Places to pray for in desperate times – Israel

Given Christ’s own love for the Jews how can we not want to pray for the people of Israel?

The land in which so much of the Bible is set, the land where our Saviour walked and taught and went to the cross for us. A land now economically secure despite massive financial investment in defense expenditure due to the centuries of conflict with the neighbouring Arab lands.

But a land of blindness, the largest grouping being Jews, followed by Muslims, making up together some 92% of the population with Christians (incl nominal Christians making up only 2%

Today Christians hold very diverse views as to the future of the Jews and any part they might or might not have yet to play in Redemptive History, and consequently have very different ideas about what to pray (if anything) for them, but if you want to pray for the Jews, then pray as Paul did:

Rom 9:1 I am speaking the truth in Christ—I am not lying; my conscience bears me witness in the Holy Spirit—
Rom 9:2 that I have great sorrow and unceasing anguish in my heart.
Rom 9:3 For I could wish that I myself were accursed and cut off from Christ for the sake of my brothers, my kinsmen according to the flesh.
Rom 9:4 They are Israelites, and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises.
Rom 9:5 To them belong the patriarchs, and from their race, according to the flesh, is the Christ, who is God over all, blessed forever. Amen.
Rom 9:6 But it is not as though the word of God has failed. For not all who are descended from Israel belong to Israel,
Rom 9:7 and not all are children of Abraham because they are his offspring, but “Through Isaac shall your offspring be named.”
Rom 9:8 This means that it is not the children of the flesh who are the children of God, but the children of the promise are counted as offspring.

Rom 10:1 Brothers, my heart’s desire and prayer to God for them is that they may be saved.
Rom 10:2 For I bear them witness that they have a zeal for God, but not according to knowledge.
Rom 10:3 For, being ignorant of the righteousness of God, and seeking to establish their own, they did not submit to God’s righteousness.
Rom 10:4 For Christ is the end of the law for righteousness to everyone who believes.

They stand before God in exactly the same place as any gentile – either secure in Christ, or condemned outside of Christ –

Rom 3:9 What then? Are we Jews any better off? No, not at all. For we have already charged that all, both Jews and Greeks, are under sin, Rom 3:10 as it is written: “None is righteous, no, not one; …..

Rom 3:23 for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God,
Rom 3:24 and are justified by his grace as a gift, through the redemption that is in Christ Jesus,

Oh friend, that God would turn stubborn proud hearts to Christ in true repentance and faith! Will you not pray for the people of Israel and for the millions of Jews around this world?

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