PT-1 “Introduction to “Jesus’ Birth in Bethlehem” (Luke 2:1-7)

 

EVENING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/28/2026 7:58 PM

My Worship Time                              Focus:  PT-1 “Introduction to “Jesus’ Birth in Bethlehem”

Bible Reading & Meditation                                                                     Reference:  Luke 2:1-7

            Message of the verses: “1 Now in those days a decree went out from Caesar Augustus, that a census be taken of all the inhabited earth. ² This was the first census taken while Quirinius was governor of Syria. ³ And all the people were on their way to register for the census, each to his own city. ⁴ Now Joseph also went up from Galilee, from the city of Nazareth, to Judea, to the city of David which is called Bethlehem, because he was of the house and family of David, ⁵ in order to register along with Mary, who was betrothed to him, and was pregnant. ⁶ While they were there, the time came for her to give birth. ⁷ And she gave birth to her firstborn son; and she wrapped Him in cloths, and laid Him in a manger, because there was no ^[g]room for them in the inn.” (NASB 2:1-7)

            In this evening’s SD I will quote the introduction to these verses as seen in John MacArthur’s commentary.  Just a note it was the 9^th of February that I began my study on the gospel of Luke.

            “Luke’s simple, straightforward, unembellished language describes the most profound birth, with the most far-reaching implications, in the history of the world.  On a night like any other night, in an obscure village in Israel, unnoticed by the world, a child was born.  But while His birth was like that of every other child, the child was unlike any other child ever born, either before or since.  For this child was the Son of God, the Lord Jesus Christ, deity in human flesh, Israel’s long-awaited Messiah, the Savior of the world.  In His birth God entered human society as an infant; the creator of the universe became a man; the eternal “Word became flesh, and dwelt among us” (John 1:14).

            This chapter, which provides the most detailed look at the events of the first Christmas, is perhaps the most widely known chapter in the Bible.  Its familiar story has inspired music, cards, books, and pageants over the centuries.  But the world celebrates the birth of Jesus Christ of all the wrong reasons.  Christmas has become an excuse for self-indulgence, materialism, and partying; it has degenerated into a secularized social event that misses entirely its true meaning.”

            Now let me give my two cents worth here.  No one actually knows exactly what was the date that Jesus Christ was born.  We know where He was born, and I will give an account of this event later after I finish what I have to say here.  Now in the last SD’s that I finished this morning we learned some things about the catholic “religion” and you can refer to that by looking at the last couple of SD’s.  I have mentioned that I have a great deal of trouble with the holidays of Christmas and Easter in past’s SE’s, and I think with good reason as Easter to me is a heathen holiday, along with the Easter eggs that are apart of it, and the way that they are seen in the Old Testament was a part of heathen practices.  Now I will attempt to find what I have copy and pasted about where Jesus was actually born.

12/25/2020 10:41 AM  As I was having a little trouble sleeping last night I was thinking about this SD that I was going to put onto my blog and also my FB story.  What I was thinking about was as one reads the story in the Bible about the birth of Jesus, perhaps they think that because of the reason that Joseph and Mary came to Bethlehem that all of the inns were filled and so they had to find a farmer who had a barn and that is where Jesus was born.  I truly believe that the place where Jesus was born was certainly in the plan of God; for God was in control of all that His Son would be doing while on planet earth.  Why would not the Messiah who is later called “our Passover” and also we read the following in two places in the gospel of John “Joh 1:29 The next day he saw Jesus coming to him and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!  Joh 1:36 and he looked at Jesus as He walked, and said, "Behold, the Lamb of God!"  It was no accident of Jesus being born in Bethlehem as the OT says he would be born there and so why would not the “Lamb of God” who is our “Passover” be born in the cave where the Passover Lambs were born?  12/25/2020 10:49 AM

I, Jacob Howard, wrote Dr. Charlie Dyer, who is the speaker on the Land and the Book Radio, a question about Midgal-Eder, mentioned in Micah 4:8. This was Dr. Dyer’s response.

 

Jacob,

 

Thank you for your e-mail, and thanks as well for your kind words! Denny and I both appreciate the privilege God has given us to serve Him in this way. You have encouraged us both!

 

As far as Midgal Eder is concerned, there is no universal identification of the site. But I do believe it was a real site. The best thing I’ve read on the subject is from Alfred Edersheim’s The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah. (You can find his complete work online at Google Books.) I’ll include his quotation here, and then I’ll follow it with a few observations. (I’ll also highlight the key point he makes in the quote.)

