{"id":18672,"date":"2019-04-07T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2019-04-07T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sugar-land-bible-church.local\/sermon\/israel-trip-2019-005\/"},"modified":"2019-04-07T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2019-04-07T05:00:00","slug":"israel-trip-2019-005","status":"publish","type":"sermon","link":"https:\/\/slbc.org\/es\/sermon\/israel-trip-2019-005\/","title":{"rendered":"Israel Trip 2019 – 005"},"content":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"template":"","book":[54],"series_event":[497],"sermon_service_type":[473],"speaker":[6],"class_list":["post-18672","sermon","type-sermon","status-publish","hentry","book-1-samuel","series_event-israel-trip-2019","sermon_service_type-sunday-school","speaker-dr-andy-woods","no-post-thumbnail"],"acf":{"sermon_title":"Israel Trip 2019 - 005","sermon_date":"20190407","sermon_month":"4","sermon_year":"2019","sermon_notes":"","sermon_slides":6547,"sermon_mp3":6550,"sermon_id":"47191157516343","series_or_event":497,"service_type":[473],"speaker":6,"books_of_the_bible":54,"chapter_and_verse":"24:1","sermon_transcript":"Andy Woods\n\nIsrael Trip 005\n\n4-7-19\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 \u00a0\u00a0I Samuel 24:1\n\nAs you go to the North-West corner of the Dead Sea, you come to a place called Qumran. Has anyone heard of the Dead Seas Scrolls? Most people have heard of them. Basically, what happened in 1947 roughly, and that is a very interesting year because what country would become an independent country in 1948? Israel. God allowed a lot of things to take place in that general time period. But you basically have Bedouins or shepherds, they were there in the Qumran area. They were kind of going in and out of caves. As the story goes, one of them took a rock and threw it into a cave. There are several caves in Qumran. They have got them labeled Cave 1, Cave 2, Cave 3, etc.\u2026As this Bedouin threw a rock into a cave there in Qumran, he heard pottery glass or pottery breaking and what was discovered in that pottery was what I used to call the discovery of the century. However, I do not now call it the discovery of the century. I now call it the discovery of the millennium. It was unbelievable what was discovered through this. And what was found among other things is many, many copies of what we call the Old Testament kept and translated faithfully by a group of people called the Essenes. The Essenes were kind of a break away community that thought Jerusalem was going corrupt. And so they set up their own system there in Qumran. They were kind of what we call separatists or a break away community. And they discovered many copies of Hebrew Bible or what we call the Old Testament, except one book. They did not find any translations of the Book of Esther. Now, why wouldn\u2019t they find translations of the Book of Esther? Maybe it had something to do with the fact that the Book of Esther, unlike the other books of the Old Testament, does not use the name God. So that may be one reason why they did not have any value for the Book of Esther. So other than that, they found multiple copies of Old Testament books.\n\nMultiple copies of the Book of Genesis, these folks really like the Book of Deuteronomy, multiple copies of the Book of Deuteronomy and probably the most valuable thing that was discovered there is a complete, not a fragment, not a part, not a section, but a complete all sixty-six chapters, you know the chapter divisions of course they didn\u2019t have, those were added later by Protestants, but a complete scroll, a complete copy of what we call the Book of Isaiah.\u00a0 And you say well why is that such a big deal?\u00a0 Let me explain why this is such a big deal and why it\u2019s the providence of God and the sovereignty of God that allowed this discovery.\u00a0 Prior to this discovery at Qumran the oldest copy that we had of Isaiah was A.D. 900 so that takes you into the tenth century A.D.\u00a0 That\u2019s the oldest manuscript of Isaiah that we had.\n\nAnd that poses a problem because when did the prophet Isaiah write?\u00a0 Well he wrote all the way back in the eighth century, the seventh to the eighth century B.C.\u00a0 So Isaiah\u2019s ministry spans from about 739 B.C. to 696 B.C. and the oldest copy that we had prior to the discovery an Qumran was a manuscript from A.D. 900.\u00a0 That\u2019s a big chunk of time, isn\u2019t it.\u00a0 How in the world would we ever know that Isaiah, written in the seventh to eighth century B.C. was faithfully transmitted to the copy of the manuscript of Isaiah that we had at the time, prior to the discovery at Qumran in A.D. 900?\u00a0 I mean, we\u2019re spanning from the eighth century B. C. to the tenth century A.D.\u00a0 So why would we trust that as a reliable copy.\n\nWell, we sort of had to do it by faith and we do know a little something about the discipline of the copyists.\u00a0 They\u2019re called the Masoretes, he says were well disciplined and treated the text with the greatest imaginable reverence and devised a complicated system of safeguards against scribal slips.\u00a0 I mean, think of all the opportunities there would be to mess something up over that long period of time in terms of transmission.\u00a0 They counted, for example, the number of times each letter of the alphabet occurs in each book.\u00a0 They pointed out the middle letter of the Pentateuch, the middle letter of the whole Hebrew Bible, and made even more details calculations than these. \u201cEverything countable seems to be counted\u201d says Wheeler Robinson \u201cand they made up mnemonics by which the various totals might be readily remembered.\u201d\n\nSo we were basically trusting the fact that these scribes knew what they were doing and were very, very careful in their copying through the centuries and therefore this copy of Isaiah that we had in A.D. 900 was essentially a faithful copy of what Isaiah originally said in the Book of Isaiah, going back to the eighth century B.C.\n\nBut you see what was discovered an Qumran was stunning, they found in it a completed copy of the Isaiah scroll, (watch this now) going back all the way to 125 B.C.\u00a0 That\u2019s a thousand\u00a0 years.\u00a0 So we had this A.D. 900 copy and now all of a sudden we have this completed scroll of Isaiah, all sixty-six chapters spanning all the way back to B.C. 125.\u00a0 That\u2019s a thousand\u00a0 year gap.\u00a0 In other words, the discovery allowed us to go back a thousand years.\u00a0 And so what did they do?\u00a0 Well, they compared the 125 B.C. newly discovered copy of Isaiah to the A.D. 900 existing manuscript of Isaiah, thinking that they were going to find all of these mistakes, all of these slips of the pen, all of these errors.