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Foreshadows of the Second Coming of Jesus
Part 1 The Restoration of the Nation of Israel
Bruce A. Hess
[If you’ve been around for a little while, you know that we were anticipating the potential of adding to our pastoral team and we had a period of feedback on the prospect of adding Jon Dunton to our pastoral staff. The good news that we have today is that, indeed, we are going to be adding Jon Dunton to our pastoral staff here at Wildwood. We are really, really excited about that. He is going to be joining our staff officially on July 8. So, if you see the Duntons just encourage them as they seek a new chapter in their family’s life and joining our pastoral staff. It is so exciting to see God strengthening our staff, who in turn want to minister to you. So, we are very, very grateful for them]
Now, if you would, please take out the Word of God and turn in it—in the New Testament—to the gospel of Matthew, and chapter number 24. Matthew, chapter number 24. As you are turning there, I want you to do something. I want you to put your imagination cap on for a moment. I want you to imagine that you are in an era where you have no access to a calendar. You have no access to television, no access to media, no access to an Apple watch. You have none of that input. Here is the question: if that is your situation, how would you know if the holiday of Christmas, on which we celebrate the birth of Jesus, was coming near? How would you know that if you didn’t have access to all of those things?
Well, you might say, there would be some signs, there would be some indicators that Christmas is nearing. You might say, when the weather starts to turn a lot cooler, then I know that Christmas is approaching. Or, you might say, when I’m in a craft store or some other store and you start to see Christmas decorations filling the shelves, there’s a sign and an indicator that Christmas in nearing. Maybe you see people out in parking lots selling live Christmas trees. Or, maybe you see people in your neighborhood beginning to put up Christmas lights on their house. Those are signs and indicators that Christmas is nearing. Or, maybe when you are shopping in the mall you hear music coming over the audio system that is Christmas music. You may not have access to a calendar, time, and everything else. You may not know the exact date, but you know that Christmas is getting near.
The same principle is very true related to the Second Coming of Jesus. We may not know the exact date, but there are some signs, there are some indicators, that can indicate to us that the Second Coming of Jesus is near.
We are going to be launching, for the rest of June, a series I have entitled, ‘ForeShadows of the Second Coming of Jesus.’ Now, that word ‘foreshadow’ is both a verb and a noun. When it is used as a noun, it means it is an indicator of what is to come. So, when we talk about Foreshadows of the Second Coming of Jesus, we’re talking about indicators of what is to come. In this short series, we’re going to look at four indicators, four sign posts that the Second Coming of Jesus is near.
Now, there is an important question that we need to ask as we launch into this series and that is this: why should we care about future prophetic events? Why should we even bother with this at all? Why should we care about it? I’m going to site two reasons why we should care. Number one is, the Bible has much to say about future prophetic events. There are huge sections of Scripture that talk about future prophetic events. The very nature that there’s a lot of Scripture about that, definitely implies that there is significance to what the Bible has to say about these future prophetic events.
A second reason why we should care about future prophetic events is that Jesus, Himself, taught the disciples about future prophetic events. Right? Didn’t He do that with them? Remember how He taught them ahead of time—which was then a future prophetic event—that He was going to be crucified? Remember that? We also see in Matthew, chapter 24 that He is teaching them through this chapter about future prophetic events. In verses 1 and 2 of Matthew 24 He is teaching them that there is a time coming in which the temple will be destroyed; there is a time coming in which Israel will be judged; there is a time coming in which Jerusalem will be ravaged.
He says in verse 21 of chapter 24 there’s going to come to Israel a future time of great tribulation. It says in verse 21, “Such as has not been from the beginning of the world until now, nor ever will be.” There’s a time of incredible difficulty and tribulation that is going to be coming to the nation of Israel. Never has happened as bad as it is going to be, and it never would after that.
