AGAINST B.I.

Southland Times, Issue 22345, 9 June 1934, Page 7

AGAINST B.I.

ISRAEL IN THE PAST AND PRESENT. W. TROTTER. To the Editor. Sir, —Deut. 32, 8-10, when the Most High divided to the nations their inheritance when He separated the sons of Ad. _n he set the bounds of the people according to the number of the Children of Israel. For the Lords portion is His people, Jehovah is the lot of his inheritance. That which formed the central and controlling thought in his arrangements, was his foreknowledge of the number of the children of Israel. Israel was dear to him above all the other nations, his portion and the lot of his inheritance. God made Israel the centre of his earthly government, even the profane history of nations centres round it. The light of Israel’s history is shed on all the nations around them, it is preserved almost with modem accuracy when a few fragments scarcely rescue from entire oblivion other ancient histories for which we have to disentomb ruins and burial places, but we find in the country of the Pharaohs pictures and carvings of Jews making bricks under overseers exactly as Moses speaks of in Exodus. Israel shall dwell in safety alone; the fountain of Jacob shall be upon the land of corn and wine. Happy art thou O Israel who is like unto thee. For thy people Israel didst thou make thine own people for ever and thy Lord became their God (1 Chron. XVII: 20-21). It was in the counsels of God from the beginning that David’s son and David’s Lord should sit upon the throne of David and upon His Kingdom to order it and to establish it with judgment and with justice for ever (Isaiah IX:7). Nothing was to cause the forfeiture of God’s mercy and favour by the house of David. The history of the ten tribes is, one dark picture of evil without a, single relieving feature from beginning to end and at last the whole kingdom of the ten tribes is carried away captive. The kingdom of Judah still continued a while under the government of the house and the throne of David, but became corrupt and the throne was cast down and the people went into captivity and were disowned of God. There can be no doubt that the great design of the return from Babylon at the end of 70 years was that Israel might be in the land, when the hour arrived for Christ’s coming. All the divine counsels as to Israel have Christ for their centre. He is the seed of Abraham to whom the promises were made. All the typical persons, places, offerings and acts celebrated in, Israel s history or enjoined in Israel’s laws were representative of him. Of him the prophets had spoken and the psalmists had sweetly sung. He the Son of David was born in David’s city, but in a stable with the manger for a cradle, in the land and in the world over which He is to reign in glory. Concerning Jerusalem, “And when He was come near He beheld the city and wept over it, saying, If thou haast known even thou at least in this thy day the things which belong unto they peace. Behold your house is left unto you desolate, For I say unto you ye shall not see me henceforth till ye shall say blessed is He that cometh in the name of the Lord (Matt.XXHI). They have suffered the terrible consequences of having set him at nought.— I am, etc. "FUTURIST.”