In this sermon, the speaker discusses the concept of Jacob's trouble, a time of great tribulation that will affect all nations. The speaker emphasizes that no nation will be exempt from this reality and that God will sift Jacob through the nations and sift the nations through Jacob. The sermon also highlights the importance of showing mercy and compassion to others, as the Lord will judge the nations based on how they treated the least of his brethren. The speaker connects the present state of Israel to the story of Jacob, describing it as a supplanting and usurping of something that was originally possessed by Esau. The sermon concludes with a plea for moral strength and courage to face the coming reality and to be a refuge and source of understanding for the Jewish people.

Good evening, you dear sisters and other of the guests who have come, especially the gray heads, which I now also enjoy. So it's good to be back after almost 20 years. The Lord has inserted this night. So I'm happy for the privilege and sad for the message. Sad because I know that it's difficult. And your dear hearts for Israel will be offended. You're bruised at the hard things that we need yet to consider for that nation's future. So I bring a rare perspective. I believe that it's God's, and it's not often welcomed, and especially rejected in Israel itself. So you can pray for my coming trip to Israel in this month, March 29th. A first visit after five years. Where the last visit was not warmly received. And I have already been informed that this visit will not be warmly received either. Because the title of the last conference, which we had to conduct at our own hotel, saying that no Messianic or other fellowship was willing to receive me, was entitled, The Coming Calamity of Israel. And that calamity is closer now than it was five years ago. It's an inevitable calamity. A time of Jacob's trouble worldwide. Though it has its first eruption in Israel itself. It's not God's final word. His final word is restoration. Even resurrection. But of course that must always be preceded by a death. That's the calamity. We should not be astonished at this. When we consider Israel's destiny. Not merely to establish a successful state and national home. More importantly, to bless all the families of the earth. And bless them how? By a character and nature that the present nation does not yet possess. Seeing that it is still Jacob. And not yet Israel. The nation ought more probably to be called the state of Jacob. For we are still exhibiting the Jacob nature. How shall it be otherwise? Can a leopard change its spots? Or an Ethiopian his color? That transformation must come from God. And it's coming soon. So I want to pray a prayer. Grace to again express this theme. Which we express everywhere the Lord brings us. And everywhere we go we talk about it. Not to somehow frighten God's people who have a heart for Israel. But in fact to prepare them. That they expect such a time of Jacob's tribulation. When no nation will be exempt from seeing this reality. In which God will sift Jacob through the nations. And sift the nations through Jacob. That the Lord himself might judge the nations. Even separating the sheep from the goats one by one. Over one question only. What did you do for the least of these my brethren? Be assured that his brethren will become least. Entirely reduced. Shattered in all of their categories. Walking the road to Calvary. Like the Lord before them. Marred more than any man. Having no beauty that any should desire them. Despised and rejected of men. Except those few that shall take them in. And extend mercy that they may obtain mercy. Or there'll be no survival at all. The redeemed of the Lord shall return to Zion. So they did not leave it in that condition. It's the reason for which present Zion has to be left. As well as Los Angeles and Chicago. And Cape Town and Pretoria. And every place in the nations where Jews have found. Security and affluence. The redeemed of the Lord shall return to Zion. With everlasting joy upon their heads. Not only because of the confidence. That they will not again be rooted up and out. But having suffered the humiliation and the abasement of their God. The chastisement. Even unto death. Mourning and sighing fleeing away. They will then be exalted above all nations. And all nations will come to Jerusalem. To acknowledge Israel's God. It will not add to our arrogance or superiority. Which we have always. Believed or expressed or felt. Above Gentiles, above the nations. But our enduring character will be other than that. Utterly broken and contrite. We will abhor ourselves for all of our sin and iniquity. Acknowledging the sins of our fathers as our own. And that the judgments with which we were judged were altogether just. And that day God says, I will remember my covenant toward you. Jacob will have become Israel. A blessing