THE HORRORS INFLICTED ON THE JEWISH PEOPLE

Posted on by

January 27, 2024, was International Holocaust Remembrance Day. On this day, people around the world remember the six million Jewish victims of the Holocaust during WWII. The horrors inflicted by evil men and women on human beings made in God’s image are absolutely sickening. And as we soberly remember those victims, many of us will naturally think of the ongoing horrors inflicted on the Jewish people in Israel today by the vile actions of Hamas—yes, evil continues. Sadly, the attack by Hamas and Israel’s response has only resulted in antisemitism rearing its ugly head across Western nations and elsewhere.

There is only one place we can go for the truth about what is unfolding here. It is to God’s Word. Ever since God established Israel as His nation over 3000 years ago to be a witness to the world it has been under attack. The real battle is spiritual with Satan and his demons using people to destroy God’s nation, the Jewish people. They did so almost 2000 years ago but God miraculously rebirthed the nation in 1948.

About the horror unfolding we always need to go to God’s Word for answers. Learn from Habbakuk.

“O Lord, how long shall I cry for help, and you will not hear? Or cry to you “Violence!” and you will not save? Why do you make me see iniquity, and why do you idly look at wrong? Destruction and violence are before me; strife and contention arise. So the law is paralyzed, and justice never goes forth. For the wicked surround the righteous; so justice goes forth perverted. (Habakkuk 1:2–4)

Let me remind you of God’s answer to Habakkuk. He revealed to his prophet that, yes, God would judge his people (who were sinning greatly against him) by a horrifying invasion from the Babylonians but that God would also judge the Babylonians when their time came—they did not get away with any of their sin! They too were eventually judged. And Habakkuk ends with a message of great hope:

Habakkuk was probably written about 640–615 B.C., just before the fall of Assyria and the rise of Babylon (Chaldea). God used Assyria to punish Israel (722 B.C.); then he would use Babylon to punish Assyria and Judah. This prophecy would be fulfilled several decades after Habakkuk, in 586 B.C. The “theme question” of Habakkuk is, how can God use a wicked nation such as Babylon for his divine purpose? God judges all nations, said Habakkuk and even Babylon would eventually be judged (Babylon fell to Persia in 539). Though God’s ways are sometimes mysterious, the central message is simple: “The righteous shall live by his faith” (Habbakuk 2:4) while awaiting salvation. These words are quoted three times in the New Testament.

“For I am not ashamed of the gospel, for it is the power of God for salvation to everyone who believes, to the Jew first and also to the Greek (Gentiles). For in it the righteousness of God is revealed from faith for faith, as it is written, “The righteous shall live by faith.” Romans 1:16-17

“Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for “The righteous shall live by faith.” Galatians:3:11

And finally, we need endurance but each one of God’s children was given the Holy Spirit when we repented and accepted Jesus as our Lord and Saviour (John 14:26, John 15:26, John 16:7-11). He is our counsellor, teacher, and comforter. He will enable us to persevere knowing that Jesus is coming back. The many prophecies about Jesus’ second coming are beginning to play out in our day so we know what is coming and can prepare accordingly to do the will of God so that we may receive our reward in Jesus’ coming Millennial Kingdom.

“For you need endurance, so that when you have done the will of God you may receive what is promised. For, “yet a little while and the coming one (Jesus) will come and will not delay, but my righteous one shall live by faith, and if he shrinks back, my soul has no pleasure in him.” Hebrews 10:36-38

“Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Through Him, we have also obtained access by faith into this grace in which we stand, and we rejoice in hope of the glory of God. Not only that, but we rejoice in our sufferings, knowing that suffering produces endurance, and endurance produces character, and character produces hope, and hope does not put us to shame, because God’s love has been poured into our hearts through the Holy Spirit who has been given to us.” Romans 5:1-5

INFORMATION ON JESUS’ MILLENNIAL KINGDOM

Posted on by

I have found Reggie Kelly who hosts the website http://www.mysteryofisrael.org a tremendous resource for information on Jesus’ coming Millennial Kingdom on this Earth particularly to provide answers to questions such as “What Kind of Bodies will Israel have in the Millennium?:

  1. How is it possible that all of Israel will be saved and yet people will be going into the millennial reign of Christ on this Earth without being transformed and having new bodies?
  2. Will all Israel that’s a part of the church be transformed into heavenly bodies?
  3. How will people be going into the millennium without heavenly bodies?

First, we need to know what the text says? Second, what is the evidence for how the biblical writers expected to be understood? Were they correct in how they understood their own prophecies? Or was there a deeper, allegorical meaning that eluded their limited understanding? Was their interpretation of what Yahweh spoke merely a reflection of a “primitive, nationalistic, time-bound” understanding that would someday be replaced by a different interpretation that could not have been understood or recognized by the prophets or their contemporaries? That’s the hermeneutical question in debate.

After establishing the plain person’s reading of plain language, we can then begin to look for light as to how certain antinomies (difficulties/paradoxes) can be reconciled without violence to the original author’s intention.

The very meaning of the millennium is at stake here. Why should God make such a point of ending the age around the “controversy of Zion”, a conflict that is destined to draw all nations into an insoluble, inescapable dilemma over the Land and people of Israel that sets off the final world conflict? (Isaiah 34:8; Zechariah 12:2-3).

It will be a kind of valley of decision designed to test hearts, primarily over the issue of the nature of saving grace and the ‘kind’ of righteousness (not one’s own but the Lord’s alone) that can stand in the judgment. In other words, why should God be so determined to save an elect remnant of ethnic Jews (“natural branches”) unless it is to set forth the wayward nation that was given an irrevocable divine election as the statement and demonstration of His free and sovereign prerogative to change and qualify them for a final and secure inheritance of the Land by predestined grace.

He has set them at the center of the nations, that He might show in them for a thousand years of public demonstration, the power of His ability to choose whom He will, and quicken whom He will (Mt 11:27; Jn 5:21; Ro 9:18) at the “set time” of His choosing (Ps 102:13; 110:3; Isa 30:18; Gal 1:15-16), and thus finally and forever preserve, not only them but each and every one of their children after them in abiding holiness, never again to depart (Isa 59:20-21; Jer 32:40, et al.).

