Israel as Central to God's End Time Plan

The other day Duarte and I were discussing the role of Israel in God’s plan which spurred me on to listen to a session by Wes Hall on the topic. Here’s some notes and reflections from One Thing 2006 – Israel in God’s End Time Plan.

Isaiah 62:6--7 – “I have posted watchmen on your walls, O Jerusalem; they will never be silent day or night. You who call on the Lord give yourselves no rest; and give him no rest until he establishes Jerusalem and makes her the praise of the earth.”

I. All Believers are called to pray for Israel

There are some people that God has given a special calling as watchmen over the city of Jerusalem. Their calling is to cry out day and night for God to restore His covenant people. But in verse 7 we see something interesting, “you who call on the Lord give yourselves no rest.” You who call on the Lord, this is anyone who calls on the name of Jesus. This applies to ALL of us who have faith in the Lord. We are called to pray, to give him no rest until he establishes Jerusalem as the praise of the earth. Why should we be praying for one dusty city in the Middle East? Should we not be focusing our prayers on our own cities? Should we not focus on energies praying for revival within our local churches? Why does God call his people to cry out for Jerusalem? Why is God so adamant that we give him no rest, and that he himself not rest, until this city is the praise of the earth?

Throughout the Word of God we can find the answers to these queries. God’s ultimate purpose is to glorify himself, yes, and by glorifying Jerusalem he does just that. Why? Because God is serious about keeping His promises. God made a promise to Abraham not just concerning spiritual matters but concerning a specific piece of real estate. God has set his affection on Jerusalem, the actual city. God made many promises to Israel, and he will watch to see that all of those promises are fulfilled. We, as Gentiles, are grafted into the promises given to Abraham. If God has rejected Israel, then we have no redemption. God has chosen to make himself known in the earth by revealing himself through history and by making a covenant with a specific group of people. The covenant God made with Abraham still subsists today. The new covenant does not leave the Jewish people and replace them with the Gentile church. New branches must be grafted into the original plant, otherwise the new branches will have no roots and will surely perish. Yes, the old dry branches will be cut off, but the plant must not be uprooted completely or we as Gentiles have no promise to share in. We must partake in the promises of God alongside Israel. When God establishes Jerusalem and makes her the praise of the earth He will be dwelling among men and his glory will fill the whole earth.

II. God is Zealous for Israel and for Jerusalem in a special way

Zechariah 1:14 “This is what the Lord Almighty says, ‘I am very jealous for Jerusalem and Zion…”

Zechariah 8: 2-3 “This is what the Lord Almighty says: ‘I am very jealous for Zion; I am burning with jealousy for her.’ This is what the Lord says: ‘I will return to Zion and dwell in Jerusalem. Then Jerusalem will be called the City of Truth, and the mountain of the Lord Almighty will be called the Holy Mountain.”

God has tied his gory to Jerusalem. He will make this city the capital of the earth. His activity in Zion is connected with redeeming the whole of mankind. The center of his redemptive plan is Jerusalem and his covenant people.

II. God will use the Gentile church to awaken Israel to jealousy

Paul writes to the Gentile church in Rome concerning Israel.

Rom 9:2 “I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart. For I could wish that I myself were cursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, those of my own race, the people Israel. Theirs is the adoption as sons; theirs the divine glory, the covenants, the receiving of the law, the temple worship and the promises. Theirs are the patriarchs, and from them is traced the human ancestry of Christ, who is God over all, forever praised! Amen.

Rom 10:1 “Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for the Israelites is that they may be saved.”

Rom 11:1 “I ask then: Did God reject his people? By no means!”

Rom 11:11-12: “Again I ask, Did they stumble so as to fall beyond recovery? Not at all! Rather, because of their transgression, salvation has come to the Gentiles to make Israel envious. But if their transgression means riches for the world, and their loss means riches for Gentiles, how much greater riches will their fullness bring!”

Isaiah 49:22-23 “This is what the Sovereign Lord says: ‘See I will beckon to the Gentiles, I will lift up a banner to the peoples; they will bring your sons in their arms and carry your daughters on their shoulders. Kings will be your foster fathers, and their queens your nursing mothers. They will bow down before you with their faces to the ground; they will lick the dust at your feet. Then you will know that I am the Lord; those who hope in me will not be disappointed.”

Israel will not come to salvation apart from the witness and zeal of the Gentile church.

IV. God’s redemption of the earth is dependent upon Israel’s redemption

Eph 1:9-10 “And he made known to us the mystery of his will according to his good pleasure, which he purposed in Christ, to be put into effect when the times will have reached their fulfillment – to bring all things together under one head, even Christ.”

Acts 3:21 “He must remain in heaven until the time comes for God to restore everything, as he promised long ago through his holy prophets.”

