God's Purpose for Israel — Keith Malcomson

Please turn with me in your Bible here tonight to Romans chapter 11. We're gonna read from verse one to verse 12. You know, I wasn't gonna preach tonight. I told Brother Souf that the other day. And I've had family, very important few days.

I really needed to rest. I never shut down at the minute. I never rest or really take a break and I need it. And family were in and I needed these days just to be spent with them. It was a beautiful, precious few days for me.

And so I'd settled that I went these three days. I don't have time to study, to prepare or anything. I've got a message, but no time to study. And I went, I'll do it next Wednesday night. But late last night, just as I'm about to turn the light out, my mind starts to go, the Lord starts speaking to me and a whole new message gets inserted.

And I got so giddy and excited. I went, I don't even have time to wrestle through all of this, but it's a whole new message. In fact, I can't go to the next message. With my thinking, I would have jumped to the next message, but I'm so glad I don't exalt myself to be in charge of the order of things.

So he can suddenly insert something. Next week wouldn't mean anything if I don't deal with this. So please bear with me. It won't be an imperfection, all that I would have it to be. But I just, I believe it's important that we deal with it here.

Last week we dealt with in part two of this, of Israel, what next? Last week we dealt with Gaza and the purpose of God or God's purpose for Gaza. That was our message. Here in part three, I want to deal with God's purpose for Israel.

Paul's Question: Has God Cast Away Israel?

Reading from Romans chapter 11 and verse one. And this is the apostle Paul speaking. I say then, hath God cast away his people? God forbid. For I also am an Israelite of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin.

God has not cast away his people, which he foreknew. What ye not what the scripture saith of Elias or Elijah, how he maketh intercession to God against Israel, saying, Lord, they have killed thy prophets and dig down thine altars.

And I am left alone and they seek my life. But what saith the answer of God unto them? I have reserved to myself 7 ,000 men who have not bowed the knees to the image of Baal. Even so then, at this present time also, there is a remnant according to the election of grace.

And if by grace then it is no more of works, otherwise grace is no more. But if it be of works, then it is no more grace, otherwise work is no more work. What then? Israel has not obtained that which he seeketh for, but the election hath obtained it and the rest were blinded.

According as it is written, God has given them the spirit of slumber, eyes that they should not see and ears that they should not hear unto this day. And David saith, let their table be made a snare and a trap and a stumbling block and a recompense unto them.

Let their eyes be darkened that they may not see and bow down their back always. I say then, have they stumbled that they should fall? God forbid, but rather through their fall, salvation is come unto the Gentiles for to provoke them to jealousy.

Now, listen to this carefully. Now, if the fall of them be the riches of the world and the diminution of them be the riches of the Gentiles, how much more their fullness. Please pray together. Father, we love you, we praise you, we thank you for the word of God.

It keeps us straight, it keeps us clear. Lord God, in this hour of controversy, of world affairs, of wars, Lord God, of much media attention on Israel and Gaza, Lord God, we ask if you help us, so God, not to think carnally or naturally or according to church tradition or church history, but Father, we pray that you open up the word of God, bring us to the written scriptures and give us great light on God's purpose for Israel.

Lord God, we come to you as the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. We were strangers, we were outside the covenants of promise, but through the precious blood of Jesus, you brought us in by faith, not by works.

And Lord God, us that did not have mercy, find mercy in your sight. We thank you, God, that we've been brought into all the blessings of God in Christ Jesus through the line of Abraham. And Father, tonight we pray, Lord God, show us, make us to stand in awe of God's purpose for this little nation of Israel in the past, in the present, and in the future, that your name might receive all the glory and the praise and the honor, that you might encourage us and edify us.

Lord God, that we might see the hand of sovereignty. Lord God, that you're a mighty God, that you're a gracious God, that you're a good God, that you're a God that works according to divine election. Lord God, that you are a God that works according to foreknowledge.

My God, that you're a merciful and a great God. And Father, thank God you are. Lord God, we just submit ourselves to you tonight, that you're very gracious unto us that are called the church. In Jesus' mighty name, amen.

