Why Did God Pause Israel's Timeline for Nearly 2,000 Years?

Okay, good to see everybody back in again, and we'll be getting into 1 Thessalonians in probably not this half hour, but certainly in the next one, because as I've shared with the folks here in the studio, we get so many comments on the timeline. So we're going to look at that again before we go on into the text itself. Okay, for those of you joining us on television, we always like to make it known that all the past programs are available in the video and the book form, as well as in the audio cassette. We have put 12 half hour programs on one six hour format, and so if you're interested in any of that material, you can call us or drop us a note and we'll get the information to you. Again, we just always have to thank our television audience for your tremendous support. Television does cost money and we never mention it, but that doesn't mean we don't pay our bills, and we do. We just thank you so much for your faithfulness and for your prayers, for your letters of encouragement. My mail time, as Iris knows, is the high point of our day. And so you just keep writing to us, and if you have a question, I'll try to get back with a personal answer. If I get a little bit behind, be patient. I've got a stack right now, again, about that high. I'm going to have to take about two whole days just to answer questions, but don't let that deter you. If you have a question, you feel free to call or write. You know, people are so shocked when I answer the phone or return a phone call, but we're still small enough we can do that. Okay, now before we start 1 Thessalonians, which will probably be in our next half hour, maybe we'll do it yet in this one, I don't know, but we'll see how far we get. The timeline of Scripture, and that just makes everything so much more understandable. If you realize that all of this top line is exactly like my bottom line, with one exception. In the bottom line, we've opened up a parenthetical part of it called the Age of Grace, or Paul's Apostleship, or the Church Age, or the Body of Christ, and then of course everything else. But what I would like to point out to especially folks who haven't heard me teach before, is that all the Old Testament, from Adam, to the Flood, to the Tower of Babel, and then at the midpoint between Adam and the Cross, is the call of Abraham. And the beginning then of the nation of Israel, or the Jewish people. And that of course is in Genesis chapter 12, and let's go back and look at it a minute. Those of you in the audience, I know you've seen it a hundred times, but for those that are new and haven't been with us before, this is the, what shall I say, this is the beginning of everything concerning the promise of the coming Messiah, Redeemer, and Savior. Genesis chapter 12, verse 1, the Abrahamic covenant. And those of you who have been with me over the years, you know that I spend a lot of time in the Abrahamic covenant, because of its intrinsic importance to understand even the Church Age. Alright, in Genesis chapter 12, verse 1, now the Lord had said, back there in chapter 11, and of course that's a point to be made, the first 2,000 years from Adam until the call of Abraham, are covered in just 11 chapters. That's all. The rest of your Old Testament, from Genesis chapter 12, and the call of Abraham, all the way up until the beginning of the New Testament, is another 2,000 years, but all the rest of the Old Testament is pointing to that particular period in time. So remember, the first 11 chapters cover 2 ,000 years. The rest of the Old Testament, the next 2,000. But it's all directed now to this nation that will come as a result of this covenant made with the man Abram, or as we better know him, Abraham. Verse 1 of Genesis 12, now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's house, unto a land that I will show thee. Now on the surface, of course, you don't get the real reason for God doing this. But after you've studied with me a little while, and the nation of Israel makes an appearance, and we get into the book of Joshua, then Joshua makes it so plain why God had to separate Abram from his family. They were all idolaters. The family of Terah were idolaters. And so in order for God to bring this man into a relationship with the one true God, He of course had to make a break with idolatry. So this is the purpose of verse 1. Separate yourself from your family, your home town of Ur, and get out, turn your back on idolatry, and go to a land that I will show thee. Now here comes the covenant. I will make of thee a great nation. Now I usually break it down into three categories. The covenant is comprised of the promise of a nation of people. God will put them in a geographical area of land, and then at a future day He will come Himself as the Messiah, the King, and rule the nation of Israel over an earthly kingdom. All right, now that doesn't explicitly say it here. I know it doesn't. But as again you study the Old Testament, it becomes rather evident. All right, so He says, I will make of thee a great nation, I will bless thee, make thy name great, and thou shalt be a blessing. I will bless them that bless thee, curse him who curseth thee. And now here comes the crowning part of the covenant made with this man Abram. That in him God would bless all the families of the earth. Now on