GALILEE OF THE GENTILES

Galilee of the Gentiles   

Isaiah prophesied around 720 BC about a time and a place where great light would confront great darkness (Isaiah 9:1). The great light that he writes about occurred with the birth of Jesus, the first Christmas almost two thousand years ago, and the place was in the Middle east in a region called Galilee of the Gentiles, where the darkness of the tyranny of the Roman empire had overcome and subsumed all nations and cultures that opposed it. 
There is a phrase spoken with a political emphasis today about the river to the sea which is totally unlike the meaning of when it was first mentioned in the Bible about a land between the River to the Sea and I’m now reading that Scripture. 
Isaiah 9:1 But the former times of darkness and despair in the land of Zebulon and Naphtali called Galilee of the Gentiles, where lies the way from the Jordan River to the sea, will one day be filled with glory. The people who walk in darkness will see a great light and for those who live in a land of deep darkness, a light will shine.
There is a direct line that passes through the land of Zebulon and Naphtali, in Northern Israel from the Jordan River to the seaport harbour at Haifa. In the year 1947, 4,500 Jewish illegal immigrant refugees from Europe landed in Haifa on board the ship ’The Exodus’. They were sent back for a short time by the British to detention camps in Germany but then in 1948 because of worldwide public sentiment they were allowed back to Haifa where the Jewish population had grown through legal migration over many years to 84,000 so that the population of Haifa had become 66% Jewish.  

In the time of Jesus Galilee of the Gentiles was a place where religious darkness and idolatry opposed the then one true religion called Judaism, where even Judaism itself was opposing itself from within, through doctrines of decaying legalism and hypocrisy and pride. Galilee of the Gentiles was the battlefield of good against evil and of light against darkness, but it was to become the wellspring of life out of death. 

Jesus, the light of the world of the first Christmas grew up in Galilee of the Gentiles, in the tribal territory of Zebulon and Naphtali and lived there in the towns of Nazareth and Capernaum. And that way from the river to the sea was a busy international trade route interspersed with Roman military garrisons that would have greatly influenced the social and cultural atmosphere in which Jesus lived and where he began his ministry to bring the Kingdom of God into the earth. 

In fact, much of what Jesus did in his life and ministry was in Zebulun and Naphtali, in Galilee of the Gentiles. He announced his ministry in Nazareth in Zebulun when he said ‘The Spirit of the Lord is upon me, he has sent me to bind up the broken-hearted (Luke 4) and he turned water into wine, his first miracle, in the town of Cana in Naphtali, and he taught the Sermon on the Mount, his first public sermon, in Naphtali (Matthew 5) where he also appointed most of his apostles. He performed a multitude of miracles in the region of Capernaum and a great light did shine along that way from the river to the sea. 
He would finally go to Jerusalem where he was destined to die for all mankind and rise again from the dead, and where he is destined to return at the end of the age where he will overcome the final rebellious assault of great darkness against the power of his kingdom of great light. Isaiah’s prophecy would find its future fulfillment through Jesus the King of Kings that has fought and won the battle for our souls.

Isaiah 9:3 You will gather (raba) the nation of Israel, and its people will rejoice. They will rejoice before you as people rejoice at the harvest and like warriors dividing the plunder.
4-5 For you will break their yoke of slavery and the oppressor’s rod of power and lift the heavy burden from their shoulders.

6 For unto us a child is born, unto us a son is given. The government will be upon his shoulders. And he will be called: Wonderful Counsellor, Mighty God, Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 7 His government and its peace will never end. He will rule with fairness and justice from the throne of his ancestor David forever more. The dedication of the LORD of hosts will do this.

Over two thousand years on from that first Christmas we see in even greater measure a world that is in great darkness waiting for a great light. The odd paradox is that the world celebrates Christmas as a festive holiday season each year while not understanding the miraculous significance of that great light and not understanding the significant events of great darkness that are happening around about us. The great darkness that now awaits a great light has become a sign that a caring God who wants only the best for his people is waiting to act on behalf of his people. And those people who know their God will also be his signs of hope in today’s world, and when our lives exhibit that kind of hope people will want to know why you have such a hope – and you will have an answer. (1Peter 3:15). 

Outer darkness is the manifestation of disorder and corruption and violence which is being seen at the present moment on the ground in Israel, where malevolence and terrorism has reached a fever pitch of destructive power against the nation of Israel, and where hatred of Jews is being stirred up in certain parts of the media and politics. 
Malevolence and destructive political activism has been increasing in the world in recent years where groups and individuals contend with each other in power struggles to dominate and do harm to others. This outer darkness is a direct result of inner darkness which is described in the Bible as the work of the ‘god of this world’, the prince of the power of the world of darkness who uses deception to blind people’s minds from receiving the revelation of a loving and forgiving God in Jesus Christ. 

The Christmas story is a message of God’s intervention of his great light into both the outer darkness and into the inner darkness of people’s lives, so that they can see the things that are there as they truly are. At the present time God is bringing many things to the surface that have been hidden but are now being exposed so that they can be justly dealt with.

We saw in the prophetic Scripture from Isaiah that Jesus would be called the Prince of Peace, and that the government would be upon his shoulders. Jesus is showing himself in this way at this time in the world as he reorders our lives even in the midst of upheaval and loss and gives us his peace. Only he knows what things lay ahead as he determines the course of history and determines each day of our lives for us as we become drawn into his perfect will for us. I have told you these things, so that in me you may have peace. In this world you will have trouble. But take heart! I have overcome the world.” John 16:33 

And Jesus spoke of two different kinds of peace, the peace of God and the peace of the world. Peace I leave with you; my peace I give to you. Not as the world gives do I give to you. Let not your hearts be troubled, neither let them be afraid. John 14:27 
The peace of the world is not an inner lasting peace, but it is more like a short-term relief that a person feels because they have trust in their own skills and experience and financial reserves to control the circumstances in their world. These resources are effective against many threats and obstacles and hazards, but when the threats and obstacles and hazards overcome their resources, their peace is gone. 
The peace of the world is also the one-upmanship of having the upper hand against rival opposition when it comes against us. This is seen blatantly in the fragile peace of global politics and national security with strategic alliances that are negotiated. And history tells us that worldly alliances don’t last forever – they are short-lived and fragile like the peace of the world.

The peace that God gives us is not fragile as we trust in the alliance of ‘God with us’ in all things so that we never have to just depend upon our own strategies and resources in order to feel safe and secure. Commit your way to the LORD; trust only in him, and he will act.
(Psalm 37:5) God is always acting on our behalf in the world of the unseen, and that is the essence of our faith. That is the source of our peace.

We are not saved from facing the struggles and the adversity, but we are saved from having our souls being defeated and made to feel hopeless. That is what being saved is. He has overcome the world’s power to crush our souls. We are given grace to receive his peace and to administer that peace and good will to others, to be the Gospel of peace in a broken world. You were created to be ‘good news’ in different ways and at different times to different people by the grace that God has already made ready for you to step into.

Isaiah 26:12 – Lord, You will establish peace for us, For You have also done all our works in us (done = ordained – devised a plan). In other words, God has ordained, before the day starts for you, those times and places where God will meet you in your challenge and you will receive his peace and pass it on and it will be displayed in you as the good news of peace, the Gospel of peace, of the God of peace. Amen