Regathered, Reviled, & The Returning King:
Israel in the Prophetic Spotlight
Sept. 9, 2026
Host: Hon. Sam Rohrer
Guest: Chris Katulka
Note: This transcript is taken from a Stand in the Gap Today program aired on 9/09/26. To listen to the podcast, click HERE.
Disclaimer: While reasonable efforts have been made to provide an accurate transcription, the following is a representation of a mechanical transcription and as such, may not be a word for word transcript. Please listen to the audio version for any questions concerning the following dialogue.
Sam Rohrer:
Well, hello and welcome to this Wednesday edition of Stand and the Gap Today, and it’s also our bimonthly focus on Israel, the Middle East and the biblical prophecy today. Glad to have back with me returning guest Chris Katulka. He’s the vice president of North American Ministries of the Friends of Israel Gospel Ministry. And he also hosts the Friends of Israel Today radio program. Now, today we’re going to build our conversation around a powerful theme. Here’s the title I’ve come up with for this, Regathered, Reviled, and the Returning King, Israel in the Prophetic Spotlight. All of those things we’re going to touch on to some degree during the program. So stay with us. But here at the beginning, we stand here at this point in time, at this point in 2026. A looming and profound intersection is approaching on the calendar. Of course, you know what it is.
This Friday marks 25 years since the tragedy of nine eleven impacted the world. And it simultaneously marks the start of the fall feasts with Rash Hashanah. Yet the sick season arrives under, I’m going to say, a dark cloud of peril. Israel’s National Security Council, for instance, recently issued, just days ago, issued an urgent terror alert warning that Iran and its proxy network, Hamas and Hezbollah particularly, are actively coordinating to exploit the high holy days, beginning this Friday, to stage a massive, their words, October seven style surprise attack. Defense leadership there in Israel has put the nation on high alert as surprise military exercises underway reflect the grim reality of a multi-front threat. And inside Israel, going on right now, this external siege collides with a complex national emotion. We know the country. It’s navigating a fierce debate leading towards an upcoming election in the fall.
Very, very, very controversial. Domestic political divisions run deep. Yet amidst societal fatigue and diplomatic friction, Israel and Israeli leadership has asserted a resolute uncompromising posture. And this statement here I’m going to give caught my attention just a few days ago because it basically is saying this, Israel is fully prepared to go it alone and will rely on no other nation for its fundamental survival. Very key. We’re going to talk about all those things here today with guest Chris Kotalka, but Kris, welcome back and it’s so good to have you back today. What a bunch of things we have to talk about here.
Chris Katulka:
Sam, always honored to be with you. Thank you, sir.
Sam Rohrer:
Today, Chris, I’m going to follow this. Let’s look within Israel first, then we’re going to look back prophetically in the next segment. We’re going to look around to some things that are happening with anti-Israel sense and then we’re going to look ahead to Christ’s return in the last segment. But with the shadow, I’m going to put that way, of regional threats looming alongside fierce domestic internal political debates. Here’s my question. How are the Israeli people balancing spiritual reflection with the intense emotional and political fatigue? Because they’re getting tired of war, but certainly within Israel proper, I’m asking that proper, but even Jewish people generally because this is capturing every Jewish person and every person who is friendly and supportive of Jewish people it seems like.
Chris Katulka:
This is a great question, Sam. And the thing that kind of pops out at me when you ask this question is how Israelis are balancing spiritual reflection. At the heart of the Israeli, I heard this last March, March 2026, an Israeli told me we haven’t had a normal day in six years. And you go six years. I thought it was October 2023. He goes, no, no, no. We haven’t had a normal day since the pandemic started in March of 2020. So I think the Israeli people are extremely tired. They’re tired. They’re fatigued as you have been talking about. And I believe it’s created an environment of frustration within the Israeli people. But also again, what happened on October 7th has created this unity. Whatever people might think about the upcoming elections for the Israeli people on this October, October 2026, the reality is this, is that whether or not Benjamin Netanyahu becomes the prime minister again, the Israeli people are unified on certain things and that is its defense.
