The parallels are uncanny. Many cannot see the forest for the trees. The corrective is rejected as destruction progresses. Christians are fiddling as the city burns…   

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OPENING STATEMENTS:

From Part 1: Much of Christianity in America has either rejected or forfeited its spiritual vitality and strength. Christians must seek the Lord’s full anointing.

From Part 2: By the time the Woe’s come it is apparently too late…

From Part 3: There is GREAT need of direct open rebuke of many Christian entities in America (most). Such will never, of course, come from the inside.

THE PRECEDENT

God had been rebuking and correcting the wayward nation of Israel for centuries. He had done this primarily through His prophets. The time arrived, however, when the prophets were no more…

This distinct nation had a miraculous beginning and was preserved repeatedly over many centuries by God who always kept His covenant with it though the nation strayed repeatedly and committed national adultery on a semi-regular basis. Things had gotten so bad regarding the nation’s inability or desire to remain chaste that a divorce and dissolution of the covenant was acknowledged at one point, in the time of the prophet Jeremiah while Josiah was king (640-609BC):

Then the LORD said to me in the days of Josiah the king, “Have you seen what faithless Israel did? She went up on every high hill and under every green tree, and she was a harlot there. I thought, ‘After she has done all these things she will return to Me’; but she did not return, and her treacherous sister Judah saw it. And I saw that for all the adulteries of faithless Israel, I had sent her away and given her a writ of divorce, yet her treacherous sister Judah did not fear; but she went and was a harlot also. Because of the lightness of her harlotry, she polluted the land and committed adultery with stones and trees. Yet in spite of all this her treacherous sister Judah did not return to Me with all her heart, but rather in deception,” declares the LORD. [Jeremiah 3:6-10]

Already, three centuries before this, a few years after Solomon died in 930BC, the nation had split in two. It became “Israel” in the north composed of ten tribes and “Judah” in the south composed of three. (The twelve tribes had become thirteen as Joseph’s tribe became two, named after his sons.) The northern nation of Israel, composed of the vast majority, lasted only two centuries. It had grown increasingly wicked, refusing to repent, driven to this end mostly by its rebellious leaders. It ceased to exist in 722BC when carried off into permanent captivity. That constituted the divorce.

The nation of Judah remained in the south, composed of the three remaining tribes of Judah, Levi, and Benjamin, until its wickedness also caused the destruction of Jerusalem and the temple in 586BC, and the resulting national exile as it was removed to Babylon for a total of seventy years. This constituted a national separation rather than an outright divorce but was only predicated upon God’s unending love for His people and His adherence to the covenant. Also, there were a great many things left to accomplish to fulfill the prophetic plan.

He would preserve what was left of the former nation to preserve the dedicated Remnant within it due to its undying faithfulness to the covenant. However, it did no good to preserve the Remnant unless there was a plan to come to its rescue, to deliver it from the clutches of evil, to end its subjection to the slavery of wicked authoritarians, both religious and monarchical, and to bless it with spiritual LIFE. He would fight for these people, His true sons and daughters. He would go to spiritual war for them. He would continue in His quest to lead and guide them, correct them, teach them, provide for them, and love them as their spiritual Father.

For the full working out of this long term goal and its all-encompassing consequences for the world at large, God also had to become that which He had intended from before the very foundation of the world: He must be His nation’s Messiah and Savior. To that end He must be the Sacrifice Lamb, the one who would go so far as to die for His Bride, expressing with His entire heart the greatest love, which included shedding His blood for her spiritual cleansing and salvation, and then raising her up to spiritual greatness.

Therefore, what was left of the nation was safeguarded and protected as it had always been: HE MUST PRESERVE THE MESSIANIC GENERATIONAL LINE. He must do this even though the majority of His people turned against Him, served other gods, embraced the devil’s religious cults, and did it all with a stiffnecked, rebellious, unmanageable attitude, always creating problems and fomenting crises that never had to happen. Sound familiar? The line began with Adam. Then Adam fouled up the plan bigtime. The line continued with Abel. So the devil stirred up Cain to kill him. And voila! No coming Savior. Then 130 years later Adam finally repented and got his act together. He could now have a son to replace Abel. This was Seth. The line was restored. And on it went. The enemies of God were forever trying to stop the Savior from arriving by attacking the bearers of the pure generational line that would eventually result in His long awaited arrival. They failed.

