Watchman Radio Hour

David Schultz: Welcome to the Watchman Radio Hour coming to you from Portland, Oregon, here in the beautiful Northwest. This is David Schultz, your announcer. The Watchman Radio Hour is a production of Watchman Radio Ministries International, an evangelistic ministry reaching out to the peoples of the world with the gospel of Jesus Christ. And now here is our speaker, Alex Dodson, to bring you this week's message from God's word.

Alex Dodson: Let us pray before we begin our message for today. Our Father in heaven, we thank you for the word of God that you have given to us. We thank you for the Bible and that we can put our full confidence in everything that it says. And now, oh Father, as we study your word today, we pray that you will send forth your Holy Spirit in great convicting power. And we ask these things in the name of Christ. Amen.

We are now beginning a series of sermons on Jeremiah 31. This is a very important chapter, for in it, we have the new covenant described. This chapter gave hope to the Jewish people when they went into captivity that one day they would return to their land and prosper as a people. Yet there is more in this chapter than just the Jews returning to Palestine. There is more than just a prophecy of the restoration of the Jews to their land in the times of Ezra and Nehemiah.

It is true that a remnant of the Jews did return after 70 years of captivity in Babylon. And it is also true that when they returned, there was then only one kingdom, not two. Yet there is more here. There is a looking forward to the coming of the Messiah and the gospel age. There is also a far greater restoration of the Jews prophesied here in this chapter. The chapter begins with these words.

Guest (Male): At that time, declares the Lord, I will be the God of all the clans of Israel, and they will be my people.

Guest (Male): And so all Israel will be saved as it is written. The deliverer will come from Zion. He will turn godlessness away from Jacob, and this is my covenant with them when I take away their sins.

Alex Dodson: And yet there is more than this. The whole world would be invited to go up to Zion to the Lord and worship him. Our text is Jeremiah 31 and verse 6, which says there will be a day when watchmen cry out on the hills of Ephraim, "Come, let us go up to Zion to the Lord our God." We are all called to go up to Zion to the Lord our God. The Lord calls us in the gospel to come to him and to be his people.

In Isaiah 2:2, it says in the last days, the mountain of the Lord's temple will be established as chief among the mountains. It will be raised above the hills, and all nations will stream to it. Today, the call is going out to the nations to come to Zion, to come to the Lord God and know him. And that call goes out to you who are listening right now. Come to Zion. Come to the Lord your God.

Alex Dodson: Now let us see in the first place that this text points to the future. It points to the future for the Jews, first of all. A promise is made of restoration. Verse 2 of this chapter says this is what the Lord says. The people who survive the sword will find favor in the desert. I will come to give rest to Israel. And though they would go into captivity, it would not be the end. They would still be favored by the Lord.

God loved them with an everlasting love. He would not forsake them. In verse 3, it says the Lord appeared to us in the past saying, "I have loved you with an everlasting love, and I have drawn you with loving kindness." It is not the end. You will be restored in the end. Verse 4 says, "I will build you up again, and you will be rebuilt, oh virgin Israel. Again, you will take up tambourines and go out to dance with the joyful."

Guest (Male): The Lord appeared to us in the past, saying, "I have loved you with an everlasting love. I have drawn you with lovingkindness."

Guest (Male): I will build you up again, and you will be rebuilt, O virgin Israel. Again you will take up your tambourines and go out to dance with the joyful.

Alex Dodson: Restoration would come, and it did under Ezra and Nehemiah. The Jews did come back, and they rebuilt the city and the temple, and they were restored as a people. Groundwork was laid for the coming of the Messiah. From this restoration of people were prepared to meet Christ when he came. And though the nation as a whole would not accept the Messiah when he arrived, there was a remnant that did. And from that remnant came the New Testament church, and in a sense, a new Israel.

And then it points to the gospel age. The ultimate fulfillment includes the gospel to the nations and conversion of the Jews. The gospel to the nations of the world and also the conversion of the Jews. Matthew Henry writes, "This promise was to have its full accomplishment in the days of the Messiah when the gospel should be preached to all these countries and a general invitation thereby given to come into the church of Christ, of which Zion was a type."

