A History of Israel: Past, Present & Future

By Dr. Brian J. Bailey

Dr. Brian Bailey’s book on the history of the nation of Israel is an insightful and prophetic commentary on God’s past, present, and future involvement with this nation. Israel is the nation that God has chosen for Himself, both for now and throughout eternity. Dr. Bailey describes how Israel was birthed through many miracles, established in its divine inheritance, scattered among the nations, and gathered at the last days. He then looks beyond the present day to see how the Scripture contains many promises concerning Israel during the Millennium when the Lord will return to rule as King over the earth.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Zion Christian Publishers
• Release date: Aug 2, 2017
• ISBN: 9781596656673

Book preview

PREFACE

The nation of Israel is unique in that it is the only nation God has chosen to be His people. It is highly distinguished in the annals of mankind. Its origins and history are contained in a Book that only the Almighty could have inspired, for it covers a period from around the beginning of the world to the birth, ministry and death of our Lord Jesus Christ, 4,000 years in all.

The origin of the nation takes its form from the patriarch, Abraham, who lived some 20 generations after Adam. He was called The Friend of God, and to him the Almighty gave many precious promises concerning his seed, which later (through his grandson Jacob) became known as the nation of Israel.

This book is presented so that you, gentle reader, may come to appreciate the richness of the heritage of the nation of Israel, and understand its present struggles, as well as the glorious hope and future that await them at the coming of their Messiah, our Lord Jesus Christ.

We are dividing this book into three sections:

•  The Past:  From Creation to Messiah’s First Coming

•  The Present: From Messiah’s First Coming Until 1948

•  The Future: From 1948 to the End of Time

PART I

ISRAEL’S PAST

From Creation to Messiah’s First Coming

CHAPTER 1

ADAM TO ABRAHAM

Without the Bible we would have no sound historical account of Creation, nor would we know in particular the generations and the men that lived immediately after the creation of Adam until the Flood. Therefore, the Bible must be our reference when considering the history of the nation of Israel, which was brought to birth 22 generations after the creation of man.

There are seven days of creation in Genesis 1. The forming of Adam occurred on the sixth day. The first three days had seen the division of light from darkness; the separation of the dry earth from the waters of the seas; and the bringing forth of grass and trees. On the fourth day, the sun, moon and stars were created. On the fifth and sixth days, God created every living creature that moves—including the fish in the seas and the fowls of the air. Everything had been created and spoken into existence by God’s Word (Ps. 33:6, 9), but man himself was formed with God’s own hands on the sixth day.

Then God planted a garden in Eden and placed man in this most beautiful paradise. Adam was no caveman but possessed of a highly cultivated intelligence, since we see that God brought all His creatures unto Adam so that he would name them: And Adam gave names to all cattle, and to the fowl of the air, and to every beast of the field; but for Adam there was not found an help meet for him (Gen. 2:20).

Then when there was no companion found for Adam, God caused a deep sleep to come upon him. He took a rib from his side and formed woman, whom Adam called Eve. Thus, she became the mother of all the living (Gen. 3:20).

Adam and Eve were created in a state of innocence, but innocence is not holiness. These are different. Innocence must be tried and tested before it becomes holiness. Therefore, man had to be tested. Adam and Eve were permitted to eat of the fruit of every tree in the garden, with the exception of the fruit of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil (Gen. 2:16 17). A number of godly people who have visited heaven and conversed with Adam tell us that Adam and Eve were thoroughly warned by the Lord time and time again not to touch that forbidden fruit, for in so doing they would become sin and corrupt all of creation. When man fell by disobedience, it caused the whole creation to fall, for man had been given dominion over all of God’s creation.

Satan was permitted to test Eve through a serpent that was able to talk. He started his dialogue with doubt, his greatest weapon, saying, Hath God said… He reasoned that she had misunderstood God’s command and assured her that she would not die, whereupon Eve gazing upon the fruit, saw that it was pleasant to the eyes and to make one wise, and partook of it (Gen. 3:1-6). The dialogue here was totally between the serpent and the woman.