 

But as we pass from the sacred gloom of the cave [i.e., he was just talking about the birth of Jesus in a cave] out into the night, its sky all aglow with starry brightness, its loneliness is peopled, and its silence made vocal from heaven. There is nothing now to conceal, but much to reveal, though the manner of it would seem strangely incongruous to Jewish thinking. And yet Jewish tradition may here prove both illustrative and helpful. That the Messiah was to be born in Bethlehem, was a settled conviction. Equally so was the belief, that He was to be revealed from Midgal Eder, “the tower of the flock.” This Midgal Eder was not the watchtower for the ordinary flocks which pastured on the barren sheep ground beyond Bethlehem, but lay close to the town, on the road to Jerusalem. A passage in the Mishnah leads to the conclusion, that the flocks, which pastured there, were destined for Temple-sacrifices, and, accordingly, that the shepherds, who watched over them, were not ordinary shepherds. The latter were under the ban of Rabbinism, on account of their necessary isolation from religious ordinances, and their manner of life, which rendered strict legal observance unlikely, if not absolutely impossible. The same Mishnaic passage also leads us to infer, that these flocks lay out all the year round, since they are spoken of as in the fields thirty days before the Passover—that is, in the month of February, when in Palestine the average rainfall is nearly greatest. Thus, Jewish tradition in some dim manner apprehended the first revelation of the Messiah from that Migdal Eder, where shepherds watched the Temple-flocks all the year round. Of the deep symbolic significance of such a coincidence, it is needless to speak.

 

—Alfred Edersheim, The Life and Times of Jesus the Messiah, pp. 186-87

 

If Edersheim is correct (and I believe he is), the location for Midgal Eder would be north of Bethlehem and near the old road from Bethlehem to Jerusalem. (That road is the old “Hebron road” one drives on between Jerusalem and Bethlehem today!) I believe this puts the location somewhere between the Jewish kibbutz of Ramat Rachel and Bethlehem, probably just to the west of Har Homa. There used to be an actual sheepfold in this area where I would take our groups but, sadly, it has been covered over by the modern road that now goes to Har Homa.

 

A key point here. Edersheim indicates that Migdal Eder was an actual spot, but he is not saying it was a town or village. Rather, the name means “watchtower of the flock” which seems to identify it as a specific pasture area for sheep. And the sheep that grazed here were those specifically destined for Temple sacrifice. In that sense the shepherds keeping watch over the temple sacrifices were the ones to whom God announced the birth of the ultimate “sacrificial lamb.”

 

I’m attaching a screen shot from Google Earth that might be of help in identifying the location for Midgal Eder. Note that Ramat Rachel is at the top of the picture and Bethlehem is at the bottom. The road running along the left side of the picture is the old Hebron Road, and Homat Shemu’el/Har Homa is just to the right of center in the picture. Based on Edersheim’s description, I would place Migdal Eder almost in the center of the picture…north of Bethlehem, just to the west of Har Homa, and east of the road from Bethlehem to Jerusalem. Since the word means “tower of the flock” it is likely a high spot in this area where sheep would graze. The hills right around (or right at) Har Homa are probably the best possible location.

 

I hope this is helpful!

 

Charlie

3/28/2026 8:31 PM

 

 

 

PT-5 “Excursus: Why Every Self-respecting Calvinist Must Be a Premillennialist.”

 

MORNING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/28/2026 9:30 AM

            I continue this morning to quote from John MacArthur’s commentary intitled “Excursus: Why Every Self-respecting Calvinist Must Be a Premillennialist.”

            “How about James, the head of the Jerusalem church?  Was he amillennial in his view?  Acts 15—“James answered, saying, ‘Brethren listen to me.  Simon has related how God first concerned Himself about taking from among the Gentiles a people for His name.  With this the words of the Prophets agree, just as it is written,” After these things I will return, and I will rebuild the tabernacle of David which has fallen, and I will rebuild its ruins, and I will restore it, so that the rest of mankind may seek the Lord, and all the Gentiles who are called by My name, says the Lord, who makes these things known from long ago” ‘ “(vv. 13-18).

            “The acceptance of the Gentiles is not the cancellation of promises to Israel.  After Gentile conversion, after the times of the Gentiles are over, God will rebuild the tabernacle of David that is fallen—rebuild its ruins and restore it.  Davidic covenant promises and Messianic promises will be fulfilled.

            “Maybe the writer of Hebrews was an amillennialist: “When God made the promise to Abraham, since He could swear by no one greater, He swore by Himself, saying, ‘I will surely bless you and I will surely multiply you.’” (Heb. 6:13)—I will, I will; no hesitation.  And he calls on our understanding of swearing.  “Men swear by one greater than themselves, and with them an oath given as confirmation is an end of every dispute.  In the same way God, desiring even more to show to the heirs of the promise the unchangeableness of His purpose, interposed with and oath” (vv. 16-17).  God swears or makes an oath.  And “it is impossible,’ the next verse says, “for God to lie.”

            “Maybe the apostle Paul was the first amillennialist:  “What advantage has the Jew?  Or what is the benefit of circumcision?  Great in every respect.  First of all, that they were entrusted with the oracles of God.  What then?  If some did not believe, their unbelief will not nullify the faithfulness of God. Will it?  May it never be!” (Rom. 3:1-4).  And this is where Paul [the amillennialist] would have said, “Absolutely…absolutely; it nullifies the promise of God; unquestionably, it nullifies the promise of God.”  But it doesn’t say that.

