So why does Hezbollah have such hatred for Israel, and what do we make of Israel's extraordinary attack on Hezbollah fighters? What is Hezbollah? Why do they have such intense hatred for Israel? Why did Israel carry out this extraordinary attack on Hezbollah members, Hezbollah militants in Lebanon, resulting in thousands and thousands of gruesome injuries, many fatalities? What in the world is going on? We'll sort that out today.
We'll answer those questions. This is Michael Brown. Thanks for taking time to join us on Thoroughly Jewish Thursday. And should we be rejoicing that Israel is able to carry out this cyber attack?
Sounds not even a sci-fi spy movie. It seems beyond that. Should we be rejoicing?
Should we be grieving over the loss of human life and the pain and suffering being endured right now? We'll talk about that as well from a biblical viewpoint. If you have a Jewish-related call, a Jewish-related call, here's the number 866-348-7884.
866-344-TRUTH. It could be related to the modern state of Israel. It could be related to Jesus being the Jewish Messiah. It could be a Hebrew question, a Jewish tradition question. We'll do our best to give you solid answers.
Alright, let me start out of the gate with a clip. This is an Al-Quds Day speech. So Al-Quds, the holy place, the holy city, that's Jerusalem in Arabic.
This is a speech from around 2013. Hassan Nasrallah is the current leader to this day of Hezbollah. Hezbollah is, in Arabic, the party of God. It is a radical Islamic organization, political party as well, just as Hamas is. So these are radical fundamentalist Muslims. Hezbollah began in 1982.
We'll give you a bit more about the origins of that. But its great ideological inspiration comes from Ayatollah Khomeini. Now we'll play this clip in a moment, but Ayatollah Khomeini, of course, was the leader in modern days, in recent decades, of radical Islam. You can trace it back further to the Muslim Brotherhood. You can trace things further back to ideologies of, say, the Grand Mufti of Jerusalem, Haj Amin al-Husseini became a confidant of Adolf Hitler in World War II. But in terms of, from the 70s on, the real face of this, and the one that gave inspiration to so much of radical Islam worldwide, is Ayatollah Khomeini. So he was able, through his messages, through his sermons, to bring about the fall of the Shah of Iran. While Khomeini was in exile, his messages were recorded on cassette tape, where he was exiled in France.
They were smuggled into Iran. Then they became the fodder, the fuel for the imams, as they would preach in the Friday mosque services. And then the furor, the intensity, the fire burning against the Shah, against Westernism, against secularism, against modernism, just rose until the Shah, who ruled Iran with an iron hand, literally had to flee for his own life before Khomeini even arrived in the country. And then Khomeini came to the country, welcomed as this great leader, of course, the claims of the beauty and the power of radical Islam have long faded for many of the people of Iran who were dropping out of Islam and who were suffering the consequences of this evil regime.
But the fire of the revolution began to spread. So this is 1979, Khomeini. Khomeini is militantly anti-Israel. He's Persian. He's not Arab. He's not a descendant of Palestinians.
Please understand this. The Iranians are not Arabs. They don't claim Arab descent. They are Persians.
They go back to Darius and Cyrus in the Bible. So this is, we're talking, yes, Muslims, yes, Middle East, but not Arabs. The Iraqis are Arabs. The Egyptians are Arabs.
Palestinians are Arabs. The Iranians are Persians. Their language is Farsi. It's written in a similar script to Arabic, not identical, but similar, but different languages.
It's Farsi, not Arabic. What joins them is radical Islam. They are Shiites, though, say Saudi Arabia, that would be Sunni.
Most of Hamas would be Sunni. Hezbollah is Shiite, as was Khomeini, of course. So 1979 is when the Islamic revolution of Iran really takes hold. And then in 1982, when Israel takes over some territory in Lebanon. So it was really a military seizure of Lebanon in 82 in the midst of the war there. It's out of that soil that Hezbollah is born as a resistance movement.
Just out of one historical account, it was founded after the Israeli military seizure of Lebanon in 1982, which resulted in immediate formation of the Islamic resistance units for the liberation of the occupied territories and for the expulsion of the aggressive Israeli forces. And since then, they've been attacking. They've been involved in terrorist attacks against America and other countries, suicide bombings that took many American lives in the 1980s. That's been who they are.