to all the families of the earth. And the very center and locus of God's theocratic government over the nations. Yes, let's not spiritualize this away. That which the church has done historically. The law shall go forth out of Zion. And the word of the Lord out of Jerusalem. Not the present city. Which shall be reduced to rubble and to dust. But the everlasting and millennial city. Entitled God is our righteousness. That will be built upon the rubble of today's city. As unto the Lord. So Lord, mercy. For these dear ones. They're too sweet. Too tender. To have to consider a scenario of this kind. Give us the moral strength. To bear the reality that is yet to come. You should not astonish us. For anything that pertains to your glory. As Israel's destiny does. Must of course be a resurrection phenomenon. And how can it be that without the death that precedes it. Give us the courage and strength to bear that. And to be to this people what we must. Not only to take them in in the hour of their extremity and distress. But to explain to them. The meaning of their distress. Which we knew was coming. For the scriptures were full. And God had sent us messengers. To rightly interpret them. And to prepare for them a place of refuge. Where they shall be fed. In the wilderness of the nations. Not only naturally but spiritually. That the redeemed of the Lord might return to Zion. Mourning of Zion fleeing away. And everlasting joy upon their heads. In Jesus name we pray. Amen. Shall I go further? Some of you are looking at me quite mean. This is not my message. It's the Lord's. And Klaus and I have been talking as we have been driving from place to place. About Jacob himself. Still descriptive of this present nation. And so much the pattern, the prototype of the things that are yet future. And so we have been looking at the scriptures in Genesis. Picking up the essential thread of the Jacob story. So much the present pattern also. And we'll share that a little bit. And leave time for questions and answers. To try and explain so well as we can. So let's review together from chapter 28. The inception of the conflict with Esau. The threat to Jacob's life. Then and now. Jacob means usurper and supplanter. He desires the right things. But seeks to obtain them by the operation of his wit. A schemer. Willing to employ devices and, what's the word, expediencies. And it would not be an exaggeration to say that the present state of Israel is such a Jacob's state. Really a kind of supplanting and utilitarian state. A kind of usurping of something that already was in Esau's possession. Invoking prophetic scriptures as a kind of justification. But not really believing them. Seeing that the state was essentially the work of men from an atheistic, socialistic, zionistic perspective. Where you have to recognize that the founding of this state was done by men with a socialistic, atheistic background. But why has God allowed it? To simply bring all the friction and tension into motion, which Jacob had to endure with his brother Esau. Because we know that Jacob, when he wanted to return home, the great threat was his outraged brother Esau. A crisis that Jacob was not able to meet by virtue of his wit. With all of his cleverness, he recognized the futility of a dependence upon himself. For Jacob is not a Jewish personality. He's the statement of man everywhere. Self-sufficient man. Wanting to succeed on the basis of his own wit and energy. Ignoring the God of our fathers. We are essentially a Jacob world. The nation is acting out a drama for the consideration of us all. So there's a wonderful glimpse of Jacob en route in flight from his brother Esau in the wilderness. Chapter 28. Where the sun had set on Jacob. Where he took a stone and made that a pillar. He had the dream of the ladder of the Lord with the Lord on top of it. And the Lord identifies himself as the God of Abraham and the God of Isaac. But he does not say the God of Jacob. Because he's not yet Jacob's God. That reality has not been established. It's no one's by virtue of birth or ancestry. Something is required of a radical kind. So this is a first expression of God toward Jacob. Where the Lord repeats the promise that he made to Abraham and to Isaac. That one day Jacob himself will inherit. Verse 16 says, Jacob awaked out of his sleep. Surely the Lord is in this place and I knew it not. He was afraid how dreadful this place. This is the house of God and the gate of heaven. So Jacob vowed a vow in verse 20. This is a Jacob prayer. So revealing of what the man is in himself. Full of personal pronouns. I, I, I, me, me, me. If God will be with me. Will keep me. In the way that I will go. Give me bread and clothing. So I come again to my place. Then shall the Lord be my God. That's Jacob religion. That's commercial transaction. Not unknown in the history of Christianity in Germany. And the Judaism that was