            “Romans 9:6-8 says, “But it is not as though the Word of God has failed.  For they are not all Israel who are descended from Israel [that is to say, they’re not all true Israel, that is believers]; nor are they all children because they are Abraham’s descendants, but ‘through Isaac your descendants will be named. ‘  That is, it is not the children of the flesh who are children of God, but children of promise are regarded as descendants.”  There are children of God has elected to fulfill His promise in.  And He goes on to describe it, saying something as blatant as this:  Jacob I loved,”  verse 13, “but Esau I hated.”  Verse 15: “ I will have mercy on whom I have mercy, and I will have compassion on whom I have compassion.”  Verse 16: “It does not depend on the man who wills or the man who runs, but on God who has mercy.”  Verse 18: “He has mercy on whom He desires, and He hardens whom He desires.”  This is back to the whole idea of sovereignty again.

            “Just because there are some Jews who don’t believe does not nullify the faithfulness of God.  Just because there are some that God chooses, doesn’t mean that He’s not going to choose a whole duly constituted generation of Jews to fulfill His promises.

            “And then perhaps most notable, Romans 11:26; All Israel will be saved.”  How can we interpret that?  One way.  Someone tells me that’s not Israel?  Where in the text does it say it’s not Israel?  I would understand if it said, “And God has cancelled His promises to Israel.”  But verses 26-27 say, All Israel will be saved; just as it is written, ‘The deliver will come from Zion, He will remove ungodliness from Jacob.  This is My covenant with them, when I take away their sins.’”

            “Yes, they are enemies at the present time.  But that is for the sake of the Gentiles, verse 29, “the gifts and the calling of God are irrevocable,” which brings us back to where we started.

            “If it depended on the Jews to obey on their own, it was impossible from the start.  Only the One who made the promise can enable the obedience that is connected to the fulfillment of the promise.

            “So when Jonathan Edwards wrote this:  “Promises that were made by the prophets to the people of Israel concerning their prosperity and glory are fulfilled in the Christian church according to their proper intent,” I say, “where did he get that?  Where did that come from?”  It didn’t come from any passage that I can find.”

            “Let me just conclude with some effects.  I’d suggest for you reading, Israel and the Church by Ronald Diprose.  It first appeared in Italian as a Ph. D. dissertation and has no connection to traditional dispensationalism.  It’s a really, really fine work on replacement theology.  It shows the effect of this idea upon the church of the Dark Ages, explaining how the church went from the New Testament concept of the church to the sacerdotal, sacramental, institutional system of the Dark Ages that we know as Roman Catholicism. Diprose lays much of that at the feet of replacement theology, which rises out of Augustine and a few before him.

            “Where did the church ever come up with altars?  There’s no altar in the New Testament.  Where did the church ever come up with sacrifices?  Where did the church ever come up with a parallel sign to circumcision?  Where did the church ever come up with a priesthood?  Where did the church ever come up with ceremony and ritual and symbolism?  Where did the church ever come up with the idea that we should reintroduce mystery by speaking in a language that the people there couldn’t understand?  And we replace preaching with ritual.

            “From the formation of the church in those early centuries to the system of Roman Catholicism, all the trappings fit Old Testament Judaism.  And the hierarchical, institutional, nonpersonal, nonorganic, sacerdotal approach to the church, Diprose traces largely to the influence of causing the church to be the new Israel.  Replacement theology justifies bringing in all the trappings of Judaism.

            “Another effect of replacement theology is the damage it does to Jewish evangelism.  Here’s a little scenario.  Someone is talking to a Jew and saying, “Jesus is the Messiah.”

            “Really; where’s the kingdom?

            “Oh, it’s here.”

            “Oh, it is?  Well why are we being killed all the time?  Why are we being persecuted and why don’t we have the land that was promised to us? And why isn’t the Messiah reigning in Jerusalem, and why isn’t the peace and joy and gladness dominating the world?  And why isn’t the desert blooming?”

            “O no, you don’t understand.  All that’s not going to happen.  You see, the problem is you’re not God’s people anymore.  We are.”

            “Oh, I see.  But this is the kingdom of Jews are being killed and hated and Jerusalem is under siege.  This is the kingdom?  If this is the kingdom, Jesus is not the Messiah.  Can’t be.  It’s ludicrous.”

            “No matter how many wonderful Jewish-Christian relationships we try to have with rabbis, this is a huge bone in the throat.  Why can’t Jesus be the Messiah?  Because this isn’t the kingdom.  Unless we can say to a Jew, “God will keep every single promise He made to you and Jesus is your Messiah.  But look at Psalm 22, Isaiah 53, and Zechariah 12:10 and understand that He had to come and die to ratify the New covenant before He could forgive sin—but the kingdom is coming.”

            “That we have a chance to communicate.  The rest doesn’t make sense.  Now if we get election right—the divine, sovereign, gracious, unconditional, unilateral, irrevocable election—then we get God right.  And we get Israel right.  And we get eschatology right.  And guess what?—then we can just open our Bibles and preach our hearts out on the text and say what is says.  We don’t have to scramble around and find some bizarre interpretation.

            “Get it right and God is glorified.  Get it right and Christ is exalted.  Get it right and the Holy Spirit is honored.  Get it right and Scripture is clear.  Get it right and the greatest historical illustration of God’s work in the world is visible.  Get it right and the meaning of mystery in the New Testament is maintained.  Get it right and normal language is intact—Scripture wasn’t written for mystics.  Get it right and chronology of prophetic literature is intact.  Get it right and shut out imagination from exegesis.  Get it right and the historical worldview is complete.  Get it right and the practical benefit of eschatology is released for our people.  Get it right.

