Four thousand years ago, God commanded Abraham to leave the town of Ur to go to ‘the land that I will show you’. God also made great promises: ‘I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great… and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed’ (Genesis 12:1–3).
We can see for ourselves how those promises have been fulfilled. Abraham became the “father” of the Jewish race (among others), and his name is widely known to this day. And Abraham was the ancestor of Jesus Christ—the greatest blessing God could possibly have given to humankind.
The Law of Moses
God’s intention was that the Jewish people should become a “model” society and be an example for others to follow. God gave them the Law of Moses, which was thousands of years ahead of its time. For instance, the Law required careful washing after contact with a corpse—it seems obvious to us today, but the principle of avoiding cross infection was only discovered relatively recently. The Law required that the poor should be treated with compassion: ‘When you reap the harvest of your land, you shall not reap your field right up to its edge… You shall leave them for the poor and for the sojourner… you shall not deal falsely… The wages of a hired worker shall not remain with you all night until the morning… (Leviticus 19:9–13). The Law required high standards of hygiene and a healthy diet. Without doubt, the general health of the nation would have been upheld if those high level laws were followed.
But great blessings brought great respons-ibilities. God’s purpose was that other nations would learn of Him through the Jewish people and that they, too, would enjoy those blessings. ‘Keep them and do them, for that will be your wisdom and your understanding in the sight of the peoples, who, when they hear all these statutes, will say, ‘Surely this great nation is a wise and understanding people’ (Deuteronomy 4:6). Sadly, the Jewish people often ignored God’s Law. Instead of being a “model society”, they copied the shameful behaviour of the surrounding nations, even sacrificing children to idols (2 Kings 17:17).
During those years God sent prophets, for example Isaiah and Jeremiah, to teach the people, but often the prophets were persecuted. Finally God sent His son Jesus, but they crucified him. Therefore God brought the Romans against His people. They destroyed Jerusalem in 70 ad, and 65 years later the nation was finally crushed. All Jews were expelled from the land, and by way of insult to them the land was renamed Palestina (a tribute to their old enemies the Philistines).
In the year 135 ad the city of Jerusalem was destroyed and a furrow was drawn right across the site. The Jewish people were scattered world-wide. The land which had been known as ‘a land of milk and honey’ (Exodus 3:8) became a land of barren, stony hillsides and malarial marshes.
Exile and Regathering
Nevertheless, throughout the years of wordwide scattering, the Jewish people always remained a separate race; they never became absorbed into their host nations. ‘Thus says the Lord, who gives the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night… If this fixed order departs from before me, declares the Lord, then shall the offspring of Israel cease from being a nation before me forever’ (Jeremiah 31:35–36). Have the sun or the moon ever failed to rise or set? Has the Jewish nation ever disappeared? Here is the certainty of God’s Word.
During the years of scattering, Israel was like a “ghost” nation—no land, no leader, no laws—yet always separate, completely unique. Then remarkably, after many centuries, the Jews returned to that ancient homeland—not through their own merit, but through the force of circumstances, in the wake of dreadful persecution in the 20th Century. With the establishment of the Jewish State in 1948, the land which languished largely waste under the Ottoman Empire through the previous centuries became fertile; marshes were drained and stony slopes were ploughed. Now fruit and flowers grown in Israel can be bought in the shops of many countries.
What is even more marvellous is that the Bible foretold this in detail. So the people of Israel have become a witness—through their suffering, their scattering and their constant separation—to the reliability of God’s Word. Here are more quotations which you might like to check for yourself: Deuteronomy 28:49–51, Leviticus 26:14–46, Jeremiah 16:14–17, 31:35–37, 30:10–11, Ezekiel 36:6–10, 37:1–14, Psalm 83:1–4.
Jesus Christ himself foretold the destruction of Jerusalem, but he added this: ‘Jerusalem will be trampled underfoot by the Gentiles, until the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled’ (Luke 21:24). We are now living at the last time, when the times of the Gentiles are fulfilled.
The Jewish nation is unique in many ways:
It had a definite beginning—the call of Abraham out of Ur approximately 4000 years ago.
It had a unique, advanced law—a law thousands of years ahead of its time.
It has been scattered worldwide, nevertheless its national identity has been preserved. Usually after scattering, national identity is lost through intermarriage in host nations.
It has suffered persecution and attempts at extermination. The first attempt is recorded in the book of Esther (about 500 bc). Hitler sought to exterminate the race. Hitler is dead—but the Jewish race lives on.
Through its unique history Israel has become a witness to the truth of God’s Word. ‘”You are my witnesses,” declares the Lord, “and I am God”’ (Isaiah 43:12).
The ‘land flowing with milk and honey’ has now regained its former fertility. But Israel is surrounded by enemies determined to destroy it.
Israel today is largely a godless nation. Bible prophecies suggest that finally their enemies will almost destroy them, but a Saviour will appear—a Saviour having scars in hands and feet. Then they will accept Jesus: ‘And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and pleas for mercy, so that, when they look on me, on him whom they have pierced, they shall mourn for him, as one mourns for an only child, and weep bitterly over him, as one weeps over a firstborn’ (Zechariah 12:10).
I am about to act… for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations to which you came… I will take you from the nations and gather you from all the countries and bring you into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you… And I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh’ (Ezekiel 36:22–26).
Jesus, he who was born ‘King of the Jews’ (Matthew 2:2); he who has the right to the throne (Ezekiel 21:25–27), will save Israel. He will establish the Kingdom of God; Jerusalem will be the world’s capital city.
And many peoples shall come, and say: “Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths”… nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore (Isaiah 2:3–4).
David Budden