{"id":19175,"date":"2016-09-04T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2016-09-04T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/sugar-land-bible-church.local\/sermon\/the-bible-and-voting-part-9\/"},"modified":"2016-09-04T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2016-09-04T05:00:00","slug":"the-bible-and-voting-part-9","status":"publish","type":"sermon","link":"https:\/\/slbc.org\/es\/sermon\/the-bible-and-voting-part-9\/","title":{"rendered":"The Bible and Voting – Part 9"},"content":{"rendered":"","protected":false},"featured_media":0,"template":"","book":[65],"series_event":[466],"sermon_service_type":[472],"speaker":[6],"class_list":["post-19175","sermon","type-sermon","status-publish","hentry","book-proverbs","series_event-the-bible-and-voting-2016","sermon_service_type-main-service","speaker-dr-andy-woods","no-post-thumbnail"],"acf":{"sermon_title":"The Bible and Voting - Part 9","sermon_date":"20160904","sermon_month":"9","sermon_year":"2016","sermon_notes":3914,"sermon_slides":3918,"sermon_mp3":3921,"sermon_id":"9416919240","series_or_event":466,"service_type":[472],"speaker":6,"books_of_the_bible":65,"chapter_and_verse":"14:34","sermon_transcript":"Andy Woods\n\nSUGAR LAND BIBLE CHURCH\n\nSeptember 4, 2016 The Bible and Voting, Part 9\n\nShould Christians and Americans Support the Modern State of Israel?\n\nLet\u2019s take our Bibles, if we could, and open them to the book of Genesis, chapter 12, and verse 3.\u00a0 The title of our message this morning is The Bible and Voting, Part 9; these parts are getting kind of generic so let me give you another title you might like better.\u00a0 Should Christians and Americans support the modern state of Israel?\u00a0 Yes.\u00a0 Let\u2019s close in prayer\u2026 no.\u00a0 Should Christians and Americans Support the Modern State of Israel?\u00a0 And that\u2019s a subject\u00a0 you\u2019re not going to get the same answer on, depending on what kind of church you\u2019re in.\u00a0 Even as I speak there are actually, I can think of two, mainline Christian denominations that are not only not supporting the modern state of Israel but they\u2019re actually boycotting formally Israeli products, an economic boycott by Christians against the state of Israel.\u00a0 And so given the confusion within Christianity and given the confusion about this in our culture I want to address this issue this morning and I\u2019ve got so much material it\u2019ll probably bleed into next week.\n\nCoincidentally there\u2019s a lot of stuff going on here at the church but let me throw something else at\u00a0 you, a conference I mentioned last week called Israel Today, Understanding Critical Issues; it\u2019s all about the nation of Israel, there should be a flyer on the name tag table on your way out; it\u2019s a free conference hosted at West Houston Bible Church which is about 20 minutes from here and they do streaming and archiving so if you can\u2019t make it in person.\u00a0 I\u2019m going to be speaking there Friday evening on the subject of Israel, so it\u2019s something I want to draw your attention to, in addition to all the other things we\u2019ve got going on; I think we have a men\u2019s group on Saturday morning and other things.\u00a0 So a lot of options to choose from and a lot of ways to be edified in the things of God.\n\nShould Bible-believing Christians and Americans support the modern state of Israel?\u00a0 We have been working our way through a study through a series of studies that I really didn\u2019t think would take this long; I thought this would be one sermon, believe it or not.\u00a0 But we started this on Independence Day weekend and it\u2019s all about the subject of voting; it\u2019s not to corral you for one candidate or the other, or one party or the other.\u00a0 That\u2019s not the point.\u00a0 It\u2019s to go through the Scripture and let the Scripture speak on volatile political issues of the day, as a means of equipping you, not just for this election but any election, and not just a Presidential election but Senate elections, House elections, State elections, Federal elections, local elections.\u00a0 God has spoken on these subjects and the issue is when we vote are we thinking the way God does?\u00a0 So the goal of this series is really to orient our thinking and to help us understand that the Bible has a lot to say, not just about how to get to heaven (as important as that is) but it actually comments on every of life including the political realm.\n\nSo we\u2019ve looked at economic issues and there are several of them that we went through.\u00a0 We\u2019ve also spent some time on social issues and there are several of those we went through.\u00a0 And the last couple of weeks we\u2019ve been looking at foreign affairs.\u00a0 What are foreign affairs?\u00a0 Foreign affairs is our relationship with other countries.\u00a0 We\u2019ve seen, for example, that the Bible does not favor one-world government unless Jesus is running it, amen!\u00a0 We have also seen last week the biblical case for borders enforcement; the Bible actually deals with that.\u00a0 And perhaps one of the issues, this may even be the most important issue that we cover, is a candidate\u2019s attitude towards the Jewish people in general but the modern state of Israel in particular.\n\nYou mean to tell me, pastor, that that tiny nation off the coast of the Mediterranean Sea in the Middle East has some kind of bearing on the United States of America?\u00a0 I want to show you today and probably next week that it has more to do with the destiny of our nation than perhaps any other single issue.\u00a0 One of the most important things to understand about anybody is what do they think about the nation of Israel?\u00a0 Do\u00a0 they think the way God thinks, because God, as I\u2019ll be showing you today, thinks about that nation and the Jewish people in a very specific way.