\u00a0 And they went back and they carefully compared the two and guess what their discovery discovered?\u00a0\u00a0 They discovered that the two were basically identical.\u00a0 The only places, I think there\u2019s eight places where there is even a difference and those had to do with really minor things, such as cosmetic things, stylistic things, conjunctions, slips of the pen, etc.\n\nAnd now for the first time we\u2019ve got a manuscript of not just part of Isaiah but the whole Book that\u2019s more than one thousand years older than the manuscript previously possessed.\u00a0 And upon comparing the two things the scholars were completely stunned to discover the similarity in identity between the two.\u00a0 And that\u2019s why I believe this was a discovery of the millennium because what it demonstrates is what you\u2019re holding in your hand, particularly with the prophet Isaiah, is in fact the very Word of God.\u00a0 There is no room anymore to second guess whether we have accurate translations of the original.\u00a0 And it\u2019s one of those things that the Lord, in His sovereignty, allowed the human race to discover, I think primarily to demonstrate to people that when you study this Book you\u2019re studying God\u2019s Word.\u00a0 You\u2019re not studying mistakes, you\u2019re not studying errors, you\u2019re not studying scribal slips, or slipups, you\u2019re studying virtually exactly what Isaiah originally said.\n\nAnd therefore we have great respect for the Masoretes and the copyists and the scribes because of what they dutifully gave themselves to, to transmit to us the Bible.\u00a0 And it was Dr. David Hocking that did the teaching for us while we were at Qumran and he put it this way: when you\u2019re standing here at Qumran you\u2019re literally standing on holy ground.\u00a0 I mean, it\u2019s awesome to think about it.\u00a0 And you see, a lot of people when they hear about the Dead Sea Scrolls, even people go to Qumran and they look at this cave and they look at that cave and they go to the bookstore and the gift shop and it\u2019s kind of a tourist attraction and they don\u2019t really understand exactly what they have there and what God allowed humanity to have.\n\nSo the reality of the situation is there\u2019s absolutely no excuse whatsoever for doubting God\u2019s Word, saying to yourself well, I can\u2019t trust this because maybe the scribes didn\u2019t translate it accurately.\u00a0 So this is such an important discovery and this poor Bedouin had no idea what he\u2019d discovered.\u00a0 I think he sold it for very cheap and this discovery is so valuable that they moved the Isaiah scroll from Qumran to Jerusalem in a place called the Shrine of the Book and there\u2019s my wife and our tour as we went to Jerusalem to the Shrine of the Book.\u00a0 You notice how it\u2019s kind of\u2026 the roof of the museum is sort of built like the case that this Bedouin discovered the Isaiah scroll within.\u00a0 And there bottom left in the glass case you see the Isaiah scroll; it kind of goes all the way around and you can actually walk around and see it.\u00a0 And they used to have the original Isaiah scroll in that case but when that area came under attack in the Six Day War they didn\u2019t want to risk something that valuable being damaged so they have it housed elsewhere, I think in the same building but not in that case.\u00a0 But that case is sort of what it represents is a copy of that Isaiah scroll that was discovered at Qumran.\n\nSo it\u2019s a stunning thing and that\u2019s one of the significances of Qumran.\u00a0 And once again God is providentially reaching His hand into history to show us exactly what we have in His Word in an age of skepticism where everybody is challenging God\u2019s Word, doubting God\u2019s Word, and just prior to the miraculous rebirth of national Israel you have this stunning discovery known as the Dead Sea Scrolls in Qumran. \u00a0There\u2019s other things in it that are very interesting but I think that\u2019s probably the most significant aspect of Qumran.\n\nAnd now leaving Qumran, still on the Dead Sea, we come to a place called Engedi and that\u2019s why I had you open up to 1 Samuel 24:1.\u00a0 There is kind of a trail that you can take into that area to a waterfall and that\u2019s sort of a special waterfall because my wife and I on our honeymoon twenty years ago got our picture taken by that very waterfall.\u00a0 And so there we are twenty years later, she looks exactly the same, I look a little older and you say well why aren\u2019t you smiling. Well the reason I\u2019m not smiling is I took a little bit of a spill on the trail and really did a number on my right arm, which\u00a0 you can\u2019t see, it\u2019s behind my wife there, blooding myself up a little bit.\u00a0 That was the only thing that broke my fall was my arm.\u00a0 But other than that it was a very romantic place to return to.\u00a0 There\u2019s a picture of Angela, my daughter there in Engedi.\n\nEngedi is known as an area of palms and vines, heavily cultivated.\u00a0 Josephus refers to Engedi as a beautiful place of palm groves.\u00a0 It has an elevation to get up there of about 2,000 feet.\u00a0 It receives several casual mentions in the Bible; it\u2019s mentioned for example in Joshua 15:62.\u00a0 [Joshua 15:62, \u201cand Nibshan and the City of Salt and Engedi; six cities with their villages.\u201d]\n\nIt\u2019s mentioned in 2 Chronicles 20:2 where it say during the reign of Jehoshaphat the children of Ammon, Moab and Mt. Seir attempted to invade Judah by way of Engedi (you\u2019ll see that in 2 Chronicles 20:2) but were easily defeated.\u00a0 [2 Chronicles 20:2, \u201cThen some came and reported to Jehoshaphat, saying, \u2018A great multitude is coming against you from beyond the sea, out of Aram and behold, they are in Hazazon-tamar (that is Engedi).\u201d]\n\nYou might remember that I told\u00a0 you about a prophecy concerning the Dead Sea, there\u2019s going to be\u00a0 a river that\u2019s going to flow from the temple area in Jerusalem, Ezekiel 40-48 predicts a millennial temple.\u00a0 And there\u2019s going to come from that temple a millennial river and that river is actually going to flow into the Dead Sea and what\u2019s going to happen to the Dead Sea?\u00a0 It\u2019s not going to be dead anymore, it\u2019s going to team with life and it\u2019s going to team with fish to such a degree that it says in Ezekiel 47:10 that fishermen are going to cast their nets as far as (in the Dad Sea) Engedi.\u00a0 So Engedi is actually going to play (apparently) a millennial role.\u00a0 And the reason why Engedi is so well-known in the Scripture is it\u2019s a favorite site for David.