He also, Jesus, taught the disciples that He was going to come and rule in an earthly kingdom. What is interesting, if you note this, it is fun to just look at it, but the disciples, as Jesus was teaching them about future prophetic events, they just struggled to comprehend what it was all about. For example, in Luke 18, verse 34, it says, “They understood none of these things…it was hidden from them and they did not grasp what was said.”
Then things began to change quite drastically, with of course, not only the death and the crucifixion of Jesus, but His resurrection! We also learn that in Luke 24, verse 44, Jesus appears to His disciples and part of what He says to them is, “These are my words that I spoke to you while I was still with you.” And, He goes on to include, “everything that was written about Me in the Law of Moses and the Prophets and the Psalms and how they must be fulfilled.” He taught them about future prophetic events.
If you would like to, in your Bible, turn a few pages to the right to the Book of Acts and chapter number 1. We learn something very interesting in Acts, chapter 1 and verse 3. We learn that Jesus held a forty-day intense discipleship school for the disciples. It was a discipleship school of intensity for forty days, where He was, as it says, “speaking of the kingdom of God.” He was sharing with them, in this forty-day intensive seminary, if you would, both the fulfilled prophetic events that had related to His First Coming, and also the future prophetic events that related to His Second Coming.
It is fascinating to look at the disciples. “Pre” this forty-day intense discipleship school, the disciples barely could follow the Scriptures about all these things. “Post” this forty-day intensive discipleship school and seminary, they became masters of the Scriptures. You can see it in the sermons of Peter. You go through the Book of Acts and he is quoting verses all over the place about the fulfillment of the First Coming and things related to the Second Coming. He’s quoting all the verses. Where did he learn all of that? Well, in the forty-day intense discipleship school!
Then, in Acts, chapter 1, verses 4 and 5, He says, here’s your next assignment: what I want you to do is, I want you to stay here in Jerusalem and I want you to await the coming of the Holy Spirit, which eventually happens in Acts, chapter 2. But, something very interesting happens in verse 6 of Acts 1. It says there, “So when they (the disciples) had come together, they asked Jesus,” a question. After this forty-day intense discipleship school about prophetic events, they ask Jesus a question and it is a timing question. Notice what it says, they said, “Lord, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?”
He had been teaching them that part of the future prophetic events would be that I am going to restore the earthly kingdom to Israel. Their question was, is it going to happen NOW? Jesus’ answer in verse 7 was, “It is not for you to know the times or the seasons.” Don’t you worry about the timing of that, that’s the heavenly Father’s business. What I want you to do is stay in Jerusalem and wait for the Holy Spirit to come.
See, there is a very clear implication here that He had been teaching them—in this forty-day intensive period—that there is going to be a future earthly kingdom for Israel, as it had been promised in the Old Testament. When they asked this question, this timing question, if there was going to be no future earthly kingdom for Israel, Jesus could have said: Hey, you guys misunderstood what I’ve been teaching. There is no future kingdom coming. There’s going to be no future for Israel. He doesn’t say that. He says, don’t you worry about the timing of that.
Now, I say all of that simply by way of some introduction to what we want to look at today in our series, when we look at ForeShadows of the Second Coming of Christ. You know, whenever you study prophecy, there is something that we do not want to do. We do not want to do what is sometimes called “newspaper exegesis” of the prophetic future. What do we mean by that? Well, that is where we look at current events that are going on out there, and then we try to read these current events back into Scripture in some way. That is not the way we want to approach this! What we want to do is, we want to start with the Scriptures. We want to let the Scriptures speak, and then consider how does that reflect on current events in our world today?
So, we’re looking at ForeShadows of the Second Coming of Jesus and the First Indicator and Sign we are going to look at is The Rebirth of the Nation of Israel. This is an indicator that the Second Coming of Jesus is coming near. We could call this the Super Sign of all things. You might remember, if you know your history, that in 70 A.D. the Roman armies came in and they destroyed the temple in Jerusalem. They also destroyed Jerusalem and the people of Israel were scattered and dispersed around the world. That happened in 70 A.D. Now, here is what I want you to think about: in the geography of the land of Israel, since that happened in 70 A.D., there has been no independent nation there, of any kind, for 1900 years. There were empires that included it, but in the land of the geography of Israel for 1900 years—some nineteen centuries—there was no independent nation there.
