Then Ahijah laid hold of the new garment that was on him, and tore it into twelve pieces. 31And he said to Jeroboam, “Take for yourself ten pieces, for thus says the LORD, the God of Israel, ‘Behold, I am about to tear the kingdom from the hand of Solomon and will give you ten tribes 32(but he shall have one tribe, for the sake of my servant David and for the sake of Jerusalem, the city that I have chosen out of all the tribes of Israel).'”

[1 Kings 11:30-32]

Near the end of Solomon’s life, the LORD God pronounced a serious judgement against the king that would forever change the future of Israel and at the same time set into motion the most compelling display of love and redemption the world has ever known.

Showing total disregard for God’s commandments, King Solomon became spiritually compromised and corrupt, introducing all Israel to pagan idolatry and gross immorality (1 Kings 11:1-10). So severe was Solomon’s sin, the LORD swore to strip the Kingdom of Israel from the hands of his son and rightful heir to David’s throne — Rehoboam. Israel was ripe for rebellion and the very moment Solomon died (circa 932 B.C.), the kingdom quickly fractured into two distinct kingdoms/nations, or what commonly became known as the two houses of Israel.

Jeroboam — representing Ephraim — was given authority over the 10 tribes of the Northern Kingdom, which became known as the house of Israel (aka Joseph).

Rehoboam — representing the royal house of Judah/David — retained 2 tribes in the Southern Kingdom, which became known as the house of Judah (aka the Jews).

While the royal house of Judah retained control over the capital city Jerusalem and more importantly the administration of worship in the House of God, Jeroboam wasted no time in establishing his own capital in Samaria and creating a competitive religious system, which was at best a syncretic blend of pagan idolatry with a perverse form of the priesthood.

Although the LORD did prevent the two kingdoms — Judah and Israel — from escalating into all out civil war [1 Kings 12:21-24], they irreparably were broken. The Northern Kingdom of Israel would be subjected to an unbroken line of wicked kings and defined by generations of apostasy and idolatry, while the Kingdom of Judah would give rise to a only handful of righteous kings in David’s house and preserve a faithful remnant of God’s covenant people.

DEFINING OUR TERMS BIBLICALLY

“In those days and in that time, declares the LORD, the people of Israel and the people of Judah shall come together, weeping as they come, and they shall seek the LORD their God. 5They shall ask the way to Zion, with faces turned toward it, saying, ‘Come, let us join ourselves to the LORD in an everlasting covenant that will never be forgotten.’ 6“My people have been lost sheep. Their shepherds have led them astray, turning them away on the mountains. From mountain to hill they have gone. They have forgotten their fold.“

[Jeremiah 50:4-6]

From the time the Kingdom of Israel was divided, the Biblical prophets were precise in how they communicated both to and about these two separate kingdoms, or houses. The Scriptures are replete with references specifically to the house of Israel — which also was identified with alternative nicknames such as Ephraim, Joseph, and sometimes Samaria. At the same time, the Bible clearly distinguishes Israel from the house of Judah, which exclusively represents the Jewish people.

In other words, a Jew is a person who distinctly can trace his ethnic descent from the tribe of Judah. This is most important in arriving at accurate Biblical terminology and concepts . While all Jews are Israelites, not all Israelites are Jews! For example, Moses — a Levite — was not a Jew. Joshua was not a Jew but rather from the tribe of Ephraim. Only those who come from the house of Judah are Jews.

One of the most unfortunate errors in all of orthodoxy is to automatically conflate the terms Jews and Israelites, or Judah and Israel. The Bible makes a distinction between Judah and Israel, and we should too. Otherwise, one of the most important theological threads throughout Scripture will be lost.

For a more modern analogy, consider the United States of America. While every Texan is an American, not all Americans are Texans. There remains important distinction among the 50 states, while every state is still a part of the greater national commonwealth of America.

It is no different with the 12 Tribes of Israel. Judah is just one of the tribes of Israel and therefore does not represent the “whole house” of Israel. When the Scriptures speak of the whole house of Israel, or “all” Israel, it is referring to all 12 tribes. Therefore, the Jews do not represent all Israel but only a remnant.

THE HOUSE OF ISRAEL IS SCATTERED

The house of Israel (Ephraim) persisted in idolatry for 200 years after the split, and the LORD sent His prophets, such as Elijah, Elisha, Amos, Isaiah, Jeremiah and Hosea, to desperately call Israel back to repentance. Sadly, Ephraim refused to come back to the LORD — her Husband — and pursued other gods instead, finally forcing the LORD to make a heartbreaking but necessary decision.

The God of Israel would divorce the Northern Kingdom, or the house of Israel [NOT JUDAH — see Hosea 1:6-7], and send her away in disgrace as a serial adulteress, removing her from her homeland and scattering her to the four winds of the earth, where the house of Israel (Ephraim) would become wanderers and exiles among the nations. The house of Israel effectively would cease to exist as a people and be absorbed by the Gentiles, while Judah would retain her ethnic identity up until this very day.

All their wickedness is in Gilgal,
For there I hated them.
Because of the evil of their deeds
I will drive them from My house;
I will love them no more.
All their princes are rebellious.

16Ephraim is stricken,
Their root is dried up;
They shall bear no fruit.
Yes, were they to bear children,
I would kill the darlings of their womb.

17My God will cast them away,
Because they did not obey Him;
And they shall be wanderers among the nations.