            “Kingdom theology of the eschaton is the only view that honors sovereign, electing grace; honors the truthfulness of God’s promises; honors the teaching of the Old Testament prophets and the teaching of Jesus and the New Testament writers, which will allow Christ to be honored as supreme ruler over His creation, now temporarily in the hands of Satan. And the earthly, millennial kingdom, established at Christ’s return, is the only and necessary bridge from temporary human history to eternal divine glory.  Let’s make our churches second coming churches and make our lives second coming lives.”

            Well this is the end of this very informative sermon, and it is my prayer that all who read it will be better off for reading it, and that it will bring honor and glory to the Lord Jesus Christ.  This evening I will begin my study on the second chapter of the gospel of Luke.

Spiritual meaning for my life today:  Trust the Lord to use what I write on my Spiritual Diaries to bring glory to the Lord.

My Steps of Faith for Today:  I trust the Lord that as He sends this sermon around the world that His Son, the Lord Jesus Christ will be honored.  3/28/2026 11:10 AM

 

PT-4 “Excursus: Why Every Self-respecting Calvinist Must Be a Premillennialist.”

 

EVENING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/27/2026 05:30 PM

            I continue this evening to quote from John MacArthur’s commentary intitled “Excursus: Why Every Self-respecting Calvinist Must Be a Premillennialist.”

            “Let’s dig a little into the text of verse 7:”which the Father has fixed [tithemi, ‘set, appointed’],” “Fixed” is in the aorist middle’’—“fixed for Himself.”  It’s about His glory.  It’s about His exaltation.  It’s about the whole world finally seeing paradise regained.  It’s about God finally being glorified—who is so dishonored through human history.  It’s about the glory of God and the honor of Jesus Christ.  And God the Father has fixed for Himself that time by His own authority—it is singular, unilateral.  There is no other way to understand it.

            “There’s no replacement theology in the theology of Jesus.  There’s no supersessionism, which is a movement to establish that there is no earthly kingdom for Israel.  That is absolutely foreign to the Old Testament and completely foreign to the New Testament.  Jesus didn’t say, “Where did you get that crazy idea?  Haven’t you been listening?”

            “They just couldn’t know the seasons, the time.  The cross was always the plan.  He said, you remember in the eighteenth chapter of Luke, also recorded in Matthew and Mark, “Behold, we are going up to Jerusalem” (v. 31).  And what’s going to happen, if we put those three accounts together? “I [Jesus] am going to be betrayed.  I’m going to be handed over to the chief priests and the scribes.  They’re going to condemn Me.  They’re going to hand Me over to the Gentiles because the can execute Me.  All this is in exact order.  Then when I’m handed over to the Gentiles, I’m going to be mocked, mistreated, spit on, scourged, crucified, and I’m rising again” (see vv. 32-33).  “32  For he will be delivered over to the Gentiles and will be mocked and shamefully treated and spit upon. 33  And after flogging him, they will kill him, and on the third day he will rise.’” (Luke 18:32-33) ESV)

            “That’s not plan B.  In fact, If we think that’s plan B, we’re fools.  And Jesus used that terminology: “O foolish men and slow of heart to believe in all that the prophets have spoken!” (Luke 24:25).  So, wherever this amillennial thing came from, it didn’t come from the Old Testament, it didn’t come from the New Testament Jews, and it didn’t come from Jesus.

            “We might say, “Well, were the apostles amillennialists?”  How about Peter; was Peter an amillennialist?  In Acts 3, Peter is preaching away: “Men of Israel,” and so forth.  Verse 13: “The God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the God of our fathers, has glorified His servant Jesus, the One whom you delivered [there’s that primary and secondary element] and disowned in the presence of Pilate, when he had decided to release Him.  But you disowned the Holy and Righteous One and asked for a murder to be granted to you, but put to death the Prince of life” (vv. 13-15).” “13  The God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob, the God of our fathers, glorified his servant Jesus, whom you delivered over and denied in the presence of Pilate, when he had decided to release him. 14  But you denied the Holy and Righteous One, and asked for a murderer to be granted to you, 15  and you killed the Author of life, whom God raised from the dead. To this we are witnesses.”  “What an indictment!  They [the Jews] couldn’t be any worse, and more horrific.

            “Verse 18:  “But the things which God announced beforehand by the mouth of all the prophets, that His Christ should suffer, He has thus fulfilled.”  That’s literal isn’t it? “Therefore repent and return, so that you sins may be wiped away, in order that times of refreshing may come from the presence of the Lord [‘the times of refreshing’ is a kingdom phrase] and that He may send Jesus, The Christ appointed for you [set for you, fixed for you], whom heaven must receive until the period of restoration[another kingdom term] of all things about which God spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets from ancient time” (vv. 19-21).

            “And then I specially love verses 25-27, “It is you who are the sons of the prophets and of the covenant which God made with your fathers.”  Does Peter cancel the covenant?  What does he say?  “You…are the sons of the covenant which God made with your fathers, saying to Abraham, ‘And in your seed all the families of the earth shall be blessed.’  For you first, God raised up His Servant and sent Him to bless you by turning everyone of you from your wicked ways [and He will do that; you’re still the sons of the covenant].” That was a perfect opportunity to cancel those promises.”

