They Search For Legitimacy

We live in interesting days, significant days that the prophets of old longed to look into and couldn't. Days that Jesus foretold to his wide-eyed Disciples who were filled with questions. Days that were prophesied and written of in the annals of the beginning and the end...

Whether we realize it or not, and whether we believe it or not, we are living out our lives today as Divinely selected vessels. We are the election God has sent into the world for such a time as this to witness the rapid countdown of man's final great push toward a one-world dominion, and as the final preparation of the Bride of Christ...

We have witnessed the rebirth of Israel, the capture of Old Jerusalem, social breakdown and the corruption of good manners, and the birth pangs are upon us. And sometimes, from beyond the sweetness of His Word, we hear the cry of the flesh as it takes up sword against the Spirit, rushing without God toward the mother of all battles at the end of days...

Each and every soul on planet earth today waited a near 6,000 earth years in the timeless past to see this day. Each and every one of us was conceived in the timing of God (as was Isaac and Jeremiah), and we were born when God called each of us forth from our mothers' wombs.

In the foreknowledge of the Father, who knows the beginning and the end, He knew each of us when we were still in our soul state. This is not to say there were men and women who were created for evil, for we are all given a free will to choose life or death, it is merely to say God knew ahead of time who would believe on Him and accept His Great Salvation and who would not. God keeps the door open, but the choice is for every man to make.

As it was with Judas Iscariot, Jesus had chosen him to be a Disciple and had said to the little group, "Have I not chosen each of you and one of you is a devil?" He knew the heart of Judas, and He knew the time would come when he would need a devil to get him to the Cross. Even the unrighteous, though unaware, serve God's purpose...

The generations of today were called forth to serve Him by serving one another. Mine is the dwindling generation that saw Israel returned to his land, the generation that Jesus said would not pass from the earth until all prophecy was fulfilled. In this generation, evil is called good and good is called evil.

We are individuals with individual destinies but there is not one of us who walks alone. Individually, personally and intimately, we walk with Christ or we walk with Satan. We choose the companion we will walk with and in so doing, we choose the direction of our life in this world and we choose the direction of our eternal destiny...

Today we live in a world run amuk, vile, corrupt and godless. The informed hoary heads of my generation might refer to it as, "The Age of Cain Revisited," or they might call it, "The New Gutter Age." In any case they avoid its influences like the plague that it is.

Jealousy, lust for power and greed have a malevolent life of their own, beating their demonic cadence for the spreading of lies, accusations, envy, murder and mayhem. In far too many hearts today the hatred is inconsolable, and in some, it is all consuming. The truth is lost to them, having faded into the fog of lies they've heard since the cradle, lies that today feed a despair they cannot name. Reason is hidden because the hatred is intense. Perhaps it is legitimacy they seek, and a long-overdue invitation from those they hate...

Invitation? From whom? To whom and for what?

From the Jews -To the Arabs - to learn of the Almighty God of Abraham their Father. To share appreciation for Shem, the patriarch to Israel, Iran, Syria, Edom, Arabia and to learn of Noah, the only righteous man found among men at the time of the last great judgment of the earth...

Perhaps Iran could be given Israel's appreciation for Darius, Cyrus, Queen Esther (Haddasah) and her husband King Xerxes.

Perhaps Syria could be given Israel's appreciation for its kindness to Jacob and eleven of the tribal patriarchs born and half raised in Syria. Only Benjamin was born in Canaan, in Bethlehem. If that were today, eleven of Jacob's twelve sons would hold Syrian citizenship. And not only were they born in Syria, they were born of Syria-born mothers (Leah, Rachel and their two Syrian handmaidens). Syria and Israel, brothers indeed!

And perhaps Israel could say, "ThankYou" to Morocco for their decades of kindness and friendship with the children of Jacob. It is never too late to say, "Thank you. We appreciate you."

When Abraham entered Canaan, he had no children of his own. Lot was his brother's son whom he loved and thought of as his own. He was 75 years old when he entered Canaan, and he waited twenty-five years for the Seed of Promise. Meanwhile, he walked a bit ahead of God, deciding God might need a little help with the heir of promise, so he accepted a youthful concubine, his wife's Egyptian maid, Hagar, and produced a son with her, named Ishmael. The child was banished from Abraham's camp with his mother after Isaac was born and weaned (Genesis 21:10-13).

Some may think Sarah was wrong to do what she did, that she herself was filled with hate. But Sarah may have received more understanding of the Seed of Promise than Abraham. In fact, the need for her declaration in this text is amazing in that God had already told Abraham that He would establish His Covenant with Isaac, "and with his seed." And at that time Isaac was not yet born (Genesis 17:18-19).

