A FRIENDLY WARNING TO THOSE WHO HATE JEWS AND ISRAEL

 

 

I have stayed away from this subject for decades. I didn’t want anything to interfere with my newly-found identity in my Savior Jesus. My Jewish identity had been all-embracing. It had even led me to live in Israel for three years.

However, now that most of the world hates Israel and the Jews and wants to see their destruction, I can no longer remain silent. I must insist that they are opposing the Creator who has chosen the Jewish people:

·       ”But now I will not deal with the remnant of this people [Israel] as in the former days, declares the Lord of hosts. For there shall be a sowing of peace. The vine shall give its fruit, and the ground shall give its produce, and the heavens shall give their dew. And I will cause the remnant of this people to possess all these things. And as you have been a byword of cursing among the nations, O house of Judah and house of Israel, so will I save you, and you shall be a blessing. Fear not, but let your hands be strong.” For thus says the Lord of hosts: “As I purposed to bring disaster to you when your fathers provoked me to wrath, and I did not relent, says the Lord of hosts, so again have I purposed in these days to bring good to Jerusalem and to the house of Judah; fear not”... The inhabitants of one city shall go to another, saying, ‘Let us go at once to entreat the favor of the Lord and to seek the Lord of hosts; I myself am going.’ Many peoples and strong nations shall come to seek the Lord of hosts in Jerusalem and to entreat the favor of the Lord. Thus says the Lord of hosts: “In those days ten men from the nations of every tongue shall take hold of the robe of a Jew, saying, ‘Let us go with you, for we have heard that God is with you.’” (Zechariah 8:11-15, 21-23)

To continue in your hatred is to resist God and to harden your heart, further condemning yourselves:

·       “And I will enter into judgment with them there, on behalf of my people and my heritage Israel…Egypt shall become a desolation and Edom a desolate wilderness, for the violence done to the people of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land. But Judah shall be inhabited forever, and Jerusalem to all generations. I will avenge their blood, blood I have not avenged, for the Lord dwells in Zion.” (Joel 3:1, 19-21)

There are many verses like these in the Hebrew Scriptures but also in the New Testament:

·       Lest you be wise in your own sight, I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers: a partial hardening has come upon Israel, until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And in this way all Israel will be saved, as it is written, “The Deliverer will come from Zion, he will banish ungodliness from Jacob; and this will be my covenant with them when I take away their sins.” As regards the gospel, they are enemies for your sake. But as regards election, they are beloved for the sake of their forefathers. For the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable. (Romans 11:25-29)

Therefore, I urge you to seek peace with Israel and with Israel’s God, the Messiah, in whom you will find everlasting peace.

 

DOES SCIENCE PROVE THE NATURAL?

 

Does science provide any evidence for the existence of anything natural—what exists and occurs naturally—as the atheist claims? Not in the slightest! Instead, in every way, even science points to its Creator. If this is God’s world, this leaves no room for anything that had occurred naturally. We are surrounded by evidences of His Intelligent design:

1. The profound elegance of its laws (e=mc2, Demonstrating the Unity of all Creation)

2. Their Immutability in a World of Continual Change, suggesting that it is sustained by the Transcendent ID

3. Their Harmony, Predictability and Universality (they operate the same way throughout the world, transcending all geographic boundaries)

4. The Stability and Beauty of its objects (atoms, molecules do not fly apart) and Laws governing how they Interact.

5. The Minds, Math, and Logic enabling us to Comprehend the Evidence for Creation

Must we then bring these truths back to the Gospel? I think so! Ignorance of these truths is a willful and culpable rejection of the obvious—an Intelligent Designer. It is also a self-imposed sentence of death--a desire to remain in the darkness.

 

DYING TO SELF

 

We talk about dying-to-self and the never-ending quest to prove our personal worth, to make-it, and to look good in the eyes of others. However, are we able and willing and to surrender the desire to be the center of attention, admired, successful, and affirmed? Certainly not! These are life-controlling addictions, which we can barely see, and these control our minds. As difficult as it might be to break our addiction to cigarettes, such addictions are external rather than our very heart, mind, and kidneys. I am convinced that it would be easier stop breathing than to break these cravings to prove our worth. Consequently, it is often said that the narcissist cannot change. However, Jesus claimed that we must:

•    Luke 17:10 “So you also, when you have done all that you were commanded, say, ‘We are unworthy servants; we have only done what was our duty.’”

