Egypt in History
and Prophecy
Date: 8 February, 2011
In the last two months we
have seen a number of different events that have taken place that have truly
transformed the world. Whatever we thought the issues or the problems were two
months ago they are not anymore; they have completely and radically changed
because of these events. The first are the Wikileaks and Al Jezera leaks
regarding Palestinian authority willingness to commit to give up a claim to a
tremendous amount of territory in along the west bank, along with ceding claims
to Jerusalem. The revelation of that has caused the leaders in the Palestinian
Authority, and others to have to retrench and react and go to the other
extreme, so the hope of any kind of peaceful settlement now that the Arabs have
learned their willingness to give up some of these territorial claims is pretty
much gone. Then there has been the food riots and a change of government in Tunisia and riots in Yemen.
Two or three weeks ago there
was an election in southern Sudan where there has been ongoing warfare for the last
30-40 years. The northern part is Muslim, the southern part is not, and they
voted overwhelmingly for independence. The US has stated that it will recognize their independence.
Earlier in January or late
December Lebanon was basically lost to Hezbollah which has taken
complete control, and this basically means that instead of just having a
terrorist organization that is a proxy for Iran on their northern border Israel now has a terrorist state on their northern border.
For Israel that is just like having Iran on their northern border.
Then, of course, we haven’t
missed the fact that there have been these riots in Egypt going on for the last two weeks or so. Along with
that there have been some minor uprisings in Jordan and the king is trying to get right out in front of
that right now. He immediately fired his Prime Minister and Deputy Prime
Minister, formed a new government, and is trying to get out in front of the
demands of the people in order to prevent anything happening in Jordan that is similar to what is going on in Egypt. But we don’t know what the future holds for any of
these countries right now. All of these events add up to basically a historical
and political earthquake and right now the epicentre of that is in Cairo.
That means that whatever were
the issues for Israel six weeks ago are not the main issue anymore; everything has truly
changed, and it has changed for the US and for the world because whatever works out here is
going to shape maybe the next fifteen to twenty years. We don’t know whether
this is going to be positive or whether it is going to be negative. Anybody who
prognosticates is probably going to make mistakes because it is an extremely
fluid situation. Anything could change and we probably won’t know what the
results of this are going to be for maybe another year. Just because they are
going to have elections in six or seven months doesn’t mean that we understand
the impact of those elections even once they are held. Right now it seems
Mubarak is going to stay in office and maintain a position where he has had
some sort of stability for transition but even that can change. We don’t know
who a lot of the players are. A lot of the news that we get, whether we are
watching Fox News, CNN or MSNBC or whatever news outlook we are looking at, it is all
being openly controlled by the Egyptian Government. But we are seeing fewer
than one per cent of the people out on the streets of Cairo in terms of the entire population of Egypt, so once again it is a very slanted view of what is
going on.
Now and then there are emails
forwarded to me from Christians who are there and recording what is going on
and what they are saying doesn’t necessarily fit with what we are hearing on
the news. So we need to read a lot and pay attention to a lot of stuff, and I
don’t think we are living in an era when anybody can afford to not be a news
junky. Listening to the news and understanding what the issues are so we can
understand what is happening in terms of US policy and US politics, and the maintenance of our
position of freedom and security is now second only to the amount of time we
need to spend in the Word and our study of Bible doctrine. This is no longer
the kind of optional thing where we can just sort of go on neutral and think
the leaders in Washington or the leaders in Austin or Houston are going to do
the right thing and they won’t do anything too bad that is too difficult to
reverse. A lot of things that are happening are going to be extremely difficult
to reverse and just inaction at the right time can be as calamitous as
specifically taking a wrong course of action. It takes a tremendous amount of
wisdom right now to understand when to act, when not to act, when to talk, when
not to talk; and we need leaders who have that kind of wisdom. Too often,
especially in recent years, politicians are playing to their bases and are not
concerned about doing the right thing, keeping their mouth shut and working
behind the scenes in diplomacy. So the more things that come out in the open
the more difficult it is to come to decisions. We need to be following the
mandates of 1 Timothy chapter two and pray for our leaders in all things
because it is only in the environment of peace that we can continue to carry
out work related to missions, related to the ministry, etc. Right now it is
very easy to ignore, forget or not be aware of the fact that there are probably
hundreds and hundreds of American missionaries who operate in Tunisia, Yemen,
Turkey, Egypt, Jordan, etc. who in times of this kind of instability really do
have their lives put on the line, or their ministry. So it is not just a matter
of international politics and policies, not just a matter of what is best for Israel or the US; we also need to be thinking in terms of the ultimate
mission of the church and Christianity—carrying out the great commission in
terms of communicating the gospel. So it is important for us to understand the
issues and to know want is going on.
