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PARTIAL RESTORATION: THE DISCIPLINE OF HOPE
Because of Israel’s election
in God’s sovereign plan for history, the rise of the potent new form of the
Kingdom of Man could not ultimately destroy Israel. The beaten, exiled nation
made a comeback during the sixth and fifth centuries under Persian rule that
was unique. As John Bright observed about the exile and restoration:
“Israel was left for the
moment an agglomeration of uprooted and beaten individuals, by no external mark
any longer a people. The marvel is that her history did not end altogether.
Nevertheless, Israel both survived the calamity and, forming a new community
out of the wreckage of the old, resumed her life as a people.”[1]
The restoration was only
partial, but it provided ample proof that God would keep His promises for the
ultimate, final restoration.
Associated with these
developments were the end of OT revelation and the completion of the OT canon
of Scripture. An era began in which God would be “silent.” The finished OT
canon would now become the sole, unchanging source of revelation for all men
everywhere until Jesus came. The OT text would remain preserved in spite of
being copied and recopied over the centuries to come. In addition, two
doctrinal truths which emerge from Israel’s restoration are the doctrine of
canonicity and the doctrine of prayer. (Read here Ezra, Nehemiah, Haggai,
Zechariah, and Malachi.)
Thousands of Jews returned
to the land in the last part of the sixth century, BC, primarily from Babylon,
to re-establish the nation Israel. Led by Ezra and Nehemiah, the returning Jews
finally rebuilt both Jerusalem and the Temple (known in history as the “Second
Temple”). These Jews, however, were not all of those in dispersion. Many
remained in the Gentile nations (see Esther). The restoration era, then, dealt
with only a remnant of Israel, not the entire nation as in the pre-exilic eras.
Three details merit close observation by students of this restoration era: the
decree mentioned in Daniel 9, the role of the last OT prophets (Haggai,
Zechariah, Malachi), and the closing and transmission of the OT canonical
texts.
The Decree Given To Daniel.
Prominent in Israel’s restoration in the promised land was the prophecy given
in Daniel 9:24-27. Daniel was given this prophecy by God in response to his
dilemma on the eve of Israel’s return..
1. Daniel’s Dilemma. In the year 538 B.C., the
first year of Persian rule after Babylon had been conquered, Daniel had been
studying Jeremiah’s writing for insight into the flow of history (Dan. 9:1). As
he had studied, Daniel had become increasingly concerned with an apparent
discrepancy between the promise of an imminent end of the dispersion when
Babylon was defeated (e.g., Jer. 29:10) and the promise of the continuing reign
of the Gentiles through all four phases or kingdoms (Dan. 2:7). Daniel had
wondered how God could restore Israel in the near future (Jeremiah’s seventy
years would be up in 535 B.C.), if He also had promised that the Gentiles would
dominate the world power structure through four different kingdoms? Obviously,
passage of time was required for four kingdoms to rule.
Daniel had noticed
especially in Jeremiah’s prophecies (Jer. 29:10-14) that there was a blanket
promise of ultimate return of Jews from not only Babylon but from all nations
of the world (29:14) with the “condition” that such a general restoration be
preceded by a spiritual revival (29:12-13).
Concentrating, then, upon this ultimate return and final restoration of Israel, Daniel then petitioned God for pardon in the hope that God would be persuaded to grant not only a restoration from Babylon in the seventieth year but also a restoration from the other nations where Jews had migrated (Dan. 9:3-19).
2. God’s Answer. In the middle of his
petition Daniel was interrupted by Gabriel, an angel of very high rank (Dan.
9:20-23). Gabriel brought Daniel a divine explanation which clarified the true
nature of Israel’s return that was to begin shortly from Babylon. The
resolution of the dilemma centered upon the distinction between the immediate
return from Babylon at the end of the seventy years (Jer. 29:10) and the
ultimate return from all the nations at the end of the seventy “sevens” (Jer.
29:14; Dan. 9:24). These seventy “sevens” are interpreted by most fundamental
scholars as being seventy “weeks” (sevens) of years, constituting a 490 year
time span. [2]
Israel, therefore, would
receive God’s promised relief from the Babylonian Captivity exactly in
accordance with Jeremiah’s prophecies; but because the nation still was not in
the proper spiritual state (Dan. 9:13,24), Israel would have to wait another
long period under Gentile dominion before the final restoration could be
effected. The Kingdom of Man would have to pass through its four prophesied
stages before Israel could enjoy her elected end.
3. Implications of God’s
Decree.