[Hosea 9:15-17]

The division of the two houses — Israel and Judah — seemed to be irreversible because the house of Israel permanently was lost as a people — God’s people Israel were no longer His people and He was no longer their Husband. The original marriage covenant of Sinai tragically ended in divorce!

But at the very same time … God made a promise that He would not abandon and forsake the house of Israel forever, but would one day bring her back and remarry Israel in righteousness and faithful covenantal love.

Consider the words of the LORD through Hosea.

Now when she had weaned Lo-Ruhamah, she conceived and bore a son. 

9Then God said: “Call his name Lo-Ammi,
For you are not My people,
And I will not be your God.“

10Yet the number of the children of Israel
Shall be as the sand of the sea,
Which cannot be measured or numbered.
And it shall come to pass
In the place where it was said to them,
‘You are not My people,’
There it shall be said to them,
‘You are sons of the living God.’
11Then the children of Judah and the children of Israel
Shall be gathered together,
And appoint for themselves one head;
And they shall come up out of the land,
For great will be the day of Jezreel!

[Hosea 1:8-11]

God’s promise of a future restoration and a new marriage contract with Israel, however, was virtually impossible. At least two seemingly immovable obstacles persisted.

1. The house of Israel intermingled and intermarried with the Gentiles and practically became a mixed multitude and therefore indistinguishable from the Gentiles. Israel was assimilated culturally, genetically, spiritually, and geographically. Truly lost in the sense that Israel as a distinct people could no longer be identified.
2. In the Torah, God forbid the remarriage of an adulterous wife who had been divorced, calling it an abomination (see Deuteronomy 24 and Romans 7). God cannot break His own commandment!

How could the LORD bring a lost people, a wayward wife back home, if divorced Israel could never come back to their God (Husband) according to the law?

There was only one way … the Bridegroom had to die to release His adulteress wife from the original marriage contract, freeing her to remarry again, and then the Bridegroom had to be raised from the dead legally as a new man and therefore free to remarry His original Bride — Israel — in a new and better covenant because it was purchased and ratified in the blood of the sinless Son of God and Sacrificial Lamb — Yeshua the Christ — the Good Shepherd who laid down His life for the lost sheep of the house of Israel (see Matthew 15:24).

To get more details about the Bridegroom God’s amazing love demonstrated Israel at the cross, be sure to read my last post in this series HERE.

THE FULLNESS OF THE GENTILES — MELO HAGOYIM

For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. 26And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written:

“The Deliverer will come out of Zion,
And He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob;
27For this is My covenant with them,
When I take away their sins.”

[Romans 11:25-27]

The Bridegroom was willing to die for His Bride to bring her back into covenant relationship, yet there still remained the undeniable fact that the house of Israel had dissolved into the nations and no longer could be identified as a people group. So how would God overcome this obstacle?

To find out, we must go all the way back to the patriarch Jacob (Israel) and discover God’s prophetic promise from the very beginning.

Just before Jacob died, he blessed Joseph’s two son, Manasseh and Ephraim, and he pronounced a fascinating prophecy over Ephraim, the younger son.

Then Jacob said to Joseph: “God Almighty appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan and blessed me, 4and said to me, ‘Behold, I will make you fruitful and multiply you, and I will make of you a multitude of people, and give this land to your descendants after you as an everlasting possession.’ 5And now your two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, who were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you in Egypt, are mine; as Reuben and Simeon, they shall be mine.

[Genesis 48:3-5]

Then Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it on Ephraim’s head, who was the younger, and his left hand on Manasseh’s head, guiding his hands knowingly, for Manasseh was the firstborn. 15And he blessed Joseph, and said:

“The God before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked,
the God who has been my shepherd all my life long to this day,
16the Angel who has redeemed me from all evil, bless the boys;
and in them let my name be carried on, and the name of my fathers Abraham and Isaac;
and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth.”

But his father refused and said, “I know, my son, I know. He (Manasseh) also shall become a people, and he also shall be great; but truly his younger brother (Ephraim) shall be greater than he, and his descendants shall become a multitude of nations.”

[Genesis 48:14-16, 19]

Did you catch that?

God promised to make Jacob’s descendants into a “multitude” of nations, and Jacob specifically identified Ephraim as the one through whom this promise would be fulfilled! Obviously the house of Judah does not represent a “multitude of nations.” So how did the LORD accomplish this?

God expelled the house of Israel (Ephraim) from the land, dispersing the seed of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob into the nations, where the seed of Israel would be mixed with the Gentiles, growing into multitude of nations! So through Israel’s rebellion and dispersion, God produced literal, genetic descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel all over the world.

This is exactly what Paul meant by the phrase — the “fullness of the Gentiles.” Paul is directly quoting from Jacob’s own words in Genesis 48!

This Hebrew phrase found in Genesis 48:19 — מְלא גּוֺיִם — literally is translated the “fullness of the Gentiles.” This phrase comes from two Hebrew words — melo: fullness, that which fills + goyim: nations, peoples = Fullness of the Gentiles.

So by scattering the seed of Jacob into the nations, God exponentially multiplied his descendants for generations, and at the same time God promised to gather Israel back and restore her in the end! This is at the very heart of the gospel!

In my next post, we will delve even deeper to see the amazing contrast between how God used both the scattering of Ephraim to the nations and the preservation of the house of Judah to bring about the perfect plan of redemption and the establishment of a new marriage covenant in Messiah!

