Why The Hope of The Bible Is Called The Hope of Israel
Is the Church's hope different from Israel's?
A generation ago in 1970, an evangelical seminarian and prophecy expositor named Hal Lindsey wrote a bestseller called The Late Great Planet Earth.
Still in print after selling over 15 million copies, its author lived to be 95. He died in late 2024. The book contains these startling statements:
- For us, as believers, our hope is different from Israel’s…[p. 139]
- First there is a great distinction between God’s purpose for the nation of Israel and His purpose for the Church, which is His main program today. [p. 142].
Many of the conclusions which Hal Lindsey set out in his book are based on this divergence between God’s purpose for the nation of Israel and the Church. But is this dichotomy what the Bible teaches?
Why Paul said he was a prisoner
When the apostle Paul was imprisoned in Rome at the end of his life, he told the Jewish leaders in Rome:
After three days he called together the local leaders of the Jews, and when they had gathered, he said to them, “Brothers, though I had done nothing against our people or the customs of our fathers, yet I was delivered as a prisoner from Jerusalem into the hands of the Romans... I was compelled to appeal to Caesar—though I had no charge to bring against my nation.
For this reason, therefore, I have asked to see you and speak with you, since it is because of the hope of Israel that I am wearing this chain”
- Acts 28:17;19-20
Why did Paul tell the Jews in Rome that he was a prisoner “because of the hope of Israel” if Israel’s hope was different from that of the Church?
The failure to grasp that there is one hope in the Bible is a serious mistake. The Bible hope is not fragmented between Christians and Jews, between the Church and Israel.
Last updated 2025-03-21 Next update scheduled 2025-04-21