THE LAND PROMISE OF ISRAEL FORFEITED

READING: Deut 28:11-26

11 And the LORD shall make thee plenteous in goods, in the fruit of thy body, and in the fruit of thy cattle, and
in the fruit of thy ground, in the land which the LORD sware unto thy fathers to give thee.
12 The LORD shall open unto thee his good treasure, the heaven to give the rain unto thy land in his season,
and to bless all the work of thine hand: and thou shalt lend unto many nations, and thou shalt not borrow.
13 And the LORD shall make thee the head, and not the tail; and thou shalt be above only, and thou shalt not be
beneath; if that thou hearken unto the commandments of the LORD thy God, which I command thee this
day, to observe and to do them:
14 And thou shalt not go aside from any of the words which I command thee this day, to the right hand, or to
the left, to go after other gods to serve them.
15 But it shall come to pass, if thou wilt not hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God, to observe to do
all his commandments and his statutes which I command thee this day; that all these curses shall come
upon thee, and overtake thee:
16 Cursed shalt thou be in the city, and cursed shalt thou be in the field.
17 Cursed shall be thy basket and thy store.
18 Cursed shall be the fruit of thy body, and the fruit of thy land, the increase of thy kine, and the flocks of thy
sheep.
19 Cursed shalt thou be when thou comest in, and cursed shalt thou be when thou goest out.
20 The LORD shall send upon thee cursing, vexation, and rebuke, in all that thou settest thine hand unto for to
do, until thou be destroyed, and until thou perish quickly; because of the wickedness of thy doings, whereby
thou hast forsaken me.
21 The LORD shall make the pestilence cleave unto thee, until he have consumed thee from off the land,
whither thou goest to possess it.
22 The LORD shall smite thee with a consumption, and with a fever, and with an inflammation, and with an
extreme burning, and with the sword, and with blasting, and with mildew; and they shall pursue thee until thou
perish.
23 And thy heaven that is over thy head shall be brass, and the earth that is under thee shall be iron.
24 The LORD shall make the rain of thy land powder and dust: from heaven shall it come down upon thee, until
thou be destroyed.
25 The LORD shall cause thee to be smitten before thine enemies: thou shalt go out one way against them, and
flee seven ways before them: and shalt be removed into all the kingdoms of the earth.
26 And thy carcase shall be meat unto all fowls of the air, and unto the beasts of the earth, and no man shall fray
them away.

I. GOD’S PROMISE:
A. God made to Abraham a multi-part promise, repeated to Isaac.
1. Gen 26:1-5 And there was a famine in the land, beside the first famine that was in the days of
Abraham. And Isaac went unto Abimelech king of the Philistines unto Gerar. And the LORD appeared
unto him, and said, Go not down into Egypt; dwell in the land which I shall tell thee of: Sojourn in this
land, and I will be with thee, and will bless thee; for unto thee, and unto thy seed, I will give all these
countries, and I will perform the oath which I sware unto Abraham thy father; And I will make thy seed
to multiply as the stars of heaven, and will give unto thy seed all these countries; and in thy seed
shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; Because that Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my
charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws.

B. COMMENTS BY HUGO MCCORD: Some 2000 years before Jesus was born, God promised
Abraham that he would give to him and to his descendants all of "the land of Canaan" (now called Palestine)
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"forever" [`olam] (Genesis 13:12, 15) for "an everlasting possession" (Genesis 17:8). The word `olam, derived
from `alam, to hide, conceal (Davidson, 601), means a time hidden, indefinite or unlimited. The duration of
`olam time is therefore hidden and indefinite. The context in which it is used tells how long a time is being
considered. The land promise of Palestine to Abraham and his descendants, fulfilled in stages, thus came
to an abrupt termination in 70 A.D. when the Lord allowed the Romans to destroy the Temple at
Jerusalem. That long context of `olam in Genesis 13:15; 17:8, stretching from Abraham's day (c. 1921 B.C.)
until the Jews lost all of their "holy land" (Zechariah 2:12), leads to the translation of God's words to Abraham:
"I will give it to you and to your descendants on and on." In reference to God personally, the context of `olam
is not to an "indefinite" span of years, for God is "eternal" (1 Timothy 1:17; 6:16). Hugo McCord in THE
GOSPEL GAZETTE.