Thus Daniel was given a decree that history would not go on endlessly. God had
decreed an end at the appropriate time—490+ years hence. From this divine
decree one should observe certain implications. First, prophecy is always
“open” to amplification and genuine response to human responsibility in
history. Jeremiah prophesied of a return in complex terms, terms so complex
that upon actual outworking the “single” return was revealed to be two
separate, distinct returns. Then, too, the 490 years was actually to have a
hiatus between the 483rd year and the last seven,
thus the total time span would exceed 490 years. Students of prophecy, then,
would do well to interpret prophecies in the light of the most complex terms in
the context rather than in light of the simplest terms. [3]
A second implication is that
apparent “contradictions” in the Bible appear because the omniscient Creator
does not reveal the “whole picture” to the limited knowledge of the creature.
In Chapter 3 above I mentioned the apparent contradiction left in the OT
between the demands of God’s holiness upon the sinful nation and the election
promise that the nation would ultimately enjoy unbroken, eternal fellowship
with Himself. We know, of course, how Jesus Christ through His atonement
resolved these apparently conflicting demands. In this Chapter with God’s answer
to Daniel the same sort of resolution occurs. An apparent contradiction appears
in two different strands of prophecy only to be resolved by later acts of God.
We need to recall these examples when so-called contradictions appear to us
whether in the Scripture itself or between Scripture and historical experience.
Our faith rests in the perfect rationality of God, not in the incomplete
rationality of man.
Finally, a third implication
follows from the second: God runs history with a coherent, non-contradictory
master plan. The God of the Bible is not a gambler who operates by chance and
statistics. His sovereign prophecies, as noted in the previous chapter,
constitute a valid and sure base for the believer’s hope. Israel’s return was
controlled by God as to its size, its time, and its character; it was not due
to mere human efforts of Jewish leaders like Ezra and Nehemiah or to some
mysterious economic (after Marx) or political (after Hegel) force of history.
The Last of the OT Prophets. Besides the Decree given
to Daniel, another feature of the post-exilic partial restoration was the role
of the last of the OT prophets. Three prophets—Haggai, Zechariah, and
Malachi—finished the doctrinal framework of the OT by providing prophetic
balance to Daniel’s apocalyptic prophesies. They stressed the familiar
prophetic theme of obedience and human responsibility (D.I. No. 1). They would
permit no fatalistic illusion to cloud Israel’s understanding of God’s
sovereignty.
Haggai insisted that the
economic reversals in the restoration community were due to disobedience (Hag.
1:5-11; 2:15-19). Zechariah argued that this group was still under the
obligation to obey God’s Law for His vassal nation in spite of Israel’s
subordination to Gentile political supremacy (Zech. 1:4-6, 12; 7:4-14; 8:9-17).
Malachi scored all levels of the community, priests and family units alike, for
their violation of God’s Law (Mal. 1:6-2:10; 2:11-17).
Israel was still to maintain a distinctive testimony to the world by her social righteousness—including rebuilding the Temple, re-establishing the priesthood, and imposing the law over every area of life. The partial restoration from Babylon, the fulfillment of Jeremiah’s prophecy in Jeremiah 29:10-11, did not erase Israel’s continuing need to respond daily and comprehensively to God’s Word. In fact, all these obligations were an absolute necessity if God were to finish Israel’s ministry to the world (Gen. 12:3). Israel had to exist as an obedient nation because, due to her election, she awaited the most climactic moment of history when God would crush here enemies (Hag. 2:21-22), return to Jerusalem (Zech. 14), and visit the Temple (Mal. 3:1-6; cf. 4:5-6). Besides Ezra and Nehemiah, then, these last three OT prophets were the ones who prepared the remnant of Israel for her next era in history: the Messianic era. To appreciate Yahweh’s Messiah the regathered remnant would have be spiritually mature and balanced.
The Closing and Transmission
of the OT Canon. The previous chapter showed that Israel’s last bit of Messianic
preparation for the world was her gift of a body of Scripture. This
contribution, I noted, has long been recognized by men like Augustine and
Pascal.[4] With the close of the careers of Ezra and Nehemiah—together with
those of Haggai, Zechariah, and Malachi—God’s revelation to man ceased for a
time. All that remained of that revelation was what had been written down in
the books that were to be collected into the OT canon. The closing of the OT
canon with its subsequent transmission is the third feature of the restoration
period worthy of careful attention.
1. The Closing of the Canon. When God ceased speaking
to humanity through Israel in the fifth century, B.C., there began a
four-century period of divine “silence” with a total absence of verbal
revelation and confirming miracle. Several evidences support this statement.