Now, what I am going to do today in our time together is, I am going to highlight five points. That is going to be our plan. It is pretty simple, five points. Here is the first one that I want to highlight and that is that The Biblical Prophets Taught that God Would Restore the Nation of Israel from Worldwide Dispersion. The Biblical prophets taught that God would restore the nation of Israel from worldwide dispersion. We see this, for example, in Ezekiel, chapter 28, verses 25-26, where it says, “Thus says the Lord God: When I gather the house of Israel from the peoples among whom they are scattered, and manifest My holiness in them in the sight of the nations, then they shall dwell in their own land that I gave to My servant Jacob.” Then, it goes on to say, “…They shall then dwell securely when I execute judgments upon all their neighbors who have treated them with contempt and they will know that I am the Lord their God.” This is what the prophets taught.
We see it in Amos, chapter 9, verses 14 and 15. Now, remember this, Amos was a prophet to the northern kingdom of Israel, the ten tribes in the north who had been conquered by Assyria and scattered around the world in 722 B.C. He was a prophet to them. He wrote these words, he said, God speaking, “I will restore the fortunes of my people Israel, and they shall rebuild the ruined cities and inhabit them…I will plant them on their land and,” notice this, “they shall never again be uprooted out of the land that I have given them,” says the Lord your God.” This is obviously talking about a future event in the distant future, they shall never again be uprooted out of the land that I have given them. That is highlighting point number one.
Point number two, The Biblical Prophets Taught that Jesus (Messiah) Would Return to Jerusalem and Rule There. We see that very clearly being taught by the prophets. Zechariah 8:3, “Thus says the Lord: I have returned Zion to Israel and will dwell in the midst of Jerusalem, and Jerusalem shall be called the Faithful City, and the mountain of the Lord of hosts, the Holy Mountain.” Prophets clearly taught that Jesus, Messiah, would return to Jerusalem and rule there.
We see this also in Zechariah, chapter 14, verse 4 and verses 8 and 9, “On that day His feet ( the Messiah) shall stand on the Mount of Olives that lies before Jerusalem on the east, and the Mount of Olives shall be split in two from east to west by a wide valley…” What ends up happening is, there is an extreme seismic event of incredible proportions that happens when the Messiah comes back and it goes on to say that, “ on that day living waters shall flow out from Jerusalem…and the Lord shall be King over all the earth.”
Think back to Acts, chapter 1. Remember when Jesus ascends up into heaven from the Mount of Olives? Remember what the angel said to the disciples? He says, as you have seen Him go from here, He will come again in the same way, at the same place, on the Mount of Olives. This whole idea that Jesus was going to return to establish His kingdom in Jerusalem has been clearly seen by past generations.
I want to give you one illustration of that. A guy by the name of J.C. Ryle, who was a British pastor and writer, you will see his picture down here in the corner of this slide. Here is what he wrote, he said, “Time would fail me, if I attempted to quote all the passages of Scripture in which the future history of Israel is revealed. Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Hosea, Joel, Amos, Obadiah, Micah, Zephaniah, Zechariah all declare the same thing. All predict that in the end of this dispensation the Jews are to be restored to their own land and to the favor of God…to my eyes, the future salvation of Israel as a people, their return to Palestine and their national conversion to God, appear as clearly and plainly revealed as any prophecy in God’s Word.”
What is interesting about that is that he wrote that in the late 1800’s, before there ever was a restored nation of Israel. He says, it is clearly, clearly taught in Scripture.
Now, I want to highlight a third point and that is, A Tradition Arose in Church History that Spiritualized the Promises to Israel. That is, that the church inherited ALL the promises to Israel…that, basically, the church replaced Israel permanently.