In commenting on verse 5, John Gill writes, "Mountains are proper places for vines and which generally produce the best wine. But vines are not to be understood merely literally or as only expressive of the outward peace, plenty, and prosperity of Samaria, with other places given to the Jews, as Josephus observes, they were by the Demetrii, which they might improve by planting vines. But figuratively, of the planting of gospel churches there, comparable to vines, which was done in the first times of the gospel and which was a pledge of what will be done in those parts hereafter in the latter day."

Jamieson, Fausset, and Brown write, "Our God from whom we formerly revolted, but who is now our God and earnest of that good time to come, is given in the partial success of the gospel in its first preaching in Samaria." The gospel would go to the nations beginning at Jerusalem, and all the nations would be invited to come to Zion to the Lord our God. And then this passage points ahead to the future conversion of the Jews.

Verse 1 says, "At that time, declares the Lord, I will be the God of all the clans of Israel, and they will be my people." The prophet was pointing to a future time when all Israel would know the Lord, all the clans of Israel, not just some. A similar passage is found in Zechariah 12:10 through 13, pointing to the conversion of the whole nation in the future.

Guest (Male): At that time, declares the Lord, I will be the God of all the clans of Israel, and they will be my people.

Guest (Male): And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son. On that day, the weeping in Jerusalem will be great like the weeping of Hadad Rimmon in the plain of Megiddo. The land will mourn, each clan by itself, with their wives by themselves, the clan of the house of David and their wives, the clan of the house of Nathan and their wives, the clan of the house of Levi and their wives, the clan of Shimei and their wives, and all the rest of the clans and their wives.

Guest (Male): The word of the Lord came to me. Son of man, take a stick of wood and write on it "Belonging to Judah and the Israelites associated with him." Then take another stick of wood and write on it "Ephraim's stick, belonging to Joseph and all the house of Israel associated with him." Join them together into one stick so that they will become one in your hand.

When your countrymen ask you, "Won't you tell us what you mean by this?" say to them, "This is what the sovereign Lord says. I am going to take the stick of Joseph, which is in Ephraim's hand and of the Israelite tribes associated with him, and join it to Judah's stick, making them a single stick of wood, and they will become one in my hand." Hold before their eyes the sticks you have written on and say to them, "This is what the sovereign Lord says. I will take the Israelites out of the nations where they have gone.

I will gather them from all around and bring them back into their own land. I will make them one nation in the land on the mountains of Israel. And there will be one king over all of them, and they will never again be two nations or be divided into two kingdoms. They will no longer defile themselves with their idols and vile images or with any of their offenses, for I will save them from all their sinful backsliding, and I will cleanse them.

They will be my people, and I will be their God. And my servant David will be king over them, and they will all have one shepherd. They will follow my laws and be careful to keep my decrees. And they will live in the land I gave to my servant Jacob, the land where your fathers lived. They and their children and their children's children will live there forever, and David my servant will be their prince forever.

I will make a covenant of peace with them. It will be an everlasting covenant. I will establish them and increase their numbers, and I will put my sanctuary among them forever. My dwelling place will be with them. I will be their God, and they will be my people. And then the nations will know that I, the Lord, make Israel holy when my sanctuary is among them forever."

Guest (Male): Instead, they will serve the Lord their God and David their king, whom I will raise up for them.

Guest (Male): His father Zechariah was filled with the Holy Spirit and prophesied. Praise be to the Lord, the God of Israel, because he has come and has redeemed his people. He has raised up a horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David, as he said through his holy prophets of long ago.

Guest (Male): Note then the kindness and the severity of God. Severity toward those who have fallen, but God's kindness to you, provided you continue in his kindness. Otherwise, you too will be cut off. And even they, if they do not continue in their unbelief, will be grafted in, for God has the power to graft them in again. For if you were cut from what is by nature a wild olive tree and grafted contrary to nature into a cultivated olive tree, how much more will these, the natural branches, be grafted back into their own olive tree?

Lest you be wise in your own sight, I do not want you to be unaware of this mystery, brothers. A partial hardening has come upon Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. And in this way, or so all Israel will be saved. As it is written, the deliverer will come from Zion, and he will banish ungodliness from Jacob. And this will be my covenant with them when I take away their sins.

