphasize the diversity of truth, seeing each truth as a self-sufficient, encapsulated entity to the point of neglecting the organic unity of truth. British empiricism compared truths to billiard balls and rejected the concept that truths are related organically like a blossom is related to fruit. Similarly, dispensationalists reject the idea that the Old and New Testaments are related like a bud is related to a blossom. British empiricists also emphasized individual autonomous freedom, and a similar emphasis can be seen in the teaching of those dispensationalists who say that the Christian today is not under law in any sense. Dispensationalism is individualistic in its pessimistic attitude toward the organized church and in its relegation of kingdom truths, with their social implications, to a future age.

George M. Marsden has pointed out that dispensationalism developed in the nineteenth century when the empiricism of Francis Bacon was philosophically popular in America. Mr. Marsden made the following observations:

To whatever degree dispensationalists consciously considered themselves Baconians (it is rare to find reflections on philosophical first principles), this closely describes the assumptions of virtually all of them. They were absolutely convinced that all they were doing was taking the hard facts of Scripture, carefully arranging and classifying them, and thus discovering the clear patterns which Scripture revealed.[1]

The role of the interpreter, according to the same Baconian assumptions, was not to impose hypotheses or theories, but to reach conclusions on the basis of careful classification and generalization alone. This disposition to divide and classify everything is one of the most striking and characteristic traits of dispensationalism.[2]

Dispensationalist leaders regarded these methods of dividing and classifying as the only scientific ones. Scofield, for example, contrasted his work to previous "unscientific systems." Similarly, Reuben Torrey regarded ideas basically as things to be sorted out and arranged. One of his major works, What the Bible Teaches (1898), is an incredibly dry five-hundred-page compilation of thousands of Biblical "propositions" supported by proof texts. The closest analogy would be to an encyclopedia or dictionary. Torrey explicitly defended this utter lack of style or elegance. "Beauty and impressiveness," he said in the preface, "must always yield to precision and clearness." As usual, his model was the scientist. Torrey depicted his work as "simply an attempt at a careful unbiased, systematic, thorough-going, inductive study and statement of Bible truth. ... The methods of modern science are applied to Bible study -- thorough analysis followed by careful synthesis."

Induction had to start with the hard facts, and dispensationalists insisted that the only proper way to interpret Scripture was in "the literal sense," unless the text or the context absolutely demanded otherwise.[3]

The parallels between dispensational and empirical thought are striking.

[1] George M. Marsden, Fundamentalism and American Culture: The Shaping of Twentieth-Century Evangelicalism: 1870-1925 (New York/Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1980), page 56.
[2] Ibid., page 59.
[3] Ibid., page 60.

Dispensationalism: Dealing with It in the Real World

Marsden's analysis helps to explain why many dispensationalists tend to read the Bible as if they were reading a newspaper or college textbook. It also explains why they tend to look skeptically at any interpretation that does not fit into a set of nice categories of the literalist's making.

Progressive dispensationalists are moving beyond these artificial categories and exploring more the organic nature of the Scripture, esp. wrt the unfolding of the salvation narrative in the person of Jesus Christ and the fundamental unity of the people of God in all generations.