[Note: we know many of the earliest church fathers held to a Premillenial view (that Jesus would return to set up His kingdom as was promised to Israel).
Papias (he was a disciple of the Apostle John) AD 60-130
Ignatius AD 108
Polycarp AD 69-155 (also a disciple of the Apostle John)
Justin Martyr AD 100-165
Irenaeus AD 130-202]
This tradition (of spiritualizing the promises to Israel) began to arise among the church fathers in the third century. There was, for example, Origen, and some other of the church fathers in the third century, and they looked at these promises that were given to the nation of Israel, and I think here is part of what was going through their mind…it makes some sense. It has been three centuries since 70 A.D! The nation of Israel is gone, gone. Everything is still in ruins. We can’t find the Jews anywhere, they’re spread everywhere. Maybe we should just take another look at how we interpreted all of those promises to Israel. So, they began to think about spiritualizing, allegorizing some of these promises to Israel.
This particular tradition became greatly popularized in the fifth century by Augustine. And this particular tradition—which arose way back in the third century—remains popular in some circles today. The idea is that there’s really no future for Israel in God’s economy. Israel forfeited all the promises that God gave to them, and that there is no earthly kingdom to come.
Now, think back to Acts, chapter 1, and verses 6 and 7. What had Jesus been teaching them?? There was going to be a future earthly kingdom! And their question was, are You doing it right now? And He said, No, don’t worry about the timing, just go about what I want you to do. So, this tradition, to me, misses some significant things in Scripture.
Paul makes it very clear that God still has plans for Israel. We see this in Romans, chapter 11, verses 1 and 2. He asks the question, “Has God rejected His people?” And, he responds with, “By no means,” as it says in the ESV. In the original language it is the term me genoito. Me genoito is the strongest possible negative. Some translations translate it, ‘may it never be!’. Has God rejected His people? May it never be! Paul says, “For I myself am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin. God has not rejected his people whom He foreknew.”
He talks about more of this in Romans, chapter 11, in verses 17 and 18. Part of what he says is—as he is writing to the Romans—he says, as Gentile believers we’ve been grafted into the tree of blessing. And, he says in verse 20, do not become proud about that. Because, he says, the natural branches (speaking of Israel) which had been cut off due to its rebellion and unbelief (which he mentions directly in verse 20 and verse 23), he says one day they’re going to be grafted back into their own olive tree. He says, in verse 25, “A partial hardening has come upon Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in.”
Now, I want to move to the fourth point I want to highlight. That fourth point is this, The Existence of Israel Today is a First-class Miracle, a first-class miracle. Now, that can be very easy for us to miss if we don’t know our history well. Maybe if you are younger, you would miss this. But here is what I want us to think about: the hatred and persecution of the Jews, as a people, is unmatched in human history. It all started back in Genesis 3:15. You might remember, you have Satan, who is tempting Adam and Eve to disobey God and they disobey God and there’s great consequences that come from that.
And in Genesis 3 God begins to lay out the consequences for the man, consequences for the woman, the consequences for the world, and the consequences for the serpent, Satan himself. He says, by way of some consequence, He says to the serpent, “I will put enmity,” that’s a word we don’t hear a lot today, I like the NET translation: “I will put hostility between you and the woman, between your offspring and her offspring and he (future offspring of the woman) will bruise your head,” that would be a very mortal blow, which is ultimately going to be the judgment of Satan one day, “and you shall bruise his heel,” talking about the crucifixion, which of course was followed by the resurrection.
Here is what I want us to see, from the very beginning in the book of Genesis, Satan has been the enemy of God’s plan and God’s plan was to bring salvation through the Jews. We see the enemy fighting against that from the very beginning. In Genesis we see that Esau gets very embittered against his brother, Jacob, who is in the line of Messiah. He has a grudge against him and he seriously considers killing Jacob. Where did he get that idea from? I think from the Enemy.
