“Pray for the well-being of Jerusalem: ‘May those who love you be secure; may there be peace within your walls, security within your fortresses.’ Because of my brothers and friends, I will say, ‘May peace be in you.’ Because of the house of the Lord our God, I will pursue your prosperity.” (CSB – Read the chapter)

This past Saturday a new horror was unleashed upon the world. Well, it wasn’t actually a new horror at all. It was an old horror that has been played on repeat for a very long time. But this particular manifestation of it was new. It was started afresh perhaps. Islamic terrorists from the religio-political entity known as Hamas executed a long-planned and vicious attack on a mostly unsuspecting Israel. Reactions around the world to this atrocity have been disgustingly mixed. Additionally, like so many violent confrontations involving Israel, this one has prompted believers to wonder if this is a sign of the approaching end of the world. A Babylon Bee headline satirically noted that the 700 Club’s Rapture Clock was set two minutes closer to the start of the Tribulation. What should we make of this latest attack on Israel by its enemies, and does it actually say anything about the timing of Christ’s return? Let’s spend a few minutes this morning thinking about that.

There is a large and even growing minority among some progressive elements of the culture in the West – and this is particularly true on college campuses – that reflexively hates Israel. The folks who have bought into this political outlook sympathize with the awful plight of the people living in the Palestinian territories to the extent that any time Israel retaliates against Hamas, the religio-political entity that rules part Palestine (they won this position in a civil war against the PLO), for launching a volley of rockets at their Jewish neighbors, they loudly blast Israel for their horrendous acts of aggression. They frequently launch diatribes against Israel because of their perpetuation of an apartheid state in Palestine.

This particular cultural pathogen is largely Marxist in its foundational assumptions, deeply postmodern in its outlook on the world, and instinctively hates Israel not so much because of their so-called oppression of the Palestinian territories, but because they are a mostly healthy, functioning democracy and a close ally of the United States, whose existence as a nation mostly represents everything Marxism was built from the ground-up to oppose. There is also the contribution of the fact that Marxism has been closely tied to anti-semitism since its founding, and Israel is the world’s only Jewish state. It is probably much more accurate to say, then, that this animus toward Israel is more emotional than truly rational.

None of this is to say that Israel is perfect or entirely just in their dealings with the Palestinians. They aren’t. While a great majority of their actions are reactive and in response to the aggressions of Hamas and the Palestinian Liberation Organization who ruled before them along with a host of other radical Islamic political and terrorist groups in the region, not all of them have been. That being said, if there is one side of this ongoing conflict on which the great burden of unjust perpetuation rests, it is unquestionably the side of the Islamic groups around Israel and not Israel itself. When one side of a political divide has as one of its foundational platforms the utter and total destruction of the other side, the prospects for the seeking out of a peaceful solution seem rather grim from the outset.

All of that was the state of affairs before this past Saturday. Then Hamas pulled back the curtain and revealed that it is more like ISIS than the PLO it supplanted in taking power over the region. The moral evil of what Hamas did to Israel, to otherwise innocent Israeli civilians, to unsuspecting men, women, the elderly, and even children is staggering. They butchered their victims. They used rape as a weapon of warfare. They used and are promising to use more the cold-blooded execution of prisoners as a means of terrorism by actively promoting the videos of such horrors on social media. They murdered forty babies many of whom were beheaded. If there was even the slightest moral argument to be made for some kind of an equivalence between these two groups (there wasn’t, but just for the sake of argument), that argument has been shattered into a million pieces.

It is tragically necessary and even right for Israel to act now to scrub Hamas from the earth. These strikes need to be surgical. They absolutely cannot play down to the atrocious actions of their mortal enemies. And indeed, to highlight the ongoing difference between the two sides of this conflict, Israel recently called for the citizens of northern Gaza to evacuate the region because of their plans to move in military units to seek and destroy all Hamas infrastructure in the area. Hamas responded by calling the evacuation orders a political stunt, telling residents there is no need to leave their homes, and in fact prohibiting many who tried from doing so.

Hamas has for many years used the non-combatants of the Palestinian territories they rule as human shields. They show no inclination to stop doing that now. This is a terrorist organization that has zero regard for human life of any kind. Israel does not have a blank check now, and is still legally requiring their forces to abide by modern rules of just warfare, but Hamas’ actions have justified a great deal of necessary force on Israel’s part in order to ably defend themselves from anything like this happening again.