That's what they do. They are, outside of an official country, the best armed military in the world right now, according to what I have read. So outside of an actual state player, an actual country, they are that well armed. And who arms them?
Iran. They're armed by Iran with between 120,000 and 200,000 rockets, missiles available to them. And the arsenal is such that it could get to anywhere in Israel. They could cover territory and get to anywhere in Israel without a problem. And they have been attacking Israel from the north for decades. And Israel finally saying, OK, enough is enough and we're going to do what we can to disrupt you and take you down. So I want you to get the spirit of things. I'm going to play this clip, getting back from 2013. And it's just important to understand who Hezbollah is and what you'll hear at the beginning is the crowd chanting and we swear to Nasrallah. And then after they're chanting, I'm going to play a little bit.
You'll hear this. This is in Arabic. Again, this is in Lebanon. So these these are Arabs in Lebanon.
Hezbollah is is an Arab Arabic organization, but again, inspired by Khomeini of Iran. And once it goes in, I'll I'll tell you from the the transcript what's actually being said. Let's listen to the crowd first. All right. So maybe you heard in reference Khomeini there.
Here's what he's saying. As the imam Khomeini described it, Israel is a cancerous tumor. It was a cancer. Everybody knows the nature of a cancer is to spread itself in the body and destroy it.
The only solution to heal is to eradicate the cancer, never to surrender to it, never give an opportunity. Israel represents a constant danger to all the people of the region. Israel is a danger to Jordan and it's elimination serves the national interest of Jordan. It's a danger to Egypt and its elimination serves the national interest of Egypt. It's a danger to Syria, and its elimination serves the natural interest of Syria and the same spirit.
Israel is a danger to Lebanon and its elimination serves the national interest of Lebanon. And you'll hear in a moment the crowd shouting their allegiance once again. Listen. What are they chanting?
What are they chanting? Death to Israel. And his last line, the least we can do on this all codes day, this Jerusalem day, is to not recognize the state of Israel, not to recognize its existence and legitimacy. So again, this is the very spirit of Ayatollah Khomeini, who referred to Israel as a cancerous tumor, who distinguished between the Jews who lived in his country and were loyal citizens from what he called the blood-sucking Zionists, the goddess blood-sucking Zionists. So Hezbollah, like Hamas, has no interest in a two-state solution, has no interest in dwelling side-by-side peacefully with the people of Israel, again Lebanon to the north of Israel. And they have been simply bombing, attacking Israel, a terrorist group, a resistance group, that is who they are, that is their origin, that is their mindset, that is their basis, that is one of their great goals, primary goal of eradicating Israel. So what would America do if we had to our immediate north, in different cities across Canada, to our immediate north, I'm talking about just a matter of miles, in some cases 50 miles, in some cases 5 miles, and our civilians for years, for decades, are being attacked by them, are being bombed by them. And then just recently, a few weeks back, in retaliation for Israel taking out the political leader of Hamas, Ismail Haniyeh in Iran, in retaliation for that Iran attack itself, Hezbollah attacked with hundreds and hundreds of rockets and missiles which, thank God, were intercepted, almost all of them, by the Iron Dome. And Israel said that, from what they could tell, 90% of the rockets were launched from civilian areas, again just like Hamas, go ahead, come after us, you're going to have to kill civilians in order to do it.
So even in terms of rules of war engagement, violating them, but they're a terrorist organization, they don't play by those rules, like Hamas doesn't play by those rules. What would America do? This goes on for years. You think we'd let it go on for years? Thousands, in some cases, many, many tens of thousands, several hundred thousand, have had to flee from the north, and still fled from the north.
I'm people talking about Israelis who lived there, they've had to move, they've had to relocate, stay in hotels and other places temporarily, because their houses, their neighborhoods are being bombed, their communities are being bombed. How long would America wait before it said to Canada, you either eradicate these people, arrest them, make them ineffective, disable them, or we're going to destroy them, and you're going to have limited time to get out of the way because we're going to wipe out every last one of them. How long would we put up with that?
Not a fraction as long as Israel has. So what happened now with these pagers exploding and just gruesome, gruesome stories? I've been reading some of the videos that are graphic, but gruesome, gruesome stories. What happened? How did it happen?
