It is because I believe that God still supports the physical nation of Israel in their historic homeland. Let us look at some Scripture:
“Now the LORD said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” Genesis 12:1-3
The same promise of blessing and cursing is repeated in Genesis 26:3-4; 27:29; and 28:13-15. But has the blessing and cursing part of the verse been made of no more effect since the resurrection of Jesus? I don’t believe so, because the covenant that God made with Abraham and his offspring after him (the physical nation of Israel) is an everlasting covenant, which was affirmed, including the blessing and cursing, in the Scriptures listed above. The everlastingness of God’s covenant with the physical nation of Israel is beautifully reinforced to Israel just before they are carried off into captivity to Babylon:
“Behold, the days are coming, declares the LORD, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and the house of Judah, not like the covenant that I made with their fathers on the day when I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant that they broke, though I was their husband, declares the LORD. But this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel after those days, declares the LORD: I will put My law within them, and I will write it on their hearts. And I will be their God, and they shall be My people. And no longer shall each one teach his neighbor and each his brother, saying, ‘Know the LORD,’ for they shall all know Me, from the least of them to the greatest, declares the LORD. For I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more. Thus says the LORD, who gives the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar– the LORD of hosts is His name: If this fixed order departs from before Me, declares the LORD, then shall the offspring of Israel cease from being a nation before Me forever.” Thus says the LORD: “If the heavens above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth below can be explored, then I will cast off all the offspring of Israel for all that they have done, declares the LORD.” Jeremiah 31:31-37
After the Lord proclaimed the new covenant, He declared that as long as the sun shines and the moon and stars move in their courses, the nation of Israel will endure. Since the sun is still shining and the heavens have not been measured, then in my understanding of the Scripture the Lord has NOT cast off the offspring of Israel. He declared that His faithfulness to them is because He is faithful, and not because of their works or lack thereof. He receives us to Himself because of His work and not because of ours as well.
“For thus said the LORD of hosts, after His glory sent me to the nations who plundered you [the nation of Israel], for he who touches you touches the apple of His eye,” Zecharah 2:8
To be continued …
Update: Continued in Why I support Israel, continued
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