In America we have a real problem, and that is that we have been
taught from the cradle that democracy solves the world’s problems: everybody
ought to have a democracy. That is an extremely flawed assumption. Hitler was
elected by a democracy; Mussolini was put in power via a democracy; Hamas was
put in power in the Gaza strip via a democracy, and so just because there is a
democratic election it doesn’t mean there are going to be good results. When
the people vote the result is directly tied to their integrity and their
virtue, and if the people have neither then those who they elect will have no
integrity or virtue either. If the people have integrity and virtue then the
people they elect will have integrity and virtue. So just because you get rid
of a despotic government doesn’t mean that using a democracy is going to solve
a problem. It is impossible for a Muslim country which is dominated by people
who think in terms of a an Islamic worldview to have a true democracy that
respects opposing viewpoints and respects the individual. It is antithetical to
their ultimate view of reality, due to their rigid, strict monotheism. As long
as they hold to the kind of monotheism that they have in Islam it a
contradiction in terms for them to value the many when the only thing that they
have as an ultimate reality in the one. That is why they don’t value their
women, why they don’t truly value every individual in society, and they never
will. It is inconsistent with their whole religious structure.
When we look at Egypt it is critical to everything that goes on in the Middle East (actually it is in North
Africa). It is the largest
Arab country and has a population of 80-million people. Since the Camp David
Accords in 1978 it has an army that is twice the size of Israel’s army. In terms of looking at Egypt as a potential enemy of Israel we have to recognize how dangerous Egypt. Since 1978 Israel has been able to relax in terms of its southern
border to a large degree because Egypt was taken off the field and was not a concern. They
were able to focus more to enemies to the north. Since 1994 their peace agreement
with Jordan they haven’t had to be concerned about Jordan and they have actually been able to reduce their
military expenditure to an extremely large degree. In the 1070s Israel spent 23% of its GDP on its military and national
defence, and now they are spending about 9%, so they have reduced that by about
two-thirds. Now they are going to have to go in the other direction if things
do not go well in regard to Egypt and where Egypt goes.
Ever since the Camp David
Peace Accords Egypt has been the corner stone of all US peace strategy in the Middle East and it has really been the basis for and the conduit for establishing
ties with other Arab regimes in the Middle East and for
trying to move the peace process forward. The basis for all US attempts to
maintain and contain radical Islam has gone through Egypt. In 1991 the time of the first Gulf War Egypt was central to putting together and Arab alliance to
go against Saddam Hussein but they did not join in the alliance to go against
him in the second gulf war and that kept most of the Arab countries out of the
war. As a result of Camp David the US gives $1.3-billion each year in aid to
Egypt, most of which goes to its military. People ask why we give them
anything. It is part of the deal at Camp David to
upgrade and update their military. That means that Egypt at this point has 300 F16s and an army that is
equipped with the latest technology that is two times the size of Israel’s IDF. We give them that much aid because that was part of
that peace agreement. It seemed like a good idea at the time; forty years later
it doesn’t seem like such a great idea, but that is often what happens in the
twists and turns of history.
In the past two weeks a lot
of people in the national news say lots of negative things about Mubarak. The
press has decided he must go because this is a “horrible regime”—it’s
autocratic, a dictatorship—but they have glossed over the positives. We have to
remember that you can’t even classify Mubarak in the same category as Assad in Syria or Saddam Hussein or, of course, the ayatollahs in Iran. Look at the fact that the army didn’t start killing
thousands and thousands when they started to riot in the streets. This just
shows that his way of handling things was very different. That is not to say
that he has always been good but he has been much better than any of the
alternatives. Over the last forty years he has taken a truly wrecked economy on
Egypt and improved it in a tremendous way. In terms of his
foreign policy he has been a bulwark in terms of peace in the Middle East. He has never violated the peace treaty with Israel. It may have been a cold peace as some have termed it
but he has been instrumental in locking down the Gaza strip and preventing radical elements from bringing
weapons into Gaza that would be used against Israel. If he is removed the likelihood of having a
government that will not honor the peace accords of Camp David is extremely high.
