"I will bless those
who bless you,
and
whoever curses you I will curse;
and all peoples on earth
will
be blessed through you.” (Genesis 12:3 NIV)
Some Christians do not
take Genesis 12:3 literally. Some do, but do not see Abraham's nation in
Genesis 12 as the political Israel we see today. I believe that God's Word is
simple, straightforward and true. God will bless those who blesses
Abraham's nation, which was inherited by Jacob according to Genesis
35:11-12.
11 And
God said to him, “I am God Almighty[a]; be
fruitful and increase in number. A nation and a community of nations
will come from you, and kings will be among your descendants.12 The land I gave to Abraham and Isaac I also give
to you, and I will give this land to your descendants after you.” (Genesis
35:11-12)
God's statement unequivocally affirm that the divine promises given to
Abraham and Jacob is not inherited by Jacob, whose name was changed to Israel
in the same chapter. Therefore, if Jacob is heir to the promises to Abraham in
Genesis 12, it flows that the spiritual principle in Gen 12:3 will apply today,
with the Jews as the reference point since the Jews are descendants of Jacob,
now Israel.
Much has been argued about US's prosperity being linked to their alliance with Israel, with Singapore's prosperity being explained the same way. It is also argued that Britain's downfall as a colonial power related to their barring of Jews from returning to their homeland in 1940, sending many of them back to face concentration camps in Europe. Does this spiritual principle explain China's rise as a global superpower today?
I was prompted by the Holy Spirit one day to look up China's phenomenal
GDP growth, and see if there was any correlation between that and China-Israeli
diplomatic relations.
I was not expecting what I found. These figures are taken from China
Statistical Study 2012.
Let us first look at China's GDP from 1979-1992.
Let us now look at China's GDP from 1993-2012
A clear picture may be seen from the China's GDP growth chart.
We can see that growth started to pick up from 1984. However, the tremendous growth from 1992 was off the charts. What happened between China and Israel in 1992? 1992 was the landmark year where China-Israeli diplomatic relations were restored. Since then, there were military and economic cooperation between the two countries until today.
Is this coincidence? Nah, I just believe the Bible to be simple, straightforward and true.
Does the fact that many Christians believe that they too have inherited Abraham's blessing by being grafted into the tree changes your understanding of this principle? (i.e., through Christians, we bless the other nations)
ReplyDeleteHi squeak, thank you for your comment.
ReplyDeleteIf you are referring to the spiritual principle that those who bless Israel will be blessed, and those who curse Israel will be cursed, I do not think that the fact that Christians are grafted into the Romans 11 tree change the understanding of this principle.
In fact in Romans 11:24 says that "After all, if you were cut out of an olive tree that is wild by nature, and contrary to nature were grafted into a cultivated olive tree, how much more readily will these, the natural branches, be grafted into their own olive tree!"
"you" refers to the Gentiles in the Roman church. Who then is the "cultivated olive tree"? It would be the Israel and they are cultivated because they have know God for a long long time, compared to Gentiles who at the time Romans was written, only just to know God through our Lord Jesus Christ.
Romans 11:1-2 makes it clear that " I ask then: Did God reject his people? By no means! I am an Israelite myself, a descendant of Abraham, from the tribe of Benjamin. 2 God did not reject his people, whom he foreknew."
If God did not reject His people, it would be very difficult to believe that the Abrahamic covenant is somehow annulled with respect to the Jewish lineage and fulfilled through the Christian church.
Gentile Christians are "grafted" into the tree. They do not replace the tree :)
thanks :) in other words, the promise applies to both Jews and Christians.
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