Why did it happen? We'll take that up on the other side of the break, and then phone lines are open. We've got a few phone lines open. Natalie, you'll be first.
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Here again, it's Dr. Michael Brown. Welcome back to the Line of Fire. We're praying with friends of mine in Israel as we're working together with the launching of the Jerusalem Bible Institute. Hebrew speaking only, it's for training leaders within Israel. God willing, though, we'll be recording classes in English. And anything I record will be in English because I speak Hebrew poorly. I read it well, I speak it poorly. But I read Biblical Hebrew well. Modern Hebrew, not so strong. So we'll be recording classes, student classes of the future, God willing, for everyone in English right now, Hebrew speaking. But I was praying with some of the brothers and it was reality of what's happened in your neighborhood.
You've been hit with anything. This is something Israel has lived with day and night for years and years and years. Before I get into this and come back to what happened with the pager attack and then take your calls, two quick orders of business. First, as always, my heartfelt appreciation to our great co-sponsor TriVita. I enjoy their products every day, their great wellness products, and they are super generous to you, our listeners and viewers.
So thank you again. Also, we're really encouraging you to stand with us at a critical time. We are sowing into Israel in different ways. We'll be sowing in financially as well, especially to help with training leaders within the land. And we want to invite you to participate with us at a critical time in the history of Israel. As we push back against the lies of anti-Semitism. And they're out there, friends.
They are out there in a very, very serious way. I was interacting with students at a ministry school the other day. This is actually yesterday. The student asked a question and referenced Nick Fuentes. I just showed a video.
Nick Fuentes is a Hitler praising radical white supremacist Jew hater. And the student said, yeah, he makes a valid points. What?
I mean, I actually sat the student down. Ultimately, what what are you talking about? What are you talking about is out there. So we're combating the lies. On the one hand, on the other hand, on the other hand, we are reaching out to the lost sheep of the house of Israel. And we want to invite you to participate with us in the sacred work. I just finished signing a bunch of copies of Hearts of Compassion, Backbones of Steel.
It comes out October 8th. We have advanced copies. This book. Well, the title speaks for itself. It's seeking to model how we engage in the culture wars, bringing grace and truth together.
We want to send it to you for your gift of any size. Signed with John. Well, John 114. That's the verse in there about Jesus being full of grace and truth. So thank you for standing with us. Here's the number to call. Eight hundred five three eight five two seven five eight hundred five three eight five two seven five.
Or just go to the line of fire that or you'll be able to see it right on the home page, the line of fire. Stand with us as we stand with Israel, as we push against the lies. OK, before you go before we go to your calls, before we go to your calls. Israel has pulled off something that's beyond stunning. As best as we understand, Israel intercepted a shipment of thousands of pagers from Taiwan going into Lebanon. Why pagers?
Who uses pagers anymore? Well, the philosophy was that it was better and safer to use pagers because it's harder to hack them. Whereas smartphones, cell phones, Israel could more readily hack.
And Hezbollah knows about Israeli technology, its legendary spying abilities and things like that, although also quite human, as evidenced by the horrific, horrific Israeli security failures on October 7. But you're using pagers because they're considered to be harder to hack, intercept signals and things like that. And shipment of pagers went in a few months ago and Israel, according to what we understand, was able to intercept the shipment.
It's all beyond wild. Insert one or two ounces of explosive material in each phone, in each pager and then a triggering device. They want a certain message which was sent, would trigger the pager to explode. So on Tuesday, all over Lebanon, within an hour, thousands, thousands of these pagers exploded.
Thousands exploded. And according to what I've read, again, I'm no expert here. I'm not a military expert, a science who's going to say sci fi.
It sounds like sci fi, doesn't it? I'm not an expert in terms of how these things are done. So I'm just reading the same reports that you're reading and doing my best to see what's accurate. What's being confirmed before we understand Israel was planning to not use this until there was real war. And then it would massively disrupt activities and spread absolute terror throughout the militants while they are incredibly well armed. Again, estimates of between one hundred twenty two hundred thousand rockets that they currently have, rockets, missiles, these destructive devices. I mean, God knows the damage these could do if they landed and hit their targets. But their their units, their their fighters are considered to be very well disciplined, well trained, even better than Hamas and others, but not that large in number.