\n\nSo our outline has three parts today: Number 1, the divine purpose for Israel.\u00a0 Number 2, the divine protection of Israel.\u00a0 And then number 3, which we may not get to today, the power of your voice concerning Israel.\u00a0 So if you like the alliteration beginning with the letter \u201cP\u201d we have: Purpose, Protection, and Power.\n\nLet\u2019s start here at the beginning.\u00a0 What is the divine purpose for the nation of Israel?\u00a0 Why did God call the nation of Israel into existence?\u00a0 That story begins in Genesis 12.\u00a0 In fact, let me take that back, it doesn\u2019t begin in Genesis 12, it begins in Genesis 11.\u00a0 Genesis 11 is the explanation of why God raised up this tiny nation in Genesis 12.\u00a0 To understand Genesis 12 you have to understand Genesis 11.\u00a0 Now for the last two Sundays I\u2019ve read through the verses talking about the great one-world project called the tower of Babel, how the nations, in fact, there weren\u2019t nations there was just one language at this time, the peoples of the earth were coming together to build what some have called a New World Order, which is a one-world system of economics, politics and religion that excludes God\u2019s viewpoint on life.\n\nWe saw that this building project was coming together in the land of Shinar which is that area between the rivers, in Greek called Mesopotamia, between the Euphrates and the Tigris, Genesis 11:2 explains that this was coming together in that location.\u00a0 [Genesis 11:2, \u201cIt came about as they journeyed east that they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there.\u201d]\u00a0 And then Genesis 11:1 says this:\u00a0 \u201cNow the whole earth used the same language and the same words.\u201d\u00a0 When this project was coming together and before God confounded the progress of the workers through the confusion of the language there were no different language speaking groups, there were no different ethnicities, there weren\u2019t even different cultures, as we have them today, there weren\u2019t even different nations.\n\nSo the thing to understand about the tower of Babel is that the sin that took place here was replicated throughout the world because everybody took with them into their own people group a fragment, if you will, of the religious system of the tower of Babel.\u00a0 It\u2019s sort of like taking a stone and casting it into a calm lake and you\u2019ll notice that when the stone hits that lake the wake reverberates outward in a circle and goes outward in every direction.\u00a0 That, in essence, is what happened at the tower of Babel.\u00a0 The sin that was happening at the tower of Babel was exported into every culture.\n\nNow what was the sin that was happening at the tower of Babel? It was something called the mother-child cult.\u00a0 You get this, primarily from the book The Two Babylons<\/em> by Alexander Hislop, considered a classic.\u00a0 Hislop, through his study of that Babylonian tradition explains what was happening at the tower of Babel.\u00a0 There was a man named Nimrod, who is mentioned in the Bible, Genesis 10:8-10; he was the leader of this one-world project.\u00a0 [Genesis 10:8-10, \u201cNow Cush became the father of Nimrod; he became a mighty one on the earth. [9] He was a mighty hunter before the LORD; therefore it is said, \u201cLike Nimrod a mighty hunter before the LORD.\u201d [10] The beginning of his kingdom was Babel and Erech and Accad and Calneh, in the land of Shinar.]\n\nHe was married to a woman named Semiramis, who is not mentioned in the Bible but is mentioned in Babylonian tradition.\u00a0 And the two of them, Nimrod and Semiramis, had a child whose name was Tammuz.\u00a0 Tammuz, according to Babylonian tradition was killed by a wild animal and was miraculously brought back to life, not through divine power but through satanic power, similar to how the antichrist himself, Revelation 13 tells us, will die and miraculously be brought back to life for the whole world to see.\n\nAnd once this satanic miracle happened people started to worship the mother and the child; they began to worship Semiramis and Tammuz, in other words.\u00a0 And this became known as the mother-child cult or religious system that was commonly practiced at the tower of Babel.\u00a0 And so when God confused the language so that they could not cooperate with each other and everyone separated into their own people group, they took with them a little bit of the tower of Babel into every culture.\n\nAnd this is why Alexander Hislop explains that no matter what culture you get into there are remnants of, vestiges of, remembrances of the mother-child system, it\u2019s just the names are changed from group to group.\u00a0 In Assyria, for example, the mother is called Ishtar, the child, Tammuz.\u00a0 In Phoenicia the mother is Astarte, the child is Baal.\u00a0 In Egypt the mother is Isis, the child is either Osirus or Horus.\u00a0 In Greece the mother is Aphrodite, the child is Eros.\u00a0 In Rome the mother is Venus, the child is Cupid.\u00a0 In Asia the mother is Cybele, the child is Desius.\u00a0 In India the mother is Isi, the child is Iswara.\u00a0 No matter where you go, Hislop says, it\u2019s the same; in the archeological remnants of any civilization you can find this mother-child worship system.\n\nNow you say what\u2019s the point?\u00a0 The point is every nation of the earth, since they all owe their origins to the tower of Babel, has been contaminated by idolatry.\u00a0 Every nation of the earth has been contaminated by this Nimrod\/Semiramis\/Tammuz worship system, regardless of what name it goes under.\u00a0 The incident at the tower of Babel, therefore, had a universal effect everywhere, in every culture and every nation.