            It looks like I will be able to finish this sermon in my “Morning SD for tomorrow.

3/27/2026 6:02 PM 

 

PT-3 “Excursus: Why Every Self-respecting Calvinist Must Be a Premillennialist.”

 

MORNING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/27/2026 10:16 AM

            I continue this morning to quote from John MacArthur’s commentary intitled “Excursus: Why Every Self-respecting Calvinist Must Be a Premillennialist.”

            “So when God gave unilateral, unconditional-as-primary-cause, sovereign, gracious promises to an elect people, they are guaranteed by divine faithfulness to be fulfilled like all His salvation work.  And when God says  such covenant promises are irrevocable, we cannot, with impunity for any seemingly convenient idea or assumption, say these are void. Why”

            “Someone may say, “Well, what about Israel’s apostasy?  Doesn’t that cancel the promises? Doesn’t Israel’s apostasy cancel the promises?”  But doe we understand that the New covenant promises given in Jeremiah and Ezekiel were given to Israel at the time when they were under divine judgment for apostasy.  They weren’t given to them when all was well and they were living and flourishing in obedience to God.  They were so apostate, they were out of their land and then the covenant was given to them.  And God was saying, “Don’t get the idea that what’s going on by way of apostasy changes My promises.”

            “Someone else may say, “Well wait a minute, didn’t they reject their Lord and Messiah?  That did it.  They rejected Him.  They killed Jesus,”  That’s in the plan.  One of the wacky ideas of old-line dispensationalism is that Jesus came and offered a kingdom; and because the Jews didn’t accept it and killed Him, He went to the church and came up with plan B.

            “The cross is not plan B.  What is Zechariah 12:10 saying when it declares, “They look on Him whom they have pierced” (see Psalm 22 and Isaiah 53)?  It’s in the main plan.  And then 13:1 says, “In that day a fountain will be opened for the house of David.”  Israel will be saved.  The New covenant will be fulfilled.  Keep reading into chapter 14: “The Lord will be king over all the earth” (v. 9). There is no other way to interpret Zechariah 12-14.

            “So is the Old Testament amillennial?  No.  Were the Jews in Jesus’ say amillennial? No. Emile Schure’s helpful Study of Jewish Eschatology in the Day of Jesus, published in 1880 by T. &T. Clarke in Edinburgh (a new edition of it was published by Hendrickson Publishing in 1998), does a great job of studying the Jewish messianic, eschatological mind-set at the time of Jesus.  They believed the Messiah was coming, preceded by a time of trouble.  They believed that before Messiah, Elijah the prophet would come.  They believed that when Messiah came, He would be the personal Son of David.  He would have special powers to set up His kingdom, and all Abrahamic and Davidic covenant promises would be fulfilled.  They also believed that Israel would repent and be saved at the coming of Messiah.  They believed the kingdom would be established in Israel, with Jerusalem at the center, and would extend across the world.  All people would worship the Messiah.  There would be no war, only gladness and health.  They believed in a reinstituted temple worship; and the fulfillment of the covenants included the renovation of the world, a general resurrection, final judgment, and after that the eternal state.  That’s Jewish pre-New Testament eschatology.

            “That’s what Zacharias, the priestly father of John the Baptist, believed.  Read Zacharias’s great Benedictus in Luke 1:67 to the end of the chapter.  And what is he saying?  Every single phrase comes from an Old Testament text on the Abrahamic covenant, The Davidic covenant, or the New covenant—every single one of them.  He knew what was happening.  The covenants were to be fulfilled.”

Zacharias’s Prophecy

67 And his father Zacharias ^awas filled with the Holy Spirit, and ^bprophesied, saying:

 68 “^aBlessed be the Lord God of Israel,

For He has visited us and accomplished ^bredemption for His people,

 69 And has raised up a ^ahorn of salvation for us

In the house of David ^bHis servant—

 70 ^aAs He spoke by the mouth of His holy prophets ^bfrom of old—

 71 ^1aSalvation ^bfrom our enemies,

And from the hand of all who hate us;

 72 ^aTo show mercy toward our fathers,

^bAnd to remember His holy covenant,

 73 ^aThe oath which He swore to Abraham our father,

 74 To grant us that we, being rescued from the hand of our enemies,

Might serve Him without fear,

 75 ^aIn holiness and righteousness before Him all our days.

 76 “And you, child, will be called the ^aprophet of ^bthe Most High;

For you will go on ^cbefore the Lord to ^dprepare His ways;

 77 To give to His people the knowledge of salvation

¹By ^athe forgiveness of their sins,

 78 Because of the tender mercy of our God,

With which ^athe Sunrise from on high will visit us,

 79 ^aTo shine upon those who sit in darkness and the shadow of death,

To guide our feet into the ^bway of peace.”

            “ Was Jesus an amillennialists?  Acts 1 is the first postresurrection account “about all that Jesus began to do and teach, until the day when He was taken up to heaven, after He had by the Holy Spirit given orders to the apostles whom He had chosen’ (vv. 1-2).  There’s election again.