So if you can inflict terror and casualties on thousands of them, you've massively disrupted their operation. So suddenly all over Lebanon, these explosions, people fall into the ground, bleeding, screaming. Initially, they reported a few fatalities. Now the numbers up to in the high thirties, including two children reportedly. And and then yesterday, Wednesday, in the midst of this and as they're having their first funeral services, hundreds of walkie talkies start exploding. Don't use the pages.
Go to the walkie talkies. They start exploding. So Israel infiltrated those as well.
Why? Why did they go off yesterday? Well, from what I understand, again, Israel was planning to wait for the right moment. But apparently one Hezbollah operative figured out that something was funny with the pages. So Israel took him out again. I don't know how they knew it, how they took him out.
Then when the second one found out, they realized, OK, we have to detonate these. And the stories, as I said, the horror stories are absolutely extreme. I was reading one account today and a journalist said I was in the hospital. I saw I saw fleshless faces. I said I saw people with all the bones exposed, still conscious. The doctors have said that they have had to. There's many, many, many, many people who've lost eyes, lost hands, lost fingers.
And for many, it would be the their dominant hand, because that's what they were looking at. Israel sent out a message, a page which appeared to be coming from Hezbollah headquarters. They look at the pager and next thing explodes. People with private parts ripped up. People rushed into the hospital with holes, massive holes in their abdomen or back. Absolutely gruesome.
I posted this. I grieve over the pain and suffering experienced by all the Hezbollah militants whose pagers exploded today. At the same time, I recognize that they're radical Islamists who chant death to Israel, that they were inspired by Atul Khomeini and had been lobbing tens of thousands of rockets and bombs into Israel for decades. Not one of them would be dead or injured today, if not for their incessant attacks on Israel. And as long as they are determined to wipe Israel off the map, they will suffer terrible casual casualties like today. May they recognize the bankruptcy of radical Islam.
They put down their weapons. They find mercy and new life in Jesus. I saw someone posted a response to that on X. I don't see most responses.
It happened to note a response which was a valid question. Did the Israelites grieve when God himself destroyed the Egyptian army? Farrowing the Egyptian army as they were drowned in the Red Sea, they sang songs of rejoicing. Well, on the one hand, God just did that sovereignly. That would be one thing as opposed to carrying out this attack.
On the other hand, there's Jewish tradition. That is, the angels were singing. God said, hey, that's my creation too. But when Isaiah the prophet is pronouncing judgment on Moab in Isaiah 15, and he's talking about the terrible suffering that's going to come their way, he says, my heart cries out over Moab. My heart cries out over Moab. He's speaking of his own pain over the suffering of people. So this is unimaginable suffering being experienced throughout Lebanon.
That grieves me. Still, these are fellow human beings, people creating God's image for whom Jesus died. Many of them just caught up in a deadly ideology.
Yes, responsible for their actions. So may their murderous attempts on Israel be thwarted. May they be stopped in their tracks. May Hezbollah come to an end. My greater prayer is that they would repent and be saved. So I grieve over the pain and suffering, but I hope that their actions will be thwarted.
We'll be right back. You can be silenced. I'm here to say, friends, that I am not about to be silenced, and I don't believe you are either. It is time for us to stand up. It is time for us to say enough is enough. It is time for us to push back in Jesus name, not fighting the way the world fights.
No, overcoming evil with good, overcoming hatred with love, overcoming the flesh with the power of the Spirit, overcoming lies with truth. And that's what we're here to do on the Line of Fire broadcast. And friends, it's not just a broadcast. It is a movement of people around the world. God's people standing up saying enough is enough and saying, Lord, here we are. Send us. Use us. I want to urge you today to join our support team because we are on the front lines together.
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This is how we rise up. It's The Line of Fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get on the line of fire by calling 866-34-TRUTH. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Shammah Yisrael Adonai Eloheinu Adonai Echad Hear Israel, O Lord our God, Hear His law, O Lord, Hear O Israel, the Lord is our God, the Lord alone. He is the one and only that we worship. 866-34-TRUTH.
