WHY SHOULD CHRISTIANS SUPPORT ISRAEL?

By Marilyn Brown October 2026

Firstly, because God Himself loves Israel and chose her to be the place wherein His plan of
salvation would unfold. At the time of the fall of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden, God warned
the serpent (Lucifer) that He would deal him a death blow through “the seed” of a woman
(Messiah’s being born of a virgin):

“And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed;
He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel.” (Genesis 3:13)
In Genesis 12:2-3, God promised Abram that, through his lineage (Abraham, Isaac and
Jacob/Israel), “all the families of the earth shall be blessed”. It should be impossible for the
Christian to feel anything but gratitude for the formation of Israel and the people of Israel who
gave rise to our Messiah and Saviour, Yeshua/Jesus.

So important was this coming nation to God and His plan of salvation, that He said to Abram, “I
will bless those who bless you, and I will curse him who curses you” (Genesis 12:3). He proclaims
Himself to be Israel’s husband: “For your Maker is your husband, the Lord of Hosts is His name;”
(Isaiah 54:5). And, in the same passage, God pours out His love for rebellious Israel: “For a mere
moment I have forsaken you, but with great mercies I will gather you. With a little wrath I hid My
face from you for a moment; but with everlasting kindness I will have mercy on you” (Isaiah 54:7-
8).

Jesus shows this same passion for the nation when He looked out over Jerusalem and cried, “O
Jerusalem, Jerusalem, the one who kills the prophets and stones those who are sent to her! How
often I wanted to gather your children together, as a hen gathers her chicks under her wings, but
you were not willing!” (Matthew 23:37)

When Jesus was dying an agonising death on a Roman cross, so great was His love for humanity
– both Jew and Gentile – that He cried out to God, “Father, forgive them, for they do not know what
they do” (Luke 23:34).

And, when speaking of His return to earth as King of Kings, He reiterates the blessings and curses
of Genesis 12:3: “When the Son of Man comes in His glory…..He will sit on the throne of His glory.
All the nations will be gathered before Him…..and He will set the sheep on His righty hand, but
the goats on His left. Then the King will say to those on His right hand, ‘Come, you blessed of My
Father, inherit the kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry
and you gave Me food; I was thirsty and you gave Me drink; I was a stranger and you took Me in; I
was naked and you clothed Me; I was sick and you visited Me; I was in prison and you came to
Me……Assuredly, I say to you, inasmuch as you did it to one of the least of these My brethren (the
Jews), you did it to Me.’ Then He will also say to those on the left hand, ‘Depart from Me, you
cursed, into the everlasting fire prepared for the devil and his angels….Assuredly, I say to you,
inasmuch as you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’” (Matthew
25:31-46)

And, possibly most importantly of all, it will be the Jewish response that will bring about Messiah’s
return: “See! Your house is left to you desolate; for I say to you, you shall see Me no more till you
say, ‘Blessed is He who comes in the name of the Lord’” (Matthew 23:38-39). “And I will pour on
the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then
they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only
son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn….They will call on My name, and I will answer
them. I will say, ‘This is My people’; and each one will say, ‘The Lord is my God.’” (Zechariah 12:10-
13:9).

From a purely humanitarian point of view, when someone who professes to be a Christian says,
with sapient nod and tightened lips, “I do not approve of what’s happening in Gaza!” one can only
cry in bewilderment, “But what about October 7th?! How soon even Christians have forgotten the
horror of that day – we, who should love Israel as our Saviour loves her!

THIS WAR IS NOT ABOUT LAND

The “two-state solution” has been obsessed over for more than 85 years, without resolution,
because the Arabs do not want anything short of the annihilation of Israel itself!
“The Arabs never miss an opportunity to miss an opportunity.” [As quoted in The Jerusalem Post
(18 November 2002); the quote is attributed to Abba Eban after the Geneva Peace Conference
with Arab countries (21 December, 1973)].

