In Jeremiah chapter thirty we have another Old Testament prophecy which has been applied to the modern State of Israel. Jeremiah the prophet is speaking some time before the first destruction of Jerusalem in 586 BC by Nebuchadnezzar of Babylon. Let us read.
Jeremiah 30:1-2. "The word that came to Jeremiah from the Lord, saying, Thus speaks the Lord God of Israel, saying, Write thee all the words that I have spoken unto thee in a book."
It looks as if God was interested in having Jeremiah write it down to preserve it for future generations as a testimony against them, as a warning to them. Like Isaiah had prophesized some years earlier.
Isaiah 46:10. "Declaring the end from the beginning, and from ancient times the things that are not yet done, saying, My counsel shall stand..."
God had even said that before he formed Jeremiah in his mother's womb, he had already called him, sanctified him, and ordained him to be a prophet unto the nations.(Jeremiah 1:5) In Psalm 45:1 we read, "....my tongue is the pen of a ready writer."
Even in the writings of Moses we find the Lord telling him to write it down that it may be a witness to future generations.
Deuteronomy 31:18-19. "And I will surely hide my face in that day for all the evils which they have wrought, in that they are turned unto other gods. Now therefore write ye this song for you, and teach it the children of Israel: put it in their mouths, that this song may be a witness for me against the children of Israel."
Deuteronomy 31:22-30. "Moses therefore wrote the song the same day, and taught the children of Israel...And it came to pass, when Moses had made an end of writing the words of this law in a book, until they were finished, that Moses commanded the Levites (the religious leaders)...Take this book of the law, and put it in the side of the ark of the covenant of the Lord your God, that it may be there for a witness against thee. Gather unto me all the elders of your tribes, and your officers, that I may speak these words in their ears, and call heaven and earth to record against them. For I know that after my death ye will utterly corrupt yourselves, and turn aside from the way which I have commanded you; and evil will befall you in the latter days; because ye will do evil in the sight of the Lord, to provoke him to anger through the work of your hands. And Moses spoke in the ears of all the congregation of Israel the words of this song, until they were ended."
Could the latter days spoken of here by Moses have their final fulfilment in Jacob's trouble of the last days?
Going back to Jeremiah we see that the Lord tells him.
Jeremiah 30:3. "For, lo, the days come, says the Lord, that I will bring again the captivity of my people Israel and Judah, says the Lord: and I will cause them to return to the land that I gave to their fathers, and they shall possess it."
The above verse is often quoted with the additional "second time" included in the words.
"For, lo, the days come, says the Lord, that I will bring a second time (replacing the word again with second time) the captivity of my people....and I will cause them to return to the land that I gave to their fathers, and they shall possess it a second time."
The first time the Jewish people returned was after the fall of Babylon where they had been taken captive in 586 BC. Under Cyrus the King of Persia the Jewish remnant began their return to Palestine so that by the time of Christ, much of the Jewish nation was living in the land under Roman occupation. Later in 70 AD, Titus and the Roman legions destroyed the 2nd Temple built by Herod the 1st and the Jewish nation was again scattered abroad and sent into captivity as had happened previously under the Babylonians.
The return of the Jews under the Balfour Declaration of 1917, and then at the end of WWII culminating in the birth of the modern State of Israel on May 14, 1948 is seen as a fulfilment of Jeremiah's ancient prophecy and as a decree that God has ordained the land to the Jewish people. Christian Zionism is the idea that it's God's will that the land be returned to the Jewish people, therefore, an overly pro-Israel position is advocated by many Christian pastors. A blind eye is turned to the unprecedented and continual extermination of the Palestinian people in the hands of the modern Jewish nation. The religious Jewish leaders also use the prophecies to pressure their political leaders to a very unsympathetic view of the former Arab inhabitants of the land. The political leader Yitzhak Rabin that advocated a more peaceful approach to the Palestinian question was assassinated in 1995 in Tel Aviv as a result of his more compassionate approach.
The prophecy in Jeremiah 30 continues.
