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Question:

"How can the modern country of Israel be a fulfillment of Bible prophecy (since the Church has replaced Israel)? The Bible says in Jeremiah 50:4-5 that Israel must be repentant before they can be restored to their land, yet modern-day Israel is not Christian. Also, 1 Kings 4:20-21, Nehemiah 9:7-8, and Psalm 105:42-44 prove that the Land Promise which God made to Abraham (Genesis 15:18 and 22:17) was fulfilled in Old Testament times. This negates the idea that Abraham's descendants must wait for some kind of "thousand year reign of Christ" before the Land Promise will be fulfilled."

Answer:

There is often a direct correlation between a person's view of prophecy and his view of whether or not the Church has "replaced" Israel in God's program. According to the "premillennial" view of prophecy, Jesus will someday physically return to the earth and then reign on earth for one thousand years. Those who believe this view also tend to believe that the Church has not replaced Israel in God's program. According to the "amillennial" view of prophecy, on the other hand, Jesus will never physically rule on the earth for a literal one thousand year period. Those who believe this view also tend to believe that the Church has replaced Israel in God's program. So people's views about whether or not the Church has "replaced" Israel are often directly linked to their view of end-times prophecy. That's a little background information before I get into my answer.

There are two parts to this question, and I'll address the part about the Land Promise first.


The Land Promise

According to the "premillennial" view of prophecy (which I believe has the greatest Scriptural support), the Land Promise that God made to Abraham will be fulfilled during the Millennium, after Jesus "raptures" the Church and then returns to the earth to set up His thousand-year government (for more on the Rapture, I invite you to see my article called The Rapture of the Church). Here's what God promised to Abraham concerning the land:
"On that day the LORD made a covenant with Abram and said, "To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates --"" (Genesis 15:18)

"I will surely bless you and make your descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the sand on the seashore. Your descendants will take possession of the cities of their enemies" (Genesis 22:17)
In Genesis 22:17 (above), the Greek word for "possession" means:
"to occupy (by driving out previous tenants, and by possessing in their place)" (Strong's Greek Dictionary)
That has never happened, even to this day. As we will see, the Jewish people have never driven out the previous tenants and occupied the land that God had promised to Abraham and his descendants forever. This promise is still waiting for a future fulfillment.

However, the "amillennial" view (which I don't believe Scripture supports) is that this promise has already been fulfilled. One passage which is used to justify this view is 1 Kings 4:20-25:
"The people of Judah and Israel were as numerous as the sand on the seashore; they ate, they drank and they were happy. And Solomon ruled over all the kingdoms from the River to the land of the Philistines, as far as the border of Egypt. These countries brought tribute and were Solomon's subjects all his life. Solomon's daily provisions were thirty cors of fine flour and sixty cors of meal, ten head of stall-fed cattle, twenty of pasture-fed cattle and a hundred sheep and goats, as well as deer, gazelles, roebucks and choice fowl. For he ruled over all the kingdoms west of the River, from Tiphsah to Gaza, and had peace on all sides. During Solomon's lifetime Judah and Israel, from Dan to Beersheba, lived in safety, each man under his own vine and fig tree." (1 Kings 4:20-25)
The amillennial argument is that this passage says that Solomon ruled from the Euphrates River down to Egypt, which fulfills Genesis 15:18 (above). But this argument is overlooking a key point. In 1 Kings 4:20-25 (above), notice that Solomon ruled over various kingdoms and countries in that area of land, and it specifically says that Judah and Israel occupied the area from Dan to Beersheba, which is only a part of the land that God had promised to Abraham (as you can verify by looking at a map of Solomon's time). At this point, Abraham's descendants had not driven out the occupants and taken full possession of the land, because there were other people living within the borders which God had promised to Abraham. This situation did not fulfill God's promise, so 1 Kings 4:20-25 (above) does not support the amillennial view.

