Hey friends, welcome to the line of fire. Michael Brown, so glad to spend this time with you. We're going to be looking at a very contentious issue today, an issue that's causing a lot of division, both in the church and even in the broader society. My goal is not to get your blood boiling. My goal is to illuminate.
My goal is to edify. My goal is to help us with our understanding.
So maybe if we come in rather than, I'm for you, I'm against you. I agree, I disagree. Maybe we can just come in and say, Lord, give us insight. You have a topic that we'll be dealing with today where sincere brothers and sisters who love Jesus, who love the Word, have differences of interpretation and understanding. And these things work out in very practical ways when it comes to the State of Israel.
Unbelievers, how should they feel about Israel today? Does God call Christians to support Israel today? What does the Bible actually say? What does scriptural logic say? What does straight interpretation of scripture say?
So I'm going to do my best to break this down honestly and openly. And then a little later in the broadcast, we'll take your questions. If you're watching on YouTube, which I imagine most of you are right now, if you're watching on YouTube during the live chat, you can just post your questions. I'd recommend you wait a little while to post so I can lay out a number of things scripturally. And then I'll be taking the questions.
So I'll be seeing them coming in a little bit later. If you have a question, just write first at the line of fire. This way it'll stand out from any chat going back and forth. And just make sure it's on the topic of Christians and Israel, what the Bible says about the Jewish people. Just keep the questions on topic there.
We'll get to as many as we can. If you're watching on Facebook because we're doing a live stream on Facebook as well. Welcome there. Want to tell your friends, why not just take a second? Because take a little while before we get going.
Take a second, text your friend, send the link to a friend, share it with a friend, tell them to go ahead and watch. And again, on YouTube, if you're not a subscriber, just click to subscribe, but make sure you ring the bell so you'll be notified about our new videos because we're not doing five days a week at the same time like we did in the past. They're going to be different times and different frequency. We're really praying for God's mind on that.
So this way you'll be notified as soon as we post something new. I also wrote an article, a little bit longer than normal. It's on the Line of Fire website. The lineofire.org. I wrote an article that's just posted today: The Church is not spiritual Israel.
The church is not spiritual Israel. I encourage you to check that out. And just came back from Germany, beautiful time of ministry there with the church doing a phenomenal work in Tübingen and around the world. And uh It's just beautiful to be in the presence of God and seeing him work among hungry children. children of God.
Before we get started and dig in, let's pray. Abba father The psalmist prayed, Open my eyes, and cover my eyes, and I'll behold wonders in your teaching.
So, God, I pray you'd open our eyes as we humble ourselves before you. Not coming to interpret the word based on our understanding, but really sincerely saying, Lord, give us. understanding. Give us insight. Help us to know the truth.
We humble ourselves before you and ask this in Jesus' name. Amen. All right, a few things up front.
So there is no misunderstanding whatsoever in terms of my own position. Number one. Jesus Yeshua is the only Savior for Jew and Gentile. He is the Messiah of Israel and the Savior of the world. No one is saved outside of him.
No one who rejects him is part of the family of God. We all sin, we all fall short, we all need His cleansing blood. without exception. That's why I have so avidly taken the gospel to my Jewish people for the last 53 plus years, going on 54 years now, in the Lord. And that's why Paul said, I'm not ashamed of the gospel in Romans 1:16.
It's the power of God to salvation for everyone who believes, first for the Jew, then for the Gentile.
So. That's number one. Even though I am convinced by Scripture that the Jewish people are still called and chosen with a mission, does not mean that they are automatically saved. No one is saved outside of Jesus. And a Jew who rejects Jesus as Messiah and Savior and Lord is lost, is just as lost as a Gentile.
That's the first thing. Secondly, even though I'm convinced by scripture. that it is God who brought the Jewish people back to the land. and that the modern state of Israel is part of ongoing fulfillment of prophecy. I do not believe under any circumstance that the Bible says that Christians must support everything Israel does, must agree with everything Israel does.
I don't believe that for a split second. I don't believe that the Bible says that. Nor do I believe that if you Agree with me that God has restored the Jewish people back to the land as part of his ancient promises. That if you believe that, that you don't care about the Palestinians, that you don't care about the Iranians, that you don't care about anybody else except Israel. No, that is absolutely unscriptural and contrary to the heart and mind of God.
Just grabbing some. water here. The nice thing about not being on live radio Is you can actually do this.
Sorry to be coughing, but I'm surprised I am, actually. No, I'm not going to say it's demons trying to stop me from this important teaching. Let's get my throat clear and move on. All right.
So As I've said many times before, we'll say it again, the blood of a Palestinian baby is just as precious in God's sight as the blood of an Israeli baby. And the Jewish person who dies without Jesus It's just as grievous in God's sight as a Muslim person who dies without Jesus, or a Hindu person, or an atheist, or a nominal Christian.
So there is no favoritism in God's sight in that respect.
Okay? All clear. I just want to lay that out. Up front.
Okay. Here we go. There was um Video that's going viral now, senator Ted Cruz on Tucker Carlson's. And the question of supporting Israel comes up, or Christians called to support Israel. Ted Cruz says yes, but he can't exactly remember the scripture for it.
Tucker Carlson says, well, he's a Christian too. He'd like to know the scriptural basis. And obviously, Ted Cruz was thinking about Genesis 12, where God says to Israel or to Abraham, I got ahead of myself by saying to Israel, to Abraham, who was then Abram, that he would bless him. And his seed, and through his seed, the whole world would be blessed, and those who cursed his seed. would be cursed, and those who blessed the seed would be blessed.
Does that have anything? whatsoever. to do with the Jewish people worldwide today? or to the modern state of Israel. Is there any connection between that verse and Israel and the Jewish people today?
So just a warning, we're going to go through a lot of scripture. I'm going to take you into an academic article that I wrote on Galatians 3:16, asking, Is the seed of Abraham Christ exclusively? Does that exclude the Jewish people? We'll be reading some of that as well.
So, just get ready, we're going to dig in together.
So, we start. We've got slides for these we'll put up. This is what God said to Abram. Genesis 12, 3. Genesis 12, 3, I will bless those who blessed you.
and him who dishonors you or disdains you I will curse. And you, all the families of the earth, shall be blessed. Then this is what God says to Isaac. In Genesis 26, 3-5.
Sojourn in this land, and I will be with you. And will bless you, for to you and your offspring I will give all these lands, and I will establish the oath that I swore to Abraham your father. I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, and will give to your offspring all these lands, and in your offspring, all the nations of the earth, shall be blessed, because Abraham obeyed my voice and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.
Now, notice that offspring here is plural, it's clearly plural. In other words, it's a collective noun, offspring, just like in English, we don't speak of offsprings plural, but offspring, which can refer to one, you know, your offspring, you have one child, or to your offspring meaning generations of children, as it is here. Right, I will multiply your offspring, not speaking of one person, but of many, as the stars of heaven. All right, now this is what Isaac says in a blessing to Jacob, Genesis 27. 29.
This is now to Jacob. Genesis twenty seven twenty nine. Let people serve you And nations bow down to you, be Lord over your brothers, and may your mother's sons bow down to you. Cursed. Be everyone who curses you.
And blessed or blessed be everyone who blesses you.