Alex Dodson: Now it is true that on the whole, the Jews rejected the Messiah when he came, although a remnant did receive him. Yet a time is coming when Israel as a whole people will embrace the Messiah, will embrace Christ. This time will come at the fullness of the Gentiles or a time of great revival for both Jew and Gentile in the future. In commenting on this fullness of the Gentiles mentioned in Romans 11:25, John Murray writes, "The fullness of the Gentiles denotes unprecedented blessing for them and does not exclude even greater blessing to follow."

And then let us see in the second place that there is an invitation to come to Zion. Again, our text says in verse 6, "There will be a day when watchmen cry out on the hills of Ephraim, 'Come, let us go up to Zion to the Lord our God.'" To the place of the true worship of God. The proper place to worship God for the Jews was at the temple in Jerusalem. The northern kingdom had set up their own worship in another place. This was not the proper place for them to worship.

This verse is significant in that it says the watchmen of Ephraim would call the people to go to Zion to worship. That's where the true worship of God took place. No longer would Ephraim, the northern kingdom, worship in the wrong place. The Samaritan woman in John 4:19 says, in talking to Jesus, "Sir, I can see that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem."

Guest (Female): Sir, I can see that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem.

Alex Dodson: John Calvin writes, "But the contrast ought to be noticed, for Jeroboam had closed up every passage by which the Israelites might ascend to Jerusalem. For he feared lest they should there hear of God's covenant, which he had made with David and his posterity. He forbade anyone to ascend to Jerusalem, and therefore he built altars in Dan and Bethel."

The significance here is that these future watchmen from the same place as the northern kingdom had formerly been would call the people to go to Mount Zion to worship the true God instead of Mount Gerizim or other places. And then we see there is an invitation to the church to worship. There is an invitation to come into the church to worship the true God. This prophecy was fulfilled to some extent when the gospel was preached in Samaria and the people were called to Christ to follow him and become a part of his church.

Jesus himself proclaimed the gospel in Samaria, and many followed him. In John 4:39 through 42, it says many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony. He told me everything I ever did. And so when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words, many more became believers. They said to the woman, "We no longer believe just because of what you said. Now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man is the Savior of the world." Later, Philip would preach to the Samaritans and many would believe.

Guest (Female): Many of the Samaritans from that town believed in him because of the woman's testimony. He told me everything I ever did. And so when the Samaritans came to him, they urged him to stay with them, and he stayed two days. And because of his words, many more became believers. They said to the woman, "We no longer believe just because of what you said. Now we have heard for ourselves, and we know that this man is the savior of the world."

Guest (Male): Philip went down to a city in Samaria and proclaimed the Christ there. And when the crowds heard Philip and saw the miraculous signs he did, they all paid close attention to what he said. And with shrieks, evil spirits came out of many, and many paralytics and cripples were healed. And so there was great joy in that city.

Guest (Male): Then the church throughout Judea, Galilee, and Samaria enjoyed a time of peace. It was strengthened and encouraged by the Holy Spirit, and it grew in numbers, living in the fear of the Lord.

Alex Dodson: In this invitation to go up to Zion to the Lord our God is a spiritual invitation. Jesus told the Samaritan woman that a time would come when people would neither worship on the literal Mount Gerizim or in Jerusalem, but would worship God spiritually from anywhere.

Guest (Female): Sir, the woman said, "I can see that you are a prophet. Our fathers worshipped on this mountain, but you Jews claim that the place where we must worship is in Jerusalem." Jesus declared, "Believe me, woman, a time is coming when you will worship the Father neither on this mountain nor in Jerusalem. You Samaritans worship what you do not know. We worship what we do know, for salvation is from the Jews. Yet a time is coming and has now come when the true worshippers will worship the Father in spirit and truth, for they are the kind of worshippers the Father seeks. God is spirit, and his worshippers must worship him in spirit and truth."

Guest (Male): In the last days, the mountain of the Lord's temple will be established as chief among the mountains. It will be raised up above the hills, and all nations will stream to it. Many peoples will come and say, "Come, let us go up to the mountain of the Lord, to the house of the God of Jacob. He will teach us his ways so that we may walk in his paths." The law will go out from Zion, the word of the Lord from Jerusalem.

