Exposing Error

Hank Hanegraaff, the Bible Answer
Man, Continues to Air Anti-Israel
Programs - Transcript

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Note from Bill:

The Bible Answer Man, Hank Hanegraaff, has been on aggressive mission to discredit the biblical importance of the nation of Israel and the Christians who stand with Israel.

Hanegraaff, is a preterist, who believes that most, if not all, major prophetic events have already been fulfilled in history. His error about Israel is leading some of his radio audience astray, especially young Christians.

We have provided below the transcript of his December 9, 2004, program. We have others coming. You can listen to his programs by clicking here.

We have also created a “Error Exposed” category under our Page Two News section. You can access it by clicking here.

We are adding this category to specifically expose the church leaders who are chastising pro-Israel Christians and/or any Christians that see the land of Israel and her people at the center of God’s redemptive plan for the world.

Additionally, an estimated ninety-five percent of prophesies being spoken each year, posted on Internet web sites, and spread via email never happen. False prophecies and dreams and visions are leading many people astray and are producing alarming damage and confusion within the American Church. We will include these in our “Error Exposed” section, too.

Dr. Mal Couch responds to question regarding Hank Hanegraaff on November 15, 2004

Click here for question.

Dr. Mal Couch, it seems that on his radio program, Hank Hanegraaff [the Bible Answer Man] continually attacks dispensationalism from a partial preterist-covenant point of view. What do you think?

Nothing! I do not think anything about him. What can you expect from men who have no solid hermeneutical training in the Word of God, who (1) are allegorists, (2) who hold to a view that God is through with the Jews, (3) that the Church replaces Israel, and (4) who are blind to the facts of the Middle East that point like great big arrows to the prophetic promises of the ancient prophets?

I simply quote the awesome predictions God made to the nation of Israel through the prophet Ezekiel:

"'I will put My Spirit within you [Israel], and you will come to life, and I will place you on your own land. Then you will know that I, the Lord, have spoken and done it,' declares the Lord" (Ezek. 37:14). "I will take the sons of Israel from among the nations where they have gone, and I will bring them from every side and bring them into their own land; and I will make them one nation in the land, ... and one king (the Messiah) will be king for all of them; and they will no longer be two nations, and they will no longer be divided into two kingdoms. ... I will cleanse them. And they will be My people, and I will be their God" (vv. 21-23).

Stick to the Word of God. Do not listen to contrary voices.

Thanks for asking.

Dr. Mal Couch

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Hanegraaff’s December 9, 2004, Program

The program was transcribed by Debbie Wicklund with Olive Tree Ministries http://www.olivetreeviews.org.

Announcer: Today, we return to our conversation with our guest Colin Chapman. Mr. Chapman is lecturer in Islamic Studies at the Near East School of Theology in Beirut, Lebanon and the author of several books including “Christianity on Trial” and “The Case for Christianity.” Our discussion today continues on his book “Who’s Promised Land, the Continuing Crisis Over Israel and Palestine.” We’ve got all the calls we need today but you can still contact our Resource Center to order your copy of “Who’s Promised Land” by Colin Chapman by calling toll free at 888-700-0CRI or visit our website at www.equip.org. Let’s return to the discussion now with the host of Bible Answer Man Hank Hanegraaff.

HH: I read a book “Who’s Promised Land, the Continuing Crisis Over Israel and Palestine” and now I have an opportunity to speak with the author Colin Chapman yesterday and he’s with us today as well. Colin, so nice to have you with us.

CC: Thank you, it’s a pleasure.

HH: Thank you for being with us from London. You’re in the middle of the night and we’re on earlier in the day from parts of the United States and Canada but we appreciate your very, very cogent answers so late in the night in your part of the world. Let me ask you a basic question. How did you come to write this book in the first place?

