Marcus Mecum - Israel and God's Time Clock - Part 2
God's still winning souls, he's still winning the lost. That's why we're here today, that's what we're all about. The point is, we're gonna continue to gather the end time harvest, but in the end, verse 26 says, "And in this way, all of Israel will be saved". God is not done with Israel and it's important for you to know that. Now, since deicide or killing God is not possible, the devil targets his representatives, he targets those people that are carrying the ball, carrying the book, if you will, and this is not new to our generation, every generation has had its enemies of the book and its enemies of God and the goal has always been "Kill the messengers and you kill the book".
You could go back to Pharaoh, kill all the male children under the age of three, kill 'em all. Why? Because God was sending a deliverer, God was sending a message to the world, and you gotta kill the people and then you kill the message. Herod, when Jesus was coming into the planet, "Kill all the children," why? Because if you can kill the messenger, you kill the message and you dismantle the Bible which is our primary way of knowing who God is, what he's about, how he is, his nature, his character, all the things we learn about God are through the scriptures, and the devil wants to do everything he can to rip the scriptures away from us, his people, including the Jewish nation.
So, Hamas is not the first, Hamas won't be the last. You had the Romans, you had the Assyrians, you had the Egyptians, yet Israel is still there because this is a spiritual battle. This is not just a natural battle. We see it in the natural, but God calls us to the spiritual side of it, that we battle not against flesh and blood, not against ethnicities or creeds, we battle against a spirit that's not flesh and blood, right, but against principalities and powers and rulers of darkness. What are these demons trying to do? They're there to oppose the gospel of Jesus Christ, and they'll do anything they can to oppose people from being saved and hearing the message of Jesus Christ, and demons work through people, that's how demons work.
You say, "What are you saying"? I'm saying the devil's never gonna show up at the end of your bed in the morning with horns and a pitchfork saying, "I'm the devil and I wanna destroy your life". What the devil does is he looks for people that are against the scriptures, against the book, against the inherency of scripture, against the authority of scripture, against the trustworthiness of scripture. And this is not just happening in the Middle East, this happens in our churches.
And so, the enemy, if he can find an area of your life that you are not in agreement with God's word, there's a crack in your life, he can begin to get in there and work an ideology a mindset, a way of thinking that opposes the gospel, opposes God's plan in the earth, opposes the scriptures, ultimately dismantling God's plan for us to also be a light to the world. Ephesians 2 explains how this happens. "This is how you used to be before you got saved," and it goes on to say, "Following the course of this world. Following the prince of the power of the air". So, the course of this world, what's it following? The course of the prince of the power of the air, that's a name for satan. "The spirit that is now at work," not on its own, "He's at work in the sons of disobedience".
When people are disobedient to scripture, disobedient to God's way, what happens, it opens them up to a spirit that can work through them to attack, insult, degrade, persecute, murder, kidnap, rape, whatever it takes, stop the message, kill the messengers, kill the message, stop the people from carrying the book. We don't want them to get to the end zone. This is why we have the armor of God, right? That we wouldn't be ignorant that we're in a spiritual battle. So, we put on the helmet of salvation, we put on the breastplate of righteousness, we put on feet, shods of peace, we grab the sword of the spirit which is the Word of God. We're to be on the offense, that's what's happening right now.
I'm not cowing in fear, "Oh no, what will people think"? No, I got the sword of the spirit which is the Word of God, that is my armor. That is your armor, to fight against the demonic attack on your family and in our nation and world. And then we put on the belt of truth, that's what we're doing right now, we're getting the truth. Not what opinions are, not what people out, but what's the book say? What's the Bible say?
So, the attack is all over the idea that we're carrying the message, we're taking the message, we're carrying it to nations around the world and the devil does not want that to happen, and the same spirit that you see targeting Israel is the same spirit that's targeted the gospel and that same spirit that you see all through the scripture is still at work today. Isn't it interesting we can praise the Hebrews that brought us our faith like Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, we can praise and celebrate them and then we despise the people today? God said, "Don't discount them, don't disregard them, don't see them as insignificant, don't do that. Instead, bless them".