One of the names that has
been bandied about by the western press (they are probably more in love with
him than the Egyptians are) is ElBaradei who has a horrible track record. He
covered up for the Iranians when he was part of the International Atomic
Commission that was to go in and see what the Iranians were doing, and he lied
for them. He is anti-Semitic to the core, hates the Jews and will not do
anything in favour of them. The fact that he is going to be used or enter into
negotiations with the Muslim Brotherhood is just another indication that there
is nothing good about ElBaradei—and he is the best of the options. So whatever
is going to come along in Egypt it is probably going to go from bad to worse.
In terms of the opposition we
don’t really know much. The only group that has any organization is the Muslim
Brotherhood. It does not have the power it once had in Egypt; it has been outlawed by Mubarak. It is very
important to understand who the Muslim Brotherhood are, what their goals and
objectives are, and that we don’t want to have anything to do with them. There
are two things we can say about the Muslim Brotherhood, and to understand these
two things says it all: a) Their goal is to destroy the state of Israel and
they are anti-Semitic to the core; b) Their objective is to re-establish the
caliphate—the Islamic political arm coming out of the Ottoman Empire that
governed and unified all of the Islamic Arab countries up until the collapse of
the Ottoman Empire. They came into existence four years after the Ottoman Empire dissolved in the early 1920s and their goal was to
re-establish the caliphate. The thing to always remember about the Muslim
Brotherhood is that they sort of reinvented themselves. They had a sort of
brand improvement, to put it in modern parlance, in the 70s and they adopted
moderate goals. They talked a lot about democracy and other things that would
have resonance in the west but their objective is still radical--destroy the
Jewish state and re-establish the caliphate, which would be centered in Turkey. We have seen Turkey move more to the radical Islamic countries and move
away from the west and it is also getting closer and closer to the radical
regimes in Iraq and Iran.
So it is really important to
watch these developments and see how they come out in the next couple of years.
There are some democratic forces operating in Egypt there are many other
forces, many other radical groups that are not on anybody’s radar, as well as
the Muslim Brotherhood which although not really strong in Egypt still has the
organization and the potential to take over. Many revolutions have started—the
French Revolution, the Bolshevik Revolution, the Iranian Revolution, three
which come to mind—by those who wanted democracy, had good ideals, and then
once the previous government was overthrown they were taken over by radicalized
elements. So we just have to be aware of these trends in history. Just because
people want the right things doesn’t mean they use the right way to go about it
and they end up often having their revolution co-opted by some radicalized
group.
In addition to Egypt there have been problems in Yemen and Jordan, a few demonstrations in the Palestinian
authority, a couple of attempts to have demonstrations in Syria but they were shut down very rapidly, and still
turmoil in Tunisia. Jordan is something that Israel is most concerned about. The demonstrations there
focus more on the government rather than the King. But if Egypt goes and goes radical then we can see all of North Africa going radical, including probably Jordan. There will be a domino effect that takes place.
People in the US need to be educated about the Muslim Brotherhood. Too
often when we listen to various people on news shows say maybe it wouldn’t be
too bad if we entered into negotiations with the Muslim Brotherhood. It would
probably be better of we entered into negotiations with the devil himself! But
we just don’t have any kind of absolute framework to judge evil anymore because
we have become a relativistic nation that has thrown out religion, thrown out
absolutes, and we have bought into this horrible, horrible idea of
multiculturalism, that every culture is equally valid and equally good. The
reality of that is if we really believe in multiculturalism then we have to say
Hitler was just as good as George Washington, and we don’t have any leg to
stand on to challenge that. Unfortunately most liberals, many conservatives,
and all progressives have bought into that kind of garbage to influence their
thinking. It is just horrific; it destroys objectivity and the ability to
understand reality.
The Muslim Brotherhood was
founded in 1928 by Hassan al-Banna in Egypt and part of his goal was to restore the caliphate.
Islam has evil fundamentals and its goal is world domination. The Islamists
look at the objective in terms of the long-range goal. They will look at
history and their objective over a period of centuries and they are not going
to back off and relax because this is what Islam has taught them. That doesn’t
mean that every Muslim believes all of that 100% but if we realize that there
are one and a half billion Muslims in the world and only one per cent is
fifteen million. It only takes one person to blow a dirty bomb in Washington DC or New York
in order to wreak international havoc and so to act as if a person who is a
Muslim who truly believes in all of the tenets and values of Islam, that they
are on equal footing with a Buddhist or a Christian or a Jew, is just absurd.