II. THE LAND PROMISE WAS CONDITIONAL.

A. If …
1. Deut 28:1-2 And it shall come to pass, if thou shalt hearken diligently unto the voice of the LORD
thy God, to observe and to do all his commandments which I command thee this day, that the LORD thy
God will set thee on high above all nations of the earth: And all these blessings shall come on thee, and
overtake thee, if thou shalt hearken unto the voice of the LORD thy God.

B. Dire prophecies were sent from God to reveal the future of unfaithfulness.
1. Deut 28:49-53 The LORD shall bring a nation against thee from far, from the end of the earth, as
swift as the eagle flieth; a nation whose tongue thou shalt not understand; A nation of fierce
countenance, which shall not regard the person of the old, nor shew favour to the young: And he shall
eat the fruit of thy cattle, and the fruit of thy land, until thou be destroyed: which also shall not leave
thee either corn, wine, or oil, or the increase of thy kine, or flocks of thy sheep, until he have destroyed
thee. And he shall besiege thee in all thy gates, until thy high and fenced walls come down, wherein
thou trustedst, throughout all thy land: and he shall besiege thee in all thy gates throughout all thy land,
which the LORD thy God hath given thee. And thou shalt eat the fruit of thine own body, the flesh
of thy sons and of thy daughters, which the LORD thy God hath given thee, in the siege, and in the
straitness, wherewith thine enemies shall distress thee:

III. THE LAND PROMISE WAS FULFILLED.

A. Specifically as promised.
1. Josh 21:43-45 And the LORD gave unto Israel all the land which he sware to give unto their
fathers; and they possessed it, and dwelt therein. And the LORD gave them rest round about,
according to all that he sware unto their fathers: and there stood not a man of all their enemies before
them; the LORD delivered all their enemies into their hand. There failed not ought of any good thing
which the LORD had spoken unto the house of Israel; all came to pass.

IV. THE JEWS BECAME UNFAITHFUL.

A. They were punished specifically as prophesied
1. 2 Kings 6:24-29 And it came to pass after this, that Ben-hadad king of Syria gathered all his host,
and went up, and besieged Samaria. And there was a great famine in Samaria: and, behold, they
besieged it, until an ass's head was sold for fourscore pieces of silver, and the fourth part of a cab of
dove's dung for five pieces of silver. And as the king of Israel was passing by upon the wall, there cried
a woman unto him, saying, Help, my lord, O king. And he said, If the LORD do not help thee, whence
shall I help thee? out of the barnfloor, or out of the winepress? And the king said unto her, What aileth
thee? And she answered, This woman said unto me, Give thy son, that we may eat him to day, and
we will eat my son to morrow. So we boiled my son, and did eat him: and I said unto her on the
next day, Give thy son, that we may eat him: and she hath hid her son.
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 2. 2 Kings 20:16-18 And Isaiah said unto Hezekiah, Hear the word of the LORD. Behold, the days
come, that all that is in thine house, and that which thy fathers have laid up in store unto this day, shall
be carried into Babylon: nothing shall be left, saith the LORD. And of thy sons that shall issue from
thee, which thou shalt beget, shall they take away; and they shall be eunuchs in the palace of the
king of Babylon.

3. Dan 1:1-3 In the third year of the reign of Jehoiakim king of Judah came Nebuchadnezzar king of
Babylon unto Jerusalem, and besieged it. And the Lord gave Jehoiakim king of Judah into his hand,
with part of the vessels of the house of God: which he carried into the land of Shinar to the house of his
god; and he brought the vessels into the treasure house of his god. And the king spake unto Ashpenaz
the master of his eunuchs, that he should bring certain of the children of Israel, and of the king's
seed, and of the princes;