We start in Detroit with Natalie. Welcome to The Line of Fire. Hi, Dr. Brown. Can you hear me OK?
Yes, I can. Thank you. Awesome. Well, I said this the last time I called, but I'm going to say it again. Thank you so much to you and to your team for organizing the trip to Israel in 2023. My husband and I went on that trip and. Yeah, just. Can't really express how great it was in the short time that we have here, but I always want to mention that every time I call.
Hey, let me let me ask you and thank you so much, Natalie. We were we were hoping to schedule the tour for May of 2025. But things are just so volatile right now. It just didn't seem to be the right time for us to be talking about that or promoting it. But I was asked by a student, a third year student at a school yesterday about going to Israel and said, you know, they they don't want to do the tour thing and on the bus, off the bus and all these different sites and different way.
What would I recommend? I said, actually, I think the first time you should do that. Just make sure it's the right choice. There's there's so much. If you don't know what you're doing, obviously, you just you know where to go. You know, the background of things.
But it just seems to be the first time just kind of take everything in that you can get a feel for everything that's happening. And then you'd always go back and spend more time here or there. Would you agree with that? Yeah, I would agree 100 percent. Like if we wouldn't have had our tour guides who were both messianic Jewish believers. Yeah. With us telling us everything about everything.
It wouldn't have been the same. It was it was honestly priceless to have them with us. Yeah. And also knowing where to go and things like that. Yes. I couldn't I couldn't lead a tour. You know, I I need to be there.
And then at certain sites, give some biblical teaching. But to be the one the tour guide, even people really experienced it on the ground anyway. Yeah. Thanks for sharing that again. Your question. Yes. So I'm a youth group leader. And right now we're doing a comparative religion series that we're going through. So teaching about Islam, Mormonism, Jehovah's Witnesses. And I'm going to be teaching on Judaism in the next couple of weeks here. And it's about an hour long that I get to really give as much information as I can as far as, you know, background history. And then really like how to evangelize to this specific group of people.
So I just wanted to get your best advice for how to fit as much as I can into one hour in the best way that I can. Right. Do you have my book? Sixty questions. Christians ask about Jewish beliefs and practices. No, I don't. Yes.
You might want to jot that down. Sixty questions. Christians ask about Jewish beliefs and practices just to kind of review it and make sure you understand the basics.
Right. So you want to define Judaism in its own right as opposed to just define it in contrast with Christianity. You want to define its own religion. So it shares with Christians the Old Testament. It worships the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob as best as it understands. And it believes that that the purpose of Israel on this earth is to obey God's laws and honor him in doing so.
It starts monotheistic, of course, but law based. But law seen as a gift from God that Israel was entrusted with this out of all the nations and that Israel believes that Judaism believes that God gave unwritten traditions along with the Bible. Which explains much of what Jews do to this day, why certain customs are kept. It's the Bible in the light of Jewish tradition. You could say Christians read the Old Testament in the light of the New Testament and Jesus in the Holy Spirit.
Jews read the Old Testament in the light of their subsequent traditions that have now been put in writing. And you could obviously say the basics that Jews believe the Messiah is still to come. They don't believe that a man could die for our sins or that God could be a man or a man become God.
So they reject any Trinitarian type of beliefs. But you want to again paint the picture of this belief that the Jewish people, people of Israel were singled out by God and his love. That they were entrusted with his sacred laws and commandments. So observing the Sabbath, keeping the dietary laws, the biblical calendar, even by certain ethical principles. This is the role, this is the mission of the Jewish people in the earth and in doing so they bear witness to who God is. And thereby teach the nations about the one true God. So Christians a lot of times look at the law in a negative way.
It's a burden, have to do it, all that old stuff. For a Jewish person this is a privilege. God gave Israel alone these commandments and traditions and it's a sacred entrustment. And that there's a great emphasis on repentance because there's a great emphasis on obedience, there's a great emphasis on repentance.
And that that's believed to be the ultimate way to be reconciled with God through repentance and changing one's lifestyle. Now the other thing that's important to remember is that there are wide ranges of Jews from the very religious to the very secular. And the great majority of American Jews are more secular. The great majority of American Jews are not that familiar with the Bible. The great majority of American Jews do not attend Sabbath services regularly or strictly observe the dietary laws, etc. So your average Jewish person they talk to is going to be pretty similar to your run of the mill person. They're not really religious, they don't really read the Bible. But for a Jew they know we don't believe in Jesus. That they know.
