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We know of Jesus and believe in Him from the record of His life and teachings recorded in The Bible. Jesus repeatedly (in His own day) told those to believe in Him because of the Old Testament prophesies that were fulfilled in His life.

Ezekiel was among the many prophets Jesus quoted to legitimize His Ministry. Without the prophesies in the OT being fulfilled in Jesus life, we would have no grounds to believe He is our Saviour.

God spoke to Ezekiel in regards to the reforming of Israel from the dry bones (of the Holocaust). For you to say that God did not re-create Israel, His Nation, His Chosen People, but that modern-day Israel is the creation of mere men, is blasphemy of the worst order imaginable.

I know of Jesus through His Church, which preserved God's Word for me and handed it down from generation to generation. My bishop is a living link with the Apostles. I learned to cherish the Bible as a young adult due to the Church that ministered to me from my infancy.

You know of Jesus through God's Word as found in Scripture, the inerrant testimony of His Truth as revealed by Him to His servants.

Despite our divergent paths to Christ, we both revere the Holy Scriptures as an infallible source of knowledge about Christ and His saving work.

You cite Ezekiel as a source for prophecy of Christ's coming. We are in full agreement there.

you also cite Ezekiel as justifying Zionism as a political undertaking, specifically 37:11-13 of his prophecy. I understand the meaning of this passage not as a symbolic "rising from the grave" of Israel as a political entity, but as foretelling the physical resurrection of the sons and daughters of Israel which will take place when the lord comes in His glory at the end of the age.

Alternately, a preterist Christian might interpret these words to mean the events of Matthew 27: 52-53.

Ezekiel might very well have been foretelling all three events: the political resurrection of Israel in the XXth century, the participation of Israel in the general resurrection on the Day of Judgment, and the reawakening of Jewish saints at the time of the Crucifixion.

We should avoid a too facile or an immediately gratifying interpretation of any Scriptural pericope.

I just re-read your post #27, shaking my head in amazement. re your words:

If a fellow Christian's faith is so weak that he needs to believe that the modern State of Israel is a necessary condition of God's Kingdom, I will not begrudge him the crutch that he requires. But he has no reason to require it of me.

I say to you, brother, in all sincerity... to characterize God's Holy Word as "a crutch" is something I strongly urge you to be extremely circumspect before doing. I urge you to think 70 times before cavalierly doing that.

Forgive me for replying to a post not directed specifically at me, but I do have questions.
berned, you write: God spoke to Ezekiel in regards to the reforming of Israel from the dry bones (of the Holocaust). For you to say that God did not re-create Israel, His Nation, His Chosen People, but that modern-day Israel is the creation of mere men, is blasphemy of the worst order imaginable.

Where is your proof that it was indeed 'The Holocaust' that God was referring to?
How do you reconcile the above statement with Christ Jesus' own statement that "(He) came not to destroy the prophesies...but fulfill them?" Doesn't the New Testament actually indicate that "Christianity" is indeed (and of itself) the reforming of Israel?

God spoke to Ezekiel in regards to the reforming of Israel from the dry bones (of the Holocaust).

This is where you need to be careful. The Old Testament is nothing if not the story of Israel's perpetual wandering from God's love and reunion with Him after various travails and punishments, including exile and captivity. You have applied Ezekiel's words to the latter day Holocaust. I would say that you are standing on precarious ground with this statement and you need to be very careful with your Biblical interpretation.

For you to say that God did not re-create Israel, His Nation, His Chosen People, but that modern-day Israel is the creation of mere men, is blasphemy of the worst order imaginable.

No it's not blasphemy. In fact, it is you who is in danger of wandering into the mistake of the Jews of Jesus' time. Remember that it was precisely this earthly kingdom that they were expecting Jesus to create. They were expecting a Messiah who would evict the Romans and restore the kingdom to Israel. This was not part of Jesus'plan, as we now know.

God's relationship with the Jewish people was never intended to create a worldly kingdom. His covenant with them had its fulfillment in the sending of the promised Messiah. Jesus is that fulfillment.

Let me get this straight. Ezekiel wrote prophecies that referred to events, not of his own day, but of a time 2700 years in the future. One of his prophecies referred, not to the resurrection of the dead at the end of time, but of the reformation of Israel after the Holocaust. It is therefore blasphemous to assert that a nation founded by secularist, socialist Jews with the assistance of the secularist, internationalist UN at the close of World War II is anything but a divinely ordained fulfillment of prophecy.

Do I have it right? Are you looking for an eisegesis award or something?

Maybe this will help. "Israel," to Ezekiel, refers to the "Northern Kingdom," home of the Ten Lost Tribes. None of those tribes had anything to do with the foundation of the nation called "Israel" in 1948. Israel is a "Jewish state" (by its own description of itself) and the Ten Tribes were Israelites, but not Jews. Ezekiel's prophecy concerns the restoration of the Ten Lost Tribes of Israel, and has nothing whatsoever to do with the Holocaust or with the Zionist state called "Israel".

You really ought to study the Bible with people who know something about the Bible.