Another passage which seems to support the amillennial view is Joshua 21:43-45:
"So the LORD gave Israel all the land he had sworn to give their forefathers, and they took possession of it and settled there. The LORD gave them rest on every side, just as he had sworn to their forefathers. Not one of their enemies withstood them; the LORD handed all their enemies over to them. Not one of all the Lord's good promises to the house of Israel failed; every one was fulfilled." (Joshua 21:43-45)
Here is what some Bible scholars say about the above passage:
"[Concerning Israel possessing the land that was promised to Abraham, some people] claim that all such prophecies have already been fulfilled in the days of Joshua (21:43-45) and/or Solomon (1 Kings 4:21, 24). To this contention Walvoord responds:

The amillennarian position is often distinguished for its blindness to facts which would upset its own argument. The present instance is a good illustration. If its promises regarding the land were fulfilled in Joshua's time or in Solomon's, why do the Scriptures which were written later still appeal to the hope of future possession of the land? Practically every one of the Major and Minor Prophets mention in some form the hope of future possession of the land. All of them were written after Solomon's day. This is an obvious rebuttal to the amillennial position and points to the amillennial failure to face the real issues of the millennial debate with a view to all the evidence.

The original promises of the land involved (1) possession of the land, (2) permanent possession, (3) and occupying the land. Even in Solomon's day at the height of his kingdom the land was not all possessed. At best it was placed under tribute as the very passage cited by the amillennarians indicates (1 Kings 4:21). Certainly all must agree that possession was not permanent. Further at no time was all the land actually occupied by Israel." (Israelology: The Missing Link in Systematic Theology, Arnold Fruchtenbaum, p.521-522, emphasis added)

"This did not mean that every corner of the land was in Israel's possession, for God Himself had told Israel they would conquer the land gradually (Deut. 7:22). Neither do these concluding statements ignore the tragedies that would develop during the period of the Judges, but those would be Israel's fault, not God's. Yet the unfaithfulness of Israel in no way impugned the faithfulness of God. Paul affirmed this fact in his words to Timothy, "If we are faithless, He will remain faithful, for He cannot disown Himself" (2 Tim. 2:13).

Some theologians have insisted that the statement in Joshua 21:43 means that the land promise of the Abrahamic Covenant was fulfilled then. But this cannot be true because later the Bible gives additional predictions about Israel possessing the land after the time of Joshua (e.g., Amos 9:14-15). Joshua 21:43, therefore, refers to the extent of the land as outlined in Numbers 34 and not to the ultimate extent as it will be in the messianic kingdom (Gen. 15:18-21). Also though Israel possessed the land at this time it was later dispossessed, whereas the Abrahamic Covenant promised Israel that she would possess the land forever (Gen. 17:8)." (The Bible Knowledge Commentary (Old Testament edition), Walvoord and Zuck, Dallas Theological Seminary, p.364-365, emphasis added)
As these Bible scholars point out, Joshua 21:43-45 (above) does not support the amillennial view that the Land Promise has already been fulfilled. In Joshua's time, the Israelites were finally allowed to enter the Promised Land after wandering in the wilderness for 40 years, but they did not possess and occupy the land forever as God had promised Abraham and his descendants. For example, the Israelites were later taken into captivity (see chapters 24 and 25 of 2 Kings), and there were prophecies written after Joshua's time (such as Amos 9:14-15) which looked forward to Israel possessing the land in the future. Therefore, God's promise was not actually fulfilled in Joshua's time. The same thing applies to the Nehemiah 9:7-8 and Psalm 105:42-44 passages which are sometimes used to justify the amillennial view:
"You are the LORD God, who chose Abram and brought him out of Ur of the Chaldeans and named him Abraham. You found his heart faithful to you, and you made a covenant with him to give to his descendants the land of the Canaanites, Hittites, Amorites, Perizzites, Jebusites and Girgashites. You have kept your promise because you are righteous." (Nehemiah 9:7-8)

"He brought out Israel, laden with silver and gold, and from among their tribes no one faltered. Egypt was glad when they left, because dread of Israel had fallen on them. He spread out a cloud as a covering, and a fire to give light at night. They asked, and he brought them quail and satisfied them with the bread of heaven. He opened the rock, and water gushed out; like a river it flowed in the desert. For he remembered his holy promise given to his servant Abraham. He brought out his people with rejoicing, his chosen ones with shouts of joy; he gave them the lands of the nations, and they fell heir to what others had toiled for--" (Psalm 105:37-44)
When some of the Jews returned to Jerusalem in Nehemiah's time (see Nehemiah 9:7-8, above), they didn't possess or inhabit all of the land that God had promised to Abraham. Notice Nehemiah's prayer, for example:
"But see, we are slaves today, slaves in the land you gave our forefathers so they could eat its fruit and the other good things it produces. Because of our sins, its abundant harvest goes to the kings you have placed over us. They rule over our bodies and our cattle as they please. We are in great distress." (Nehemiah 9:36-37)
The Jews did not drive out all of the previous occupants of the land in Nehemiah's time, and they didn't possess the land forever (for example, the Jews were dispersed when the Roman army destroyed Jerusalem in 70 A.D.). Plus, there were prophecies written after Nehemiah's time (such as Amos 9:14-15) which looked forward to Israel possessing the land in the future. Therefore, the situation in Nehemiah's time did not fulfill God's promise. And the passage in Psalm 105 (above) specifically refers to Joshua's time (after the wilderness wandering), which we examined above in Joshua 21:43-45. These passages do not support the amillennial view that God's promise to Abraham has already been fulfilled.