V. SEVENTY YEARS LATER, MANY OF THEM RETURNED TO POSSESS THE LAND.

1. Ezra 2:1-2, 64 Now these are the children of the province that went up out of the captivity, of those
which had been carried away, whom Nebuchadnezzar the king of Babylon had carried away unto
Babylon, and came again unto Jerusalem and Judah, every one unto his city; Which came with
Zerubbabel: Jeshua, Nehemiah, Seraiah, Reelaiah, Mordecai, Bilshan, Mispar, Bigvai, Rehum, Baanah.
The number of the men of the people of Israel: The whole congregation together was forty and two
thousand three hundred and threescore,

VI. THEY, TOO, BECAME UNFAITHFUL.

A. The last words from God to His unfaithful people – circa 430 BC.
1. Mal 4:1-3 For, behold, the day cometh, that shall burn as an oven; and all the proud, yea, and
all that do wickedly, shall be stubble: and the day that cometh shall burn them up, saith the
LORD of hosts, that it shall leave them neither root nor branch. But unto you that fear my name
shall the Sun of righteousness arise with healing in his wings; and ye shall go forth, and grow up as
calves of the stall. And ye shall tread down the wicked; for they shall be ashes under the soles of your
feet in the day that I shall do this, saith the LORD of hosts.

B. The Jews reject Jesus and kill him.

1. Acts 2:22-23 Ye men of Israel, hear these words; Jesus of Nazareth, a man approved of God among
you by miracles and wonders and signs, which God did by him in the midst of you, as ye yourselves also
know: Him, being delivered by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have taken, and
by wicked hands have crucified and slain:

VII. JUDEA ATTACKED AND JERUSALEM BESIEGED AND DESTROYED. (AD 69-70)
A. Prophesied.
1. Jer 19:6-11
6 Therefore, behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that this place shall no more be called Tophet, nor
The valley of the son of Hinnom, but The valley of slaughter.
TOPHET [TOE fet] (meaning unknown) - a place southeast of Jerusalem, in the Valley of
Hinnom, where child sacrifices were offered and the dead bodies were buried or consumed (Isa 30:33;
Jer 7:31-32; 19:6,11-14; Topheth, 2 Kings 23:10). Chemosh, a Moabite god (1 Kings 11:7,33; 2 Kings
23:13) and Molech, an Ammonite god (1 Kings 11:7; 2 Kings 23:10) were worshiped at Tophet through a
practice despised by God-infant sacrifice (2 Kings 16:3; Jer 7:31; 19:5; 32:35). (from Nelson's
Illustrated Bible Dictionary, Copyright © 1986, Thomas Nelson Publishers)

7 And I will make void the counsel of Judah and Jerusalem in this place; and I will cause them to fall by the
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sword before their enemies, and by the hands of them that seek their lives: and their carcases will I give to be
meat for the fowls of the heaven, and for the beasts of the earth.
8 And I will make this city desolate, and an hissing; every one that passeth thereby shall be astonished and hiss
because of all the plagues thereof.
9 And I will cause them to eat the flesh of their sons and the flesh of their daughters, and they shall eat
every one the flesh of his friend in the siege and straitness, wherewith their enemies, and they that seek
their lives, shall straiten them.
10 Then shalt thou break the bottle in the sight of the men that go with thee,
11 And shalt say unto them, Thus saith the LORD of hosts; Even so will I break this people and this city, as
one breaketh a potter's vessel, that cannot be made whole again: and they shall bury them in Tophet, till
there be no place to bury.

B. History records:
1. “… they drank the blood of the populace to one another, and divided the dead bodies of the poor
creatures between them; … Now the seditious at first gave orders that the dead should be buried out of the
public treasury, as not enduring the stench of their dead bodies. But afterwards, when they could not do that,
they had them cast down from the walls into the valleys beneath.”