It might waver or they might disagree with one another on the outcomes and how it should be done. But at the end of the day, the next prime minister, whether he’s in the opposition party or he’s a Benjamin Netanyahu, guess what they’re going to do? They’re going to stand within their government and say, “We need to defend ourselves.” So this isn’t just a Netanyahu problem that the world is looking at. A lot of people are saying, “I don’t like Netanyahu.” I think no matter what prime minister comes along, it’s going to show the unity of the Israeli people that they want a prime minister who is going to push back this constant threat that they’ve been living with, not since October 7th, 2023, Sam. I like to remind our listeners, they’ve been dealing with this for decades. It’s decades upon decades upon decades of Israel trying to make some semblance of peace with the Palestinian people, some semblance of peace with their neighbors, and ultimately coming to the conclusion of nothing but terror attacks.
And so I think that the Israeli people are at a place where you can imagine that kind of frustration. The reason that the Liberal Party, which is the Labor Party, which you used to control the Israeli politics for decades going back to its founding with Ben Gurian, the reason they have no power whatsoever anymore is because year after year after year, the Israeli people were willing to make concessions to build peace with the Palestinians and their neighbors. And you know what happened? It turned into war after war, terrorism after terrorism. And they said, enough is enough. This is where we are today with the Israeli people. And so yes, they are fractured because I think a lot of Israelis are over Benjamin Netanyahu, but I also think they’re looking forward to what does the future look like for our state and our country? There’s a lot at play there.
Spiritually, I can only speak for the hearts of the Christians in Israel, the Israeli believers. And I know, I believe in this time during this difficult moment, it has forced them to their knees more than ever. It has caused them to rely on the Lord Jesus more than ever. And it has caused them to understand Israel’s place in God’s plan of redemption, but also how important the gospel is right now more than ever as there are open hearts and open ears to the good news of Yeshua Hamashiak in Israel.
Sam Rohrer:
Chris, we don’t have just a little bit left, but even in the unbelieving Jewish population, the fact that in Israel comes out and the leadership says, look, we can’t depend on anybody else anymore. We’re going to have to go it alone. That’s moving them towards, do you think moving them towards God again?
Chris Katulka:
Well, it could be. I can’t speak for every Israeli. In my mind, of course, I think that there are open hearts to the Lord and open hearts, especially to the gospel. But going it alone means we’ve got to finish this once and for all. We cannot live in a state of constant terror all the time.
Sam Rohrer:
Okay. All right. So that’s a little bit of a different definition of that. Glad you put that in there. Ladies and gentlemen, stay with us because the balance of the program’s going to be of the same type of a flavor. Next segment, we’re going to look back. Do you know that prophecy, scriptural prophecy talks about the regathering of Israel? God said he’s going to do that. We’re going to talk about how he has been and is doing it. Well, if you’re just joining us today, this is our bimonthly emphasis on Israel, the Middle East and the biblical prophecy. And today is returning guest Chris Katulka. He is the vice president of North American Ministries of the Friends of Israel Gospel Ministry. And we’re talking about a number of things today. The theme, the title that I phrased is this, Regathered, Reviled, and the Returning King, Focus Israel in the Prophetic Spotlight.
And that’s our focus here today. We talked just a little bit in the first segment about the attitude and the things that are happening inside Israel today. A lot of things happening. We’re going to look back now. We’ll shift a perspective to this because not only is Israel recent history, you can’t really talk about Israel without going back and looking at the ancient prophetic record. Because despite the severe security threats and rising global hostility that are facing the Jewish state, God’s timeless covenant promises to that nation continue to unfold in plain sight for those who have eyes to see, I’m going to say. And in a remarkable milestone, the Nafash, a nonprofit organization that helps Jewish people immigrate from North America to Israel, that organization just reported that over 1,100 North American Jews made Aliyah, that’s returning back to Israel, last month alone, just 1,100 in one month, August.
That was an historic monthly record as that organization is tracking things. And 2026 totals are now pushing towards a landmark 4,000 new arrivals. And of course we’re not done with 2026. As Mark Rosenberg, vice president of Diaspora Partnership stated at Ben Gurian Airport, he said, “It’s record breaking for us.” And I asked a question, what makes this wave of people, Jewish people moving from North America in particular and other place around the world too, but we’re just looking here, what makes that so extraordinary? It’s not just the volume, but who is coming? I actually did a little research on this to get the profile of the people. This is interesting. The average age of these immigrants has dropped to 29 years old. These are not old, worn out people that are going. These are 29-year-old average age. The influx includes 480, this is from 2026, 480 young families, 700 school-aged children, and 300 young adults explicitly moving to enlist in the Israel Defense Forces or national service.