CC: Well, I first went to the Middle East in the sixties. I was working first in Egypt but I also traveled in Israel and Jordan and other countries, so I had the opportunity to visit many countries in the region and, of course, very, very quickly you have to begin to understand what the Palestinian problem is all about because it has profoundly affected the whole policy of the Middle East for a very long time. So, trying to understand what that problem was all about and reading history and seeing how it all affected the lives of people, I began to understand the processes leading to the State of Israel and all that had happened as a result of the establishment of the State of Israel. One particular insight that I gained into the whole Palestinian issue was through my wife, Ann who first went out to work as a nurse with Palestinians in Jordan and she was actually caught up in the famous Black September in 1970 and through her I really began to understand the whole problem through the point of view of the Palestinians. Now, when I came back to the West, when I came back home I went into a Christian book shop and looked at the shelf on prophecy, I could find books that were attempting to interpret what was going on in the Middle East and to be honest, what these books were saying simply did not fit with the realities that I could observed there on the ground. And with that mismatch and that difficulty with relating the two that first drove me to understand more about the history and secondly, to do more research in the biblical areas and theological areas. I then wrote an article for a Christian magazine in the 70’s, which attracted a lot of criticism and attention. That encouraged me to do further research and eventually the book “Who’s Promised Land” was first written in Beirut during the 1980’s. We were living in West Beirut at the time, very near the lighthouse and very often we could hear gunfire in the streets and this of course was the time of the civil war. We could often hear gunfire in the street and didn’t go out after dark very often and that’s when I did a lot of the work and the first edition was published in 1983 and several editions have been published since then, the most recent being the one two years ago that you have referred to. So, the book was written in the Middle Eastern context trying to understand what has happened in the light of the Bible and Christian theology.

HH: What would you say, Colin, is the main message of your book?

CC: I would say the main message of the books is let’s try and understand what this particular problem with Israel and the Palestinians is all about. Let’s try and see it not simply as a problem of biblical interpretation, a problem of eschatology, but let’s try and understand it in human terms. Then let’s also trace the theme of the land right through the Bible from the book of Genesis to the book of Revelation and if we find that one particular traditional popular interpretation of the Promised Land simply doesn’t fit are there other ways of using the Bible to interpret this very, very complex problem that is being played out before our eyes. And so instead of simply challenging another interpretation, a dispensational interpretation, I have tried to present an alternative and to say look, there are many, many other ways in which scripture can shed light on this problem.

HH: Colin, speak to the listener who is saying in their mind right now look, this is a pretty simple issue, you’re overcomplicating it. God promised that the Jews are gonna return to the land of Palestine, to the Promised Land. The fulfillment of that prophecy came in 1948 and certainly was increased in its efficacy in the Six Day War in 1967. Very simple issue here. God is fulfilling His promises to Israel and this is a great and glorious time in which we are living because the Rapture is not far off.

CC: I think the first thing I would want to say is if you develop that argument, your god seems to me to be encouraging what is a very fundamental injustice. Anybody who owns any property, any piece of land he feels attached to it. If you own a house, if you’ve got a backyard you’re attached to it. It belongs to you. Now what you are talking about amounts to a kind of ethnic cleansing which suggests that other people have the right to come along and turn you out of your land for other reasons, for biblical reasons and so part of my response would be to say do you actually realize in human terms, in very human terms what you are talking about? And do you understand that the god that you are talking about seems to be encouraging a very fundamental injustice which means people being turned out of their land and losing the inheritance of their forefathers.

HH: But Colin, can’t God do what he wants? He did the same thing with regards to the Amalekites. He has done this throughout history. There’s a precedent for this and God has said that Israel is going to return to the land, therefore, whether it’s an injustice or not this is God’s plan and God’s purposes are now being fulfilled.

CC: But we must hold onto the fact that God is a holy god and God is justice and also I would say that as Christians we must read everything in the Old Testament through the eyes of Jesus and so if Jesus is the new Joshua who has brought us into the rest, the Promised Land described in the book of Hebrews, there is no way that as Christians we can think of somebody wanting to do the same thing today as part of the coming of the kingdom of God. Because we live after Jesus there is no possibility that we’d go back to the model of Joshua and his ethnic cleansing of the land. Totally different situation today as Christians.

HH: Yes. So you would challenge the idea that the recent return of the Jews to the land and the establishment of the State of Israel should be seen by Christians as the fulfillment of the promise made to Abraham and the predictions of a return?