Why? What’s God out to prove? What’s His point?

The design/purpose is to press upon the consciousness of the nations God’s faithfulness to His immutable covenant word that most of the world doesn’t even know exists, as multitudes are even now being preconditioned to despise and dismiss His word by the events that are swiftly hurling us to the time of final reckoning.

That covenant (called synonymously “new” and “everlasting”) is not fully complete or satisfied (in all its original terms) until there is not a living Jew on the post-tribulation earth that is not born again and preserved in the “everlasting salvation” of the “everlasting righteousness” of Christ throughout the entirety of the millennial interim as an all holy nation, “never again” to depart (Isa 45:17, 25; 59:20-21; 60:21; Jer 31:34; 32:37-41, Dan 9:24, with so many more that could be listed ).

This uniformity of a completely saved and eternally preserved Jewish population at peace in their own, covenanted Land is the goal of the covenant, since only then will the long-blinded Jewish nation have their spiritual eyes opened. A coming day when the blind shall see, and those who always before resisted the Spirit opposer shall learn doctrine is promised all throughout Moses and the prophets (compare Deut 29:4 with Deut 4:25-31; 30:1-6; Isa 29:18, 24; Acts 7:51).

Only when, not a mere remnant, but “all” the people are righteous (Isa 60:21; Jer 31:34), with eternal righteousness not their own (Isa 45:24; 54:17; Jer 23:5-6; Dan 9:24), can they fulfill the covenant conditions and thus keep the Land forever in abiding peace and security.

This will be possible because the tendency to backslide and come back under the curses of the covenant will be forever cured by the everlasting righteousness of the everlasting covenant. No more will the righteous remnant suffer the sins and exile of the larger apostate nation, since all will be preserved in new covenant righteousness forever, “world without end” (Isa 45:17).

It is one thing for God to bring the Jews into the Land, but a radical transformation is required for them to be assured of permanent security in the Land. This is the very thing the everlasting/new covenant guarantees. From this, it is clear to see why the prophets understood that nothing short of a climactic, apocalyptic day of the Lord could ever bring about such a radical and permanent change in the whole of the nation.

More specifically, not all the nation but only the remnant who escaped death arrive at that ultimately transformative day (Ps 102:13; 110:3; Isa 66:8; Eze 39:22; Zech 3:9; 12:10; 13:8-9; Mt 23:39; Acts 3:21; Ro 11:26; Rev 1:7) .

This is why, not only a remnant, but the entirety of the nation must “all” know Him (Jer 31:34; Eze 39:22, 28-29) for them to be able to keep the Land forever, as promised in the plain language of the covenant. As I like to say, “For the Jews to inherit the Land forever, they must have a righteousness that is forever”.

This righteousness, which is the Lord’s own righteousness (Isa 45:24-25; 54:7; Jer 23:5-6), must extend, not only to a remnant but the whole of the nation and all the children born to them in future generations, lest the tendency to backslide send them back under the curses of the broken covenant.

This “everlasting righteousness”, which is none of their own, but the Lord’s alone, is that righteousness that was perfected in the Son and imputed to the believer whose faith is counted for righteousness. This righteousness, once imputed, is invariably made manifest by the gift and fruits of the enlivening Holy Spirit.

Of course, all of this applies now to every true-born believer of this age and the assurance of eternal inheritance in the age to come (both the millennium and the new heavens and earth), but God intended an earthly demonstration of His ability to accomplish this divine, self-assigned “mission impossible” here, on this earth with the Jewish people, at the scene of the crime, so to speak, in the presence of a helplessly bound enemy (Satan).

This grace needed to be exhibited and put on display by weak, natural jars of clay, supernaturally upheld in holiness by the gift of the Holy Spirit and nothing of human power.

Manifestly, God has set this interim period as the demonstration of His ability, not only “to graft them in again” but to keep them in, forever!. This requires an interim that is a glorious advance on the present age, yet short of the final, ultimate perfection that follows the millennium.

This newly and suddenly saved remnant of penitent survivors (like Paul’s sudden arrest on the Damascus road) will enter the millennium in their natural bodies and be assisted back to their Land by surviving Gentiles. Compare Isa 14:2; 40:22; 60:9; 66:20; Zech 8:23). Manifestly, these survivors from among the nations did not take the mark, but were also not yet born again (not yet “in Christ”) at the time of the last trump, when Jesus was revealed from heaven (Isa 26:12-13 with Mt 24:29-31; 1Cor 15:52).

Many scriptures speak of this sudden salvation of the surviving remnant of penitent Jewish survivors at the Lord’s post-trib return (Ps 102:13; 110:3; Isa 59:17-21; 66:8; Jer 30:6-7; Eze 39:22, 28-29; Zech 3:9; 12:10; Mt 23:39; Acts 3:21; Ro 11:26; with Rev 1:7) with the result that now, an all saved Jewish population will never again backslide and fall back under covenant judgment, but “all”, from the least to the greatest will know the Lord (Isa 59:21; Jer 31:34; 32:40; Eze 37:25; 39:22). This is the O.T. context behind Paul’s statement, “and so all Israel shall be saved”.

This sudden national salvation of a surviving remnant is everywhere shown to take place on the post-tribulation day of the Lord. Its purpose is the open and public vindication of “My covenant with them (natural branches) when I shall (future) take away their (the irrevocably elect and no less beloved enemy’s) sin …”

Several scriptures show very definitely that the time Paul has in view is the post-trib day of the Lord, which the N.T. obviously equates with Christ’s return. When Jesus arrives in glory, the dead in Christ, together with all those alive in Christ at the time, will be changed in an instant, immediately translated into glorified immortality.

At the same time (“in one day”; Ps 102:13; 110:3; Isa 66:8; Zech 3:9; Eze 39:22; Mt 23:39; Ro 11:26; Rev 1:7); a surviving remnant of Jews, having just been brought to the end of their power (Deut 32:36; Dan 12:7), “look upon their pierced Messiah”, and immediately go apart to weep in deepest contrition, as when Joseph revealed himself to his estranged brethren (compare Gen. 45 with Mic 5:3-4; Zech 12:10; Mat 23:39; Rev 1:7). After the great purgation of tribulation judgment, the newly saved Jewish remnant (Eze 20:33-40; Amos 9:9-10) goes into the millennium in natural, albeit Spirit filled bodies (Eze 39:22, 28-29).