That to me is remarkable. And far from fleeing out of desperation, people wanting to get out of the United States for a fear of their life, these are vibrant young families. They’re deliberately leaving the comfort and quasi safety of North America during an active war to plant their lives or replant their lives, raise their children and defend their ancestral homeland. This to me is remarkable. Chris, human logic to me would suggest that people run away from conflict zones, yet over a thousand North Americans, as I just talked, packed up their lives to move directly into Israel during a time of war. Here’s my question. What is driving this counter-cultural movement and how do you explain this, I’m going to say spiritual pull because that’s got to be a part of it, but how do you describe it?
Chris Katulka:
Yeah, this is amazing. And your listeners might be going, “Well, a thousand people or 4,000, that doesn’t seem like that much.” Well, number one, there’s only 15 million Jewish people in the world, Sam. So there’s not that many Jewish people to begin with. They make up less than 1% of the world’s population. And number two, the reason why this number is big for Nefesh is because if there’s another country outside of Israel where Jewish people can thrive, grow, worship as they want as Jewish people, make a living for themselves, be content outside of the land of Israel, it is in America. America to the Jewish people has always been the golden Medina. So it has always seen lower numbers of Jewish people immigrating from North America to Israel. It’s always been that way. The reason this is big news is because it’s the record-breaking number coming out of the United States and other countries in North America as well, but it’s record-breaking numbers.
And I believe the reason why is because I think you nailed it. You had given great stats there. There is a sense of, when you said spiritual, I’m glad that you said that. The Jewish people are the most interesting group of people in the world because they are both an ethnicity, a religion and a nationality at the exact same time. And that’s not a modern thing. This goes back to biblical days. They are a religion, they are a ethnicity, and they are a nationality all wrapped up in one. When you read through the Tanakh, the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament, you cannot remove the land from the story of the Jewish people. You can’t remove it. That’s why I love that you used that word in your opening statement there, the ancestral. You can’t remove that. It’s where the patriarchs are buried. It’s where the prophets spoke.
For them, when their feet touch that ground, it’s more than just North America or the United States. This is something that is bound up in everything that they believe in as Jewish people. And so it’s a conviction for them. And I do believe a spiritual one for many of them to leave their comforts of America and to move to a place that’s conflict ridden. And I’m going to tell you something, you’re just talking about conflict. Forget about conflict that you go over there. Israel’s one of the most expensive countries to live in. It’s very pricey to buy property and to rent an apartment. Finding a job is okay, but it’s not going to be easy for somebody learning the language, going from English to an ancient Semitic language like Hebrew is going to take time, acclimating into the culture. All of that is obstacles, but yet they still do it because of a deep conviction that I actually believe is almost as calling that God gives them.
I don’t know how much time we have to talk, but just 80 years ago, Sam, 80 years ago, the number one Jewish population in the world was Warsaw, Poland. That’s the number one Jewish population in the world when it comes to concentration of Jewish people. But today Poland barely has any Jewish people in it. And today, as a result, just 80 years later, the number one country with the largest Jewish population is the land of Israel. Just think about less than a century, the migration patterns of Jewish people globally have moved them from the centerpiece, which is Poland to what? Right to the land of Israel. The other country is North America, or actually where I’m sitting right now, right between Boston and Washington DC is the second largest Jewish population in the world. But just recently, Israel became that, which shows that Jewish people are migrating home.
And the more antisemitism that rises up, guess what? The more they’re going to want to move to their Jewish homeland.
Sam Rohrer:
To me, it is remarkable to see. Let’s go on in this. We have about three minutes left or whatever in this segment. When we read Old Testament passages like Ezekiel chapter 36 and Jeremiah 31 regarding the physical regathering of Israel, which is what we’re talking about in the end times, which is what we’re talking about, how does this ongoing surge of Aliyah as referred to serve as to you a tangible signpost that God is actively setting the stage for his prophetic timeline and that this is not just some ordinary time with some historical precedent?