CC: Yes, I would. Yes. And it seems to me that the starting point there is to recognize that Jesus in a lot of his teaching echoes passages in the Old Testament which are talking about a return from exile so that Jesus is saying look, a greater return from exile is taking place through my ministry. And so, many, many of the ideas and themes about return from exile of Babylon described in the Old Testament prophets are echoed in the teachings of Jesus, suggesting that he saw his own ministry not just as a new exodus but also as a new return from exile.

HH: Talk for a moment about something that I think is very fuzzy in the minds of most today. When we talk about the Palestinians, it’s like a word to most of us in the West. Now what I mean by that we don’t really imbue that word with real flesh and blood recognizing that these are people and arguably the largest displaced people group in the world.

CC: Yes, the problem here is that the word Palestinian is very often associated with terrorist, with suicide bombings and so forth. And I think we also have to recognize that for many people in the West there is the idea that the Palestinians are occupying the land of the Jews when in fact it’s the other way around. The whole movement of Zionism beginning at the end of the 19th century was a movement of Jewish people returning to the land of their ancestors taking the haven from anti-Semitism in Europe. But in 1880 when the return began to speed up the Jews were only 5% of the land so gradually as they came in greater number and then of course it speeded up because of the holocaust, the balance began to change. But, these Jews came, returning to the land of their forefathers but they came to a community that was very, very small and powerless, but they came wanting to turn this land into a Jewish land and some of them said quite clearly that ultimately they wanted to turn it into a Jewish state. And so actually instead of Palestinians occupying Jewish land, if you look at it historically what has actually happened, it’s more the other way around. Yes, there were Jewish communities living in the land for centuries in various centers like Jerusalem and Joffa and other places but the movement of Zionism increased this small minority until it eventually took over and established the State of Israel.

HH: And I think that’s an important point to make. One other thing that I’d like to do, draw out of you is the whole issue of Zionism which you go into in the book, but if you look at Zionism from Theodore Hertzl Long and you recognize that Palestine was not the only choice of destination. There were other choices as well back then in the embryonic stages of Zionism. Argentina or Uganda were possible places of relocation for the Jewish people.

CC: Yes, and of course it’s very understandable but the Jews themselves, there was no alternative to the land. It had to be the land, because they had felt an attachment to the land, almost like an umbilical cord to the land so this attachment that had been built up over the centuries was very, very important for them. So, it’s very understandable that they really didn’t take seriously the other suggestions that were put forward.

HH: Colin, speak for a moment to the issue of the anti-Semitism. A lot of people will immediately pull that that particular card and say, the moment that you say anything against the Jews, their occupation of Gaza, Golan, West Bank, East Jerusalem that you are Anti-Semitic.

CC: One of the first things I would want to say is many of the things I’ve said and written are no different from the things that many, many Jews themselves are thinking and writing today. There are many Jews today who believe the occupation of the West Bank is illegal. That the settlements are illegal. Illegal in international law. So, what I’m saying is something that is said by quite a number of Jews and quite a number of proportion of Israeli Jews as well. And so, it’s very, very strange if this particular view is labeled as being Anti-Semitic. It’s nothing of the kind.

HH: One of the interesting quotes in your book is from David Ben Gurion in 1944 where he said there’s no example in history of people saying we agree to renounce our country and let another come in and settle there and outnumber us.

CC: Yeah, you’re right and yet here again I think it’s so important to emphasize we need to understand the actual processes by which this whole problem has developed and some of those writings from the diaries of Hertzl and Ben Gurion and others are extremely revealing and many of these writings do indicate that these people themselves who are the pioneers, the people spearheading the movement, they understood the implications of what they were doing. They understood they were taking over land which other people had been inhabiting for centuries. But they believed that it was justified because of the Jewish attachment to the land and because of Anti-Semitism that they had faced in Europe. They believed that it was justified in order to give them a secure homeland.

(break in program)

HH: And it’s a delight to have Colin Chapman with us from Birmingham England near London, a couple of hours away from London. His book “Who’s Promised Land, the Continuing Crisis over Israel and Palestine” again available. Pick up a copy. It’s a great read. Available when you give us a call at 888-700-0CRI or log onto the worldwide web at equip.org. It is a book that will help you become not only historically literate but biblically literate as well. Again, a must read. Please pick it up today. We have operators standing by 888-700-0CRI or again you can get this book on the worldwide web at equip.org. We’re going to go to our phone lines, so many people hanging on so long to talk to Colin. Amere in Kentucky, you’re up first. Hi, Amere.