My message here tonight is God's purpose for Israel. And just again, that first verse in Romans 11, verse one, I say then, hath God cast away his people? God forbid, God forbid it. And that's gonna be a very important statement for the future weeks with some of the things I'm gonna deal with.

I've got several things here I wanna deal with tonight, God's purpose for Israel. Last week, we looked at God's purpose for Gaza. We went back and looked at the scriptures, the mentions of Gaza in the Bible, 19 times Gaza is mentioned in the Bible.

A small little bit of land, 30 miles by five miles, but mentioned in the Bible. God prophesies about Gaza. Much is revealed about Gaza, but nothing in comparison to Israel. And I wanna give you several points here in this message, and I'm gonna be brief and concise, and I don't wanna say that and be a liar.

So maybe I shouldn't say it. I should withhold myself from such statements, but by concise says, I'm giving you key essential points. I'm not teaching on each of them. I'm giving you the raw material, and I could preach an entire message on each of these, but I want you to hear it, and we'll deal with it more in weeks to come.

Israel Defined by Scripture

But I want you to see from the Bible, God's purpose for Israel in the Bible. Number one, Israel defined. And this is very important because I believe lots of people through theology, church tradition, ideologies, go on different extremes in defining Israel.

Before I show you God's purpose for Israel from the Bible, you've got to understand who Israel is, what it is, and where it is. That is very, very important. And so we go to the Bible to find out our definition of Israel.

Don't go anywhere else. Not to the early church fathers, not to history, certainly not to today's media or today's preachers. Let's go back to the Bible. What does the word Israel mean in the Bible? What is it?

Who is Israel in the Bible? The name Israel occurs about 2 ,600 times in our Bible. That's very, very significant. The name Christian is only mentioned three times in our Bible, yet we use it all the time.

But Israel is used 2 ,600 times throughout the entirety of the Bible. And when you begin to look at what is Israel, who is Israel, you see they are the physical, literal, direct descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

The entirety of Israel come out of one man, one woman, one house, one family, and they raised up an entire family and that family became tribes. It became an entire nation, an extraordinary nation. Jacob gave birth to 12 children and those children become the heads of entire tribes.

We read in our Bible about Jacob when Joseph is already down in Egypt as a great man, as a man with power, second in command to Pharaoh. We read that Jacob, at the end of the story, he sends for his old father, Jacob, and Jacob comes down into Egypt and we're told that the people of Israel, that small family, only numbered 70 people, only 70 people, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob.

This is Israel. When you read the story of Jacob, you read about the night he wrestled all through the night with the Lord. And because he wrestled and triumphed in prayer with the angel of the Lord, do you remember the Lord changed his name, which means God literally changed his character and touched him and he never walked the same again.

He always walked with a limp thereafter. Do you know what the name Israel means? It means a prince with God. You have wrestled with God and got the victory. Literally one man wrestling for one night in prayer with God.

Birth for something that was phenomenal. Never underestimate one night praying through with God. I've had those nights. I can remember when I was 10 years old or 12 years old or 13 or 21 or 25 or 31. I can remember incidents one single night where I wrestled through with God.

I mean, I wrestled in prayer. I would not let go of him. I didn't just say a little token prayer and go off to bed. I was desperate. I had faith in my heart. I needed to touch God. I wanted to get something.

Well, that's what happened to this man. This man, Jacob, remember what his name means? Conniver, Twister, that's what he was. What'd God do? God touched him and changed him from being a conniver, a twister, to being a prince with God, a man who knew how to wrestle with God.

You know what? God can change you in one night of prayer. One night of prayer, you could be so changed that God's plan and purpose could come out of you. You can't even imagine what God could do with your house, your family, if you can get a hold of God.

And so Israel went down into the land of Egypt for a period of 400 years. And when they come up out of the land of Egypt, through Moses, there was two to three million people, 70 people, one family, became an entire great nation that was delivered by God.

And so we see this name Israel, talking about a people, a family, 12 tribes, 2 ,600 times plus. When you go over into the New Testament, the name Israel is used 51 times. And listen to me carefully. In the New Testament, it almost always, apart from maybe one or two times, it always talks about the same national, physical, racial people who came from Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.