            “So He had spent time before His ascension with the apostles.  Now verse 3 says, “To these He also presented Himself alive after His suffering, by many convincing proofs, appearing to them over a period of forty days.”  Literally, “appearing to them over forty days.”  It must have been intense.  Can we imagine the level of teaching a resurrected Jesus would give His own over a forty-day period?  What kind of a seminary education would that be?  And what was He talking about?—“speaking of the things concerning the kingdom of God.

            “For forty days He  talks about the kingdom of God.  This is His moment.  If Jesus is an amillennialist, this is where He has to tell them.  The Jews’ apostasy—that’s a given.  The rejection of the Messiah, that’s a given.  The execution of the Messiah, that’s a given.  This is the perfect place for Jesus to launch amillennialism.

            “Verse 6 says, “So when they had come together, they were asking Him, saying, ‘Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?’”  Now what did He say?  “ Where did you get such a stupid idea?  Where did you ever come up with that concept?  Haven’t you been listening for forty days?  I’m an amillennialist.  What a bizarre thought, that I’m going to restore the kingdom to Israel?  Ou don’t listen.”  This is it.  If Jesus is amillennialist, this is His moment.  He’s going to say, “No, the church is the new Israel.”

            “The disciples ask if this is the time the Father is going to restore apokathistano (according to Jewish sources, a technical eschatological term for the end time).  They were using a term that was a part of their eschatology.  “Is this the end  time when You are restoring the kingdom to Israel?’  Forty days of instruction on the kingdom and they knew one thing for sure:  the kingdom for Israel was still coming.  And all they wanted to know was, When?  That’s all.

            “He said to them, “It is not for you to know times or epochs’”(v. 7a).  We can’t know timing.  He didn’t say. “Wait, wait, wait.  There isn’t going to be a kingdom.”  He said, “It’s not for you to know times and epochs [seasons’.” 

            “By the way, “which the Father has fixed by His own authority” (v. 7b).  There’s that sovereign election again.  It’s sovereign.  The disciples knew that when they asked, “Lord, is it at this time You are restoring the kingdom?’ (v. 6).  They knew it was a divine work to do it.  This was a perfect opportunity for Jesus to straighten things out.”

Spiritual Meaning for my Life today:  It is great for me to understand what MacArthur writes in this section, although I knew some of these things before it is really great for me to get this refresher course on these very important Scriptures.

My Seps of Faith for Today:  I trust the Lord to continue to give me revival in my heart as the things that are now going on in my life are difficult now.

3/27/2026 11:32 AM

PT-2 "Excursus: Why Every Self-respecting Calvinist Must Be a Premillennialist"

 

EVENIING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/26/2026 5:06 PM

            In this evening’s SD I continue quoting from the sermon that John MacArthur was preaching in 2007 as this sermon was put into his commentary on the gospel of Luke because it fit well there.  This will take me a few more days to quote it, but well worth looking at it.

            “God’s decision to set His love on Israel was in no way determined by Israel’s performance.  It was not determined by Israel’s national worthiness.  It was based purely on His independent, uninfluenced, sovereign grace (see Deut. 7:7-8)”  “7  It was not because you were more in number than any other people that the LORD set his love on you and chose you, for you were the fewest of all peoples, 8  but it is because the LORD loves you and is keeping the oath that he swore to your fathers, that the LORD has brought you out with a mighty hand and redeemed you from the house of slavery, from the hand of Pharaoh king of Egypt.”  “He chose them because He predetermined to set His love on them, for no other reason but election.  The survival of the kingdom of Judah, despite the blatant sin of its rulers, depended on covenant  promises God had made (read Pss. 89 and 132), where these are reiterated).  God’s unilateral covenant declares that the Lord alone is the party responsible to fulfill the obligations.  There are no conditions that Abraham or any  other Jew could fulfil on his own.  It’s no different from our salvation—we were divinely chosen.  But we didn’t come to Christ on our own.  We were given life by the Spirit of God in God’s time.  God’s unilateral covenant declares that the Lord is the sole party responsible to fulfill the obligations to preserve Israel.

            “Obedience is not the condition that determines fulfillment.  Divine sovereign power is the condition that determines obedience, which leads to fulfillment.  When God gave Israel the unilateral covenant, He knew He would have to produce the obedience in the future, according to His plan.

            “Then God gave the Davidic covenant, 2 Samuel 7, where the promise comes to David that he’ll have a greater Son who will have an everlasting kingdom.  That is an expansion, by the way, of the Abrahamic covenant.  Verse 12 says, “I will establish his kingdom.  He shall build a house for My name, and I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.”  God promises to Abraham a seed, a land, a nation, and now, of course that embodies a kingdom, and now comes the promise of a king.  This is an expansion of the Abrahamic covenant.  And what’s notable here, again, in 2 Samuel 7:12-13, “I will raise up your descendant…I will establish his kingdom…I will establish the throne of his kingdom forever.”  I will…I will…I will…again.

            “This is not to say the Abrahamic covenant is only for Israel.  We all participate in its blessings spiritually—and we will millennially.  The Abrahamic and the Davidic covenants—we all will participate in them, even those not of Israel, because we’ll participate in salvation and be in the kingdom.

