Why Israel Failed to Evangelize the World — Isaiah to Acts

Hello, and welcome to Through the Bible with Les Feldick. An Oklahoma rancher and farmer, Les Feldick has been teaching homestyle Bible classes for 20 years in Iowa, Oklahoma, and Texas. Les Feldick's unique style of Bible teaching has made the books of the Bible come to life. When Les is teaching, it's so interesting that people say time just seems to fly by. And now, here is Les Feldick. And again, ready to go for another half hour of this, and we're just going to drop right back in where we left off in our last program concerning the fact that God was going to use the nation of Israel, after the king and the kingdom were established, to bring salvation, the knowledge of their Jehovah, to the Gentiles. Now I always have to emphasize, this was the prophetic program, which of course we now know that Israel rejected. But I want all my students to understand that everything is moving along through time according to the prophetic program. Now I just see it on the board. We've got to make a correction before we go any further. I made a glaring mistake in my fourth -grade arithmetic, and we caught it as soon as we got off the air. But anyway, this should be 536, and I'd have found it just as soon as we get into the prophecy again. But anyway, just one of those simple mistakes that shows we're all human. Don't pretend to be anything other than that. So now in Isaiah chapter 42, we're going to continue with this theme that Israel, once her Messiah was in place, was the king, she could have had the opportunity to bring the Gentiles to a knowledge of her God. And all right, Isaiah 42, verse 1, and always remember that God is dealing with the Jew only at this point in time. And He says, "...Behold My servant, who I uphold, Mine elect, in whom My soul delighteth, I have put My Spirit upon him." Now these are pronouns, so who are we talking about? We're talking about Christ, the Messiah. "...I shall put My Spirit upon him, and he shall bring forth judgment." Now the word judgment here does not mean like we think of a judge handing down a sentence or punishment, but it's rather rule. "...And he shall bring forth rule to..." Whom? Gentiles. See? "...He would bring forth rule," or a government, "...to the Gentiles." Now back up in Isaiah to chapter 9. I throw a curve at you people here in the studio, I know I do. I give them some hints as to where we're going to go next, and then I change my mind. So we're going to back up here a little bit to Isaiah chapter 9, and every time you hear Handel's Messiah, especially the hallelujah chorus there at the end, I want you to be reminded that here's where it comes from, Isaiah chapter 9, verse 6, "...For unto us," that is, who's the us? Israel. See? Unto the nation of Israel. "...Unto us a child is born, and unto us a son is given." I know what I love about this book, you never exhaust it. You know, I've tried to explain to people over the years that as it sits, I always have to be so careful that I'm not misunderstood, but as it sits in the text, John 3, 16 makes no mention of the death, burial, and resurrection. You know that? Now we put it in there because we now know that this is part and parcel of it. But see, when Jesus said it, He hadn't yet gone to the cross. He hadn't yet died and been raised from the dead. And so I've sort of struggled trying to explain to people what was meant by, "...For God so loved the world that He gave His only begotten Son." And then the other night, as I was reading this verse, the light came on, and I think, well now, why haven't I seen this before? Now you'll see it. I know you will. "...Unto us a son is born, unto us a son is..." What's the next word? Isn't that plain? What did God do? He gave them the Son. He gave them the Messiah. See? They didn't work for it. They didn't deserve it. It was all part of those covenant promises that He would come and be their Messiah. So, "...unto us a son is given." Tie that with John 3, 16, and you're in perfect accord with Scripture. All right, read on. "...the government," see, "...the government shall be upon His shoulder." And when that comes to pass, when He's on His throne in Jerusalem and the kingdom is set up, what will be His titles? Now can't you hear Handel's Messiah? Oh, I can. Every time I read this verse, it just rings in my ears. "...and His name shall be called Wonderful, the Consular, the..." What? "...the Mighty God." And then some of these liberal theologians tell us that Christ was never God, never claimed to be God. The Scripture screams that He's God, the Mighty God. "...the..." What? "...Everlasting Father." Philip said, "...show us the Father, and it sufficeth us." What was Jesus' answer? Philip, have you been so long time with me? Have I been so long time with you? "...and thou hast not known..." When you've seen me, you've seen who? The Father. Now here it is in the Old Testament, see? "...the Son that was given to the nation of Israel is the same One whose name shall be called..." When He sets up His kingdom, of course, even though we know from our aspect these names are already valid, that He is the Wonderful, the Consular, the Mighty God, the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. And then going to verse 7, "...of the increase of His..." What? "...government." What's government for? To rule, see? To maintain law and order is the way we look at it. "...and of His government and peace there shall be no end, and not from heaven, but from where? From the throne of