Now, I want us to do something together. If you brought your Bibles, I'm gonna encourage you to do this, if you didn't, I'll do this for you. Turn with me to Matthew 1, turn with me to Matthew 1. If you didn't bring your Bible, I'll show you what every Bible pretty much has in it, it's the only not anointed page in your Bible. Everybody has this, this is a page in your Bible that's not anointed, it's not inspired, it wasn't given by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit, it's not authoritative in any way, and if you go to Matthew 1, turn back one page, and there should be a blank page in your Bible or a page that says, "New Testament". See that page? And that page, for some reason in the church, has become a barrier, it's become a wall.
So, let's do this together, let's just tear it out. Okay? That's a page that was not put there by God, that was put there by us. And what I'm encouraging you to do is to reunify the scriptures. To not look at it as old, past, irrelevant, and new. Why? Because we worship a God from Genesis to Revelation. We don't serve God and he just picks up in Matthew 1, that's not how it works. We serve a God that in the beginning was God. And what did he do? He created the heavens and the earth. It is still important, it still matters that we see that we serve a God that is our Creator. He created the heavens and the earth, he created us male and female and this generation still needs to hear that. He said things like, "Thou shall not murder".
That still matters. "Thou shall not steal". That still matters. And the Bible is clear that Jesus was actually there in Genesis 1. "Let us make man in our image". Jesus was there at the creation account and if you don't believe it from Genesis 1, go to John 1, "In the beginning was the word, and the word was God, the word was with God, and the word," did what? "Became flesh," that's Jesus, right? "And he dwell among us. The word dwell among us and" we did what? "We beheld his glory as the only son begotten of the father, full of grace and full of truth".
This generation needs to know it's one story contained in 66 books, and Jesus is on every page from Genesis to Revelation, it's all about Jesus, it'll always be about Jesus, and this whole book points to him and his salvation plan in the world. You need to know you're here by divine purpose. You are not irrelevant, you are not an accident, and we have to reunify the book. Ezekiel 36 is a prophecy of everything that we're seeing happen in the world right now. This is a 2,500 year old prophecy. You can read Ezekiel 36, 37, 38 is what we're actually seeing happen right now. That never before have we seen this but you're seeing it right now. But let's look at Ezekiel 36. This is written 600 years before Jesus.
Verse 16, "Again the word of the Lord came to me, 'Son of Man, when the people of Israel were living in their own land, they defiled it by their conduct and their actions. Their conduct was like a woman's monthly uncleanness in my sight. So," I did what? "I poured out my wrath on them because they had shed blood in the land and because they had defiled it with their idols". So, God deals with the sin of Israel like he deals with anybody's sin. "I dispersed them among the nations," we'll talk about that in just a second, "And they were scattered through the countries: I judged them according to their conduct and their actions. And wherever they were among the nations they profaned my holy name, for it was said of them, 'these are the Lord's people, and yet they had to leave his land'. I had concern for my holy name, which the people of Israel profaned among the nations where they had gone".
So, what we're reading right now happened 600 years before Jesus showed up on the planet. When Jesus was on the planet, he prophesied to the City of Jerusalem that not one stone would be laid upon another, speaking of Jerusalem's destruction. Seventy years after he died, in 70 a.D. That prophecy was fulfilled, this prophecy that we're reading about here and Jesus' prophecy was fulfilled and Jerusalem was seized and destroyed by the Roman general, Titus.
So, now what you do, is you go back to 70 A.D. for 19 years, and we'll get to the exact dates in a minute, for 1,900 years, what you read about in Ezekiel happened. They were distributed and dispersed all over the world, especially in Europe. They had no land, they had no home, because they had profaned his name, they were dispersed all over the world. Now, let's read Ezekiel 36:22, "'therefore say to the Israelites, 'this is what the sovereign Lord says," what he's about to do, "'it is not for your sake, people of Israel, when I'm doing these things, it's for the sake of my name, which you have profaned among the nations where you have gone. I will show the holiness of my great name".