1937: Offer by the British Peel Commission: Rejected outright by Arab leader ship.
1947: U.N. Partition Plan: Rejected by Arab states; accepted by Jewish Agency
1949: Armistice Negotiations: Arab states refused recognition
1967: Post Six-Day War – Israel signalled readiness to withdraw from territories in exchange for
peace and recognition: Khartoum Resolution – No peace, no recognition, no negotiations.
1978-1979: Camp David Accords (Egypt-Israel: P.L.O. rejected. Egypt accepted for itself.
1993-1995: Oslo Accords: P.L.O. accepted; Hamas rejected. Final status and talks later stalled.
2000: Camp David Summit (Barak/Arafat/Clinton): Arafat rejected without counter-offer.
2001: Taba Talks: Palestinian state, land swaps, shared Jerusalem. P.L.O. walked away.
2008: Olmert Offer: Mahmoud Abbas did not accept; later admitted he “did not respond in time”.
2014: Kerry Framework: Talks collapsed; each side blamed the other.
2020: Trump “Peace to Prosperity” Plan: P.L.A. rejected outright; refused to engage.

THIS IS A SPIRITUAL WAR

This war had its genesis in the heavenly realm before time began, when Lucifer decided to
demand equality with God.

This is a war between Judeo/Christianity and Islam; a war between God and Satan. 1 John 3:8
tells us: “For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that He might destroy the works of the
devil.”

“For though we walk in the flesh, we do not war according to the flesh. For the weapons of our
warfare are not carnal but mighty in God for pulling down strongholds,….” (2 Corinthians 10:3-4)
“For we do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against
the rulers of the darkness of this age, against spiritual hosts of wickedness in the heavenly
places.” (Ephesians 6:12)

The great lie of Replacement Theology – the idea that the Church has replaced Israel as the
recipient of God’s promises (no mention of the curses!) – has absolutely no Biblical foundation,
but, still, it infects vast swathes of the so-called Christian church, rendering it smug and impotent
spiritually!

The Bible is the story of Jesus Christ, from Genesis to Revelation: His first coming as “the Lamb
of God who takes away the sin of the world”, to deal with the problem of sin and to reconcile us
to a loving God, and His second coming as King of Kings and Lord of Lords to finally put an end to
Satan’s rule over the earth.

The Bible is also the story of Israel, from Genesis to Revelation: The Old Testament, Genesis to
the Prophets, is about the establishment of the land of Israel in preparation for the Messiah; the
Prophets prepared the people for the coming Messiah. The whole of the New Testament is about
that promised Messiah.

The New Testament begins with the very Jewish genealogy of Jesus, He was born in the Jewish
town of Bethlehem and was raised in the Jewish town of Nazareth. He was baptized in the Jordan
River in Israel by His Jewish cousin, John. His ministry began in Galilee, fulfilling the prophecy of
the Jewish prophet, Isaiah (9:1-2). His 12 disciples were all Jewish and Jesus’ ministry was
exclusively to the Jews: “I was not sent except to the lost sheep of the house of Israel” (Matthew
15:24). He was tried and crucified in Israel’s capital, Jerusalem, and buried in the tomb of a rich
Jewish man. When He rose from the dead, He went again into Galilee and appeared to many – all
Jewish people. After Jesus’ return to heaven, those who went out into all the world to preach the
gospel were all Jews.

Leading up to Jesus’ return, the seven-year Tribulation is called “Jacob’s (Israel’s) trouble”
(Jeremiah 30:4-7) and will be focussed on Jerusalem. 144,000 Jewish men will be raised up to
preach the gospel to the world: “And I heard the number of those who were sealed. One hundred
and forty-four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel….” (Revelation 7:4).

The Song of Moses, a Jew, will be sung in heaven: “Then I saw another sign in heaven……And I
saw something like a sea of glass mingled with fire, and those who have the victory over the
beast…..standing on the sea of glass….They sing the song of Moses, the servant of God, and the
song of the Lamb….” (Revelation 15:1-3).

