DaDad said:
Hi rjp34652,
I would suggest that if you know everything, then you're all set. However, if there are some things you don't know, then please consider that information from knowledgeable sources.
As such, I stand by what Scripture says about the U.S.:
... and I'm also willing to provide additional perspectives FROM SCRIPTURE as discussions prevail.
With Best Regards,
DD
Quoting scripture to support a political agenda seldom convinces anybody. The reason it doesn't is because political agendas are primarily based upon base human desires of greed, will to power and the popular attitudes of the huddled masses. Quoting scripture to support a political agenda is only successful when it's used for propaganda purposes.
Such propaganda has had its greatest success in the rise of the National Socialist German Worker's Party (NSDAP) in Germany in the 1930's. Under the guidance of Joseph Goebbels, Reich minister of propaganda, Christian imagery and scripture was used effectively to justify party politics. Until recently, scripture and references to the Christian religion have been a common tool in American politics as well. Scripture has often been abused to justify all sorts of inhuman behavior. However, a true and honest study of Biblical context,
the meaning of scripture interpreted within a consistent theme, will often render obscure doctrines and opinions inert.
One of those false doctrines includes America. In point of fact, scripture says nothing at all about the United States. There's a logical reason for that.
All scripture and all prophesy has Israel at its core. Israel as a nation in Palestine, the center of the Levant. Israel as a people and a nation. Israel as the birthplace and focus of attention of the King of Kings and Lord of Lords. All eschatology, even that of Islam, points to Israel as the central focus of the final events in human history and purposes of the Almighty.
"I said, I would scatter them into corners, I would make the remembrance of them to cease from among men"
- Deu 32:26 (Prophesy of Moses regarding the split and dispersion of Hebrews among the people of the world.)
The 'knowledgeable sources' you refer to have their basis in the ancient Jewish theory of the
TWO HOUSES. As you recall, the united nation of Israel was not fond of the rule of Solomon. Not fond at all. Solomon was ruthless and intractable in his rulership. When he died the northern kingdom of Israel, composed of 10 tribes, sent representatives to his heir requesting relief from Solomon's edicts of forced labor and taxation. Rehoboam refused both mercy and kindness and a civil war resulted. The Kingdom of David and Solomon was split in two. The northern kingdom was henceforth called Israel and the southern kingdom was called Judah.
Israel was the first kingdom to corrupt itself before God. Despite numerous attempts by the Almighty to inspire the kingdom to repentance, He eventually abandoned them to invasion by the Assyrian Empire. Israel was annihilated as a unified culture and people. To this day, nobody can trace the whereabouts of the lost 10 tribes with any accuracy. But legends and rumors persisted from that time until this very day. Even Jesus referred to it on occasion.
Judah remained. According to God's promise to King David, the scripture the cultural identity of the Jewish people have remained intact despite millennia of persecution. Persecution itself was the tool God chose to purify and perpetuate the culture. In this has the whole world prospered, for by their suffering the Jewish people have preserved the cultural basis for the story of God's redemption of fallen man.
But it was during the diaspora, the scattering away from their traditional homeland, that the Jewish legends of the
TWO HOUSES (Israel and Judah) and the 10 lost tribes of Israel were first conceived. Even Jewish scholars, who are intimately familiar with the details of the legend, find little real evidence to link the ancient stories with modern historical records. There are odd circumstances and coincidental events, but nothing of real substance that can link scripture, history and the hand of God as a matter of certainty. We are left with only the verifiable interpretations of scripture which focus on Israel, the land of the surviving two tribes, in it's historic and Biblical location on earth. We must work with what we have and what is revealed in scripture, not wishful thinking and the X-Files school of interpretations of ancient non-scriptural legends.
The Stone of Scone may indeed have strange links to the latter days of the prophet Jeremiah, but it does not provide a theological or moral foundation to believe that the islands of the west are some sort of 2nd Kingdom of Israel. It does, however, make a good premise for a Twilight Zone movie or yet another Christian novelization (oh yes, we really need another one of those....).
The Two House theory is just that, a theory. It provides no substance or proof of anything except implausible conjecture and a very definite tool for misleading those who fancy rumor over sound doctrine. Quote all the scripture you want. You will only prove scholarship in chasing a flock of wild geese. It might make a good story line, though. If you want to get with me privately we might collaborate on a short story or two.
The sad truth is that the United States does not and never did enjoy any sort of exceptional status among the family of nations. God used America for His purposes. It is now time to focus on something else in this country. It is time to focus upon faith in Christ Jesus and to beg His mercy upon those of us who are called by His name in this land. He will hear no other prayer for the nation.
and that's just me, hollering from the choir loft...
