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THE TWO ISRAELS

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 19, 1901

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 78, No. 12.

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THE TWO ISRAELS

By L. D. Santee

L. D. SANTEE
“Now all these things happened unto them for ensamples [“types” margin]: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.” 1 Cor. 10:11.
When God finished the creation, the Sabbath stood forth as a prominent factor. It crowned the week's labor with a diadem of thanksgiving and praise. It was to be a day of holy joy, a fitting tribute of a sinless race. But sin reversed all. The carnal mind, man's legacy from the devil, soon filled the earth with violence and crime. But even amid the darkness of a lost world, the Star of hope shone out. In the promise that the seed of the woman should bruise the serpent's head were embodied all those events that are necessary for its fulfillment.
It embraced the second coming of the Lord, and the Judgment. I read in Jude 14: “And Enoch also, the seventh from Adam, prophesied of these, saying, Behold, the Lord cometh with ten thousand of His saints, to execute judgment upon all.” It embraced the sacrifice of Christ, and this hope found expression in the sacrificial system. It included the “restitution of all things, which God hath spoken by the mouth of all His holy prophets since the world began.” Acts 3:21. Later, God gave to Israel the land of Canaan, a type of the redeemed inheriting the earth made new; and if the people had been obedient and loyal to God, the type would have continued until it reached the antitype.
No nation ever entered a land with more glorious prospects than did Israel when they entered Canaan under the leadership of Joshua. Moses asked, “For what nation is there so great, who hath God so nigh unto them, as the Lord our God is in all things that we call upon Him for? and what nation is there so great, that hath statutes and judgments so righteous as all this law, which I set before you this day?” Deut. 4:7, 8. Not great numerically, for other nations outnumbered them, but great in having the favor and nearness of God. When the land was divided among them, they had vineyards that they had not planted, and wells and cisterns that they had not digged, and Jerusalem was already built, ready for their use. Their hands did not need to fashion the architecture nor lay the foundations.
So in the antitype. The city above is not built with hands. The land that they possessed might have been theirs for all time; for the promise of God was not limited. But alas for evil associations! By affiliation with their heathen neighbors, they were led, first into idolatry, and then to forget God's Sabbath, and then to take the first day of the week as the seal of that idolatry. God plainly set before them the results of obedience and of disobedience. It was the Third Angel's Message for their day. “And it shall come to pass, if ye diligently hearken unto me, saith the Lord, to bring in no burden through the gates of this city on the Sabbath day, but hallow the Sabbath day, to do no work therein; then shall there enter into the gates of this city kings and princes sitting upon the throne of David, . . . and this city shall remain forever.” Verse 27 tells the consequences of Sabbath-breaking: “But if ye will not hearken unto me to hallow the Sabbath day, and not to bear a burden, even entering in at the gates of Jerusalem on the Sabbath day; then will I kindle a fire in the gates thereof, and it shall devour the palaces of Jerusalem, and it shall not be quenched.”
Now by reading what God did to them afterward, it is easy to see what course they followed. Turn to 2 Chron. 36:19–22: “And they burnt the house of God, and brake down the wall of Jerusalem, and burnt all the palaces thereof with fire, and destroyed all the goodly vessels thereof: . . . to fulfill the word of the Lord by the mouth of Jeremiah, until the land had enjoyed her sabbaths: for as long as she lay desolate she kept sabbath, to fulfill three-score and ten years.” They were taken down to Babylon, there to begin the hopeless tasks of slavery, urged on by the lash, and dying in a strange land. Their wailing is pitifully voiced in the one hundred and thirty-seventh Psalm: “By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat down, yea, we wept, when we remembered Zion. We hanged our harps upon the willows in the midst thereof.” And this nation, knowing that their captivity was the result of Sabbath-breaking, must have cried, times without number, “Oh, why did we not keep the Sabbath; and, instead of this punishment, have the safety and the joys of home?” Had the Jews kept the Sabbath, they would be, to-day, a self-governing people, with their kingdom firmly established.
Now let us remember that they are the type, and we the antitype. Before us is the heavenly Canaan, even as the earthly Canaan was before them. The heavenly Jerusalem is our home, even as the earthly was theirs. We are facing the same conditions that existed in their day. The battle is still on, the old strife still continues. God says to us, as He said to them: “Hallow the Sabbath day, to do no work therein.” Jer. 17:24. The Jewish nation, in their day, sowed to the wind and reaped the whirlwind. God's professed Israel is doing the same thing. They were tested on the Sabbath, failed, and were punished. The Third Angel's Message brings the same test to us. The large number will receive the mark of the Beast, and by and by, out of the “everlasting burnings,” will lift anguished eyes, and repeat the regret, forever unavailing, “Oh, why did I not keep God's Sabbath, and escape this punishment?”
Some will escape this destruction. “And I will take you one of a city, and two of a family, and I will bring you to Zion.” Jer. 3:14. Even so, in old Israel, some escaped the captivity. “The captain of the guard left of the poor of the land to be vinedressers and husbandmen.” 2 Kings 25:12. And in the antitype, some will be loyal. Read Isa. 4:3: “And it shall come to pass, that he that is left in Zion, and he that remaineth in Jerusalem, shall be called holy, even every one that is written among the living in Jerusalem.” Again, Rev. 15:2: “And I saw as it were a sea of glass mingled with fire: and them that had gotten the victory over the Beast, and over his Image, and over his mark, and over the number of his name, stand on the sea of glass, having the harps of God.”
In the type, the condition of the Sabbath-breaker was sadder than death. “Weep ye not for the dead, neither bemoan him, but weep sore for him that goeth away: for he shall return no more, nor see his native country.” Jer. 22:10. So, in the antitype, those who receive the mark of the Beast leave hope behind.
Of the heavenly Jerusalem, I read: “And the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it.” Rev. 21:24. And their custom is told in Isa. 66:23: “From one Sabbath to another, shall all flesh come to worship before me, saith the Lord.”
In conclusion, let us read again: “Now all these things happened to them for types: and they are written for our admonition, upon whom the ends of the world are come.” Even as Israel, down among the brick kilns of Babylon, sent up their unavailing regret for Sabbath-breaking, so, from the entanglements of modern Babylon, will the bitter cry go up from myriads that are lost. God grant us the love and life and joy of heaven, instead of the “outer darkness.”