\u00a0 It\u2019s a place where David would\u00a0 go and sort of retreat to and it was a stronghold where David fled from Saul.\n\nAnd as I\u2019m walking through there I\u2019m thinking to myself, I\u2019m glad David was short to make it through all that rocky area without having a fall and all those kinds of things that us tall people go through.\u00a0 But if you look at 1 Samuel 24:1, actually go back to 1 Samuel 23:29, it says, \u201cDavid went up from there and stayed in the strongholds of Engedi.\u201d\u00a0 And then if you go into the next chapter it says, \u201cNow when Saul returned from pursuing the Philistines, he was told, saying, \u2018Behold, David is in the wilderness of Engedi.\u2019\u201d\u00a0 [1 Samuel 24:1]\n\nSo this is the place where it\u2019s acknowledge that David fled to as he fled from Saul.\u00a0 And in fact, David, it\u2019s interesting how David had an opportunity to kill Saul.\u00a0 Did you know that?\u00a0 In fact, he had that opportunity twice; he had that opportunity in Engedi, 1 Samuel 24.\u00a0 And then just a chapter or two later he had the same opportunity in 1 Samuel 26.\u00a0 And so I believe that the Holy Spirit has given us this picture of the interim period when David was anointed and fleeing and Saul was still on the throne as a picture of Jesus and His present position today.\n\nAnd let me sort of explain that.\u00a0 I\u2019ve used this before in the kingdom series that we\u2019re doing Wednesday nights.\u00a0 David was anointed as the King of Israel in 1 Samuel 16 but did he begin to reign over Israel at that point?\u00a0 He did not, so he was anointed without a throne.\u00a0 He actually doesn\u2019t reign over Israel until Saul is deposed.\u00a0 Saul, as you know, commits suicide and is finally out of the picture and then David arises to the throne in 2 Samuel 2 and 2 Samuel 5.\u00a0 And that\u2019s when David made Jerusalem, formerly part of the nation of Israel, annexed the city of Jerusalem which prior to that point in time was not even a Jewish city.\u00a0 More on that a little bit later.\n\nSo you have a picture given by the Holy Spirit of a man who\u2019s anointed, 1 Samuel 16, but not yet reigning.\u00a0 And why was David not\u00a0 yet reigning?\u00a0 Because there was an illegitimate usurper on the throne, a man named Saul, who should have never made king to begin with because Saul came from which tribe?\u00a0 Benjamin, and the kings were supposed to come from which tribe?\u00a0 Judah.\u00a0 So the nation, because of his appearance (because they were walking by sight, he was tall, not that tall people are bad) but they\u2019re walking by sight and not by faith, installed this man as king and they really didn\u2019t wait on God.\u00a0 And so they took a man from the wrong tribe and made him the king.\n\nAnd over in 1 Samuel 16:13-14 it says this: \u201cThen Samuel took the horn of oil and anointed him\u201d that\u2019s David, \u201cin the midst of his brothers; and the Spirit of the LORD came mightily upon David from that day forward. And Samuel arose and went to Ramah. So David is anointed.\u00a0 And then what happens to Saul, verse 14, \u201cNow the Spirit of the LORD departed from Saul, and an evil spirit from the LORD terrorized him.\u201d\u00a0 So here you have a situation where David is the anointed king and Saul has no anointing at all; in fact, he\u2019s being heavily influenced by demons.\u00a0 And,\u00a0 you know, Saul, who never should have been made the king to begin with, is still on the throne illegitimately and governing the nation of Israel without the anointing of God.\u00a0 And the more Saul saw that he didn\u2019t have the anointing anymore, and in fact it was possessed by David, what did that do to Saul.\u00a0 It made him very jealous and so he sets out during this interim time period to kill David multiple times.\n\nAnd it\u2019s very interesting that in Engedi David has an opportunity to kill Paul but he does not do it because he will not touch the Lord\u2019s anointed.\u00a0 David was the type of person that wasn\u2019t going to put himself into a place of authority.\u00a0 He was going to wait on the Lord to put him into that place of authority, although there in Engedi he very easily could have killed Saul and usurp the throne by force.\u00a0 And why is God allowing this time period to play out?\u00a0 Because Israel was having to make a choice as to who they\u2019re going to follow.\u00a0 If you follow Saul, the existing king, you\u2019re walking by sight.\u00a0 See that?\u00a0 That\u2019s why when you go through the Samuel books there\u2019s so much information on Saul\u2019s appearance, Saul\u2019s good looks, Saul\u2019s height in contrast to David\u2019s somewhat smaller stature ruddy appearance etc.\n\nSo obviously if you\u2019re going to follow David you\u2019re going to have to walk by faith, you\u2019re going to have to trust that he\u2019s the anointed king even though he\u2019s not yet reigning.\u00a0 And tragically what happened is the majority of the population followed Saul and a very minority of the population follows David. And that smaller group is referred to as David\u2019s mighty men.\u00a0 That\u2019s why they\u2019re so special in the Book of 1 Samuel in particular; these are people that trusted and walked by faith rather than by sight, contrary to the patter of the nation of Israel.\n\nSo if you can understand that you can clearly understand what\u2019s happening to humanity at the present time; the exact same thing!\u00a0 Jesus has been anointed King, right?\u00a0 That happened at His resurrection, it happened at His ascension and\u00a0 you\u2019ll see His anointing clearly described through a couple of Psalms, Psalm 16 and Psalm 110, in Acts 2:33-35.\n\nYet even though Jesus has been anointed as king is He reigning over this earth as King?\u00a0 He\u2019s not!\u00a0 He will not actually reign over this earth as king until the tribulation period ends and He returns and takes His seat on David\u2019s throne, Matthew 15:31. [Matthew 25:1, \u201cSo the crowd marveled as they saw the mute speaking, the crippled restored, and the lame walking, and the blind seeing; and they glorified the God of Israel.\u201d]\u00a0 So in the interim what\u2019s happening in between Christ\u2019s anointing and actual inauguration as king is you have a usurper on the throne.\u00a0 Who\u2019s the usurper?\u00a0 Not Saul but Satan, Satan shouldn\u2019t be there because God intended for humanity to be governed by the first Adam.\u00a0 Remember?\u00a0 And in Genesis 3 he turned the keys over to Satan and that\u2019s why Satan when he tempts Jesus in the Judean wilderness in Luke 4 says worship me and I will give you the kingdoms of this world, they will all be yours and they have been given to me, the kingdoms and I can give them to whoever I want.