They are not, these other religions do not have the same goals or objectives as
Islam.
It is now viewed (because
they have adopted modern tactics) as a more moderate group than other Islamist
organizations that are operating in the Middle East, such as al Qaeda And a
number of others. In September 2010 Mohammed Badi, who is the leader of the
Muslim Brotherhood now, stated: “The improvement and change the Muslim nation
seeks can only be attained through Jihad and sacrifice and by raising a Jihadi
generation that pursues death just as the enemies pursue life.” Their goal is
death; our goal is life. Christianity offers life. Even though the west has
divorced itself from its Christian roots it is still a civilization that values
life to a large degree, even though it has been pursuing death more and more
over the past thirty years or so in terms of its philosophies and values. This
is what he recognizes: Christians and Israel are enemies, they pursue life whereas Islam values
death. If we listen to what people say in English, German, French or other
languages they sound very moderate. But if we go to the Middle East Media Research Institute which translates speeches made in Arabic into
English and we read what they say, their radical agenda has never been set
aside. They preach hate against all of the countries in the west and Israel, they raise money for Hamas and for al Qaeda, and are
fully supportive of all of the radical agendas. We have to remember that they
have very flexible tactics and their agenda, their goal has never ever
changed.
In February, 2006, then FBI Director
Robert Mueller met with the then head of Egyptian Intelligence, Omar Suleiman,
who is now the new Vice President of Egypt, who told him that the Muslim
Brotherhood was neither a religious organization nor a social organization or
political party, but a combination of all three. In his view the principal
danger was the group’s exploitation of religion to influence and mobilize the
public. He claimed that the Muslim Brotherhood has spawned eleven different
Islamic extremist organizations, one of which is Hamas.
What are the implications of
all of this?
1. The
first is that destabilization of Egypt radically increases the destabilization of the entire
region, and in that chaos the radical forces of the Muslim Brotherhood and
other radical Islamist organizations will move in so that they can influence
the direction.
2. The
chances are that even with a moderate democracy the Camp David peace agreement will be rejected, which means that Egypt will no longer protect the borders of Gaza which is keeping weapons out of the hands of radicals
in Gaza. The Muslim Brotherhood has stated that one of its
primary objectives is to overturn the Camp David peace
agreement which is the lynchpin for peace and stability in the entire region.
3. If Egypt doesn’t continue to maintain border integrity with Gaza then Israel will have a serious problem on its southern flank.
4. With
the destabilization of these regimes all of the Middle East regimes become less dependable, their security demands go off the
charts, and that means they are going to be spending more and more time and
money focused on domestic issues and couldn’t care less about external issues
such as peace with Israel or bringing peace to the region. It will also
traumatize all of North Africa, and the horn of Africa
will become extremely destabilized as well. If Egypt falls there will be a domino effects in the whole
area.
5. Between
ten and fifteen per cent of Egyptians are Christians—Coptic Christians. They
need to be protected. There are twice as many Coptic Christians as there are
radical Islamists in Egypt probably, and they need to have a voice in government
as well.
6. We need to be praying for Christian missionaries that are
there.
7. We
have to get out of the fantasy. Islam is not a peaceful religion. The religion
of the Quran (those who take it literally) is world domination and they are not
going to let anything stop them. So we should not operate on false assumptions
with regard to Islam.
Three important points about
prophecy; terms of prophetic interpretation among those who look at Old
Testament prophecy and New Testament prophecy. There are three schools, just
think of this as past, present and future. The technical terms are (1)
preterist [Latin word that means past]. The preterist school looks at most of
the prophecies in the Old Testament and prophecies Jesus made in Matthew 24 and
Revelation as having been fulfilled with the destruction of the temple and
Israel in AD 70. (2) The historicist view is the view that sees
these prophecies being fulfilled over the entire period of time in which we are
now living. So we could go in and see different things that are happening on
the world stage and say this is that event, this is this other event, and so
on, and we begin to identify where we are on God’s prophetic timetable. Where
that led to historically was people saying, Oh, Jesus is coming back in 1837,
or 1841, etc. (3) Pure theological dispensationalism said that no prophecy has
to be fulfilled before Jesus comes back; all these prophecies are future. They
don’t take place until after the Rapture occurs, so no prophecy is going to be
fulfilled prior to the Rapture—with the one exception which is the beginning of
the return of Jews to the land of Israel because there has to be a state of
Israel in existence at the beginning of the seven-year Tribulation.