How can we consider ourselves as unworthy, when our entire life depends upon believing highly of ourselves in order to even function? We cannot as Jesus had taught:

•    John 15:4–6 Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit by itself, unless it abides in the vine, neither can you, unless you abide in me. I am the vine; you are the branches. Whoever abides in me and I in him, he it is that bears much fruit, for apart from me you can do nothing. If anyone does not abide in me he is thrown away like a branch and withers; and the branches are gathered, thrown into the fire, and burned.

If we trust in Him, the Father will prune us back so that we can bear good fruit:

•    John 15:1–2 “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.

As we learn self-despair, we begin to trust in Him to perform this needful and painful surgery to realize that it’s all about Him:

•    Galatians 2:20 I have been crucified with Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh I live by faith in the Son of God, who loved me and gave himself for me.

Our Savior purposely puts us in situations where our own confidence fails us, leaving only one alternative—to trust in Him exclusively:

•    Proverbs 3:5–7 Trust in the LORD with all your heart, and do not lean on your own understanding. In all your ways acknowledge him, and he will make straight your paths. Be not wise in your own eyes; fear the LORD, and turn away from evil.

We trust Him by also taking His medicine by turning from our old ways—and we are not alone in this:

•    1 Corinthians 10:12–13 Therefore let anyone who thinks that he stands take heed lest he fall. No temptation has overtaken you that is not common to man. God is faithful, and he will not let you be tempted beyond your ability, but with the temptation he will also provide the way of escape, that you may be able to endure it.

To trust in ourselves and to retain control is a burden too heavy to bare:

•    Jeremiah 17:5–7 Thus says the LORD: “Cursed is the man who trusts in man and makes flesh his strength, whose heart turns away from the LORD. He is like a shrub in the desert, and shall not see any good come. He shall dwell in the parched places of the wilderness, in an uninhabited salt land. “Blessed is the man who trusts in the LORD, whose trust is the LORD.”

Trusting in Jesus is a joy:

•    Psalm 33:20–21 Our soul waits for the LORD; he is our help and our shield. For our heart is glad in him, because we trust in his holy name.

•    Isaiah 26:3 You keep him in perfect peace whose mind is stayed on you, because he trusts in you.

What greater joy than knowing that He loves us and takes care of us (Romans 8:28). Consequently, we gladly surrender our sovereignty to Him, no longer wanting to be captain of our own ship:

•    Romans 5:8–10 but God shows his love for us in that while we were still sinners, Christ died for us. Since, therefore, we have now been justified by his blood, much more shall we be saved by him from the wrath of God. For if while we were enemies we were reconciled to God by the death of his Son, much more, now that we are reconciled, shall we be saved by his life.

Spiritual change is not like taking a shower. Although we are being transformed as our mind is being renewed (Romans 12:2), it requires patience and humbling for God’s truths to percolate from the surface throughout our being.

WHAT DRIVES THE ECONOMY AND WHY THE WEST IS FALTERING

 

In Truth and Transformation, Vishal Mangalwadi, an Indian economist, identified the central element for prosperity—morality. He explained why his India had long failed while the West had leaped forward. It was because of the West’s moral engine:

·       Swami Sivananda of the Divine Life Society summarized classic Hinduism in this way: “The world is neither good nor bad. The mind creates good and evil. Thinking makes it so. The evil is not in the world; it is in the mind.…If you become perfect [God] the world will appear good [perfect].”

Mangalwadi marveled at the irony:

·       For me the ironic fact is that while my culture teaches that each one of us is God, the Netherlands and England were built on the biblical idea that human beings are sinners and accountable to God. India’s religious philosophy taught that since the human soul was divine, it could not sin. In fact, our most rigorous religious philosophy teaches that everything is God. God is the only reality that exists, and therefore there is no ultimate distinction between good and evil, right and wrong.

Ironically, to regard oneself as a sinner in need of God’s grace and His moral standards became the antidote to corruption and the way forward. Consequently, none were above criticism. Instead, critical thought is necessary for growth and advancement.

Without God’s objective moral standards, moral relativism reigned in Mangalwadi’s India with disastrous effects:

·       You don’t grow fruits or vegetables, or keep chickens or rabbits, because they will be stolen. A mango from India sells for as much as three dollars in America. Growing mangoes or guavas alone could lift whole families out of poverty. But if hardworking peasants grew good mangoes and guavas, the higher castes would come and take them. If the peasants tried to protect their fruit, they would be beaten and their wives raped.