Jesus will return to Israel: “Behold, the day of the Lord is coming…..Then the Lord will go forth and
fight against those nations…..and, in that day, His feet will stand on the Mount of Olives…..”
(Zechariah 14:1-4).

And, finally, in the eternal kingdom, Israel is honoured forever, both under the Old Covenant and
the New Covenant: “Now I saw a new heaven and a new earth, for the first heaven and the first
earth had passed away….Then I, John, saw the holy city, New Jerusalem…..descending out of
heaven from God…..she had a great and high wall with twelve gates….and names written on
them, which are the names of the twelve tribes of the children of Israel…..Now the wall of the city
had twelve foundations, and on them were the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb.”
(Revelation 21:1, 10-12, 14).

The Lord Jesus Christ taught us the model prayer: “Our Father in heaven, hallowed by Your name;
Your kingdom come and Your will be done on earth as it is in heaven.” (Matthew 6:9-10). For the
kingdom of God to come, we need Israel! And God commands us, “Pray for the peace of
Jerusalem: ‘May they prosper who love you.’” (Psalm 122:6)

Never, never should we forget this: “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten
Son, that whoever believes in Him should not perish but have everlasting life. For God did not
send His Son into the world to condemn the world, but that the world through Him might be
saved.” (John 3:16-17)

PRAY FOR THE PEACE OF JERUSALEM

MARILYN BROWN

Marilyn Brown was born in Sydney, Australia. A darkly unhappy child and passionately enamoured of
horses but unable to own one, by the age of 10, she was suffering from ulcerative colitis, a stress-related
illness, causing ulceration of the bowel. She managed to scrape through the Leaving Certificate at the
Methodist Ladies’ College, where evolutionary biology and geography were two of her subjects. At the
age of 21, an on-again/off-again relationship drove her to hand her life over to a God whose Word was
not particularly relevant as science had proven that its opening chapters were not. Classical singing
lessons produced a passion to succeed in this field and, at the age of 30, she and Max, her life-long friend
and husband of 6 years, set off for England to pursue the dream. But the Lord had other plans. Instead
of continuing her training, the colitis, which had come as acute attacks at times of stress, now became
chronic.

It was Max who directed their search for answers to the Lord, buying books on Christian healingfor them to read. It was through these books that the Lord led them both to be baptized with the HolySpirit which, soon after, prompted Marilyn to question whether David Attenbrough’s Life on Earth, showing on U.K. television at the time, were the whole story.

Could the Biblical version have any support
at all?

As the Lord always does, once we display an interest in the truth, He will see to it that we find it.
It took very few pages of a thick tome, The Creation/ Evolution Controversy, by D.L. Wysong, for the
truth to burst the bubble of the evolutionary lie. From that moment, the passion of Marilyn’s heart has
been to point people to the absolute, unshakeable truth of the Bible. The worsening level of the colitis
would send Max and Marilyn back home to Australia where they began attending Hills C.L.C. (now
Hillsong), then only 12 months old. Here they would be nurtured and encouraged to hold fast to the
Word of God and would provide an Australia-wide network of prayer as the illness continued its grim
progress over the next 10 years, culminating in a perforated bowel that would place Marilyn on lifesupport in hospital. However, after 12 years, without any fanfare, the Lord moved and the colitis began to recede so that now, contrary to all medical expectations of this disease, there have now been 19 yearsthat have been free of colitis.

When finally able to return to C.L.C., the Church that had once been Biblebased and Christ-centred seemed to be shifting away from these foundations, subtly at first and now, of course, in a landslide. It was time to move on. Marilyn continues to constantly strive to be equipped to impart Biblical truth to whomever should ask questions. “…and always be ready to give a defense to
everyone who asks you a reason for the hope that is in you…..” (1 Peter 3:15)