birthed in Germany. That was a kind of commercial transaction. A small acknowledgement of God. So long as we can continue in the way that we want to go. A Saturday or a Sunday religion. Whose real center is one's own self. The way that I want to go. And if God will comply with our terms. We will even be magnanimous enough to give him a tenth. This is the religion of convenience. Whether it's called Judaism or Christianity. And we are both guilty for it. And our idolatry is the worst. Because we have employed the name of God in it. Every religion is an idolatry that has man at its center. And it's practiced the world over. But for us Jews. With our history with God. With our privilege in God. With the deliverance out of slavery and through the wilderness. The giving of the law. The prophets. For us the penalty is double for our sins. For we are to be a witness to all nations. Of God as God. And not a deity of our own making. That serves our convenience. Where we can really give our energy and passion to the things that really count. Business, commerce, culture. So Germany has spurned this bourgeois religion. And until you repent of that. For it still continues. So we know that many years were spent after that. With no further consideration. With God. Until the appointed time for the return has come. God has his times. A set time. And he's about to perform it again. Jacob was afraid. He sent his messengers before him to appease his burden. His brother Esau. With the gifts that he would give him. Something like Israel's present activity. To appease its Palestinian and Arab neighbors. Even with whole pieces of the land itself. That's how far a Jacob is required to go. When he seeks to find an answer to his own dilemma and distress. Independent of God. But this present Esau is not to be placated. No amount of territory will satisfy him. This is ultimate enemy. Beyond Israel's ability to placate. Satisfied with one thing only. Israel's extermination. For the very presence of a Jewish state in that region. Is standing insult to the Islamic Allah. This is not mere circumstance. It's the very logic of history itself. Ironically issuing out of our own sin. Who created Islam after all? For the monotheistic heresy that it is. That inscribes on the mosque, on the temple mount. God has no son. Mohammed was impressed and inspired by Israel's apostate example. Of a nation that in rejecting Christ, rejected the revelation of God in his triune fullness. Because there is no greater revelation of this triune God than on the cross itself. The son who gives himself without spot as sacrifice to the father by the eternal spirit. The son who gives himself without spot on the cross to the father. This is a costly revelation from God. To reject it. Cannot be without consequence. And so our sins bring our own judgment. We celebrated Germany as the ultimate civilization. As even being the messianic answer. Because we loved Kant and Hegel and Schopenhauer. And all of the German genius of civilization. Goethe. We were more endeared to your culture than yourself. And we so admired it that it had become a messianic substitute. This was humane civilization. The exaltation of man. Philosophical and moral and cultured. What is the ironic judgment that issues from that? To be brought to death by that same nation. Not just systematically. But bestially. Worse than animals. Far from the refinement of a Kantan culture and morality. Men devoid of what is human. This is God's ironic judgment. Which we brought upon ourselves. By worshipping a false god. And so also Islam today. It's a heresy. A monotheistic heresy. That we ourselves have inspired. Who still insist on a monotheistic view. As if by it we are doing God's service. That He may have winked in times past. But after the profound revelation of the fullness of the Godhead. Through the Son and the Spirit and the Father. To insist on the narrow monotheism now. And to be proud of that. Will invite its own judgment. And Islam is that judgment. That cannot be placated. Cannot be appeased. And Israel will yet taste its fury. So there's something in the pattern of Jacob sending over all that he had. His wives, his children, his animals, his possessions. That's how I came to God. When I was stripped. And put up into the world and into the nations. As a disillusioned ex-Marxist. With his ideologies and philosophies. My gods who had failed. And thrust out into the world. Just looking for philosophical answers. And only by the mercy of God. And the prayers of one of my own former students. And her mother. Was I pursued by the hound of heaven unto salvation. Oh the depth of Jewish intransigence. Self assurance. Idolatry. For a God who is waiting to encounter us. Whom we have been safely avoiding. That our lifestyle not suffer. And his moment comes when we send all that we have over. Not just our possessions. But our confidences. Our