Now, with it established that the scripture is very clear that a surviving remnant will make up the newly born nation, entering the post-tribulation kingdom in natural bodies, returning by every natural means of transport back to the Land to build and plant, to raise families, and witness to the nations, the question is naturally raised, “what will be the relationship of those who enter the millennial kingdom in their natural bodies and those who have been translated at the rapture?”

When taken together, the cumulative evidence of scripture creates what can be called a “necessary inference”. I believe the puzzle is only solved, with due respect to all that the scripture says, by recognizing what I like to call, a “dimensional divide”.

The mystery of the rapture is not a mystery as to its time. That is no mystery (compare Hos 13:14; Isa 25:7-8; 27:12-13; Mt 24:29-31 with 1 Cor 15:5-54 ). The mystery has to do with a ‘dimensional divide’ between those who will be putting on resurrected bodies with capacities that are like the angels and like the Lord in His post-resurrection appearances for the purpose of spiritual rule, (as for example, ruling over 5 or 10 cities), but in a realm of existence, not any less on earth, but not immediately visible to saved and unsaved mortals in the millennium (compare Mt 19:28; 22:30; Lk 19:17:18; 1Cor 13:12).

There is so much more that can help clarify and harmonize, but the greatest problem (other than failure to fully depend on the Spirit for the mercy of illumination) is the lack of O.T. literacy on the popular level, and on the scholarly level, the tendency to embrace of a set of apriori presuppositions that seeks to harmonize the testaments by a radical method of reinterpretation and spiritualization. It’s a great, historic deficiency in the church due to centuries of neglect of the OT and artificial, unsatisfactory solutions that fail to convincingly harmonize the Testaments.

The second point implicit in the questions is the relationship of the body to national Israel:

To be clear, Israel can only be saved as it becomes the body of Christ by the transforming, regenerating revelation of Christ. If they are alive to God, they are “in Christ”, and thus part of His body sharing in the unity of the Spirit, equally with all saints, whether Jew or Gentile.

“But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit.” 1 Corinthians 6:17

In the natural order, there is a necessary and crucial distinction between Israel and the church, just as between male and female. But there is no distinction at all in the unity of the one new man, that is all who know the Lord, whether in times past, in this age, or in the millennial age to come.

This unity of the Spirit in the God-Man is not a new truth, but an old truth that has come to full light in the revelation of the mystery. (Remember this: something that is newly revealed, or has come to much greater light, does not mean that it did not exist before, just as the revelation of Jesus has brought much clearer light on the triune nature of the Godhead. Yet no one would say that such a new revelation created something that did not exist before).

In distinguishable contrast from the one new man of the Spirit, natural Israel and the supernatural preservation of Jewish identity throughout the generations, belongs to a corporate election that does not guarantee the salvation of any individual in the set-apart nation. Instead, precisely because of the covenant mandate, belonging to the Jewish race commends the covenant breaker to a “double” discipline, as foretold in scripture and witnessed throughout history.

So when Israel comes to faith on that day, they will be no less the living body of Christ, albeit with a unique and special calling, role, and stewardship to be lived out openly in the presence of the nations throughout the millennium.

Thus, the millennium exists primarily for this open covenant vindication and demonstration of every word and aspect of His everlasting covenant, to be lived out in literal detail before the nations and also the onlooking principalities and powers. This will show for a thousand years of open, fully visible demonstration that God was indeed able, not only to bring the people He first brought out of Egypt back into the Land, but now, because of an “everlasting righteousness” (namely, the righteousness of the Son), eternally secure to one and all, they will abide, preserved in holiness and peace in the Land, within the originally specified borders of the promise.

We are led then to infer, most necessarily based on 1 Cor 15:50-52, that all who come to faith during the millennium, with any who die in the Lord during the millennium, will be raised with their new body at the end of the millennium when the great transition to the new heavens and earth follows the final rebellion.

If that explanation does not fully satisfy every question, it is also to be considered that there is a mystery about time in the realm of the Spirit as it intersects with natural historical time. In any event, lingering questions must not be permitted to impose on the clarity of what the text plainly ‘SAYS’.

May the kind Shepherd, “come alongside”, and cause our hearts to burn within us, as He opens to us the Scriptures.

Reggie

WHO WERE THE PHILISTINES AFTER WHOM THE ROMANS NAMED PALESTINE?

Posted on by

The Philistines are first mentioned in the Table of Nations in Genesis 10. They descended from Noah’s son Ham, through his son Mizraim. The Hamitic people spread widely, settling across the Mediterranean region, Arabia, Mesopotamia, Anatolia (modern-day Turkey), Egypt, Libya, and Sudan. Yet, many of these people groups are enigmatic. For example, these are the people groups (note the plural -im ending in this list of names) who came from Mizraim (translated Egypt in the ESV):

Egypt (Mizraim) fathered Ludim, Anamim, Lehabim, Naphtuhim, Pathrusim, Casluhim (from whom the Philistines came), and Caphtorim. (Genesis 10:13–14)

The next mention of the Philistines is in the time of Abraham. He was living in southern Canaan, in the environs of Beersheba. Water was (and is) scarce in that region, so control over the water sources was important. Unsurprisingly, there were struggles between Abraham’s house (which probably numbered about 1,000 people at the time; and the Philistines who lived to the west: So they made a covenant at Beersheba. Then Abimelech and Phicol the commander of his army rose up and returned to the land of the Philistines. (Genesis 21:32) And Abraham sojourned many days in the land of the Philistines. (Genesis 21:34)

Abimelech is a name, but it is also a title. The Hebrew word ab (אב) means father and melech (מלך) means ‘king’, so the name Abimelech translates to ‘my father is king’. We are not yet told where this leader of the Philistines lives, but Abraham lived in Beersheba and at least visited a town to the west called Gerar. Abraham’s son Isaac also had dealings with the Philistines. In this case, however, we are given additional geographical details:

“Now there was a famine in the land, besides the former famine that was in the days of Abraham. And Isaac went to Gerar to Abimelech king of the Philistines.” (Genesis 26:1)

Since the name Abimelech can also be used as a title, this is not necessarily the same person that Abraham knew. But note that Abimelech is living in Gerar. This was a city situated northwest of Beersheba, on a different tributary within the same river system.