David." Now be logical, be sensible. Where was David's throne? On earth or in heaven? On earth. Of course it was. And that's the same throne that Jesus is going to assume in Jerusalem, see? "...and upon His kingdom to order it, and to establish it with judgment," or with rule and with justice from henceforth, "...the zeal of the Lord of hosts will perform it." In other words, because He's the Sovereign God. All right, now then, come back further through Isaiah and go with me to chapter 49. Chapter 49. Oh, I think these things are so thrilling. If we'll just let the Bible say what it means and mean what it says and not try to twist it all out of shape. Verse 5 of Isaiah 49, "...and now saith the Lord, That form me from the womb to be His servant, to bring Jacob," that is the nation of Israel, "...again to him, though Israel be not gathered, yet shall I be glorious in the eyes of the Lord, and my God shall be my strength." Now look at verse 6, "...and he said, It is a light thing that thou shouldst be my servant, to raise up the tribes of Jacob, and to restore the preserved of Israel." To restore them to the place where they're going to have the kingdom. "...I will also," now see, that's an important word. Israel is going to be there, but along with Israel, "...I will also give thee for a light to whom?" The Gentiles, see? "...that thou mayest be my salvation to the end of the earth." So when I say that all the way from Abraham until into the New Testament that God was looking at the Jew only, yes, He was, with those exceptions, but had He lost sight of this Gentile river of humanity? No. He had the whole program laid out that Israel could have just evangelized those Gentiles and brought them to a knowledge of Jehovah. They could have been a nation and a kingdom of priests. I say could have every time, because they didn't, but they could have. Hypothetically, this is the way it could have all happened, as I've got the timeline on the board. All right, now let's go over to another one, to Isaiah 59. I try to keep this in order just to facilitate your finding these Scriptures. In Isaiah 59, drop down to verse 20, "...and the Redeemer shall come to Zion," where's Zion? Jerusalem. "...and unto them that turn from transgression in Jacob." In other words, what would have to be the spiritual climate of Israel? Every one of them had to be a believer. Now we'll see that when we get into the book of Acts, where Peter says, "...and every one of you," not 90 percent, it had to be 100 percent, all right? Read on. "...as for me, this is my covenant with them." Where does that covenant go back to? Abraham. Now there were other covenants that came under the Abrahamic covenant. God made the covenant of law with Moses, He made the covenant of a royal family with David, but they're all wrapped up in that Abrahamic covenant, "...my spirit that is upon thee and my words which I have put in thy mouth shall not depart out of thy mouth, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, nor out of the mouth of thy seed, saith the Lord from henceforth and forever." Now we'll go right into chapter 60, "...arise and shine, for thy light is come." What did Jesus tell the nation of Israel in His earthly ministry? I am the light of the world, see? In fulfillment of this, all right, "...your light is come, and the glory of the Lord is risen upon thee." Verse 2, "...for behold, the darkness shall cover the earth." What kind of a darkness? Spiritual, spiritual. All you want to remember is I've said over and over, the whole world at the time of Christ was steeped in idolatry and paganism and mythology, with the exception of the Jews, of course, who should have had a knowledge of the one true God. But they were in a spiritual darkness, see? "...and gross darkness the people," even Israel, "...were in a spiritual darkness. But the Lord shall arise upon thee, and His glory shall be seen upon thee." See, this is why He came to the nation of Israel, to reveal Himself of who He was and what He was and why He had come. They should have had their eyes open. They should have known. Oh, I've told my classes a thousand times, I've told them once. Israel should have known who He was. The Old Testament was full of it. Israel could have known who He was if they had just studied the book, but Israel did not know. Now, you know, we're getting to the same place in America. There is not a man, woman, boy or girl in America that could not know the plan of salvation, that should not know that we're in the last days, but they don't. And why not? Because they don't want to. They will not listen, they will not learn, because they don't want to know any better. All right, that was Israel's plot as well. And then verse 3, "...and the," who? "...Gentiles," see, "...and the Gentiles shall come to thy light, and kings to the brightness of thy right hand." Remember the verse we read in Isaiah in the last program, Isaiah 2, verse 2, "...and the Gentiles shall flow unto it," it's the same picture here, "...if only Israel could have believed it." Well, now, let's go all the way into your New Testament, and let's just follow this same premise. As we come into the New Testament, I want to stop with Matthew 1, verse 1, just for a second, because it won't be too, too long until we'll be coming into the New Testament in our weekly study. But just to whet your appetite just a little bit, stop at verse 1 of chapter 1, where it says, "...the book of the generations of Jesus Christ, the Son of David, the Son of Abraham," period. Why stop