\n\nNow this, in a sense, creates a problem for God because God, all the way back in Genesis 3:15, right after the fall of man, announced the plan of salvation in a prophecy sometimes called the protoevangelium, which simply means first gospel.\u00a0 Genesis 3:15, God announces this to the serpent right after the sin of Adam and Eve.\u00a0 God says to the serpent, \u201cAnd I will put enmity between you and the woman,\u201d the woman being Eve, \u201cI will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel.\u201d\u00a0 And right then and there the world and the devil himself is put on notice that there\u2019s coming one into the world through the lineage of Eve, the woman, who will one day deal a death blow to Satan by crushing his head.\u00a0 Satan, along the way, will wage great warfare but when all is said and done the serpent\u2019s head will be crushed by this coming One, and we know who that coming One is from the New Testament; it\u2019s a prophecy of none other than Jesus Christ.\n\nSo God has announced what He is going to do.\u00a0 Now here is the problem as far as God is concerned: I can\u2019t use, God says, Assyria, or Phoenicia or Egypt or Greece or any other country to bring forth this Messiah because they all have been tainted by idolatry thanks to the universal impact at the tower of Babel.\u00a0 So what does God do?\u00a0 God creates something unique.\u00a0 God creates something special, and what is that special thing?\u00a0 It is a nation that was established after all of these things happened because what I am describing here is in Genesis 11.\u00a0 The formation of Israel begins in Genesis 12.\u00a0 Israel is the only country that has ever existed, it is the only people group that has ever existed that was started independently of the mother\/child system at the tower of Babel.\n\nAnd it is going to be through this nation, later called Israel, that God is going to bring forth and fulfill the promise of Genesis 3:15.\u00a0 [Genesis 3:15, \u201cAnd I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; he shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel.\u201d]\u00a0 And so consequently God is called in the Bible the creator of Israel; it\u2019s the only nation that has ever existed that has come forth through the direct creative activity of God.\u00a0 Isaiah 43:1 puts it this way, \u201cBut now, thus says the LORD, your Creator, O Jacob, And He who formed you, O Israel\u2026.\u201d \u00a0Isaiah 43:15, God says, \u201cI am the LORD, your Holy One, The Creator of Israel, your King.\u201d\n\nJust as God created in Genesis 1 something out of nothing, God, in a sense, and it\u2019s almost the same Hebrew word for create as used in Genesis 1 that are used in those passages that I just read, God did a work of supernatural creativity and He created the nation of Israel for the purpose of exporting His Messianic blessings to the world.\u00a0 This is why God is not using, as His instrument, any of these other nations that have all been corrupted and owe their origin to the tower of Babel.\u00a0 He is using a nation created after the tower of Babel, Genesis 12, independent of the tower of Babel, Genesis 12.\n\nAnd thus the genealogies of early Genesis are so careful to connect the dots for us.\u00a0 We have the prophecy in Genesis 3:15 of the protoevangelium, and then the line is carefully traced from Adam and Eve, right down to Noah, Genesis 5.\u00a0 Then there is something called the angelic eruption, Genesis 6, which I believe (to make a long story short) is trying to contaminate the genetics of the human race so that a Messiah, who must be fully man, can never be born.\u00a0 That\u2019s what\u2019s happening as these angels in Genesis 6 are procreating with human women creating a race of people that Genesis 6:4 calls the Nephilim, which simply means the fallen one.\u00a0 [Genesis 6:4, \u201cThe Nephilim were on the earth in those days, and also afterward, when the sons of God came in to the daughters of men, and they bore children to them. Those were the mighty men who were of old, men of renown.\u201d]\n\nSatan is seeking to lock the human race into a permanent state of fallenness by creating a race of people that aren\u2019t fully human, because the Messiah must be fully God and fully what? Man.\u00a0 In fact, back in Genesis 3:15 God specifically said that this Messiah will be the seed of the woman, humanity in other words.\u00a0 [Genesis 3:15, \u201cAnd I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, and you shall bruise him on the heel.\u201d]\u00a0 Satan knows that and is trying to disrupt it in Genesis 6.\n\nSo Noah is protected from that; that\u2019s why he\u2019s called unblemished, Genesis 6:9.\u00a0 He and his family, eight total in the ark, are tucked safely and securely in the ark, Genesis 7:1.\u00a0\u00a0 [\u201cGenesis 6:9, \u201cThese are the records of the generations of Noah. Noah was a righteous man, blameless in his time; Noah walked with God.\u201d\u00a0 Genesis 7:1, \u201cThen the LORD said to Noah, \u2018Enter the ark, you and all your household, for you alone I have seen to be righteous before Me in this time.\u2019\u201d]\n\nThe world is destroyed by a flood; the Nephilim are wiped out, Satan\u2019s project of tampering with the gene pools of the human race is brought to an end and God safely brings, from the old world into the new world this man and his family who had been genetically unaltered, named Noah.\u00a0 We know that Noah had three sons, Ham, Shem and Japheth, and we learn from Genesis 9:26 that of those three lines it will be from the lineage of Shem that the Messiah will come.\u00a0 [Genesis 9:26, \u201cHe also said, \u2018Blessed be the LORD, The God of Shem; And let Canaan be his servant.