This explains much of the struggles the people were having about the control of water and why a treaty was needed. Abraham’s large contingent of people was in direct competition with the Philistines in the neighboring Gerar Valley.

In Genesis 26, we have the famous account of Rebecca being stolen by Abimelech (just like Sarah had been [Genesis 20]), the account of the Philistines stopping up Isaac’s wells due to jealousy of his large household and large flocks, and the account of how Isaac re-dug the wells.

We do not hear of the Philistines again until the Exodus, where the Israelites are told to not take the short route out of Egypt “by way of the Philistines” (Exodus 13:17). Later, the “sea of the Philistines” (i.e., the Mediterranean) was used as a boundary for the Promised Land (Exodus 23:31). Strangely, in Exodus 23, 24, and 33, when listing the nations that are to be displaced, no mention of Philistines is made.

A confusing array of tribes and nations

The term ‘Canaanites’ is used inclusively to describe the many tribes and groups that were living in the land of Canaan. The term ‘Philistines’ also describes a panoply of people groups living in Canaan. It is not always easy to separate the two terms and it is not always clear to which of the main groups one of the subgroups (e.g., the Pelethites discussed below) belong.

First, there were many non-Canaanite nations in the area, many of whom were Semitic:

  • To the northeast lived the Aramaeans, named for Aram, a son of Shem. Their home base was the city of Damascus.
  • When Abraham first moved into Israel, he was accompanied by his nephew, Lot. Lot’s sons were Moab and Ammon. The Moabites and Ammonites lived to the east of the Jordan River.
  • Abraham himself had several sons. His first, Ishmael, gave rise to the Ishmaelites, a collection of 12 main tribes (Genesis 17:20) that also lived on the east side of the Jordan River.
  • Abraham’s second son, Isaac, had two sons of his own, Jacob and Esau. Edom was another name for Esau. Like the others, the Edomites lived east of the Jordan.
  • Abraham had more sons later in life. One of those was Midian. When Joseph’s brothers sold him into slavery, in one verse the Bible says they sold him to both Midianite and Ishmaelite traders (Genesis 37:28). Ishmael was the older brother of Midian. The two were living in the same region and their names were beginning to be comingled even at this early date.
  • There were additional tribes that claimed Ham as their main patriarch (e.g., Sabtah and Sabteca), but these Arabian tribes do not factor into the story much.
  • Next were the many Canaanite nations and tribes. Only two of Canaan’s sons are named (Sidon and Heth). The other tribes are ‘Canaanite’, but we cannot know how they connect.
  • Hamath was a city to the northeast of Israel on the bank of the Euphrates River. The Hamathite territory was included in the ‘land’ promised to Abraham and which was later controlled by the Israelites under David and Solomon.
  • To the northwest were the Phoenician cities of Tyre and Sidon. These are not named among the nations that were to be displaced, but Sidon was a son of Canaan.
  • The Hittites were another Canaanite tribe. Their center of operations was in northern Israel. Bathsheba’s husband Uriah was a Hittite. It is unclear if the ancient Hittite empire that was centered in Anatolia was named after these people.
  • The term ‘Amorite’ occurs frequently in ancient histories. They ranged widely. The Bible says they came from Canaan. In Scripture, we see them living on both sides of the Jordan. Og, king of Bashan, and Sihon, king of Heshbon, were Amorite leaders who lived on the east side of the Jordan and were defeated in battle (Numbers 21:21–35). The Amorites also figure heavily in the initial invasion of Canaan because the Israelite route went from Jericho up into the Amorite territory on the west side of the Jordan (e.g., Joshua 10:5).
  • The Jebusites lived in and around the future city of Jerusalem. They are also associated with Amorites.

There were other people in the area for whom we have little information. Some were of great stature, specifically the Rephaim (Deuteronomy 3:11) and the Anakim. The Rephaim were driven out of the area on the east side of the Jordan by the Ammonites before the Israelites entered Canaan (Deuteronomy 2:20–21). The Valley of Rephaim that led down from Jerusalem to the coastal plain (Joshua 18:16) may have been named for them. The Avvim and the Geshurites were additional enigmatic tribes, but they lived between Mt Hermon and the Sea of Galilee. The mother of two of David’s children (Absalom and Tamar) was Maacah, the daughter of Talmai the king of Geshur. (2 Samuel 3:3, 13:1)

Finally, we have the Philistines. In the book of Joshua, we learn that the Israelites were unable to conquer Gaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Gath, and Ekron, the five-city “pentapolis” of the Philistines (Joshua 13:2–3). That region was controlled by the Philistines throughout the time of the Judges (e.g., the first period of Israelite rule after the Exodus; see Judges 3:3). For example, Shamgar famously killed 300 Philistines with an ox goad (Judges 3:31), and Samson had many dealings with them (Judges 14–16). There are many mentions of them throughout the books of 1 and 2 Samuel (e.g., Goliath was called a Gittite, that is, he was a Philistine from the city of Gath). They are also mentioned frequently in the prophets (e.g., Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Amos, Obadiah, and Zephaniah). For example:

“Are you not like the Cushites to me, O people of Israel?” declares the Lord. “Did I not bring up Israel from the land of Egypt, and the Philistines from Caphtor and the Syrians from Kir?”. Amos 9:7

Note here that Amos, who lived in the 8th century BC says the Philistines came from Capthor (Crete). Jeremiah, who was writing about 100 years after Amos, confirms where they came from:

“… because of the day that is coming to destroy all the Philistines, to cut off from Tyre and Sidon every helper that remains. For the Lord is destroying the Philistines, the remnant of the coastland of Caphtor.”. Jeremiah 47:4

Answering the riddle of the Philistines

The solution to these many puzzles is that there seems to be two different people groups called ‘Philistines’ in the Bible. The latter Philistines were indeed from Crete, but these may not have been the same Philistines that Abraham knew. In fact, the Bible records a population displacement in this very area:

As for the Avvim, who lived in villages as far as Gaza, the Caphtorim, who came from Caphtor, destroyed them and settled in their place. (Deuteronomy 2:23)

The book of Deuteronomy was written right before the Israelites invaded Canaan (~1406 BC). Thus, these new people (1) came to the area from Crete sometime between the time of Isaac and the time of Moses, a span of about 300 years. But the Bible refers to a group called the Avvim who lived in the area where the Philistines are also said to have lived.