What we are getting today is
a certain number of evangelicals and dispensationalists who can’t think
logically. They don’t understand what imminency means and they don’t understand
the schools of prophecy. The Rapture of the church is imminent, it could happen
at any time. Putting those together that means that we can’t look at anything
on the world stage and say Jesus is coming soon. We may all think that but
don’t bet on it. We can’t look at one thing in the world today and say that the
coming of Jesus is close. The only way we can say that Jesus’ coming is closer
is that we are one day further down the calendar. We can’t predict. Things like
events in the Middle East are clearly God moving the international chess pieces
on the game board of history to prepare for that.
We only have three ways to
look at the Hebrew prophets in the Old Testament. The first way to look at them
is that they were who they claimed to be. They were honest men. When they said
that they spoke the words that God gave them they spoke the words that God gave
them. They were legitimate and they truly foretold the future because God was
the one who was giving them their information. The second way to look at them
is that they were religious charlatans, just frauds like every religion has
false prophets and teachers who claim that they can predict the future, and
they just happened to be better guessers than other religious charlatans. The
third way to look at them is that they were sincere religious leaders who were
devoted to Israel and their religion but they were liars all the same
because they said God told them when He didn’t tell them. Actually in this view
they didn’t have any predictive prophecy, they just wrote it down after the
events occurred in history and made it look like they had predicted it.
The first view is the view of
Orthodox Jews and conservative evangelical Christians. The second view is the
view of skeptics, atheists and agnostics who think that all religious books are
just made up by somebody who was on a power trip and they are all a bunch of
religious charlatans. The third view is the view of religious liberals. They
want to preserve something good out of these world religions but they don’t
really believe them. They don’t think that there is any absolute truth but they
think that there is some value there, so they try to say Jesus was a good man,
the prophets were good men, but when you push them to the wall you have to
admit they were liars because Jesus said: “Nobody can come to the Father except
by me.” Either He was telling the truth or He was lying, those are the only
options. Really option B that they are charlatans, option C that they were
liars just doesn’t fit the record. The record is that when they could be
evaluated their prophecies came true 100% of the time. That was the standard in
the Old Testament—Deuteronomy chapters 13 & 18 lays down the groundwork.
Some things were beyond their lifetime, so those were all validated by things
that they predicted within their lifetime and of they only had a 99.9% record
they were dead. God did not want anybody speaking for Him that wasn’t.
Egypt is one of those nations that is mentioned more than
any other in the Old Testament—over 700 times compared to less than 30 times in
the New Testament. There are 125 times in the Old Testament where God is
reminding Israel that He brought them up out of the land of Egypt. That is a central event. The first time we see Egypt mentioned is in Genesis 12:10 when there was a famine
in the land and Abraham took his wife Sarah down to Egypt in order to find food. The first prophecy that we see
related to Egypt is in Genesis 15:13 NASB “{God} said to
Abram, ‘Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that
is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years.
[14] But I will also judge the nation whom they will serve, and afterward they
will come out with many possessions. [15] As for you, you shall go to your
fathers in peace; you will be buried at a good old age. [16] Then in the fourth
generation they will return here, for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete.’”
Their entrance into Egypt is usually located around 1875 BC and the
exodus was in 1446 BC, approximately 400 years. Then we don’t hear anything
more. After the 10th plague, the death of the firstborn son which would have
devastated the male population of Egypt, and Israel’s deliverance at the Red Sea which drowned the mighty Egyptian army, we don’t hear from them again
for 500 years. Think about all the plagues that wiped out their economy and
agriculture and military. The great and mighty Egypt was no more.
The next time we hear Egypt mentioned historically is at the beginning of 1 Kings
chapter three when Solomon too the daughter of Pharaoh as his wife. That was
475 years after the exodus. The next time we see Egypt is when Pharaoh conquered Jerusalem at the time of Rehoboam the son of Solomon at about
the mid-tenth century. Next time we hear of Egypt is about 200 years later, roughly from 740-690 BC, when Egypt comes up when there is the temptation for the
northern kingdom of Israel to look to Egypt to deliver them, to be their ally, with the rise of
the power of Assyria in the east. It was at this time that Egypt also was defeated by the Assyrians and they were
warned about that by Isaiah. There are a number of prophecies in the book of
Isaiah that were fulfilled historically and literally during that time as Egypt was defeated by the Assyrians. The same, then, about
100 years after that when there was the destruction of the northern kingdom
with the rise of Babylon and the southern kingdom was also being tempted to
rely upon the strength of Egypt to help them against Babylon. God warned them
very much against that. Not only did Nebuchadnezzar defeat Judah but he also went down and devastated Egypt.
