I think back to how the times of kings David and Solomon are, by large numbers of Jews, still considered Israel's 'glory days'. Then I start to ask myself: did David or Solomon ever have such hospitals, laboratories, green fields and greenhouses as does Israel today, not to mention their water-management technology which is light-years ahead of almost anyone else on earth, ESPECIALLY Israel's neighbors? Was that long-past Israel appropriately hospitable to the poor and the stranger and the non-Israelite among them? If the story of Rehoboam's succession to his father is accurate, there can be no doubt that today's Israel makes it plenty easier for the ordinary Moshe and/or Rivka to register discontent with the government--a government which can always be voted out and exchanged for another, without violence, at the next election!
As I contemplate today's Israel and compare it with ancient Israel, it seems to me that the times of David and Solomon might be better described as the days of Israel's INITIAL glory. Based on the Israel I see today, I believe that God has such glory in store for Israel that, beside it, the Israel of David and Solomon will be as a flickering candle beside a high-wattage floodlight! And NO, real peace with the neighbors will not mark its beginning! Not as long as most of those neighbors still look on Israel with the same malevolence as struggling peckerwoodies looked on both the Greenwood section of Tulsa and upon Rosewood in Florida! (For those who don't know of these things, go google them and be illumined!)
But what I think will bring Israel closer to such glory is making it a less hospitable place for billionaires and more so for the working poor and its middle class, together with the marvelous variety of ecosystems that flourish in that little space! Let there be more and better provenance for the poor and needy and may fewer Israelis be uncertain of their next meal! If Scripture tells the truth (and I believe it does) will not such measures bring Israel's next great glory closer? I believe it will! Make equal rights for ALL Israelis more of a daily reality; Israelis themselves know far better than I do what needs to be done to push that along--so I excuse myself from that debate.
We (I mean all of the West) also need to back up Israel in 1) its strengthening of ties with sub-Saharan Africa, including and perhaps especially the peoples who have shown themselves to be connections of the House of Israel and 2) administering sharp correction to ostensibly religiously-inspired attempts at murder or to set off Shoah II. Because for us in this respect, Israel is still very much our canary in the coal mine. What has happened in Israel we are now seeing in our own countries!
But above all, such aggression should never terrorize us to the extent that we forget who we are--an alliance of FREE peoples, open to admitting those who really do want to join us as equals and show that by their individual and collective actions. This is why I think Turkey ought to be suspended from NATO until and unless it re-secularizes itself!
I believe Israel still is God's 'pilot light' for the nations and that, when this twilight struggle is won as I believe it will be if we stay true to ourselves, Israel will stand in glory and be known for its light! So let us all take heart, do all we can and march on--to greater glory than has yet been known!!
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