\n\n[Luke 4:5, \u201cAnd he led Him up and showed Him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time. [6] And the devil said to Him, \u201cI will give You all this domain and its glory; for it has been handed over to me, and I give it to whomever I wish. [7] Therefore if You worship before me, it shall all be Yours.\u201d [8] Jesus answered him, \u201cIt is written, \u2018YOU SHALL WORSHIP THE LORD YOUR GOD AND SERVE HIM ONLY.\u2019\u201d]\n\nWell, who gave them to Satan?\u00a0 The first Adam did.\u00a0 And so we have an interim period where Jesus is anointed but is not\u00a0 yet reigning and consequently the world is just following the course of the satanically controlled world system.\u00a0 Satan continues on as the one who\u2026 the whole world it says lies in his lap, 1 John 5:19.\u00a0 [1 John 5:19, \u201cWe know that we are of God, and that the whole world lies in the power of the evil one.\u201d]\n\nSo you ask yourself a question, why is God allowing this interim time period to happen?\u00a0 Because just as in the days of David and Saul God is forcing humans, humanity, to make a choice, the exact same choice.\u00a0 He wants people to walk by faith with Christ but the only way they can do that is if they embrace Him by faith because He\u2019s not yet running the world, Jesus.\u00a0 So David\u2019s mighty men is sort of a type, if you will, of the Christian in the world today.\u00a0 If you walk by sight you follow what\u00a0 you can see, the world system orchestrated by Satan.\u00a0 So everybody today in this interim time period is forced to make a decision\u2014are you going to embrace Christ by faith or are you going to walk by way of sight?\u00a0 And just like in David\u2019s day the majority followed Saul, the minority followed David,.\n\nIt\u2019s the same way today.\u00a0 What\u2019s the majority of the world\u2019s population doing?\u00a0 They\u2019re following Satan; they\u2019re walking by sight.\u00a0 A small minority is embracing Christ by way of faith.\u00a0 And that\u2019s why Jesus said in Matthew 7:13 and 14, broad is the road that leads to destruction, many there are that go that way, narrow is the road that leads to life, few are they which find it.\u00a0 [Matthew 7:13, \u201cEnter through the narrow gate; for the gate is wide and the way is broad that leads to destruction, and there are many who enter through it. [14] \"For the gate is small and the way is narrow that leads to life, and there are few who find it.\u201d]\n\nSo I don\u2019t know, Engedi to me is sort of a special place where this interim time period was played out where David had an opportunity to kill Saul but did not and he waited upon the Lord for Saul to be evicted, just like Jesus, at the right hand of the Father is waiting on God\u2019s timing for Satan to be evicted.\u00a0 That\u2019s why it says of Jesus, \u201cSit at My right hand,\u201d Psalm 110:1, \u201cSit at My right hand\u201d and what\u2019s the next word, \u201cuntil I make your enemies your footstool.\u201d\n\nSo David was waiting for God to depose Saul; Jesus is waiting for God the Father to depose Satan.\u00a0 And one of these days Jesus is going to be enthroned on David\u2019s throne on earth in Jerusalem and just as all of David\u2019s mighty men were rewarded at that point (who had walked by faith) those that have trusted in Christ as their Savior will be rewarded at that point as well because they will have walked by faith and the majority of the world\u2019s population along with Satan will be deposed.\u00a0\u00a0 So Engedi is a special place where this whole typology is being carried out.\u00a0 And that\u2019s one of the reasons I believe the Holy Spirit has given us this type.\n\nWell, we\u2019re leaving Engedi and going to Jerusalem; you might want to go back to Genesis 14 for just a moment, verses 18-20.\u00a0 Jerusalem is pretty easy to locate on a map, all you do is go to the tip of the Dead Sea and hang a left and you\u2019ll eventually run into Jerusalem.\u00a0 And Jerusalem is mentioned for the very first time in the Bible in Genesis 14, it\u2019s where this very strange character named Melchizedek came from, and notice what Genesis 14:18 says, \u201cAnd Melchizedek king of\u201d which city, \u201cSalem\u201d doesn\u2019t that sound a little bit like Jerusalem. \u201cAnd Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; now he was a priest of God Most High.\u201d [19,\u201dHe blessed him and said, \u2018Blessed be Abram of God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth;\u00a0 [20] And blessed be God Most High, Who has delivered your enemies into your hand.\u2019\u00a0 He gave him a tenth of all.\u201d]\n\nSo notice that there\u2019s a man, not a lot of information is given about him in the Old Testament, but he\u2019s king and priest.\u00a0 Do you see that, verse 18, and he came from Jerusalem.\u00a0 \u201cAnd Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine; now he was a priest of God Most High.\u201d\u00a0 And then earlier in the verse it calls Melchizedek \u201cking of Salem,\u201d priest and king.\u00a0\u00a0 Now as you go through the Old Testament you\u2019ll discover that priests were not kings and kings were not priests.\u00a0 In fact, if you mixed those two offices you were in a lot of trouble with the Lord.\u00a0 In fact, this was one of the reasons that Saul\u2019s kingdom started to deteriorate, because he got tired of waiting on the Lord on a particular occasion and he usurped the priestly function.\u00a0 And you recall that he was confronted by Samuel for doing this.\u00a0 And he was told that his empire, his kingdom, would be torn away---because those are two different offices.\u00a0 You don\u2019t mix those two.\n\nIt\u2019s evidence in the fact that the priests come from which tribe?\u00a0 Levi!\u00a0 The kings come from which tribe?\u00a0 Judah!\u00a0 So people want to talk about separation between church and state, I mean, I don\u2019t really like how the left abuses that phrase today but there is a doctrine of separation of church and state rightly interpreted between the kings and the priests going all the way back to the Old Testament.\u00a0 And then there was another king named Uzziah and I think that his story, if I remember right, is in 2 Chronicles 26, but he did the same thing.\u00a0 He didn\u2019t learn from history.\u00a0 He usurps things that the priests are supposed to do in terms of offerings and incense and things like that.\u00a0 And when you read, I believe it\u2019s 2 Chronicles 26, when he did that he immediately was smote with leprosy by God.\u00a0 And he spent his waning days as a leper.