 I wanna bring a message to you entitled Why Israel Matters. And let me just give you the background to this message this morning. I had intended on beginning a brand new series from the Gospel of John this morning. And we are gonna start that, not next weekend, but the following weekend where we're gonna, most of the summer we're gonna be spending our time looking at the seven IMs and the seven signs in the Gospel of John and really looking forward to that, but there are some things recently that have come up on the scenes and questions that have been asked me several different times about the subject of Israel. And so I felt just kinda out of the blue, the Lord just say, Lee, I want you to go in this direction this weekend. So one of the things I always wanna do is make sure that I'm walking in step with what Jesus, who's the great shepherd of this church wants to say to his people. And so this morning I'm gonna bring this message to you entitled, Why Israel Matters. And we're gonna talk about the subject of Israel, the people of God, as well as the nation and the land of Israel. And I believe that this is gonna be very helpful for all of us. What we just saw this morning, both here and at Portage and downtown where people have made the decision to follow Jesus Christ, believed that he is the Son of God, that he came into the world, died on the cross, was raised from the dead, is alive and soon returning, is a faith that actually began 2000 years ago in Israel, in the city limits of Jerusalem. And it is a faith that also as Christians, our faith will culminate also in the city of Jerusalem with Jesus reigning and ruling as the king over all the nations of the earth. That's what we believe. So it's important for us to know that because the faith that we have, even though here we are, we're in West Michigan and I don't know, we're kind of a melting pot now, but 20 years ago, if you weren't Dutch, you weren't much. But I've got news for you, Christianity and followers of Jesus, the original followers of Jesus and the movement that Jesus started on the day of Pentecost in Acts chapter two in the city limits of Jerusalem where 3,000 people got baptized. We just saw 20 or so get baptized. Can you imagine one day where 3,000 got baptized? That's where the Jesus movement began. That's where Christianity began in Jerusalem with a service with 3,000 being baptized and a command for the gospel to go to the ends of the earth and a promise and a promise in Acts chapter one that Jesus would return to fulfill all the promises that God the Father had made to the nation of Israel. So this morning I wanna come from that different direction and talk to you about why Israel matters. The subject of Israel in my experience is one of the most mysterious and misunderstood subjects for the student of God's word because it has to do with the significance of Israel, oftentimes people, especially those of us who are not Jewish, don't come out of the Middle East. We read the Old Testament and we ask the question, why does Israel matter? Why does it matter today? You know, I get that it matters in the Old Testament because we read through our Bibles and the whole first half of the Bible is all about God's dealing with this people called Israel that he chose for himself by election to be the subject of his focus and his covenants and his eternal redemptive purposes in the earth. And obviously we know that Jesus was Jewish. He came through the line of Judah. We know that he was an Israelite in John chapter one, verse 11, when John is describing how God the Son came into the earth to be our savior, it says in verse 11, that he came to his own, that's Israel, and his own did not receive him. So I think we all know that Jesus is Jewish. His first disciples were Jewish in the nation of Israel. That's where Jesus did all of his ministry. And we also know that the church began Israel centric. You know, it was really about 30 years before there were any Gentile believers really to say anyways. I mean, the early first 30 years or so of the church was primarily a bunch of Jewish followers of Jesus, the Messiah who believed he was a fulfillment of all the Old Testament promises. But then the gospel goes to the Gentiles and it begins to move outside of Jerusalem and Judea to Samaria and then into Europe and Asia Minor and Africa and over into Persia and even beyond that. And then something took place in the year 70 AD. And 70 AD, the Romans came surrounded Israel and came surrounded Jerusalem, destroyed the city of Jerusalem, destroyed its temple and took after those Jewish people that did not get killed, took them, the rest of them, marched them back into the Roman Empire, scattered them throughout all the nations of the Roman Empire at that time and then even beyond that and it appeared that Israel as a nation and the Jewish people were done. But yet the church kept going forward. The church of Jesus Christ kept growing and expanding but now there was a tilt to where the church became primarily Gentile. Now, if you wonder what a Gentile is, if you're not Jewish, you qualify. You're a Gentile. The Bible will talk about barbarians. How many have ever seen that in your Bible? And you wondered, am I a barbarian? Well, if you are a German descent, that's what they described as barbarians. So all of you Germans, we always knew you were a bunch of barbarians but