Why? Well Jesus is for the Gentiles. That's one perception. They hardly think of him as Jewish. He's like for the Gentiles. That's a separate religion, Christianity. And through church history the church often mistreated Jews, pushed them away from Jesus and gave Jesus a bad name. So it's important to understand there may be some obstacles when they talk about Jesus.
But the best way as far as evangelism is not to try to get in a theological argument as much as to share a testimony. To say as a Christian I'm a lover of the God of Israel and the people of Israel. And here's what God did in my life. What about your life?
What's he doing in your life? And then if questions come up say well I understand. A young person can say I don't really know what the prophecies are but I understand that Jesus is prophesied in the Old Testament. And then if there's interest you can go further and send them to our website realmessiah.com. Realmessiah.com. They can watch debates there, they can have their questions answered. So I could train people for three years and there's still more to teach. So in an hour you just want to give them that essence, that understanding.
And encourage them to take an interest in someone as a fellow human being. If you can share your testimony, do it. If questions come up, send them to realmessiah.com. Alright? Alright, fantastic. Thank you so much.
You're very welcome. God bless. 866-344-TRUTH. Let's go over to Steve in Virginia.
Welcome to the line of fire. Hi, Dr. Brown. Can you hear me alright? Oh yeah. Okay, excellent. So I have a bit of a tough question for you but before I get into that I just want to say I appreciated your tweet where you talk about compassion for the Hezbollah fighters. I thought that was the right message.
I think that's a good message of compassion. And by the way, I've referenced fighters but in fact they're Hezbollah members so not all of them are military, right? So I've said the word fighters. You just repeated it. But yeah, in fact they're Hezbollah members.
Maybe someone else was around the page or picked one up that wasn't part. But yeah, for sure. But go ahead.
I'm sorry to cut you off. Go ahead. Sure. For sure.
For sure. And I heard the earlier part of the program where they're chanting death to Israel and obviously that's horrible and unconscionable, whatever adjective you want to use, right? But I do want to say this. So I want to get your feeling on all the innocence involved in this conflict and shouldn't we as Christians be compassionate toward everyone, all the members of Hezbollah or the innocent lives lost in Israel or anyone? And like me, there's a lot of Christians in Lebanon that are caught up in all of this. So shouldn't we feel for all sides here?
Yeah, absolutely we should. So let me say a few things. When there's a time of war or ongoing conflict, there are civilian casualties all the time which is tragic.
It just happens. It's one thing when you try to inflict civilian casualties, that's your goal, which is what the terrorists do. It's another thing when you were trying to kill the terrorists and as a result, civilians die. So, for example, what Hitler did, the extermination of Jews and others was murderous, unmitigated evil. When the allies bombed German cities, many, many civilians died.
Ultimately, that was because of the Nazis. But yes, you mourn for the loss of all the lives. So I look at it like this. Let's say ISIS terrorists were about to execute a busload of Christian children and snipers in mountains nearby were able to kill all those terrorists before they did. Boy, I'd be rejoicing that those lives were saved. I'd be so thankful to God that we were able, whoever was able to be there, to take them out, absolutely. And I would still grieve that these are human beings for whom God had purpose, for whom Jesus died, who were created in His image that were caught up in such evil, that they had to be rightly taken out. So, you know, we could be witnessing someone's execution on death row and someone was a murderer and a rapist and they're paying the price, they deserve to die under the law, so be it. And hopefully it brings slight closure to the families of the victims and things. On the flip side, I still mourn as a human life that was someone that could have brought life and help to others that could have been used by God and instead was used by the enemy. So it's both and, right?
It's both and. We've got to mourn just, yeah, exactly. We can't cheapen life. Yeah, exactly, sir. Hey, got a break. Thank you for the call.
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Go to triveda.com or call 800-771-5584. Again, 800-771-5584. This is how we rise up. It's the Line of Fire with your host, Dr. Michael Brown. Get on the Line of Fire by calling 866-34-TRUTH. Here again is Dr. Michael Brown. Welcome to the Line of Fire.