As tragic as what Hamas unleashed upon Israel is, though, around the world we have seen another tragedy unfold in the reactions of many to this barbarity. Because of the kneejerk posture of so many progressive and otherwise liberal groups to side with Palestine against Israel (including the U.N.’s ridiculously-named Human Rights Council’s releasing a statement of support for the innocent Palestinians who will now be made to suffer under Israel’s unconscionable aggressions), we saw many spontaneous rallies in support of Palestine and even in support of Hamas on Sunday. There was even one rally at the Sydney Opera House at which participants were chanting, “Gas the Jews.” In case there is any doubt about this, these kinds of hate-fueled responses to murderous and evil campaigns against a group of people are what once made something like Holocaust possible. When we not only fail to call evil, evil, but go so far as to celebrate it simply because it is directed against a group of people we don’t like, we are treading on very dangerous ground.

Thankfully, there has been a counter reaction from the saner, more rational parts of our culture against such displays, calling out these morally bankrupt demonstrations for what they are. In one instance, a young woman attending a prestigious law school and with a job already secured at a prestigious law firm found herself suddenly unemployed because of a grotesque statement she posted on social media in support of Palestine and Hamas. As the extent of the horror Hamas unleashed became clearer, several groups were politically forced to make retractions to and even apologies for their initial statements.

Alongside all of these moral and political conversations, among Christian communities, or in places where the Christian worldview still holds some level of cultural dominance, another conversation has been happening. This is one that flares up just about every time a big, violent conflict between Israel and one of its many enemies blows up in the Middle East. This conversation centers itself on this question: Is this a sign of the nearness of Christ’s return? Are we close to Armageddon? My boys came home from school on more than one day this week sharing how their friends were talking about some of these very things. (By the way, parents, even as you are trying to wrap your head around all of this, don’t forget that your kids are struggling with that too; help them out to the best of your ability. Work to make sense out of it together.)

Because that may be a question you have asked, or have had asked of you, I thought I’d share a couple of thoughts to hopefully quell some anxiety and make sure we are thinking Biblically together. First, the short answer to the question of whether or not this means the time of Jesus’ return is near, is a slightly qualified no. The qualification is that we are closer to Jesus’ return today than we were yesterday because that’s how the flow of time works. That being said, this one event is almost certainly not a sign in and of itself that should make us more focused on its imminence than we were before. If you were not already living your life in such a way as to be ready for Christ’s return, you should absolutely fix that, but not because Hamas attacked Israel.

Another question often asked in times like this is about the level and nature of support we should have for Israel. After all, we are often told, Israel is God’s chosen people. We are supposed to support and care for God’s chosen people. They may have rejected Him before, but He is going to come back around and see many of them saved in the end. I understand that reaction. I can see how someone engaging with some of Paul’s writings could come to that conclusion. Our support for the nation of modern Israel as individuals and as a nation, though, should not be justified on religious grounds like that.

While Paul made clear that God’s plans for the Jewish people are not yet complete, and that because of the special relationship He had with them, He will yet make sure they have one more chance to accept the Gospel before the end when all sales are made final, he also made clear that the people of God, or Israel, if you will, is not a genetic designation. That is, someone is not part of the people of God simply because he or she is genetically related to Abraham. God’s people are those who have submitted themselves to His covenantal promise. Yet the covenantal promise God made with the genetic descendants of Abraham through Moses which took its form from the Law has been fulfilled and replaced by God’s new covenant of life through Christ. In other words, today, the church is God’s people in the way we are accustomed to thinking about ancient Israel. We are the bearers of the promise now.

Modern Israel and ancient Israel are not one and the same entity. What this means is that while I think there are very good political and moral and even historical and archaeological reasons for us to support modern Israel individually with prayers and perhaps giving to reputable relief organizations when the time comes, and as a nation through humanitarian aid and military cooperation, I think the religious case for such support is weak. The citizens of Israel today are being victimized by a grotesque moral evil and a grave injustice. Hamas and its supporters are the perpetuators of this evil. Because we serve a God who is just and who hates evil and sin in all of their forms, we should support the former and vigorously oppose the latter. At the same time, there are many innocents in the Palestinian territories who are also the victims of Hamas’ evil. Not a few of these are fellow brothers and sisters in Christ. They deserve our prayers and support as well. To borrow a phrase from a teacher whose work I greatly respect, we have to be able to walk and chew gum at the same time on this issue. Let us make sure that we are.