Not one of the many books written during this period of the silence of God ever
was considered as inspired Scripture worthy of being included in the OT canon.
Other evidences show that
the people themselves knew there was a silence. In 164 B.C., for example, when
Judas Maccabeus wanted to cleanse Antiochus’
abominations from the
Temple, he and the priests tried to decide what to do: “They deliberated what
to do about the altar of burnt offering, which had been profaned. And they
thought it best to tear it down, lest it bring reproach upon them, for the
Gentiles had defiled it. So they tore down the altar, and stored the stones in
a convenient place on the temple hill until there should come a prophet to
tell them what to do.” (I Maccabees 4:44-46)
In addition to a lack of
biblical writing and prophetic activity, there were no great sign miracles
after the restoration. Such an absence of miracles can be explained easily by
referring to the purpose of miracles in the Bible. According to Deuteronomy
18:22 miracles were to authenticate the prophet. As Sir Robert Anderson has
written: It is nowhere suggested [in Scripture] that [miracles]. were given to
accredit the teaching; their evidential purpose was solely and altogether to
accredit the Teacher.”[5] Thus if there were no prophets, if the teachers had
ceased, then obviously the purpose of miracles had ceased. The absence, therefore,
of public miracles in the four centuries between the end of the OT and the
advent of Jesus Christ further attests to the overall purpose of God.
In the fifth century when this miracle-barren silence had just begun, there was a movement in Israel to collect and codify Scripture. Tradition says that Ezra had something to do with the gathering together the individual books of the Bible into one canon.[6] Regardless, of who actually did the work, however, it is known that by the first century BC a developed idea of an OT canon and a reasonable standard list of books included therein definitely existed. The OT canon had closed and had become a stable collection.
The Transmission of the
Canon Text.
Once the OT canon existed in a collect form, the matter of transmission arose.
How could such a textual work be passed over the centuries down to this very
time with any degree of accuracy? Although not everything about textual
transmission is understood, enough information is available to conclude that
the OT text was handed down with extreme accuracy. Prof. Yamauchi writes:
“Prior to the discovery of
the Qumran manuscripts our oldest extant Old Testament texts were those known
as the Masoretic text dating from the tenth century, AD . . . The traditional
text of the Old Testament preserved in our medieval manuscripts is called the
Masoretic Text (MT) after the editorial work of the Jewish scribes known as
Masoretes. They labored from the fifth to the ninth century, introducing vowels
into the consonantal text and adding notes in the margins. We were not sure how
accurate the work of the Masoretes and their predecessors was. Thanks to Qumran
we know that the MT goes back to a Proto-Masoretic edition antedating the
Christian era, and we are assured that this recension was copied with
remarkable accuracy.[7] In other words, the recent findings in the Qumran caves
near the Dead Sea of early manuscripts of OT books (dating as far back as two
centuries before Christ) show clearly that the OT text did not change significantly
between Christ’s time and 1000 AD.
Exactly how there came to be
a fairly standard OT text in Christ’s time is not well understood. [8]
Apparently Ezra began a movement to “update” the OT text into the language of
the people (Neh. 8:1, 2, 8). Scribes after him copied his text-type, portions
which show up at Qumran and which may form the forerunner of the Greek
translation in Egypt of the OT known as the Septuagint (LXX). While this
copying was going on in Palestine and in Egypt among the restoration remnant of
Jews, other Jews still in Babylon also faithfully copied the OT text.
Eventually, the Babylonian text-type came West to Palestine and was selected as
the “standard” text for many book of Scripture. Examples of differences in
textual readings of Isaiah 53:1-5 between the Masoretic text-descendent from
the Babylonian text and the Palestinian text represented at Qumran and in the
LXX are shown in Table Five.
|
Verse of Isa. 53:1-5 |
Hebrew Masoretic Text (ca. 980 AD) |
Hebrew Qumran Isaiah Scroll A (ca. 125 BC) |
Greek Septuagint (LXX) (ca. 200 BC) |
|
1 |
on whom |
to whom |
to whom |
|
2 |
form* comeliness see him* desire him* |
form* comeliness** see him* desire him* |
form comeliness see him beauty |
|
3 |
man of sorrows known by grief he was despised |
man of sorrows knows grief we despised him |
man in calamity knows grief he was despised |
|
4 |
he has borne* |
he has borne* |
he has borne |
|
5 |
by his wound |
by his wounds |
by his wound |
Table 5.—Differences in
textual readings for Isaiah 53:1-5 between the modern Masoretic text and the
Palestinian text of Qumran and the LXX. Asterisk (*) refers to spelling
differences; double asterisk (**) means synonym used. The believer can be assured,
therefore, that the OT canon text has been transmitted accurately by means not
well understood but obviously under the sovereignty of God. This idea will be
further expanded in the following section on the doctrine of canonicity.