Caller: Yes, sir. I want to thank you very much for this opportunity and I was raised as a Muslim all of my life. I lived in the Middle East and you know, by the grace of God I am saved. And my question is we need to go back to the solid rock of our faith, Christ. And I would like for you to comment on what is Paul speaking about in Hebrews 8:6-13, about the new covenant in Jesus Christ?

CC: Amere, it’s good to talk to you. The idea of covenant in scripture is not so much an agreement between two equals but God taking the initiative and reaching out to human beings and making promises to them. And so, in the book of Genesis we have the first covenant that God makes which includes a land, nation covenant relationship and the blessing for all peoples. This is the basic framework within which salvation is worked out and we see successive stages of the covenant being worked out in the Old Testament through the exodus and then through David, then the temple. Then prophets are pointing to a final and greater fulfillment of the covenant of God that is going to bring blessing to all the nations of the earth. And then we come to Jesus and the coming of the kingdom in him and it is in there, my understanding that we see the promises being fulfilled. I wonder if you can remind me again of the actual verses in Hebrews that you’re referring to.

Caller: Hebrews 8:13. “By calling this covenant new he has made the first one obsolete and what is obsolete and aging will soon disappear.”

CC: Well, my understanding of this is that what comes in Jesus, in the kingdom of God, when God becomes man, when the Word becomes flesh in Jesus of Nazareth, this is the fulfillment of all the covenant promises and the prophecies in the Old Testament. So, what we read about in the Old Testament is looking forward beyond itself, so when Jesus comes we find the final fulfillment of everything that has been spoken about beforehand. So, we continue to read the Old Testament because it is all part of God’s plan. And I often think of the Old Testament as being like the roots of a plant and no plant can survive without roots. And while we have Christ, who is like the plant that produces flowers and fruit and so on, that is sustained by the roots. Quite a number of Christians in various stages of history have wanted to do away with the Old Testament because there are quite a number of problems associated with the Old Testament for those who lived after Christ. But we can’t do without the Old Testament because it represents as it were the roots of the plant and we can’t actually fully understand who Jesus is without the Old Testament background. So, everything that we read about in the Old Testament is part of God’s preparing of the human race to (unintelligible) for the time when Jesus was going to come.

HH: And of course, the writer of Hebrews makes it clear that the new covenant is better than the old covenant because the blood of Jesus Christ is better than the blood of animals. Makes that clear in Hebrews Chapter 7 as well as Hebrews Chapter 8, verse 6. One of the questions that I want to pose to you before I go back to the phone lines, Colin, is when you look at scripture, all of scripture is indeed eschatological in nature in that in the beginning Adam and Eve fell into a life of constant sin terminated by death, the rest of the Bible is about God’s redemptive plan culminating in a new paradise, a holy city, the new Jerusalem coming down out of heaven prepared as a bride, beautifully adorned for her husband.

CC: Yes, and this is where we have to understand the whole plan of God from the beginning through to the end. Perhaps at this point I could just mention that the publishers who first published “Who’s Promised Land” asked me some time ago to write a sequel to the book, specifically on the subject of Jerusalem and this book has recently been published in the UK and I understand it will be published in the United States some time next summer and it’s a fascinating opportunity to see the plan of God as it’s focused on the city of Jerusalem and to see how the city develops in the pages of scripture and then to trace the history from the time of the Bible right to the present situation with all the problems associated with that city. But, as you’ve mentioned the book of Revelation takes up the theme of the city and relates it to something in the new heaven and the new earth. And so in the book of Revelation, Jerusalem is not just the earthly Jerusalem, it’s something that comes down from heaven to earth.

HH: So, when we say see you next year in Jerusalem or next year in Jerusalem that famous phrase for a believer really can be taken to have an eternal perspective, can’t it?