It is never spiritualized. There's no term written that says spiritual Israel. It's not there. Never is the church confused with Israel. It's important you understand this. And so in the New Testament, we are not called Israel, never, not once, not at all.

So the name Israel is always very specific, very carefully used. In Galatians 6, verse 16, this is one of those rare times. It talks about the Israel of God, and theologians argue what that means, but it's obscure.

All the other times, it is very clear. In Romans chapter 9, Paul defining what a Jew is, what Israel is, he goes very carefully, and he says, all that are called Israel aren't actually Israel. But he's not making it broader to include the church and all believers outside of Israel.

Oh no, he's narrowing it. And so the national state of Israel, the national people of Israel, he actually limits it, restricts it, narrows it, and says a true Israelite, the real Israel are those that believe, those who have a spiritual condition of the heart towards God.

That's the real Israel. He doesn't deny the literal, physical nation called Israel, but he just says, if you really want to define Israel correctly, this is how you do it. So it's not a broad term, including all the people of God.

Oh no, it's actually a restricted term. Even the city of Jerusalem is also, we can't talk about Israel without mentioning Jerusalem. It's been the only capital of Israel ever throughout 4 ,000 years of history.

No other city was their city or their capital. It's always been Jerusalem. That's been worldwide history making that Jerusalem is the capital of the Jewish people. And so when you come to the Bible again, you read the name Jerusalem 814 times in our Bible.

Listen, these facts need a dawn on you because there's a lot of media that's a loaded trap, okay? And you need to know what your Bible says. Your Bible mentions Jerusalem 814 times. Guess how many times the Quran mentions the name Jerusalem in the entire Quran?

Not even once, zilch. They claim Jerusalem as one of their three holy cities. The Quran doesn't even mention Jerusalem, but all through our Bible, it's mentioned, it's histories given, details are given.

Muhammad never once mentioned Jerusalem. If you come over to the New Testament, Jerusalem is mentioned 130 times in our New Testament. And then let's go a little bit further. What about the name Jew that is so associated with Israel?

The name Jew is used 84 times in the Old Testament, 84 times, that's not many. But in the New Testament, it's mentioned 192 times Jew in the New Testament, more than in the Old Testament. And again, you don't have terms of, we are the spiritual Jews.

That's not so, you're not a Jew. You can't be a Jew unless you convert and become a Jew. And then you'd be backslidden on your way to hell if you'd done that. So you can never be a Jew if you weren't born a Jew, or if you didn't convert to be a Jew.

70 times in the John's Gospel in the New Testament, Jew is mentioned more than any other book in the New Testament. John's Gospel, which is about God's heavenly people and God's heavenly son, the Lord Jesus Christ.

And yet it mentions Jews all of this time. You see, these terms are very important. They're in our Bible. What was a Jew? Originally the name Jew in the Old Testament came specifically out of Judah, not all of Israel, but only Judah.

It was a specific name. It was limited. It was restricted. But from Judah, it then becomes synonymous with the name Israel. So all of Israel, or those that were religious and devout in their faith, became known by the time of the New Testament to be Jews.

So to be an Israelite often meant you were also a Jew, but not always. It was a unique name given to these worshipers of the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But again, Jew is never used of the church.

You don't get spiritual Jews. And in fact, in Romans 2, we have clear definitions of what a Jew is. It defines the term. It limits it. Again, it restricts it. It doesn't enlarge it. And again, over in Revelation 2 and 3, when it talks about Jews in the seven letters to the seven churches, you know what it says?

They that say they are Jews, but are not. In other words, it was talking about those who say, we're Jews. We're practicing Jews. We're religious Jews. We believe in the Old Testament. We believe in the law of Moses.

But yet Jesus said, they're not really Jews. They're not even practicing Jews. They're not authentic Jews. They're actually hypocritical in all of their ways. So you've got to define this term Israel and Jerusalem and Jew to begin understanding.