Great to be with you. Friends, my new book comes out next month, Hearts of Compassion, Backbones of Steel. This does reflect God's heart. He's a God of justice. He's a God of mercy. He's a God of grace. He's a God of truth. It's neither or.
It's both and. So, yes, on the one hand, the world sings and shouts when the wicked are destroyed. Relief has come.
Judgment has come. And it's a cause for rejoicing. The fall of the Nazis is a cause for rejoicing to the extent ISIS was dismantled.
I mean, it's still around. That's a cause for rejoicing when murderous people are stopped in their tracks. That's a cause for rejoicing. Yet, these are still people that could have been redeemed and lived for God and glorified him. And I know personally, I've met former terrorists, former terrorists, Egyptian, Palestinian men and talk with them. Lovers of Jesus, lovers of Israel.
Also, interestingly, I've met them and talk with them. God's a redeemer. It's a shame it didn't happen with these others. And then for the civilian casualties, all the people suffering in Gaza right now.
It's tragic. But ultimately, as much as Israel could always do better. I don't fault Israel for the deaths of the Palestinians in Gaza. I fault Hamas.
Because if not for Hamas, and if the people of Gaza had an opportunity to elect humane leaders that wanted to dwell side by side with Israel, it could be a beautiful, prosperous country, side by side, or a beautiful, prosperous neighbor to Israel with people flourishing, thriving. All right, let's grab a few more calls. Let's go over to Canada. Omar, welcome to the Line of Fire. Hi, Dr. Michael Brown. How are you?
Doing well, thank you. So I've been following the issue in the Middle East with Israel, and I know I realize how resolute they are in regards to standing up against even the UN with various laws that pass against them. So I'm wondering if we as Christians can glean from how strong Israel is, so that's like a practical outlook of a spiritual fight that we have as a Christian, because if we give the enemy any sort of loophole, they will definitely destroy us as Christians spiritually.
Yes, sir. But when I look at Israel, if they show any sign of weakness, then that's an opportunity for the surrounding enemy. So on the one hand, great point, sir. On the one hand, we recognize that the great majority of Israelis are more secular than religious, that they would not share some of our strong moral stance on issues like abortion or marriage and sexuality. We understand that the very, very religious Jews, 15 plus percent of the population, are militantly opposed to the gospel of Jesus. So we don't glorify Israel. We recognize Israel needs the Lord, like America needs the Lord. But as far as your point in terms of the military mindset, the resoluteness, the recognition that if we put down our vigilance for a moment, the enemy will take us out, to the recognition that we're all soldiers. Like 2 Timothy 2, Paul says to Timothy, Endure hardship as a good soldier of Messiah Jesus. Yeah, this is like, like I said, just praying with guys.
We're Jerusalem Bible and students are weekly prayer time and talking, planning for classes and training, discipling people in Israel. The first conversation is the war and everything okay in your neighborhood. You know, you hear of latest attack, you text your friend, you email your friend, everything okay there. So there's this constant state of vigilance people live with, this recognition that we're in a war, we're in a battle. And that's, sir, that's definitely something that we as followers of Jesus can take hold of and say, we must have that same mentality towards the enemy of our souls, Satan, towards demonic powers at every moment they want to take us out. And while we don't live in fear, we live with a resolute mindset. 1 Peter 5, 8 and 9, be sober, be vigilant. Your adversary, the devil goes about us with roaring lions, seeking whom he may devour. So be watchful and sober.
And when we think of our brothers and sisters being persecuted around the world, which 1 Peter reminds us of, reminds us of that. Hey, thank you, sir, for the call. I appreciate it. 866-34-TRUTH.
Let's go to Antonio in West Salem. Welcome to the line of fire. Thank you again, Dr. Michael Brown, for this opportunity today. I actually want to just be very clear. I am not a person who believes in Jesus.
I'm actually Jewish. Thank you for calling. Thank you for calling.
You're more than welcome. But my question in the Book of Acts, which we're told is written by Luke. We are explicitly giving purview to the disciples.