CC: Absolutely. And of course this is very much a Jewish expression related to the Passover. It’s a vital part of the celebration of Passover for Jews to say next year in Jerusalem, but yes, as you say for Christians it can be interpreted in a spiritual way and an eschatological way.

HH: We’re talking to Colin Chapman, his book “Who’s Promised Land, the Continuing Crisis over Israel and Palestine,” it’s just a must read. Pick it up or give us a call at 888-700-0CRI or log onto the worldwide web at equip.org. Back to the phone lines. Greg in Phoenix, Arizona, you’re on with Colin Chapman.

Caller: Hello, Colin. It’s a pleasure talking to you.

CC: Thank you.

Caller: I’ve got one question for both of you. Actually, I’d like to hear your viewpoint on the modern day Israel. What, if anything, does the Bible prophecy have to do with the modern day Israel?

HH: I think first and foremost what we are talking about in terms of the return to the land is in fact, fulfilled in the Lord. And so, we look at returning to the land and we’re looking at the promises ultimately fulfilled in the Lord Jesus Christ and then fulfilled in a new heaven and a new earth wherein dwells righteousness. A new heaven where nothing impure will ever enter nor will anyone who does what is shameful or deceitful but only for those whose names are written in the Lamb's Book of Life. Colin.

CC: If I could just add to that. In my understanding, it’s really not possible to find in the pages of scripture detailed prophecies or predictions that relate to the modern State of Israel. In the eschatological discourses in the gospels, the three passages that speak about the future the main emphasis is on the events leading up to the destruction of Jerusalem in 70 A.D. And the end of these chapters is talking about the end, but that is much more vague and it seems to me that it is not possible to find in scripture detailed predictions that can be related to the modern State of Israel. I personally do not feel therefore, that the State of Israel is something that has theological significance. I accept the State of Israel as something established in international law by the will of the United Nations, the international community, but I do not feel that we can turn to the Bible to find a biblical justification or a theological justification for the State of Israel.

Caller: Are we living in the Promised Land now, but you still believe we’re waiting for Jesus to return?

CC: Yes. I think yes, you’ve got it. Hebrew is very, very clear. Hebrews Chapter 4 that every believer in Jesus has entered into the rest which is the Promised Land. And it’s interesting the word inheritance is used in several places in the New Testament to describe what every believer in Jesus enjoys. Now, here is a word that in the Old Testament is associated specifically with the land, the inheritance of the land. So that in Jewish ears is associated with the land, is used by New Testament writers to speak of what every believer in Jesus enjoys. So, yes, every believer in Jesus has entered into the Promised Land and enjoys all the benefits of what God has done for us in Christ.

HH: So, this for you, Colin, is not a matter of nationality, it’s a matter of spirituality, not the circumcision of the flesh but the circumcision of the heart. And I’d like your comment then in that regard to Galatians Chapter 6:16, or 15 and 16. Neither circumcision nor uncircumcision means anything, what counts is a new creation. Peace and mercy to all who follow this rule and then this phrase, even to the Israel of God. So, it sounds to me as though the New Testament writers are taking Old Testament images and language and now applying it to people who are redeemed from every tongue and tribe and nation.

CC: You’re absolutely right and if you take the important passages in Romans 9 to 11 you have Paul’s image of Gentiles being grafted into the olive, so I as a Gentile am grafted in to Israel. So, Israel in the Old Testament is the Jewish people, the descendants of Abraham, the sons of Israel. But when Jesus comes and invites people to be his disciples and the message goes to the ends of the earth, every person who believes in Jesus is grafted into Israel. So, Israel in the New Testament comes to have a much, much broader meaning, not just a physical descendant of Abraham, it’s all those who by faith in Jesus as Messiah

(break in program)

HH: And before we go to our next caller a quick commendation for Colin Chapman. Colin, I appreciate the very clear way in which you deal with this issue, your love for the Word of God and your love for the Lord is obvious, not only in how you write but the manner in which you speak as well.

CC: That’s kind of you to say so, Hank. Let me just really give a kind of testimony at this point. I would say that this whole study has forced me to go deeper into the scriptures. It has really enlarged and deepened my understanding of Christ as a result of this subject I think I have a much deeper, richer and fuller understanding of who Jesus is and what he has done.

