the new radio type telescopes which do not photograph light waves but receive radio waves instead, the space frontier was around a billion light years dis tant — That is, light had been pho tographed from objects so far away that it had taken light travelling 186,- 000 miles per second one billion years to reach our planet. But with the de velopment of the new radio telescopes which do not photograph light but rather absorb radio waves, the space frontier has been pushed back at least twice that far and matter is still dis- cemable in space even at that incredi ble distance. So apparently the Lord was on quite safe ground using this criterion espe cially as a measure of the eternal pres ervation of His people. If heaven above can be measured “I will also cast off all the seed of Israel” meaning, of course, that He was never going to cast off His people finally and permanently and therefore by implication that hea ven above is never ultimately going to be measured by man. now notice the other one very interesting. If the foun dation of the earth can be searched out beneath and this needs to be recognized as to exactly what it means for it does not mean what ignorant skeptics and critics of the Bible suggest it means, namely, that this is an insinuation that the earth is flat and rests on founda tions of some kind. The Bible recog nizes the fact that the earth is an oblate spheroid and rotates on its own axis. This fact is clearly indicated in several passages but I would like you to no tice that the name or designation “earth” was first applied by God in the first chapter of Genesis not to the entire planet but simply to that portion of it that consists of the dry land and the continents about 23 per cent of earth’s surface on which all liv ing things, as far as you and I know them, have their existence except the creatures of the sea. In Genesis 1 we’re told that when God divided the sea from the dry land He called the dry land earth, there fore the foundations of the earth are the foundations of the dry land. And 8
ISRAEL (continued) the foundations of the earth searched out beneath. I will also cast off all of the seed of Israel for all that they have done, saith the Lord.” Now here are two distinct promises namely 1—that the nation of Israel was to be preserved forever without ceasing. 2—that the people as distinct from the nation were similarly to be preserved. Now you may ask what is the difference between the people and the nation. I think this is quite appar ent in the little prophecy of Amos which tells us that (Amos 9:8) this prophecy was uttered hundreds of years before Christ, “Behold, the eyes of the Lord our God are upon the sinful king dom, and I will destroy it from off the face of the earth.” The kingdom of Israel officially came to an end in 70 A.D. when Titus and his Roman leaders destroyed the city, but the pro phecy goes on to state saying that “I will not utterly destroy the house of Jacob, saith the Lord.” Now here is one statement that covers both areas and the assurance that the kingdom, as a political entity, was to have a lapse of existence, which it has had for 1878 years, until May of 1948. But the peo ple, the house of Jacob, as such, God said He would never destroy and this literally has come to pass as we know— for in spite of the persecution, and dispersion of the centuries, the people of Israel have continued to exist. Now notice this tremendous state ment here in Jeremiah 31 with which we began: “If heaven above can be measured, and the foundations of the earth searched out beneath, I will also cast off all the seed of Israel -for all that they have done, said the Lord.” The measurement of the heavens above is the objection of the scientists in the entire world at this present moment and the latest sober conclusions of as tronomers who have carefully weighed all their findings thus far are this, that apparently there is no determin able limit to that which outer space may include in the way of created matter. Up until the development of
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