Does God Have A Plan For The USA? Part 2

One God - Three Religions - Israel 

I have never done this before, a series in a series.  So we are going to look at the potential plan that God has for the United States.  In the first post, I mentioned One God and Three Religions.  Since we will be talking about God's plan, we might run into more situations like this and we can run in a focused direction for a mini-series.

I have stated I am a Christian and I am a practicing Catholic.  I think this does give me a good handle on the Old Testament and the New Testament of the Bible and thus we do feel connected to the Israel nation and it's history.  After all, Jesus is a descendant of the Israel nation.

I am not familiar with Islam so this journey and understanding will be interesting for me and I hope all of us.  Along the way I do hope to learn why I have always felt the United States is a player in God's plan.

I do not think God would have put all this in play without knowing the outcome - he made a covenant with Abraham, with Ismael, and with us Christians.  The end game is what we want to understand.  Looking through God's eyes might help provide an answer.

Let's go back just to review the start of Judaism.

Judaism

 The call of Abram; as he was originally known, happens in Genesis 12:1-4.

1 Now Jehovah said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto the land that I will show thee:
2 and I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee, and make they name great; and be thou a blessing;
3 and I will bless them that bless thee, and him that curseth thee will I curse: and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed.
4 So Abram went, as Jehovah had spoken unto him; and Lot went with him: and Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran.

So God called Abram and made a covenant with him - looks like there is a promise of land and a great nation.

In 1948 the world established the current Israel.  This story will be a post all by itself as this event is such a significant event historically and what I think is part of God's plan.  I will look at the events that occurred during this formation and also what it might mean in God's overall plan.

As we start some of these time lines we have dates with labels, BCE, CE, BC, and AD.  

Anno Domini (AD or A.D.) and Before Christ (BC or B.C.) are designations used to label or number years used with the Julian and Gregorian calendars. The term Anno Domini is Medieval Latin, translated as In the year of the Lord, and as in the year of Our Lord.:782 It is sometimes specified more fully as Anno Domini Nostri Iesu (Jesu) Christi ("In the Year of Our Lord Jesus Christ"). This calendar era is based on the traditionally reckoned year of the conception or birth of Jesus of Nazareth, with AD counting years from the start of this epoch, and BC denoting years before the start of the era. There is no year zero in this scheme, so the year AD 1 immediately follows the year 1 BC. This dating system was devised in 525, but was not widely used until after 800.

Common Era (also Current Era or Christian Era), abbreviated as CE, is an alternative naming of the traditional calendar era, Anno Domini (abbreviated AD).  BCE is the abbreviation for Before the Common/Current/Christian Era (an alternative to Before Christ, abbreviated BC). The CE/BCE designation uses the year-numbering system introduced by the 6th-century Christian monk Dionysius Exiguus, who started the Anno Domini designation, intending the beginning of the life of Jesus to be the reference date.  Neither notation includes a year zero, and the two notations (CE/BCE and AD/BC) are numerically equivalent; thus "2013 CE" corresponds to "AD 2013", and "399 BCE" corresponds to "399 BC".

From Abraham to Moses - Jordan Promised Land

The deal with Abraham and the Israelites appears to involve land that is promised or a place where the Israel Nation can go and freely worship God as he desires and as they desire.  However, there are times that God appears to be asleep and he is not with the Israel Nation.  This could be perceived as retribution and sometimes it might be.  There are other times that while appearing to be away from the Israel nation - he is  actually building a place for them.

Abraham is considered to start in 1812 BCE.   There are many stories that occur throughout Abraham's life.  He lived in and among the Philistines and had a son Issac.  Issac has twins, Jacob and Esau.  It was Isaac's dream to make Esau the inheritor of the Covenant with God.  But through some trickery, Jacob stole the blessing from Esau.  Jacob was considered the faithful and Esau was considered the strong warrior. 

Jacob then had two wives and 12 sons.  The 11th son, Joseph, is considered to be the first son of his favorite wife.  A long story - trust me, it is the truth according to the bible.  Jacob later changed his name to Israel - the first time we see God and Israel now closely linked and Jacob started the Jewish Nation.

Esau, who embodies the power of might and sword, will, through his descendants, give rise to the Roman Empire or "Edom" as the Bible calls it. The power of Rome clearly lays in its ability to conquer, dominate, and build an Empire.

So far Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob have all been loyal to God and yet they were moved around and forced to leave their land by the Philistines.

But the next major event that lead to the movement of the Israel nation to the promised land was 10 of Joseph's brothers sold him into slavery and he made it to Egypt.  In Egypt, Joseph interprets some dreams and becomes the second in command in Egypt.  There is a drought and Jacob and his family are driven to Egypt.  

This might be one of those times God seeing the future placed Joseph in harms way but saved him in Egypt so he could save the roots of Israel.

The family of 70 individuals that arrived in Egypt at the time of Joseph has grown to a nation of about 3 million people.

The supernatural, rapid increase in the Jewish population made the Egyptians nervous -- "there are too many of them, what if they rise up against us" -- and Pharaoh issues a genocidal decree: Kill all the Jewish boys. (This is a classic anti-Semitic pattern -- the Jew the in Diaspora is always loyal to his host country, yet can never escape unfounded suspicion of treachery.)

Most of us are very familiar with the Movie Ten Commandments.  We know that Moses was a son of an Israelite but grew up as the grandson of the Pharaoh, murdered an Egyptian and was banded from Egypt.  He cam back under God's direction to lead His people to freedom and the  Promised Land - across the Jordan.

Let's roll through history quickly for this post.

1312 BCE is the time of Exodus so it has been nearly 500 years from the time of Abraham and the Exodus.  So what transpires over the next 3,000 years can be rolled forward to the establishment of Israel in 1948.  We are all aware of some of the tragedies the Jewish nation has endured, maybe the most horrific was the genocide attempt by Hitler.  

To get there, lets take a look at some of the major events in the Jewish nation.

1272    BCE Conquest of Promised Land

879      BCE Saul anointed king

877      BCE Time of King David begins

796      BCE Israel split into two kingdoms

422      BCE Babylonians conquer Israel and destroy Temple

347      BCE Time of the Great Assembly begins

312      BCE Greeks conquer Israel

167      BCE Revolt off Maccabees begins

37        BCE Herod the Great begins his rule

67        CE The Great Revolt of Jews against Rome begins

70        CE Jerusalem conquered by the Romans

312      CE Constantine converts Roman Empire to Christianity

638      CE Islamic Conquest of Jerusalem

1263    The Great Disputation

1478    The Inquisitions Begins

1492    Jews expelled from Spain; Columbus discovers America

1517    Protestant Reformation

1567    Jews invited into Poland

1654    First Jews arrive in America

1791    Emancipation of the Jews begins in Europe

1810    Reform Movement begins in Germany

1882    First Aliyah to Israel

1897    First Zionist Congress’s

1917    British Mandate begins in Palestine

1927    Country of Jordan created by the British on the East Bank of the Jordan

1933    Hitler comes to power in Germany

1947    Partition off Palestine by the UN

1948    State of Israel Declared

As I mentioned, the story of the formation of Israel in 1948 is a significant story and shows the United States ( now a super power) siding in the UN to form Israel while all Arab nations opposed the formation.

After many years, the Jewish people have a secure country to worship their God as he promised AND as they have always desired.  

Maybe the United States was / is a player in that freedom.

God thank you for staying with the Jewish people throughout all history as you promised.  There have been many years of good and bad.  I pray their current troubles will end in the good and for the United States to stand by their side through these troubled times.

Bob,