James, the brother of Jesus who leads the church, Peter, John, the son of Zebedee, and Paul. And we see implicitly Peter and John come to the temple at 3 o'clock to participate in the message of pure air, the midday prayer, which they would be bringing as sin sacrifice. And then we're told that Paul explicitly by James and by the elders that he has to engage in a Nazarite vow to bring sin sacrifice to show that he hasn't abandoned the law of Moses. My question is, James doesn't die until about 62, 63. If the disciples are bringing sin sacrifices probably almost three times a day during the temple time, clearly they couldn't have seen then Jesus's death as the final and ultimate sacrifice or remission for their sins.
I'm happy to answer. First, just to clarify some misconceptions. Jews were not bringing sacrifices to the temple three times a day. The Jewish community was not doing that.
If they were doing that, life would cease to exist. Nothing else would happen except trafficking out of Jerusalem. Cattle would cease to exist.
Life as a whole would cease to exist. Nor would Peter or John going to the temple at the time of prayer be offering a sacrifice. There were the perpetual sacrifices morning, evening that were offered up by the priests in the temple.
So that was happening all the time. But you didn't go to the temple three times a day and bring a sacrifice or even twice a day. You didn't daily bring a sacrifice. But for sure, Acts 18, Paul takes out a Nazarite vow, which would involve sacrifices as well. And for sure, in Acts 21, he engages in taking on a vow, which would involve offering sacrifices. We know explicitly that Peter wrote, no one disputes or virtually no one taking the Bible seriously disputes that Peter wrote. First Peter, where he talks about Jesus being the lamb and we're saved by his blood or sins are forgiven by his blood.
Paul writes about it over and over and over. Hebrews is written before this and Hebrews explicitly talks about it. The whole thing is they understood that those blood sacrifices themselves couldn't take away sin. They were for ritual purification. It would be like washing with soap versus taking an antibiotic for something inside of your body. But this is the argument that you gave about baptism as well from the book of Mark, which is where this is kind of following up from. But again, Dr. Michael Brown, I would have to beg of you, at least since you believe in the authority of the New Testament text, there's nothing in the book of Mark that suggests that the baptism was for purification.
And again, there's nothing in the book of Acts. Hang on for a second. What did you call last, by the way?
I think it was on Monday, I believe. Don't quote me. OK, got it. Got it. So it just slipped past.
So just our rule is no calls, same caller within three weeks out of fairness to others. So that's where this is coming from. OK, so. I would really encourage you to get your facts in order. You asked about why Jesus would be baptized and said it was a an outward. He said, do it to fulfill all rights. Because John recognized, you know, you should be baptizing me.
So we just do this. This is a righteous thing to do. But the New Testament, the authors, the very people you mention in Acts, we have their words. They explicitly over and over again, talk about the blood of Jesus, talk about forgiveness of sins through Jesus. Peter, in the book, in the very book of Acts, says it. Peter in Acts, the 13th chapter says this.
So you hear this out of his mouth. OK, so this is in the very book of Acts. And by the way, in the second chapter, when people say, what do we do? What do we do is repent and be baptized. Every one of you in the name of Jesus for the forgiveness of sins.
That's so it's it's through out. It is through out the book of Acts that this is the theme. And then actually, Paul Paul preaching in the 13th chapter says this through. Therefore, my friends, I want you to know that through Jesus, the forgiveness of sins is proclaimed to you through him.
Everyone who believes is set free from every sin, a justification you are not able to obtain under the law of Moses. So there you have it. Take the Bible seriously, sir, as a seeker. I'm so glad you listen.
I'm so glad you're calling. But you can't just pull out a verse here if if by the time we get to Acts 21, we see verse after verse talking about forgiveness of sins through Jesus over and over and saying that the law of Moses couldn't produce this. Then you get to Hebrews. I encourage you, if you've never read Hebrews, read it through. Read through Hebrews. I think you'll find it really eye opening and you really realize that the blood of bulls and goats never could actually take away sins itself. It ultimately derived its power from the once and for all sacrifice of what Jesus would do. These things pointed to it and in natural terms serve for ritual cleansing. Hey, James, Simone, unable to get to your calls or others. Now, if you're able to call in tomorrow, I'll get you up to the top as quickly as possible. And let's pray that God would open up the eyes of Antonio and bring him into a revelation of the truth of Jesus. The one and only Messiah of Israel, the one and only savior of the world. .