Then you shall say to Pharaoh, “Thus says the LORD, Israel is my firstborn son, 23and I say to you, ‘Let my son go that he may serve me. If you refuse to let him go, behold, I will kill your firstborn son.'”

[Exodus 4:22-23]

Israel began as one man, Jacob, growing into a family and then an entire ethnic people group in Egypt. Once in captivity under Pharaoh, the LORD God of Israel redeemed His people and chose them as a holy nation — a people of His own possession.

God often uses human relationships to illustrate and convey His love and commitment to us, and one of the most profound examples is the relationship between father and child. The LORD speaks of Israel as both son and daughter to demonstrate the depth of His heartfelt devotion to His people, and as we will see, this thread continues to run throughout the Scriptures to the very end.

In essence, God is communicating one big idea to Israel. We are family.

The Apple of God’s Eye

The LORD your God who goes before you will himself fight for you, just as he did for you in Egypt before your eyes,31and in the wilderness, where you have seen how the LORD your God carried you, as a man carries his son, all the way that you went until you came to this place.

[Deuteronomy 1:30-31]

The LORD called Israel his firstborn son, which is a term associated both with preeminence and inheritance. God’s law made provisions for the firstborn to receive a double portion of the father’s inheritance [Deuteronomy 21:15-17]. By using the title of firstborn, God was declaring Israel to be the rightful heir of His kingdom and His possessions. The LORD was willing to give Israel everything.

The language of the Exodus provokes a powerful image of a loving father carrying his son through the perils of the wilderness and leading him to safety. Like any doting father, God kept Israel as the apple of His eye from the day he was born. Nothing compares to a father’s love for his children.

But the LORD’s portion is his people,
Jacob his allotted heritage.

10 He found him in a desert land,
and in the howling waste of the wilderness;
he encircled him, he cared for him,
he kept him as the apple of his eye.
11Like an eagle that stirs up its nest,
that flutters over its young,
spreading out its wings, catching them,
bearing them on its pinions,
12the LORD alone guided him,
no foreign god was with him.

[Deuteronomy 32:9-12]

A Wayward Son

Tragically Israel grew privileged, ungrateful, and rebellious — dishonoring his Father with all forms of idolatry and immorality. Not only did Israel’s habitual sin break God’s heart but also provoked Him to anger.

But Jeshurun grew fat, and kicked; you grew fat, stout, and sleek; then he forsook God who made him and scoffed at the Rock of his salvation. 16They stirred him to jealousy with strange gods; with abominations they provoked him to anger. 17They sacrificed to demons that were no gods, to gods they had never known, to new gods that had come recently, whom your fathers had never dreaded. 18You were unmindful of the Rock that bore you, and you forgot the God who gave you birth. 19 The LORD saw it and spurned them, because of the provocation of his sons and his daughters. 20And he said, ‘I will hide my face from them; I will see what their end will be, for they are a perverse generation, children in whom is no faithfulness.

[Deuteronomy 32:15-20]

The prophet Hosea echoes the words of Moses. You can hear the disappointment in the Father’s heart, as He reflects on the memories of Israel’s life.

When Israel was a child, I loved him,
and out of Egypt I called my son.
2The more they were called,
the more they went away;
they kept sacrificing to the Baals
and burning offerings to idols.

3Yet it was I who taught Ephraim to walk;
I took them up by their arms,
but they did not know that I healed them.
4I led them with cords of kindness, with the bands of love,
and I became to them as one who eases the yoke on their jaws,
and I bent down to them and fed them.

[Hosea 11:1-4]

God’s One and Only Son

He was still speaking when, behold, a bright cloud overshadowed them, and a voice from the cloud said, “This is my beloved Son, with whom I am well pleased; listen to him.”

[Matthew 17:5]

Where Israel failed as God’s firstborn son, Jesus the Messiah would succeed. Where Israel would dishonor the Father in sinful rebellion, Jesus would perfectly please the LORD. Where Israel would fail to be a light unto the Gentiles and lead the nations to worship the One True God, Jesus would come as the light of the world, leading all men out of darkness into His marvelous light.

Of course, we must not conclude that the Father sent His one and only Son into the world as a supplemental fix for Israel’s rebellion. NO! The incarnation of God the Son was always God’s original plan from before the very foundation of the world [John 17:23-24]. As the Creator Himself, Jesus is the firstborn over all creation, having preeminence in all things [Colossians 1:15-18].

And as only God could do, He opened the door through the cross for the whole world to believe in His Son and be given the right of being adopted as sons and daughters of the King!

But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of woman, born under the law, 5to redeem those who were under the law, so that we might receive adoption as sons. 6And because you are sons, God has sent the Spirit of his Son into our hearts, crying, “Abba! Father!“

[Galatians 4:4-6]

A Prodigal Returns

With weeping they shall come,

and with pleas for mercy I will lead them back,

I will make them walk by brooks of water,

in a straight path in which they shall not stumble,

for I am a father to Israel,

and Ephraim is my firstborn.

[Jeremiah 31:9]

One of the most amazing realties of God’s ultimate plan of redemption is His unwavering commitment to the covenant people of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. Although Israel has proven to be by and large a rebellious son, God has not forsaken Israel and has promised to bring him back home in the end. The natural branches that were broken off in unbelief will be grafted back in to God’s family tree in the end.

So I ask, did they stumble in order that they might fall? By no means! Rather, through their trespass salvation has come to the Gentiles, so as to make Israel jealous. 12Now if their trespass means riches for the world, and if their failure means riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their full inclusion mean!