Now let's look at another verse concerning the promise that God made to Abraham:
"The LORD said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, "Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north and south, east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted. Go, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I am giving it to you."" (Genesis 13:14-17)
God had promised Abraham that both he and his descendants would possess the land forever. But notice that Abraham lived in tents in the Promised Land as a stranger, and he did not receive the fulfillment of God's promise during his lifetime:
"By faith Abraham, when called to go to a place he would later receive as his inheritance, obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going. By faith he made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country; he lived in tents, as did Isaac and Jacob, who were heirs with him of the same promise. ... All these people were still living by faith when they died. They did not receive the things promised; they only saw them and welcomed them from a distance. And they admitted that they were aliens and strangers on earth." (Hebrews 11:8-9, 13)

"To this he [Stephen] replied: "Brothers and fathers, listen to me! The God of glory appeared to our father Abraham while he was still in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran. 'Leave your country and your people,' God said, 'and go to the land I will show you.' So he left the land of the Chaldeans and settled in Haran. After the death of his father, God sent him to this land where you are now living. He gave him no inheritance here, not even a foot of ground. But God promised him that he and his descendants after him would possess the land, even though at that time Abraham had no child."" (Acts 7:2-5)
The above passages tell us that neither Abraham nor Isaac nor Jacob have received the fulfillment of the Land Promise yet; they only saw it as from a distance. We have already seen that Abraham's descendants have not yet received the fulfillment of this promise either. In Genesis 13:14-17 (above) and Acts 7:2-5 (above), God promised the land to Abraham (in addition to his descendants), and this promise is still awaiting a future fulfillment. In order for this promise to be fulfilled, Israel must be restored back to the land, and Abraham must be resurrected. Both of these things will happen after the Second Coming of Christ (see my article called Beyond the Second Coming).

Conclusion: The Land Promise which God made to Abraham and his descendants has never been fulfilled. This is significant, because it disproves the amillennial view that this promise was fulfilled in Old Testament times. The Land Promise will reach its fulfillment when Jesus returns to the earth and establishes His thousand-year reign of righteousness and peace. At that time, all of the Old Testament saints (including Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob) will be resurrected, and the Jews will finally be in full possession of the land which God had promised to Abraham and his physical descendants.


Must the Jews Be Repentant Before They Can Be Restored Back to Their Land?

The other part of the question (at the top of this article) concerns the issue of whether or not Israel must be repentant before it can be restored to its land.

Those who hold the amillennial view tend to believe that the Church has "replaced" Israel in God's program, and therefore they do not believe that the modern country of Israel is a fulfillment of end-times Bible prophecy. Their argument is that the Bible says that Israel must be repentant before it can be restored or regathered to the land, yet the modern country of Israel is unrepentant and secular (i.e. non-Christian). As in the question that I am addressing (at the top of this article), amillennarians sometimes point out that the modern country of Israel does not fit the conditions given in Jeremiah 50:4-5:
""In those days, at that time," declares the LORD, "the people of Israel and the people of Judah together will go in tears to seek the LORD their God. They will ask the way to Zion and turn their faces toward it. They will come and bind themselves to the LORD in an everlasting covenant that will not be forgotten." (Jeremiah 50:4-5)
According to the amillennial argument, the modern country of Israel does not fit the conditions in the passage above (because Israel has not yet turned to the Lord in an everlasting covenant), and therefore modern-day Israel does not fulfill the prophecies which say that Israel will be restored back to its land.