ABRAHAM

This small and obscure ancient nation composed of the descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob was blessed to be the only nation on earth to have an actual covenant with the Creator of the universe. The far-reaching agreement was initially a compact of only two parties, the Lord and the nomad Abram, whose name meant “exalted father” or “father of elevation.” Later, as recorded in Genesis 17:5, God changed his name to Abraham, which means “father of a multitude.” In context, it is translated as “father of a multitude (הָמוֹן hāmôn) of nations (גּוֹי gôy).” Thus, Abraham was not only the progenitor of the nation of Israel but was also the father of other nations as signified by the Hebrew word goy, pluralized to goyim.

Regarding the name Israel, this had also been the result of a rename by God. It became the new name of Jacob, the son of Isaac and grandson of Abraham. Jacob fathered the twelve sons whose descendants became the twelve tribes. One may recall that Isaac, the promised one, actually had twin sons by his wife Rebekah: Esau and Jacob. But the eldest, Esau, had no part in God’s covenant after he thought so little of it and sold his birthright.

Thus we have a man named Abraham who fathered the child Isaac by miraculous means though he had previously fathered his first son Ishmael by purely natural means thirteen years before. After Isaac was born and raised and after Sarah died, Abraham married again to a woman name Keturah and became the father of six more sons. There is also an indication that he had other children besides these by women other than Keturah because Genesis 25:6 refers to his “concubines.” Most if not all of these sons and later descendants settled to the east of Canaan. Isaac’s son Esau and his future offspring comingled with them to a degree. The sons of Abraham thus became the ancestors of many Middle Eastern peoples.

Therefore, Abraham truly became the father of many nations which later were referred to as “Gentiles” in that they were all distinct from the nation of Israel though they all descended from the same man.

Yet there is another aspect to Abraham’s fatherhood, one much more significant. There is another nation that arose through his miracle son Isaac. This particular nation is descended from Abraham but not through natural means. It is comprised of many nations in the natural yet is but one nation in the Spirit. The apostle Paul taught this truth as follows:

For the promise to Abraham or to his descendants that he would be heir of the world was not through the Law, but through the righteousness of faith. For if those who are of the Law are heirs, faith is made void and the promise is nullified; for the Law brings about wrath, but where there is no law, there also is no violation.

For this reason it is by faith, in order that it may be in accordance with grace, so that the promise will be guaranteed to all the descendants, not only to those who are of the Law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all, (as it is written, “A father of many nations have I made you”) in the presence of Him whom he believed, even God, who gives life to the dead and calls into being that which does not exist.

In hope against hope he believed, so that he might become a father of many nations according to that which had been spoken, “So shall your descendants be.” Without becoming weak in faith he contemplated his own body, now as good as dead since he was about a hundred years old, and the deadness of Sarah’s womb; yet, with respect to the promise of God, he did not waver in unbelief but grew strong in faith, giving glory to God, and being fully assured that what God had promised, He was able also to perform.

Therefore it was also credited to him as righteousness. Now not for his sake only was it written that it was credited to him, but for our sake also, to whom it will be credited, as those who believe in Him who raised Jesus our Lord from the dead, He who was delivered over because of our transgressions, and was raised because of our justification. [Romans 4:13-25]

For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to promise. [Galatians 3:26-29]

THIS IS THE END

We see then, starting at the time of the Promise in 1876BC until the Exodus from Egypt 430 years later, that the original nation of God’s covenant had grown large, unified, and strong resulting in the victorious Conquest of Canaan in circa 1400BC. It was not long, however, until it fell into a pattern of fits and starts, national sin and deliverance, and then suffered a disastrous split about five centuries later from which it never recovered.