the rest of us are classified either under Greeks or Gentiles, which is just general for the nations other than Israel. And this is how the church began to grow and expand and flourish throughout much of medieval period of time and then even expansion, colonial expansion. We see Christianity growing among the nations and among the Gentiles. When that began to take place, when the Jewish portion of the church began to diminish and almost disappear and the Gentile portion of the church began to expand and dominate, there was an insertion of a false teaching and that false teaching is called replacement theology. Here's what replacement theology is. Replacement theology says that God has replaced in his economy, the church in place of Israel. Israel has been replaced by the church. And so therefore all of the promises that God made in the Bible to Abraham and to his descendants, Isaac and Jacob, who is Israel, all of those promises about the land and about redemption and about a kingdom have now been all spiritually transferred to the church, which is primarily Gentile and that God has nothing to do with Israel anymore. Israel is under judgment, Israel rejected their Messiah and therefore God doesn't have anything to do with them. And the problem with that is that doctrine of replacement theology began to be taught as the dominant theology in our seminaries and in our Bible colleges. And by virtue of that, it has infected most of the pastors and the pulpits, even in our present day. I would say many of the leading theologians, pastors, seminary scholars, and even major denominations embrace what's called replacement theology. Now I could probably spend multiple hours just talking on this subject, but here's the problem with that. When the church embraced replacement theology, it opened the door for persecution of the Jewish people by Christians. And the medieval period of time is a dark hour for the church of Jesus. Jesus who came as a Jew will return as a Jewish man to reign and to rule from Jerusalem over the kingdom from Israel over all the nations of the earth. His church, Jesus, his church spent a thousand plus years brutally persecuting the Jewish people. And so now we're living in a time period where for a lot of Jewish people around the world, some 10 million or more of them, they look at Christianity not as the fulfillment of God's promises, but they look at the cross, the symbol of a cross, as basically a death warrant for their people. And it's important that as the church we expose replacement theology and we understand the significance of Israel so that we are able to partner with God in his plan that he has and has always had for the nation of Israel and will ultimately fulfill it when he returns. This is important stuff. Now, I know that when we talk about this, it's not necessarily, oh, Pastor Lee, you're not gonna give me five steps to a happier, healthy life today. This is not a life application message, but this is an eternal purpose of God application message because what we wanna make sure is that in all of our daily practical living, we are aligned eternally with what God is doing in the earth and make no mistake about it. We are living in a time when God is still active and pursuing the nation of Israel and he is at work. Israel is not a secondary issue. It's a prophetic issue for us as God's people and ultimately for God's redemptive plan because, and here's why, God is a covenant keeping God. God is a covenant keeping God and what we find is that right from the very beginning of your Bible, the very first book, somebody shout out the name of the first book in your Bible, it is, thank you, y'all get an A. Right from the beginning in the book of Genesis, we see that God steps into a world that is rebelled against him and he could have left it to be self-destroyed but what he does is he inserts himself into human history in order to redeem mankind and the nations back to himself and how he does it is he establishes a everlasting covenant with a man named Abram. Let me read to you a couple of scriptures. Genesis 15, it says in verse 18, on that day the Lord made a covenant with Abraham, or Abram, saying to your offspring, I give this land from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, the land of the Kenites, the Kennesites, the Cadmonites, the Hittites, the Parasites, the Mosquito bites, and all the otherites, Amorites, Canaanites, Gyrgishites, Jebusites. But seriously, it says, Genesis chapter 15, God established a covenant with Abram and he said, all this land is the down payment on the covenant that I'm establishing with you, it's yours. And then we see a couple of chapters later in Genesis 17 when God reiterates this, it says, the Lord said, I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout all generations. Somebody say, all generations for an everlasting covenant to be God to you and your children after you. Now, what's interesting about the covenant that God cut with Abraham, and by the way, I want you to understand, as Gentiles, and especially as Americans, modern, postmodern Americans, we don't understand covenant. We are a contract society. Contract says this, I don't trust you and you don't trust me, but we're going into business together, so we're gonna write up a contract that's enforceable legally based out of mistrust, but that's not a covenant. Covenant is the exact