And that's the first thing I want you to see. Who are Israel? They've got a capital. They've got a nation. Because the people of Israel, when they moved into the land of Canaan, that name, that nation was renamed Israel, an entire nation with boundaries, with borders, with mountains, with valleys, with rivers.

All of that became Israel. So what started with a man, then a nation became an entire land with regulated borders. And see this Bible. It gives the land. Wasn't given to the Palestinians. Wasn't given to the PLO.

Wasn't given to Hamas. Wasn't given to Islam. You know what? We have exact records, 4 ,000 years old, given by prophets, by men of God, by Abraham himself, the father of the faith. And you're given an exact land.

In fact, let me just tell you about this name Palestine. As we define the name Israel, let's consider the name Palestine. Some claim it comes from the term land of the Philistines. But where did this name Palestine originate?

It was actually given by the Greeks and the Romans almost 2 ,000 years ago, speaking about the land of Canaan. When they wanted to discredit Israel, who'd been there for 2 ,000 years, they created this name Palestine.

Then it wasn't used for 1 ,900 years. It wasn't used. You couldn't find Palestinians in Palestine during the 19th century. You could search far and wide. Nobody called themselves a Palestinian. And yet Israel, for 4 ,000 years, called themselves Israel.

We are Jews. And you go back just 150 years, and you won't find any Arabs, any Muslims, calling themselves Palestinians. These are facts. These are details. And so the Hebrew prophets predicted that in the future, Jerusalem would be the capital of the world, not the Palestinian capital.

You see, Palestinian is a counterfeit name, mistermed, misunderstood, misclaimed. Israel is an ancient name, a historical name, a very well-recorded name, a name that you can trace through all of history, through many different events.

That's the first thing. Israel defined. Number two, Israel saved. Listen to what it says in Romans 10 in verse one. And there's the great apostle Paul writing, and I'm gonna quote a lot from Romans here tonight.

You know, the book of Romans, we preached about many times from it about justification by faith, or being washed in the blood, or being crucified by Christ. You remember all those teachings? Well, from chapter one to chapter eight, you've got this progression.

You've got the fall of man, the depravity of man for the first few chapters, then justification by faith, then the work of the cross and the victorious Christian life, then our wrestling with sin in Romans chapter seven, Romans chapter eight, what it really is to walk in the spirit.

Then mystery of mystery, you get to Romans chapter nine through to 11, and it's talking about Israel, national Israel, Israel as a nation outside of Christ, but also God's plan and God's purpose for Israel.

He's not confusing it with the church. He's not spiritualizing it. He's not doing anything of that. You know what he's showing? God's plan to save Israel. Listen to what it says in Romans chapter 10 in verse one.

Brethren, my heart's desire and prayer to God for Israel is that they might be saved. And so you see the great apostle, what was his heart's desire? I mean, deep desire, passion, burden for Israel. What was his desire?

That the Palestinians get victory over them? That they get punished for their rejection of Jesus Christ? Oh no, oh no. You know what he says? That they might be saved. That was his chief desire. And not only his desire, his prayer.

Do you know how Paul was praying for Israel? And you ought to be praying for Israel, not just to be saved from bombs and bullets and death. You ought to be saying, my heart's desire for Israel. My prayer is that they be saved.

If you meet someone who's a Christian and they're cursing Israel and blackening them and speaking against them, and they never talk about their heart's desire, oh, that they might be saved. There's something wrong with that person.

Either with their mind, their mind's not right, or their heart's not right. If their heart doesn't burn and say, oh, I desire that Israel would get saved. What does the term saved mean? It means to be born again, saved from their sin, regenerate, going from darkness into light.

You know, Paul was saying here, Israel as a nation, having rejected Christ, is in need of salvation. They actually need salvation. And Paul's desire, as he begins to show chapter nine to chapter 11, here he begins to show God's purpose for national Israel, a physical people, the seed of Abraham, outside of Jesus Christ.

Isn't it strange from chapter one to chapter eight, he speaks about the church, about salvation, about redemption, about victory over sin, and then he turns his attention. And for three chapters, chapter nine, chapter 10, chapter 11, he talks about national Israel.