In the midst of all that are
various prophecies. Isaiah chapter eleven is clearly a messianic passage,
talking about the Messiah’s future kingdom that God promised to Israel.
Isaiah 11:1 NASB
“Then a shoot [Messiah] will spring from the stem of Jesse, And a branch from
his roots will bear fruit.” The tree trunk has been cut down. That is what
happened after the defeat of the northern and southern kingdoms when they went
out into captivity. But out of that tree trunk that had been cut down a
“branch” would come forth. That is a name, a title, for the Messiah. [2] “The
Spirit of the LORD will rest on Him, The spirit of wisdom and
understanding, The spirit of counsel and strength, The spirit of knowledge and
the fear of the LORD. [3] And He will delight in the fear of the LORD, And He
will not judge by what His eyes see, Nor make a decision by what His ears hear;
[4] But with righteousness He will judge the poor, And decide with fairness for
the afflicted of the earth; And He will strike the earth with the rod of His
mouth, And with the breath of His lips He will slay the wicked. [5] Also
righteousness will be the belt about His loins, And faithfulness the belt about
His waist.” This is the context of the future messianic, Davidic kingdom.
Isaiah 11:11 NASB
“Then it will happen on that day [The day that His kingdom is established—yet
future] 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.” When was the first time
that God restored His people from a worldwide dispersion? We think that is what
we are seeing right now. It didn’t happen in the 530s BC with Zerubbabel. When
they returned from Babylon it was just Babylonian Jews and a few others but
there were still two-thirds of the Jews living outside of the land at the time
of Christ in the first century. There was no worldwide return like we do today.
The second return occurs at the beginning of the Davidic kingdom. God will
bring back all of the Jews from around the world to Israel to establish that kingdom. [12] “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.
Then we see that there is a
destruction. This occurs during that end time of the Tribulation period, just
when the Messiah comes and destroys the enemies of Israel. Isaiah 11:15
NASB “And the LORD will utterly destroy The tongue of the Sea of Egypt…” This is the Red Sea as it comes up between the Arabian peninsula
and Egypt and up to the west of the Sinai peninsula. That is going to be wiped out, and prophecy says
that in the kingdom there will be a highway between Egypt and Israel and Assyria. The traditional enemies of Israel in the Old Testament would not be enemies in the
future and it is pointing to the prosperity that will be taking place during
that time. “…And He will wave His hand over the River With His scorching wind;
And He will strike it into seven streams And make {men} walk over dry-shod.
[16] And there will be a highway from Assyria For the
remnant of His people who will be left, Just as there was for Israel In the day
that they came up out of the land of Egypt.”
The next major prophecy is in
Isaiah chapter nineteen. The first part of the chapter talks about prophecy
that was fulfilled when the Assyrians invaded Egypt at the time of Isaiah, but there is a shift in verse
16 to the future. Isaiah 19:16 NASB “In that day the Egyptians will
become like women, and they will tremble and be in dread because of the waving
of the hand of the LORD of hosts, which He is going to wave over them. [17]
“The land of Judah
will become a terror to Egypt; everyone to whom it is mentioned will be in dread of
it, because of the purpose of the LORD of hosts which He is purposing against them.” This
hasn’t ever been fulfilled in history.
Everything that was fulfilled
in history was fulfilled literally the way that it was predicted. So it stands
to reason that if that was fulfilled literally then that which is yet future
which is to take place at the time that the Messiah establishes His kingdom
will be fulfilled literally.
Isaiah 19:18 NASB
“In that day five cities in the land of Egypt will be speaking the language of
Canaan and swearing {allegiance} to the LORD of hosts; one will be called the City of
Destruction.” The LXX says that is Heliopolis. [19] “In that day there will be an altar to the LORD in the
midst of the land of Egypt,
and a pillar to the LORD near its border.” That has never happened. They will
worship the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. That is not happening in Egypt right now. [20] “It will become a sign and a witness
to the LORD of hosts in the land of Egypt; for they will cry to the LORD because of
oppressors, and He will send them a Savior and a Champion, and He will deliver
them. [21] Thus the LORD will make Himself known to Egypt, and the Egyptians will know the LORD in that
day. They will even worship with sacrifice and offering, and will make a vow to
the LORD and perform it.” That is not happening now. We can’t go into the Bible
and find anything related to today being fulfilled in relationship to Egypt.