According to Mangalwadi, morality is merely constructed by those in power for their own pleasure. Consequently, “Morality is merely a function of cultural power.” Mangalwadi blames this on Hinduism:

·       They do so because our pantheism dismisses morality and our polytheism worships corrupt gods.

However, Mangalwadi claims that the West has succumbed to the same religion:

·       The West is becoming corrupt like us because it is developing a “new spirituality” without morality. This new spirituality is no different than our old spirituality.

Why had the West progressed? According to Mangalwadi, the West had been granted the beliefs necessary to progress:

·       Given our early start, India and China should have been eons ahead of the West in developing technology and economy. Why did we fall behind? The answer is that our cultures were shaped by worldviews that taught us that intellect was our problem and salvation depended on deliverance from intellect, not from sin.

Mangalwadi had once been initiated into Transcendental Meditation. When he asked what his mantra meant, he was told something quite revealing:

·       “The principle of Transcendental Meditation is not to know truth but to empty one’s mind of all rational thought—to “transcend” thinking. To think is to remain in ignorance, in bondage to rational thought. Meditation, he explained, is a means of escaping thinking by focusing attention on a sacred though meaningless sound like Om.”

It became apparent that this was the reason for the great suffering India had endured. According to Mangalwadi, England had been rescued by the mercy of God through the Bible:

·       Early eighteenth-century England was as corrupt as my country; it was transformed by a religious revival led by John Wesley, the founder of the Methodist Church. For that story, see chapter 7 of my book Missionary Conspiracy: Letters to a Postmodern Hindu (New Delhi, India: Nivedit Good Books, 1996).

However, as the West has rejected its Christian roots, it has also rejected the prosperity that had once made it the envy of the world.

AN UNBRIDGEABLE CHASM

 

     

 

We are the Tower of Babel, torn apart as our common moral language has disintegrated. For a recent of example:

·       Colorado Democrats have recently struck down House Bill 1092, a bill that would have instituted minimum sentencing for offenders convicted of selling or buying children for the purposes of exploitation.  The bill was heard in the House State, Civic, Military and Veterans Affairs Committee, which is also known as the "kill committee." On Thursday, the panel lived up to its nickname, killing the bill on an 8-3 party-line vote.  The eight Democrats who voted to stop HB 1092 were…

What possible reason could the Democrats have had for voting against such a needful bill to protect children?

·       Colorado Democrats reportedly argued that they oppose the harsher minimum sentences in part because offenders might "also be victims," a narrative which has been spreading among leftist activists often in relation to LGBT issues and trans rights issues.  The purpose?  They assert that pedophilia is a form of sexual orientation, and once something is labeled an orientation it suddenly becomes a protected group status.

·       Not long ago Democrats denied any of these activities were real and accused conservatives of "conspiracy theory."  Now that they have been thoroughly exposed, the leftist response is to defend the sexualization of children rather than admit they are wrong. https://www.zerohedge.com/political/colorado-democrats-more-offended-pictures-wood-chippers-child-sex-trafficking

The Democratic party has become the party of free sex, any sex, even when it is clearly destroying children and even poisoning the lives of the perpetrators and those who support them. Is their stance scientifically justified?

·       In 1934, an Oxford and Cambridge academic, J.D. Unwin, M.C., Ph.D., published the results of an exhaustive study of 86 different societies over five thousand years, concerning monogamy, free sexual expression and rampant promiscuity, and their impact upon society, entitled Sex and Culture.

·       Unwin describes himself as a rationalist, confiding that science exclusively conveys the ultimate tool for factual inquiry. With no religious convictions to convey, Unwin offered evidence without judgment in his six-hundred-plus page study, saying:” I offer no opinion about rightness or wrongness” [of sexual choices.]

Unwin investigated 86 different societies and discovered that civilizations where men and women practice abstinence until marriage and marital faithfulness thrive, and promiscuous cultures with sexual divergence decline:

·       In human records, there is no instance of a society retaining its energy after a complete new generation has inherited a tradition which does not insist on pre-nuptial and post-nuptial continence.

·       Any human society is free to choose either to display great energy or to enjoy sexual freedom; the evidence is that it cannot do both. https://byfaith.org/2023/05/09/homosexuality-promiscuity-and-the-collapse-of-society-follow-the-science/

Eventually, the building of the Tower was abandoned and the peoples disbursed.