Friday, December 8, 2017

Will God Bless America for Moving Its Embassy to Jerusalem?



That is very unlikely, though the devil may give the appearance of some kind of favor from God to further delude the Dispensationalists/Zionists.

The beliefs of the latter are based on a wrong interpretation of God’s promise to the holy Patriarch Abraham in Genesis 12:1-3 (and other passages): 

Now the Lord had said unto Abram, 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.


One may get a sense of what they believe in this quote from Michael Brown:

 . . . My question is spiritual in nature: Will God bless President Trump and the United States for making this bold and courageous move?

I believe He will, since: 1) in doing so the president is blessing Israel, and God still blesses those who bless His covenant nation [a reference to Gen. 12:3--W.G.], despite that nations sins; . . .


But the Dispensationalist view is not right.  The Holy Fathers of the Orthodox Church tell us a rather different story about Jerusalem and Israel.  The earthly Jerusalem and Israel have fulfilled their purpose in salvation history and no longer possess any special ability to impart blessings.  St Irenaeus of Lyons (+202) is quite clear on this in On the Heresies, Book 4:

Chapter IV.-Answer to Another Objection, Showing that the Destruction of Jerusalem, Which Was the City of the Great King, Diminished Nothing from the Supreme Majesty' And Power of God, for that This Destruction Was Put in Execution by the Most Wise Counsel of the Same God.

1. Further, also, concerning Jerusalem and the Lord, they venture to assert that, if it had been "the city of the great King," it would not have been deserted. This is just as if any one should say, that if straw were a creation of God, it would never part company with the wheat; and that the vine twigs, if made by God, never would be lopped away and deprived of the clusters. But as these [vine twigs] have not been originally made for their own sake, but for that of the fruit growing upon them, which being come to maturity and taken away, they are left behind, and those which do not conduce to fructification are lopped off altogether; so also [was it with] Jerusalem, which had in herself borne the yoke of bondage (under which man was reduced, who in former times was not subject to God when death was reigning, and being subdued, became a fit subject for liberty), when the fruit of liberty had come, and reached maturity, and been reaped and stored in the barn, and when those which had the power to produce fruit had been carried away from her [i.e., from Jerusalem], and scattered throughout all the world. Even as Esaias saith, "The children of Jacob shall strike root, and Israel shall flourish, and the whole world shall be filled with his fruit." The fruit, therefore, having been sown throughout all the world, she (Jerusalem) was deservedly forsaken, and those things which had formerly brought forth fruit abundantly were taken away; for from these, according to the flesh, were Christ and the apostles enabled to bring forth fruit. But now these are no longer useful for bringing forth fruit. For all things which have a beginning in time must of course have an end in time also.

2. Since, then, the law originated with Moses, it terminated with John as a necessary consequence. Christ had come to fulfil it: wherefore "the law and the prophets were" with them "until John." And therefore Jerusalem, taking its commencement from David, and fulfilling its own times, must have an end of legislation when the new covenant was revealed.  . . .


The proper understanding of the verses from Genesis quoted above may be seen in Sts Didymus the Blind and Bede of Wearmouth-Jarrow.  St Didymus says that v. 2 refers to the physical nation of Israel (Ancient Christian Commentary on Scripture, Old Testament, Vol. II, InterVarsity Press, 2002, p. 3).  St Bede says the same thing, and then that v. 3 refers to the ‘spiritual nation’, i.e., the Orthodox Church:

The promise of this blessing is greater and more important than the preceding one.  That was earthly, this one is heavenly, since that one referred to the generation of the fleshly Israel [Gen. 12:2--W.G.] and this one to the generation of the spiritual Israel [Gen. 12:3--W.G.]; that one to the nation born from him according to the flesh and this one to the generation of the nation saved in Christ from all the families of the earth.  Among these saved are included all those born from him according to the flesh, who wished also to imitate the piety of his faith.  To all these together the apostle Paul says, “If you are of Christ, you are then the seed of Abraham.”  Therefore when he says, “In you will be blessed all the families of the earth,” it is as if he were saying, “And in your seed will be blessed the families of the earth.”  Mary, from whom would be born the Christ, was present already when these things were said to him.  This is what the apostle meant when he spoke of them [the descendants of Levi] as “in the loins of Abraham.”  . . . (p. 4)

Christ is the New Israel, as are all those who have been united to His resurrected, glorified, and ascended Body, the Orthodox Church (Gal. 6:16).  Therefore, if the South or any people want to be blessed, they must bless Christ and His Church (and become united to Them themselves).  Trying to bless the conscious opponents of Christ and the Orthodox Church (like the current nation-state of Israel) will only bring evil to a people in the long run.

--

Holy Ælfred the Great, King of England, South Patron, pray for us sinners at the Souð, unworthy though we are!

Anathema to the Union!

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