Yet, the earlier record from Genesis does not claim they were from Capthor (although their relatives, the Capthorim, were). About 1,500 years later, the Bible claims they were. Thus, we have some confusion as to who these earlier Philistines were. If they came from Capthor, when? And, if they had come prior to the time of Abraham, why would that still be important more than a millennium and a half later?

It is strange that the Philistines are not mentioned in the ‘land’ promised to Abraham. Neither are they mentioned by the spies who searched out the land 40 years prior to the invasion of Canaan: But who were these later Philistines of David’s time? In the historical record, the enigmatic Sea Peoples attempted to invade Egypt during the reign of Ramses 111 ( 19th Dynasty, approximately 1186-1155 BC). This would have been during the period of the Judges, almost 300 years after the Exodus, and Israel had long been established as a nation. Their failed invasion was famously depicted on the walls of Ramses 111’s mortuary temple (Medinet Habu), but the diagram includes animals and women in the scene. Thus, the Sea People were not attacking; they were migrating. About the same time, we witness the end of the HIttite, Mycenaean, and Mitanni empires in the Mediterranean region. The reasons for all the upheaval are unknown, and we cannot seperate cause and effect (e.g., were the Sea People marauders, or were they seeking to escape some other group of attackers?). The Egyptian records claim that Rameses forcibly settled the survivors in southwest Cannaan, right where the ‘Philistine‘ cities were in Abraham’s day.

After Canaan had been successfully invaded by the Israelites, the Bible describes many of the people who had yet to be conquered. These include Philistines, Geshurites, the Avvim, and others:

“Now Joshua was old and advanced in years, and the Lord said to him, “You are old and advanced in years, and there remains yet very much land to possess. This is the land that yet remains: all the regions of the Philistines, and all those of the Geshurites (from the Shihor, which is east of Egypt, northward to the boundary of Ekron, it is counted as Canaanite; there are five rulers of the Philistines, those of Gaza, Ashdod, Ashkelon, Gath, and Ekron), and those of the Avvim, in the south, all the land of the Canaanites, and Mearah that belongs to the Sidonians, to Aphek, to the boundary of the Amorites, and the land of the Gebalites, and all Lebanon, toward the sunrise, from Baal-gad below Mount Hermon to Lebo-hamath, all the inhabitants of the hill country from Lebanon to Misrephoth-maim, even all the Sidonians. I myself will drive them out from before the people of Israel.” (Joshua 13:1–6)

By the time of David, there were multiple foreign people groups in the land, and it is a bit confusing who was there first and who may have come later. Some of these groups are closely associated with the Philistines, e.g., the Geshurites:

This is the land that yet remains: all the regions of the Philistines, and all those of the Geshurites. (Joshua 13:3)

The Bible claims the Philistines were in Canaan from the time of Abraham to the time of the final Old Testament prophets. This places them in the land before the significant influx of pottery and DNA that is associated with the island of Crete. This does not mean the Bible is wrong about the early Philistines, however. There are several possible solutions, each of which is faithful to biblical history:

  • The earlier people were called Philistines by their contemporaries; the later people could have been given that name because they lived in Philistine territory.
  • The earlier people could have been given the name ‘Philistines’ retroactively because they lived in the area later dominated by the real Philistines.
  • The earlier and later Philistines were cousins or otherwise related by language or blood, so the new arrivals simply moved into a similar culture. In other words, they were both original ‘Philistines’, but can be distinguished by episodes of migration.

VIOLENCE AND WAR IS IN THE DNA OF HUMAN BEINGS

Posted on by

Violence and war seem to be in the DNA of human beings as far back as Cain and Abel. Practically from the beginning, the soil of Earth is tainted with the blood of both guilt and innocence.

Just 1600-plus years after Creation the violence on Earth grew so bad that God poured out His wrath upon the Earth with the global flood of Noah’s day. Billions of dead things buried all over the world (picture – fossil graveyard), including fossil fuels formed from dead vegetation are testimony enough of God’s judgement. Slow gradual change over billions of years did not produce fossils and fossil fuels.

“Now the earth was corrupt in God’s sight, and the earth was filled with violence. And God saw the earth, and behold, it was corrupt, for all flesh had corrupted their way on the earth. And God said to Noah, “I have determined to make an end of all flesh, for the earth is filled with violence through them.” Genesis 6:11-13

After the flood, it did not take long before God created the nations by confusing languages and ultimately, there was a people who made lawlessness and violence a sport: The Philistines. The most famous Philistine, of course, was Goliath the giant, who foolishly confronted the shepherd of Israel, David. When Rome desecrated and decimated Jerusalem 1,900 years ago, its final insult against Israel was to impose the name of Palestina, recalling Israel’s arch-enemy, the Philistines.

The commonly held view is that Hadrian officially renamed Judea Syria Palaestina after his Roman armies suppressed the Bar-Kokhba Revolt (the Second Jewish Revolt) in 135 C.E.; it was viewed as a move intended to sever the connection of the Jews to their historical homeland. However, Jewish writers such as Philo, in particular, and Josephus, who flourished while Judea was still formally in existence, used the name Palestine for the Land of Israel in their Greek works. The name Palestine, surprisingly, may have originated as a Greek pun on the translations of “Israel” and the “Land of the Philistines.” Regardless, Hadrian made it worse when he renamed Jerusalem—the already 1,000-year-old Jewish capital—Aelia Capitolina and turned it into a pagan city. Also, it must be remembered there were no Arabs in the land.