So this is now the same word that was spoken to Abram. Abraham has now spoken to Jacob. And then This is what is said to Jacob, Isaac, sends Jacob away to find a wife, and he says, Genesis twenty-eight, three and four, God Almighty blessed you. and make you fruitful. and multiply you, that you may become a company of peoples.
May he give the blessing of Abraham to you and to your offspring with you, that you may take possession of the land of your sojourns that God gave to Abraham.
So repeatedly, the promise now that was given to Abram. then to Isaac, is now reiterated to Jacob. And it ties in with a plural offspring, and it ties in with a promise to the land. of Israel as well. And now it's going to be spoken to the nation.
of Israel as a whole. The nation of Israel as a whole, not just Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and their offspring, but the nation of Israel as a whole. This is at the end of the wilderness wanderings before entering the promised land, and this is what Balaam.
Now speaks over the nation as a whole. This is in Numbers the 25. Fourth chapter, verses eight and nine. Are you ready? To the nation of Israel as a hold.
God brings him out of Egypt, and is for him like the horns of the wild ox. He shall eat up the nations his adversaries, and shall break their bones to pieces, and pierce them through with his arrows. He crouched, he lay down like a lion, like a lioness who will rouse him up. Blessed are those who bless you, and cursed are those who curse you. Number 24.
This is now spoken over the nation as a whole.
So it's not just ambiguous Abraham's seed, or maybe Abraham's seed means the whole church.
Some things we'll come to in a moment. All right.
This is quite specific, speaking to the nation of Israel. Blessed is he who blesses you. Cursed is he who curses you.
Now, my question is... Where does that change? Where does God ever take that back regarding the nation of Israel as a whole? I'm just asking for Scripture. Where does God explicitly ever take that back.
regarding the nation of Israel as a whole. This was not just the believing remnant. This was the nation of Israel as a whole. Where in Scripture does God explicitly take those words back? I will say that you cannot find anywhere in Scripture where God explicitly takes those words back.
Just leave it there for the moment, all right?
Now, one of the key promises that God made to Israel in the Old Testament was. The promise of the land. We'll get into this a lot. But Psalm 105 lays it out most clearly. in in the entire Hebrew Bible.
Psalm 105, beginning in verse 5. Remember the wondrous works that he has done. His miracles, and the judgments he uttered. O offspring of Abraham, his servant, children of Jacob, his chosen ones, he is the Lord our God. His judgments are in all the earth.
He remembers his covenant forever.
Now, notice how emphatically this is spoken. He speaks of a covenant. He remembers it forever. The word that he commanded for a thousand generations. which is longer than the history of the world.
The covenant that he made with Abraham, speaking of, when I say longer than the history of the world, certainly of people being on the world, in the planet, the covenant he made with Abraham, his sworn promise to Isaac, which he confirmed to Jacob as a statute to Israel as an everlasting covenant, it's almost overkill. How many times God says this is my promise, my everlasting promise? I swore it. I promised it is forever. What?
What? To you, I will give the land of Canaan as your portion for an inheritance.
Now Speaking to all believers, Jesus says, for example, blessed are the meek, for they shall inherit the earth.
So believers inherit the entire world. And Paul's writing to the Corinthians, 1 Corinthians 3, the end of the chapter, he says, the whole world is yours.
So, in Jesus, for the body, the whole world is our inheritance, and then forever the new heaven and the new earth. But in this world and in this age, one particular land was promised to one particular people. The land of Canaan was not promised to the church as a whole. You can't fit all the believers in the world into the land, what was the land of Canaan today. All believers worldwide, however many hundreds of millions that is, you can't fit them in there.
This was the one particular piece of property given to the Jewish people by God's promise forever, meaning as long as this world endures. Reiterated over and over. This is part of the promise that was given to Abraham. Repeated over and over to a plural offspring. Again, we'll reiterate this in a moment.
Are you with me so far? Luke 21, verse 24. As Jewish people were about to be scattered all over the earth with the destruction of Rome, and then in subsequent battles, what would happen in the next generation? Jesus says this, speaking of the Jewish people. They will fall by the edge of the sword.
And be led captive among all nations. Has that happened? Yes, we've been scattered around the world. And Jerusalem will be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles until. The times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.
Now If I reference other scholars, it's not to say that if a scholar says something, it's right and true, because there's massive disagreement among scholars. But plenty of top Biblical scholars, Greek scholars, agree and understand That this until means that after that time, Jerusalem will no longer be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles, and those who have been scattered among the nations will be restored.
So even Jesus is speaking of a dispersion of Jewish people worldwide in the New Testament. And in trying with it, Or restoration of the Jewish people back to the land and a Jerusalem that will no longer be trodden underfoot by Gentiles. And then, again, staying in the New Testament, Acts chapter 3, Acts chapter 3, Peter preaching. After Pentecost, So miracles have happened after Pentecost. He's now preaching after the healing of the lame man in Acts 3.
And now, brothers. I know that you acted in ignorance, as did also your rulers. But what God foretold by the mouth of all the prophets, that is Christ would suffer, He thus fulfilled. Repent therefore and turn back, that your sins may be blotted out, that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send the Messiah, the Christ appointed for you, Jesus, whom heaven must receive until the time for restoring all the things about which God spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets long ago. What did God speak about?
This is New Testament. This is Peter preaching in the New Testament. That Jesus will remain in heaven until the time for the restoring of all things. Spoken of by the prophets. Go back to the Old Testament and you'll read promise after promise in chapters like Isaiah 60 or Isaiah 62 or Ezekiel 36.
the full restoration of the Jewish people back to the land and the glory of God there and their salvation. Peter says God is going to restore. And the Greek word restore there is often used in the Septuagint, in the Greek translation of the Old Testament, to refer to God's restoration of the Jewish people back to the land.
So the promise of restoration is a New Testament promise as well. And we'll see in a moment. That Paul teaches that Jesus confirms the promises to the patriarchs. He doesn't cancel them, he confirms them. You say, well, Mike.
For a supposedly intelligent person, How could you be so ignorant? You're forgetting what Paul said in Romans 9, verse 6, not all Israel is Israel.
So, forget what you're saying. You know, you go Israel, Israel, Israel, Israel. Paul's telling us not all Israel is Israel.
So, first question is: you think Paul, just with one stroke of his pen, can overwrite hundreds of verses of the Old Testament. Is that how it works? Jesus says explicitly in Matthew 5:17, he didn't come to abolish the law or the prophets, but to fulfill.
So, you're telling me just in one stroke of a pen that everything that's come before you, just wipe it out, goodbye. If that was the case, then every Jewish person in Jesus' day, including Paul himself, should have rejected the Messiah because he abolished the Old Testament rather than fulfilled. You say, no, no, but Mike, you don't get it. Jesus is the fulfillment of Israel. Oh, I get it.
He's the ultimate expression of the promises to Israel. Yes, he's the one through whom the promise to Abraham's seed is fulfilled. Absolutely. But it doesn't wipe out all the promises that God gave to Abraham's seed over and over and over and over and over through the entire Old Testament. You have to rewrite the entire Bible in this way.
Not only so, And I've been through this so many times on the air and in writing. But if you've never done this exercise for yourself, Take out your Bible. And read it slowly and carefully. If you can look into Greek, great, but every English translation that's fair should make the point just as well. Romans 9 Start in verse 1.
and read to the end of the 11th chapter. All right?
