Why The Holocaust?

By Sam Nadler

Since April 11, 2018 is Holocaust Remembrance Day, we thought it vital for all who take the Bible seriously to understand the importance of the spiritual issues at stake. During the 1930’s & 40’s about one third of all the Jewish people alive on earth at the time were murdered by the Nazi regime. As terrible as that was, the prophet Zechariah tells us that there is something even worse to come. In Zechariah 13:8 he prophesies that during a future holocaust, not one third, but two thirds of all the Jewish people living at that time will be killed! Many ask the question, “Why? Why are there Holocausts? The Scriptures are clear regarding the main reason for anti-Semitism in general and holocausts in particular: “Spiritual Warfare.”

The Scriptures inform us that there is an enemy of God: Satan (the Hebrew word for “adversary”). Though it may seem futile for anyone to fight against an almighty God, Satan is working to defeat God’s redemptive plan in order to dethrone God (Isaiah 14:12-14).

Satan’s Activity To Stop The Redeemer

In Genesis 3:15 God promised that the Redeemer of mankind would also be the Destroyer of Satan. This Redeemer was promised to come through the Jewish people as the Messiah of Israel (Genesis 12:3; 22:18; 49:10; Isaiah 11:10; 49:5-7; etc.), and Satan would attempt to stop this Redeemer from coming by destroying the Jewish People (via Pharaoh in Exodus 1; Balaam in Numbers 23-24, Haman in Esther 3, etc.). But Messiah did come, died for our sins and was raised from the dead! On this point we know Satan has failed. But if he has failed, why is Satan still trying to destroy the Jewish people today?

Right now “the devil prowls like a roaring lion looking for someone to devour” (1 Peter 5:8); but at The Second Coming, when Messiah returns to earth to restore the Davidic Kingdom, He will then have Satan bound for 1000 years ( Revelation 20:1-3).  Afterwards, Satan will be “thrown into the lake of Fire” forever (Revelation 20:10). The lynchpin to all of this future activity and victory of God is the survival of the Jewish people.

The return of the Lord to reign on planet earth is directly related to Israel’s repentance of rejecting her Deliverer. This is a consistent principle in Scripture: before deliverance can take place, God’s deliverer must be recognized and received on God’s terms. For example, after first being rejected, Moses brought his people out from Egyptian bondage only after he was accepted by Israel as their deliverer. Joseph, as well, could deliver his estranged family from destruction only after his brethren repented of their rejection of him. Joseph, the ‘rejected one’, was actually God’s means for their salvation (Genesis 50:20). Again, David could not rule over all of Israel and completely remove his adversaries until the people accepted him as their King (2 Samuel 5:1-5). So, Yeshua will not return to reign on the Throne of David and remove the Adversary, Satan, until the Jewish people acknowledge Yeshua as King. This is why Yeshua said to our people, “You will not see me again until you say,–‘Baruch Haba B’shem Adonai—Blessed is He that comes in the name of the Lord’” (Matthew 23:39).

Indeed, the prophecy of Isaiah 53 is not so much a prophecy of the Jewish people confessing their rejection of the true Messiah, who would die as atonement for their sins (Isaiah 53:4-10). This confession will be made at the Second Coming of Messiah: “And I (God) 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” (Zechariah 14:4).

Peter reiterates this point when he proclaims to the Jewish people, “Repent and turn to God, that your sins might be wiped away, in order that the times of refreshing might come from the Lord, and that He might send the Messiah, who has been appointed for you—even Yeshua. He must remain in Heaven until the time comes for God to restore everything, as He promised…” (Acts 3:19-21). The return of Yeshua who will “restore everything”—“the times of refreshing”, as well as the destruction of Satan—depends on the Jewish people repenting and returning to God. Yeshua must remain in Heaven until that time.

Stop Messiah from Coming Again!

God has made very specific promises to the Jewish people, among them…

• The Jews shall always remain an identifiable people before the nations of the world: “Thus saith the Lord, which giveth the sun for a light by day, and the ordinances of the moon and of the stars for a light by night,…If those ordinances depart from before me, saith the Lord, then the seed of Israel also shall cease from being a nation before me forever. Thus saith the Lord” and…
• Israel would become a nation again: For, lo, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will bring again the captivity of my people Israel and Judah, saith the Lord: and I will cause them to return to the land that I gave to their fathers, and they shall possess it (Jeremiah 31:35-37;30:3).

If the Jewish people were to go the way of the Babylonians, Hitites, Ninivites, etc., God’s promises would be nullified and Satan would essentially have a stalemate. Thus in his desperate attempt to prevent Messiah’s return, Satan is doing all he can to destroy Israel and the Jewish people. At the same time he is trying to make faith in Yeshua so alien and repugnant that no self-respecting Jew, much less all Israel, would ever desire to repent and trust in Yeshua as the Messiah! I would even say that every congregation of believers in Yeshua/Jesus, Jewish or Gentile, which does not endeavor to bring the Good News to the Jewish people, is actually, though unwittingly, playing into the plan of Satan: To stop Israel from recognizing their Messiah.

Spiritual Warfare

Why the holocausts? Because of spiritual warfare! Therefore as believers in Jesus/Yeshua, Israel’s Messiah, let us “fight the good fight” (1Timothy 6:12) for “we are more than conquerors through Him who loves us” (Romans 8:37). I’m asking that you encourage your congregation to remember the Holocaust at your services, to “pray for the peace of Jerusalem” (Psalm 122:6), and do all you can to bring the Good News of Messiah to the Jewish people around the world. And may Israel soon say, “Baruch Haba B’Shem Adonai: Blessed is He who comes in the Name of the Lord!”