'God created the nation of Israel': Pastor Robert Jeffress weighs in on Cruz-Carlson debate

Jeffress never misses an opportunity to bend his theology to fit his politics, does he?

iluvatar5150 said:

Jeffress never misses an opportunity to bend his theology to fit his politics, does he?

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The Israel lobby in the US did alot to carefully craft a narrative of its country's origins favorably, and comprehensible, to Americans, obscuring the role that British colonialism and double-dealing played in the entire region, or the fact the founding Israeli ideologies had nothing to do with American notions of freedom. Instead, they used "Cowboys vs. Indians" and "Frontier" tropes, carefully selected to appeal to Americans. Premil dispensationalism was just the icing on the cake.

FireDragon76 said:

Premil dispensationalism was just the icing on the cake.

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Was it, though? My experience growing up in that milieu was that those folks fetishized Israel way before they would’ve been exposed to their lobbying. Unless Israel was lobbying John Hagee back in the 80’s.

And now it’s them and the NAR folks running things.

iluvatar5150 said:

Was it, though? My experience growing up in that milieu was that those folks fetishized Israel way before they would’ve been exposed to their lobbying. Unless Israel was lobbying John Hagee back in the 80’s.

And now it’s them and the NAR folks running things.

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The Israel lobby had to appeal at one time to the bulk of Americans that were amillenialists or postmillenialists, or seldom thought of eschatology at all. Think of the majority of Catholics, Presbyterians, Methodists, and Episcopalians in the 1950's. Premillenialism didn't really get on the wider cultural radar until the 1970's in the US, when the aformentioned churches had started to decline.

FireDragon76 said:

The Israel lobby had to appeal at one time to the bulk of Americans that were amillenialists or postmillenialists, or seldom thought of eschatology at all. Think of the majority of Catholics, Presbyterians, Methodists, and Episcopalians in the 1950's. Premillenialism didn't really get on the wider cultural radar until the 1970's in the US, when the aformentioned churches had started to decline.

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But was Israel lobbying us fundies back then? I wouldn’t have thought so. We were pretty fringey.

I remember Australia's 4 Corners (ABC Current Affairs flagship) about 15 something years ago saying there were 4 times as many Christian Zionists (for whatever eschatological position) as there were Jews on the planet! This is what drives American policy in the Middle East.

Not Israel being our only 'democratic friend' in the area (because are they really democratic and liberal with behaviour like this?)

Would that they would have the same passion for countries like Armenia or Christian communities like the Copts. But no, Israel first.

Ignatius the Kiwi said:

Would that they would have the same passion for countries like Armenia or Christian communities like the Copts. But no, Israel first.

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I would also note that megachurch pastors who say that it is a tenet of the Christian faith to directly support Israel are actually endangering the persecuted Oriental Orthodox, Copts, Syriac Orthodox, Armenian Apostolic Christians, and the persecuted Antiochian Orthodox and other Eastern Orthodox Christians in the region, such as the Greek and Arabic members of the Patriarchate of Jerusalem (which also has a surprising number of converts from Judaism), and the monks and Bedouin laity of the autonomous Church of Sinai at the Monastery of St. Catharine, and the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate of Alexandria, and the Phanariot Greeks in Constantinople. It should be noted by the way that in the Middle East, extremely good EO-OO relations exist (except at the Church of the Nativity where occasionally the Greeks and Armenians have had disagreements, but not recently, the last major dispute was in 2008) prevail, with ecumenical agreements between the Copts and Alexandrian Greeks and the Antiochians and Syriac Orthodox, the latter being particularly strong (to the extent that Old Calendarist schismatics like to whine about it on their numerous blogs and try to argue that the “world orthodox” are heretical.

Of course, if Israel suddenly collapsed, that would be bad for the Christians who live in Israel and Palestine and worse for religious minorities in Israel like the Druze, as the recent genocide against the Christians and moreso the Druze and Alawis in Syria indicates.

Additionally if Iran did obtain a nuclear weapon, there is a concern it would use it, even accepting Israeli nuclear retialiation, against Tel Aviv, which would endanger the Christian pilgrimage site of Mount Carmel.

Thus, we should neither support nor oppose Israel, but lobby Israel to adopt pro-Christian policies and not to adopt policies which could further endanger the Christian minority elsewhere in the region.