So Paul starts off by saying That his heart is broken, grieved continually because his people are cut off from the Messiah. If it would help, he would be cut off from the Messiah so they should be saved. But he says that they are still God's people. And the promises still remain theirs. Read Romans 9:1 through 5.
Reading the Greek, the promises remain theirs. Then he says, okay, but it's not as though the word of God failed. It's like, well, what? But they rejected the Messiah when he came?
So did the whole thing fail? He goes, no, because not all Israel is Israel. What does he mean? Is he referring to the whole church there? No.
Categorically, no. It's impossible that that's what he's saying. Keep reading, and you'll see he's now referring to there is a remnant within Israel. If there was, quote, a spiritual Israel, a term that nowhere occurs in the Bible, but if that term spiritual Israel was used, The Bible mentions Israel after the flesh in 1 Corinthians 10. It speaks of the Israel of God in Galatians 6.
It never uses the term spiritual Israel. But if there was such a term, it would refer to Jewish believers within the nation, like Paul or Peter. Or, like me today, a Jewish believer in Jesus. Spiritual Israel, if there was such a term, would be referring to the remnant within the nation. Not all Israel is Israel.
No, there's a remnant. And that's what Paul then begins to argue, and the remnant has received the promise. But then, after he uses Israel in verse 6, just read it through or check out my newest article where I quote every relevant verse. The church is not spiritual Israel at thelineoffire.org. Check it out for yourself.
I go through every relevant verse, and I've done it so many times on the air, so I'm not doing it again today. And perhaps you just need to take the Bible and get along and go through it yourself. You'll see every time that Paul references Israel after that, every single time without fail, he's speaking of the nation as a whole, the nation as a whole, the nation is all. The Israel that rejected the Messiah, the Israel that rejected the law of faith, the Israel that sought justification by works. That is real.
That is real. That is real. The Israel that Paul writes to the Gentiles in Rome. He doesn't call them spiritual Israelites. He says, I'm writing to you Gentiles.
people of the nations, because it's your mission to provoke Israel to envy. Who is he talking about? The nation as a whole, the non-believers. He still refers to them as Israel. explicitly in Romans 9, 10 and 11.
So he says, yeah, there's a remnant, there's an Israel within Israel, a remnant that believes within the nation. But now let me talk to you about the nation as a whole, the nation as a whole. 11:25, Israel, speaking of the nation as a whole, has experienced a hardening in part until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And in that way, and so. Consequentially.
Following this, All Israel will be saved. And and uh I've cited this in writing. on the air and debate I did with Gabe Finocchio. When Paul speaks of all Israel there, Scholar after scholar after scholar, the top exegetes overwhelmingly. understand it is referring to The nation as a whole.
Why? Verse 25 says that this same people has experienced a hardening in part. The ones that experienced a hardening. Are now the ones who are redeemed at the end of the age. And the verses that follow: 26, 27, 28, 29, make it explicit.
Paul explicitly says, right now, these people, Israel as a whole, the Jewish people, are enemies for your sake because of the gospel. They've rejected the gospel because of that. For your sake, it's now gone to you. They are enemies. Who?
The nation as a whole, the Jewish people who don't believe, to whom the covenant promises still remain. But they are beloved on account of the Father's. Romans 11:28. This is explicit. It can't be any more clear.
Verse 29: for the gifts and calling of God are irrevocable. And this is not some new dispensationalist interpretation. Non-dispensationalist scholar after scholar after scholar recognizes that this was being said. And I can take you back hundreds of years in church history, especially from 16th century England and thereafter, where church leader after church leader recognized that there would be a literal physical restoration of the Jewish people back to the land. And people like Charles Spurgeon and J.C.
Ryle in the 1800s, Christian leaders who were not dispensationalists, said that this would happen according to the plain sense of Scripture. Were they missing the point? Were they unspiritual? Were were they just modern Zionists? Zionist movement didn't exist.
They were Bible. Believers, friends, and they saw that God had given His promise and that God who scattered the Jewish people worldwide would bring them back to the land. And some explicitly said: first the natural, they'll be restored in the natural, and then spiritually they'll turn to the Lord, just as we see in our day. You say, okay, well, maybe Romans 9, 10, 11 is not the best place to go. And please.
Read it through. Look at Paul's overall argument. Look at how it culminates in Romans 11, 26 through 29. And whatever he says, just accept. All right?
You say, okay, what about Galatians 3? Come on. This destroys every argument you've given so far. Galatians 3. 16 and 17.
And here's what Paul says. It's writing to the Galatians, Gentile Christians who came under pressure from some Jewish believers or false believers who said, You must be circumcised and keep the law of Moses in order to be saved. Galatians 3. 16 and 17. The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed.
Scripture does not say, and to seeds, meaning many people, but and to your seed, meaning one person who is Christ.
Now, hang on, hang on. That's the NIV. But if you read it saying the ESV and in some other modern translations, it it brings the point home better. The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his offspring. to his offspring.
Scripture does not say, And to offsprings, plural, Meaning many people, but and to your offspring, meaning one person is Christ. What's the point? There is no such word as offsprings. In our normal language, because offspring itself is a collective plural. It's a collective noun.
That when we speak of offspring, we can be speaking of millions of people that have descended over the ages, or hundreds of people. Again, it can potentially refer to one, but the word itself is a collective word. And Paul fully knew that. He fully knew that the Hebrew Zerah was collective. You know, the only time you would speak of Zeraim?
Plural seeds is if you're talking about seeds that you put into the ground. Otherwise, zerah could potentially refer to one child if you just had one, but zerah would be the word for all your offspring, all your children, all your descendants over the generations. And the same with the Greek word sperma. And Paul knew that full well. Notice what he says in verse 17.
What I mean is this, the law introduced 430 years later does not set aside the covenant previously established by God and thus do away with the promise. Oh.
So, what God promised the patriarchs before the law, he's going to keep. And one of the big promises was the promise of the land. What does Paul say when he ends the chapter? Galatians 3.29. If you're in Christ, then you are Abraham's seed, heirs according to the promise.
He uses it in the plural sense. Paul fully understands that seed is plural. that seed offspring is plural. You say, well, what does he mean then when he says singular? Because anyone who could read Hebrew or Greek and understand it would know that the word itself has a collective meaning.
Like offspring. Like the word brethren in English. Brethren is brothers. Plural for brother, right? Brothers and brethren are synonyms.
Have you ever heard people say, brethrens? There's no such word as brethrens, no such word. Brethrens is brother. in the plural.
Okay? The same way zerah in Hebrew, sperma in Greek, they refer to a collective offspring plural. The word in and of itself does not mean just one unless it is specified. You say, okay. Then then what's Paul's point?
And in Romans, Paul uses seed in the same way, and Abraham's seed understands it in a plural way.
So I'm going to get into this article that I wrote. And we can put the um The graphic up. It's a book that was co-edited by Stanley Porter and Alan Kirshner on the future restoration of Israel. They asked a number of scholars to contribute to it. The future restoration of Israel It's like a $70 hardcover.