the surface that's hard to be understood, but as we study the Old Testament economy from the call of Abraham, and then his son Isaac, and then the grandson Jacob, and then the twelve sons of Jacob who formed the nation of Israel, everything keeps moving along. The land of Canaan is deeded to Abraham as a homeland for this new nation of people, but everything all the way up through the Old Testament is preparing this little nation coming out of one man for the coming of their Messiah, and King, and Redeemer, whom we know of course as Jesus of Nazareth. And so at 2000 BC then, with the call of Abraham, we have the beginning of the nation of Israel. Now usually in days gone by I've always put over this part right here, that from Abraham until way back over, well I've got to come down to the bottom line where we are, from the call of Abraham to the beginning of the church age, you can fairly positively say it's Jew only, but there have always been exceptions, and I always have to make that point. Yes, there were exceptions to the Jew only aspect, and they're easy enough to name. You have Rahab in Jericho. She was not part of the family of Abraham. She was a non-Jew, she was a Gentile, she was an exception. And Nineveh, when God sent Jonah to Nineveh, and that's of course why Jonah didn't want to go. Those Gentiles weren't to have anything to do with the promises of Israel, but God made an exception and sent him anyway. And so Ruth, the Moabites, the Jews were to have nothing to do with the Moabites, but Naomi and her husband went down into Moab, contrary to the laws of God, but God blessed them anyway. And of course, when Ruth then came back with Naomi, she came in as part and parcel of the family of the Messiah, although she was a Gentile, but she's what we call an exception. And so all the way up through the Old Testament, from the call of Abraham to the coming of Christ, it's Jew only, only to the Israel, with these occasional exceptions. And then in response to the coming of the King, or rather in response to the covenant given to Abraham, we have the coming of the King. And I think the easiest way to show that is to turn right on up to, no, I don't want to go to yet. Well, I guess we can. Let's just go to Matthew for a moment so that you'll see what I'm talking about. Matthew chapter three, where a man who was prophesied in the Old Testament, and so I call him an extension of the Old Testament prophets, John the Baptist, and he's prophesied as a messenger or a herald who would announce to the nation of Israel, their King. And that of course is what happens then in Matthew chapter three, where it says in verse one, in those days came John the Baptist preaching in the wilderness in Judea and saying, Repent ye, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. Well, the kingdom as a whole wasn't really at hand yet, but what part of the kingdom was? The King. The King was now ready to make his appearance. And so all through his earthly ministry, as we've stressed over and over, the purpose for all of his workings of signs and wonders and miracles was to prove to the nation of Israel who he was. They were to have understood that he was the prophesied Messiah and King. It had been prophesied all the way up from the onset of the Abrahamic covenant that this covenant nation would one day have their King. All right. Now you see, I've got two timelines up here instead of one. And my purpose for that is, and I do this over and over. And every time I do, someone says, well, I never saw it that way before. So hopefully we can accomplish the same thing even today. Psalms chapter two. And I call Psalms chapter two, the outline of this old Testament program based on this Abrahamic covenant. This is the outline of what's going to happen. Now, once the nation of Israel has made its appearance, the prophets have come on the scene. You've got King David and all the Psalms and the mosaic system, the tabernacle, the commandment, everything has come as a result of that covenant that God made with Abraham. All right. But now in Psalms chapter two, we, we get a, a timeline all its own. And that's what the top line is. This top line is going to be the timeline of Psalms chapter two with the call of Abraham, the appearance of Israel, of course, as a given. Psalms chapter two, starting at verse one. Why do the people, the nation of Israel, why are, why do the heathen, I'm sorry, why do the heathen rage the non-Jew world and the people Israel? Imagine a vain thing. The Kings of the earth, the, the, the, the, the rulers and so forth and the rulers of Israel, they take console together. See, now all you got to do is just stop and close your eyes and think at the time of Christ's arrest, who all was involved? Well, the Romans and the religious leaders of Israel together, they consorted together to arrest him. And then they put him on trial and who was demanding his death? Israel, the Jew, who carried it out? Rome. See, so you can't separate the blame. You can't say, no, the Jews killed the Christ. On the other hand, the Jews can't say, no, we didn't have anything to do with it. The Romans killed him. They were both guilty. And that puts the whole world then under the anathema of having rejected and killed the promised King and Messiah of Israel. All right, verse four, what was God's reaction? Well, He laughed at the