\n\n[2 Chronicles 26:17, \u201cThen Azariah the priest entered after him and with him eighty priests of the Lord, valiant men. [18] \u00a0<\/sup>They opposed Uzziah the king and said to him, \u201cIt is not for you, Uzziah, to burn incense to the Lord, but for the priests, the sons of Aaron who are consecrated to burn incense. Get out of the sanctuary, for you have been unfaithful and will have no honor from the Lord God.\u201d [19] \u00a0<\/sup>But Uzziah, with a censer in his hand for burning incense, was enraged; and while he was enraged with the priests, the leprosy broke out on his forehead before the priests in the house of the Lord, beside the altar of incense. [20] \u00a0<\/sup>Azariah the chief priest and all the priests looked at him, and behold, he was<\/em> leprous on his forehead; and they hurried him out of there, and he himself also hastened to get out because the Lord had smitten him. [21]\u00a0<\/sup>King Uzziah was a leper to the day of his death; and he lived in a separate house, being a leper, for he was cut off from the house of the Lord. And Jotham his son was<\/em> over the king\u2019s house judging the people of the land.\u201d]\n\nSo God didn\u2019t like it when these two offices were mixed.\u00a0 And here what\u2019s interesting is here is a man coming from Jerusalem that has the title \u201cpriest\u201d and has the title \u201cking\u201d simultaneously so we take Melchizedek as a historical figure but he at least prefigures or is some kind of type of Christ that\u2019s coming. Some have argued that Melchizedek perhaps is Christ here, as what\u2019s called a Theophany or a Christophany, or a preincarnate appearance of Jesus.\u00a0 I\u2019m not entirely sure if that\u2019s true, maybe it is but he\u2019s definitely a type of the coming Messiah.\u00a0 And he comes from this place called Salem which we today take as Jerusalem, and so that\u2019s your first reference to Jerusalem, I think, in the entire Bible.\u00a0 And then over in the Book of Joshua, chapter 15, verse 63 you learn that it was a Jebusite stronghold, Jerusalem was.\u00a0 [Joshua 15:63, \u201cNow as for the Jebusites, the inhabitants of Jerusalem, the sons of Judah could not drive them out; so the Jebusites live with the sons of Judah at Jerusalem until this day.\u201d]\n\n \n\nSo Jerusalem wasn\u2019t even a Jewish city even during the days of the conquest in the days of Joshua.\u00a0\u00a0 And Jerusalem doesn\u2019t become an Israeli city until which king?\u00a0 David, and in 2 Samuel 5, I made reference to 2 Samuel 5 I think a little earlier, when David actually begins to reign.\u00a0 That\u2019s when Jerusalem becomes an Israeli city, a city of Israel and that happened in 1000 B.C. three thousand\u00a0 years ago.\u00a0 And Jerusalem has never been the capital city of any other nation, other than Israel.\u00a0 I mean, it\u2019s true it was a Jebusite stronghold that the Jebusites, best we can tell, were not an official formal nation the way the nation of Israel was.\n\n \n\nAnd so in\u00a0 your Bible there are a thousand references, did you know that?\u00a0 To the city of Jerusalem, probably around 800 in the Old Testament, 200 in the New Testament.\u00a0 And\u00a0 yet Muslims believe that Jerusalem is a holy city to them because they believe that\u2019s where Mohammed allegedly ascended back to Allah on a stead, you know what the stead\u2019s name is, I can\u2019t make this stuff up folks,\u00a0 a stead is named Barak, isn\u2019t that interesting.\u00a0 I don\u2019t know how far I want to push that.\n\n \n\nAnd they have this belief, even though their Qur'an never mentions Jerusalem at all, and I wish I had a picture of this but when you have Muslims praying there in the Temple Mount area their backsides, their rear ends in other words, are facing the temple Mount they\u2019re faces are facing where?\u00a0 Mecca! And so if this site is so precious to them why do they have their backs to it as they\u2019re praying.\u00a0 I mean, they\u2019re real holy sites are Mecca and Medina, it\u2019s not until the Jews got into that area and made it prosperous that suddenly the Muslims sort of had a switch in their thinking and they made it a holy site.\u00a0 So it is the third most precious holy site today (in their minds anyway) but I think it\u2019s hard to document that historically.\u00a0 This is kind of a recent innovation that they\u2019ve come up with and compare that to the Scripture where clearly Jerusalem is a holy site because it\u2019s mentioned a thousand times in the Bible and it doesn\u2019t have a single reference in the Qur\u2019an, except to this furthest mosque, it uses the expression furthest mosque where Mohammed allegedly ascended and went back to Allah on a steed named Barak.\u00a0 So Jerusalem is very significant to us because it\u2019s the only city in human history chosen by God.\u00a0 God chose Jerusalem.\n\n \n\nNotice, if you will, Psalm 78:68-69.\u00a0 It says, \u201cBut chose\u201d that\u2019s God, \u201c the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion\u201d now Zion is sort of a synonym for which city?\u00a0 Jerusalem, \u201cwhich He loved. [69] And He built His sanctuary like the heights, like the earth which He has founded forever.\u201d\u00a0 So God very specifically chose Jerusalem.\u00a0 Jerusalem may not be on your personal radar screen or my personal radar screen, we might not even figure out what all the commotion is about but if you look at it from the lens of God you can very clearly see that Jerusalem is God\u2019s city.\u00a0 God chose that city.\u00a0 In fact, when you go to Psalm 137, which I think was probably the last or the latest Psalm written, it was written as the nation of Israel went into Babylon in captivity, and it was there they sat by the rivers of Babylon and wept.\n\nIf you look at Psalm 137:5, this is as the nation of Israel has been evicted from their land and they\u2019re living three hundred miles to the east, God says in this Psalm, \u201cIf I forget you, O Jerusalem, May my right hand forget her skill.\u201d\u00a0 Verse 6, \u201cMay my tongue cling to the roof of my mouth if I do not remember\u00a0 You, if I do not exalt Jerusalem above\u201d not just my joy but my what?\u00a0 \u201cmy chief joy,\u201d so if God says gosh, if we ever forget Jerusalem let \u201cmy right hand forget her skill.\u201d \u00a0Your right hand and its skill is your livelihood, it\u2019s your ability to work a trade and earn a living for your family.\u00a0 Let me homeless is what he\u2019s saying, let me be a beggar if I ever forget Jerusalem.\n\nAnd so Jerusalem is a big, big deal to God.\u00a0 And as Christians, as believers, did you notice we\u2019re to pray for the city\u2019s peace.