And I don't know how much paperback, expensive paperback, but you can download the Kindle. Right now, so I'm speaking with today, June 25th, for $2.99. I'd really encourage you to do it. Download the Kindle. Right now it's the number one bestseller in theology.
Download the Kindle. $2.99, that's maybe 400 pages of great material, different scholars. I probably have differences with certain articles here and there. That's the nature of academic work. I wrote one, even though I normally do Old Testament Semitic work in scholarship or Jewish apologetics.
I wrote the article in Galatians 3.16.
So if you want an in-depth discussion of it, I'd encourage you to go there. Those of you that are really into theology, those of you that are really into exegesis, those of you who think I'm really missing the point here, hey, I respect that if you're a student of the word. You dig, we dig, we ask God for insight, but check out the article. And and then if you have differences then we can have a more sophisticated discussion about it. All right.
And if you are a recognized representative of the position, that modern Israel today has no connection to biblical prophecy. Or that the Jewish people today are not still chosen for a mission by God. If you're a recognized leader, teacher in the body, scholar in the subject, And would you like to have a formal discussion with me? We don't have to call it a debate. If you'd be at-length, sit down, make sure we understand one another's position, and then graciously challenge each other.
If it's the right setting and the right person, I'm very happy to do that. You just reach out to us through our website, The Line of Fire. Mm-hmm. All right.
So Why do I say that we are misinterpreting Galatians 3.16. when we make the claim that It now wipes out all the previous promises to Israel as a nation. And everything that was said to Abraham's seed in the Old Testament is just Christ. And Jesus is the new Israel, and he's the fulfillment of the promises to Israel, and therefore the land promised no longer belongs to the Jewish people, etc. I want to read some quotes, just selective, from my article.
Why do I differ with that viewpoint. And again, I'm going to repeat some of what I said first. It violates. The plain sense of a host of passages in the Hebrew scriptures where God makes unconditional promises to the physical descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Second, it contradicts what Paul stated emphatically in Romans 11, 28, and 29, where he indicated that the promises still remained for national Israel even while in unbelief.
See also Romans 9:4. Third, if taken at face value, it would mean that Paul completely misunderstood the collective nature of seed in both Hebrew and Greek. This becomes immediately apparent when seed is rendered with offspring, as in the ESV.
Now, the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, and to offsprings, referring to many, but referring to one, and to your offspring, who is Christ. Who speaks of offsprings?
Now, Let me demonstrate this point to you from the Old Testament. Was Paul really saying that the Hebrew word zeroth seed Speaks of a singular. And not of a plural. Again, the only time you use the plural zeraim in Hebrew is speaking of physical seeds you put in the ground. There was no such thing as talking about your physical descendants as zraim, plural.
No, that was zerah, a singular form speaking collectively, like the word offspring speaks collectively.
So this is just a sampling of verses. We can spend hours probably reading verse after verse after verse that indicates the point. Genesis 13. 15 and 16, God speaking to Abram. For all the land that you see, I will give to you and to your offspring forever.
I will make your offspring as the dust of the earth. That's not one person.
So that if one could count the dust of the earth, your offspring also can be counted. offspring zerah is plural. Genesis 15, 5. And he brought him, Abram, outside, and said, Look toward heaven, and number the stars if you're able to number them. Then he said to him, So shall your zerah, your offspring be.
Plural, plural, plural. Genesis 15, 13. Then the LORD said to Abram, Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs, and they will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for 400 years. They, plural, zero, plural. Genesis 17, 7-9 to Abraham.
And I will establish my covenant between me and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant to be God to you and your offspring after you. And I will give to you and to your offspring after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession. And I will be their God. And God said to Abraham, As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your offspring after you throughout all their generations. Plural, plural, plural.
Collective seed. Speaking of the people as a whole. And again, I'm not going to take the time to read this. We'll put them up on the screen. But Genesis 22.
17 and 18. Same thing. Multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven, as the sand is on the seashore. Zerah, offspring, plural. Genesis 24, 60.
And they blessed Rebekah, said to her sister, May you become thousands of tens of thousands. May your offspring possess the gate of those who hate him. Offspring, Zarah, plural. The same in Genesis 26 that we read before, verses 3 and 4. Genesis 26, 24, the same thing.
Once again, I'll multiply your offspring. Zerah, plural. Genesis 28, 13 and 14. Same thing. Verses that we've seen now speaking to Jacob.
Your offspring will be like the dust of the earth. Genesis 32, 13. I'll make your offspring as the sand of the sea, which cannot be numbered from multitude. Paul knew this was in the Torah. Paul was fluent in the Hebrew scriptures.
He could quote left and right. We see how richly the Hebrew Scriptures inform his theology. That was his Bible. The Hebrew Bible was his Bible.
So Paul's 100% aware, a million percent aware, whoever you want to say, that Zerah is used collectively to speak to offspring as a whole. Offspring multiplied thousands, millions of descendants like the sand of the sea or the stars in the sky. Emphatically. over and over and over. He knew that.
So to think This is a quote from my article on Galatians 3.16 in the book, The Future Restoration of Israel. If you haven't downloaded it, go over to Amazon, Kindle, do it. And by the way, people are, you're just trying to sell books for money. First thing, When you do academic work, you don't do it for money. I was joking with Nancy when I finished my Job commentary.
and got $1,000 advance for writing a commentary on Job. I said, I could have dug ditches with a toothpick. And made more money than that. I mean, the amount you do it out of love for the word and out of love for scholarship, right? And then in a multi-author thing like this, you get paid a small amount of money to write an article.
And then if the book sells 10 million copies, you don't get another penny. You don't get a percentage of royalties, okay? It just goes back to the editors and to the publisher, and that's it. And when a book... sells on Kindle at reduced price.
Of course, you don't get anything. There's nothing to cut up. There's nothing to, and that's one reason, by the way, when I see some of my books on sale at Kindle, like 99 cents, I tell people, get them, get them. You can I'm not gonna make any money on it. Get it.
Take advantage of it. Anyway. All right, so. Mm-hmm. Here's quoting from my article.
to sync that this overwhelmingly clear scriptural testimony Could be overthrown by one verse in the New Testament, a highly disputed one that represents the height of supersessionist error.
Well, Paul said that the seed is singular. You can't just say he didn't know what he was talking about. He couldn't read Hebrew or Greek, number one. Number two, he uses the word the plural, the very same chapter. He's used it elsewhere in the plural in the New Testament.
And he knew this abundant evidence. I'm just giving you a sampling of it. He knew without a doubt that the seed was plural and spoke collectively.
So, what's his point? His point is that there is one seed in particular, the seed. Par excellence, the Messiah through whom the promises to Abraham are fulfilled. That doesn't nullify the physical land promises to the physical people of Israel and the descendants of Abraham. Why?
On what basis? Paul said the law, which comes 430 years after the promise, can't nullify the promise. Gerald McDermott. Who started off as one that held to replacement theology and then was convinced by the word that he was wrong? Professor Joe McDermott writes this.
By my counting, more than 1,000 times in the Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible, the land, Eretz, of Israel is either stated or implied. Of the 250 times that covenant, the word covenant bret is mentioned, and 70% of those instances, 177 times, covenant is either directly or indirectly connected to the land of Israel. Of the 74 times that breach occurs in the Torah, 73% of those times include the gift of the land either explicitly or implicitly. Accordingly, Gerhard von Roth noted that of all the promises made to the patriarchs, it was that of the land that was the most prominent and decisive. John Walvert, therefore, is correct in stating, in the broad program of prophecy relating to Israel, few factors are more important than the promise to Abraham of the perpetual possession of the land.