Jeremiah 30:5-7. "For thus says the Lord; We have heard a voice of trembling, of fear, and not of peace. Ask ye now, and see whether a man does travail with child? wherefore do I see every man with his hands on his loins, as a woman in travail, and all faces are turned into paleness? Alas! for that day is great, so that none is like it: it is even the time of Jacob's trouble; but he shall be saved out of it."
Note that it says, "none is like it." In other words, there would be no other day similar in distress, or as bad as, the day of Jacob's trouble. The imagery also is of a man in travail as if a woman who is giving birth. Where do we find the similar imagery being used in the New Testament? The first place that comes to mind is Apostle Paul's words in 1 Thessalonians 5:1-3. Paul writes,
"But of the times and seasons (Paul had been talking about Jesus's return at the Rapture event in the last verses in chapter 4), brethren, you have no need that I write unto you. For yourselves know perfectly that the day of the Lord so comes as a thief in the night. For when they shall say, Peace and safety; then sudden destruction comes upon them, as travail upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape."
Jesus Himself had alluded to the same travail in Matthew 24 about the signs of His coming with the words,
Matthew 24:8. "All these are the beginning of sorrows."
In other words, the wars, rumours of wars, famines, pestilences, earthquakes were like the beginning of a woman's sorrows at the time of birth. Many believe today that what we are seeing with the present pandemic and the push for World Government are the final stages of the beginning of sorrows. We could very well be seeing the other end time prophecies, more specific in nature, soon come to pass.
The aspect of Jeremiah's prophecy that says, "None is like it," seems similar to Jesus's own words in Matthew 24:21 where Jesus says,
"For then shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be."
In other words, there will be no other day similar to or as bad as the day of Jacob's trouble, the time Jesus has called the great tribulation.
Jesus goes on to say,
Matthew 24:22. "And except those days should be shortened (to just three and a half years), there should no flesh be saved; but for the elect's sake those days shall be shortened."
It seems to indicate that all mankind, all humanity would die, if God did not intervene, shorten the days to just three years and a half for the sake of the elect, and finally return at the Battle of Armageddon to stop mankind's holocaustic end.
Throughout the New Testament the "elect" are always referred to as being the newly converted Christian believers or the Old Testament saints or remnant that followed God faithfully. In Isaiah 45:4, we see God calls Israel "mine elect." In other words, the obedient descendants of Jacob, or of Abraham, were God's Old Testament "elect." The elect does not refer to all the flesh descendants of Israel. Apostle Paul has clarified that which God had said throughout the Old Testament.
Romans 9:6. "For they are not all Israel, which are of Israel."
In other words, not all the physical descendants of Israel are true followers of God. Jesus, also, made the same point in his confrontation with the Pharisees as recorded by Apostle John.
John 8:37, 39, 40. "I know that ye are Abraham's seed, but ye seek to kill me....If you were (truly) Abraham's children (in spirit), ye would do the works of Abraham. But now ye seek to kill me, a man that has told you the truth, which I have heard of God: this did not Abraham."
In Isaiah 42:1-4 Jesus is prophesized as being God's ultimate "elect."
"Behold my servant, whom I uphold; mine elect, in whom my soul delights; I have put my spirit upon him: he shall bring forth judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not cry, nor lift up, nor cause his voice to be heard in the street (like John the Baptist did). A bruised reed shall he not break, and the smoking flax shall he not quench: he shall bring forth judgment unto truth. He shall not fail nor be discouraged, till he has set judgment in the earth: and the isles shall wait for his law."
The Apostle Matthew in his Gospel quotes Isaiah's passage and applies his prophecy to Jesus.
Matthew 12:14-21. Then the Pharisees went out, and held a council against him, how they might destroy him. But when Jesus knew it, he withdrew himself from thence: and great multitudes followed him, and he healed them all; and charged them that they should not make him known: That it might be fulfilled which was spoken by Esaias the prophet, saying, Behold my servant, whom I have chosen; my beloved, in whom my soul is well pleased: I will put my spirit upon him, and he shall show judgment to the Gentiles. He shall not strive, nor cry; neither shall any man hear his voice in the streets. A bruised reed shall he not break, and smoking flax shall he not quench, till he send forth judgment unto victory. And in his name shall the Gentiles trust."