There's a lot of Christians say, oh, I don't know about Israel. I don't need to know about Israel. Do you need to know about the sinfulness of men? Do you need to know about justification by faith? Do you need to know that you're crucified with Christ on the cross and buried in his death?

Do you think that Israel is of no consequence? And when you read Romans, you're building all the way through. A lot of Christians, they stop at Romans chapter eight and go chapter nine, chapter 10, chapter 11.

I don't understand it. It means nothing to me. I don't need to understand. I don't need to understand God's plan and purpose for Israel. Nothing to do with me. Doesn't affect my Christian life. Does it not?

Does it not? Maybe it does more than we can ever imagine. And so the great apostle Paul moves from a walk in the spirit, genuine believers. He moves straight into talking about national Israel outside of Christ.

And he begins to teach. For I bear them record that they have a zeal of God, but not according to knowledge. For they being ignorant of God's righteousness and going about to establish their own righteousness have not submitted themselves unto the righteousness of God.

For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone that believeth. Again, in chapter nine, verse one, this is what he says. I say the truth in Christ. I lie not. My conscience also bearing me witness in the Holy Ghost that I have great heaviness and continual sorrow in my heart.

Do you see this is hard for Israel? I'm continually sorrowful for Israel. I'm burdened over them. I'm broken over them. I am praying for them. Do you pray for Israel? Are you burdened for the salvation of Israel?

Is this a part of your Christian life or have you spiritualized the term? Have you done something the Bible never does and the apostles never did is to take the term Israel and go, well, God only cares about the spiritual people, the church of Jesus Christ.

That wasn't Paul. That wasn't the apostle here. He actually goes on to say, for I could wish that I myself were accursed from Christ for my brethren. Notice how he defines who he's speaking about Israel, my brethren, my brothers, my kin men according to the flesh.

Do you know that Paul was a Jew, a zealous Jew, a radical Jew who killed Christians. He was of the tribe of Benjamin. He was a Pharisee of Pharisees. He was a devout Jew who with a good conscience he's kept all of the law, trying to be good enough for salvation.

Well, here he is, he's defining what a Jew is. My kinsmen according to the flesh, they are a physical people outside of Christ. That's who Israel is in the New Testament. And Paul's heart, the great apostle of the Gentiles.

Remember, he's not the apostle of the Jews, Peter was. This is the apostle who says, I'm going to Ephesus. I'm going to Corinth. I'm going to Rome. I'm going to Spain. I'm reaching out to pagans, to unbelievers, to dark nations.

What does he teach about Israel? Do you know what my passion is? That Israel might be saved. Oh, I'm the apostle of the Gentiles, but I've got a burden for Israel. Listen, he goes further. Who are Israelites?

To whom pertaineth the adoption and the glory and the covenants and the giving of the law and the service of God and the promise? Whose are the fathers? Talking about Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. And of whom as concerning the flesh, Christ came who is over all, God bless forever, amen.

So this people who Paul's saying here are outside of Christ. They're not walking according to faith. They haven't received the righteousness of Christ. They're his physical, natural people. But do you know what he says?

They're the ones who had all of the covenants. All of the promises were theirs. It was all in Israel. This is Paul. This is theology. This is what we ought to believe. This is clear biblical teaching.

Israel Scattered According to Prophecy

Number three, Israel scattered. I'm showing you from the Bible here, God's purpose for Israel. And you've got to understand this. This third point, Israel scattered. Almost 4 ,000 years ago, God spoke to Abraham and said, I've given you this land to Abraham.

It was a specific land. He's only one man. He can't have children. His wife, Sarah, was barren. They've got a promise. Hey, Abraham, your children are gonna be more than the stars of the heaven and the sand on the seashore.

Try counting the stars tonight. See if you get outside and it's a clear night. Start counting the stars. Start, go down to the beach there, Ballybunion or somewhere else, and begin to go one, two, three, four, five, six, seven.

I'll see you in a millennium, okay? I'll see you a long time down the road. One, two, three. You know what? God says, can you count them? Your seed's gonna be more than what you can possibly count there.