It is not only constantly reiterated in prophecies relating to the hope of Israel, but it is an integral part of the call to Abraham, which begins the program. You say, but Walvert is a dismissationist. Correct. And he's correct about what he said here. What he said here is absolutely true scripturally.
This, all this, these promises, cannot be undone by one stroke of Paul's pen. Yet, supersessionists have no problem claiming that the earthly promises to Israel are now null and void, as expressed by Kenneth Gentry, who I assume. Loves God and loves the word. We have a difference here. Israel's special place of prominence in God's plan has been removed.
God forbid, friends. Her geopolitical distinctiveness has ended. She will not be exalted above or distinguished from the other nations. The word of God is quite contrary to that. A few more verses.
Deuteronomy 1 verse 8. Deuteronomy 1.8. See, I've set the land before you. Go in and take possession of the land that the Lord swore to your fathers to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob to give to them and to their offspring after them. Plural.
offspring after them. Same in Deuteronomy 34:4. I will give this land to your offspring. Many, many other references, and even references to cursing the seed, the offspring, plural. as well.
So again, to quote a bit more from my book. Would anyone from my article in the book would anyone reading these texts let alone a master exegete like Paul. Conclude that it was Jesus the Messiah, not the children of Israel, who would inherit the land? That it was a singular seed, not a collective seed to whom the promises were made? Such interpretations would be as untenable as they were unscriptural, especially since the whole of the Old Testament tells us exactly what these texts mean.
They speak of God's determination to give the physical descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, their Zerah, sperma, their offspring, the land of Canaan as a lasting possession, to exile them from the land for their disobedience under the Sinai covenant, and to bring them back to the land as a result of their repentance again under the Sinai covenant, or as a result of the Lord's sovereign mercy. out of jealousy for his own name ezekiel 36 17 and Eighteen. I'll come back to that. Who was it then to whom the land was given? The people of Israel.
Who was it? Who was exiled? The people of Israel. Who has regathered the people of Israel, the seed, offspring of the patriarchs? Of this there can be no doubt historically or scripturally.
Yet some fulfillment theologians, meaning the promises are fulfilled in Jesus and no longer apply to Israel as a whole, allege that with the coming of Jesus into the world, quote, the true promised land is Jesus Christ. And that Jesus is the only promised land into which God will lead anybody. These are actual quotes. What might this mean to one of the 800,000 Jews who in 1948 were forcibly expelled from their homes throughout the Middle East? As most of them sought refuge in the land of their forefathers, the land promised to the descendants of the patriarchs, should they have been told, but Jesus is now your promised land.
One might as well tell a starving person that Jesus is the bread of life. Did these Jewish refugees not need a place to live? Should they have been encouraged to live in the land of Jesus rather than seek a homeland? And how is it that Israel's scattering was physical and literal, but its regathering is spiritual and ethereal? The one thorny problem that remains for quote fulfillment theologians is that one, The clear and indisputable witness of the Old Testament continues to exist, and no one has the authority to overthrow it.
It's still the Word of God that still stands. You can't just throw out the Old Testament and, well, that has a new meaning. Two, the Jewish people continue to exist, just as God promised. Three, The Jewish religion continues to exist. 4.
Many Jewish people still believe that the promises of the Old Testament apply and pray for their fulfillment on a daily basis. 5. The Jewish people still need a place to live in safety, a place where they can govern themselves. And 6. They still make the same hopeful declaration regarding the future, saying next year in Jerusalem.
Shall we just tell them I'm sorry? But the New Testament is asking a different set of questions, and once they're heard, the older questions of territorial theologies become obsolete. Again, it's an actual quote. Gerald McDermott cites a letter written A letter writer to the Christian Century who complained that the editor's approach to the land of Israel is roughly equivalent to a Jew asking a Protestant teenager, Hey, what's up with the resurrection thing? A Judaism without the covenantal component of the land of Israel is a faith shorn of most of its parallel.
power. I I could read a lot more from the article. In fact, I've got a whole bunch of slides. It's just going to be a bit overwhelming if I do that.
So I'm going to pull back. And if you want to start posting questions. I know many of you differ with me. I'd love to interact with you in a civil way. Even if your question is heated when you post it, I do my best to interact in a civil way.
So if you have a question, Again And the YouTube chat. Just type At the line of fire. at the line of fire, this way it'll stand out, or if you'd like to contribute. Help us with our outreach to Jewish people. Help us stand up against anti-Semitism.
We would warmly welcome that. Just click on the dollar sign. And then when you give, Just if you have a question, post your question at the same time because that'll jump up to the top. If you have a question on Facebook, we'll be grabbing some questions and looking at them in a moment. But What Paul is saying in Galatians 3.
He is making a polemical point. He's using rabbinic type argumentation which will hyperinterpret a word even beyond its sense. to say hey When God said seed, he only talked about one. What he means is ultimately, the ultimate point, there is one specific descendant. through whom the blessing comes, and that's the Messiah.
That's Jesus. And all those who are in him. Spiritually become part of Abraham's seed, collective, his offspring. But this does not mean that the plural physical offspring of Abraham, to whom the promises come, no longer have the promises. No, Paul says the gifts and calling of God are irrevocable.
Even the Jewish people in unbelief are still recipients of the promises. The promises are theirs to take. And if they'll turn to the Lord, they'll receive forgiveness and mercy through the Messiah. And even in unbelief, God has promised to keep the Jewish people. to scatter us in the nations.
And to bring us back to the land, you say, yeah, that's conditional on our repentance. And if we don't repent, God in His sovereignty can bring us back. If we don't repent, God In his sovereignty, can bring us back, as is written in Ezekiel 36 and other passages. Even though God says to the Jewish people, your presence in the nations has brought reproach to my name. has caused my name to be blast streamed.
Isaiah 52. Even though you haven't repented and you're unclean, I'm going to bring you back to the land for my namesake. He did it after the Babylonian captivity. And if you read Ezekiel 36 carefully, You'll see that all the promises there, the new heart given to the nation, it never happened. It never happened.
So, those promises are still to be fulfilled. In Acts 3, Peter preaching. We looked at it earlier, said that God will fulfill these promises. Jesus will remain in heaven until the time of restoration spoken of the prophets. And again, one of the principal things they spoke of is the restoration of the Jewish people back to the land.
If we have Our video ready. Is God a Zionist? Rather than me going through this last teaching, five minutes, this is on our YouTube channel.
So if you've never watched it, just Check it out, send it out to your friends. Five minutes is God a Zionist. But I'm going to get into some scriptural logic here as well, and then come back and take your questions. Let's go. Is God a Zionist?
Before we can answer the question, is God a Zionist, we first need to define the term Zionist.
Well, a Zionist is simply someone who believes that the Jewish people should have a homeland in what is now Israel. That's it. Based on that definition, we can say that yes, for sure, God was a Zionist. How can I be so confident? First, the scriptures make it perfectly clear that the land of Israel was to be the lasting homeland of the Jewish people.