Jesus will remain in heaven until the earth is ready to receive him. Before Jesus can come back, the Spirit and the Bride must call him, (Rev 22:17) and his covenant people Israel invite him back to Jerusalem as their king and Messiah.

Matt 23:37-39 “O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, you who kill the prophets and stone those sent to you, how often I have longed to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under wings, but you were not willing. Look, your house is left to you desolate. For I tell you you will not see me again until you say, ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’”

In this passage, Jesus is addressing the city of Jerusalem. When he says “you will not see me again until YOU say,” this applies to Jerusalem and her children. Jesus longs to gather together the natural children of Israel who have been chosen as his elect. Before Jesus can come back, Israel must acknowledge him as king and say ‘Blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord.’ Jerusalem who has for so long scorned the prophets and run after other lovers, must acknowledge that Jesus is coming in the name of the Lord and that he is their long awaited Messiah.

Satan has been trying to work with this loophole. As he knows the Jewish people must invite Jesus back to reign on king David’s throne in Jerusalem, he is determined to extinguish the Jewish people and the city that God plans to reign from over the whole earth.

V. God will restore Israel as a nation

Isaiah 11:9-12, 16 “…for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the Lord as the waters covers the sea. In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his place of rest will be glorious. In that day the Lord will reach out his hand a second time to reclaim the remnant that is left of his people from Assyria, from Lower Egypt, from Upper Egypt, from Cush, from Elam, from Babylonia, from Hamath and from the islands of the sea. He will raise a banner to the nations and gather the exiles of Israel, he will assemble the scattered people of Judah from the four quarters of the earth….There will be a highway for the remnant of his people that is left from Assyria, as there was for Israel when they came up from Egypt.”

Isaiah 35:8,10 “And a highway will be there; it will be called the Way of Holiness. The unclean will not journey on it; it will be for those who walk in the Way; wicked fools will not go about on it…But only the redeemed will walk there, and the ransomed of the Lord will return. They will enter Zion with singing; everlasting joy will crown their heads. Gladness and joy will overtake them, and sorrow and sighing will flee away.”

Isaiah 49:5-6 “And now the Lord says – he who formed me in the womb to be his servant to bring Jacob back to him and gather Israel to himself, for I am honored in the eyes of the Lord and my God has been my strength, he says: “It is too small a thing for you to be my servant to restore the tribes of Jacob and bring back those of Israel I have kept. I will also make you a light for the Gentiles, that you may bring salvation to the ends of the earth.”


VI. Praying for Israel in God’s end time plan

Joel 2:15-17 (not all quoted here), “Let them say, ‘Spare your people O Lord. Do not make your inheritance an object of scorn”

We are called to declare fasts and call sacred assemblies. We must cry out for justice night and day and ask God to make his dwelling among men. We must ask God to spare his people Israel and bring complete redemption to men by fulfilling his purposes on the earth. If God’s people are an object of scorn then God is not a God who keeps his promises and is therefore a liar. If God is a liar who breaks promises then he has no place to judge Satan, the prince of lies, and he has no place to take his throne. God desires to restore the whole earth, not only mankind. He had five days of creation before he created man. He desires to restore everything, plants, flowers, mountains, animals, to the way that he created it to be before the fall of man. When God created he said, “It is good.” When he is ruling and reigning on the earth he must be able to say, “It is good” about everything he created and therefore everything must be restored. If we desire to see God glorified in all the earth we must pray for the redemption of Israel and of Jerusalem.

Joel 2:28-32 “And afterward, I will pour out my spirit on all people. Your sons and daughters will prophesy, your old men will dream dreams, your young men will see visions. Even on my servants, both men and women, I will pour out my spirit in those days. I will show wonders in the heavens and on the earth, blood and fire and billows of smoke. The sun will be turned to darkness and the moon to blood before the coming of the great and dreadful day of the Lord. And everyone who calls on the name of the Lord will be saved; for on Mount Zion and in Jerusalem there will be deliverance, as the Lord has said, among the survivors, whom the Lord calls.”

Afterward, after the worldwide movement of prayer, fasting and solemn assemblies calling God to come back and redeem his people. God will not be at rest, he will display his zeal in supernatural signs and wonders. What will be the result of this? All who call on the name of the Lord will be saved and there will be deliverance in Zion.

The prayer movement --> renewal and revival in the church --> provoking Israel to jealousy --> redemption and deliverance in Israel --> invitation by the Jewish people of Jesus to come back and rule --> Jesus comes back in a hostile takeover of the earth --> God dwells among men and rules on earth --> redemption and deliverance in all the earth à God’s glory will fill the whole earth as the waters cover the sea

For more info see www.ihop.org and check out Wes Hall’s teachings on the theology of Israel.