substitutes for God. Even called Judaism itself. Which is more an ethical humanism. Than it is a faith predicated on the knowledge of God. And when that night comes. Where we cannot save ourselves. The same man that wrestled with Jacob of old. Waits to wrestle with us. May we have the same instinctive wisdom of Jacob. That we will not let him go. Except that he bless us. When we wrestle with that man through the night. Which night is coming for Jacob all over the world. And may we receive the blessing. That changes Jacob to Israel. Strange blessing that it is. I will not let you go except you bless me. So he touched him in the socket of his thigh. With the cowboys where they are six shooting arrows. There where the cowboys wear their colt. And where the belt is placed by our macho manhood. God knows where to touch. He broke the power of the Jacob life. This self-sufficiency. That was able to acknowledge the God of their fathers. But not yet his God. And when the sun rose on Jacob he limped. And everyone who has been touched by God limps still. People have said to me on this trip. Are you tired? I am always tired. I am always weak. And always dependent. I have no inspiration. I do not know how to speak this time. I can only rely on God. For words, inspiration, anointing. And it is more than a successful meeting that is at stake. Certainly not the issue of a man's reputation. It is the issue of Jewish survival. It is communicating a view of coming reality. That is unthinkable. And offensive to us. That God would a second time bring such a holocaust. And you have only one occasion to hear it. There are not many speaking it. Rather other more pleasing messages. Peace, peace. Healing the wounds of his daughter lightly. For nothing has changed. In the false prophets and the true. The one is always giving assurance. Yes, Israel is going through difficulty. And it will become worse. But they will recover. Why do you take a more severe view, brother? Because I see this hope of Israel's improvement as humanistic. As if it is an inevitable progress. Oh, you dear saints. If you are any student of the present state of Israel. You know that a point has already been reached. Of which there is no return. The moral character of the nation. The necessary employment of violence. The corruption in the highest levels of leadership. The conflict within themselves that is religious and political. The employment of torture in suspected captive terrorists. Once you have employed those things. Those expediencies. That survival presses upon you. If you will not turn to your God as your protection. And seek by your own wit and ability to save yourself from the distress. Then you will be required to employ devices and acts and procedures. Contrary to every hope for the state of Israel. A disappointment to ourselves. But the very necessary revelation from God. We will have occasion to see the Israel that we have sought ourselves to establish to our Jacob strength. That has exacerbated the Esau in our midst. And made him an implacable enemy. That cannot be appeased. And requires of us acts that contradict any moral meaning for the state. So that then our actions, finally every moral expectation of this state. Can be easily removed. And will result in an inevitable disaster. Not only a defeat but a humiliation. You can read it yourself in Isaiah and in other places. Where we have to drink the cup of God's wrath. But we will not always have to drink it. He will take this cup of wrath from us. And give it to them who have so ruthlessly exploited and harmed us. Who were not satisfied merely to defeat us. But in that Islamic and Arab temperament. Requiring vengeance. That is without mercy. Lie down and we will walk over you. And we will see that. Actually fulfilled. In the humiliation and expulsion of the nation. And again into the nations. So that the word of God in Jeremiah can be fulfilled. You will no longer speak of me as the God who brought you out of Egypt. What do you mean? That's our distinctive historic experience. It's by that that our nationhood was birthed. True. But there's a greater event coming. And this will be your millennial and eternal memory. Not the God who brought you out of Egypt. But the God who has brought you back from every nation wherein I have scattered you. And so we will know our God. Not academically nor rabbinically. But actually. As the God of judgment and the God of mercy. The God who chastises sons and comforts them. Whom we will meet face to face. In the wilderness of the nations. And there we will come into the bond of his covenant. And under the rod of his authority. For Ezekiel tells us in chapter 20. With a fury poured out. Mentioned twice in two verses. With a fury poured out. I will rule over you. And bring you into the wilderness of the nations. And there I will meet with you. Face to face. And there you will come