And when I say perfectly clear, I mean perfectly clear. God himself promised this, repeating it over and over in scores of different texts, most clearly in Psalm 105. In fact, in this passage alone, this theme is repeated in so many different ways that it's almost redundant. The Lord was making a point. The Psalm states, He is ever mindful of his Covenant.
The promise he gave for a thousand generations that he made with Abraham, swore to Isaac, and confirmed in the decree for Jacob. For Israel as an eternal covenant, saying, to you I will give the land of Canaan as your allotted heritage. Notice the vocabulary used. This is God's covenant. His eternal covenant.
The promise he made, his decree, this was something he swore and confirmed, and is eternal for a thousand generations. Could he have made himself any more clear? It's true that under the law, the Sinai covenant, God said that he would exile his people from their homeland if they sinned and bring them back only if they repented. But this does not annul his previous promises. As Paul explained, what I'm saying is this, the Torah, the law, which came 430 years later, meaning 430 years after God gave his promise to Abraham, does not cancel the covenant previously confirmed by God so as to make the promise ineffective.
For if the inheritance is based on law, it's no longer based on a promise, but God has graciously given it to Abraham by means of a promise. That promise still stands, which means that God is still a Zionist. Second. It's impossible to explain the existence of the Jewish people in their ancient homeland today without divine intervention. No other nation has been expelled from its homeland for a period of many hundreds of years only to maintain its identity and then return to its original homeland.
Every other nation that has been scattered from its homeland for a period of centuries has ceased to exist as a nation, without exception. Except for the Jewish people. And note that the Jewish people survived as a nation despite centuries of terrible suffering, being expelled from country after country, being herded together in ghettos, being reduced to second-class citizenship, sometimes even facing annihilation, most recently under the Nazis. Yet the Jewish people live, as celebrated in Hebrew, Ami Israel Chai, because God has preserved them. As a Jew myself, I can say he has preserved us.
Not because of our faithfulness, but because of his faithfulness. Not because of our goodness, but because of his goodness. And just think. The Nazis slaughtered 6 million Jews, two out of every three Jews in Europe, and yet today there are more than 6 million Jews living in Israel. This could not have happened without the hand of God.
Don't take my word for it. This is supported by the scriptures as well, based on simple biblical logic. You see, According to the scriptures, when God blesses, no one can curse. Nobody curses. No one can bless.
When he opens a door, no one can close it. And when he closes a door, no one can open it. When he smites... No one can heal. And when he heals, no one can smite.
In the same way, when he gathers, no one can scatter, and when he scatters, No one can gather. Since the Bible tells us that God scattered the Jewish people in his anger, there's only one possible way they can be back in the land today. God himself regathered them. To suggest that the Jewish people themselves and the United Nations reestablished Israel is to say that God's will was overthrown by human effort. Perish the thought.
This also explains why there's such extreme hostility towards the state of Israel, why so many radical groups want to wipe out the Jewish state, why the nations of the world want to determine Israel's boundaries, why these same nations refuse to recognize Jerusalem as Israel's capital. It's the same pattern that has existed for millennia. The nations of the world are hostile to the purposes of God, in particular, his purposes for Israel. This doesn't mean that everything Israel does is right, everything the Palestinians do is wrong, and it doesn't mean that lovers of the God of the Bible should not pursue justice for all the Middle Eastern peoples. But it does mean the state of Israel exists today because God decreed it.
And that means that God is a Zionist. Yo, here we go. Hope we timed that correctly.
So Let's just step back, say these couple of last things, and then we'll go over to your questions. get to those that I can get to. All right?
Who scattered the Jewish people? In anger. God. Who said that they were under a curse. God rejecting Torah, Moses, prophets, Messiah.
Who has the power to regather those God-scattered? Only God. Only God. Satan can't do it. Wouldn't do it.
UN doesn't have the power to do it. Jewish people don't have the power to undo the curse and regather themselves.
So That was laid out plainly on the video. Again, it's called this God of Zionists, so just watch it independently, share it with your friends. It's God who regathered the Jewish people. And I want to present the scripture logic and then come back to the question. Does the Bible call Christians to support Israel?
God promised Explicitly, passages like Jeremiah 31, verses 35 to 37 promised explicitly. that he would Never allow the nation of Israel, the Jewish people as a whole, the physical nation, to be wiped out from the earth, ever, ever. That he would preserve us, even despite our sin.
So if you're Satan, you want to make God into a liar. And you want to stop these people from their mission, so you want to wipe Satan out.
So we stand with God. against the devil in terms of the attempts to wipe out the Jewish people. Number one. Number two. God promised he would bring the people back to the land.
Even in unbelief. for his sovereign purposes. Yes, if we repented, he guaranteed our return. But even without our repentance and his sovereign purposes... And his sovereign purposes When he wants to He will restore us back to land.
That he did. And for my many Calvinist Reformed friends, You believe in God's sovereignty. You certainly recognize that it was God orchestrating these events.
So the horrors of the Holocaust, the regathering, who's behind the Ultimately, bringing the people back, you'd have to say God was. And since the word says it's going to happen, you put two and two together.
So I stand with God. against the devil. when it comes to the right of the Jewish people to be back in their land. That's number two. Number three.
Passages like Zechariah 14, which clearly have not been fulfilled yet, Zechariah 12, which have not been fulfilled yet, speak of a Jewish Jerusalem at the end of the age. Therefore I stand with God. And against the devil. or others that would keep Jewish people out of Jerusalem from saying that the Jewish people have a right to their ancient capital city. And number four.
Since the Jewish Jerusalem must welcome Jesus back, As laid out, for example, in Matthew 23, verses 37 to 39, a Jewish Jerusalem must welcome him back. Therefore, I stand with God against the devil and working to see Jewish people turn to Jesus Yeshua. That is my greatest emphasis, to see my people turn to Jesus Yeshua.
So, I recognize if Satan wanted to destroy the Jewish people as a whole, Satan wanted to drive the Jewish people out of the land. I see groups like Hamas and Hezbollah and the Houthis who say death to Israel as being agents of Satan. Yes, they need Jesus too, Jesus died for them as well, but I see them as being agents of Satan working against the purposes of God.
So therefore I stand with God. And this purpose is for Israel. That does not mean I support everything Israel does. That does not mean that I therefore support everything the Israeli government does. or say that Prime Minister Netanyahu can do no wrong.
Or that Israel is always right and the Palestinians are always wrong. No, we look at everything based on justice, based on fairness. based on realism in the midst of war, what's the best that can be done. and as friends of Israel And yes, Zionists, meaning we believe that this is the Jewish homeland, and it's Christian Zionists. Messianic Jewish Zionists, meaning we believe that God brought the Jewish people back to the land.
We call on the Jewish people to act justly and rightly. But yes, we recognize the hand of God, we recognize the promises of God, and this brings encouragement to us. That the same God who has preserved the Jewish people against all odds, even through much suffering because of our disobedience and much suffering because of satanic attack. That same God will keep his promises to his children. children, all of his children.
Say it again. Jews without Jesus are not saved. There's not a separate covenant or separate way for them. We all come the same way through the Messiah's blood, through the Messiah's cross. And when all Israel will be saved at the end of the age, that turning will be a turning to Jesus Yeshua the Messiah.
