Even if you know nothing about Bible prophecies for the last
days or how from the start God chose a specific nation to be His special
people, you've heard much political attention given to Israel. In his book, Rabbi Jonathan Bernis would
argue this is because Israel has been and will be important in practically all
events that fall on history's timeline from Genesis through Revelation. Bernis, a Jew who has come to accept the
Jesus of Nazareth as the Jewish Messiah, contends that everything about
Israel's part in biblical events is traced back to Genesis 3:15, the Seed
Promise. In that verse, "God decreed
the seed of the woman would ultimately crush Satan's head and bring about his
destruction". That promise depended
on Abraham's seed, the line through which the Redeemer would eventually
appear. Satan's mission was to stop it
before it happened. Bernis believes
that Satan's number one priority is to destroy that seed, even to this day and
this is the basis and rationale of all anti-Semitism. In the book, he explains why this promise is
yet to be fully fulfilled. He believes
that Calvary was a "down payment", the "first installment"
since the domain of Satan has not yet been brought to completion. The promise will ultimately be fulfilled when
Jesus returns as the Lion of the Tribe of Judah in victory. This two-part fulfillment is why Satan has
worked so hard to destroy the Jewish people, even at times in the name of
Christianity. Bernis goes into detail,
outlining specific prophecies and what is happening in Israel today that
convinces him the end days are at hand as he sees these in fulfillment. He spends the latter sections of the book
encouraging the reader to reach out to their Jewish friends. To do so, we must love them and make them
jealous of the goodness of our God through our lives and personal stories. If you understand the verse about blessings
coming to those who bless Israel and curses to those who curse Israel, then it
is easy to grasp how we should treat our Jewish friends with kindness and a
love for them that cares about where they will spend eternity. We will also want to pray for the nation and
its people. Bernis shares how we can do
that. Knowing that the people of Israel
are not loved by God any more than you or I are but are uniquely special to
Him, you'll want to learn more about their struggle, their pain, their abuse in
history, and their place in prophecy. I
highly recommend this book for that reason alone. The book was released on Jan 15, 2013 but my
copy was a free advance courtesy of the publisher for review through
www.netgalley.com.