\u00a0 We\u2019re told in Psalm 122:6 to pray for the peace of Jerusalem.\u00a0 Now is that part of your prayer life?\u00a0 Psalm 122:6 tells us to do that.\u00a0 I hear the pages flipping which always makes me happy to hear your Bible pages ruffling in a church.\u00a0 [Psalm 122:6\u00a0 says, \u201cPray for the peace of Jerusalem: \u2018May they prosper who love you.\u2019\u201d\u00a0 Hey, do you want to prosper?\u00a0 I want to prosper.\u00a0 Well, then love Jerusalem, and we\u2019re to pray for its peace.\n\nAnd in Luke 19:41 you see Jesus on Palm Sunday presenting His Messianic credentials to the nation of Israel and He sees the wayward condition of Jerusalem and He starts to weep.\u00a0 Palm Sunday!\u00a0 Now Palm Sunday that\u2019s coming up, isn\u2019t it?\u00a0 I don\u2019t think that\u2019s week, that\u2019s next week isn\u2019t it?\n\nLuke 19:41 says, \u201cWhen He approached Jerusalem, He\u201d that\u2019s Jesus, \u201csaw the city and wept over it,\u201d because of its wayward condition.\u00a0 And this is part of the ministry of the two witnesses that we\u2019ve studied in the Book of Revelation.\u00a0 The reason they\u2019re clothed in sackcloth is because Jerusalem has become, Revelation 11:8, like Sodom and Egypt.\u00a0 [Revelation 11:8, \u201cAnd their dead bodies will lie in the street of the great city which mystically is called Sodom and Egypt, where also their Lord was crucified.\u201d]\n\nSo what happened forty years after Jesus made this statement?\u00a0 Well, you know the events of A.D. 70, Rome came in and basically pushed the Jews out of Jerusalem, out of the land of Israel except for that rebel group in Masada, that three years later (roughly) engaged in that mass suicide and Jerusalem was destroyed by General Titus of Rome.\u00a0 The temple was destroyed, it was taken apart brick by brick.\u00a0 And so the nation of Israel has gone into what we call the diaspora, the worldwide dispersion, and they\u2019ve been in dispersion for two thousand years and only in recent times have they begun to come back into their land, beginning in 1948.\u00a0 And even in 1948 the nation of Israel really didn\u2019t have control over the city of Jerusalem.\u00a0 In fact, they didn\u2019t even have control over that yellow area there that we as Christians call Judea and Samaria.\u00a0 The world system refers to that area as the West Bank.\n\nNow think about this for a minute.\u00a0 Is that yellow area on the west side of the nation of Israel or the east side?\u00a0 It looks to me like it\u2019s on the East side.\u00a0 So when you use the expression West Bank that the world system constantly uses you\u2019re describing something politically from the Jordanian point of view. Do you see that?\u00a0 Words mean things. So there\u2019s some words I don\u2019t think we should use.\u00a0 I don\u2019t think we should ever refer to that area as the West Bank, that\u2019s a non-Israeli perspective; in fact, that\u2019s probably better referred to as the East Bank.\u00a0 And beyond that your Bible never\u00a0 uses the expression West Bank, it uses the expression Judea and Samaria.\n\nAnd while I\u2019m on words we shouldn\u2019t use I think we ought to just throw the word, take the word Palestine and throw it right into the garbage can where it belongs because the word Palestine is not found in the Bible either.\u00a0 Palestine is a term created by Emperor Hadrian of Rome following A.D. 70; in the second century he came up with this term because\u00a0 he basically was doing what the Muslims want to do to that area, they want to de-Judaize the land and they want to pretend like the Jews were never in that land.\u00a0 So that\u2019s what Hadrian wanted to do and he basically called that area Palestine and he named it after one of their ancient enemies, the Philistines.\n\nSo the Bible never uses the phrase West Bank.\u00a0 It does\u00a0 use the phrase Judea and Samaria, that\u2019s the proper designation for it.\u00a0 And the Bible never uses the word Palestine and\u00a0 you say well if I\u2019m not going to call that land Palestine what do you think I should call it?\u00a0 You call it exactly what our Lord called it.\u00a0 Over in Matthew 2:21, I\u2019m not sure if this is the words of Christ or the words of Matthew, probably better said the words of Matthew, \u00a0it says, \u201cSo Joseph got up, took the Child and His mother, and came into the land of Israel.\u201d\u00a0 That\u2019s what you call that land, you call it the land of Israel.\n\nThere\u2019s all sorts of propaganda that goes on when you visit this part of the world.\u00a0 Bethlehem is under Palestinian control today because of the Oslo agreements back in the 1990\u2019s and as you walk out of Bethlehem, my wife and I saw it, and this time we didn\u2019t see it because I think we went out a different way and we should have taken a picture of it, but there\u2019s a sign that everybody has to see when you walk out, and it says: Welcome to the land where Jesus was born, Palestine.\u00a0 Jesus was the first Palestinian and we were the very first people here to greet Him.\n\nWell, what do you call that?\u00a0 You call that political propaganda; if you say something lone enough people will eventually believe it.\u00a0 And you know how in Google you put something into your search engine and it\u2019s not quite right, it says if you Google this did\u00a0 you mean this, you know how it does that on Google?\u00a0 You put in your search item and it says well really what you\u2019re probably looking for is this, that appears down on the screen a little bit.\u00a0 Well, there\u2019s a whole T-shirt that\u2019s made and it reads this way: \u201cGoogle Israel, what you really meant to say is Palestine.\u201d\u00a0 And they sell these T-shirts.\u00a0 And what is that?\u00a0 That\u2019s basically political propaganda.\n\nSo the nation of Israel is in their land in 1948, they don\u2019t have control over Judea and Samaria yet, they don\u2019t even have control over Jerusalem yet, and then something happens called the Six Day War. Ever heard of that?\u00a0 Where it was a war that we would call a self-defensive war, a war of non-aggression by Israel started by basically her neighbors.\u00a0 And everybody thought that the nation of Israel was probably going to be eradicated of eliminated at that point.\u00a0 And it goes on for six days, there\u2019s a book on it out called Six Days in June<\/em>, it\u2019s an older book sort of documenting the miraculous survival of Israel during this time period.\u00a0 And not only does Israel survive, but when the dust clears what does she have control over?\u00a0 Judea and Samaria and also the city of Jerusalem.