absurdity of the thing. How in the world could they not recognize who He was after three years of constant working of miracles? But they did. They crucified Him. All right, verse five, first word. Those of you who've been in my class, you know already what I'm going to say. It's a time word. Doesn't name the month and the day and the year, but in generalities, after they have rejected the anointed one, then whatever the day of the year was, it doesn't matter. But in God's timeline, after all of these promises of a coming King and a kingdom given to the nation of Israel, where they could literally have heaven on earth, they came to the place and they said, we'll not have that man rule over us. Can anything good come out of Nazareth? You heard it all. And so they cried for his death and Rome carried it out. All right, then the next word is then. I suppose in English, we could probably say, and then He, God shall speak unto them. That is the whole world, Gentile as well as Jew. He will speak unto them in His wrath, not love and mercy and grace, but He will speak unto them in His wrath and vex them in His sore displeasure. All right, now that's my top line. As you come along through it and they've rejected the Messiah, they've crucified him. Then the next event would be the seven years of wrath and vexation, which of course comes back from the prophecies given to Daniel in chapter nine, that this would all be part and parcel of a 490 year prophecy. 490 years, Daniel says in chapter nine are determined upon thy people, the nation of Israel. Now we know from archeological facts and all the decrees that have been found, that from that period in Israel's history, when they had been in the Babylonian captivity and Nehemiah was given permission to go back and rebuild the city walls and everything, that there was 483 years to the crucifixion, Palm Sunday really, and then the other seven years, which would follow almost immediately, would complete the 490 years of the prophecy given to Daniel. And that's all what the Old Testament was looking for. The coming of the King, yes He would be rejected, He would die, He would be raised from the dead, then would come the wrath and vexation, but what's the next verse in Psalms 2? Yet in spite of everything that man has done, they can't upset God's program, yet I have set my King upon the holy hill of Zion. See how plain that is. Now I can see that just as plain today, maybe you can't, but I can. My, it just comes up out of the Old Testament prophecies, the 483 years are fulfilled, and then comes the wrath and vexation, the seven years of the tribulation, as Daniel foretold it, completing the 490. And then what would happen? The King would return and set up His kingdom, and of course from the Old Testament account, that would just sort of go into eternity. But we know now from our own point in time, that's not the way it happened, is it? It just didn't go. But see, every Old Testament prophet, I don't care whether it was Isaiah, or Daniel, or Joel, this was their timeline. And even in Christ's earthly ministry, those three years, and Peter ministering after the crucifixion on the day of Pentecost, all they were looking for, was the fulfillment of this Old Testament format. Now let me show you what I'm talking about. Turn with me all the way up to the book of Acts. See, this is just a review, and we got to skip about 95%. But at least we can hit the high points. And for those of you who are new to our line of teaching, you'll see where we're coming from, hopefully. But here in the book of Acts, chapter 2, the day of Pentecost, and Peter and the eleven are supernaturally empowered to proclaim to the nation of Israel that this Jesus, whom they had crucified, had risen from the dead, and He wasn't dead. He was alive and well, thank you. Consequently, what could He do? He could fulfill the prophecies. He could still bring in the King and the Kingdom. But, Peter says, we can't skip this seven years. Now, in chapter 2, then, look what Peter writes, or says, in Acts chapter 2, dropping in at verse 15. Acts 2, verse 15. Now this is the day of Pentecost. And he says, these are not drunken, as you suppose, seeing it is but the third hour of the day. But what you're seeing is what Joel, the prophet, spoke. See? This is that which was spoken by the prophet Joel. And what did Joel prophesy? That it would come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit, Holy Spirit, upon all flesh, your sons, that is, Israel, your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, your young men shall see visions, your old men shall dream dreams, on my servants and on my handmaidens I will pour out in those days of my Spirit. That's what Israel was experiencing there at Pentecost. And they shall prophesy, Peter says, quoting from Joel. But he doesn't stop there. See, now normally that's where he should have stopped. Had Peter understood that this Old Testament program was no longer valid, he should have stopped right there, like Jesus did in Luke chapter 4. But Peter doesn't have the foreknowledge that Jesus had, so Peter, relying on the Old Testament prophecies, just keeps right on quoting Joel. And look what happens next. Verse 19, And I will show wonders in heaven above, and signs in the earth beneath, blood, fire, vapor of smoke, the sun turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before