Israel’s blessing for the families of man has survived centuries of
transmission down to the present moment. Thus the OT closing and preservation,
as well as the divine decree given to Daniel regarding Israel’s future history
until the Messiah would come and the ministry of the last OT prophets to speak
God’s Word to man, comprises the restoration era.
When God restored the
remnant of Jews in the fifth century according to his promise, He gave much
information to encourage the development of the “long-range” faith I spoke of
in the previous chapter. There we learned about the need for such long-range
faith for believers to survive centuries of suffering under the reign of the
imperial Kingdom of Man. They had to be forcefully reminded that the apparent
invincible and “normal” character of the pagan world rule was a profound
illusion. Even the returning remnant would need this vision to keep separated
from the ideas of the surrounding pagan powers. Crucial to this long-range
faith was the preservation of its source—the OT Scripture. Additionally,
clarification of the role of prayer in an age of God’s “silence” was needed.
Both these areas of concern will now be addressed:.
The Doctrine of Canonicity:
Preservation. Elsewhere it has been taught that canonicity
concerns the matter of the existing body of books of Scripture left from the
time of historic revelation.[9] Included in the doctrine of canonicity is the
matter of the origin of the canon concept itself through the giving of a
covenant or contract. For a covenant/contract to remain in legal force
generation after generation there has to be a legal standard of reference
testifying to the terms of the covenant. Yahweh’s covenants with Israel
presuppose the existence of a legal canon or standard of reference. Also
included in the doctrine of canonicity is the proper source of the canon: did
Israel make the Bible or did the Bible make Israel? Chronologically, of course,
Israel made the Bible; but, logically, the Bible was the standard which ruled,
molded, and judged Israel. Finally, the doctrine of canonicity includes the
problem of the boundaries of the canon, i.e., which books ought to have been
included and which ought not to have been included. Only those that were
written under the direction of prophets with proper theological consistency
(Deut. 13:1-5) and empirical validity (Deut. 18:20-22) qualified for entrance
into the OT canon.
To those three points in the
doctrine of canonicity a fourth point now can be added: the preservation of the
canon down through history. After clarifying the issue at stake, the present
discussion will lead to the proper resolution of the issue with an
understanding of God’s providential preservation of the Bible. The Issue: The
necessity of a canon for proper functioning of a covenant, the role of a canon
in ruling spiritual matters of the believing community, and the proper
boundaries of a canon are important factors in canonicity. One can and should
insist upon inerrantly inspired Scripture in the autographs, or original
writings. The problem which must be faced, however, is this: what good is the
canon if it has not been accurately preserved throughout history so that the
Word of God is available today? What good is an inerrant autograph if there are
no texts today which precisely reflect it? Quasi-biblical cults that rely on
post-biblical texts like Islam and Mormonism try to contrast the supposedly
“unbroken” line between their original texts and today’s texts. It is
important, therefore, for us to examine preservation of the biblical writings.
During the eras of active
revelation in history, Scripture was sometimes destroyed, but since there were
living prophets in those eras, that same Scripture could be replaced (e.g.,
Jer. 36). Moreover, the continuing line of prophets could constantly update
archaic terms and passages (e.g., notices in Jud. 18:30b; I Sam. 9:9; II Sam.
18:18b). Preservation of the canon, then, during times of active revelation is
not the issue. What is the issue is the preservation of the canon during times
of silence when revelation has ceased. One must note, too, that the issue is
not the relatively low percent of variability in data such as that displayed in
Table Five. The issue concerns not statistics but whether one can speak at all
of the Word of God when he has only modern-day manuscripts in his hand. Has the
OT canon been preserved since the fifth century, BC, so that the OT text in
modern translations is the Word of God? Has the NT text been similarly preserved
since the end of the first century AD?