The whole chapter in Isaiah is very beautiful and appropriate to Jesus's first and second coming. But let me just continue with a few more verses.
Isaiah 42:5a. "Thus says God the Lord, he that created the heavens, and stretches them out..."
Let us note here that God seems to be describing an expanding universe. The scientific confirmation for such an expanding universe was only discovered since 1911 with photos from a solar eclipse which brought about the idea of the red shift in light elements recorded by spectrogram. Ultimately, science has resolutely confirmed the idea of an expanding universe starting from a single point in space, time and matter.
The prophecy continues,
Isaiah 42:5b-7. "he that spreads forth the earth, and which comes out of it; he that gives breath unto the people upon it, and spirit to them that walk therein: I the Lord have called thee in righteousness, and will hold thine hand, and will keep thee, and give thee for a covenant of the people, for a light of the gentiles; to open the blind eyes." (Jesus did both physically and spiritually open the blind eyes.) "To bring out the prisoners from the prison, and them that sit in darkness out of the prison house."
Again we see that Jesus frees us from the bonds of Satan by giving us the truth of His word which in turn sets us free.
John 8:31-31. "If you continue in my word, then are you my disciples indeed; and you shall know the truth and the truth shall make you free."
Isaiah 42:9 declares, "Behold, the former things are come to pass, and new things do I declare: before they spring forth I tell you of them." Like we read in Isaiah 46:10 about "declaring the end from the beginning," God is faithful to give us His word, to prophesize of the future, that we may believe His word. The book of Revelation tells us that "the testimony of Jesus Christ is the spirit of prophecy."(Revelation 19:10) Prophecy is a way that God testifies to the truth of the Gospel and to the truth of the word of God. Fulfilled Bible prophecy is a compelling proof to God's existence and care for His children.
The New Testament "elect" are those that accept Christ and follow in His steps. Apostle Peter writing to the new Christian believers scattered throughout Asia Minor calls them "elect according to the foreknowledge of God the Father."(1 Peter 1:2) Jesus refers to the believers present at the time of his return as "his elect."(Matthew 24:31) Apostle Paul, also, confirms that nothing shall be able to separate God's elect, the Christian true believers, "from the love of God, which is in Christ Jesus our Lord."(Romans 8:33-39)
From our knowledge of Bible prophecy, found in both the Old and New Testaments, we can conclude with certainty that we are moving closer to the day of Jacob's trouble or that period that Jesus called the great tribulation. But, "he shall be saved out of it."(Jeremiah 30:7b) God will save His people one way or the other. It behoves us to do our best to deepen our relationship with Him in preparation for the ominous days ahead.
"But he that shall endure unto the end, the same shall be saved."(Matthew 24:13)
Let us finish with the words of Apostle Paul from 1 Thessalonians 5:1-9,
"But ye, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day (of Jacob's trouble) should over take you as a thief. Ye are the children of the day: we are not of the night, nor of darkness. Therefore let us not sleep, as do others; but let us watch and be sober. For they that sleep sleep in the night; and they that be drunken are drunken in the night. But let us, who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love; and for an helmet, the hope of salvation. For God has not appointed us to wrath (that 30 to 75 days described in parts of Revelation 14 - 16, 19:11 - 22, and chapters 38 & 39 of Ezekiel, among others), but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ."
Of course, the salvation mentioned here includes our rescue by the Lord in the Rapture event which Jesus mentions in Matthew 24:29-31.
"Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken. And then shall appear the sign of the Son of man in the heaven, and he shall send forth his angels with a great sound of a trumpet and they shall gather together his elect from the four winds, from one end of heaven to the other."
We are closer to those sobering days than we have ever been before. Be thou therefore a faithful servant of the Lord as we see that day approaching.
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