Chris Katulka:
Number one, statistically, it’s impossible. No other people group in the history of mankind have ever been kicked out of their homeland and after 2000 years returned to their homeland and then create something in less than a hundred years to make it one of the most significant countries in the world that are blessing other nations. And then on top of that, resurrect a language that was only reserved for synagogues in the diaspora and now it’s their common language. There’s no other people group that have ever done that before. Only God’s faithfulness can be attested to the fact that Israel still matters today. And it’s the reason why Jewish people are returning back to their homeland. I also want to say this, when you talk about those passages in Ezekiel and in Jeremiah, the amazing thing about it is that Ezekiel and Jeremiah not only see the Jewish people returning to their ancient homeland, they see the reunification of that once divided kingdom.
Remember in the Old Testament after Solomon, the kingdom split between Judah and Israel. When Jeremiah speaks in Jeremiah 31, and when Ezekiel speaks, he sees not only just the fact that Jewish people are returning, he sees a reunification of every Jewish tribe that ever existed coming back into the land that God had given to them and reforming it to the way that it was supposed to be. And we can also know for certain that that wasn’t just a promise from the Old Testament, but even Jesus promised the apostles that they would rule over the 12 tribes of Israel. Even the Apostle Paul said, “Is God through with Israel? May it never be. He promised that they would return to the land as well.” So again, we not only have Old Testament evidence for it, we have New Testament as
Sam Rohrer:
Well. And Chris, what you just said there is remarkable. And to me, what we’re witnessing, for those who say, “Well, no big deal.” For those who say, “Well, God is done with Israel.” For those who say that the church has replaced Israel, for those who may say what is taking place, to me, it’s an impossibility that that can be happening. Chris, 15 seconds or whatever. Any comment on that?
Chris Katulka:
Yeah. I want to just say this. Aliyah is the Hebrew word to go up. For Israelis, it simply means immigration, but it actually is the idea of going up to Jerusalem, Zion. That’s why I’m a Zionist. I believe the Jewish people are returning to their ancient homeland.
Sam Rohrer:
And ladies and gentlemen, we’re going to conclude, stay with us, because in the last segment, we’re going to end up there in Zion, Jerusalem, because God’s redemptive plan takes us there. Now in the next segment, we’re going to look around. We looked back there in the last segment. We’re going to look around in this next one and just give some evidence of some remarkable anti-Israel, anti-Semitic, I’m going to say anti-Christ, anti-God things that are happening, also a part of where we are now. Stay with us back in just a moment. Well, moving into looking around, that’s where our focus was. We looked in, inside what’s happening in Israel right now. Last segment looked back to the prophetical aspect of God saying he would pull back. The Jewish people prophetically said would be scattered to the ends of the world. He would gather them back, which is exactly happening now.
Alaya, going back up, as my guest today, Chris Katulka from Friends of Israel said, and they have a website at foi.org, friendsofisrael.org or their magazine, israelmyglory.org. You can get a subscription there, that people are coming back. Jewish people are being pulled back. There’s a spiritual tug, we’d know that, but it’s something that only God can do, but he said he would do it and it’s happening, so we can’t and should not overlook it. In fulfillment of biblical prophecy, as we’ve talked, Jewish people, they return to their homeland and record numbers, that’s happening. I gave some of the numbers in the last segment. But as that same thing as that’s happening, international hostility toward Israel and Jewish people is reaching a fever pitch. The shift is happening. Now, I’m going to give you a couple examples. In one dramatic political diplomatic shift just happened yesterday, September 8th, was in a speech to Britain’s House of Commons.
British Foreign Secretary Ed Milleband announced a complete ban on trade from what? The West Bank, from West Bank settlements along with sweeping sanctions. Historic. He marked the strongest official action against Israel in UK history. That has happened yesterday. And Milliband went so far as to accuse Israeli government-backed settlers, the people who are in that area, and I have been to that area. I have seen those people that are there and talked with some that are there. He accused them of committing, he said, “Ethnic cleansing.” How could they, as Jewish settlers in Judea, Samaria, which is Judea because it’s Jews, Judea, I mean it’s their land. How could that be ethnic cleansing? Well, Chris will probably explain what that means, but another. State level pressure is mirrored across Western popular culture. One example, secular activism continues. It just happened under the banner, I’m going to say, of modern social justice.