            “There’s a third covenant, the New covenant.  Jeremiah 31—there can be no fulfillment of the promises God gave to Abraham or David apart from salvation.  Throughout history there has always been an Israel of God, there’s always been a remnant, there has always been those who didn’t bow the knee to Baal.  God always has had a chosen people.  But not all Israel is Israel.  That is to say, not all Israel is the true Israel of God, true believers.  But God has always had a remnant, always had a people—always, as Isaiah 6 says, a stump, a holy seed throughout history.  But in the future there will be a salvation of ethnic Israel on a national level.  And that’s the message of Jeremiah 31.  Here is the New covenant given to Israel.

            “We like to talk about the New covenant because we participate in the salvation provision of the New covenant, ratified in the death of Christ.  But the application of the New covenant is in a special way given to a future generation of Jews.  Jeremiah 31:31 says, “Behold, days are coming,’ declares the Lord when I will make a New covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah [that is unmistakable], not like the covenant which I made with their fathers in the day I too them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt, My covenant which they broke, although I was a husband to them,’ declares the Lord. ‘But this is the covenant which I will make with the house of Israel’” (vv. 31-33).

            “What warrant is there to say that doesn’t mean Israel?  It does mean Israel.  I will…I will…I will…I will…I will make a covenant with the house of Israel.  “ I will put My law withing them and on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God and they shall be My people …I will forgive their iniquity, and their sin I will remember no more’ (33-34).  Did we ever see so many “l wills’?—unconditional, unilateral, sovereign, gracious, and irrevocable.

            “We could say, “Well, maybe God changed his mind.”  Go to verse 35: “This says the Lord, who gives the sun for light by day and the fixed order of the moon and the stars for light by night, who stirs up the sea so that its waves roar; the Lord of hosts is His name:  ‘If this fixed order departs from before Me,’ declares the Lord, ‘then the offspring of Israel also shall cease.’”  I haven’t noticed that that’s happened. If it doesn’t mean what it just said, it’s incomprehensible.

            “And the New covenant promises the salvation that then includes the reception of all the promises in the Abrahamic covenant, Davidic covenant, and all the extended promises throughout the whole Old Testament.

            “What is the key feature of this?  “I will put My law within them on their heart I will write it; and I will be their God…I will forgive their iniquity.”

            “Notice how sovereign that is: “I will do it; I will do it in My time.”

            “Look at Ezekiel 36, because this is a parallel; but I think it’s good just to be reminded.  Ezekiel 36:24-27, “For I will take you from the nations, gather you from all the lands and bring you into your own land.  Then I will sprinkle clean water on you, and you will be clean; I will cleanse you from all your filthiness and from all your idols.  Moreover, I will give you a new heart and put a new spirit within you; and I will remove the heart of stone from your flesh and give you a heart of flesh.  I will put My spirit withing you,’—It’s overwhelming, isn’t it?—“and cause you to walk in My statues, and you will be careful to observe My ordinances.”

            “How could anybody walk in His statues and obey and observe His ordinances?  Only if He caused them to do it.  “You will live in the land that I gave to your forefathers; so you will be My people, and I will be your God.”

            “ And then verse 32, just a good reminder: “I am not doing this for your sake,’ declares the Lord God, ‘let it be known to you.  Be ashamed and confounded for your ways, O house of Israel!’”  For whose sake is He doing it?  His own sake.

            “Go to the end of verse 38.  When God does this, “Then they will know that I am the Lord (see also v. 37).”  “37  "Thus says the Lord GOD: This also I will let the house of Israel ask me to do for them: to increase their people like a flock.” (ESV)

            3/26/2026 5:55 PM

 

PT-1 “EXCURSUS: WHY EVERY Self-respecting Calvinist Must Be a Premillennialist”

MORNING SPIRITUAL DIARY FOR 3/26/2026 8:08 AM

            This morning I will begin to quote from a chapter in John MacArthur’s commentary which is different from other chapters that we have been looking at.  Let me begin by giving the title of this chapter, and then write something that is written first in the chapter.

“EXCURSUS: WHY EVERY Self-respecting Calvinist Must Be a Premillennialist”

“This material is taken from a message delivered by the author at the March, 2007 Grace Community Church Shepherds’ Conference.  It has been lightly edited, but no effort has been made to remove the marks of the original spoken message.  It is included here as an expansion of a theme introduced in the discussion of the covenants in chapters 9-11 of this volume.  A proper interpretation of the biblical data leads to the conclusion that God’s promises to Israel will be literally fulfilled in the nation of Israel and not transferred to the church.  That reality logically leads to premillennialism.

            “Is one of the strange ironies in the church and Reformed theology that those who love the doctrine of sovereign election most supremely and sincerely, and who are most unwavering in their devotion to the glory of God, the honor of Christ, the work of the Spirit in regeneration and sanctification, the veracity and inerrancy of Scripture, and who are the most fastidious in hermeneutics, and who are the most careful and intentionally biblical regarding categories of doctrine, and who see themselves as guardians of biblical truth, and are not content to be wrong at all, and who agree most heartily on the essential matters of Christian truth so that they labor with all their powers to examine in a Berean fashion every relevant text to discern the true interpretation of all matters of divine revelation are in varying degrees of noninterest in applying those same passions and skills to the end of the story, and are rather content to be a happy and even playful disagreement regarding the vast biblical data on eschatology, as if the end didn’t matter much.