It's remarkable. And what does he say to Abraham? I have given you this land. You're literally walking upon it. This is an extraordinary thing that Israel, when we read their full history, for 1 ,900 years were out of that land.

Something happened to them. Why would God say, this is your land? Promise it to them and then be there. They're prophets, they're kings, they're princes, they're people, they're patriarchs. And yet for 1 ,900 years, almost half of their entire history, they weren't in the land.

Have you ever stopped and asked why? It's this third point, Israel scattered. Do you know that was a part of God's plan and purpose that Israel were gonna be scattered? It wasn't outside of his plan. It was all part of his plan.

And yet that people in a period of 1 ,900 years, they retained their culture, their language, their religion, their roots, their family structure, all of this. Do you know no nation in history for 6 ,000 years have ever got removed from their nation and brought back into the same land and retained their same language and same religion.

Israel, a small nation, is the only nation in the entire world, the entire history of mankind, the entire history of religion. No other people have ever managed to accomplish that. And yet Israel, the seed of Abraham, managed to do that.

So you're beginning to see the plan and the purpose of God here. And in fact, the Bible says, not only are they gonna be scattered, but they're gonna be scattered from a very specific land. And when they get regathered, they're gonna come back to a very specific land, the same land that Abraham walked on, build his altars on, was buried in and buried his wife in.

You read the names of, in the days of Abraham, you read about Hebron and Bethel and Ai. You read about all of these places like Shechem, Bethany, Jerusalem, all of these. And yet they're there today. They are real places in the land of Israel where the real people of Israel are now living.

It's utterly remarkable, all of these things. But Israel scattered was in the plan and purpose of God. Listen to what God spoke through Moses in Deuteronomy 2864. And the Lord shall scatter thee among all people.

It only happened once in their entire history, once. One single time that they were scattered as a nation to all nations, all people, only once. And the Lord shall scatter thee. Who's gonna scatter thee?

The Romans? No. Nebuchadnezzar? No. God is gonna scatter you. He's speaking about Israel, the seed of Abraham from the mountains of Israel. God is gonna scatter you. God's hand is gonna do this. And you know what?

In that scattering, you're gonna go to live in many different nations across the world from one end of the earth, even to the other. And there thou shalt serve other gods which neither thou nor thy fathers have known, even wood and stone.

And among these nations shalt thou find no ease, neither shall the sole of thy foot find rest. You know what he was prophesying? You'll never come to rest there. There's gonna be a day you come back. I'm gonna scatter you to all nations.

But why did he scatter them? Even Christ prophesied during his earthly ministry. He said, I would have gathered you as a mother hen. Judgment is coming. You mothers in Jerusalem, you're gonna bemoan the day.

You're gonna cry out in this city. Your babies are gonna cry out. He warned them of judgment. Judgment is coming on this city. You're gonna get scattered. Why? Because they rejected him. See, the Jews rejected the Messiah, the promises of the Old Testament.

You remember what Israel, as they gathered in the streets, remember Pilate said, who will you have to be delivered? A murderer? A man that's a known criminal? Or this man, Jesus, who calls himself your Messiah?

You know what they said? They said, let his blood be upon us and our children. Remember, that's why he washed his hands. This Roman leader, he said, you take the consequence. You know what? They absolutely did.

Jesus prophesied the destruction of the temple, the destruction of the city. Not one stone is gonna sit upon another stone. Remember when the apostle Paul began to teach and preach and minister in pioneer churches?

Remember many times, he went to the Jew first, went into a town or city. Where's the synagogue? He went preach to the Jew first. And then if they rejected him, he turned to the Gentiles. And so we see in the book of Acts, I turn from you, the Jews, unto the Gentiles.

And that's where I'm going. The Jews rejected the gospel. You know what? The branch was cut off the tree. Blindness came onto them. A veil fell upon them. All in the plan and purpose of God. Do you know what happened as a consequence of that?

According to Romans chapter 11, your fall meant the gospel went to all Gentiles, all nations of the world. I had a plan. Even in their fall, they're scattered. Them rejecting the gospel, I had a plan on that.