\u2019\u201d]\n\nAnd thus we come to the genealogy of Genesis 11 which carefully traces the genealogy from Noah\u2019s son, Shem, all the way to Terah; Terah, of course, being Abraham\u2019s father.\u00a0 And what the early chapters of Genesis is simply showing is this: God is working in history to preserve a line leading to Abraham. Abraham, whose name at that time was Abram, becomes very significant because he is going to be the father or the progenitor of the Hebrew nation.\u00a0 Through the Hebrew nation God is going to bring forth His Messianic promises to planet earth, and thus God calls this man in Genesis 12 Abram, who was, like everyone else of that day, an idolater, a pagan.\n\nAnd God begins to supernaturally reveal Himself to this man, Abram; He tells him to walk by faith and to trust Me, and I\u2019m going to take you to a land that you know nothing about.\u00a0 And thus the walk of Abram, who later is renamed to Abraham, is carefully documented for us in the pages of God\u2019s Word and it becomes quite important because God is going to channel Genesis 3:15 to the world through this nation or this race that will come forth from this man, Abram.\u00a0 [Genesis 3:15, \u201cAnd I will put enmity Between you and the woman, And between your seed and her seed; He shall bruise you on the head, And you shall bruise him on the heel.\u201d]\n\nAnd in the process God begins to unfold to Abram promises.\u00a0 In Genesis 12:3 God says this: \u201cAnd I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse.\u00a0 And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.\u201d\u00a0 I want us to focus on that last clause for just a moment,\u00a0 \u201cAnd in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.\u201d\u00a0 As I am not working sovereignly in your life, creating a nation independent of the mother-child cult I am going to lavish upon you blessings.\u00a0 These blessings are not for you and you alone, it is through you, kind of a spillover effect, if you will, the entire planet earth is going to be blessed.\u00a0 God chose to unleash His blessings upon planet earth through a specific people and a specific nation starting at a specific time or a specific point in history.\n\nAnd isn\u2019t it interesting how literally God has fulfilled His Word!\u00a0 He has brought and when is all is said and done, and will bring three of the greatest blessings that could ever come to the human race through the Hebrew nation, otherwise known as the Jewish people.\u00a0 The first blessing is the Scripture itself; this book that we study over and over again here at Sugar Land Bible Church.\u00a0 Paul in Romans 3:2 says to them, that\u2019s the Hebrews, were given the oracles of God.\u00a0 [Romans 3:2, \u201cGreat in every respect. First of all, that they were entrusted with the oracles of God.\u201d]\n\nEvery single writer of this book, the only one that\u2019s even debated anymore is Luke and some even think Luke was Jewish.\u00a0 But the fact of the matter is, every writer of this book, with the possible exception of Luke, was Jewish.\u00a0 Moses was Jewish, he wrote the first five books of the Bible.\u00a0 The Gospel writers were all Jewish, the prophets were all Jewish, the Apostle Paul was Jewish, the Apostle John was Jewish, Jude was Jewish.\u00a0 We wouldn\u2019t have a Bible had it not been for God\u2019s work through the Jewish people.\n\nThe second great blessing is the Savior Himself; in John 4:22 Jesus, to the Samaritan woman who wanted to sort of follow the patterns of Samaria and worship God as she chose on Gerizim rather than in Jerusalem, the Samaritan woman, Jesus says in John 4:22, \u201c salvation is of the Jews.\u201d\u00a0 [John 4:22, \u201cYou worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews.\u201d]\n\nThis plan and program of God from the beginning will be exported to the world through the Jewish nation.\u00a0 Now let me tell you something about the nation of Israel: Israel is the gift that keeps on giving.\u00a0 If I were what we would call a Reformed theologian, if I were what would be called a Replacement theologian, I would stand up and say to you every gift that God has given to the world through the Jewish people has already been given.\u00a0 But may I just say to you that is not what I believe; it is not what the Bible teaches because there is a third gift on the horizon called the Kingdom.\n\nThe Kingdom, according to Isaiah 2:2-3, will not be headquartered in Washington D.C., Belgium or any other Gentile city.\u00a0 It\u2019s very clear in the Bible it will be headquartered in Jerusalem.\u00a0 Jesus will reign in the Millennial kingdom from David\u2019s throne in Jerusalem.\u00a0 The gift that keeps on giving. \u00a0\u00a0[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] And 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.\u00a0\u00a0 For the law will go forth from Zion And the word of the LORD from Jerusalem.\u201d]\n\nAnd as we sit here today as Gentile Christians, most of us, we need to understand something; that every single blessing that we have today has come to us, spiritually, through the Jewish people.\u00a0 The patriarchs, Abraham, Isaiah, Jacob, Joseph, all Jewish.\u00a0 The Law of God, which is a perfect revelation of God\u2019s moral character came to us through the Jewish people.\u00a0 All the prophets were Jewish.\u00a0 Jesus, contrary to what many people communicate, was not a Southern Baptist or a Presbyterian, or a Methodist, or a member of a Bible church; He was as Jewish as they come.\n\nMatthew traces that genealogy for us very carefully in Matthew 1. All the apostles were Jewish.\u00a0 Every biblical writer, with maybe the exception of Luke and even that is debated, was Jewish.\u00a0 The early church that we read about in the book of Acts, all Jewish.\n\nIn fact, there\u2019s not even a Gentile convert into the church age until the conversion of Cornelius in Acts 10.