at Abraham? When you get to the next genealogy in Luke chapter 3, where does it go? All the way back to Adam. But see, Matthew is presenting Christ as the King. Since He's being presented as the King, the Scripture only goes back to that part of Scripture that promises a King, and what is it? The Abrahamic covenant. And so, the first verse stops then, "...the Son of David, the Son of Abraham," period, because it's out of that covenant with that man that the King is coming on the scene. All right, now let's go on into Luke's Gospel for just a moment. Chapter 1, I think it is. Following this same format now, the prophetic program given to Israel within a time frame of 490 years, they could have had their King and the Kingdom, and they could have evangelized the world. Now, Luke chapter 1. And I always like to explain the setting a little bit. You've got the birth of John the Baptist is just around the corner, and what we're dealing with are the parents. Now, you want to remember, Zacharias and Elizabeth were well along in years, much as Abraham and Sarah were, and so John the Baptist's birth was actually miraculous in itself. And you remember that during her term of gestation that Zacharias was stricken dumb. He was a priest, but he couldn't speak. And so as the child was about to be born, they asked Elizabeth what she was going to name him. And she said, John. Of course, inspired. And they said, uh-uh, that can't be. Nobody in your family ever named that before. We better go check with the father. So they go to the temple, and they look up old Zacharias, and they ask him, what's the child's name? And so he asked for a writing tablet, because he couldn't speak, remember. And so what did he write on the tablet? Well, it's back up there in verse 63. And he asked for a writing tablet, and he wrote, saying, his name is John. And they all marveled. Well, the biggest marvel was that as soon as he wrote the word John, what happened? He got his speech back. Verse 64. And his mouth was opened immediately. See? Oh, this is all in tune now with what God had programmed. Elizabeth agreed, and Zacharias agreed, his name is to be John. And so he gets his voice back. And now you come down to verse 67. And his father, that is John's father, Zacharias, was filled with the Holy Spirit. Now a lot of people think the Holy Spirit wasn't on the scene before Pentecost, but they just don't know their Bible if they say that, because here it is. Zacharias was filled with the Holy Spirit. Now the reason I emphasize this is to show that Zacharias is not merely mouthing the heart desires of an average Jew or even a priest of the Jews, wishful thinking. But what Zacharias is now going to say in these following verses is actually the mind of God being spoken through this man. And look what it says. Oh, this shocks people every time I read it. Verse 68. He starts out by saying, Blessed be the Lord God of the world. No. You see how it confines everything to Jew only? Blessed be the Lord God of Israel. Now remember, God isn't being picky here. God is not being unfair. He dealt with the whole human race for 2,000 years, from Adam until Abraham. And what did they do with all of his offers of salvation? They walked it underfoot. And so now he turns his back, so to speak, on the Gentile river of humanity, and he goes to the Jew, and now here it is, the God of Israel. For he hath visited and redeemed his people. Now you see, Zacharias understood the prophetic plan that once his little son would announce the coming of the king, the king would come, Israel would have her kingdom, as we'll read on. Verse 69. He hath raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David. Is that confining? Sure it is. It doesn't include the Gentiles. This is Jew only. For us in the house of his servant David. As he spake by the mouth of all his holy prophets. What's he referring to? Old Testament. The prophetic program, as we've been reading it. Which have been since the age began, that we should be saved from our sins. It doesn't say that. From our what? Enemies. Enemies. Now, who were Israel's enemies at the time of Luke? Well, the same ones that they've got today. The Syrians, the Egyptians, and the Persians, and you name it. Everyone that lived around them. It's no different. And so he says that we can be saved from our enemies, the Romans. You know how they hated the Romans. And from the hands of all that hate us, see? Very logical. Very practical. To perform the mercy promised to our fathers and to remember his holy covenant. Now I could stop there and tell you what covenant, but I don't have to. The next verse tells you. What covenant? The oath which he swore to our father Abraham. See how all this goes back to Abraham? Matthew 1 went back to Abraham. Luke 1 goes back to Abraham. Everything that Jesus does in his earthly ministry is based on that covenant. And oh, if only people could see that. That just answers all the controversies, all the misunderstandings when you realize that everything he is doing is under the covenant promises that he made with Abraham, and that was Jew only. Now you all know the verse in John's Gospel. He came unto his own. Who were his own? The Jew. And his own received him not. Read on. Verse 74, that he, that is God, would grant unto us, the nation of Israel, that we be delivered out of the hand of our enemies, mortal enemies, physical enemies, next door enemies, that we might serve him, that is the God of Abraham, without fear, in holiness and righteousness before him all the days of