HH: And the more you understand what the Lord Jesus Christ has done for us, the more you not only love him but want others to know him and I think one of the things that we often do is we forget there are Arabs who are those for whom Christ died. They’re a mission field and of course many Arabs already know Jesus Christ as Savior and Lord of their life. There is this false dichotomy I fear, maybe even in the sense of Anti-Semitic because Arabs are Semitic as well, where we say the Arabs are descendants of Ishmael, the Jews of Isaac, therefore, if we stand with Ishmael we’ll have the curse of God. If we stand with Isaac, we’ll have the blessings of God. Comment on that.

CC: There are actually quite a number of parts of the Bible that can be related to the Arabs as a people throughout history. You can find references in the book of Genesis and in also some of the prophets and there are quite a number of suggestions that Ishmael the son of Abraham, God did make a promise to him and those promises were fulfilled in a limited way within biblical history, but there are many who suggest that some of those prophecies might have been fulfilled. For example, in the coming of the Magi and there’s quite a number of scholars today who would suggest that the Magi came not from Iraq or Iran, somewhere further in the east, but actually Arabia. There were people present from Arabia in Jerusalem on the day of Pentecost and it is actually quite thrilling to find that there are passages in scripture that relate to the people that are called today the Arabs.

HH: The bottom line then, Colin, is in God’s economy the Arab believer and the Jew believer stands on equal footing.

CC: Exactly, and there’s a very, very important phrase in the book of Ephesians where Paul says that God’s intention was in Christ to create in himself one new man out of the two, thus making peace. So, Jew and Gentile are brought together. So, in the body of Christ, in the body of Christ the Messiah, Jews are not first class citizens. Yes, they are special because of all the promises in the history of the Old Testament but in the prophecy of Christ, Jewish and Gentile believers can actually be brought together.

HH: Colin, what do you make of the whole dynamic we have today whereby there are so many Christians who are involved financially in bringing Jews back into the land of Palestine from areas around the world, including Russia and the Ukraine and so forth. What do you make of that when those Jews are going to be brought back into Israel and the belief of those bringing them back to Israel, they’re going to face a holocaust that will make Hitler look like child’s play in comparison.

CC: Well, to me it is really very, very distressing to see the way the Christians from outside are pouring funds and moral support into this kind of activity. Let me just point out that in February of this year I spent two and a half weeks in the West Bank and in one place near Hebron I actually watched Jewish settlers erecting a fence that was going to take away a large area of a yard from its Arab owners. Now, I think I’m going to point out to some of these Christian friends who are supporting activities of this kind that this is what you are supporting. Jewish people taking over land that does not belong to them and I think we have to understand in human terms what these activities actually involve.

HH: Well said. We want to go back to the phone lines. Steven in Idaho, you’re on with Colin Chapman. Hi, Steven.

Caller: Hi. My question has to do with the promise of the covenant in Romans Chapter 9. What are the children that receive the physical covenant? Do they exist today in Israel or was that just for the old economy, that kind of reference?

CC: When Paul speaks about the Jewish people as Israel in Romans 9 to 11 he’s obviously thinking about people who think of themselves as being descended from Abraham and therefore, the inheritors of the covenant. I think one of the important things about Romans 9 to 11 is that Paul wanted to say that God still has purposes for the Jewish people. He has not rejected them. And so, in one verse he says they are loved for the sake of their forefathers. ‘Are’ is in the present tense, not ‘were.’ There is still something special about the Jewish people is my understanding. But, in those chapters Paul also goes on to say that Jews who do not believe in Jesus as Messiah are like branches that are cut off because of unbelief. Now, it’s difficult to see how Paul can say one minute they are loved for the sake of their forefathers and the next minute say they are cut off through unbelief. But, this is the tension I think we as Christians have got to live with. Yes, there is something special about them because of their background, because of the covenant and all the promises that were made over to them. But, Jews who do not accept Jesus as Messiah, while they have all these privileges and possibilities, they’re not enjoying them because the real fulfillment, the fruition of those covenant promises is found in Christ, the Messiah.