On October 7, the spirit of the Philistines rose through the Iranian proxy of Hamas, which means “violence” in the Hebrew Scriptures. No one can deny the massacre of October 7, especially since the murderers themselves recorded the atrocities. Yes, Hamas is so committed to its barbarism that its members took video of their invasion of a sovereign territory. They filmed its rage, which they took out on not only against the military, but innocent civilians. They bludgeoned, burned, beheaded babies. They raped women before murdering them.

God’s Word, the Bible reveals that we are fast approaching the time when God will pour out His wrath again upon an unrepentant world with the Trumpet (Revelation 8) and Bowl (Revelation 16) judgements.

“Now the seven angels who had the seven trumpets prepared to blow them. The first angel blew his trumpet, and there followed hail and fire, mixed with blood, and these were thrown upon the earth. And a third of the earth was burned up, and a third of the trees were burned up, and all green grass was burned up. The second angel blew his trumpet, and something like a great mountain, burning with fire, was thrown into the sea,… Revelation 8:6-8

“Then I heard a loud voice from the temple telling the seven angels, “Go and pour out on the earth the seven bowls of the wrath of God.” So the first angel went and poured out his bowl on the earth, and harmful and painful sores came upon the people who bore the mark of the beast and worshiped its image... Revelation 16:1-2

What will people do when God pours out His wrath upon the Earth? At the final Bowl judgement (Seveth) they cursed God because the plague was so severe.

“And great hailstones, about one hundred pounds each, fell from heaven on people; and they cursed God for the plague of the hail because the plague was so severe.” Revelation 16:21

HAMAS’S INVASION OF ISRAEL IS AN IMPORTANT END TIMES EVENT

Posted on by

Since October 7, the war between Israel and the terrorist group Hamas has steadily caused ruin and demise — even beyond the Middle East.

The trauma Hamas inflicted upon the Israeli people during the initial attack including the “massacred” neighborhoods, the burning of houses and people, and loved ones ripped away by “a murderous regime.” means Israel has no option but to proceed with the war until Hamas is eliminated no matter how long it takes and the cost, economic and political. Sadly, we are already seeing any goodwill Israel had in the International Community being eroded. It is hard to comprehend the size of marches for the Palestinians and the vehement antisemitism being expressed in most Western Countries. It is not only Muslims marching but many young Westerners.

What about the media? In Australia, journalists signed a group letter in 2021 demanding that journalists be allowed to be activists for Palestinians against their Israeli oppressors – and it has flowered since the October 7 massacre by Hamas terrorists.

Despite what horror Hamas inflicted on women and children, within days, even hours, there were petitions circulating and group letters, signed by journalists, that branded Israel a colonialist apartheid state and excused the October 7 horrors by providing “context” or simply ignoring them. All subsequent petitions, group letters, and statements from every conceivable and inconceivable group, such as Queers for Palestine, have followed the formula of these initial letters and petitions.

The latest one, signed by 300 journalists and approved by the Media, Entertainment & Arts Alliance, the journalists union, is in many ways just a rehash of all the letters and petitions that preceded it. It is confirmation of the fact the contagion is real: a significant number of journalists see themselves as warriors for a cause, the cause of the oppressed Palestinian people, occupied for 75 years by a racist white supremacist state that is perpetrating genocide in Gaza. What this means, in effect, is a call for reporting that is not open and fact-based at all but based on the simplistic and distorted view of Israelis and their Jewish fellow travellers as ruthless and heartless oppressors of the powerless and victimised Palestinian people.

When you consider the amount of land Israel occupies compared to the Muslim countries that surround it you realize that what the Bible tells us, that it is not about the land, it is a spiritual war that is raging, and as prophesied, the only way it will end is when Jesus returns to defeat all the nations against Israel at the battle of Armageddon.

“Behold, a day is coming for the Lord… I will gather all the nations against Jerusalem to battle… Then the Lord will go out and fight against those nations as when he fights on a day of battle. On that day his feet shall stand on the Mount of Olives that lies before Jerusalem on the east, and the Mount of Olives shall be split in two from east to west by a very wide valley, so that one-half of the Mount shall move northward, and the other half southward.” Zechariah 14:1-4

“Then I saw heaven opened, and behold a white horse! The one sitting on it is called Faithful and True, and in righteousness, he judges and makes war… And the armies of heaven, arrayed in fine linen, white and pure, were following him on white horses. From his mouth comes a sharp sword with which to strike down the nations, and he will rule them with a rod of iron. He will tread the winepress of the fury of the wrath of God the Almighty. On his robe and on his thigh He has a name written, King of kings and Lord of lords.” Revelation 19:11,14-16

“Then I saw an angel standing in the sun, and with a loud voice he called to all the birds that fly directly overhead, come, gather for the great supper of God, to eat the flesh of kings, the flesh of captains, the flesh of mighty men, the flesh of horses and their riders, and the flesh of all men, both free and slave, both small and great.” And I saw the beast and the kings of the earth with their armies gathered to make war against him who was sitting on the horse and against his army. And the beast was captured, and with it the false prophet who in its presence had done the signs by which he deceived those who had received the mark of the beast and those who worshiped its image. These two were thrown alive into the lake of fire that burns with sulfur. And the rest were slain by the sword that came from the mouth of him who was sitting on the horse, and all the birds were gorged with their flesh.” Revelation 19:18-21

TRUTH ABOUT ISRAEL AND RECENT EVENTS

Posted on by

CONTENT OF VIDEO – Vlad Savchuk interviews Joel Richardson on recent events: Hamas invading Israel and how this fits with end times prophecies – Antichrist & Israel War.

1. Intro 1:04 – Why do Christians stand in opposition to supporting Israel?

2, 5:35 – It is never justifiable to inflict genocide

3. 16:22 – Jewish identity is not just all about the bloodline

4. 21:00 – What is the synagogue of satan?

5. 27:09 – What would you say to people who claim all of Jesus’ prophecies have already come to pass?

6. 37:12 – Has the futurist end-time view been embraced by the early church fathers?

7. 39:46 – Different views between preterists and futurists

8. 46:44 – Could you give examples of how some prophecies have matched history

9. 51:38 – Does the temple have to be built in order for Christ to come?