opposite. The word covenant in the Hebrew language means the cutting. It means that covenant is sealed in blood first by an animal that represents that if I don't keep the covenant that I'm making with you that is sealed in blood, it's everlasting, it's unbreakable, that means death to me. And I'm actually doing it not out of mistrust, but I'm doing it out of a commitment. I'm committing to you that to my own personal exhaustion and even to the ceasing of being who I am any longer, I will keep the words that I'm making you here today upon my life and I'm gonna prove it by the shedding of blood. When God made a covenant with Abraham in Genesis 15, it was not a two-sided covenant. Most covenants in the Bible are two-sided, which means you and I are coming into covenant together and we're both making vows to one another. If one breaks it, the other one is free from it. That's what divorce is. Marriage is a covenant in the eyes of God. It's not a contract, but there is a breaking of covenant when there is unfaithfulness. The covenant that God established with Abraham and therefore Israel is described as an everlasting covenant. Here's why, it's because in Genesis 15, God initiated the covenant. He said, I'm gonna make a covenant with you, I'm gonna bless you, I'm gonna impact, I'm gonna bless all the other nations of the world through you. We know that's fulfilled when Jesus comes through the lineage of Israel as the Savior. But then when he separated out the animals, he told Abraham, Abraham, I want you to take animals, these bowls, I want you to cut them in half. And I want you to do it at night. It says, normally two people come together and they walk in the midst of the animals that have been sacrificed and they take vows upon themselves. In this particular case, only God came as like a burning torch and he went through the animals and he said, I am making a covenant with you. It's an everlasting covenant. What that means is it doesn't matter what you do, Abraham, I'm taking it upon myself that no matter what you do, I will fulfill my covenant promises to you and to your descendants or I'm not God any longer. The day that God breaks his covenant with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob is the day that God ceases to be God. In Jeremiah, he says it this way, if I forget you and if I forget my covenant promises, may my hand no longer work. In Zechariah chapter two, he says, Israel is the apple of my eye. So God has made an everlasting covenant with Israel. And yet Israel very often, that's what most of the Old Testament is about, Israel very often has been unfaithful to the covenant. They've been unfaithful to God because God said, if you will be faithful to me, I'm gonna dwell in your midst, I'm gonna make you the head and not the tail, first and not last, I'm gonna bless you and through you bless all the other nations of the earth and I'm gonna give you the land to possess. But if you become faithless and you refuse to follow me, then I'm going to discipline you and I'm gonna bring surrounding nations, I'm gonna bring empires that are gonna come in and judge you, take you away in captivity until you turn to me with your whole heart again, stop worshiping the idols. And when you cry out to me in your discipline, whether that be Assyria, Babylon or Rome, I'm gonna hear you and I'm gonna rescue you and I'm gonna bring you back into the land once you've repented. I'll bring you back into the land. And what has happened is throughout history, throughout the Old Testament, we see the cycle of God bringing them in, then them worshiping idols, becoming apathetic and complacent and God warning them through prophets, them refusing to repent and then God taking them out in captivity, whether it into Persia or Babylon or Assyria and then they began to cry out to God, God, we're so sorry, we forgot your covenant with us, we've gotten sucked into worshiping idols and being just like the world and God says, yeah, I hear your prayer, so guess what I'm gonna send a deliver. So he sends a Moses or he sends a Zerubbabel or he sends a Cyrus and he delivers them and he brings them back into the land and for a while everything's good and then they go back into rebellion against God again. Ultimately, God sent his son as the final word, as the ultimate, he comes as Israel, he's Jewish, he comes as God and he comes as the savior to remove their sins from them and to fulfill what he promises in Jeremiah that I'm gonna start and I'm gonna establish a new covenant with you, even a greater covenant with you and he establishes that new covenant through the blood of his son, Jesus. But even at this moment, at this day, even though Israel right now after 2000 years of being in captivity among the nations, in 1948, May 14th, 1948, Israel was born as a nation again and they came back into the land, even though they came back into the land in unbelief, they're back in the land and it's interesting because Israel unlike any other nation that's ever existed on the face of the earth, it's the only time in world history that you will ever find a nation that existed that ceased to exist and was destroyed and then was born again. Israel's the only nation and it's a signpost prophetically for you and I to know that God is still dealing with the people that he established a covenant with, Israel. That does not mean though that because the