C. The Jews had condemned themselves.

1. Matt 21:33-46 Hear another parable: There was a certain householder, which planted a vineyard, and
hedged it round about, and digged a winepress in it, and built a tower, and let it out to husbandmen, and
went into a far country: And when the time of the fruit drew near, he sent his servants to the
husbandmen, that they might receive the fruits of it. And the husbandmen took his servants, and beat
one, and killed another, and stoned another. Again, he sent other servants more than the first: and they
did unto them likewise. But last of all he sent unto them his son, saying, They will reverence my
son. But when the husbandmen saw the son, they said among themselves, This is the heir; come,
let us kill him, and let us seize on his inheritance. And they caught him, and cast him out of the
vineyard, and slew him. When the lord therefore of the vineyard cometh, what will he do unto those
husbandmen? They say unto him, He will miserably destroy those wicked men, and will let out his
vineyard unto other husbandmen, which shall render him the fruits in their seasons. Jesus saith
unto them, Did ye never read in the scriptures, The stone which the builders rejected, the same is
become the head of the corner: this is the Lord's doing, and it is marvellous in our eyes? Therefore say
I unto you, The kingdom of God shall be taken from you, and given to a nation bringing forth the
fruits thereof. And whosoever shall fall on this stone shall be broken: but on whomsoever it shall fall,
it will grind him to powder. And when the chief priests and Pharisees had heard his parables, they
perceived that he spake of them. But when they sought to lay hands on him, they feared the multitude,
because they took him for a prophet.

D. History.
1. “THUS did the miseries of Jerusalem grow worse and worse every day … And indeed the multitude
of carcasses that lay in heaps one upon another was a horrible sight, and produced a pestilential stench … And
truly the very view itself of the country was a melancholy thing; for those places which were before adorned
with trees and pleasant gardens were now become a desolate country every way, and its trees were all cut down:
nor could any foreigner that had formerly seen Judea and the most beautiful suburbs of the city, and now saw it
as a desert, but lament and mourn sadly at so great a change: for the war had laid all the signs of beauty quite
waste: …” (from Josephus: Wars of the Jews, PC Study Bible formatted electronic database Copyright © 2003
by Biblesoft, Inc. All rights reserved.)
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 E. Prophecy.
1. Acts 3:22-26 For Moses truly said unto the fathers, A prophet shall the Lord your God raise up unto
you of your brethren, like unto me; him shall ye hear in all things whatsoever he shall say unto you.
And it shall come to pass, that every soul, which will not hear that prophet, shall be destroyed
from among the people. Yea, and all the prophets from Samuel and those that follow after, as many as
have spoken, have likewise foretold of these days. Ye are the children of the prophets, and of the
covenant which God made with our fathers, saying unto Abraham, And in thy seed shall all the kindreds
of the earth be blessed. Unto you first God, having raised up his Son Jesus, sent him to bless you, in
turning away every one of you from his iniquities.

F. History.
1. “Now the number of those that were carried captive during this whole war was collected to be
ninety-seven thousand; as was the number of those that perished during the whole siege eleven hundred
thousand, the greater part of whom were indeed of the same nation [with the citizens of Jerusalem]…” (from
Josephus: Wars of the Jews, PC Study Bible formatted electronic database Copyright © 2003 by Biblesoft, Inc.
All rights reserved.) These and those who survived and did not obey were all destroyed spiritually. (cy)

G. Prophecy.
1. Matt 24:1-2 And Jesus went out, and departed from the temple : and his disciples came to him for to
shew him the buildings of the temple. And Jesus said unto them, See ye not all these things? verily I say
unto you, There shall not be left here one stone upon another, that shall not be thrown down.

H. History.
1. “NOW as soon as the army had no more people to slay or to plunder, because there remained none to
be the objects of their fury, (for they would not have spared any, had there remained any other work to be done,)
Caesar gave orders that they should now demolish the entire city and temple, but should leave as many of the
towers standing as were of the greatest eminency; that is, Phasaelus, and Hippicus, and Mariamne; and so much
of the wall as enclosed the city on the west side. This wall was spared, in order to afford a camp for such as
were to lie in garrison, as were the towers also spared, in order to demonstrate to posterity what kind of city it
was, and how well fortified, which the Roman valor had subdued; but for all the rest of the wall, it was so
thoroughly laid even with the ground by those that dug it up to the foundation, that there was left
nothing to make those that came thither believe it had ever been inhabited. This was the end which
Jerusalem came to by the madness of those that were for innovations; a city otherwise of great
magnificence, and of mighty fame among all mankind.” (Josephus)

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