\n\nAnd the world community wasn\u2019t very happy about that, let me tell you, because over the next fifty years the world community contested that Jerusalem even belonged to the nation of Israel, when in fact when you read your Bible you learn that Jerusalem has been the uncontested capital of the city of Jerusalem going back three thousand years to whose dynasty?\u00a0 The Davidic dynasty.\u00a0\u00a0 But the world community doesn\u2019t look at it that way; they look at Jerusalem as really not belonging to Israel.\u00a0 In fact, there\u2019s a Supreme Court case called Zimbo-todsky v Carey as in John Carey, 2015, and here\u2019s the ruling in the case?\u00a0 \u201cCongress\u201d see Congress passed legislation saying well let\u2019s just acknowledge Jerusalem as part of Israel.\u00a0 Well, I think at the time the Obama administration and then later the Bush administration really wasn\u2019t comfortable with that because they thought that would disrupt the peace process.\u00a0 And so they said we\u2019re not going to recognize Jerusalem as part of Israel and so this whole issue came to the Supreme Court and our own Supreme Court in one of the worst rulings I can think of besides the infamous Roe vs. Wade decision, ruled this way: Congress may not require the State Department to indicate in passports that Jerusalem is part of Israel.\u201d\n\nSo my friend, Randy Price, who I was just with this last week, and I think it was his passport, or his wife\u2019s passport, his daughter\u2019s passport it says \u201cshe\u2019s a resident of Jerusalem but not a citizen of Israel, simultaneously.\u201d\u00a0 Born in Jerusalem, and what\u2019s the rest of it?\u00a0 [someone answers, can\u2019t hear]\u00a0 That\u2019s right, it asks what country she was born in and she was born in Jerusalem, when it should have said she was born in Israel, because if you\u2019re born in Jerusalem you\u2019re automatically born in Israel.\u00a0\u00a0 So that\u2019s our own State Department at work and our own Supreme Court.\n\nThen comes along this guy known for his casino\u2019s and foul mouth, a guy that nobody ever thought would be elected President, including Yours Truly, he gets elected President and he moves the embassy from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. And I say to myself, I can\u2019t believe this is happening.\u00a0 Isn\u2019t that like God, to take the least qualified person to do something awesome?\u00a0 I mean, you\u2019ve got this foul mouth womanizing\u2026 I voted for the President so don\u2019t think I\u2019m maligning him, I\u2019m just saying he\u2019s not exactly a role model for the moral majority.\u00a0 Let\u2019s just put it that way.\u00a0 And he gets in office and he moves the capital from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem and in the process, not our capital, our embassy, excuse me, from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem, and in the process settles a controversy that\u2019s been going on for fifty years, that yes, we as the United States are going to recognize Jerusalem as belonging to Israel.\u00a0 That\u2019s the significance of that embassy move.\u00a0 And then what do all the other countries of the world start doing?\u00a0 Well, with the Big Kahuna is going to do it, if the top dog is going to do it then we\u2019re going to do it too.\u00a0 And so Trump, I believe, whatever you think about him, has been raised up by God I think to do some really neat things.\n\nAnd I think Donald Trump kind of fits into America\u2019s prophetic destiny in the sense that America is special in the sense that she has typically taken the side of Israel.\u00a0 In fact, you can trace that all the way back to George Washington.\u00a0 You can go to what\u2019s called the Touro Synagogue in Newport, Rhode Island, (and I\u2019ve been there) and that\u2019s a synagogue that George Washington visited when he was our first President and he wrote a letter to them the same day he worshipped with them in their synagogue explaining to them that the Jews are always going to have a home in the United States of America and they\u2019re not going to be persecuted and they\u2019re going to have the right to worship as they want, which has not been something they\u2019ve enjoyed in their history.\n\nThen you have a guy like Harry Truman, 1948, you know what Truman\u2019s nickname was?\u00a0 The Cussing Baptist!\u00a0 And he was among the first, when Israel declared her independence in 1948 that recognized the new State of Israel. Now why did he do that.\u00a0 Well, he was raised as a Baptist and he remembered all this stuff from his Sunday School about Israel and the significance of Israel and what the Bible says about Israel.\n\nAnd then later on, around 1973 you\u2019ve got Tricky Dick, Richard Milhous Nixon, who received a phone call from Golda Meir in the middle of the night in what\u2019s called the Yom Kippur War, 1973, where she says we need help, we\u2019re being beaten here as Israel was involved in another war or self-defense in 1973.\u00a0 And she had originally placed the call to Henry Kissinger and Henry Kissinger in the midst of the administration his response was well\u00a0 \u201clet the Jews bleed for a while.\u201d\u00a0 So Golda Meir just got tired of it, and by the way, she already had her suicide pills ready to go because they thought it was over.\u00a0 She places the call to Nixon.\n\nNixon picks up the phone in the middle of the night and he remembers a story that his mother told him as a child, you know his mother (you may know this, you may not know this) he comes from a very devout Quaker background, and she would read to him at night and she was reading to him out of the Book of Esther, I think, as the story goes, I haven it documented in my book, The Middle East Meltdown, if you\u2019re interested.\u00a0 And then she stopped sort of in the middle of reading to him and says, \u201cRichard, if you\u2019re ever in a place of influence in your life,\u201d you know the story of the Book of Esther, right, Israel\u2019s survival, Purim against Haman and all that kind of stuff, she says \u201cif\u00a0 you\u2019re ever in a position of authority in your life I want you to use that authority to help the nation of Israel.\u201d\u00a0 So when he picks up the phone and receives this call from Golda Meir that\u2019s the story that comes to his mind.\u00a0 AND he says to Golda Meir for the first time I realized why I\u2019ve become President of the United States.\n\nNow I think that was the sovereignty of God that put him in that position when\u00a0 you study Richard Nixon\u2019s political career because nobody thought\u2026first of all he lost the Presidency to who?\u00a0 It was Kennedy, wasn\u2019t it, 1960, then he ran for Governor of California and lost, then he made his famous statement, you know, you\u2019re not going to have Nixon to kick around anymore.