covenant that he has with them, he also has a controversy with them. He has a controversy with them and the controversy is their unfaithfulness. In Micah chapter six, verses one through two, this is King James. This may be the only time you ever hear me quote the King James Bible. So listen very closely. Hear ye now what the Lord saith. Arise, contend thou before the mountains and let the hills hear thy voice. Hear ye, oh mountains, the Lord's controversy and ye strong foundations of the earth for the Lord hath a controversy with his people and he will plead with Israel. So what's God's controversy? Other translations say indictment or some say that he has a conflict with them. What is it? It's their covenant unfaithfulness. This is God's controversy and I wanna teach a whole bunch on this. I just don't have time to do it. Here's where we sit today in this present hour. God has made covenant promises to Abraham that he will be faithful to complete. They have been under discipline scattered among the nations, but God's promises is that he would bring them back into the land and he would allow them to go through difficulties and troubles and trials and what the Bible describes as tribulation so that they would turn back to the Lord and the reason why the Lord is allowing this and will allow this to happen even near the end of the age in a very intense way that Jeremiah refers to as Jacob's trouble is he's not doing it to destroy them. He's doing it because of his covenant promises, but he still has a controversy with them because he's saying, I've been faithful to you but you've not been faithful to me, but there's gonna come a time when you cry out to me and ultimately I'm gonna save and deliver you and Zechariah gives the promise. I love this. Zechariah chapter 12 gives a promise in verse 10 11 that there's gonna come a day when God's gonna pour out his spirit of grace and supplication on Israel in their darkest, most difficult moment and they are gonna look up when they are surrounded by all nations and about to be wiped out and destroyed and they are going to mourn for the one that they see who has been pierced. How many know who's been pierced on the cross? They're gonna see the one who's been pierced for them. They're gonna mourn as for an only firstborn child and Jesus is going to return to rescue and save them and all of Israel is gonna be saved. But ultimately God's gonna bring them to a point of difficulty in order for this to take place. So all that's just kind of a panoramic view of from the beginning until where we're at. This is where God is at right now. God is still very much dealing with Israel. So what is God's agenda with Israel? I want you to open your Bibles to Romans chapter 11 and I'm gonna take one of the most difficult chapters in the entire Bible and I'm gonna explain it to you in seven minutes. Are you ready? Here we go, you're welcome by the way. Romans chapter nine verse 11 is by and far away three of the most difficult chapters in the New Testament. And the reason why it's difficult for us to understand is because for about 1500 years we've been taught all wrong about Israel. And how many know if you've been taught to do something wrong? It doesn't matter if the thing is easy if you've been taught wrong to try and rebuild like a golf swing. How many in here have ever played golf? How many have ever hacked at golf? How many still hack at golf? I've got a slice that should be in a Hall of Fame. But it's because I learned how to swing it wrong. If you learn how to swing properly the first time golf can be easy, but if you're a baseball player like I was and then you try take your baseball swing and swing it at a golf ball, it messes everything up. If you've been taught replacement theology or no theology of Israel your entire life, reading Romans chapter 11 is challenging. But if you read it the way that it was written it's very simple to understand. So what is God's agenda from Romans chapter 11? Well, first of all, look at verse number one. It says, I ask then, has God rejected his people by no means? For I am myself an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham, a member of the tribe of Benjamin. God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew. I mean that should just solve the problem right there, right? Has God written Israel after the flesh off? He says, no. Then how do we write theology books that say yes? God is not finished with Israel at all but will fulfill his covenant promises. It's right there. Number two, what's God's agenda? Look down at verse number seven. It says, what then? Israel failed to obtain what it was seeking which was salvation. The elect obtained it, that's the church but the rest of the Jewish people were hardened as it is written, God gave them a spirit of stupor, eyes that would not see, ears that would not hear and down to this very day. Now look over at verse 25. Verse 25 says, a partial hardening has come upon Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles come in. Verse 26, and in this way all of Israel will be saved. So number one, what's God's agenda? God's not finished with them yet. He's not finished with Israel. He's not written them off. He's gonna be faithful to his covenant promises. Number two, understand that the reason why God has a controversy with them is because a hardening has occurred in part because of their