However, there are two major problems with this argument. For one thing, Jeremiah 50:4-5 (above) does not actually address the issue of the Jews returning to live in the land of Israel. When we examine this passage in context, we can see that it really describes Israel turning to the Lord for salvation at the end of the seven-year Tribulation (just before the Second Coming):
"This is the word the LORD spoke through Jeremiah the prophet concerning Babylon and the land of the Babylonians: "Announce and proclaim among the nations, lift up a banner and proclaim it; keep nothing back, but say, 'Babylon will be captured; Bel will be put to shame, Marduk filled with terror. Her images will be put to shame and her idols filled with terror.' A nation from the north will attack her and lay waste her land. No one will live in it; both men and animals will flee away. In those days, at that time," declares the LORD, "the people of Israel and the people of Judah together will go in tears to seek the LORD their God. They will ask the way to Zion and turn their faces toward it. They will come and bind themselves to the LORD in an everlasting covenant that will not be forgotten."" (Jeremiah 50:1-5)
Revelation 18:1-24 tells us that Babylon will be destroyed shortly before the Second Coming. The passage above (which includes that Jeremiah 50:4-5 passage) says that in the days when Babylon is destroyed, the Jews will seek the Lord in tears and they will bind themselves to the Lord in an everlasting covenant. I showed in my article called The Second Coming that as God finishes pouring out His wrath during the seven-year Tribulation, the Antichrist and his armies will be in position to destroy the remnant of the Jews. The Jews will begin to repent as a nation for rejecting Jesus as the Messiah, and they will turn to the Lord for salvation. This will "trigger" the Second Coming, and Jesus will return to the earth to destroy the Antichrist and his armies at the so-called "Battle of Armageddon."

Jeremiah 50:4-5 (above) does not give any conditions for Israel to be restored or regathered to its land (as amillennarians sometimes claim), but instead it describes the Jews turning to Jesus for salvation just before the Second Coming. Therefore, Jeremiah 50:4-5 (above) does not prove the amillennial argument. Again, the amillennial argument is that Israel must be repentant before it can be regathered back to its land, but the second major problem with this view is that there are a number of passages of Scripture which describe Israel being regathered back to its land in an unrepentant state. Here is an example:
"As surely as I live, declares the Sovereign LORD, I will rule over you with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm and with outpoured wrath. I will bring you from the nations and gather you from the countries where you have been scattered--with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm and with outpoured wrath. I will bring you into the desert of the nations and there, face to face, I will execute judgment upon you. As I judged your fathers in the desert of the land of Egypt, so I will judge you, declares the Sovereign LORD. I will take note of you as you pass under my rod, and I will bring you into the bond of the covenant. I will purge you of those who revolt and rebel against me. Although I will bring them out of the land where they are living, yet they will not enter the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the LORD." (Ezekiel 20:33-38)
In this passage God says that He will gather the Jewish people from out of the nations of the world, but He will do it with wrath and He will purge out those who rebel against Him. This disproves the claim that Israel can only be regathered after they repent, because this passage says that God will regather them in unbelief and then execute judgment on them. According to the premillennial view of prophecy (which I believe has the greatest Scriptural support), the judgment which God is referring to in the passage above is the seven-year Tribulation. The remnant of Jews who survive the "purging" during the Tribulation will be the repentant (saved) Jews who will be allowed to enter into the Millennial Israel after the Second Coming. Notice in the passage above that God says He will bring the Jews into the bond of the covenant with Him, which exactly echoes that Jeremiah 50:4-5 passage (above). This will happen at the end of the seven-year Tribulation when the Jews will repent as a nation for rejecting Jesus as the Messiah (see my article called The Second Coming).

Here is another passage which describes a regathering of Jews in unbelief:
"Then the word of the LORD came to me: "Son of man, the house of Israel has become dross to me; all of them are the copper, tin, iron and lead left inside a furnace. They are but the dross of silver. Therefore this is what the Sovereign LORD says: 'Because you have all become dross, I will gather you into Jerusalem. As men gather silver, copper, iron, lead and tin into a furnace to melt it with a fiery blast, so will I gather you in my anger and my wrath and put you inside the city and melt you. I will gather you and I will blow on you with my fiery wrath, and you will be melted inside her. As silver is melted in a furnace, so you will be melted inside her, and you will know that I the LORD have poured out my wrath upon you.'"" (Ezekiel 22:17-22)
This describes a regathering of Jews back to Jerusalem in order for God's wrath to be poured out upon them (during the seven-year Tribulation). This disproves the claim that Israel can only be regathered after they repent, because this passage describes a regathering in unbelief for judgment.

