Promises, Promises...

Winston Churchill once said, “No thoughtful man can deny the fact that the Jews are, beyond any question, the most formidable and most remarkable race which has appeared in the world”.

There have been many throughout history, and even today, who would disagree with Mr. Churchill. Adolf Hitler is, perhaps, the most infamous anti-Semite the world has ever known, and his hate-filled rhetoric blaming the Jewish people for the world’s ills led to the destruction of over 6 million Jewish people.

Had any other people group gone through a holocaust of that proportion, I do not believe they, would ever recover from such a blow; but not so with the Jewish people.  Just three years after World War Two ended, something happened that few, outside of those who knew their Bibles, ever thought possible. May 14, 1948—after more than eight centuries, Israel became a nation again.

Jonas Salk, developer of the polio vaccine

As Churchill said, the Jewish people are both formidable and remarkable. To illustrate this point, consider this: The Jewish people make up a meager 0.2% of the world’s population, yet 22% of all Nobel Peace Prize recipients have been Jewish .

“Overall, Jews have won a total of 41% of all the Nobel Prizes in economics, 28% of medicine, 26% of Physics, 19% of Chemistry, 13% of Literature and 9% of all peace awards. Jews have been recipients of all six awards.”

Some say this is a “conspiracy”. The fact is it is a conspiracy—a divine one, not one secretly devised by Jewish people; it is God’s very plainly laid out plan. Anyone who desires to know about it may pick up their Bible and turn to Genesis 12.

12 Now the LORD had said to Abram:

“Get out of your country,

From your family

And from your father’s house,

To a land that I will show you.

2 I will make you a great nation;

I will bless you

And make your name great;

And you shall be a blessing.

3 I will bless those who bless you,

And I will curse him who curses you;

And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

If you remember, Abram later was named “Abraham” by God. God calls Abram out of his homeland, Ur of the Chaldeans in southern Babylonia—he separates Abram from the world. He calls him to be the beginning of the next stage in His plan of redemption for mankind.

These three verses are known as the Abrahamic Covenant. God makes several promises to Abram and his offspring, which are “unconditional”, that is God makes all the promises and they are not hinged on the obedience of Abram or his future family—the Jewish people, the nation of Israel.
Let’s take a look at these promises.

A Land (v.1)—God tells Abram, in verse 1, to get out of his country and to go to a land that God will show him. In verse 5, we learn that this special land is the land of Canaan. God sets the boundaries from the river of Egypt (Wadi el-Arish) in the south to the Euphrates in the north (Genesis 15:18). In addition, God promises the Land to Abraham’s biological descendants forever (Genesis 13:14-17). And when the timeless God says “forever”, He means forever!

 When we hear people claiming that the land was taken from the Arab people, the Palestinians, we must remember what God has said. He did not give the land to the Arabs, or the Irish, or the Germans, or the Poles. He gave the land to the Jewish people to be their possession forever. We need to let the Word of God be our authority on all matters, especially how we view what is happening in the headlines.

A Great Nation (v.2)—Abram, at this time, has no children. In fact, he would not have children at all during the prime of his life. One of the most famous, astounding stories of the Old Testament is when God tells Abram and Sarah—he 100 years old, and she 90— that they are going to have a baby. Not long after, Sarah conceives and eventually gives birth to a son, Isaac. And so the Jewish nation begins. Every person who is born Jewish is a descendant of Abraham, and is a continuation of God’s promise to make Abraham a great nation.

A Blessing (v.2)—God promises to bless Abram and make his name great. He blesses him in a few ways. First, Abram was a very wealthy man. In Genesis 13:2, we read that “Abram was very rich in livestock, in silver, and in gold”. He also knew God personally. In Genesis 15:6, we read that Abraham “believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness”. In modern terms, we would say that Abraham was “saved” –he had a personal relationship with God. His name is revered by all three monotheistic religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam— to this day.

A Unique Promise (v.3) – God made a promise to Abraham and his descendants that He has never made to another people. He said, “I will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you…” Later on, God says to Abraham’s descendants, the nation of Israel, “…he who touches you touches the apple of His eye”. This promise, as all the others we’ve mentioned this morning, have not gone away. God has not backed out on his promises to Israel.

Think about those who have dared to curse Israel, who have dared to lift their hands against her. They are all either non-existent, or at least not nearly as powerful as they once were—Egypt, Babylon, Rome, Great Britain, the Soviet Union, Haman, Hitler, Hussein, bin Laden, etc.

Personally, I believe one of the greatest reasons the United States of America has been blessed all these years is that she has blessed Israel; she has been a friend to her. Now, we see an administration that has turned the relationship between us to a cool one, at best. God is faithful to His promises. He will bless those who bless Israel, and He will curse those who curse her.

A Blessing to the World (v.3)—The most important promise made in the Abrahamic Covenant is found in the second part of verse 3. God says, “And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed”. This promise includes people like me—Gentiles.