We see it in the Book of Exodus, where Pharaoh announces he wants all the male Hebrew babies to be slain. Why? Where did that come from? The Enemy, who is anti-the Jewish nation, and doesn’t want the Messiah to come through the Jewish line. Let’s end it!!
We see it in the Book of Esther, where Haman announces he is out to execute all the Jews, not some of the Jews, but all of the Jews. Because, again, that is being energized by Satan, who is behind it all. And, of course Queen Esther keeps that from happening as God worked through her.
We see it in the Gospels. King Herod hears the rumor that there’s been someone born in Bethlehem who was going to be the King of the Jews. What does he do? He orders all the male children in Bethlehem under the age of two to be executed, slaughtered.
We see it in our history. We see it in the holocaust in World War II, where Hitler in Germany eliminated six million Jews. You see, there’s just been this plan that the Enemy has had from the beginning of Genesis 3:15. You think about Israel being conquered, they were conquered always by secular kingdoms: Assyria, Babylon and Rome. What is interesting is that for two thousand years there was no mention of the nation of Israel. But there had to be eventually, because of the predicted events that relate to Israel and the Second Coming.
The existence of Israel today is a first-class miracle. Do you know that never in human history has a nation been uprooted from their homeland, and scattered throughout the world, and yet preserved their identity and their language for decades of centuries, and then became a nation again? That’s never happened in human history! How did that happen? How did that happen? No nation ever was uprooted, scattered throughout the world, preserving their identity and language for decades of centuries and then become a nation again. How does that happen? God does it. That’s how it happens.
Isaiah, chapter 11, verse 12, it says that, “God will raise a signal for the nations and will assemble the banished of Israel and gather the dispersed of Judah.” Israel refers to the ten tribes, Judah the other two tribes. “He will gather the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.” God said, that is what I am going to do. And God’s promise related to Israel is rock solid.
We see this in Jeremiah 31, verses 35-37. It says there, “Thus says the LORD (Yahweh) who gives the sun for the light by day and the fixed order of the moon and stars for light by night.” Then, it says this, “If this fixed order departs from Me…then shall the offspring of Israel cease from being a nation before Me forever.” It goes on to say this, “If the heavens can be measured above (all the universe out there) and the foundation of the earth below be explored (which it can’t be), then I will cast off all the offspring of Israel for all that they have done.” That is how solid His promise is.
Now, think about this for a moment, if the prediction that we see in Scripture regarding the captivity and the scattering of the people of Israel was literal—and it was—so the regathering of Israel will be literal. And, God’s initiation process on all this began officially on May 14, 1948, when a British ruling created the nation states of Israel, Syria, Jordan, Iraq, and Lebanon. May 14, 1948, a British ruling created those five nation states.
You often wonder, particularly when we see some of the events going on in our culture today, how could a country the size of the state of New Jersey—and I lived in New Jersey two different times—how could a country the size of the state of New Jersey… just to give you an idea of that, this is New Jersey in the blue, this is the state of Israel today, the land that they possess today and you see it over here in this world of the Middle East, in that little red slice, that’s Israel
–how can a country the size of New Jersey become the focus of global affairs and world news? I mean, how does that happen?? It is such a tiny nation. And, the answer to that question is God. God.
Look at Ezekiel 5:5, “Thus says the Lord God: This is Jerusalem. I have set her in the center of the nations.” Very colorful language, because that word that is translated ‘center’ in the original language means literally, ‘the belly button’, the ‘naval’ of the nations. You know, I’m not going to ask you to lift up your shirt and look at your belly button right now, but, you know, when you look at the belly button, our naval, it is an insignificant part of the body. It’s not a highly admirable part of our body, but it is truly at the center of our body. What it is saying is that Israel is going to be the centerpiece of future prophetic drama.
Now, I’m going to highlight another point and that is, What’s the Situation with Israel Today? Some of you might be thinking, you know, when I look at Israel today, I don’t really see a godly, spiritual group of people. It seems like it’s a secular nation. And I think that is what it is in the process that God is working through. That’s what they largely are today: a secular nation.