10. 59:10 – Biblical understanding and Jewish text concerning the battle that will bring the day of the Lord

11. 1:05:14 – Why is the antichrist most likely not a European leader?

Many great questions. You will need to watch the video to get the answers.

THE TRUTH ABOUT PALESTINE

Posted on by

The young Australian actor Nathaniel Buzolic is an exceptional example of someone who did his homework before making a decision and telling the world about it. In an interview that took place today on Israel’s Channel 13, Nathaniel mentioned that when he was growing up, he was familiar with the Israel-Palestinian narrative as it was told to him by Palestinians. But Nate was eager to learn the facts, asked the right questions, and even traveled to Israel to witness events with his own eyes. So the next time you see celebrities and influencers taking sides in any conflict, regardless of nation, religion, culture, or whatever, ask yourself if these people made even a fraction of the effort that Nathaniel Buzolic made. You know what? Ask yourself if any of the people you encounter on social media and in real life put in such efforts to understand why Nathaniel Buzolic eventually decided to bravely stand with Israel.

God has raised up Nathaniel for such a time as this. It is obvious that Nathaniel knows God and is doing what He requires of him by walking away from all of the worldly success he could have achieved as an actor.

Australian Actor Nathaniel Buzolic Interview in Israel’s Channel 13

Let’s remind ourselves just what happened three weeks ago. Two Gaza-based terrorist groups inspired by Islamist ideology, committed to the destruction of the state of Israel and backed by at least one government, staged an attack whose sadism and savagery exceeded even the horrors perpetrated by the Russian butchers of Bucha in Ukraine. The video evidence of their crimes, much of it recorded by the perpetrators, is horrifying. More than 1400 Israelis were killed, including children and even babies. More than 200 were kidnapped and are being held hostage. The idea that Israel should do nothing in response to this outrage – other than increase the flow of aid into Gaza – defies both human emotion and strategic sense. Only those wearing ideological blindfolds cannot see that.

WHAT’S NEXT FOR PLANET EARTH ON GOD’S AGENDA?

Posted on by

We already know how the next few years will play out. Why? Because the Bible, God’s Word is largely a book of prophecy. There are more than 1,000 Bible prophecies about Jesus’ second coming to Earth so I am sure God wants to prepare us for this event. Sadly, the religious leaders of the time of Jesus first coming to Earth misread it totally, not because of what the Scriptures said but because they wanted a Saviour from their Roman oppressors. They did not want the suffering servant depicted in Isaiah 53. What about the religious leaders of our day? Well, the Bible tells us that there will be a great falling away from true faith in the last days (apostasy) before Jesus returns. We see that already happening as many of the denominational/institutional churches have accepted gay marriage, and homosexual pastors/leaders. Look what Jesus told us would happen in the end times:

“Then they will deliver you up to tribulation and put you to death, and you will be hated by all nations for my name’s sake. And then many will fall away and betray one another and hate one another. And many false prophets will arise and lead many astray. And because lawlessness will be increased, the love of many will grow cold.” Matthew 24:9-12

Are you taking these words of Jesus seriously? You should, because the re-establishment of the nation of Israel 75 years ago was the first major end-times prophecy fulfilled. The Bible clearly tells us that Jesus’ second coming to Earth is to rescue the nation of Israel at the battle of Armageddon when all the armies of many nations come against Israel. Israel did not exist as a nation prior to 1948 so all the end times prophecies which are Israel and Middle East-centered made no earthly sense. Its rebirth was miraculous and God has sustained it miraculously ever since despite Satan’s desperate efforts to destroy it.

The good news is that what’s next for this planet is Jesus’ Millennial reign on this earth for one thousand years, The earth will then have had six thousand years of man’s rule under Satan’s dominion. It is still to have 1,000 years with Jesus ruling the nations with the glorified Saints so that the covenants God made with Abraham, David, and the New Covenant (Jeremiah 31:31-34) can be fulfilled. Israel will finally be the leading nation in the world with its Messiah ruling from a magnificent new Jerusalem.

During Jesus’ Millennial reign, Satan is bound in the Abyss but God allows him to come out at the end of the thousand years and he is still able to gather an army whose number is like the sand of the sea. I often wondered why during Jesus’ Millennial reign, He and the Saints have to rule the nations with a “rod of iron” until I read the following Scripture.

“And when the thousand years are ended, Satan will be released from his prison and will come out to deceive the nations that are at the four corners of the earth, Gog and Magog, to gather them for battle; their number is like the sand of the sea. And they marched up over the broad plain of the earth and surrounded the camp of the saints and the beloved city, but fire came down from heaven and consumed them, and the devil who had deceived them was thrown into the lake of fire and sulfur where the beast and the false prophet were, and they will be tormented day and night forever and ever.” Revelation 20:7-10

END TIMES PROPHESIED WARS & RUMOURS OF WARS

Posted on by

World on alert as call for vengeance ignites fear of Armageddon

This headline appeared in THE AUSTRALIAN (newspaper) on Friday, October 20th, 2023.

How the tables of world opinion can turn. It has taken an enormity of an appalling nature in Gaza – the bombing of the Al-Ahli Arab Hospital. Hamas claims Israel is responsible for the bombing. Israel and US President Joe Biden claim it was a misfired rocket from Gaza Strip’s Islamic Jihad. The Israeli Defence Forces has produced footage it claims dispels a “global media campaign” from Hamas terrorists to inflame the ­region over the hospital tragedy. Muslims can lie to infidels. it is in the Koran so I know who I believe. Hamas is using its incompetence (a misfired rocket) to fuel rage among supporters of Palestine.

Quran 3:54, og Quran 8:30; “Allah is the most accomplished liar and deceiver.”

The hospital carnage and suffering have resulted in a tinder box of horror and rage, particularly in Muslim nations and among supporters of Palestinians. There are calls for a worldwide uprising, for vengeance, for retribution. Who could possibly benefit from letting loose a bloody and global maelstrom of death and destruction? One abhorrent truth is that there are those who do see it as in their interests to fan and release such an Armageddon.