How have we been blessed by Israel, the Jewish people?

The Jewish people have either created or discovered the following: the first polio vaccine, insulin, color photography, the Law of Thermodynamics, the sewing machine,  blue jeans, the song “God Bless America”, chemotherapy for childhood leukemia, the Barbie doll , the biological pacemaker, the Microsoft Windows operating system, and voice mail just to name a few.

Obviously, we have been very blessed materially by the Jewish people. But the real blessing this verse is referring to is a blessing that is available to everyone, but very few accept. It is a spiritual blessing—the blessing of the coming Messiah.

The fulfillment of this promise of blessing to the world is summed up in what is probably the most famous verse in the world—John 3:16. “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life.”

God sent His Son, Jesus Christ, to take the penalty of our sin upon Himself. Romans 3:23 tells us that “…all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”. That means not one of us in this room this morning can claim that they have not sinned against God, that they have not disobeyed God in their thoughts, words, or actions. God says we all have.

And there’s an even greater problem. God’s Word tells us that the penalty for sinning against God is death. Romans 6:23 says, “For the wages of sin is death”. This means, certainly, that we will all die physically. But it also means spiritual death—separation from God for eternity in a place called Hell.

The Bible tells us that none of our good works—helping the poor and sick, going to church, giving money, being baptized, taking communion—none of that will save us from our sin and Hell. God calls our good works “filthy rags” (Is. 64:6). They aren’t going to help us out of Hell.

This great blessing we are talking about came through the genealogical line of Abraham, when, over 2,000 years ago, a little Jewish baby came into this world. God told His mother to name Him “Jesus”, which means “Savior”.

Jesus Christ lived a sinless life and willingly went to the cross where He was crucified for us. As a sinless man, He was able to take the penalty for our sin upon Himself. And as God, He rose from the dead three days later, proving that He has victory over death—all of this is prophesied in the Old Testament. God tells us that those who “believe on the Lord Jesus Christ will be saved” (Acts 16:31).

The question is, “Have you taken part in that blessing”? Many people go to church, know about Jesus, and even believe that Jesus existed. But that’s not enough. Have you ever made a decision to trust Jesus Christ as your personal Savior? He is the only One who can forgive you of your sin and promise you eternal life in Heaven with Him.

The Most Bloody Religion

“Christianity is the most… bloody religion that has ever infected the world.” 

When French atheist and philosopher Voltaire said this, he certainly meant it as an insult against Christianity. I happen to agree with him, though, in a way. Authentic Christianity stands out among all other religions and thought systems of the world.

Voltaire was partially right. Certainly, throughout history mankind has done murderous, vile things to other human beings in the name of the God of the Bible. The Crusades are a case-in-point. But simply because they claimed to be doing these things “for God” does not mean that God condoned it. On the contrary, His Word says that these acts are wrong.

There is, however, a sense in which Christianity is a religion of blood. In Hebrews 9:22 God says, “without shedding of blood there is no remission”--that is, no complete forgiveness of sin. This is an allusion to the days of the Old Testament when animals were sacrificed in the Temple, their blood temporarily covering the sin of the people.

Why is it that we don’t need to sacrifice animals any longer? Have people, through education and enlightenment, become less inclined to do evil? Unfortunately, the answer is no. In fact, God says “The heart is deceitful above all things and desperately wicked...” And in Romans 3:23, Paul writes, “…for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God”.

No, the sacrifices have not stopped because man has improved himself. On the contrary, our world seems to be getting worse and worse by the day. The reason they’ve stopped is that there was a sacrifice that covered our sin permanently, “not with the blood of goats and calves, but with His own blood…”(Heb. 9:12), the blood of Jesus Christ.

Back in Genesis, after Adam and Eve had sinned, God promised that there would come a descendant of Eve’s, One who would crush Satan and his power over people. Centuries later, the Promised One was born—a tiny, Jewish baby, “wrapped in swaddling cloths and lying in a manger”.

He was God in human flesh—a sinless human being. The Bible refers to Him as the Lamb of God. Like a sacrificial lamb of the Old Testament times, Jesus Christ was unblemished (He had no sin). On the cross of Calvary, Christ was crucified.

God tells us that the reason He sent His Son was because He “so loved the world”. The blood He shed on the cross covered the sin of every human being who has ever lived or ever will live. He died, was buried, and rose three days later proving two things: 1.) that He was God, and 2.) He had victory over death.

There’s more to the reason God sent His son. In John 3:16 He says, “For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have everlasting life”. What about you? Are you trusting Him alone, apart from any good things you may do, to save you from your sin, guaranteeing you eternal life in Heaven? Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Have you been to Jesus for the cleansing pow’r?

Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

Are you fully trusting in His grace this hour?

Are you washed in the blood of the Lamb?

~ Elisha A. Hoffman