into the bond of my covenant. That the redeemed of the Lord might return to Zion. That he didn't leave it in that condition. What kind of face will they find in the wilderness? What kind of face? Religious obligation? I guess I have to. Though these people are a threat. And to be identified with them now. Where they are hated all the world over. Imperils my own life. And what if it should be at a time of the Antichrist? Where his hatred of the Jew permeates the nations. And at a time when we cannot buy nor sell without his mark. We'll have to receive them not in our prosperity but in our poverty. They threaten even the store that would be required for our own survival. Who would welcome them under those circumstances? What a strange people. Who love not their life unto death. And count it a privilege. To be to Israel what they must. Expressing the unconditional love of God. A love that cannot be offended. Or disappointed. Even by Jews who will not be grateful. For you will not require their gratitude. And you'll not be offended by their conduct. So reduced will they be as the least of these his brethren. That you might have opportunity to fulfill the words of Paul. That by your mercy they may obtain mercy. The issue of Israel's survival and restoration is not Israel. It's the church. But a church of an ultimate kind. That is not inconvenienced by their coming. But counts it all privilege. So much beyond religious obligation. That it shows to them the face of their own God. Where it is nowhere more powerful than when it comes through a Gentile. That's how I got saved. Moving through the nations 37 years ago. And where I found the light of God in the face of Gentiles. Which is the glory of the people of Israel. A glory I didn't know existed. Until I saw the light expressed. Through a Gentile face. And of all Gentile faces. Nowhere more powerful. Than in Polish faces. In Latvian and Lithuanian faces. And German faces. And every place where Jews have suffered persecution. Where they have most reason to fear. There they will be most astonished. So I spoke this morning. At an evangelistic outreach in Magdeburg. In a small shopping center. And as I was waiting to be called on. I could not contain myself. At the faces that I was observing. I have never seen such darkness. Such expressions. So grim. Is there anything more fearful and more ugly. Than an unregenerate German. With their spiked hair or their shaved heads. Their earrings. Or having lived a life without God. Mean. Capable of cruelty. I was frightened by those faces. And I told them that. Your faces have terrified me. For nothing has changed. You're as capable now as you were then. Your cruelty is just under the surface of your heart. And your face condemns you. Your face testifies against you. You can't live a life that you have lived without showing it. Bereft of God. There's no light in your face. There's no grace. There's no kindness. Only a narrow, selfish, physical preservation of your bodily life. That's what we Jews will expect to see. But that people will not be taking us in. They will be pursuing us. But you will take us. And we will see in your face. What Jacob saw wrestling with the man. And changed all his seeing. Even if he saw himself. When I see your face now. It's as if I see the face of God. Jacob is no more Jacob. This shall be your name. Israel. And Jacob built an altar. In the last verse of chapter 33. His first altar. His first sacrifice. His first acknowledgement of God who is God. And he limped there. And he called that altar El Elohe Israel. El God Israel. The God of Israel. That's the one who will bless all the families of the earth. That word must be fulfilled. God made that promise to Abraham. And reiterated it with the patriarchs. If we do not fulfill that. If we do not become a nation of priests. And a light unto the world. How then is God God? How is his word his word? How is his promise his promise? The issue of Israel's restoration is the issue of God. For his glory forever Paul says. But that restoration is the issue of the church. Who exhibits to Jacob the face of his own God. That's why Paul says oh the depth of the riches. Both of the wisdom and of the riches. Of the knowledge of God. Who shall be his counselor. Who shall give to him and it shall be given again. For of him and through him and to him are all things. To whom be glory forever. There is an issue greater than the establishment of a nation state. It's the God of glory forever. And we are privileged to have part in that. And to conclude the age. And bring the Lord. Their David. Who's sanctuary and dwelling will be their Jerusalem. And his throne their Zion. That the law of the Lord shall go forth to all nations. Who will study war no more. So Lord bless this speaking. Give us an understanding. Of the breadth of this mystery. And our privilege part in it. The church among the nations.