[Romans 11:11-12]

Although a partial hardening has come upon ethnic Israel for many generations, God has always persevered for Himself a remnant. And like the prodigal son who has been estranged from his father in sin, Israel will return to the LORD through many trials and trust in God’s own Son — the Messiah.

This is the amazing story of redemption. God has by no means totally rejected Israel, but like a faithful Father, He will make good all His promises to the physical descendants of Jacob and keep His covenant to the end. Just as He does with all of His wayward children, the Father is waiting for the people of Israel to repent and return to Him, where He will receive them back with open arms! And in this way, all Israel — both Jew and Gentile — will be saved when Messiah returns to lead us home to inherit the kingdom of Israel as God’s firstborn sons!

Yet the number of the Israelites will be like the sand of the sea, which cannot be measured or counted. And it will happen that in the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not My people,’ they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’

[Hosea 1:10]

Say therefore to the people of Israel, “I am the LORD, and I will bring you out from under the burdens of the Egyptians, and I will deliver you from slavery to them, and I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and with great acts of judgment.“

[Exodus 6:6]

The Exodus from Egypt is the single most significant event in the history of God’s people prior to the incarnation of Jesus Christ and His subsequent death, burial and resurrection. The Exodus not only lays the foundation for our faith in the God of Israel — Yhvh or Yahweh — but also marks the birth of the nation of Israel and the supernatural redemption of God’s people.

The sacred writings of the Torah, Psalms, and prophets collectively are pointing back to the Exodus as the signature event in Israel’s past, while at the same time looking forward to the greater Exodus at the end of the age when Messiah is revealed from heaven. God’s redemption of Israel out of Egypt and through the waters of the Red Sea provide the template for our ultimate redemption through the Person and work of Jesus Christ — the greater Moses.

God Breaks the Bonds of a Cruel Master

Then the LORD said, “I have surely seen the affliction of my people who are in Egypt and have heard their cry because of their taskmasters. I know their sufferings, 8and I have come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians and to bring them up out of that land to a good and broad land, a land flowing with milk and honey …“

[Exodus 3:7-8]

Israel sojourned into Egypt as a family of 70 and grew into a great multitude. Pharaoh responded by enslaving the people of God and subjecting them to harsh labor under his cruel taskmasters. For generations all the children of Israel were born into slavery and knew nothing of freedom. Even worse, Israel was powerless to deliver herself from Pharaoh and were left desperately crying out to God in agony.

Although Israel languished in despair, the Bible tells us that God heard their cry and determined to act. Israel needed a God greater than the gods of Egypt and someone more powerful than Pharaoh. Only the LORD — the Most High — could save them, and that is precisely what He did.

Israel, of course, is meant to be indicative of humankind in general, as we all are born into spiritual slavery as sons of Adam and held in bondage by the evil ruler of this world — the devil. The parallels between man’s sinful condition and Israel are obvious. In and of ourselves we are left powerless over sin and the devil, who has authority over all the kingdoms of the world [Luke 4].

Like Israel, we need a God who is greater than all our sin and more powerful than the devil to deliver us from our hopeless state. The good news is that the God of Israel became a man in the person of Jesus Christ and came to redeem us from the powers of darkness and transfer us into the Kingdom of God.

But now that you have been set free from sin and have become slaves of God, the fruit you get leads to sanctification and its end, eternal life. 23For the wages of sin is death, but the free gift of God is eternal life in Christ Jesus our Lord.

[Romans 6:22-23]

Whoever makes a practice of sinning is of the devil, for the devil has been sinning from the beginning. The reason the Son of God appeared was to destroy the works of the devil.

[1 John 3:8]

He has delivered us from the domain of darkness and transferred us to the kingdom of his beloved Son, 14in whom we have redemption, the forgiveness of sins.

[Colossians 1:13-14]

God Brings us through the Waters of New Birth

The LORD will reign forever and ever. For when the horses of Pharaoh with his chariots and his horsemen went into the sea, the LORD brought back the waters of the sea upon them, but the people of Israel walked on dry ground in the midst of the sea.

[Exodus 15:18-19]

It was the LORD Himself, clothed in a cloud, leading Israel through the sea, as He also protected them in the rear by a column of fire. When Israel emerged from the depths with the enemy in her wake, she had been reborn — the birth of a nation through the waters of baptism. What a scene as the children of Israel rejoiced and praised God with a victory song of celebration!

The imagery of water baptism and the new birth runs consistently throughout the Scriptures. Noah and his family saved through waters. Moses and Israel saved through the sea. Jesus Himself, while ascending from the baptismal waters of the Jordan, is identified by the Father from heaven as His beloved Son — the Messiah of Israel. Later Jesus schools the teacher of Israel — Nicodemus — by revealing that man must be born of more than mere natural descent in order to enter God’s kingdom. We must be born again — from above — by the Holy Spirit.

In other words, flesh and blood cannot inherit the kingdom of God, but only those who participate in the resurrection at the end of the age. Ultimately the flesh counts for nothing, but God’s words are Spirit and eternal life!

Baptism, which corresponds to this, now saves you, not as a removal of dirt from the body but as an appeal to God for a good conscience, through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, 22who has gone into heaven and is at the right hand of God, with angels, authorities, and powers having been subjected to him.