\u00a0 Prior to that point in time the entire genetic makeup of the early church was Jewish.\u00a0 Therefore, all of the early Christian martyrs were Jewish.\u00a0 Stephen, who was the first martyr in the church age was Jewish.\u00a0 Paul, the apostle, who went on three missionary journeys and took the gospel all the way to Rome and wrote 13 books of the New Testament was Jewish.\u00a0 And as I mentioned, the future kingdom that\u2019s coming will be a Jewish kingdom, headquartered in Jerusalem.\u00a0 \u00a0This is all an outworking of Genesis 12:3.\u00a0 [Genesis 12:3, \u201cAnd I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.\u201d]\n\nAnd God was so serious about this that in Genesis 15 He, as if a promise from God isn\u2019t enough, He covenantally bound Himself in what we would call today a formal legal contract, and obligated Himself to bring these blessings to the earth through the Jewish people.\u00a0 In fact, God is so serious about this that He says if I don\u2019t do this then let Me torn asunder as the animals in the covenant ritual had been torn asunder. \u00a0And consequently the way God looks at Israel is Israel is the center of the earth.\u00a0 Ezekiel 5:5 says, \u201cThus says the Lord GOD, \u2018This is Jerusalem; I have set her at the center of the nations\u2026.\u201d\u00a0 Ezekiel 38:12 describes an invasion that is coming against Israel, \u201cto capture spoil and to seize plunder, to turn your hand against the waste places which are now inhabited, and against the people who are gathered from the nations, who have acquired cattle and goods,\u201d watch this, \u201cwho live at the center of the world.\u2019\u201d\u00a0 This is not how man thinks; this is how God thinks.\n\nThe Hebrew word translated \u201ccenter\u201d in both of those Ezekiel passages is literally the navel or the bellybutton which forms the center of the body.\u00a0 You see, to the world Israel is just a nation in the way of progress, a nation that\u2019s causing trouble all of the time, a nation that has to be dealt with somehow.\u00a0 But you see, to God Israel is the center of everything.\u00a0 This isn\u2019t my opinion; this is what the Scripture teaches.\u00a0 So should that not have some kind of effect on our attitude towards Israel?\n\nPaul, in Romans 11 talks about an olive tree; he talks there about branches, natural branches that have been cut out of the olive tree (temporarily) and he talks about wild unnatural branches that have been grafted into the olive tree.\u00a0 Now in this spiritual metaphor the olive tree would represent God\u2019s foundational covenant with the nation of Israel, the Abrahamic Covenant and His desire to bless the world through Abraham, and the natural branches that had been chopped out of the tree would represent Jews who, back in the first century, refused to receive Jesus, who they call Yeshua, as their Messiah.\u00a0 So they have been removed from the blessings of God for a season.\u00a0\u00a0 And in their place, temporarily, have come these strange branches that really don\u2019t belong in the tree.\u00a0 And who is that?\u00a0 That\u2019s you!\u00a0 That\u2019s me, as Gentiles.\u00a0 We are these odd out of place branches that have been grafted in because we have received by faith the very Messiah Israel rejected.\n\nNow Paul makes some statements, does he not, to those wild branches about their attitude, and this is what Paul says, Romans 11:17, if you\u2019re tracking with me in the Scripture, Romans 11:17, Paul says, \u201cBut if some of the branches were broken off, and you, being a wild olive, were grafted in among them and became partaker with them of the rich root of the olive tree,\u201d watch this, verse 18, \u201cdo not be arrogant toward the branches;\u201d he\u2019s telling us unnatural branches to not become arrogant about the natural branches that have been temporarily removed; it\u2019s an attitude issue.\u00a0 \u201c\u2026 but if you are arrogant,\u201d Paul says, watch this, \u201cremember that it is not you who supports the root, but the root supports you.\u201d\u00a0 You have what you have because of God\u2019s dealings and fulfilling His program through the Jewish people and the patriarch Abraham.\n\n\u201cBut if you are arrogant\u201d verse 18, \u00a0\u201c\u2026remember that it is not you who supports the root, but the root supports you.\u201d\u00a0 Verse 19, \u201cYou will say then, the branches\u201d this is the natural branches, \u201cwere broken off so that I might be grafted in.\u201d\u00a0 Verse 20, \u201cQuite right, they were broken off for their unbelief, but you stand by your faith. \u00a0Do not be conceited, but fear; [23] and they also, if they do not continue in their unbelief will be grafted in, for God is able to graft them in again.\u201d\u00a0 Verse 24, \u201cFor if you were cut off from what is by nature a wild olive tree, and were grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these who are the natural branches be grafted into their own olive tree?\u201d\n\nPaul\u2019s point here is just very simple.\u00a0 Number 1, you shouldn\u2019t look at the Jewish people in unbelief and be arrogant towards them because if God didn\u2019t work through them we would have nothing as Gentiles.\n\nNumber 2, if God can take a wild branch and put it into a tree, how much easier is it for God to take the natural branches and just reinsert them, which prophetically we know is something that God will do.\u00a0 See, it\u2019s an attitude issue.\u00a0 Paul here doesn\u2019t chide us for our bad Bible study techniques; he chides us for our attitude toward the Jewish people.\u00a0 Do you love the Jewish people as you look at the Jewish people today?\u00a0 The Bible says you ought to.\u00a0 The Bible says as you grow in Christ you should have a particular attitude towards the Jewish people.