We see an interesting picture in Ezekiel, chapter 37, which talks about the regathering of Israel. It’s this idea of all these dry bones begin to come together. They begin to come together to form a body. It is later on, with those dry bones that have come together, that God is going to breathe His Spirit into those dry bones and make it a living, spiritual body. We know when that is going to occur, from the prophets. It’s later on at the Second Coming when it happens. Because, in Zechariah 12:10 it says that when Jesus gets ready to return that Israel is going to, “Look on Me, whom they have pierced,” and there is going to be this national repentance that happens, and He is going to breathe His spirit into the people of Israel. But, at this point Israel is a secular nation.
All the decisions of a secular nation are not going to be right. What is interesting about Israel is: if they think they are in dark days now, the darkest days are still ahead for them as the seven-year tribulation is going to occur, designed to purge the nation of their unbelief and rebellion.
Another question that comes up with Israel today is: who owns the land? I mean that is part of the argument, is it Israel that owns this land? Did the Palestinians own the land? Who owns the land? The answer to that is very simple: God owns the land. In Leviticus, chapter 25, verse 23, He says this, “The land is Mine.” That’s who owns the land of Israel. That’s who owns the land. He’s the one who determines who would have or should have the land.
Now, there is a big issue that is unfolding in Israel today, and a big part of it, part of the controversy, relates to radical, Islamic Jihad belief…Radical, Islamic Jihad belief. Here is part of what that belief is, “Any territory,” I’m quoting here directly, “that was once Islamic held territory cannot revert to a non-Islamic authority.” While there was never an independent nation over the geography of Israel, there were empires that enveloped part of Israel. The Ottoman Empire in the 1500’s brought Islamic rule to the geography of Israel. I mean, Israel is only 8500 square miles, but it is surrounded by twenty-two Arab nations that envelope five million square miles. Part of what is going on is some of this radical, Islamic Jihad belief.
You might know that Hamas is the ruling party in Gaza and Hamas said this in 1988: “The land of Palestine is an Islamic trust…It is forbidden to anyone to yield or concede any part of it…Israel will continue to exist until Islam will obliterate it.”
That is part of what is going on in the controversy in Israel today. And it is very, very sad because we have a lot of Palestinian civilians who are being used as shields and pawns in a religious chess game, with the aim of ultimately destroying Israel.
You know, Hamas even denies that Israel was ever the ancient homeland of the Jews. They say, no, no, that never happened. We hear a lot of quotes, for example quotes like, “From the river to the sea, Palestine must be free.” I was just listening to the news very early this morning and that was being shouted out by protesters. “From the river to the sea, Palestine must be free.” You know what that really means…what they really mean when they say that? Well, you have the Jordan River and you have the Mediterranean Sea and Israel is in between. That statement is basically saying, Israel must be gone, must be gone!
Now, there are myrias and myriads of political issues…they are very, very complicated in all of this. What are we to think about all of that? Well, here is what I have to say about all these issues, I’m not smart enough…I’m glad I’m not involved in trying to work all those political and social issues out. But here is what I want us to think about: when you lift up the covers of the spiritual realm, you know what we see? Satan’s aim is to destroy Israel and God’s aim and promise is to preserve Israel. So, I think one of the things we need to wrestle with—each one of us—is which side would we prefer to align with, in terms of what the undercurrent of things are?
One thing we can all do is what it says in Psalm 122:6 and that is, we can pray for the peace of Jerusalem. And, in Romans, chapter 10, in verse 1, Paul says, “The longing of my heart and my prayer to God is for the people of Israel to be saved.” We can pray for those who are in secular Israel to come to know Christ, that the Gospel can go forth. Also, I want to say this, God loves Arabs, too! So we can pray for those who are in the Arab community to come face-to-face with the Gospel. Pray for those in Hamas to have their life transformed just like Paul did on the road to Damascus. We can pray in that regard.