[1 Peter 3:21-22]

Do you not know that all of us who have been baptized into Christ Jesus were baptized into his death?4We were buried therefore with him by baptism into death, in order that, just as Christ was raised from the dead by the glory of the Father, we too might walk in newness of life. For if we have been united with him in a death like his, we shall certainly be united with him in a resurrection like his.

[Romans 6:3-5]

Paul reminds us that all of these supernatural events throughout history are examples and foreshadowings of greater things to come in Christ — who not only redeemed Israel as a new nation but also who redeems us as a new creation.

For I do not want you to be unaware, brothers, that our fathers were all under the cloud, and all passed through the sea, 2and all were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea, 3and all ate the same spiritual food, 4and all drank the same spiritual drink. For they drank from the spiritual Rock that followed them, and the Rock was Christ.

[1 Corinthians 10:1-4]

God Redeems us a People of His own Possession

Thus you shall say to the house of Jacob, and tell the people of Israel: 4‘You yourselves have seen what I did to the Egyptians, and how I bore you on eagles’ wings and brought you to myself. 5Now therefore, if you will indeed obey my voice and keep my covenant, you shall be my treasured possession among all peoples, for all the earth is mine; 6and you shall be to me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you shall speak to the people of Israel.

[Exodus 19:3-6]

Once the LORD had drowned Pharaoh and the army of Egypt in the sea, the process of redemption had been complete. Israel was chosen and set apart from all the nations of the earth to be God’s treasured possession and covenant people. The LORD will forever be the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Israel. Israel is the name of the covenant people of God, but Israel was not redeemed at the exclusion of the other nations of the earth but rather for their ultimate blessing and inclusion into God’s kingdom.

In Christ, all the nations of the earth will be blessed. In Christ, God has made for Himself a people from not only the tribes of Israel but also from every tribe and nation and people of the earth. Even as Israel departed Egypt and crossed the sea, it was a mixed multitude of Egyptian and Israelite alike. God’s plan has always been to redeem for Himself kingdom of priest from every nation!

The Exodus is the pattern for all of redemptive history, and Christ is the hero of the whole story. Jesus is the image of the invisible God — the One who manifested in human form to redeem Israel out of Egypt — the One who took on flesh to save the world — and the One who is coming down again in power and great glory at the end of this present age to ultimately redeem the sons of God through the resurrection of the dead.

They shall dwell in the land that I gave to my servant Jacob, where your fathers lived. They and their children and their children’s children shall dwell there forever, and David my servant shall be their prince forever. 26I will make a covenant of peace with them. It shall be an everlasting covenant with them. And I will set them in their land and multiply them, and will set my sanctuary in their midst forevermore. 27My dwelling place shall be with them, and I will be their God, and they shall be my people. 28Then the nations will know that I am the LORD who sanctifies Israel, when my sanctuary is in their midst forevermore

[Ezekiel 37:25-28]

Next session, I will consider Israel the Bride of the LORD and the betrothal at Mt. Sinai.

O Come, O Come Immanuel … and ransom captive Israel … that mourns in lonely exile here … until the Son of God appear.

“Then fear not, O Jacob my servant, declares the LORD,
nor be dismayed, O Israel;
for behold, I will save you from far away,
and your offspring from the land of their captivity.
Jacob shall return and have quiet and ease,
and none shall make him afraid.
11For I am with you to save you,
declares the LORD;
I will make a full end of all the nations
among whom I scattered you,
but of you I will not make a full end.
I will discipline you in just measure,
and I will by no means leave you unpunished.“

[Jeremiah 30:10-11]

One cannot tell the story of Israel without telling the story of exile and the long, perilous journey back home. Israel knows suffering full well, passing through the fires of persecution and shedding the bitter tears of lament. The nation of Israel was born out of slavery, and her destiny is one tied to perpetual exile until the end — the consummation of all things and the arrival of the Kingdom of God.

Remember, Israel means to strive, to struggle — both with God and man — and to overcome in the end. Much of Israel’s exile was brought on by her own rebellion and departure from the One True God to serve the gods of the nations, and some of Israel’s suffering has been at the hands of the satanic powers of darkness — who hate God and His covenant people.

During those many days the king of Egypt died, and the people of Israel groaned because of their slavery and cried out for help. Their cry for rescue from slavery came up to God. 24And God heard their groaning, and God remembered his covenant with Abraham, with Isaac, and with Jacob. 25God saw the people of Israel—and God knew.

[Exodus 2:23-25]

Such was the case in Egypt, when Pharaoh and his gods determined to enslave and destroy Israel — God’s chosen portion. Israel was displaced, estranged from her homeland and held captive at the hands of her enemies. The spiritual battle was raging in Egypt over God’s covenant people. It has been raging ever since and will continue to rage until the very end.

It has been written. The patterns of exile and deliverance throughout the Scriptures paint us a prophetic pattern that has been replayed over and again throughout redemptive history. What has been done will be done again.

COVENANT & CONTROVERSY

And the LORD will scatter you among the peoples, and you will be left few in number among the nations where the LORD will drive you. 28And there you will serve gods of wood and stone, the work of human hands, that neither see, nor hear, nor eat, nor smell. 29But from there you will seek the LORD your God and you will find him, if you search after him with all your heart and with all your soul. 30When you are in tribulation, and all these things come upon you in the latter days, you will return to the LORD your God and obey his voice. 31For the LORD your God is a merciful God. He will not leave you or destroy you or forget the covenant with your fathers that he swore to them.