Resolution of the Issue. The resolution of the
issue follows a definite line of reasoning. Textual variation of the OT was
greater between the fifth century, B.C. and the time of Christ than between
Christ’s time and the present. Christ and the apostolic writers of the NT fully
accepted the OT text of their day, with all its textual variation, as the Word
of God. Since Christ and the NT writers accepted an OT text with greater
variation than the OT text of today, the OT text of today also can be accepted
by modern believers as the Word of God, in spite of minor textual
variations.[10]
The great textual fluidity
of NT times is attested by the numerous variations in the LXX OT text, NT
quotes from the OT that appear to be from yet another Greek translation of the
OT, and the various different Hebrew text-types found at Qumran. As Prof. Cross
states:
“The pre-Christian Hebrew
text exhibits recensional variation which differs toto caelo from the variation
exhibited after the promulgation of the official Hebrew (consonantal) text. . .
. The text established about 100 AD appears to be the culmination of rabbinic
recensional activity which began perhaps a century or more earlier, to judge
from the Qumran texts. [11]
In other words, believers
who lived during NT times faced far more variations in the OT text than
believers living today. If any excuse could be found that the Word of God was
not available, those people of the NT era would have been more justified in claiming
it than modern people who have the statically-preserved Masoretic Text which
became “standard” abound AD 100.
It was this pre-AD 100
environment that Christ and the NT writers insisted that not only they but all
the people had the OT Word of God available. Numrous evidences of their claim
can be given. In Matthew 22:32 Jesus builds the doctrine of the resurrection on
a fine textual point which He insisted the general public ought to have read
(v. 31). The Pharisees did not object that the textual variation was so great
that Jesus’ point could not be valid! In Luke 16:29 Jesus’ story about Abraham
and Lazarus implied that the general public had the Word of God available in
its OT versions of Moses’ writings. Certainly Jesus was aware of the textual variations
between the LXX and the Hebrew versions when He told this story. The apostle
James made precisely the same claim in Acts 15:21 when he stated that Jews
throughout the world, with all the different textual variations then in use,
had the Word of God.
The most powerful evidence
that the Word of God was available to all believers, in spite of textual
variation, however, can be found in Hebrews 7:14. Here the author of Hebrews
argued that the existing text of Moses’ writings said nothing about the tribe
of Judah’s being connected with the priesthood. This author’s statement would
have been nonsense if neither he nor his readers could have been sure that
their own manuscripts accurately conveyed what Moses had written. The whole
point of Hebrews 7:14 presupposes that nothing had dropped out of the OT text
throughout the four-century period of silence between Malachi and Jesus.
The proper resolution of the
issue, therefore, is that God somehow preserved the OT canonical text during
four centuries of prophetic silence such that the existing manuscripts in NT
times could, for all intents and purposes, be considered as the Word of God.
This fact being so, modern believers can be confident that today’s manuscripts,
too, are the Word of God in spite of obvious textual variations here and there.
The truth of the
preservation of the canonical texts implies something about human language. Human
language can have textual and semanitc range without nullifying its meaning.
In fact, translation of the OT from Hebrew to Greek and the subsequent
identification of the Greek text as the Word of God by Jesus and the Apostles
imply that translation in principle does not nullify meaning either.
After all, it was God who fractured human language at Babel centuries earlier
knowing full well that He would need to disseminate His Word to all men
everywhere. For the gospel to have meaning across multiple languages, human
language after Babel must carry a sufficient “translationability.” Thus the
objection of Islam that the Word of Allah cannot be translated from the Arabic
original and still technically remain the Word of Allah is built upon a theory
of language foreign to the Bible.
The Doctrine of Prayer. In addition to the doctrine
of canonicity, the doctrine of prayer is another doctrinal consequence of the
restoration period. During the exile and restoration believers lived under the
intensified dominion of the Kingdom of Man which closely parallels the modern
environment of prayer in which God is “silent” and is not doing major sign
miracles. Prayer, in both cases, would be in the atmosphere of this silence.
Although it occurred before the end of revelation, the prayer in Daniel 9,
being given in the midst of an alien culture where God was not ruling as He had
done in Israel, forms a valuable model for the doctrine of prayer. Four
principles of prayer follow.
1. Prayer Should Avoid
Fatalism. Prayer
is killed by the heresy of fatalism. Fatalism insists that “what will be, will
be,” regardless of the means necessary to execute that which “will be.” In the
area of prayer fatalism argues that prayer effort is unnecessary because God is
going to do His will anyway. In the Bible, however, one reads many passages
such as “ye have not, because ye ask not (Jas. 4:2b), a statement which clearly
implies that prayer can be a means of effecting God’s sovereign will. Biblical
believers were not fatalists. For example, David continued to petition God for
the life of his infant son, even though God had made it clear that the child
would die (II Sam. 12: 14, 16). God might be persuaded in prayer to change His
mind, David believed (II Sam. 12:22). Daniel also, in spite of the prophecies
of Daniel 2 and 7, continued in this prayer to beseech God to grant Israel her
final, ultimate return in 535 BC (Dan. 9:15-19). As a result God supplied
Israel with revelation concerning His decree of the 490 years so that Jewish
believers of the restoration would have hope. Although Daniel’s exact petition
was not answered, God gave Israel something which she would not have otherwise
enjoyed had no one prayed.
