Jaw-dropping Jewels about Jesus
Rarely does Jesus, God the Son, do exactly what we expect of Him. It seems odd that He so frequently surprises us, given that He never changes. Hebrews 13:8 makes this absolute statement: “Jesus the same yesterday, and today, and forever.” Still, though He is blessedly consistent in His goodness, Jesus does unforeseen things. Even when He does what is expected, He does not always do it in the way that we anticipate. Let us join with Jesus on a jaw-dropping journey. (I will be using this opening paragraph for each of the brief messages in this series. The following material will change daily.)
As we saw yesterday, the only possible Biblical interpretation of the “woman” in Revelation 12:1-2 is Israel. When the Apostle John wrote these words late in the first century, the nation of Israel had ceased to exist, defeated and scattered by the Romans in A.D. 70. Only in 1948, around 1850 years after John’s “Revelation of Jesus Christ” (1:1), did Israel resurface as a nation, just as God’s Word had predicted. The context (which we will discuss more fully tomorrow) reveals the world’s irrational and implacable hatred of the Jewish people. Centuries after they were driven from their homeland, they were forced out of nations such as England and Spain, severely persecuted in the Soviet Union, and nearly exterminated in Germany. One scholar, commenting on this pervasive genocidal bigotry, wrote, “Next to the survival of the Jews, the most baffling historical phenomenon is the hatred which [they have] repeatedly encountered among the nations of the earth.” The current worldwide increase in anti-Jewish sentiment is a sad continuation of this evil malice – and is something that no Christian should be a part of.