I think it's like, seven or eight times, he keeps bringing it back, "This is about me, this is about my name, this is about my reputation, this is about my covenant, this is about I keep my word, this is about I do what I say, I follow through". God did not make a covenant with man when you go back to Abraham. Abraham was put to sleep because God knew he couldn't trust man, so God made the covenant with himself, he swore to himself that God would never be a liar, that he would do what he says. And so, that's what he's saying here, he's like, "I'm gonna do what I said". "I will show the holiness of my great name which has been profaned among the nations, the name you have profaned among them. Then the nations will know that I am the Lord, declares the sovereign Lord, that I am proved holy through their eyes before me".
And this is how he's going to do it. Again, 2,500 years ago, "For I will take you out of the nations that you were dispersed into. I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land". Do you see it? God wasn't finished with Israel in 70 a.D, 1,900 years they were dispersed, but after World War II, because of the holocaust, the world felt sorry for the Jews, and they should have, remember? They lost their businesses, they lost their wealth, starving, hungry, barely able to stand up from being in concentration camps. And what happened? This prophecy was fulfilled. They were gathered from all over the world and brought back to their homeland.
In may 14, 1948, after 1,900 years of being dispersed, they became a nation again just like Ezekiel prophesied. And after the holocaust, the Jewish people came up with a statement, and you can actually read this same statement, in Ezekiel 37. They said, "Never again will we let this happen". Why would they fight? Because they made a commitment. "Never again will we let that happen". Nor should they. Ezekiel 37, the valley of dry bones, you hear it preached all the time, go back and read it. It wasn't about you or me, that was a prophecy about Israel that they would be a valley of dry bones dispersed, but then how did the prophesy end? "They will become a mighty, mighty army". And God said he will fight for them and never again will they cease to exist. In one day, they became a nation, in one day.
The Bible says in Isaiah 66:8, ask this question, which was a prophecy, a rhetorical question that was a prophetic word, "Can a nation be born in one day"? And that happened. Israel has never been replaced, they were only reborn, and the message is not about Israel, God said, "It's about my name's sake". The message is, "I keep my covenant," and the message today is God is still sending that message to the world, "I'm faithful, I keep my covenant, I do what I say". In no way or another should you ever underestimate God's faithfulness to his word or to his people.
May 15, 1948, this is one day later, Israel has been a nation for one day, a war breaks out between Israel and five nations that surrounded Israel, Lebanon, Syria, Iraq, Jordan, and Egypt. Egypt surround them, Egypt attacks Tel Aviv with an air strike. They're not even a day old and they're fighting for their existence. They had no tanks, one day old, they had no artillery, they had no war planes, all they had was some Cessna planes, and they actually went to war by dropping grenades out of a Cessna plane. The Egyptians were so confident in their victory, the pilots were partying, getting drunk, and were intoxicated when the Cessna planes flew over the air force place where all their fighter planes were and was dropping grenades on their fighter planes and on their airstrip that immobilized them from retaliating.
An unexplainable victory, unexplainable protection. Today, their economy is the fourth most powerful among the developed countries of the world, and they're only 75 years old. Countries that had been around for thousands of years, 75 years old, they're the fourth, and that population of that area is about 8 million people, 0.2% of the global population.
You say, "What's the point"? Jerusalem proper is 40 acres and the whole world is focused on her. Only Christians and Jews have their roots here, isn't it interesting that the whole world, every news article you read, the whole world is focused right there on that area and that city? But it isn't about Israel, this is what it's about, and this is the most beautiful part.
