Piper on Israel/Palestine

Jon Piper has a great sermon entitled "Israel, Palestine, and the Middle East" addressing the Israel/Palestine issue from a series teaching through Romans.  Click Here to read or listen to the whole thing... a couple excerpts that are particularly insightful: 

"Israel has broken covenant with her God and is living today in disobedience and unbelief in his Son and her Messiah. That is why Paul says in Romans 11:28, “As regards the gospel [the good news of the Messiah] they are enemies of God.”

"Therefore, the secular state of Israel today may not claim a present divine right to the Land, but they and we should seek a peaceful settlement not based on present divine rights, but on international principles of justice, mercy, and practical feasibility."

"This follows from all we have said so far, and the implication it has for those of us who believe the Bible and trust Christ as our Savior and as the Lord of history, is that . We should approve or denounce according to Biblical standards of justice and mercy among peoples. We should encourage our representatives to seek a just settlement that takes the historical and social claims of both peoples into account."

"Neither (Palestinians or Israelis) should be allowed to sway the judgments of justice by a present divine claim to the land. If you believe this, it would be helpful for your representatives to know it. We are not whitewashing terrorism and we are not whitewashing Jewish force. Nor is there any attempt on my part to assess measures of blame or moral equivalence. That's not my aim. My aim is to put the debate on a balanced footing in this sense: neither side should preempt the claims of international justice by the claim of present divine rights. Working out what that justice will look like is still a huge and daunting task. I have not solved that problem. But I think we will make better progress if we do not yield to the claim of either side to be ethnically or nationally sanctioned by God in their present conflict." (emphasis mine)

Good teaching on the importance of distinguishing modern day political Israel from true "Spiritual Israel".  This is THE key distinction in the Christian's posture towards the current conflict.  Encourage prayerful digestion of Piper's entire teaching.  

Praying for peace in the Middle East.