Just a few days before that on Saturday, September 5th, during a concert at MetLife Stadium in New Jersey, American rapper Macklemore shouted, Free Palestine to tens of thousands of fans out there accusing Israel of apartheid and genocide before telling his. And he said this, “My Jewish brothers and sisters,” that he loves them. Now, I got to say here of note, Macklemore is not Jewish. He actually was raised Irish Catholic. And so even more ironically to me, referring to attending Jews as brothers and sisters, there’s a lot of deception going on. Anyways, this growing alignment between European foreign policy and Western celebrity culture is just one aspect to me that underscores how wokeism, or I would say the spirit of antichrist and anti-Semitism has turned the Middle East conflict into some type of a moral fashion statement, completely ignoring historical and biblical realities, weird things happening.
Okay, Chris, from British trade bands to pop stars making stadium declarations I just gave, we’re seeing Western institutions adopt a rather rigid oppressor versus oppressed framework against Israel. In your opinion, what are we really witnessing when secular activism and wokeism is weaponizing Middle Eastern politics while completely dismissing historical facts and Israel’s, as we talked about, ancestral right to exist?
Chris Katulka:
Sam, did you ever think that we would see a day when we would have a Senate candidate in Michigan, Abdul Sayed, who is an avowed Muslim? He is Muslim, follows the Islamist traditions, is also partnering with the woke left. At the crosshairs of this interesting place that we’re in right now, not in American politic, but I would say globally as well, at the crosshairs of all of it is Israel. All you have to do is go on social media. It’s a swamp of anti-Israel lies. They’re lies. And at the same time, it’s antisemitism. Everybody likes to say, “Oh, I can criticize the Israeli government and not be antisemitic.” Amen, of course you can. I think I told this to you on the last program, there are plenty of Israelis that are going to go to the polls in October to stress their disagreement with their government.
They have a democracy, it’s amazing over there. So it works really well. They’re able to share their thoughts about what they want the future of their country to be, and we will find out about that in October. But it’s very interesting to me that we are watching all of these lies being perpetrated because those same people that will say something about a lie about Israel online, if you begin to read the comments, it’s no longer about Israel. It’s about the Jews. It’s about how horrible the Jewish people are. It’s about how they control everything. They have all the power, they have all the money, they have all the influence, they control the media, they control the banks, they do this. And guess what? They’re controlling you. And so that is exactly the kind of verbiage that was coming out of the 1930s leading up to the Holocaust.
So it’s very sad to hear someone like Millivan talk because number one, he’s Jewish and he invoked his family who suffered in the Holocaust, who died in the Holocaust. He invoked their names and then tied what was going on in the West Bank to ethnic cleansing. I’m going to tell you something. In the Holocaust, there were only 15 million Jewish people, 16 million Jewish people prior to the Holocaust. Six million Jewish people were ethnically cleansed. They were systematically murdered. They’re still working their way back to pre-Holocaust Jewish numbers. That’s ethnic cleansing. The last I checked every single year, the Palestinian population, whether in the West Bank or Gaza, continues to grow exponentially. So I don’t think it’s ethnic cleansing to invoke those kind of terms is to invoke a lie. Same thing with Macklemore, to call Israel an apartheid state. It’s not an apartheid state.
I go to Israel and I serve at a hospital outside of Tel Aviv with the friends of Israel. And you know what? I meet Arab Israelis. I meet Muslim Israelis. I meet Christian Israelis. I meet Jewish Israelis. They all get along. They drink from the same water fountain. They go to the schools. They go to the same universities. Actually, Arab Muslims don’t even have to participate in the military. Only Jewish Israelis have to. They even give them the free out to say, “You don’t have to serve in the military if you don’t want to.” That’s not apartheid. There’s a lot of lies that are going around and at the center of it, of this wokeism and the social activism and the rise, I believe, of communism and socialism at the crosshairs of it is Israel, and that’s very dangerous.
Sam Rohrer:
It is dangerous, and shifting sands are happening here. Let me go to this question. Recent polling, I did a little search on this. Pew and Gallup and others show that right now, 60% of American adults now hold an unfavorable view of Israel, a dramatic jump since just two years ago. Actually, 2025, it was 50%. So the unfavorable is dramatically increasing even within the time zone we’re on here. And as American public opinion trends closer to Western Europe, so I’m going to say diplomatic hostility, which has been more present there. How does this shift, Chris, from your perspective, inside Israel’s strongest historical ally, us, the United States, how does that signal that the prophetic stage is being set for, say, Zechariah 12 where all nations ultimately turn their backs on Jerusalem? What do you think?