HAMAS ATTACK ON ISRAEL

They weren’t hunting for Israelis, much less for soldiers; they were hunting for Jews. Their instructions were simple: kill as many as you can. Nor were the civilian casualties collateral damage: they were the objective. And maiming babies, butchering children, raping women, and defiling corpses wasn’t the work of a handful of sadists; they were a pervasive feature of the operation.

At least the Einsatzgruppen – the Nazi brigades who murdered nearly half a million Jews in a matter of months, forcing their victims to stand naked at the edge of mass graves before shooting them through the head – tried to hide their crimes, showing they had some inkling of breaching morality’s fundamental principles. Hamas’s killers did the opposite: they videoed their atrocities and posted them – to howls of joy that echoed from Gaza to Lakemba – on the internet.

Only one word can describe these people: evil. To use the term may seem as anachronistic as speaking of abomination, uncleanness or iniquity. Even the Oxford English Dictionary tells us “evil” has been “commonly superseded, in familiar speech, by “bad”. But exactly as we know good from bad, so we can differentiate evil from ordinary wickedness – and this was it.

“Radical evil”, thought Immanuel Kant, is ultimately incomprehensible: to explain human action, he argued, is to appeal to good reasons; and there can never be good reasons for murdering babies, mutilating toddlers, and disfiguring the dead. However, even if we can’t make that evil intelligible, we can capture its essence: the denial of the victim’s humanity.

Thus, just as the Nazis believed Jews were less than human, so the Islamists, gripped in their death cult, refuse to acknowledge that Jews have the moral standing that would protect them from humiliation, degradation, or extermination. And just as it was absolutely impossible for the Allies to make peace with Hitler, so it is absolutely impossible to make peace with Hamas.

Hamas knew that Israel, as it grieved its dead, would be faced with a choiceless choice. And Hamas also knew it could maximize the scale of the tragedy by placing rocket launchers in schools, hiding its command centres in hospitals, and preventing Palestinians from fleeing to safety. Its goal, since it was founded in 1987, has never been to protect civilians; it has always used them as shields, compounding its crimes against humanity. Now, as Gaza yet again groans in seas of blood, the Palestinians losing their lives are Hamas’s victims every bit as surely as their Israeli counterparts.

Much of the Bible (God’s Word) is prophecy. It even reveals how God will end His story of His Cosmos. The principal battle that has been raging from the beginning is a spiritual battle and it is centered around the nation that God established for His purposes, ISRAEL. The most significant end-times prophecy was the re-establishment of Israel as a nation in 1948 and since that time Satan has been doing his utmost to destroy it. We are fast approaching the prophesied last seven years prior to Jesus’ return to rescue His nation at the battle of Armageddon.

“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places.” Ephesians 6:12

“For they are demonic spirits, performing signs, who go abroad to the kings of the whole world, to assemble them for battle on the great day of God the Almighty… And they assembled them at the place that in Hebrew is called Armageddon.” Revelation 16:14,16

THE TRUTH ABOUT THE HAMAS INVASION

Posted on by

This invasion of Israel was not a protest march that got out of hand. It was not a complaint about living conditions. It was the latest war launched by Palestinians to demonstrate their unwillingness to share the land. And it cannot win. If the world wants peace in the Middle East, it must ensure that what Hamas has done is not rewarded in any way. Only once the failure of such violence is obvious to them and to the Palestinian people will it ever stop.

The murderous rampage of Hamas, the killing, the raping, the kidnapping, is so shocking, so sickening it seems almost frivolous to say that it was also ironic. The apologists for this action suggest that Israel’s security measures – its fence, its border posts, its searches – are so oppressive that they are part of what is to blame for what has happened. Yet these terrible acts show that the security measures were necessary. In fact, they were inadequate to prevent this slaughter.

WHERE SHOULD THE JEWS GO?

Thomas Keneally tells this story in his book Schindler’s Ark, a volume that recounts one of the Holocaust’s most extraordinary stories. But sadly there was nothing exceptional about this exchange. At the end of the war, of those Jews who survived, very few could ever go home. Certainly nobody in my family did. And it was that – the many hundreds of thousands of displaced Jews with nowhere to go – that played a big role in changing my grandfather’s mind about Zionism. That, and the reflection that the experience of Jews over the previous decade had vindicated much of the Zionist argument.

The death and displacement of millions, including so many who were close to him, made him a pragmatic supporter of a state of Israel. It seemed to him obvious that there had to be an answer to the question asked by the Brinnlitz prisoners. Where do we go now? My paternal grandfather, also not a Zionist before the war, felt the same.

So we became a Zionist family, having never been one. We did not move to Israel because (unlike many others) we had alternatives. But we supported its creation, regarding it as an obvious necessity. A century of slaughter and oppression of Jews, culminating in the Holocaust, had made the case for a safe space for Jews unanswerable. And the repeated failings of other states to open themselves to Jews, even when they knew of mass murder, meant that this safe space would have to be a Jewish state.

And the United Nations reached the same conclusion. In 1947, having toured Palestine and visited Jewish refugee camps in Europe, it proposed to divide the land between Jews and Palestinian Arabs with a state for each. The Jews accepted, the Arab states launched a war. And the Palestinians are still fighting this partition plan.

Like my grandfather in 1927, I understand why the Palestinians did not want to share the land. But like my grandfather in 1947, I cannot see any choice but sharing. And while sharing is rejected by the Palestinians I cannot see any choice but to resist – stubbornly and absolutely and, when necessary, with force, even great force. For Israel must be defended. The question of Brinnlitz remains – where else are we to go?

This then is the question to put to anyone who says they are “pro Palestine” or wish a “Free Palestine” or waves the Palestinian flag. Do you mean in a state alongside Israel, within safe borders? In which case, yes, there is much to talk about. Even though it’s difficult and both sides have debating points that are hard to get past, yes, let’s talk. Or do you mean a state instead of Israel? In which case, no, definitely and firmly not.

Forty five per cent of the world’s Jews now live in Israel. Where else are they to go?

Keneally’s argument does not address the real story of who owns the land. God owns the land and He gave it to Israel. Also, God has told us how the story ends: Jesus will rule all the nations of the Earth from Jerusalem. Israel will be the ruling nation on Earth for 1000 years (Jesus Millennial Kingdom).