Man was created to be the
lord of history within the creation, and part of the means of his subduing the
earth under his feet is prayer. Denial of the necessity of means to accomplish
foreordained ends is a denial of creation itself. All forms of fatalism,
therefore, must be rejected as detrimental to prayer.
2. Prayer Should Be Built
Upon God’s Immutability. Prayer depends upon the fact that God faithfully keeps His Word (see God’s
immutable nature mentioned in Mal. 3:1-6; Heb. 6:17; Jas. 1:17). Daniel knew
that the God of Israel would keep His covenantal obligations (Dan. 9:4); thus,
he could—and did—pray upon this basis.
If God is immutable, then it
follows that the best prayer will have well-designed, thought-out petitions
centering upon the Word of God. To insure that one’s petitions are biblically
sound and therefore that sufficient reasons exist for God to answer them on the
basis of His covenant promises, one may have to write out his petitions first
before he prays. Daniel’s prayer, for example, is filled with vocabulary
borrowed from Deuteronomy and Jeremiah, books on God’s covenantal promises
which Daniel certainly studied often. Moreover, the structure of his prayer shows
that it was composed before it was actually prayed before God. By thus fitting
prayer petitions into God’s known will declared in Scripture, one truly prays
“in the Spirit” (Eph. 6:18) to this covenant-keeping God.
3. Prayer Should Be
Thoroughly Grace Oriented. In Part III we discovered in connection with the call of Abraham,
that faith is orientation to grace. Prayer, being an activity of faith, must
therefore be oriented to God’s grace. Simply put, the petitioner must be
assured that God accepts him.
When Daniel prayed, he was
very conscious of his own sin and God’s holiness (Dan. 9:5-14). Confession is
an integral part of prayer (Psa. 66:18). It must be consciously clear to the
petitioner that he has no merit with God in prayer apart from the continuing
grace extended to him through Jesus Christ. In the present moment, in spite of
past divine promises, the only actual acceptance a petitioner has with God is
what God is currently extending to him in Christ, i.e., the grace being given
to him. The opposite of being oriented to God’s grace is arrogance, the belief
that God owes him something because of my own merit.
Proper grace orientation
balances the first principle above in which fatalism is rejected. Grace
orientation prevents one from drifting to the opposite extreme from fatalism,
that of thinking that everything depends upon what he does or does not do.
Accomplishments can only come to pass through the grace extended to the
believer by God.
4. Prayer Should Have For
Its Ultimate Objective the Glory of God. Since all of history has as its objective the
glory of God (Rev. 4:11; 5:9), prayer, too, ought to have the exposure of God’s
true nature to all creation as its ultimate objective. The great prayers of the
Bible all possess this characteristic. Daniel’s prayer set forth its petition
primarily for the sake of God Himself (Dan. 9:17-19), not primarily for the
sake of Israel.
This fourth prayer principle
makes possible the attitude shown by Jesus in Gethsemane when He said “not as I
will, but as thou wilt” (Matt. 26:39). Higher purposes than merely the
immediate situation are involved in prayer.
SUMMARY
The restoration era was the last period of history recorded in the OT. Part of Israel remained in dispersion, and part participated in restoration. Under Gentile political supremacy, God’s elect nation did not manifest any longer the clear marks of the Kingdom of God. Nevertheless, her election was still manifest because she had survived seventy years of defeat to be regathered (partially) in the promised land. God’s revelation to Israel ceased, but she gave to the world the complete canon of God’s Word. Israel’s enjoyment of full-orbed fellowship with God was not then granted, but here glorious future was as certain as ever.
As the world was prepared
for the advent of Jesus Christ, God insured that man everywhere had His Word so
that His promises could be verified in history. The silence of heaven, far from
being a rejection of mankind, was to focus man’s attention upon His Word. Does
the Word occupy your mind daily? Do you think in terms of it in all your
affairs (cf. Deut. 6:7)? Of, in rebellion, do you insist that God break His
silence for your sake even though you pay no attention to His Word?