The gospel's gonna go to all nations. And so how did their scattering take place? You have heard it many times, I'm sure. In 70 AD, the city was conquered by the Roman army. One million people in the city of Jerusalem died in that awful besiegement.

One million in a small city. 100 ,000 were sold as slaves. There's good records of all of this. And the Jewish diaspora began to happen where they were scattered across many nations. See in Roman history, Rome usually didn't scatter nations.

It was very rare for them to scatter an entire nation, disrupt them, displace them, very rare. But they'd done it to Israel. They didn't just do it to every nation across the Mediterranean. They'd done it specifically.

You know who was doing it? God was scattering a nation that had the covenants, had the promises, had the truth of the patriarchs. This was all given to them. Listen to me for a second. The dispersion began in AD 70.

But later, under Emperor Hadrian, remember Hadrian's wall that separates England from Scotland? Remember Emperor Hadrian, a Roman emperor, he came and he built that wall. Couldn't defeat the Scottish.

Couldn't conquer the Picts. So what did he do? He just built a wall. What a good idea. Just those painted barbarous men will build the wall and keep them in. It was that same Hadrian who from 117 to 138, he was a Roman emperor.

But he went into Jerusalem and brought another final scattering of the city of Jerusalem and an utter destruction of it. Anything left, he finalized the work. We know that in the city of Jerusalem, that the Muslims then moved in in an extraordinary way.

Let me just say about Hadrian, he destroyed 985 towns in Israel. Hadrian did. And he scattered and killed. He killed a further 580 ,000 men. This was a scattering that was prophesied. Jesus tried to warn, this is gonna happen to your city, to your nation.

It's gonna be terrible, but still they did not listen because they rejected this. Then after all of that, Islam came in to rule the city of Jerusalem in the year 638. In the city, they blocked up the Golden Gate or the Eastern Gate in the year 810.

Do you know why? Because the Bible prophesies that through that Eastern Gate, the Jewish Messiah is gonna come back one of these days. That's from Mount Oliviet that he's gonna walk back in there. What did the Muslims do?

They built it up. Guess what? It's built up today and there's a graveyard outside it. You know what? They don't want the Jewish Messiah to come in. I wanna tell you, someone's gonna come walking in that gate one of these days.

And so we see that even in Israel scattered, God had a plan, God had a purpose. Then 1900 years, listen to me carefully, 1900 years, even just 100 years ago, most Jews, most Israelites scattered in the nations thought it utterly impossible they would ever have a nation again.

Those that dreamed of having a homeland never thought it could be in Israel, their national land given to Abraham. They thought maybe in Africa, maybe somewhere else, but it couldn't be in that actual spot.

It would be the dream of a madman. 100 years ago, that's what many of them, good Jews thought. In the year 1900, the Turkish who ruled over the land, they actually had a tree tax all through Israel, the native land of Israel.

That's why it was so barren. And you know what? The Bible prophesies they'll only come back at a time where all the mountains are barren. The entire land is barren. And the Turkish ruling that said, you get taxed for every tree in your property.

If you grow a tree outside your house, we are gonna tax you. So what did they do? They themselves cut down all of the trees. It was treeless, barren, waste, desolate, lots of swampland, lots of illness, lots of malaria, almost abandoned, uncultivated, almost unoccupied, thinly populated.

That's what it was like 100 years ago. And yet, what do we begin seeing? God stirred up the hearts to say, I'm going to regather Israel. This is point four. Point four, Israel regathered. It is of great interest that Jeremiah and Ezekiel in the Old Testament both prophesied that Israel would be scattered amongst all nations.

Only happened once in their history. And it happened for 1 ,900 years. Two great prophets said it would happen. They would be in all nations, not just Assyria, not just Babylon. And that once they're in all nations, a day would come when they'd be regathered again.

And the regathering to their land would be from all nations. Listen, Ezekiel prophesied in Ezekiel 34, 13, 36, 24, 39, 27, that they'd be regathered from all nations. That's an important term because it only happened once during this 1 ,900 years.