Eve was deceived, not Adam, according to 1 Timothy 2:13 14. Adam understood what had happened. He knew that he would lose her because she had become a sinner and would die. Because his love for Eve was greater than his love for God, he identified himself with her and also partook of the forbidden fruit. Thus, the root sin of Adam was that he preferred human love above God’s love. This is perhaps one of the greatest weaknesses of the human heart. So many people have forfeited so much in exchange for human love! Anything we love more than God is idolatry, and human love and the need for man’s approval is often idolatrous. After partaking of the fruit, Adam and Eve realized that they were naked and hid from God when He spoke to them in the cool of the evening. In His compassion, the Lord made coats for them from the skins of animals, indicating that the shedding of blood was necessary for the atonement of sin. This looked ahead to the Lamb of God who must die so that man could be clothed with His righteousness (Gen. 3:8, 21).

From Adam and Eve came forth two principal lines of men—the godly and the ungodly. Cain, who murdered his righteous brother Abel, is the father of the wicked line. Seth, who replaced Abel, was the father of the godly line. Seth produced a line of godly patriarchs unto the Flood who were essentially prophets and knew that the flood was coming. These prophets accomplished many notable feats.

For example, there was Enoch who walked with God so closely that he was translated into heaven and never saw death (Gen. 5:24). He became a type of those who will be raptured in the last days. Enoch also prophesied of the Second Coming of the Lord Jesus Christ in Jude 1:14-15. These saints knew the flood was coming. Enoch prophetically named his eldest son Methuselah, which means, At his death will the waters go forth. Amazingly Methuselah died in the same year as the Flood. He was the oldest of all men, living until 969 years, which signifies the fullness of man.

Then Lamech the son of Methuselah, named his son Noah which means rest. This indicated that Noah would bring that generation into rest. Lamech lived 777 years and died five years before the flood. He is a type of righteous men who are taken beforehand so that they do not live to see the coming judgments. This is described in Isaiah 57:1-2: The righteous perisheth, and no man layeth it to heart: and merciful men are taken away, none considering that the righteous is taken away from the evil to come. He shall enter into peace: they shall rest in their beds, each one walking in his uprightness.

By faith, Noah built an ark which preserved the human race and also all animal life. He passed from one dispensation to another. Noah’s generation was severely judged by a catastrophic flood and the earth was purged from great wickedness. When Noah stepped out of the ark, he was walking upon an earth that had been purified and Noah literally inherited the whole earth. In our times, the earth will also be severely judged and purged by the Great Tribulation. Those who live godly and meet the qualifications (as Noah did) will pass from the Church Age into the Millennial Age. Thus, Noah represents those who pass from one dispensation into another one. It is the meek who will literally inherit the earth (cf. Mt. 5:5).

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From Adam to Noah there were ten generations. From Noah to Abraham there were another ten generations. Altogether there were 20 generations from Adam to Abraham. After the Flood, man’s life expectancy was greatly diminished.

Noah had three sons—Shem, Ham and Japheth. Once again, iniquity quickly abounded on every hand, especially those who descended from the line of Ham, the second son of Noah. The line of Ham produced such rebels as Nimrod who built the cities of Babel, and Nineveh from which sprang forth the evil empires of Babylon and Assyria. They journeyed toward the land of Shinar and there they built a city and a tower where they intended to reach heaven. They did this obviously in defiance of the Almighty who stated:

…Behold, the people is one, and they have all one language; and this they begin to do: and now nothing will be restrained from them, which they have imagined to do. Go to, let us go down, and there confound their language, that they may not understand one another’s speech. So the LORD scattered them abroad from thence upon the face of all the earth: and they left off to build the city. Therefore is the name of it called Babel; because the LORD did there confound the language of all the earth: and from thence did the LORD scatter them abroad upon the face of all the earth (Gen. 11:6-9).