Chris Katulka:
Look, I’m going to tell you, I think we’re one election away from a president who could easily turn their back on Israel, easily. We’re already seeing that happen in Congress right now where typically Congress, bipartisan, Republican and Democrats were very supportive of Israel and Democrats are quickly losing that foothold, and that’s not a great place for us to be. Zechariah 12 doesn’t exclude America from all the nations that come against Israel. That is very important. I’ll just say this, I believe the epidemic that we’re seeing of the rise of this animosity toward Israel is because of what I like to call TikTok news. People, even adults who can read and understand politics aren’t going to their news sources anymore that are reliable. They’re going to TikTok news where they’re spreading antisemitism, spreading hatred about Israel, spreading lies about Israel and they’re believing it. That’s why Hamas is winning right now.
That’s why Iran is winning right now, because the TikTok news is infecting the minds of people and they don’t know what truth is. And I think that’s really important for us to make sure we’re communicating biblical truth about Israel and the Jewish people.
Sam Rohrer:
Amen, amen, Chris. And ladies and gentlemen, that’s why from the very beginning on this program, and we can’t say it more than we are saying it, the word of God is either authoritative or it’s not. If we go to anything else as our source of truth, we have stepped into the world and under the power of the man of sin, the devil himself. That’s the battle that’s taking place. So let’s keep our feet anchored on the word of God, which does not change and is frankly coming into fulfillment as we watch. Now when we come back, we’re going to look ahead because right ahead, just another day here, Rosh Hashanah, the return of Christ, the fall feast begin. And it all lines up with what we’re going to set up the 25th anniversary of nine eleven.
All right, as we go into our final segment, just one reminder, my guest today is Chris Katulka. He’s with Friends of Israel and their website FOI, friends of israel, foi.org. And they have a magazine, Israel My Glory. And if you’d want to obtain that, you can find that at Israelmyglory.org. All right, this coming Friday is September 11. Most of you who are older remember that day, it marked us all, but it also this year marks the start of the fall feast as Jews around the world, practicing Jews around the world celebrate that day, Rosh Hashanah. It’s the blowing of the shofar. It calls Israel to a season of, well, divine judgment, repentance, and the anticipation of ultimate redemption. And as we look at the converging timelines, internal division, we started the program talking about that, the unprecedented security alerts where the government of Israel saying the enemies have threatened with an imminent major event against Israel, the security alerts of all type, economic isolation from former allies, the UK, we just talked about that, rising Western cultural hostility, the mood in our own nation.
More and more and more people are looking at Israel unfavorably. It becomes clear, all these things, clear that human solutions are failing. I’m going to say just as God said they would, by the way. Earthly rulers are becoming ever more arrogant just as Psalm chapter two really foretells where they lift their fists against the God of heaven. The nations are aligning, aligning around and against Israel. We’ve talked about that in earlier programs, just like Ezekiel 38 and 39, other passages foretell. Yet scripture assures us, his people, us, that God’s plan of redemption is right on schedule and no one or nothing is going to derail his plan. Now we’ve talked in a past program about spring feasts and fall feasts. Spring feasts, they’re all fulfilled, but they were and they called out the exact day of Christ’s first coming and his death and his burial and his resurrection.
The fall feast point us directly toward the future, that which lies just ahead, the rapture of the church, the national awakening of Israel, the glorious and physical return of Jesus as King of Kings to reign from Jerusalem and concluding in the much prophesied 1,000 year millennial kingdom. All right now that’s just ahead. Chris, as true remnant believers watch the darkness deepen around Israel, all the things we’ve been talking about, why is a clear understanding of the fall feast from your perspective, specifically Rosh Hashanah, the feast of trumpets, that which comes up here on this Friday. Why is it so crucial for keeping a correct biblical perspective on today’s headlines? And put in other words, what significance does Rosh Hashanah or Feast of Trumpets hold for Christian believers? And then how are the religious Jews considering this event beginning this Friday of September 11?