[Deuteronomy 4:27-31]

The unique covenant that God made with the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob is at the very heart of the perpetual enmity surrounding Israel. The gods of the nations and the devil himself seek to devour the seed of the woman, and by destroying God’s covenant people, Satan is attempting to nullify the word of God and revoke the promise of God.

This is why the nations rage and the peoples plot in vain agains the LORD and His Anointed. God has uniquely bound Himself to the people of Israel; therefore, Israel is the nation and land of controversy among the nations. Israel is the target of satanic opposition. Israel is the key prophetic timepiece in God’s redemptive plan.

From the moment Israel was delivered from Egypt and entered into the land of promise under Joshua, she has experienced one calamity after another. One invasion after another. One exile after another. Consider the plight of captive Israel.

• Israel was held in bondage multiple times to the Philistines and Midianites during time of the Judges (circa 12th-11th Century B.C.)
• Israel was conquered by the Assyrians and the Northern Kingdom was exiled in early 8th Century
• The remnant of Israel — Judah — was conquered and carried off into Babylon, marking the exile of the Southern Kingdom in the late 6th Century B.C.
• Haman and the Persian plot of ethnic genocide in Esther’s day in the late 4th Century
• Cruel oppression of Antiochus Epiphanes IV in the days of the Maccabees, or 3rd Century B.C.
• Roman conquest and destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D, scattering the remnant of Israel to the four winds of the earth
• Persecution during the Spanish Inquisition and Crusades
• Jewish Pogroms in Russia
• Holocaust of Nazi Germany during WW II

And so it will be in the last days at the end of the age — one final episode of Jacob’s trouble. One more invasion of the land. One more siege on Jerusalem. One last exile of Israel. One final diaspora to the nations. God has bound Himself to the people and the land of Israel, and the restoration of Israel will not fully be realized until the LORD Himself comes down from heaven in flaming fire and crushes His enemies and sits down on His glorious throne.

STRANGERS PASSING THROUGH

In more ways than one, Israel’s story is our story — God’s story. We all identify as strangers passing through — aliens in a foreign land not our own — wandering and waiting to go home. We all are spiritually born into bondage, under the powers of darkness in the heavenly places and held captive by sin and oppressed by a cruel master — the devil.

The God of Israel always intended to adopt the Gentiles into His convent family and incorporate people from every nation into the commonwealth of Israel. We too are brought near into covenant relationship with God through Jesus Christ. So that in the end — all Israel — will be saved, Jew and Gentile, slave and free, male and female.

In that way, Israel not only represents the covenant people of God in the flesh and the physical promised land, but ultimately Israel represents the covenant people of God by faith and the eternal kingdom on earth as it now is under the Lordship of Christ in heaven.

God always had a bigger plan — a redemptive plan. The gospel of the Kingdom is that God has redeemed a people for His own possession from every tribe and nation under heaven — using Israel as the conduit of His blessing to the nations and then bringing exiles back into Israel to inherit the land and enjoy the covenant blessings forever.

Speaking of Abraham and the other great men and women of faith, the author of Hebrews says …

Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore.These all died in faith, not having received the things promised, but having seen them and greeted them from afar, and having acknowledged that they were strangers and exiles on the earth. 14For people who speak thus make it clear that they are seeking a homeland. 15If they had been thinking of that land from which they had gone out, they would have had opportunity to return. 16But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one. Therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God, for he has prepared for them a city.

[Hebrews 11:12-16]

The Time for Restoring All Things

Repent therefore, and turn back, that your sins may be blotted out, 20that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord, and that he may send the Christ appointed for you, Jesus, 21whom heaven must receive until the time for restoring all the things about which God spoke by the mouth of his holy prophets long ago.

[Acts 3:20-21]

Israel will be in exile until the King of Israel returns to set His people free once and for all. He is King over the whole earth, but His chosen portion, His allotted inheritance, is Israel. All people who trust in the God of Israel and in His Messiah King Jesus belong to Israel and have a permanent home in the promised land.

As we wait for the day when Jesus comes and restores the fortunes of Jacob and gathers His people to Himself and makes good on all of His promises, we wait patiently in hope, knowing that God’s people will never be fully at home as sojourners in a hostile world.

Hear, O nations, the word of the LORD,  and proclaim it in distant coastlands: 

“The One who scattered Israel will gather them and keep them as a shepherd keeps his flock. 11For the LORD has ransomed Jacob and redeemed him from the hand that had overpowered him. 12They will come and shout for joy on the heights of Zion;  they will be radiant over the bounty of the LORD—the grain, new wine, and oil, and the young of the flocks and herds.Their life will be like a well-watered garden, and never again will they languish.”

[Jeremiah 31:10-12]

Next time I will take a closer look at Israel as God’s redeemed.

All the descendants of Jacob were seventy persons; Joseph was already in Egypt.6Then Joseph died, and all his brothers and all that generation. 7But the people of Israel were fruitful and increased greatly; they multiplied and grew exceedingly strong, so that the land was filled with them.

[Exodus 1:5-7]

The house of Jacob migrated into Egypt as a family, and as the LORD had promised Abraham, Jacob multiplied greatly in Egypt for 400 years and became a distinct ethnic people group. Known as the children of Israel or the Hebrews, God’s covenant people prospered in Egypt until a wicked Pharaoh arose in power and subjugated Israel into slavery.