unbelief. So here's what God did when they rejected Jesus as the Messiah. A small remnant of them believed and followed Jesus. A small remnant of even the Jewish leaders believed and followed Jesus, but many of them hardened their heart. So God allowed a hardening to come upon natural Israel for a period of time in order to deal with them and also to open the door of salvation for the Gentiles. God's original plan was through Abraham to raise up a nation that was different than all the other nations who would then be a light to the nations, who would then be missionaries to the Gentile nations and tell them and teach them about God. But when the gospel and then when Jesus came to Israel and they didn't receive him and only a small portion of them did, God allowed a hardening to happen, their own choice. Then he started the church, took the gospel to the Gentiles and it says very clearly in verse number 11 that that hardening or chapter 11 verse 26, verse 25, that that hardening is only going to happen until the full number of Gentiles come in. So in other words, God says, harden the nation of Israel and the Jewish people in their discipline for a period of time. I'm gonna deal with bringing the gospel to the non-Jewish world, but there is a full number that I have of those that I pre-know are gonna come into the kingdom and once that number is complete and the gospel goes to all the nations of the earth as a witness, remember Jesus said that. The gospel will be preached to all nations, Gentiles. Once all the nations hear the gospel and have a chance to hear, God is then going to turn his attention back to the nation of Israel and that hardening is gonna be dealt with. So God's agenda is he's not done, he will fulfill his promises. Number two, why are the Jewish people the way that they are right now and their unbelief? It's because a hardening has happened in part. Number three, Israel in God's economy has been broken off like branches broken off of an olive branch and Gentiles are now being grafted in and the vine is Jesus. The vine is God in his covenants. So what he says in verse number 17 is he says that Israel, which are the natural branches were broken off and you talking about Gentiles where a wild olive shoot had been grafted in and now you're shared the same nourishment of the olive tree. The olive tree is Jesus, the anointed one. The natural branches were Israel and their unbelief, God broke off their branches and he grafted wild branches in. That's us, we're the wild olive branches. It's a great name for a football team, wild branches. And so here we are the Gentiles and we're grafted in, but Paul warns us. He says, but don't get arrogant. Don't look at Israel after the flesh and say, oh, you guys, I can't believe you didn't believe in Jesus. I can't believe that you rejected your Messiah. Don't allow offense and don't allow arrogance to dominate your heart because there's gonna come a day, there's gonna come a day where God is going to graft them back in to Christ. God is gonna take natural Israel and he's gonna graft them back in and he actually describes this taking place in verse number 12 of Romans chapter 11. He says, now if their trespass, in other words, their rejection of the Messiah means riches for the world, in other words, you and I as Gentiles are all benefiting from that. We're all saved today in Richland and Portage and downtown Kalamazoo today as Gentiles because the door of salvation was opened up in some part due to the way Israel responded. He says, but don't get arrogant because he says, if their failure means riches for the Gentiles, how much more will their full inclusion mean? That's future. This isn't him being done with Israel. He says, no, they're gonna be fully included back into the covenant people of God. And if you look down at verse number 15, it says for the rejection, in other words, they rejected God. Their rejection means the reconciliation of the world. What will their acceptance mean except life from the dead? Now two weeks ago, we just celebrated Jesus the Messiah's resurrection from the dead. We call it Easter, but it's the resurrection day. Jesus dead in the tomb for three days on the third day rises again, it's a miracle. It's profound. Do you know that the way that God is dealing with the nation of Israel, his covenant and his controversy is following the same path of how Jesus the Son, the Messiah came to deliver and to be the savior of Israel. They have been in the tomb for multiple days, dead as a nation, but when they come back into their full inclusion and their eyes are opened up and they see Jesus as Messiah, it's going to be just like a nation and a covenant people are raised from the dead. The same spirit that God poured out on that tomb to raise Jesus is the same spirit of grace and supplication. He's going to pour out on the nation of Israel and they are going to be resurrected as if back from the dead. This is God's dealing with Israel. This is Romans chapter 11, God's not done. They're hardened in part, but there's coming a day when they're going to be grafted back in and it's going to be like the resurrection all over again and it's going to be profound when this takes place. And listen, the stage is set in our current day for many of the things that the Bible prophesied 2000 years ago to occur. The stage is set. I'm not saying we're there yet because