            “But it does matter that Calvinist care about eschatology and get it right—and we will if we get Israel right.  We get Israel right when we get the Old Testament covenants and promises right.  We get the Old Testament covenants and promises right when we get the interpretation of Scripture right.  We get the interpretation of Scripture right when we’re faithful to a legitimate hermeneutic and God’s integrity is upheld.  We get our hermeneutics right, we’ll get Israel right.  Get Israel right, we’ll get eschatology right.

            “The Bible calls God the God of Israel more than 200 times.  There are more than 2,000 references to Israel in Scripture, and not one of them means anything but Israel, including Romans 9:6 and Galatians 6:16, which are the only two passages that amillennialists go to, to try to convince us that those cancel out the other 2,000.  There is no difficulty in interpreting those verses as simply meaning Jews who were believers, the Israel of God.  Israel always means Israel, never means anything but Israel.  Seventy-three New Testament uses of Israel always mean Israel.

            “Seventy percent of Scripture is the story of Israel.  And, I think, the whole point of the story is to get to the ending—and it doesn’t go up in smoke.  So here’s how to get the foundation for an accurate understanding of eschatology.  Get election right and get Israel right.  Those two go together; they’re inseparable.  How is it that we’ve come to get number one right and totally miss number two so often?  I’m confident that God did not reveal prophetic truth in such detail to hid or obscure the truth, but to reveal it for our blessing, our motivation, and ultimately His glory.

            “But there is a theology concerning Israel and the end times—popular in many Reformed and Calvinistic circles today—that I believe does not get things right concerning Israel.  It is replacement theology, and scholastically it’s often referred to as supersessionism.  This view demands that all the Old Testament promises to Israel be viewed through the lens of the New Testament and ultimately get transferred to the church.  Replacement theology, and integral part of amillennialism, also creates a strange dichotomy, since all the curses promised to Israel came to Israel.  Literally, and they’re still coming.  If one wonders whether the curses in the Old Testament were literal, they’re going on right now.  Israel right now is not under divine protection.  They are under the promise of God  that they will be perpetuated as an ethnic people, but this current group of Jews that live in the world today and in the nation of Israel are not now under divine protection—they’re apostate.  They’ve rejected their Messiah.  They are under divine chastening.  But they are still a  people and will be to the end.

            “What a staggering apologetic that is for truthfulness of Scripture.  We can’t abandon that without a huge loss of confidence in Scripture.  All the curses promised to Israel for disobedience to God came true, literally on Israel.  And now, all of a sudden, we’re supposed to split all those passages that give blessing and cursing and say all the blessings promised to Israel aren’t coming to Israel; they’re coming to the church instead?  Where’s the textual justification for such a split interpretation?  And wouldn’t we think that whatever way the curses were fulfilled would set the standard for whatever way the blessings would be fulfilled? Or to put the question in another context. Wouldn’t we expect that all the prophecies that came to pass when Jesus came in a literal fashion would set the pattern for how the prophecies connect to His second coming would come to pass?  There’s no place for splitting up these interpretations.

            “Thus the Old Testament cannot be amillennial.  If we affirm a normal hermeneutic—the perspicuity of the Old Testament—of course it pronounces clearly covenants and promises and a kingdom to come to Israel.

            “The Old Testament must be interpreted, preached, and taught as clear revelation from God that is to be understood, believed, and applied by the people to whom it was given.  So what did God promise Israel?  Look at the twelfth chapter of Genesis, and obviously this is a study beyond our capability to dig into all the details.  But it’s clear and straightforward; it’s not difficult.  I want us to see the connection between these covenants and divine, electing sovereignty.

            “Follow the use of the expression “I will” in verses 2-3: “And I will make you a great nation; and so you shall be a blessing; and I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you, I will curse.  And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.” I will, I will, I will—five times.  It is sovereign, unilateral, unconditional election.

            “That’s prophecy.  God later puts Abram to sleep and says this is what is going to happen:  “I will also judge the nations whom they will serve, and afterward they will come out with many possessions.  As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you will be buried at a good old age” (Genesis 15:14-15). 

            “Then in verse 17:  “It came about when the sun had set, that it was very dark, and behold, there appeared a smoking oven and a flaming torch which passed between these pieces.”  God put Abram out, anesthetized him, and He alone went through the pieces—a unilateral, unconditional, irrevocable promise that God made with Himself.  There were no conditions for Abram to fulfill.  On that day, the Lord made a covenant with him.

            “It is to be a covenant that does not end.  Chapter 17, verse 7 says “I will establish My covenant between Me and you and your descendants after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your descendants after you.” God elected Abram, elected the nation that would come out of his lions, made a covenant and a promise with them to be their God.  This is the foundational covenant in the Bible—foundational, biblical covenant—the promise of God, unilateral and unconditional.”

3/26/2026 9:30 AM