By the time of Moses and the Exodus, Israel had grown to 600,000 men plus women and children, which means that their numbers far exceeded one million at the end of their sojourn in Egypt [see Exodus 12:37-38]. It is just like God to work His perfect will and bless His people through adverse, even hopeless, circumstances. Consider what the LORD told Abraham some 400 years earlier.

Then the LORD said to Abram, “Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. 14But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions” … On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, “To your offspring I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates”

[Exodus 15:13-14,18]

Little is known about Israel during this 400 year sojourn in Egypt. All that we are told from the Biblical record is that after Joseph and his generation died, a new king arose in Egypt who despised the Hebrews and initiated what would become a vicious cycle of suffering followed by divine deliverance. If there has been one common thread that has run continuously throughout Israel’s history, it is the thread of rebellion, oppression, and divine chastisement, leading to repentance and restoration.

Many times the ethnic people of Israel brought oppression and judgment upon themselves as the consequences of unbelief and rebellion against the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Others times Israel was the exclusive target of satanic hostility and opposition, as the seed war of Genesis 3:15 developed and progressed in real time. As the chosen covenant people group of God, Israel was the conduit through which God had resolved to work His will and ultimately bring forth the Messiah to crush the head of the Serpent and bless all nations.

God’s Chosen Portion

When the Most High gave to the nations their inheritance,
when he divided mankind,
he fixed the borders of the peoples
according to the number of the sons of God.
9But the LORD’s portion is his people,
Jacob his allotted heritage.

10He found him in a desert land,
and in the howling waste of the wilderness;
he encircled him, he cared for him,
he kept him as the apple of his eye.

[Deuteronomy 32:8-10]

After the flood the LORD came down to judge the rebellion at Babel led by Nimrod. In His divine judgment, the LORD confused the languages of mankind, creating natural barriers that would lead to the birth of the original 70 nations [see Genesis 10-11]. It was at this time that the LORD divided up the nations and their boundaries according to the number of the sons of God [see Deuteronomy 32:8-9], but the LORD reserved for Himself one people group — one ethnos — as His own allotted inheritance, namely Israel.

From that moment, the nations of the earth — or Gentiles — were considered profane and alienated from God and the commonwealth of Israel. Gentiles have been oppressed and deceived by the evil, heathen “gods” of the nations, who led them into gross immorality and idolatry. Israel, on the other hand, would be set apart as holy unto the LORD — the Most High and God of gods.

This ethnic distinction runs throughout the Scriptures, until the mystery of God was revealed in Christ, who came to reclaim and redeem a people for God’s possession from all the nations of the earth and gather them into Israel. As Paul reminds us in Romans 9, “As indeed he says in Hosea, ‘Those who were not my people I will call ‘my people,’ and her who was not beloved I will call ‘beloved. And in the very place where it was said to them, ‘You are not my people,’
there they will be called ‘sons of the living God.’” [Romans 9:25-26]

In Christ, the ethnic barrier was brought down and God united all people in Christ — not so that we all would lose our ethnic identity but rather so that we could all glorify God for the immense diversity of the kingdom and represent the manifold beauty of God’s saving grace.

When you read this, you can perceive my insight into the mystery of Christ, 5which was not made known to the sons of men in other generations as it has now been revealed to his holy apostles and prophets by the Spirit. 6This mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.

[Ephesians 3:4-6]

Christ has brought down the dividing wall of hostility and redeemed people from every tribe and language and nation into His kingdom, incorporating the believing Gentiles into the commonwealth of Israel (see Ephesians 2:11-20). Now all who believe in Messiah — both Jew and Gentile — inherit God’s covenant promises.

The ethnic distinction God created through Abraham, Isaac and Jacob in the “flesh” served a very narrow yet essential purpose throughout history — namely to preserve the prophetic and genetic lineage of Messiah. That is to say, ethnic Israel was necessary to ensure Christ would be born.

Messiah came on a mission to transcend all ethnic boundaries and unite all peoples under the banner of Israel!

In my next post, I will deal exclusively with Israel in captivity — God’s people in bondage.

All the persons belonging to Jacob who came into Egypt, who were his own descendants, not including Jacob’s sons’ wives, were sixty-six persons in all. 27And the sons of Joseph, who were born to him in Egypt, were two. All the persons of the house of Jacob who came into Egypt were seventy.

Genesis 46:26-27

After Babel, God chose Abram from among the nations and entered into an everlasting covenant with him. God’s covenant involves a promise for a chosen family, a holy nation, a land, and ultimately a Son — a King — to bless all the families of the earth and save mankind. This covenant is predicated on and perpetuated by God’s grace and it is actuated and applied through our faith in Messiah and God’s holy word. As it is written, from first to last, the righteous shall live by faith.

God gave Abraham a miracle son of promise, Isaac — one of the first to typify the resurrection of Jesus Christ [see Genesis 22 the “AKEDAH“]. The LORD then extended His covenant to Isaac’s son, Jacob, changing his name to Israel. After initiating a covenant relationship with the patriarchs, the LORD God continued His redemptive work through Israel the family. By the time Jacob and His 12 sons sojourned to Egypt during the famine in the days of Joseph, they constituted a family — 70 persons in all.