\u00a0 You certainly wouldn\u2019t boycott the State of Israel, would you, as a Christian?\u00a0 What kind of sense does that make?\n\nRomans 15:26-27, look at this: \u201cFor Macedonia and Achaia have been pleased to make a contribution for the poor among the saints in Jerusalem.\u201d\u00a0 What is Paul doing?\u00a0 He\u2019s raising money for the saints in Jerusalem, not Austin, not Texas, not Sacramento, not Washington D.C., not Rome, the suffering saints in Jerusalem.\u00a0 Verse 27 he says, \u201cYes, they were pleased to do so, and they are indebted to them. \u00a0For if the Gentiles have shared in their spiritual things, they are indebted to minister to them also in material things.\u201d\u00a0 If God has blessed you through His program with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob don\u2019t you think that you, as a Gentile, owe something to the Jewish people?\u00a0 Don\u2019t you think you should try to bless them as\u00a0 you can, materially or otherwise?\n\nWhat have I just talked about?\u00a0 The divine purpose for Israel.\u00a0 This is the thoughts of God concerning the nation of Israel, which takes us to number 2, the divine protection of Israel.\u00a0 Go back to Genesis 12:3, \u201cAnd I will bless those who bless you,\u201d to the Jewish people, watch this, \u201c And the one who curses you I will curse<\/u>.\u201d\u00a0 I\u2019ll bless those who bless you, I\u2019ll curse those who curse you.\u00a0 When God launches His program through a people, which is what He\u2019s done, there are going to be, throughout history, perpetual attacks on that people, Satan, of course, being one of the great attackers, using people like Hitler, others, to accomplish his will.\n\nAnd so God in His promises to Abraham built in a promise, really there are two, the one who blesses you I will bless, the one who curses you I will curse.\u00a0 Now today when I quote these verses I\u2019ve got a whole bunch of theologians telling you that\u2019s the Old Testament.\u00a0 Let me ask you something\u2014do\u00a0 you see an expiration date in those verses?\u00a0 Does God say these hold until a certain time?\u00a0 These are immutable timeless truths.\u00a0 It doesn\u2019t matter if I agree with them or not.\u00a0 I may not agree with the law of gravity, that doesn\u2019t matter does it, the law of gravity still stands.\u00a0 This is something that God Himself has established, as revealed in His Word.\n\nNow let\u2019s focus on this one here: the one who curses you I will curse.\u00a0 Is that literal?\u00a0 Let me show you how literal this is: God, in the book of Exodus brought the nation of Israel out of Egyptian bondage and He did it primarily through plague ten, which is the death of the firstborn all over Egypt.\u00a0 When God brought forth plague number 10 the firstborn over all over all of the land of Egypt began to die.\u00a0 Did you ever ask yourself why did God kill the firstborn of the Egyptians?\u00a0 Why not the second born?\u00a0 Why not the third cousin over?\u00a0 Why the firstborn?\u00a0 You\u2019ll find the answer in Exodus 4:22, where God says this about the nation of Israel: \u201c\u2018Israel is My son, My firstborn.\u2019\u201d\u00a0 You go after my firstborn, Egypt, which they did, I\u2019m going after your firstborn.\u00a0 What does the Bible say?\u00a0 The one who curses you I will curse.\u00a0 As the tenth plague transpired and as God brought the Israelis through the Red Sea and as you know the story from Bible times He closed the water on the Egyptians; the Egyptians drowned to death.\n\nHave you ever asked yourself the question, why did God kill them through drowning?\u00a0 He could have sent a drought, He could have sent a lightning bolt, He could have sent a hurricane; why did He drown them?\u00a0 You\u2019ll find the answer to that in Exodus 1:22, \u201cThen Pharaoh\u201d an Egyptian, \u201ccommanded all his people, saying, \u2018Every son who is born you are to cast into the Nile\u2026\u2019\u201d the Egyptians were drowning the Israelis, Exodus 1, at least the firstborn, so God drowned the Egyptians.\n\nWhat is all of this?\u00a0 It\u2019s an outworking of His promises, \u201c\u2026the one who curses\u00a0 you I will curse,\u201d\u00a0 [Genesis 12:3] and this is just one example, you can track this through the whole Bible.\u00a0 God means what He says and says what He means.\u00a0 And He fulfills His Word with minute detailed accuracy. And thus the prophet Zechariah says this of Israel: \u201cFor he who touches you touches the apple of His eye.\u201d\u00a0 [Zechariah 2:8, \u201cFor thus says the LORD of hosts, \u2018After glory He has sent me against the nations which plunder you, for he who touches you, touches the apple of His eye.\u2019\u201d]\n\nWhat is the apple of one\u2019s eye?\u00a0 It\u2019s the pupil of the eye.\u00a0 God says if you come against the nation of Israel it is the equivalent of taking your finger and jamming it into the pupil of the Creator of the universe.\u00a0 \u00a0And consequently God evaluates nations by what standard?\u00a0 The primary standard is how they treat the Jewish people.\u00a0 Daniel had a dream, did he not?\u00a0 Actually it was Nebuchadnezzar, Daniel had the revelation of the dream as well, where Nebuchadnezzar saw a head of gold, chest and arms of silver, belly and thighs of bronze, two legs of iron; Daniel goes on and he begins to describe that these are four empires that would come against the Jewish people and go.\u00a0 In fact, each of these empires, although they had a worldwide influence, were given by God an expiration date, sort of like when\u00a0 you\u2019re shopping at the store and you look at the milk to see if there\u2019s an expiration date stamped on there.\n\nGod took out a stamp and He stamped each of these empires with an expiration date, despite the fact that they ruled the known world at that time.