William Blackstone, in the early 1900’s said this: “Israel is God’s sundial. If anyone desires to know our place in God’s chronology, our position in the great march of events, look at Israel.”
I’ve tried to summarize a lot of information here today and some of you are thinking, I’d like to know more, I’d like to research a little more. I want to recommend a book to you. It’s called ‘What We Should Think About Israel’ and it’s got some local connection because the forward is written by Mark Hitchcock, who is at Faith Bible Church in Edmond, OK. The editor of the book is a guy by the name of J. Randall Price. I went to seminary with him. He was in classes with me. This is a book subtitled, ‘Separating Fact from Fiction in the Middle East Conflicts.’ So you can check that book out, but remember, the darkest days are yet ahead for Israel in the events of the seven-year tribulation period, in which God will seek to purge the unbelief and rebellion from the nation of Israel.
Now, wow, that’s a lot of stuff! Let’s just draw it all together…what are some Life Lessons we can learn from what we’ve looked at today? Well, the first life lesson would be this, God is in Control of History. Aren’t you glad that’s true? These things can seem random, they can seem out of control, but He is still on the throne and there’s no need for us to panic in any way.
The second truth that we can learn is that God is Faithful to His Promises. Think about Israel, think about the Jews. They had been wayward for thousands of years and yet, God says, I’m going to fulfil My promises to you. There’s no human explanation for how the Jewish nation has survived short of God’s faithfulness.
I love what it says in Hebrews 10:23, “He who promised is faithful.” That’s not only true for Israel, it is also true of His promises to us.
Promises like this:
that He would never leave us or forsake us, Hebrews 13:5.
that He will supply all of our needs, Philippians 4:19.
that we are adopted into His family, Galatians 4:5.
that His goodness and mercy will follow us all the days of our life and we will
dwell in the house of the Lord forever, Psalm 23:6
His promises to us like, He is always there…to strengthen us and help us and uphold us, Isaiah 41:10.
that there is no condemnation in Christ Jesus, Romans 8:1
that nothing can separate us from God’s love, Romans 8:35.
that His grace is sufficient for us, 2 Corinthians 12:9.
All of those promises! And then I just love what it says in 2 Timothy 2:13, “If we are faithless,” we struggle, we’re discouraged, what does it say? What does it say? “He remains faithful.” Men and women, He is a faithful God!!
Let’s pray together. Father, we thank You so much for the truth of Your Word. We thank You not only that it gives us insight to some of what is going on, but it is a reminder that the Second Coming of Jesus is near and we want to learn from that. We thank you, too, for the faithfulness that You have toward Israel, for the way that You have been faithful to all Your promises And that You will be, and that You are, faithful to us also, even when we can be faithless, You are faithful. We thank You for that truth. And, we thank You in Jesus’ name. Amen.
Questions for Reflection
Foreshadows of the 2nd Coming of Jesus series
Message1- Restoration of the Nation of Israel
1. Recent history has been marked by certain Bible teachers who made very detailed predictions claiming Jesus would return at a particular time or date. Share about any experiences you may have had (or heard about) with such predictions.
2. Some folks seem to dismiss discussions about Bible prophecy as fruitless endeavors. Why do you think that is?
Jesus spent time talking to his disciples about future prophecy as Acts 1:3-7 demonstrates. Why do you think Scripture gives so much space to discussing future prophetic events? List some reasons.
3. Bruce emphasized that we should avoid “newspaper exegesis”, where one simply looks at current events and then reads those events back into Scripture. Why?
Bruce also stressed that good prophetic interpretation should start with ___________. What term goes in that blank?
4. “The existence of Israel today is a ‘first class’ miracle. Explain how so.
5. Since God has been faithful to His promises to the nation of Israel in much detail, it also means He will be faithful to His promises to us. List at least two of your favorite promises that God has given us.
6. Spend some time in prayer thanking God for His faithfulness to you!