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Posted on Dec 28, 2023 by Mike LeDuke Next article:What about the Jews?

Have you ever read through the Hebrew prophets and noticed that many of the prophecies haven’t been fulfilled? Just consider some of these prophecies:

• For the palace is forsaken, the populous city deserted; the hill and the watchtower will become dens forever, a joy of wild donkeys, a pasture of flocks; until the Spirit is poured upon us from on high, and the wilderness becomes a fruitful field, and the fruitful field is deemed a forest. Then justice will dwell in the wilderness, and righteousness abide in the fruitful field (Isaiah 32:14-16). Isaiah describes a time when the land of Israel (v. 13) is desolate. Then, everything changes. From that desolation, the land transforms into a paradise. The desert becomes a fruitful field and the fruitful field continues to grow until it is a forest. There is an immense amount of growth here––and eventually, in the midst of all of this physical growth, there is spiritual growth as well.
  
  
• The prophet Ezekiel writes something similar. Here, God is talking about his people: I will make with them a covenant of peace and banish wild beasts from the land, so that they may dwell securely in the wilderness and sleep in the woods. And I will make them and the places all around my hill a blessing, and I will send down the showers in their season; they shall be showers of blessing. And the trees of the field shall yield their fruit, and the earth shall yield its increase, and they shall be secure in their land. And they shall know that I am the LORD, when I break the bars of their yoke, and deliver them from the hand of those who enslaved them (Ezekiel 34:25-27).
  Just like Isaiah, Ezekiel paints a picture of peace and prosperity. The trees are fruitful, the land is plentiful, and God’s people know Him. The physical prosperity reflects a spiritual prosperity.

But again, none of these things has happened yet. Even though God’s people, the Jews, are back in the land today, there hasn’t been an outpouring of the Spirit of God. And, no one would be so crass as to suggest that there’s peace in Israel today.

So what does all of this mean?

That’s the promise of the land. Over and over, the Hebrew prophets look to a day when the land will be given back to the Jews (and also to those who have joined Abraham’s family through Christ). Abraham never received the land. But one day, all of his descendants will. And, this gifting of those land to those people will bring about a physical change as God’s spirit pours down into the land, and onto the people as well. The physical change will reflect the spiritual change.

Ultimately, this promise of the land is the promise of a changed earth:

It shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the house of the LORD shall be established as the highest of the mountains, and it shall be lifted up above the hills; and peoples shall flow to it, and many nations shall come, and say: ‘Come, let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob, that he may teach us his ways and that we may walk in his paths.’ For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the word of the LORD from Jerusalem. He shall judge between many peoples, and shall decide disputes for strong nations far away; and they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore(Micah 4:1-3).

The promises to Abraham are what this offer of hope is, both to you and to me. The question for us is whether or not we will accept these promises and then follow the faithful example of Abraham to their eventual, and in our day, soon, fulfillment.

— Jason Hensley, PhD.