Israel is dwelling in the land after 2000 years. They've recaptured the city of the great king Jerusalem in 1967 during the six day war, but yet they're still in the land in unbelief. And the promises that we read about in the Old Testament that are connected to God's everlasting covenant always talk about the moment that they turn their eyes and they believe and they turn their hearts to Messiah. That's what we're looking forward to. That is what is going to take place in the last season or the last period of time in this current evil age that the Bible refers to as the day of the Lord. That's going to take place in the future. And I want to tell you church, we are quickly approaching that day. Here's why this message is so important. From a theological perspective, replacement theology has fed like lighter fluid into a campfire, an evil demonic spirit that is dominant in our world today that has been around. It's referred to very often as the ancient hatred. And today we would call it anti-Semitism. Anti-Jewish thought, belief, even political ranker towards Jewish people and the nation of Israel. Anti-Zionism, anti-Israel, anti-Semitism. It's all the same thing. It is not motivated by politics. It is motivated by a spirit and that spirit is the same spirit that motivated Pharaoh to want to destroy and enslave the Israelites in Egypt for 400 years and wipe them out during the Passover. It's the same spirit that dominated and possessed Haman and Persia when he wanted to kill and destroy all the Jewish people throughout the Persian empire. It's the same spirit that dominated Herod when he wanted to kill the Messiah, when he killed all the children that were under a certain age. It's the same spirit that dominated Rome when they circled and destroyed the city limits of Jerusalem in 70 AD. And it is the same spirit that is at work right now in this age. And I wanna promise you that it is a anti-Christ spirit that is going to accelerate and become more dominant in the days ahead because when that figure arises on the world scene that the Bible refers to as the anti-Christ, the one who opposes God, he is going to also take up the controversy with Israel and he's gonna persecute them. And it's important for us as followers of Jesus that we know how to respond in this era. How do we respond to Israel? Well, there's about five different ways you can respond to Israel. I'm not gonna give them to you. I'm gonna give you one today. Everybody say one. Here's how we should respond to Israel knowing what we know. Should pray for them. We should be people of prayer for the nation of Israel. Here's what I know. Not everything that Israel does politically today is correct or is even righteous. But it doesn't matter because they're in unbelief. This is not a political statement. We need to be able to see through the eyes of faith and deal specifically as people that know we're engaged in a battle not with flesh and blood but against principalities and powers and spiritual hosts of wickedness in heavenly places. Isaiah 62, which is far and away one of the most beautiful prophetic pictures of what God is going to do in Israel in the future says this in verse number six. It says, on your walls, O Jerusalem, I have set watchman all the day and all the night and they shall never be silent. You who put the Lord in remembrance, take no rest and give him no rest until he establishes Jerusalem and makes it a praise and all the earth. So Israel is coming up on its 75th anniversary. May 14th will be at 75th anniversary. And if you don't know much about how Israel was birthed as a nation, it's a miracle that's worth looking at in 1948. The first nation on the face of the earth to recognize Israel as a nation was the United States of America. President Truman recognized Israel as a sovereign nation and other nations continued and followed in suit. What's interesting is that at the same time, all the surrounding nations, Arab Islamic nations declared war on Israel. 1967, Israel made a preemptive strike against all the surrounding nations. And those surrounding nations and political and even religious entities still threaten Israel. Israel is at its most critical hour ever right now. It's facing five major challenges all at the same time. First challenge is this. Iran is within days of achieving nuclear missile weapons, days. And here's what they intend to do with it. I know that some people are like, oh, Iran just wants to have peace with Israel. Now, listen, this is from the deputy commander of operations for their military. His name is Abbas Nilforah Shun. He says, Iran has encircled Israel from all four sides. Nothing will be left of Israel once we achieve nuclear capability. Doesn't sound like peace talks to me. So right now, their first challenge is Iran is days away, maybe weeks away from getting nuclear capability. And they've already declared, if we get it, we will wipe Tel Aviv off the face of the earth. The second challenge that they have is that they are surrounded on all sides by terrorist organizations that are hell bent under destruction. Hamas controls the Gaza. You've got Islamic Jihad that is within the land of the West Bank. And you have Hezbollah that's up in the North and Lebanon and Syria with constant missile launching into the cities, the villages of Israel. And then on top of that, you have very uniquely in Israel now, you