Sarah had spoken by the Spirit of the Lord in her declaration - "Cast out the bondwoman and her son: for the son of the bondwoman shall not be heir with the son of the freewoman." It has always been so - and it will always be - that the son of the flesh (the lusts of this world) cannot be heir with the son of the Spirit (Jesus Christ). And though it grieved Abraham because he loved Ishmael so, he allowed the banishment that cleared the field for God's Covenant with Isaac.

You see, Abraham had never legally adopted Ishmael, he had never pronounced the words of adoption, "my son, child," nevertheless, he provided an inheritance for him which he received at Abraham's death.

We can only imagine how distraught Abraham would have been had he known the descendants of Ishmael (the flesh) would forever bring war and terror to the descendants of Isaac (the Spirit). In the early days of this arrangement Hagar tried to run away from Sarah's frustration but the angel of the Lord spoke to her and directed her to return to her mistress because she was with child, "and shall bear a son, and shall call his name Ishmael; because the Lord has heard your affliction. And he will be a wild man, his hand will be against every man, and every man's hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren" (Genesis 16:12).

Following the death of Sarah, Abraham took a wife named Keturah (Genesis 25:1), but who continued to be classed among the concubines (perhaps as #1 concubine?). He sired six additional sons with her, and though he allotted each of them a goodly start with a piece of land - east of Canaan - he never did legally adopt these sons.

Therefore the sons of Keturah and the son of Hagar could never legitimately claim the title deed to the Promised Land or any portion thereof. They could not claim any present or future inheritance or birth-right or first-born blessings that would be passed down by the current or future Hebrew patriarchs to their Hebrew children.

In 1 Chronicles 1:32 Keturah is named as Abraham's concubine rather than his wife. Regardless, the sons of the concubines (Hagar and Keturah) were blessed immeasurably because they were the seed of the righteous Abraham.

God is faithful to His Word. Ishmael had twelve sons who became twelve kings that established twelve nations. And God has blessed the many Arab nations with the world's fair portion of black gold from the earth, giving them untold prosperity and fulfilling His promise to Abraham that he would be the father of many nations (Genesis 17:4). And yet, these nations of Abraham's seed do not acknowledge the sovereignty of the God of Abraham that has blessed them, nor do they acknowledge His only begotten Son that longs to save them.

Instead, they seek world approval and enforcement of their claim for legitimate ownership of Israel's Biblical heartland and Jerusalem, but they don't really want it. If they did they would have accepted PM Ehud Barak's offer in 2000.

They want the birthrights of Ishmael and Esau reversed. They want the legitimacy of the first-born, the inheritance of the first born, the blessing of the first born, they want acceptance. But they aren't willing to acknowledge the nation of Israel God wed in Covenant at Mt. Sinai, and they refuse to agree the Jews have the right to exist.

They want what they want, and that is - legitimacy to hate - legitimacy to kill - even if the God of Israel rejects them and fights against them, the nations of the world must force the usurpers to give them the legitimacy they were denied in old Canaan...

The hateful cries of these nations fall on the ears of the most fearful authority in Heaven and Earth and are measured and tested by the Living Word of that authority who established Israel for Himself. When one blesses Israel they are blessing God. When one curses Israel, they are cursing God. According to the prophet, (Joel 3:2) the day is coming when every nation on earth and all leaders of nations on earth will be judged by Jesus Christ at His coming for the way they treated Israel and divided his land...

Look and See - there are abundant Arab nations today, but there is only one Israel. Abraham had eight sons but only one was the Seed of Promise who carried the Seed of Promise. Isaac was God's Covenant partner for the establishing of the nation that would give a Savior to the world. Where the Arabs are different peoples in different lands, there has been, is and always will be only one Israel and one people of Israel. These are the people God calls, "My people."

They didn't ask to be chosen. They did absolutely nothing to deserve it. They didn't ask to become the wife of the Most Holy God of Heaven and Earth. And in accepting the honor, they didn't anticipate the rejection of the world. They are a small nation, few in numbers when compared to the nations of Ishmael, the sons of Keturah and Esau. But do not be deceived, they are mighty for they are the apple of God's eye and He fights for them against all their enemies. And God has promised that when He brings them back to their land again (this began in 1948) they will never again be defeated in battle or forced from their lands.

I am not saying God loves the Jews more than He loves the Gentiles. In love God created all men, made them into tribes, then nations and gave them the greatest gift a Father can give - His own Son, Jesus Christ (John 3:16)!

And while acceptance may be an issue to many in the world today, to those who already know the Savior and trust God's Word, it is a wispy issue that was settled long ago. You see, the living, breathing, powerful God of Heaven and Earth loves us with an everlasting love and He proves to us continually that He is a caring and personal Father.

You see, it isn't acceptance in this world that we need, but rather the acceptance of God the Father and Christ the Lord - and peace for a thousand years will soon be just that simple...

Joan Krempel
June 25, 2009
joan@joankrempelministries.com