In the days of Peleg, (a descendant of Shem), the earth was divided (Gen.10:25). It is believed that five generations after the Flood, the Lord changed all the races and languages and scattered mankind all over the earth. This He did to dissipate evil, for the earth’s inhabitants used their combined intelligence to work evil in the sight of the Lord. Thus, the Lord thwarted their works by changing their languages. The next ten generations from Noah to Abraham are listed in 1 Chronicles 1:24-28. The first ten are given in 1 Chronicles 1:1-4, and also in Genesis and elsewhere.

In a world that quickly became corrupt all over again after the Flood, God was looking for a man in whom He could create a separate and holy nation for Himself. Not only did God want to have a separate and holy nation, He desired this nation to be a light to the rest of the world. God found such a heart in Abraham, whom he termed, The Friend of God. We will develop the call and life of Abraham in the following chapter.

CHAPTER 2

ABRAHAM TO ISRAEL

Let us now look at this great man Abraham, who is called the father of the faithful and a friend of God. From him came the two major religions of this world—the Jewish faith which Christianity adheres to, and the Moslem beliefs.

ABRAHAM

We are told that when Abraham was living in the Ur of the Chaldees, God spoke to him and told him to leave his country and kindred and go to a land which God would show him (Acts 7:2-3). He obeyed, not really knowing exactly where he was to go (Heb.11:8). The Lord also gave him great and mighty promises:

Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto a land that I will shew thee: And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make thy name great; and thou shalt be a blessing: And I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee: and in thee shall all families of the earth be blessed (Gen.12:1-3).

Unfortunately, Abraham did not fully comply with the Lord’s injunction to leave his kindred, since he took his nephew Lot along with him (Gen.12:4).  This resulted later in the incestuous birth of Moab and Ammon who were fathered by Lot, whose descendants have been a thorn in the side of Israel even unto this day, and who will continue to be so until the Second Coming of the Lord (Gen.19:24-38).

The perils and consequences of partial obedience, as well as those errors resulting from seeking to accomplish God’s will through our own efforts, are often tragedies that last for generations and sometimes, for eternity. For example, Abraham’s desire to fulfil God’s will in having a son through Hagar the Egyptian led to the birth of Ishmael and eventually the formation of the Moslem religion. Mohammad claimed descent from Ishmael through Kedar, the second son of Ishmael.

Eventually Abraham and Lot had to separate because their cattle and substance was so great that the land could not contain them both (Gen. 13). To his detriment, Lot chose to camp in the direction of Sodom and lost everything, including his wife and the moral purity of his daughters.

GOD’S PROMISES TO ABRAHAM

Abraham was given further precious promises and we quote, And the LORD said unto Abram, after that Lot was separated from him, Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art northward, and southward, and eastward, and westward: For all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever.  And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth: so that if a man can number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered. Arise, walk through the land in the length of it and in the breadth of it; for I will give it unto thee (Gen. 13:14-17).

Then the Lord came to Abraham promising him that an heir would come from his own loins. The faith of Abraham is tested as we read, "And [the Lord] brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be. And he believed in the LORD; and he counted it to him for righteousness" (Gen. 15:5-6).

This event in Genesis 15:5-6 is most important because it is quoted by the Apostle Paul to substantiate the doctrine of salvation by faith: For what saith the scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was counted unto him for righteousness…Now it was not written for his sake alone, that it was imputed to him; But for us also, to whom it shall be imputed, if we believe on him that raised up Jesus our Lord from the dead; Who was delivered for our offences, and was raised again for our justification (Rom. 4:3, 23-25).

THE PROMISE CONFIRMED BY A COVENANT

At this time, the Lord was going beyond a promise to a most solemn covenant. God said, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river Euphrates. Now the nature of the making of this covenant has to be clearly understood that we may realize the solemnity that