think America politically is polarized, Israel right now is in the middle of what many say in the next couple of months could turn in to an internal civil war between the Orthodox religious right and the very moderate or liberal left. And they're being pulled apart politically. That's happening inside. And then on top of it, you have the UN Security Council members wanting to impose massive terrorists on Israel and declare it an apartheid state. So you've got all these challenges that are taking place all right now during the month of May. So all of that is to let you know that we as a church are going to participate in something that has never happened in human history. In the month of May, from May 7th until May 28th, there is a prayer focus called the Isaiah 62 Prayer Initiative. And here's what it is, it's 10 million, everybody get that number, 10 million intercessors, around the world, through thousands of different churches and ministries in every nation of the earth, 10 million though, have committed to pray and fast for the nation of Israel for 21 days in the month of May. To pray for their protection, to pray that their eyes would be open to see Jesus, to pray that God begins to shift and draw Israel back to themselves, to pray that the promises of God are fulfilled. Israel is the apple of God's eye, his eye is on it and the days we're living in are urgent. 10 million, think about 10 million watchmen on the wall, Isaiah 62, praying and calling God into remembrance of his promises over the nation of Israel, praying for our Jewish friends to receive Jesus, Yeshua, as their Messiah, praying for grace and supplication to be poured out. Imagine what that will look like. That's never happened in 2,000 years of church history. Mike Bickel, who's a friend of this house, was talking about saying that to a Jewish friend and the Jewish friend who's now a believer said, with tears in her eyes, he's like, you are gonna pray for us for 21 days? Church, you know what that does? It's gonna melt away. It's gonna melt away the ancient stigma that we as the church are opposed to Israel and we're gonna pour out the love of Jesus' body, the church, all over Israel, standing on the walls in the place of intercession and letting them know you can count on us. Because Romans chapter 11 says the way that Israel is going to be changed is they're gonna be provoked by how God has been good and blessed the Gentile church. In other words, our love for them is gonna provoke them to take a second look at Jesus. And so we're gonna participate in the prayer room downtown for 21 days. We're gonna be praying for Israel and we want you to be a part of it. We want you to lean into it. If you wanna pray about something that's on God's wish list, you know, oftentimes we're like, God, here's my prayer list. You know what this is? This is us saying, God, what's on your prayer list? And Jesus says, Israel. And us saying, guess what? My gift to you this year is I'm gonna invest some time in prayer for the people that are on your heart. And you know what God will do? When we bless Israel, God will bless us. I want you to stand with me all over this room if you would, and wherever you're at, Portage or downtown. I know that this is maybe a different type of message but it's an important message. It's not us centric. Unless you are Jewish and if you are, and I know we have several that are within our congregation, we want you to know that we love you. Whether you are a completed messianic believer and you now believe in Yeshua, you're a follower of Jesus. You belong in this church. If you're listening or you're joining us and you have not yet come to that point, doesn't matter, we want you to know we love you because Jesus loves you. And we love Israel because Jesus loves Israel. And we long for the day when all of Israel says, blessed is he who comes in the name of the Lord. How many know that's gonna be a glorious day church when Jesus descends, when he returns, he returns to wipe out the enemies and to establish his kingdom in the city of the great King, Jerusalem. And we're gonna reign and rule right along with him what a glorious day that's gonna be. I wanna invite the prayer partners if they would to move into place. I'm gonna pray and then we're gonna dismiss. If you would like prayer for anything going on in your life, in your heart today, we'll invite you to just come up and to receive prayer. Father, thank you today and we do, we bless Israel. We pray, Father, that as we join with 10 million other intercessors across the globe that our prayers fill up the bowls in heaven and that it adds to and it even hastens the day of the Lord and your movement and your hand upon the nation of Israel. God, we bless Israel. We know that everything that they are doing, everything that they are right now necessarily isn't them walking in the fullness of their promises. But Lord, we remind you of your covenant promises that you are faithful and we're here today because of the promises you made through them and to them in the past. So we bless them and I ask today, Father, as we leave this building today, help us to be people who are true to the covenant we have with you. Help us to walk faithfully before you as representatives of Jesus Christ. We pray this in Jesus' name, amen and amen. Everybody, you're dismissed. Come forward if you'd like to receive prayer today.