And it is not retroactive. Every Jew who ever lived is automatically saved. That would be wonderful, but that's not scriptural. And it's not how God deals with things. It's not individual.
It's not covenantal. And There's no guarantee of any Jew living today that they'll be saved. But there will be a national turning at the end of the age. Scripture is clear on that. All right.
Um Let me get to your questions first. Shoshana, thanks for your donation. What's going on with Christians stating that we've replaced the Jews? It's so shameful. Look, there are many promises that God gave to Israel that are spiritually applied to believers in the New Testament.
Again, read my article, just post it on thelineofire.org. The church is not spiritual Israel. There are many similar descriptions. Both the church and the children of Israel are called children of God. uh chosen people, a royal priesthood, etc.
And yet, the church does not become Israel. The church does not become Israel. Is the church spiritual Jacob? Obviously not. And just as in Jesus, Jew and Gentile are one, there's no class distinction or caste distinction.
Jews don't become Gentiles. Gentiles don't become Jews. Paul's explicit on that in 1 Corinthians 7. Let each one remain in their calling. If you're saved, circumcised, don't become uncircumcised.
If you're saved, uncircumcised, don't become circumcised. Uses the word called there, meaning saved in context. All right, let's see. Question, again, I'm only spotting the ones on YouTube that have at the line of fire. Uh Fresh Bueller, do you take callers?
We don't have the technology to do that now. We took live calls for 18, 16 years, I'm sorry, from 2008 to 2024. We may have that technology in the future, now that we're off radio, but not at the moment. Um Okay, let's see. Great flapper.
Thank you for your contribution. Appreciate it.
So thankful to see you back here. Have been praying for you to keep overcoming for greater purposes. How to combat replacement theology spreading through internet or is it part of prophecy? Is the Mount Zion in Revelation 14 earthly? Uh so Yeah.
We combat replacement theology, recognizing that many fine brothers and sisters hold to this. and that many are not anti-Semitic in any way. We also recognize that through church history, It is the idea that the church somehow takes the place of Israel, that the promises given to the physical seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are now given to the church spiritually, that the church somehow supersedes Israel in God's promises. that all the promises given to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob are fulfilled in Jesus.
So those outside of Jesus are no longer covenantally gods. Different variations, what you call fulfillment theology, replacement theology, supersessionism. Yes, by God's grace, we will oppose those things. And sadly, through church history, That teaching Has opened the door for Jew hatred and outright persecution of the Jews through history. Sad but True.
If you've not read my book, Our Hands Are Stained with Blood. Make sure you get the 2019 edition. I really encourage you to read it. and to see what's happened through church history. Come to grips with it, friends.
It's reality. Look, we see how much God's doing in the church today around the world to shake us, all right? We see how much God's doing in the world to bring correction to the body, America, around the world, and as one in the midst of the charismatic movement, I've written about it many times myself and on a regular basis lay my whole life before the Lord, correct me, teach me, change me. We know God's shaking the whole body right now.
Well, don't be surprised that through church history there's been a lot of junk. Don't think you have to defend everything that's happened in church history.
Okay, it's human beings. It's Jesus who's perfect, not human beings.
So we turn from our sin, we repent before God, but we recognize the only perfect one is the Savior. If you've not read, our hands are stained with blood. I strongly encourage you to. In Revelation 14, Mount Zion, it's a highly symbolic. passage in the book of Revelation, of course, but you could read it ultimately of a heavenly Mount Zion, as in Hebrews 12, or the culminations of God's purposes on Zion in a typical way referring to God's promises on the earth.
Um Let's see, Rudolph. Where is the divine command to recreate modern Israel? There are always divine commands from prophets Moses for Israel, Haggai for return, Jesus for New Israel.
Well, first, New Testament doesn't speak of anything called New Israel. It's a term you just mentioned, New Testament, doesn't... use that term just to be technical here. The promises that God gave in the Old Testament are his command. How is it that Jewish people who are scattered around the world suddenly come back en masse?
beginning in 1948 and the modern restoration of Israel, or immediately after World War II. Despite all kinds of British opposition and to return and other things like that, how is it that it happened? Who did it? Who did it? If we're under covenantal curses, we cannot regather ourselves.
So it is God who regathered, just like in Ezekiel 36, God says, I'll bring you back. I'll bring you back. You say, yeah, but this used the UN today. Yeah, well, just like God used Cyrus in the Old Testament. What's the big deal?
God used Cyrus. King Cyrus was not a worshiper of Yahweh. God says about him in Isaiah 45: you know, He's called, He's chosen, He's my Mashiach, He's my anointed one. You know, He doesn't know me. He doesn't know me.
And Cyrus, in his famous tribute to Marduk, praises the Babylonian God as the great God, and basically tells exiles from other nations: go back to your homeland, rebuild the temple, pray for us.
So that was his policy all over. And yet God used that to bring the Jewish people back to the land.
So he brought us back? and he used the UN to recognize it.
So? Four. Where is there anything against it? And all the verses about return, return, return, they're never. They never stopped until we're back in the land.
They still have their power, still have their meaning. All right?
Um let's see.
Alright, just go up a little here. My friend, did all things pass away? Another question is more of an observation. It's Clement of Rome's epistle to the Corinthians. He gives two admonitions to repent, first Gentiles, second Jews, your thoughts.
Um Slightly off topic. And I would like to review the passage before commenting.
So let's go to maybe an earlier question that was raised.
Some asked me if Gentile Christians were the remnant. What's your take on that? No, uh Gentile Christians are certainly not the remnant. The remnant that's spoken of is Jewish believers within the land. Just like in Romans 11, Paul says, hey, there's a remnant saved according to grace.
Even at this moment, there's a remnant saved according to grace. Just like God told Elijah in 1 Kings 19, there's 7,000 who have not yet bowed their knee to Baal. Let's just see here. I'm scrolling down.
Okay, let me go over to some... Facebook questions. Hey, Dr. Brown, did the early church and apostles believe in one saved, always saved teaching?
Sorry. but I'm only answering questions on topic. Does Jesus change everything at the Last Supper when he says new covenant? No, no, not at all. He's saying what Jeremiah promised to the house of Israel and Judah.
Right? To the Jewish people as a whole, the the nation of Israel as a whole. Jeremiah 31, verses 31 to 34. This is now taking place with my, I'm instituting, Jesus is saying the new covenant.
So it's instituted with that remnant at the Last Supper. It then gets all those that believe, Jewish people now get brought into that. And because the Jewish people have been called to be the light of the world. and the priestly nation bringing the message of God to the world.
Now this new covenant is opened through the cross to all people. They can now all enter into the spiritual blessing. But God never says, never ever says that the promise of the physical land. that he swore forever, meaning as long as this world endures, to the physical descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, that that goes to the whole church. Again.
We inherit the whole world and eternity, new heaven and new earth, all right, together. In this world, this is one little piece of one little tiny piece of land. for the Jewish people. What? About the size of the state of New Jersey.
That's it. Why why begrudge it? You say no, but Paul says emphatically in 2 Corinthians 1 that as many promises as God has made, they are yes in Christ. It doesn't mean that if God made a promise to a woman in the Old Testament in a specific situation, I can now take that on myself because it's yes in Christ. No, if if God made a promise The general promise, whatever it is, to whomever he made it, it's now reaffirmed in Jesus.