So Israel took his journey with all that he had and came to Beersheba, and offered sacrifices to the God of his father Isaac.2And God spoke to Israel in visions of the night and said, “Jacob, Jacob.” And he said, “Here I am.” 3Then he said, “I am God, the God of your father. Do not be afraid to go down to Egypt, for there I will make you into a great nation. 4I myself will go down with you to Egypt, and I will also bring you up again, and Joseph’s hand shall close your eyes.“

Genesis 46:1-4

Israel — the Family of God

The LORD is a personal God, a relational God. He is our Father, our Redeemer, our Comforter and Healer. He desires deep heartfelt devotion and covenant communion with His people. God has chosen a family for Himself to reflect His glory and nature to the world. From Adam to Noah — from the Garden to the flood — the LORD worked through the nuclear family to accomplish His purposes. As image bearers of the Creator and King of the universe, mankind has been purposed to be God’s kingdom representatives on the earth.

God’s covenant family always has consisted of loyal and believing sons and daughters and servants and saints, who desire to see God’s kingdom come and His will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

Even God — having revealed Himself through the infinitely complex dynamics of His own triune nature — eternally exists in perpetual love and communion as Father, Son and Spirit. The LORD is One as a unity — perfect in power and purpose and will, yet at the same time God is inherently diverse within Himself, existing in three distinct persons and expressing His manifold wisdom in all creation. Just as one family consists of many members, God consists of three distinct, yet united, personalities.

For this reason I bow my knees before the Father, 15from whom every family in heaven and on earth is named, 16that according to the riches of his glory he may grant you to be strengthened with power through his Spirit in your inner being, 17so that Christ may dwell in your hearts through faith—that you, being rooted and grounded in love, 18may have strength to comprehend with all the saints what is the breadth and length and height and depth, 19and to know the love of Christ that surpasses knowledge, that you may be filled with all the fullness of God.

Ephesians 3:14-19

As I said, the Most Hight is a God of relationship. He is the Head of the household and the Father of the family. He has chosen to redeem for Himself a people for His own possession and that people will forever be known as Israel.

Israel — the Household of God

Jacob was blessed with 12 sons and one daughter. The sons of Israel are the princes or tribal heads of the 12 tribes of Israel. The 12 sons of Israel represent God’s eternal family, and every believer in the God of Israel is automatically Incorporated into one of the 12 tribes. We see this reality expressed in the Heavenly Jerusalem that will come down to earth during the Millennial Kingdom of Christ.

And he carried me away in the Spirit to a great, high mountain, and showed me the holy city Jerusalem coming down out of heaven from God, 11having the glory of God, its radiance like a most rare jewel, like a jasper, clear as crystal. 12It had a great, high wall, with twelve gates, and at the gates twelve angels, and on the gates the names of the twelve tribes of the sons of Israel were inscribed.

Revelation 21:10-12

The Scriptures are replete with language depicting God’s covenant people as a household or family. His ultimate promise is to be our God and we HIs people.

And like any human family, Israel was to some degree both dysfunctional and disobedient, marred by scandal and moral failure. Jacob schemed his father-in-law Laban and acquired much of his wealth. Sibling rivalry often raged between Jacob’s two wives, Leah and Rachel. When Jacob showed favoritism to Rachel’s son Joseph, the rest of his brothers betrayed him and sold him as a slave into Egypt. Even Judah was deceived by his own daughter-in-law, Tamar, and conceived an illegitimate child through her.

Needless to say, the family of Israel was far from perfect, which consistently reminded them of their need for a sinless Savior and righteous Redeemer. The sons of Israel needed an elder brother to restore them to the God of their fathers, and Israel looked forward in faith to the day Messiah would come. In the same way, God’s people today look back in faith upon the cross and empty tomb of Christ, and to all who receive Him and believe in His name God gives the right to be called the children of God.

Remember that you were at that time separated from Christ, alienated from the commonwealth of Israel and strangers to the covenants of promise, having no hope and without God in the world. 13But now in Christ Jesus you who once were far off have been brought near by the blood of Christ … For through him we both have access in one Spirit to the Father. 19So then you are no longer strangers and aliens, but you are fellow citizens with the saints and members of the household of God, 20built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Christ Jesus himself being the cornerstone.

Ephesians 2:12-13, 18-20

It is Jesus Christ who came in the flesh to bring many sons to glory, leading us out of darkness into His marvelous light.

But we see him who for a little while was made lower than the angels, namely Jesus, crowned with glory and honor because of the suffering of death, so that by the grace of God he might taste death for everyone. For it was fitting that he, for whom and by whom all things exist, in bringing many sons to glory, should make the founder of their salvation perfect through suffering. 11For he who sanctifies and those who are sanctified all have one source. That is why he is not ashamed to call them brothers, 12saying, “I will tell of your name to my brothers …

Hebrews 2:9-12

Israel — the 12 Tribes of God

A tribe is a related group of people with a common ancestor. When Israel went down to Egypt as 70 persons in all, there were 12 tribes in one family. Think of it like an extended family with uncles and cousins and grandchildren and nephews. Israel is the tribe of the One True God, and Jesus Himself reminds us that the tribes of Israel have an eternal destiny in the kingdom of God and the regeneration of all things.

Jesus said to them, “Truly, I say to you, in the regeneration of all things, when the Son of Man will sit on his glorious throne, you who have followed me will also sit on twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. 29And everyone who has left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or lands, for my name’s sake, will receive a hundredfold and will inherit eternal life.

Matthew 19:28-29

From patriarch to family to the 12 tribes, Israel has always been God’s chosen people for His own possession out of all the nations of the earth. Next time I will expand my study of Israel to it’s season of captivity and it’s birth as God’s holy nation.