that great and notable day of the Lord come. And I always stop and ask my classes, did that happen? No, no, that hasn't happened yet. But is it going to? Well, you better believe it. So what happened? God intervened in grace, and He just literally opened up the Old Testament program, and He interjected, parenthetically, the Church Age. And the Church Age is totally, completely revealed only by the Apostle Paul. You won't find anything of the Church back in the Old Testament. You won't find any of the Church in this top timeline, because that was all centered on Israel. But when Israel continued to reject the King and the Kingdom, God shoved that final seven years clear out into the future. He opened up our timeline. I guess that really should just sort of erase it, because He opened it up. And now for 1900 and some years, Israel has been out of the loop, as they say lately. Israel is out of it. They're out in a dispersion. But like Paul says in Romans 11, is God through with Israel? Don't you believe it? That's what they try to tell us, that they've been set aside forever, that they killed the Messiah, and God is through with the Jew. Oh, God forbid, Paul says. That's not it at all. But He has simply given us 1900 and some years of grace, whereby Paul the Apostle of Gentiles now is the spokesman. And that's why Peter, as we saw in that first half hour, that's why Peter said, you now for salvation have to go to the epistles of this Apostle, not these. These were Apostles of Israel. They were under the law. But as soon as he commissions the Saul of Tarsus, who becomes Paul, then you see we come under these doctrines of grace, which we find all the way up through Paul's epistles from Romans up through Philemon. And so this is what makes all the difference. Now the future is still just like it was there. It's been pushed out. We're still going to face, we aren't, but the world is, the three and a half and the three and a half years, the seven years of tribulation, and then Christ will return and yet be the King and set up the kingdom. Now I've noticed in all the various books and articles that people send, when they're confused and they can't figure out, well now who's right and who's wrong? Every single time it's because what they've been hearing, what they've been reading, has been mixing all of this top line with this line. They're taking everything that God promised to Israel up here, and they're trying to, excuse me, they're trying to force it in here. Like I said with a kid with a jigsaw puzzle, they think they've got the right piece. You know it's not. But a kid being a kid, what will they do? They'll force it. See, oh that's it mommy, that's it daddy. No, that's not the right one. All right, now it's the same way with the understanding of Scripture. Just as soon as they start funneling these things into here, you've got nothing but confusion. And always separate them. Now I guess the best way I can point this out in the few minutes we have left, is that number one, I've got two ways of doing it. Let's look at Acts chapter two. You're already there, aren't you? Okay, Acts chapter two, and drop down to verse 36, 37, and 38. Acts chapter two, verse 36, 37, and 38. And this is Peter on the day of Pentecost. And he winds up his message in verse 36. And whenever somebody gets hung up on verse 38, I always ask them, why don't you read verse 36? Well, they don't want that. Do you realize how much the Christendom picks and chooses? That's what they do. They like this, and they like that. No, I don't want the rest of that. Hey, you can't do that. You have to take it all. All right, now verse 36, Peter says, Therefore let all the house of Israel, now there are no Gentiles in the house of Israel, but let all the house of Israel know assuredly that the same Jesus whom you crucified is Lord and Christ. Now then, verse 37, when they heard this, they were convicted, and they said, men and brethren, Jews to Jews, men and brethren, what shall, what's the question? We do. Who? The nation of Israel. What should Israel do? Now verse 38 is absolutely appropriate. It's just exactly what John the Baptist taught. Repent and be baptized every one of you in the name of Jesus Christ for the remission of sins, and you shall receive the gift of the Holy Spirit. Well, you come on over to Paul as we saw in our last half hour. Come over to Romans 1.16. We'll use it again. Romans 1.16, and oh, what a difference. What a difference. We Gentiles don't cry out, what must we do? The question for us is personal. What must I do? And what's the answer? Believe the gospel. See, all right, Romans 1.16 again, for I am not ashamed of the gospel of Christ, for it, the gospel, is the power of God unto salvation to everyone that believeth, to the Jew first and also to the Greek. And turn the page to chapter 3. In the few seconds we have left, we have to do this quickly. Verse 24, Romans 3, verse 24, being justified freely by His grace. And then you come on down to verse 20. No, I got to read verse 25, whom God has sent forth your propitiation through faith, believing in His blood. And then down to verse 26, that He might be the justifier of what kind of people? To those who believe in Jesus. And I don't see any water in my eyes. I don't see any water. I don't see any water. I don't see any water. I don't see any water.