The Guns of Arafat

Words like "suicide" and "bomber" combine and explode into our vocabulary. Male, and now female teens walk as bombs; hate makes them lethal. National leaders pay $25,000 to the family of any breathing bomb willing to tear now himself, then herself, and any Jews apart.

Gatherings of Jewish civilians are unsafe. What we Americans take for granted, eating out, even just going out, are acts of courage. Fearful American journalists in Israel say they won’t eat out anymore. Even riding to work takes courage; buses suddenly become burning coffins.

Bombs, bullets, and a hatred that wants to erase the Jewish people from the face of earth combine to put Israel in headlines around the world. That’s the intent—the erasure of one single people and all its men, its women, and its children. If they won’t be driven to drown in the sea, they’ll die on the land.

Yet, there’s something standing in the way of the bombs and bullets. It’s paper-thin, but stronger than any breathing bomb, or bullet blasts. It’s neither the friendship and might of the United States, nor Israel’s latest military strategy. It’s as brittle as ancient ink on an old papyrus.

Somewhere around 2,400 years ago, God put a promise to Israel in writing. He guided a man’s hand to dip a quill into ink as thin as last night’s water and make some fragile Hebrew letters on a scroll. Thin ink scratched out on brittle paper, both combining to set a shield in place that has endured from then to now and on into forever.

As God guides Malachi’s mind, He sets the shield in concrete: "I the Lord do not change. So you, O descendants of Jacob, are not destroyed." Perhaps Malachi put his quill down at that moment and thought about the bulletproof vest God had just put on Israel. The ink would stand forever: I promise, says God, "There will always be an Israel."

It seems people never learn. Pharaoh didn’t. His army drowns because he refused to learn. Nebuchadnezzar didn’t. Hamaan didn’t, and winds up on the wrong end of a rope. Hitler didn’t and drags his friends, his nation, and himself to suicide. None of these leaders believed that Israel has a bulletproof vest. They paid for their disbelief.

The lesson is as simple as the simplicity of the ancient words Malachi wrote: The shield, God Himself, is in place; there will always be an Israel.

Dr. Mike Halsey