Friday, 17 November 2023

Israel Has Been Gathered?

 

Image: Unsplash

I am loath to keep writing about this, but there are many Christians who believe many myths about the nation of Israel, and I think it is important to challenge these errors. So I want to address one other myth: “That the Gathering of Israel Has Been Fulfilled.”

There are many Christians saying online: "Can the United Nations or any human force be strong enough to gather the Jewish nation? Surely only God can achieve such a thing!"

I would actually say amen to that. Only God is strong enough to gather the Hebrew branches of God's people back to the land of Canaan. And it is because of that fact that we can know that the modern nation of Israel is not a fulfilment of prophecy, but a work of the flesh with all the manifestations of the flesh (idolatry rampant, sexual immorality, tyranny [over their own people, remember the evil Covid mandates that Israel also did], persecution of God's people the Church and more, c.f. Gal. 5:19-21). We can also see in this world that many of the Jews have not been gathered, and that is saying nothing of the other 10 tribes Israel (remember Judah represents only the remnants of two or three tribes, not the full 12).

A lot of Christians are not aware that about half of the Jewish world population today lives outside of Israel.

"Although Jews exist in most every country in the world, the vast majority are concentrated in two countries: Israel and the United States. With more than 6.9 million Jewish citizens (2021 estimate), Israel is home to more Jews than any other country in the world. 74.2% of Israel’s population is Jewish. The historic homeland of the Jews, Israel is home to the holy city of Jerusalem, which is of great importance to those of the Jewish faith. The United States has the world's second-largest Jewish population, with around 6 million Jews. More Jews live in New York City than in any other city in the world. The New York Metropolitan area is home to 1,728,000 Jews, roughly 10% of its total population. The borough of Brooklyn alone has nearly 800,000 Jews, which accounts for more than a third of its population.

The next eight countries with the largest Jewish populations were estimated to have between 446,000 and 91,500 Jews in 2021. First comes France with 446,000, followed by Canada with 393,500, and the United Kingdom with 292,000. Argentina, Russia, Germany, Australia, and Brazil all have significant Jewish populations as well...

...As of 2021, it is estimated that there are about 6.9 million Jews living around the world. The majority of the population lives in either Israel or the United States."[i]

The city with the most Jewish people living in it in the world is New York, not Jerusalem, not Tel Aviv. There are nearly twice as many Jews in New York as there are people in Jerusalem, which has a mixed population.

In fact, many Orthodox Jews believe that they should not return to the land until their Messiah brings them home,[ii] though there are big differences of opinion in modern Judaism about the issue. However, many Jewish people know their own history, they know the damage that false Messiahs have done to their nation and they know to avoid anything that has a hint of that, like a man made, secular founding of a nation called Israel, that is thoroughly dependent on US military power (the horses of Egypt, so to speak) and not led by the true Messianic King. 

Indeed, we Christians know that the Messiah is Jesus Christ of Nazareth, and we know that he will return and restore ALL nations. When national Israel is agan grafted into the true Israel, the Church and is fully restored, it will not have corrupt political leaders as its heads of state, but the King of kings himself:

"24 My servant David shall be king over them, and they shall all have one shepherd. They shall walk in my rules and be careful to obey my statutes. 25 They shall dwell in the land that I gave to my servant Jacob, where your fathers lived. They and their children and their children's children shall dwell there forever, and David my servant shall be their prince forever. 26 I will make a covenant of peace with them. It shall be an everlasting covenant with them. And I will set them in their land and multiply them, and will set my sanctuary in their midst forevermore. 27 My dwelling place shall be with them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. 28 Then the nations will know that I am the Lord who sanctifies Israel, when my sanctuary is in their midst forevermore" (Ezekiel 37:24-28).

This has not been fulfilled, the Jews have not been gathered, only about half of them have. And this is only a fraction of the full nation which includes 10 other tribes who are mixed among the peoples who have not been forgotten, Zechariah 10:6-12:

6 “I will strengthen the house of Judah,
    and I will save the house of Joseph.
I will bring them back because I have compassion on them,
    and they shall be as though I had not rejected them,
    for I am the Lord their God and I will answer them.
7 Then Ephraim shall become like a mighty warrior,
    and their hearts shall be glad as with wine.
Their children shall see it and be glad;
    their hearts shall rejoice in the Lord.

8 “I will whistle for them and gather them in,
    for I have redeemed them,
    and they shall be as many as they were before.
9 Though I scattered them among the nations,
    yet in far countries they shall remember me,
    and with their children they shall live and return.
10 I will bring them home from the land of Egypt,
    and gather them from Assyria,
and I will bring them to the land of Gilead and to Lebanon,
    till there is no room for them.
11 He shall pass through the sea of troubles
    and strike down the waves of the sea,
    and all the depths of the Nile shall be dried up.
The pride of Assyria shall be laid low,
    and the scepter of Egypt shall depart.
12 I will make them strong in the Lord,
    and they shall walk in his name,”
declares the Lord.

This prophecy indicates that God is going to regather not just Judah, but Judah and Joseph, which means the full 12 tribes of Israel. The lost tribes are not even being counted in the population figures above. But to God they are not forgotten, they will be regathered and they will confess that Jesus is Lord, for he is the Messiah.   

When God fulfills this prophecy, in the millennial reign, or new earth, then he will be seated on his throne and idolators will not be the leaders of the nation called Israel, nor any other nation on earth. Jesus Christ will have brought all thrones and powers into subjection to his heavenly father (c.f. 1 Cor. 15). The fact that the modern nation is led by those who deny Jesus is the Christ, shows us more than anything else this is not a work of God, but of the flesh. The fact that at least half of the Jewish people are still scattered around the world, shows that Deuteronomy 28 is still in full effect, and the true gathering has not yet begun.

I do not think we can consistently interpret every prophecy in the Bible literally, because prophecy is filled with symbolism and imagery and poetic language. But a close reading of what these prophecies say and what we can observe in our world today, shows the gathering has not yet happened. It will happen in the Lord's timing, and it will coincide with a great revival, as I covered in a previous piece.  

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