Israel: God’s Prophetic Calendar

“The land of Israel was the birthplace of the Jewish people. Here their spiritual, religious and national identity was formed. Here they achieved independence and created a culture of national and universal significance. Here they wrote and gave the Bible to the world. Exiled from the Land of Israel, the Jewish people remained faithful to it in all the countries of their dispersion, never ceasing to pray and hope for their return and the restoration of their national freedom.

“Our call goes out to the Jewish people all over the world to rally to our side in the task of immigration and development and to stand by us in the great struggle for the fulfillment of the dream of generations for the redemption of Israel. With trust in Almighty God, we set our hand to this Declaration on the Sabbath eve, the fifth of Iyar, 5708, the fourteenth day of May, 1948.”

Jeremiah’s Declaration

Jeremiah, the weeping prophet, glimpsed through time and saw that Israel’s faithful, covenant-keeping God would once again offer divine protection to His people in the Promised Land:

“Hear the word of the Lord, O nations, and declare in the coastlands afar off, and say, ‘He who scattered Israel will gather him and keep him as a shepherd keeps his flock.'”
Jeremiah 31:10

We find three truths contained in this one verse from Jeremiah. First, it was God Himself who scattered Israel from her own homeland. Second, the same God who scattered Israel will regather her to her own land. And third, God will put a divine hedge of protection about her during the process.

The First Regathering

It is my understanding that Scripture tells us the Jews would suffer two major dispersions, or scatterings, followed by two regatherings.

The first scattering occurred in the years when the prophets Daniel and Ezekiel were exiled in the land of Babylon. This was also the period in which the Jews of the Judean kingdom were displaced from their country after Nebuchadnezzar destroyed the Temple, Jerusalem and the commonwealth (see Daniel 1:1-6). Daniel and his associates were kidnapped around 605 BC. The Jews began to return to the land in 538 BC (see 2 Chronicles 36:22-23; Ezra 1:1-4), and the Temple remained flattened until 515 BC (see Ezra 6:15), about seventy years after its destruction.

The prophet Daniel was held captive in Babylon—a foreign land with foreign gods and culture. In about their 63rd year of captivity, while meditating on the Word of God (see Daniel 9:2), Daniel received a revelation from the prophetic promises of Jeremiah:

“‘This whole land will be a desolation and a horror, and these nations will serve the king of Babylon seventy years. Then it will be when seventy years are completed I will punish the king of Babylon and that nation,’ declares the Lord.”
Jeremiah 25:11-12

“Thus says the Lord, ‘When seventy years have been completed for Babylon, I will visit you and fulfill My good word to you, to bring you back to this place.’”
Jeremiah 29:10

Daniel believed the word and declared it as revealed to Jeremiah—that at the end of seventy years of Babylonian captivity, the children of Israel would be released to return to their own land. Daniel also sought the Lord to reveal any obstacles to the prophetic promise being fulfilled (see Daniel 9:3-19). Daniel then responded to the prophetic word by confessing the sin of his people as his own. The verse that summarizes his confession is Daniel 9:19:

“O Lord, hear! O Lord, forgive! O Lord, listen and take action! For Your own sake, O my God, do not delay, because Your city and Your people are called by Your name.”

The fact that Jeremiah spoke accurately and Daniel later knelt on those words is an example of prophetic intercession at its best. God did precisely what His prophets said He would do! At the end of seventy years the Israelites fulfilled the prophecy of their first return to their covenant land. They began to rebuild the walls of Jerusalem.

Israel continued in many more years of faith, sin, repentance, revival and restoration, but the word of the Lord had been fulfilled and God had shown Himself true to His promise.

The Second Regathering

That was not the only dispersion and regathering prophesied by God’s watchmen. Isaiah 11:11-12 states that the Lord would set His hand a second time to recover a remnant of His people:

“It will happen on that day that the Lord will again recover the second time with His hand the remnant of His people, who will remain, from Assyria, Egypt, Pathros, Cush, Elam, Shinar, Hamath, and from the islands of the sea. And He will lift up a standard for the nations and assemble the banished ones of Israel, and will gather the dispersed of Judah from the four corners of the earth.”
emphasis added

Let’s make it simple. The Scriptures explain that there would be a regional dispersion followed by a regional regathering. Then there would be a worldwide dispersion followed by a worldwide regathering. When did the second dispersion occur? It began around AD 70 under the Roman general Titus, when the Jewish people once again fled their homeland and ran for their lives. For approximately nineteen hundred years, they had no political autonomy and were scattered to the four corners of the earth.

I love it when the purposes of God unfold right in front of our eyes! That is exactly what I see occurring in the Middle East today.