Alex Dodson: Now this prophecy is not talking about people streaming to the Jerusalem and Mount Zion in the Middle East in Israel. He is looking to the time of the Messiah when Jesus came, when Jesus would come, when a new era would be ushered in. People from all over the world would come to worship the true God from everywhere, from every nation, from every people as they receive Christ and came into his church, the spiritual Jerusalem or Mount Zion. This spiritual worship is referred to in Hebrews 12 and verses 22 through 24 where it says...

Guest (Male): But you have come to Mount Zion, to the heavenly Jerusalem, the city of the living God. You have come to thousands upon thousands of angels in joyful assembly, to the church of the firstborn whose names are written in heaven. You have come to God, the judge of all men, to the spirits of righteous men made perfect, to Jesus the mediator of a new covenant, and to the sprinkled blood that speaks a better word than the blood of Abel.

Alex Dodson: To come to Jesus is to come to Mount Zion. It is to come to a heavenly Jerusalem, to the church of the living God. It is this spiritual coming to Mount Zion that the prophet refers to, and also that Jesus speaks about when he talked to the Samaritan woman. Whenever you receive Jesus Christ into your life as Lord and Savior, you have come to Mount Zion. You are a member of the heavenly Jerusalem, a member of the church of the firstborn. You have come to the city of the living God.

Now let us see in the third place that there is an invitation here to the nations, an invitation to peoples everywhere. When these watchmen cry out with an invitation to go up to Zion to the Lord our God, they are crying out to all people to come to Christ. The watchmen cry out today to come to Mount Zion to a spiritual worship of the true and living God from anywhere. They are invited to a spiritual temple to know and worship the Lord Jesus Christ.

Guest (Male): Consequently, you are no longer foreigners and aliens, but fellow citizens with God's people and members of God's household, built on the foundation of the apostles and prophets, with Christ Jesus himself as the chief cornerstone. In him, the whole building is joined together and rises to become a holy temple in the Lord. And in him, you too are being built together to become a dwelling in which God lives by his spirit.

Guest (Male): I have other sheep that are not of this sheep pen. I must bring them also, and they too will listen to my voice, and there will be one flock and one shepherd.

Guest (Male): In the last days, the mountain of the Lord's temple will be established as chief among the mountains. It will be raised up above the hills, and all nations will stream to it.

Alex Dodson: Today we are in the last days referred to by Isaiah, and people are streaming to Zion. It's the age of the Messiah. The Messiah has come. Jesus Christ has come, and he is calling all people to come and worship him. And we invite you today to stream to Zion, to come to the true and living God and worship him, to come to Jesus Christ.

Don't wait a minute longer. Come today. The Holy Spirit is calling men and women and young people to come to Zion, to come to the living God, to come to Jesus Christ, the mediator of a new covenant. And so I call you today to come to Christ, to repent of your great sins and turn to God today. The true and living God is calling out to you. The watchmen are crying out, "Come, let us go up to Zion to the Lord our God." Come, come to Christ. Come to the Lord Jesus Christ today.

Alex Dodson: Our Father in heaven, we thank you for your word. we thank you for this invitation of the watchmen. And we pray, oh Lord, that you would send your Holy Spirit forth in great power today, and that you would draw men and women and young people unto yourself.

We pray, oh Lord, that you would bring great conviction of sin, and we pray that many will come to Zion, that many will come to Zion to worship and know the Lord their God, that many will come to Christ. And we ask these things in his name. Amen.

David Schultz: We hope that this week's broadcast has been a blessing to you. If you have any questions about Mr. Dodson's message, please write us. You may email us at info@watchmanradio.org. Our mailing address is Watchman Radio Ministries International, Post Office Box 13251, Portland, Oregon 97213. That's Watchman Radio Ministries International, Post Office Box 13251, Portland, Oregon 97213. You may listen to this broadcast at any time on the internet at www.oneplace.com. In the list of ministries, just select the Watchman Radio Hour. This week's program and previous programs are always available there for listening. Our web address is www.watchmanradio.org. That's W-A-T-C-H-M-E-N-radio.org. www.watchmanradio.org.