That Israel would become a nation again is clearly seen in Zech 10-12. Zechariah writing after the Babylonian exile wrote of an exile where Israel would be cast off to far countries and then would be gathered back into the land.
This was unlike the Babylon exile where they were exiled to a single country. The nearly 2000 year exile of Israel fits this. It also fits the prophecy of Lev 26 which states that if Israel was disobedient they would be exiled. And if they repented they would be brought back. And if they didn’t repent, horrible things would happen to them, but eventually they would be brought back anyway because of God’s promises.
Israel remains in an unrepentant state, having refused to recognize the Messiah and God’s plan of salvation.
You can deny the rapture all you want or place it in any time frame you want, but you can’t read Zechariah and not realize that the exile that just ended was prophesied.
It’s called reading the Old Testament without regard to the New. It’s a primary tactic of futurism. We’ve been there before.
Were there Jews living in the land at the time of Christ? The fact is that nowhere in the Bible is their recorded a total return of all the Jews to the land. Even after the Babylonian Captivity, many Jews chose to remain in Babylon.
Zechariah, like all the prophets, needs to be read as a prophecy regarding Jesus Christ, not Israel. Until you see Jesus Christ in the entire Old Testament it will never make sense to you, and you will continue to regard earthly Israel as a focal point.
You can deny the rapture all you want or place it in any time frame you want, but you can’t read Zechariah and not realize that the exile that just ended was prophesied.
Sure I can, because I refuse to adopt the faulty presuppositions of futurism regarding Israel.
BTW, I don’t deny the “rapture.” I deny that the rapture is a chronologically distinct event from the Second Coming. They are one and the same.