Here is another passage which describes a regathering of Jews in unbelief:
"Therefore say to the house of Israel, 'This is what the Sovereign LORD says: It is not for your sake, O house of Israel, that I am going to do these things, but for the sake of my holy name, which you have profaned among the nations where you have gone. 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, when I show myself holy through you before their eyes. For I will take you out of the nations; I will gather you from all the countries and bring you back into your own land. I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your impurities and from all your idols. I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit in you; I will remove from you your heart of stone and give you a heart of flesh. And I will put my Spirit in you and move you to follow my decrees and be careful to keep my laws.'" (Ezekiel 36:22-27)
In this passage God says that He will gather Israel back to its own land, but He also says that they have been profaning His Name among the nations. He is not bringing them back for anything they have done (such as repenting), but so that He can show Himself holy through them. In fact, God specifically describes regathering them back to their own land before cleansing them and putting His Spirit in them, which means that this is a regathering in unbelief before they repent and turn to the Lord.

Here is another passage which describes a regathering of Jews in unbelief:
"Gather together, gather together, O shameful nation, before the appointed time arrives and that day sweeps on like chaff, before the fierce anger of the LORD comes upon you, before the day of the Lord's wrath comes upon you." (Zephaniah 2:1-2)
This passage calls Israel a "shameful nation," and it describes a regathering before "the day of the Lord's wrath" comes upon them (which is one of several common Old Testament expressions for the future seven-year Tribulation, as in Psalm 110:5-6, Isaiah 13:1-22, Ezekiel 7:19, and Zephaniah 1:14-18, for example). This once again describes a regathering in unbelief for judgment, which is what we are seeing today as Jews flock to the modern country of Israel before the seven-year Tribulation begins (which will be the time of God's wrath).

Here is another example:
"The infant will play near the hole of the cobra, and the young child put his hand into the viper's nest. They will neither harm nor destroy on all my holy mountain, for the earth will be full of the knowledge of the LORD as the waters cover the sea. In that day the Root of Jesse will stand as a banner for the peoples; the nations will rally to him, and his place of rest will be glorious. In that day the Lord will reach out his hand a SECOND time to reclaim the remnant that is left of his people from Assyria, from Lower Egypt, from Upper Egypt, from Cush, from Elam, from Babylonia, from Hamath and from the islands of the sea. He will raise a banner for the nations and gather the exiles of Israel; he will assemble the scattered people of Judah from the four quarters of the earth." (Isaiah 11:8-12)
This passage describes a regathering of Jews after the Second Coming, when Creation has been restored to its pre-Fall state and everyone on earth is saved (see my article called Beyond the Second Coming). Notice in Isaiah 11:11 (above) that this is specifically called the second regathering! The key point that the amillennial argument has missed is that there are two worldwide regatherings of Israel which were prophesied: One in unbelief before the seven-year Tribulation begins (which exactly fits the present country of Israel), and another regathering in belief (which will happen after the Second Coming).


Conclusion

The amillennial view tends to be that the Church has "replaced" Israel in God's program, but I believe that the weight of Scriptural evidence does not support this view (see my article called Are Gentile Christians All "Spiritual Jews"?). Those who hold the amillennial view also tend to believe that the modern country of Israel does not fulfill any end-times prophecies because they say that the Jews can only be regathered after they become repentant (sometimes using Jeremiah 50:4-5 as a justification for this view). However, when we looked at Jeremiah 50:4-5 in context we saw that it is not talking about the Jews being regathered to Israel. In fact, we saw several passages which specifically describe the Jews being regathered back to their land in unbelief for judgment (which will happen when God pours out His wrath during the seven-year Tribulation period). This exactly describes the modern country of Israel. We also saw that God's promise that Abraham and his descendants will fully possess and occupy the land has not yet been fulfilled. This promise will be fulfilled after the Second Coming when Jesus physically reigns on earth for one thousand years.


I hope this has been helpful, and may the Lord abundantly bless you as you study His Word! 		 
 
 
  Modification History  
 
 

  • 07/31/2008 - Renamed this article.

  • 02/27/2002 - Modified some of the wording, and added a link to my article about whether or not Gentile Christians are "spiritual Jews."

  • 08/21/2001 - New article.