By God’s grace it continued through all its iniquity and waywardness for another millennium until its prophesied end, due only to its repeated violation of the covenant and hatred of its Founder. When He arrived in His land, according to a multitude of prophetic statements, the movers and shakers who controlled the nation, those who had drifted far from God, did not recognize Him. They failed to see Him for who He is and refused to honor Him. Unreal Christianity has the same problem and will suffer the same fate.

In the following statement, the Lord’s sorrowful lament for His people and pained anguish of His rejection and all He could have otherwise done for them bleeds through. It is a passage filled with pathos and lost love, characterizing the tragedy of what had become of a people so blessed and cared for, less than forty years before the end. This time there would be no mere separation or divorce, but termination:

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem, who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How often I wanted to gather your children together, the way a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, and you were unwilling. Behold, your house is being left to you desolate! For I say to you, from now on you will not see Me until you say, ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord!’” [Matthew 23:37-39]

This passage came at the end of the Lord’s greatest rebukathon in Scripture in which He held nothing back. Still, it did no good. They refused to repent. All hope was lost. It was the Last Days—the final generation—the time when all the prophesied events regarding the nation’s fiery conclusion would be fulfilled a mere four decades later. The Lord had done all He could do. Essentially the only thing left was speaking the final pronouncements through prophetic Woe’s.

And once the Woe’s come, it’s pretty much over.

“But woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you shut off the kingdom of heaven from people; for you do not enter in yourselves, nor do you allow those who are entering to go in.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you devour widows’ houses, and for a pretense you make long prayers; therefore you will receive greater condemnation.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you travel around on sea and land to make one proselyte; and when he becomes one, you make him twice as much a son of hell as yourselves.

“Woe to you, blind guides, who say, ‘Whoever swears by the temple, that is nothing; but whoever swears by the gold of the temple is obligated.’ You fools and blind men! Which is more important, the gold or the temple that sanctified the gold? And, ‘Whoever swears by the altar, that is nothing, but whoever swears by the offering on it, he is obligated.’ You blind men, which is more important, the offering, or the altar that sanctifies the offering? Therefore, whoever swears by the altar, swears both by the altar and by everything on it. And whoever swears by the temple, swears both by the temple and by Him who dwells within it. And whoever swears by heaven, swears both by the throne of God and by Him who sits upon it.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you tithe mint and dill and cummin, and have neglected the weightier provisions of the law: justice and mercy and faithfulness; but these are the things you should have done without neglecting the others. You blind guides, who strain out a gnat and swallow a camel!

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you clean the outside of the cup and of the dish, but inside they are full of robbery and self-indulgence. You blind Pharisee, first clean the inside of the cup and of the dish, so that the outside of it may become clean also.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you are like whitewashed tombs which on the outside appear beautiful, but inside they are full of dead men’s bones and all uncleanness. So you, too, outwardly appear righteous to men, but inwardly you are full of hypocrisy and lawlessness.

“Woe to you, scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites! For you build the tombs of the prophets and adorn the monuments of the righteous, and say, ‘If we had been living in the days of our fathers, we would not have been partners with them in shedding the blood of the prophets.’ So you testify against yourselves, that you are sons of those who murdered the prophets. Fill up, then, the measure of the guilt of your fathers. You serpents, you brood of vipers, how will you escape the sentence of hell?

“Therefore, behold, I am sending you prophets and wise men and scribes; some of them you will kill and crucify, and some of them you will scourge in your synagogues, and persecute from city to city, so that upon you may fall the guilt of all the righteous blood shed on earth, from the blood of righteous Abel to the blood of Zechariah, the son of Berechiah, whom you murdered between the temple and the altar.

“Truly I say to you, all these things will come upon this generation.” [Matthew 23:13-36][1]

© 2023 by RJ Dawson. All Rights Reserved. [To Be Continued…]

[1] Unless otherwise noted all Scriptures are taken from the New American Standard Bible, © 1960, 1963, 1968, 1971, 1972, 1973, 1975, 1977, 1995 by The Lockman Foundation. Used by permission.