\u00a0 Babylon\u2019s expiration date would be from about 605-539.\u00a0 Then would come Medo-Persia, she would be an influence about 539 and disappear from power 331.\u00a0 And then would come Greece, 330-63 B.C.\u00a0 Then would come Rome who really came to power, at least in the land of Israel, around 63 B.C. and eventually would disappear from power.\u00a0 Isn\u2019t it interesting that when Rome removed the Jews from their homeland in A.D. 70 Rome was a world power; Israel was a tiny nation.\u00a0 Isn\u2019t it interesting that at the time that invasion happened in A.D. 70 the common language of the day was Latin.\u00a0 Fast-forward to the year 2016, Rome is gone, Israel is still here.\u00a0 Latin (unless you\u2019re a scholar or something of that nature) is a dead language.\u00a0 Hebrews is a live language.\n\nI challenge you today to read the prophet Ezekiel, chapters 25-32, which is a judgment on the nations that come against Israel.\u00a0 He deals with the eastern nations of Ammon, Moab, and Edom, the western nation of Philistia, the northern nations of Tyre and Sidon, the southern nations of Egypt, and He pronounces curses on them; many of these curses have come to pass, some are yet future, but why is God evaluating them?\u00a0 The whole evaluation, as you study these chapters is how they treated Israel, what they did to Israel historically.\n\nIn fact, there\u2019s even verses in that section about what they thought about Israel, what their motive was; that\u2019s the outworking of Genesis 12:3.\u00a0 [Genesis 12:3, \u201cAnd I will bless those who bless you, And the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.\u201d]\u00a0 There is not a nation in the history of the world that has monkeyed with the Jewish people that has prospered, or survived.\u00a0 That is a historical fact; that\u2019s a biblical fact. \u00a0\u00a0But the opposite is true; what else does it say? \u00a0\u00a0\u201cNot only will I curse you, I will bless those who bless you.\u201d\n\nA couple of summers ago I had the opportunity to go to Newport, Rhode Island, which is the location of the oldest synagogue ever built in the United States of America.\u00a0 When I was there they give you a tour and as God is my witness, I saw why God chose to bless the\u00a0 United States.\u00a0 The blessing of God on the United States is not hard to figure out once you understand a few historical facts, because on August 18, 1790, congregants of the Torah Synagogue of Newport, Rhode Island, warmly welcomed George Washington to their place of worship in their city.\u00a0 Washington\u2019s letter of response to the synagogue, which they have framed there on display, engraved, that kind of thing, Washington\u2019s letter of response to the synagogue delivered on the same day has become famous for reinforcing the ideal of religious liberty in American life.\u00a0 From its publication to the present Washington\u2019s letter has remained the touchstone of American Jewish life; more than one historian has described the letter as the single most important document in American\/Jewish history.\u00a0 It\u2019s words actually have been cited by Supreme Court Justices in at least three religious liberty cases.\n\nWhat did Washington say?\u00a0 Just a few sentences, he visited the synagogue, he was invited to the synagogue, he received a very welcome during the service time at the synagogue and he wrote them the same day this letter, and it says this, it\u2019s dated August 18, 1790, Letter to the Hebrew Congregation of Newport, Rhode Island.\u00a0 \u201cI rejoice in the opportunity of assuring you that I shall always retain a grateful remembrance of the cordial welcome I experienced in my visit to Newport.\u00a0 The Government of the United States, which gives to bigotry no sanction to persecution, no assistance, may the children of the stock of Abraham, who dwell in this land continue to merit and enjoy the good will of the other inhabitants.\u00a0 While everyone shall sit in safety under his own vine and fig tree that there shall be none to make him afraid.\u201d\n\nGeorge Washington, you have to understand this, as the father of America was the representative head.\u00a0 God in the Bible works through representative heads, like Adam, and the last Adam, and others.\u00a0 George Washington\u00a0 showed kindness to the Jewish people.\u00a0 He gave them a gift which they probably have never had in all of human history.\u00a0 The Jewish people, when you study their history, persecuted no matter where they\u2019ve gone.\u00a0 George Washington said it\u2019s not going to be that way in the United States, the Jewish people are welcome here; they are free to worship God as they choose to worship Him here.\u00a0 This country is going to be a haven for them and that, you have to understand, is unparalleled in Jewish history, to have that opportunity.\u00a0\u00a0 Let me put it this way: George Washington blessed the Jewish people.\u00a0 Do you know what God did?\u00a0 He turned right around and blessed America from sea to shining sea. You say well, it can\u2019t be that simple, there must be other reasons for the greatness of America.\u00a0 No, I\u2019m telling you something; it is that simple.\u00a0 George Washington practically, pragmatically, tangibly blessed the physical descendants of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob; God turned right around and blessed America.\u00a0 George Washington, by doing that, put America under the right side of the equation, not the cursing side but the blessing side.\n\nIt doesn\u2019t stop with George Washington.\u00a0 Dorah Von Lehe records the story of Richard Nixon.\u00a0 People have very negative views of Richard Nixon.\u00a0 I was just visiting the Nixon Memorial.