Chris Katulka:
I’m glad that you asked this and you phrased it in this question, Sam. When you actually look at what God is doing, not just with the fall feast of Israel, Leviticus 23 shows us all of the holidays, spring and fall in one chapter. These are annual events, but also like you had mentioned, they also become a picture of God’s overarching plan of redemption. As spring feast, as you said, Jesus already fulfilled those and the fall feasts are prophetic feasts looking forward to the future. The thing I think it forces me, especially as a Christian, and I hope the same thing for your listeners, is it actually makes you realize that when I read the Bible, the Bible’s not about me as a Christian. It’s actually about how God is going to use the gifts that he’s given me for the ultimate plan of redemption that he has that actually also includes the story of Israel and the Jewish people that still exist today and has a future.
A lot of times I think we open the Bible and we say, “God, speak to me now.” And that’s great. We want God to speak to us from the scriptures, but there’s also a plot line in the scriptures that this is Israel’s story and God has graciously grafted Gentile believers into that story and Israel’s story is not done yet. And so Rosh Hashanah starts off these fall feasts, Yom Kippur, the Feast of Tabernacles as well. It starts off and reminds us of something. We have been graciously grafted in. In fact, the Apostle Paul says in Romans chapter 11 that Gentile believers in Jesus should not be arrogant or boastful against the broken branches, even the branches that don’t believe in Jesus, the ones that are enemies of the gospel as the apostle Paul says in Romans 11:28. He says, “Don’t be arrogant or boastful.” Why?
Because it’s not you that supports the root. It’s the root, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob that supports you. See, instead of looking at it like the Bible’s about me, I love saying, God, thank you for including me in your story of redemption that also is bound up in the story of what God is doing through Israel and the Jewish people to bring that redemption to the world. So I don’t know if that helps or not, but it’s a great perspective to have for that. And for Jewish people, I was just reading a religious news site. There are rabbis that are saying, Rosh Hashanah and nine eleven are falling on the exact same day. It’s an opportunity for Jewish people to do what they do very, very, very well and they’ve done it for thousands of years. It’s to remember, to remember what happened. Judaism, a lot of Judaism is about remembering, remembering what God had done.
And for them, they’re saying this is an opportunity for us to do exactly what God has called us to do. A very famous Hebrew word in Judaism is the core. It means to remember. And so we’re going to remember what God has done and especially out of the trauma that came from nine eleven as well.
Sam Rohrer:
I think that’s excellent, what you just said. Just a couple of minutes left here. This aspect, we’ve talked about Aliyah, the regathering, the pressure from Western powers, looming threats against God’s covenant people. What ultimate word of hope and anticipation would you leave with that in mind with our listeners? I’m going to say who have eyes to see and ears to hear tied into what you just said and that fact that God is physically at work calling his people back.
Chris Katulka:
I work and serve with the Friends of Israel Gospel Ministry. We have a big giant sign out front here in New Jersey that says Friends of Israel. And you know what? That’s a statement to be a friend of Israel. And it actually comes with a lot of persecution as well. For your listeners who support Israel, and as you already showed the stats, it’s not popular anymore, but is that really how we should look at Israel and the Jewish people biblically, only support them when they’re popular? No. In fact, the gospel’s not popular either. And so this fits in, I think, with what God’s plan has always been, to always support and love Israel and the Jewish people and to be a witness for them because Jesus is coming back and he will judge the nations for how they treated his inheritance, it says in Joel chapter three.
And who is his inheritance? Joel tells us his people, the Jewish people and his land and how the nations divided it. So right there is a perfect example that yes, it might not be popular anymore to love and support Israel and the Jewish people, but it is certainly a command from God himself.
Sam Rohrer:
And with that, ladies and gentlemen, let me just close this program in prayer. Heavenly Father, thank you that we are able to spend this time today with Chris and I, and as we’re looking around at the things that are happening. And Father, we pray that those who are listening would be encouraged by what is said, but most encouraged by the fact that you have kept your word. You’ve given us your plan in your word. We’ve seen what has happened in the first coming and we know what you’ve said will happen in the days just ahead. And I pray, Lord, that our feet would not be moved in these days of uncertainty and we would stand with those, your people, Israel, Jewish people, the church, those who trust in Yeshua and pray that those in Israel today who have not yet embraced Yeshua would soon do so.
We pray this in Jesus’ name. Amen. Chris Katulka from Friends of Israel, thank you so much for being with me today. Always a blessing and always an encouragement. God bless you and your group. Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for being with us today. Join us tomorrow here for another relevant and up-to-date program.
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