Israel is in no way favored by God more than anybody else for their sake. They are an illustrated sermon, they are a real world, global illustrated sermon. They are a piece of dirt that says to the world, not that Israel's deserving, not that Israel has earned God's favor and protection because they haven't, but in spite of that, for his name sake, he's raised them up to be an example of his grace and his mercy to the whole world that the whole world might know of his mercy and his kindness, and his grace, which by the way, you are not deserving either.
You haven't earned it either, you and I have made a lot of mistakes too. You and I have a lot of mess ups too. You and I have a past too. You and I have a history of profaning his name, we have a history of our conduct, our actions, our lifestyles not being in agreement with scriptures but yet, somehow, God's found you and given you his undeserved grace and mercy. So, God doesn't love us because we're valuable, we're valuable because he loves us. And when you watch how God loves Israel, it tells me how he loves me. That when I'm undeserving, he's yet persistent in his love for me.
Now, let's go to Matthew 24 and I'm closing, Matthew 24:32. Now, Matthew 24 is a text on end times or the last days and you can read the whole thing if you want, it's a beautiful chapter about so many things. And people will say, "Well, I know all about this text. I, you know, I've heard about it". But I want you to consider this that Matthew 24:32, this passage that we're about to read happened may 14th 1948. What we're about to read happened about 75 years ago "Now learn this lesson from the fig tree: as soon as its twigs get tender and its leaves come out, you know that summer is near. Even so, when you see all these things, you know that it is near, right at the door".
This is speaking of the soon return of Jesus Christ. We don't know the day or the hour, but it's saying, "When you see this nation born, know that it is near right at the door". "Truly I tell you," how close to the door is it? "This generation will certainly not pass until these things have happened". According to Psalms, a generation is 70 years or more by reason of strength. So, you can get to 80, 85, 90 by reason of strength, but 70 is defined as a generation, or more by reason of strength.
Now, a real quick question so you can see how Israel is God's time clock, how many of you were born in 1948? For the people in the room, raise your hand. You were born, you were, let me say it like this, you were alive in 1948, raise your hand. Raise it high, kinda, wave it so everybody can see you guys. There is some here, right? But can we see, there's not very many? Can we see that? Well, what did it say? "Even so when you see all these things," talking about the rebirth of Israel, "You know that it is near," speaking of his return, "Right at the door. Truly I tell you this generation," raise your hands again, "Will not pass away until these things have happened".
As this generation that you saw raise their hands is thinning out, the prophetic clock is running out. And I wanna say that it's not a time to be scared or nervous, it's a time to live, it's a time to dream, it's a time to enjoy your life. Even young people here, that sounds like, "Oh no". No, enjoy your life, marry, have children, fulfill your dreams, work hard, have great friends, do all that kind of stuff, but don't forget you should be ready, it's right at the door, it's right at the door.
And this is what Matthew 25 says. It gives us the parable and the parable was all about this day. This was to the generation that would be on the earth after Israel would be reborn, and this is the message. There's ten virgins, ten bridesmaids waiting for the bridegroom. Five of them had the oil and were ready, five of them were not ready. All ten of them knew he was coming again, all ten of them were there anticipating the bridegroom's return, but only 50% were ready.
And if you go back to chapter 24, it says this, "That the wicked will say the Lord is delaying his coming". And what will be a sign to this generation? That we'll eat, drink and be merry, that we'll act like it's never gonna happen. And so, our responsibility is to not place fear in you, it's to say, "Look at Israel, look at what's going on there, the whole world's looking at her".
This is spiritual first, but secondly, this is God sending a message to his people, be ready, be ready. Get your oil out, get your lamps out, stay on fire, stay excited, stay motivated, be in God's house, be on mission. Don't set back, don't grow lazy, don't grow tired, don't grow weary, don't grow fearful, don't let the devil tell you our best days are behind us. You were born for such a time as this. God predestined it from the foundations of the world that we would be here, this is our hour to keep the message going forth in Jesus' name. Can you say a big amen?