\u00a0 The man certainly was not perfect, but let me tell you something about Richard Nixon, most people are not aware of.\u00a0 As a young boy growing up in Richard Nixon\u2019s Christian (and Quaker) mother told him that one day he would be in a powerful position, and a situation would arise where Israel and the Jews needed his help.\u00a0 When it did he was to help them.\u00a0 It was reported that Nixon said he heard the voice of his mother saying these words to him when he responded to a call and a plea for help from Golda Meir at 3:00 a.m. in the morning on October 1973 during what is the Yom Kippur War.\n\nI\u2019ve actually, just a few weeks ago, saw the very setup, they have it all intact there, and the Bible that his mother read to him from.\u00a0 In fact, other biographers note that she was actually reading for him from the book of Esther that night.\u00a0 Esther, of course, is the story of the deliverance of the Jewish people.\n\n\u201cThen came the attacks on October 6, 1973, a coordinated surprise attack on Yom Kippur, the holiest of days in the Jewish calendar and the time when the entire nature comes to a virtual standstill.\u00a0 Even observant Jews honor this holiday by fasting, staying home or going to synagogue, and refraining from the use of fire, electricity, and communication system.\u00a0 Israel could not have been more vulnerable.\u00a0 There had been concern about possible attacks, but until just shortly before the attacks began, \u2018Israeli intelligence was not able to determine conclusively that an attack was imminent.\u00a0 To demonstrate how much Israel was up against: 180 tanks faced over 1,400 Syrian tanks; closer to the Suez Canal, a mere 436 Israeli infantry fighters were posed to fight over 80,000 Egyptian soldiers. The attacks came by Egypt and Syria and were backed by nine Arab states as well as the Soviet Union.\n\n\u201cBy the second day the slaughtering of Israeli troops and the destruction of their equipment had made a huge blow, Moshe Dayan, the minister of Defense, who had been a hero in the Six Day War, started to talk about pulling back and even possible surrender. \u00a0Golda Meir, Prime Minister of Israel, resisted this, but she did have an aid secure lethal pills from her doctor; just in case her Arab enemies prevailed, in such a case Meir would take her own life.\n\n\u201cU.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger\u201d a Jew himself ironically, \u201cU.S. Secretary of State Henry Kissinger and Meir\u2019s relationship was, to say, rocky at the least. \u00a0When assistance was requested from him, Kissinger\u2019s reported response was to let Israel \u2018bleed for a while.\u2019\u201d\u00a0 Our State Department at work there.\u00a0 \u201cSo, at 3 a.m. Golda Meir picked up the phone and called President Richard M. Nixon and asked for help. \u00a0It is reported that Nixon heard the prophetic word and the voice of his mother as he listened to Golda Meir. \u00a0By the time she hung up, Golda Meir had the weapons, help her country needed that swung the pendulum to Israel\u2019s favor and to bring an end to the Yom Kippur War.\u201d\n\n\u201cTo this day, Richard Nixon is highly regarded in Israel. \u00a0Prime Minister Golda Meir and Nixon kept a lifelong relationship, kept in touch with each other, also throughout the ordeal. \u00a0For the rest of Meir's life, she referred to Nixon as \u2018my president,\u2019 and said,\u201d (quote) \u201c\u2018For generations to come, all will be told of the miracle of the immense planes from the United States bringing in the material that meant life to our people.\u201d\n\nThis is our history.\u00a0 This is why America, traditionally has been in, from Washington to Nixon, the stream of divine blessing.\u00a0 There was a day when ambassadors or leaders from Israel were greeted with welcome hospitality and joy, and how things have changed.\n\nIf you want documentation on this I would encourage you to Google the following article, by Ben Shapiro,\u00a0 A Complete Timeline of Obama\u2019s Anti-Israel Hatred<\/em>.\u00a0 I know some people like Obama, some people don\u2019t like Obama; we can fault the President for any number of things but of everything that has happened within the last four years, within the last eight years, even preceding him, this is the part of the equation that bothers me the most because let me tell you something.\u00a0 Israel does not need America; Israel is going to do just fine.\u00a0 You know why?\u00a0 Because they have a covenant from God; it\u2019s America that needs what?\u00a0 Israel, because of what God said.\u00a0 When you listen to candidates talk are you listening for this issue because it\u2019s a big deal to God.\u00a0 It\u2019s a big deal to American history.\u00a0 I don\u2019t care what they are, Republican, Democrat, whatever, when they start talking about Israel I\u2019m all ears.\u00a0 What do you believe about this?\u00a0 What are you going do to help Israel, because our national survival and existence largely depends on this issue.\u00a0 America will just go out of existence, much the same way Babylon, Medio-Persia, Greece and Rome did.\n\nMay God help us to understand the severity of this. \u00a0Finally, number 3, the power of your voice concerning Israel which we will be looking at next week.\u00a0 Shall we pray.\n\nFather, we\u2019re grateful for Your Word and how it speaks to the culture and issues what we\u2019re facing.\u00a0 We invite you, Lord, change the way we think about so many things including the nation of Israel.\u00a0 Make us people of discernment in the polling place as we seek to hear Your voice in these last days.\u00a0 We\u2019ll be careful to give you all the praise and the glory.\u00a0\u00a0 We ask these things in Jesus\u2019 name.\u00a0 And God\u2019s people said\u2026.","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