Sunday, May 17, 2009

Does God Have A Plan For The Ten Lost Tribes Of Israel?

Does God still have a plan for the ten lost tribes of Israel?

Many Christians today don't even realize that there are ten lost tribes.

So before we talk about God's plan, let's review some Biblical history first.....

After the reign of King Solomon, the land of Israel was divided into two kingdoms - the "northern kingdom" and the "southern kingdom".

The 10 northern tribes that rebelled against Solomon's son became known in the Scriptures as "the house of Israel" or as "the house of Ephraim" after the tribe of Ephraim which was one of the most dominant tribes in the northern kingdom.

3 tribes (Judah, Benjamin and the Levites) stayed in the south and they became known in the Scriptures as "the house of Judah" which referred to the most dominant tribe in the southern kingdom which was Judah.

Those two kingdoms existed side by side for several hundred years.

However, the northern kingdom (Ephraim) turned away from the Lord God and he allowed them to be invaded. Over 700 years before Jesus was born, the Assyrian empire invaded the northern kingdom and carried away the people into exile.

The northern kingdom has not been heard from since.

They became known as the ten lost tribes of Israel.

The southern kingdom (Judah) was later invaded by Babylon and also taken into exile, but later they were allowed to return to their land. The Jews (Judah) lived in the land of Israel until 70 A.D. when the Romans destroyed the Temple and scattered the Jews to the four winds.

There was no nation of Israel from 70 A.D. until 1948 when the modern nation of Israel was established and millions of Jews (Judah) starting returning to the land of their ancestors.

But what about the northern kingdom?

What ever happened to the ten lost tribes of Israel?

Did you know that the Scriptures very clearly teach that in the last days the southern kingdom (Judah) and the northern kingdom (Ephraim) will be reunited in the land of Israel once again?

Ezekiel 37:15-23

The word of the LORD came to me: "Son of man, take a stick of wood and write on it, 'Belonging to Judah and the Israelites associated with him.' Then take another stick of wood, and write on it, 'Ephraim's stick, belonging to Joseph and all the house of Israel associated with him.' Join them together into one stick so that they will become one in your hand. "When your countrymen ask you, 'Won't you tell us what you mean by this?' say to them, 'This is what the Sovereign LORD says: I am going to take the stick of Joseph—which is in Ephraim's hand—and of the Israelite tribes associated with him, and join it to Judah's stick, making them a single stick of wood, and they will become one in my hand.' Hold before their eyes the sticks you have written on and say to them, 'This is what the Sovereign LORD says: I will take the Israelites out of the nations where they have gone. I will gather them from all around and bring them back into their own land. I will make them one nation in the land, on the mountains of Israel. There will be one king over all of them and they will never again be two nations or be divided into two kingdoms. They will no longer defile themselves with their idols and vile images or with any of their offenses, for I will save them from all their sinful backsliding, and I will cleanse them. They will be my people, and I will be their God.


So has this happened yet?

Of course not.

So that means that this prophecy is still yet to be fulfilled.

Either it will happen or God is a liar - and we know that God is not a liar.

Ephraim and Judah will be reunited once again just as the Scriptures tell us. You can also read about this reunification in Isaiah 11, Jeremiah 16, Jeremiah 23 and Zechariah 10 among other places.

Could it be possible that God is getting ready to fulfill these Scriptures?

The answer, amazingly, is yes.

God is getting ready to do something so big that it will shock the world.

God is going to gather the ten lost tribes of Israel just as He said that He would.

1 comment:

matthew daniels said...

Shalom
Your writeup concerning the 10 lost tribes of Israel is a great blessing to the body of Christ. I have being praying for Israel for 2 decade, Israel is my major ministry and the in formations you gave will help a lot. In Africa we don’t have much useful information about Israel, I would be glad to hear more from you. Thanks for being a blessing. Maranatha
Matthew Daniels