Most of the rest of what is
in Isaiah were prophecies in Isaiah’s time and were fulfilled during his time.
The same is true about Jeremiah. The prophecies in Jeremiah were fulfilled
historically and literally, just as Jeremiah had predicted. Ezekiel has much
the same message but he has a prophetic section in chapters 29 & 30. This
is debated. There are those who believe that this was fulfilled at the time of
Nebuchadnezzar. Ezekiel 29:1 NASB “In the tenth year, in the tenth
{month,} on the twelfth of the month, the word of the LORD came to me
saying, [2] ‘Son of man, set your face against Pharaoh king of Egypt and prophesy against him and against all Egypt.”
Ezekiel 29:6 NASB
“Then all the inhabitants of Egypt will know that I am the LORD, Because
they have been {only} a staff {made} of reed to the house of Israel.” Because
they had been a false friend and false support for Israel they would be judged by God.
Ezekiel 29:9 NASB
“The land of Egypt
will become a desolation and waste. Then they will know that I am the LORD. Because you said, ‘The Nile is mine, and I
have made {it,}’ [10] therefore, behold, I am against you and against your
rivers, and I will make the land of Egypt an utter waste and desolation, from Migdol {to} Syene
and even to the border of Ethiopia. [11] A man’s foot will not pass through it, and the
foot of a beast will not pass through it, and it will not be inhabited for
forty years.” Nobody living in Egypt for forty years! There are people who say this was
probably fulfilled at the time of Nebuchadnezzar but there is no historical or
archaeological record to indicate anything like this ever occurred in history.
Most dispensationalists believe that this is yet future and is the result of
the destruction that comes upon Egypt after Armageddon.
Ethiopia and Libya are mentioned in 30:5 which talks about the same
period of time. Libya and Ethiopia are tied to the Ezekiel 38 and 39 invasion of Israel. We see that after those forty years God is going to
restore the people to Egypt and they will be a lowly nation. Ezekiel 30:23 NASB
“I will scatter the Egyptians among the nations and disperse them among the
lands.” This has never happened yet. Chapter 31 talks about the fact that Egypt will be made a lowly or abased nation.
The only other place Egypt is mentioned in the Old Testament is at the end of
Daniel. All through Daniel 11 it is mentioned as the king of the south. All of
the prophecies in Daniel chapter eleven were fulfilled literally and precisely.
They are detailed prophecies and were fulfilled during the inter-advent period
described by the books of the Maccabees between 200-300 BC, until we get
down to verse 36. From v. 36 on it is yet future. It talks about Egypt in vv. 42, 43.
Daniel 11:42 NASB “Then he [Antichrist] will stretch
out his hand against {other} countries, and the land of Egypt will not escape. [43] But he will gain control over
the hidden treasures of gold and silver and over all the precious things of Egypt; and Libyans and Ethiopians {will follow} at his
heels. [44] “But rumors from the East and from the North will disturb him, and
he will go forth with great wrath to destroy and annihilate many.” We think
that is where we will see the connection with Ezekiel 38 & 39. The
Antichrist goes about to destroy and annihilate those armies. [45] “He will
pitch the tents of his royal pavilion between the seas and the beautiful Holy Mountain; yet he will come to his end, and no one will help
him.”
What do we learn from all of
this? This takes us back to Isaiah 12. The bottom line in all of this is that
God is saying to Israel, despite all the calamity and chaos and despite the
fact that Israel is overrun time and time again and all the Jews are scattered
throughout the whole world, “I am in control; I will bring you back to the
land; I will fulfil my promises to you, so you can rest and relax and not be
afraid.”
So at the end when it is all
done and Israel has been restored: Isaiah 12:1 NASB “Then you will
say on that day, ‘I will give thanks to You, O LORD; For although You were
angry with me, Your anger is turned away, And You comfort me. [2] Behold, God
is my salvation, I will trust and not be afraid; For the LORD GOD is my
strength and song, And He has become my salvation.’”
No matter what happens, God
is in control. In the worst case scenario we can think of we don’t have to
worry. God is in control. We can rest and just be about our mission and not
worry about whatever winds of change blow across history.
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