HH: I was just thinking as you were talking, Colin, and how bringing someone to the land of Israel and then telling the people who are involved in the transport, don’t proselytize that person, we are just to bring them back into the land of Israel and when you think about it logically or biblically, being in the land of Israel in unbelief and dying in that condition is the worst of all possibilities. The best of all possibilities is to recognize that Jesus Christ is the promise and that there will be a restoration of paradise, so the ultimate job that we have then is to communicate the grace and truth and love that Jesus Christ can bring to the human heart whether that person is a Jew coming back into the land of Palestine, an Arab or someone who is Dutch or English.

CC: That’s absolutely right and again I would just say what a very special experience it is to see Jewish believers in Jesus joining hands with Arab believers in Jesus and finding their unity in Christ and in that context they find that it is possible to look at the politics and history and figure out what the problem is all about and reach views on the conflict that are not over spiritualized but are totally biblical, actually realistic and can be cashed out and worked out in terms therefore, bringing peace and justice to both sides today.

HH: Colin, what do you make of the words of Paul in Romans Chapter 11:26 when he says “so all Israel will be saved.” People see this as a small number of people, a particular epic of time in the 21st century. Do you see it more expansively from the time of Paul’s writing right to the present time where people are redeemed by the Messiah when he comes into their life and gives them joy, peace and happiness, the promise that one day they will see him face to face?

CC: Well, in Romans earlier on Paul has already said that not everyone who is a Jew by race is a real Jew, so it’s inconceivable when he says all Israel shall be saved that he is thinking that at some time in the future everybody who is ethnically Jewish will be saved. And in the context of Paul’s teaching generally I think one has to say that the word Israel means Israel, the Jewish people but it is also broadened out to include all the people of God, so I as a Gentile believer am grafted into Israel and so I understand all Israel shall be saved to mean the full number and I don’t think of it as meaning every single individual Jewish person at any particular time in the future is going to be saved.

HH: Is there going to be a second coming? A lot of people will say if you believe that Jesus Christ came in vindication and exhaltation, with the destruction of Jerusalem and temple in A.D. 70, you’re saying that Jesus Christ is not going to come again, that we will not see the consummation when he comes. We will not see the full resolution to the problem of sin and we won’t see the resurrection of believers immortal, imperishable, incorruptible.

CC: My understanding of the second coming is it comes at the end of the world as we now know it. So, in the language of Peter, we’re looking for a new heaven and a new earth in which righteousness dwells. Let me just make a general point about the future and eschatology. If you look at the Old Testament promises and prophecies, I think you could say that at the time of Jesus nobody, however intelligent or spiritual they were wouldn’t have been able to figure out simply from the text of the Old Testament full details of the life and the death and the resurrection of Jesus. Nobody would have been able beforehand from the text of scripture to paint the whole scenario. But when it did happen, people could understand it because of what was written about in the Old Testament. Now, on the same basis it seems to me that no one today however spiritual and however intelligent can work out a detailed scenario of every event that is going to take place before the second coming. And as we live in the situations where we are we have to live as salt and light, trying to make a difference. And the Sermon on the Mount speaks of special blessing to those who are peacemakers. It speaks about hungering and thirsting after righteousness which can easily be translated justice. So, in the present situation in the Middle East with terrible injustice that is being done, believers it seems to me at the present time need to be struggling with all their might to see some kind of peace and justice is done and I would want to add that I believe Christians have a terrific responsibility in this problem, partly because of the way Christians have been involved in many stages of history and partly also because many policies relating to Israel and Palestine are supported on the basis of a Christian interpretation of the Bible. I really believe that it is possible that there can be peace and justice. Yes, not everybody will be satisfied but I believe that Christians should be working as peacemakers, hungering and thirsting after righteousness, justice in this particular conflict.

HH: And on that note of encouragement and exhortation, we thank you so much, Colin for being with us, for your book “Who’s Promised Land” and we thank you for bringing your kind, compassionate and very clear perspective on scripture to the Bible Answer Man’s broadcast. Thank you, Colin.

CC: Thank you, Hank. It’s been a pleasure to be with you.

HH: And for all of you, thank you so much for tuning in to today’s edition of the Bible Answer Man’s broadcast. We’ll see you right back here next time with more of the show.

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