\u00a0 And then all of a sudden he runs again and miraculously becomes President of the United States.\u00a0 And this was, I think a bit prior to\u2026 maybe simultaneously, I may have my dates not exactly right, Watergate and things going on, but when you look at all the politics of it you start to see what it means in Daniel 2 where it says God sets one man in authority and puts down another.\n\nI don\u2019t know what you believe or how you interpret these events, I believe God put Nixon in that position to help Golda Meir in the midst of the Yom Kippur War and that\u2019s why he sent armaments and things to help and that kind of turned the tide.\u00a0 And Golda Meir said Richard Nixon will always be my President.\u00a0 And if you go to Israel today Richard Nixon is thought of very highly amongst the Jewish people, even though in America everybody focuses on some of his moral failings and you know, the Oliver Stone movie kind of portrayed Nixon as an anti-Semitic.\u00a0 How could he be anti-Semitic when he did this magnanimous thing to help Israel in her time of need.\n\nYou\u2019ve got George Washington, you\u2019ve got Harry Truman, you\u2019ve \u201cTricky Dick\u201d Richard Millhouse Nixon, then you\u2019ve got the foul-mouthed Casino owner, who does this thing and he moves\u2026 all these other Presidents, whether it\u2019s Obama, Bush, whatever, they all promise that they\u2019d move the embassy, none of them did it!\u00a0 Clinton promised it and he didn\u2019t do it, and all of a sudden Donald Trump actually does it.\u00a0 And in the process he recognizes that Jerusalem belongs to the Jews.\n\nNow here\u2019s something else that\u2019s interesting, I don\u2019t know how far I want to go out on a ledge with some of this stuff.\u00a0 How many years is it between 1967 when Israel got Jerusalem back but it wasn\u2019t recognized, 1967 and then when Donald Trump did this in 2017. \u00a0Can anybody do the math on that?\u00a0 What\u2019s 1967 subtracted from 2017?\u00a0 Isn\u2019t that fifty years?\u00a0 Now isn\u2019t there a little something in our Bible about the year of Jubilee, on the fiftieth year debts are erased, and Clinton promised to move the embassy, he didn\u2019t!\u00a0\u00a0 Obama promised to move the embassy, he didn\u2019t!\u00a0 Bush promised to move the embassy, he didn\u2019t!\u00a0 Why not?\u00a0 Maybe because that fifty year cycle hadn\u2019t expired yet.\u00a0 Trump does it on the 50th<\/sup> year.\u00a0 Anyway, I just submit that for your consideration.\n\nSo what is going to happen in the end time, Zechariah 12:3, Zechariah 14:2, predicts that the nations will surround the city of Jerusalem and come against it.\u00a0 [Zechariah 12:3, \u201cIt will come about in that day that I will make Jerusalem a heavy stone for all the peoples; all who lift it will be severely injured. And all the nations of the earth will be gathered against it.\u201d\u00a0 Zechariah 14:2, \u201cFor I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle, and the city will be captured, the houses plundered, the women ravished and half of the city exiled, but the rest of the people will not be cut off from the city.\u201d]\n\nThat\u2019s not hard to imagine when you look at the mindset of the world community towards the city of Jerusalem.\u00a0 And we know it\u2019s going to end on a good note because Jesus, Yeshua, is going to return and protect the Jewish people and He is going to set up His capital city of the thousand year kingdom in the city of Jerusalem.\u00a0 Isaiah 2:2-3, Zechariah 14:16-18\n\n[Isaiah 2:2-3, \u201cNow it will come about that in the last days the mountain of the house of the LORD will be established as the chief of the mountains, and will be raised above the hills; and all the nations will stream to it.\u00a0 [3] \u201cAnd many peoples will come and say, \u2018Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, To the house of the God of Jacob; That He may teach us concerning His ways And that we may walk in His paths.\u2019 For the law will go forth from Zion And the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.\n\nZechariah 14:16-18, \u201cThen it will come about that any who are left of all the nations that went against Jerusalem will go up from year to year to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, and to celebrate the Feast of Booths. [17] And it will be that whichever of the families of the earth does not go up to Jerusalem to worship the King, the LORD of hosts, there will be no rain on them. [18] If the family of Egypt does not go up or enter, then no rain will fall<\/em> on them; it will be the plague with which the LORD smites the nations who do not go up to celebrate the Feast of Booths.\n\nRevelation 20:9 refers to the capital city of the millennial kingdom as the beloved city, that\u2019s got to be Jerusalem because Jerusalem is the city God loves and has chosen.\u00a0 \u00a0[Revelation 20:9, \u201cAnd they came up on the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city, and fire came down from heaven and devoured them.\u201d\n\nPsalm 78:68, \u201cBut chose the tribe of Judah, Mount Zion which He loved.\u201d\n\nPsalm 87:2, \u201cThe LORD loves the gates of Zion More than all the other dwelling places of Jacob.\u201d]\n\nSo all of that was supposed to be background for some of the things I was going to show you in the city of Jerusalem.\u00a0 So next week we\u2019ll be looking at the Mount of Olives in Jerusalem, the Garden of Gethsemane in Jerusalem, a new excavation called the southern steps in the temple area in Jerusalem and then also we\u2019ll be looking at the western wall. But I didn\u2019t want to just throw the word Jerusalem at you without giving you this background. So this morning we\u2019ve looked at, I guess three things, Qumran, En-gedi and then just some general comments about the city of Jerusalem.\u00a0 So we\u2019ll pick this up next time.\u00a0 Shall we pray.\n\nFather, we\u2019re grateful for Your Word, we\u2019re grateful for Your hand in history, grateful for Your faithfulness to this ancient city, its past, its present and its future. We\u2019re grateful for the great plans You\u2019ve had for us, grateful for America and the roll that You\u2019ve allowed her to play to the out-working of Your purposes.\u00a0 Be with us as we continue to study these important things.\u00a0 We\u2019ll be careful to give You all the praise and the glory, we ask these things in Jesus\u2019 name, and God\u2019s people said, Amen. \u00a0Happy intermission.","series_sermon_number":""},"aioseo_notices":[],"aioseo_head":"\n\t\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t\n\t\t