Context is king

A woman recently came to Jordan and told him her real estate agent was using Jeremiah 32:15 on her to pressure her into buying. The verse says, “For thus saith the LORD of hosts, the God of Israel; Houses and fields and vineyards shall be possessed again in this land.”

Jordan says, “By the way, isn’t it interesting--almost 300 times in your Bible God is described as the ‘God of Israel’? The God of the Bible is never described as the God of Ismael. He’s never described as the God of Muhammad. He’s never described as the God of America. He’s always described as the God of Israel; the God of Jacob.

"If you’re going to understand the God of the Bible you’re going to have to understand something about the nation Israel because that’s whose God He is throughout Scripture.

“But back to Jeremiah, there’s something fascinating going on in this passage. Jeremiah’s not having a very good day. Verse 2 says, ‘For then the king of Babylon's army besieged Jerusalem: and Jeremiah the prophet was shut up in the court of the prison, which was in the king of Judah's house.’

“Nebuchadnezzar has invaded the land and taken Israel captive. Jeremiah never gets carried away to Babylon like Ezekiel and Daniel but is left in Jerusalem. He prophesies that ‘Nebby’s gonna come.’ This got him in trouble. Everybody said, ‘Agh, you’re a nut job! We don’t like you!’ Well, here Nebby did come and Jeremiah is said to be carried to Babylon, stays in the land and watches his beloved nation collapse. Think about an invading army coming in and taking over.

“Jeremiah is in the land and watches the economic collapse and the cultural demise as Israel is uprooted and carried into Babylon into captivity. It would make no economic sense . . . it would be somewhere between risky and stupid in that context to go buy a piece of real estate.

“In verse 6 his uncle comes and says, ‘Look, here’s a piece of property, it’s in the family and I’m getting out of here. I’m going to get my money out of it. So Jerry, it’s yours to buy.’

“That passage’s not talking about buying a piece of real estate in 2011 in the U.S. of America, telling you, ‘No matter what the economic condition might be where you are, you can pray and get God to change your little neighborhood’s economic situation.’

“That’s not advice about buying real estate in the dispensation of grace. It’s advice about what God’s going to do with Israel. He scattered them and He said, ‘I’m going to bring them back and where it doesn’t look good now, listen, I’m not going to forget what I intended to do with my people.’

“That passage has a context. When you see the context you get over the pretext and thinking, ‘Well, I can just claim something because God said it and l like it.’ People love that verse back in Jeremiah 29:11, ‘For I know the thoughts that I think toward you, saith the LORD, thoughts of peace, and not of evil, to give you an expected end.’ But they don’t like the ones over at the end of the book about war and being scattered.

“Paul said, ‘I’ve learned; I’ve been instructed. The Scripture corrected my bad thinking and told me what was right and what the truth of what God said gave me inner fortification that I could stand and, no matter what, go ahead. ‘In all thy ways acknowledge the Lord and he will direct thy paths.’ You know that verse in Proverbs?

“If in every area of your life you acknowledge the Lord He’ll direct you. He doesn’t put a sign post down, ‘SELL NOW.’ The way He directs your path is the counsel of His Word. But that doesn’t happen unless you acknowledge Him in all the details of your life.”

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Paul writes in II Corinthians 3:6, “Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; not of the letter, but of the spirit: for the letter killeth, but the spirit giveth life.”

Jordan reasons, “It’s interesting he doesn’t say new covenant. You know the difference between a testament and a covenant?

“Hebrews 9:16 says, ‘For where a testament is, there must also of necessity be the death of the testator.’ You can have a covenant, that’s a contract, and death doesn’t enter into it. You go and buy an automobile. That sales contract does not envision your death; it envisions you living.

“A testament is something that envisions death; in fact, it doesn’t come into effect until after you die. It’s the ‘last will and testament.’ Your testament spells out the inheritance of your heirs. Verse 17 says, ‘For a testament is of force after men are dead: otherwise it is of no strength at all while the testator liveth.’

“By the way, that’s an important verse dispensationally. That verse means Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, the earthly ministry of Jesus Christ, is not in the new testament. Why? Because a testament is a force after the death of the testator and when did Jesus Christ die? At the end of those books, not the beginning, and not through almost all of the ministries in those books.

“If you can’t rightly divide the word of truth you never figure that verse but you can’t read that verse and NOT rightly divide the Scripture. You see the Bible forces you to be a dispensationalist. It’s religion that keeps that way from you.

“The old testament did not begin in Genesis, it began in the book of Exodus when God gave it to Moses. The new testament begins after the death of the Lord Jesus Christ. When he says God’s made us able ministers of the new testament, He’s talking about the fact that you and I have been given a part in the inheritance.

“Ephesians 1:11 says, ‘In whom also we have obtained an inheritance, being predestinated according to the purpose of him who worketh all things after the counsel of his own will:’ You and I, as members of the Body of Christ do not have any inheritance in what Jesus Christ won at Calvary through a covenant.

“God covenanted with the nation Israel to give those benefits to Israel. But He’s included us in the benefits of the Crosswork, not by covenant but by His grace. Not by the covenant, but by His death and resurrection. We’re not part of the covenant God made with Israel. You don’t go back there and take that statement about God making a covenant with the house of Jacob and say, ‘That’s me!’

“You say, ‘Well how do I get in?!’ You get in by God’s grace. You get in because before the foundation of the world, before He ever made the covenant with Abraham, He’d already planned to include you in the benefits of the death of His Son. He just didn’t tell anybody but now we know. He did it in a secret fashion.”