our life. And thou, child, speaking of John the Baptist, shall be called the prophet, or the forerunner, of the highest. Who is that? The Christ. The one we just read about in Isaiah 9. The mighty God, the everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace, see? And thou shalt go before the face of the Lord to prepare his way. And we know that's what John did. He announced the coming of the King. Verse 77, to give knowledge of what? Now we come to the spiritual part of it, see? First you've got the introduction of the physical, literal, political aspect of the kingdom, granting peace and safety to the Jewish people. But now also you have to have the spiritual side, because what did Jesus tell Nicodemus in John 3? Except a man be born again, or experience salvation, he cannot enter the kingdom. So the two have to come together. I think in one of our previous programs I put the two lines on the board. You remember it? I said in all the way up through the Old Testament you've got two parallel thoughts, the king and the kingdom, a suffering Savior. And you remember I emphasized every Jew wanted the king and the kingdom, but they did not want to deal with the Savior, and that was their problem. But here it is. They were to be saved from their physical enemies, they were to have a physical kingdom, they were to have physical peace and prosperity, but they also had to have a spiritual salvation. To give knowledge of salvation unto his people by the remission of their sins through the tender mercy of our God. Now then, verse 79, here's the verse I want to lead to. As they would come to this place of spiritual as well as a political and a physical fulfillment, what was the next step for Israel? To give light to them that sit in darkness and in the shadow of death. Who were they? The Gentiles. See? Oh, this was to be their lot, that they now had the light of the world and they were going to take it out to the Gentiles. Well, let's move on to the book of Acts, Acts chapter 1, Acts chapter 1. And I always like people to see how all of this just moves right through the Old Testament. I got it up here, beginning with Genesis chapter 12, the Jew only, all the way through the prophetic books, through that time period that Daniel prophesied, the Messiah came, he was rejected, he was crucified, he ascended, but you move right into the New Testament from the Old on all these things. And now as you come into the book of Acts, which is after his crucifixion, remember, and after his resurrection, pick it up in Acts chapter 1, verse 4. Now see, there hasn't been a single word yet about going to the Gentiles with the gospel of grace. Not a word. Everything is based on this Abrahamic covenant, dealing with Israel first and then to the Gentiles. Verse 4, "...and being assembled together with them, he commanded them," that is Christ now in His resurrected body, and He has the leaven, Judas of course is long gone, "...and he commanded them that they should not depart from Jerusalem, but wait for the promise of the Father, which, he saith, you have heard of me." And then verse 5. Now this is going to be a separate lesson someday. Now in our weeknight classes it comes up periodically. Here on television it's not quite as easy, but in 30 minutes. But as a rule in our classes, though you are with me, when we've got two hours and we've got feedback and we can permit people to just interrupt me, they'll ask a question, we'll cover these things. But in 30 minutes, we just can't do it. But we'll hit it someday. Where it says, verse 5, "...for John truly baptized with water, but," now all through Scripture, whenever I've shown you that word, but, what I've always told you, it's the flip side. It's the flip side. John baptized with water, but, he says, you shall be, in a future day, baptized with the Holy Spirit. Not many days hence. And of course, when did that begin or when did it happen? Pentecost. Now then, verse 6, "...when therefore they were come together, they asked of him, saying, Lord, wilt thou at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?" What's on their heart? The kingdom, the kingdom. I hope I've got time. I'm going to run out of time. There's no use trying not to. Come back with me to Matthew. Come back with me to Matthew. Oh, let's see. It's got to be chapter, oh, I thought I could find it real quick. I'll run out of time without this. We'll get it in another one. Okay, I got it. Chapter 19. I was thinking it was 16. Chapter 19. We'll have to hit this one quickly. We've only got a minute left. Chapter 19 of Matthew. I remember why I came back here. I probably lost you while I was looking those 30 seconds. What were they looking for? The kingdom. "...will you at this time restore the kingdom?" It's all that's filling their mind. Now look what it says. Verse 27, "...then answered Peter and said unto him, Behold, we have forsaken all and followed thee. What shall we have therefore?" Now, they've got their salvation. "...and Jesus said unto them, Verily I say unto you, that you have followed me in the regeneration when the Son of Man shall sit in the throne of His glory." When will that happen? When He sets up His kingdom. Now He says, "...when I set up my kingdom, you also," speaking to the 12, of course Judas is left out, "...you also shall sit upon twelve thrones ruling," who? The twelve tribes of Israel. And from where? Jerusalem. Thank you for watching Through the Bible with Les Feldick, a weekly Bible study. 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