It's now reaffirmed in Jesus. It doesn't mean anyone can take any promise given and it's yes in Christ. As a man, I'm going to take the promise that a woman and childbirth has nothing to do with me. Promises God gave to Israel, to Israel. Can you spiritually make application?
Sure. But you don't steal them. You don't take them away from their recipients. Dr. Brown or another Arminian, how can you argue from an Arminian Position that all Israel will be saved since you believe that faith precedes regeneration.
In other words, how can God guarantee that all of Israel will be saved from an Armenian soteriological position? Yeah, I appreciate the question. Uh God foresees. He foreknows. And he will arrange things in such a way.
that there will be a final churning. We don't know. what the number of Jewish people will be at the end of the age. I'm not dogmatic about end-time prophecy, meaning how much destruction will be on the earth, how much upheaval will be on the earth. Most of the earth be wiped out.
Gentile and Jew will Will there be a massive harvest in the midst of great destruction? I believe they're parallel promises of great blessing, great destruction at the same time. I don't believe it means every single Jewish person on the planet. But God in His foreknowledge and wisdom will arrange things in such a way And will know, and he knows the future that at that time there will be a future turning. But if the only way you can hold on to that is a Calvinist, then hold on to it as a Calvinist.
Uh let me just see if there are any other Facebook questions that were sent my way. I'm just scrolling down. Don't see them here.
Alright, let me just see if there are any other YouTube questions that I missed. I know I did a lot of teaching. And Um Yeah, so I just noticed a question about debating Steve Gregg. Uh Steve and I had something set up in California in April, This past April. Um And uh We were gonna have like a a all night, next day discussion.
at a major church there. And then because of everything that was happening in my life with me having to step back from ministry for some months and take an extended sabbatical, we had to postpone the event. But to my knowledge, Steve is really eager to do it, to really have an in-depth discussion, which I really welcome. I mean, a lot can happen in a two-hour debate. A lot, a lot can happen.
But even more, just go back and forth and have this time.
So hopefully, God willing, in the future, we'll be able to have that discussion. An earlier question asked, what is it that I disagree with about dispensationalism? In my book, Not Afraid of the Antichrist with Craig Keener, I lay that out. I do believe that dispensationalists are right in recognizing the ongoing nature of God's promises to Israel. I differ.
with the idea that we're in some parenthetical period now where this is the age of grace and God's not dealing with Israel in that same way then once the church is taken out and raptured, then God will deal with Israel again in a saving way. Most of all, I disagree with the idea that there will be a sudden any second rapture that will be taken out before a period of tribulation. And there are areas I agree with in dispensationalism in terms of promises, but the strict separation between Israel and the church without recognizing the degree of overlap is another difference that I have. Again, with brothers and sisters in the Lord. All right.
You know, what's interesting is over on X, if this comes up on Twitter, you know, there'll be a flood of really intense arguments and people calling me out to discuss and debate. And when we give the opportunity to come on here and post questions. Um Yeah, check out incorporating StreamYard for callers. Thanks for mentioning that. There are a number of options.
To use, and we're looking at what would be the most feasible because I thoroughly enjoyed taking calls in the past. Gerard, surely the church fathers could not be wrong. They never placed such a great emphasis on Israel. The Jewish state is secular, and their treatment of Christians is horrible. Actually, you're 100% wrong in terms of.
Uh there Treatment of Christians in Israel is horrible. Here and there, there have been some instances of persecution of Christians in Israel, but otherwise, Christians in Israel. have more freedoms to worship God. Even to share their faith? to come together in their churches and congregations.
have more freedom to do that than in any other country in the Middle East. More freedom to do that. Fact.
Well, I saw a picture of Jews spitting on. Yeah, you have some extremists here and there. And when that happened, when you had Jews spitting on Christians, and again, The church history that these Jews know is Inquisitions and Crusades and all the Christians in Nazi Europe, okay? and and the anti-Semitism of Martin Luther. That's what they know.
That's what they think they're cursing. Even so, the prime minister and chief rabbis denounced their actions. Yes, there has been some persecution of Christians in Israel. Extremely limited. by religious Jewish fanatics, extremely limited.
Absolutely deplorable. And point of fact, it is the massive exception to the rule. Let me say it again. Christians. in Israel.
Have more Freedom, especially Gentile Christians, to worship God, to gather in their churches, to celebrate holy days, to have access to holy sites more than any other. Other Country in the Middle East. Fact.
Fact.
Not only so, God restoring the Jewish people back to the land. It is largely sector of the religious population is growing. But it's still a Jewish state. It still recognizes Saturday as the Sabbath. It still recognizes the God of Israel as the God of the nation.
It still recognizes the biblical calendar. But more importantly, God said in Ezekiel 36, He'd bring the Jewish people back in unbelief back to the land and then sprinkle clean water. More and more Jewish people coming to faith on a regular basis within the land as we see that gradually being fulfilled. And lastly, Many of the church fathers believed that there would be a national restoration of Israel. Maybe even there.
A study of the writings of Michael Vlach, V-L-A-C-H. V L A C H where he lays out text after text. I cite them in my book, Christian Antisemitism. Christian. anti-Semitism.
Look it up. Many of them spoke of a restoration of the world. of the Jewish people back to the land. or recognize that in the future kingdom the Jewish people. would would be restored.
Yes, even those that held to various aspects of replacement theology and saw the church fulfilling certain promises still realized that other promises God would keep to Israel. And of course the church fathers are wrong on different things because they're human beings. They're human beings. And that's why you have differences between church fathers, differences between East and West, and differences between Greek Orthodox and Roman Catholic. Even though they rely on the church fathers and disagreements with Protestants as well.
Um Eli or Eli, when the Lord returns for the millennial kingdom, will the only people living in the Holy Land be ethnic Jews? Won't the Lord summon all people and separate the goats from sheep? As I understand it, Mm-hmm. The Jewish people have a exalted role in the Millennial Kingdom. to teach the nations.
And The nations will come streaming to Jerusalem to worship the God of Israel.
So, the ones I would understand would be living there would be the Jewish people. and the nations streaming to Israel to worship the God of Jacob in Yeah. Isaiah chapter 2 verses 1 through 4 is an example, or the picture of Isaiah 11 being realized there. And we who are believers will be glorified when the Lord returns and will rule and reign together with him. Exactly how that works out, the details, God knows.
The last thing I'm going to be is dogmatic about future details like that. And And let's just see here. Any other questions that I missed? Yeah, I also strongly encourage you to check out the writings of Gerald McDermott. Gerald McDermott on Christian Zionism.
I think you'll find them really, really helpful. Remember, I've referenced the book earlier, The Future. Restoration of Israel. On sale from Kindle, the hardcover is $70, about 400 pages, something. The Kindle is $2.99.
You can read my detailed article there on Galatians 3:16. Hopefully, that's helpful. Also, If you don't get The frontline newsletter sent out once a month The frontline newsletter. By all means, check it out. It's free, it's digital, it's edifying, it's uplifting, it's informative.
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There's no higher, lower, better, worse. We are equal, we are one, and we need each other. And I implore you, pray. for the salvation of the lost sheep of the house of Israel. God bless.
