Israel the Fig Tree With No Fruit

It is time to see the Hand of the Lord once again on the nations of the Middle East. National judgments to bring national repentance. And that includes Israel.

As the world watches the smoke rise over the Middle East and the thundering echoes of the Gulf War reverberate across the sands of the biblical heartland, we evangelicals are compelled to look past the geopolitical strategies of nations and toward the sovereign hand of the Lord. We live in a season of intense labour pains. Nations tremble. Missiles trace arcs across ancient skies. And in the smoke and confusion, the Holy Spirit directs the eyes of the Church not to CNN, but to the Word of the Lord..

For the evangelical heart, the land of Israel — or Palestine - is a matter of great prayer and intercession.. Yet as we witness the current shaking of the nations, we must ask ourselves the difficult, heart-wrenching questions that Scripture poses. It is not comfortable to ask them. It is, in fact, an act of love to do so.

The central question before us is one of fruitfulness. God's covenant with Abraham was not merely a promise of land, but a mandate of mission:

"In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." — Genesis 22:18

As we look at the modern landscape of the Jewish people in the land, we must soberly evaluate: Are they showing the fruits of that ancient calling? Is Jerusalem truly "a praise in all the earth," as Isaiah 62:7 envisions? Or are we witnessing the final stages of a spiritual drought that precedes a divine visitation of judgment?

These are not questions asked from hostility or triumphalism. They are asked from the same broken heart with which Jesus Himself wept over Jerusalem — the One who loved her deeply enough to warn her plainly.

The Branch and the Nazarene: The Rejected Cornerstone

To understand the current state of the land, we must return to the root. In Isaiah 11, the prophet speaks of a "Rod out of the stem of Jesse" and a "Branch" — in Hebrew, Netzer — that shall grow out of his roots. This is the Netzer Prophecy: the promise that from the seemingly dead stump of Davidic royalty, a fresh, life-giving Shoot would emerge. This Branch is none other than Jesus of Nazareth.

The linguistic and prophetic connection is arresting. As Matthew records, "He shall be called a Nazarene" (Matthew 2:23). To be a Nazarene was to be identified with the Netzer — the Branch, the living continuation of Jesse's royal line. In Jesus, the stump of David bloomed again.

Yet for the establishment of His day, this Branch was a "root out of a dry ground," having "no form nor comeliness" that they should desire Him (Isaiah 53:2). He was rejected — not by accident, but as the agonising fulfilment of prophecy. That rejection reached its shattering apex at the Cross. In John 19:19, Pilate affixed a title above His tortured frame:

Jesus the Nazarene, the King of the Jews" — Iesous ho Nazaraios, o Basileus ton Ioudaion

The usual translation is "Jesus of Nazareth" but since gospel of John was written in Greek that is wrong Greek...that would then have been written "Iesous ho apo Nazoret" That is why the crowds hailed him "son of David" hoping He would fight for the throne. He was the expected branch of Jesse of Isaiah 11:1. Pilot knew this and mocked Him with the title of "the Nazorene". The branch.

Written in Hebrew, Greek, and Latin for all the world to see. The Netzer — the Branch — hung between heaven and earth. The King was presented to His people in blood and anguish, and the nation replied: "We have no king but Caesar." In doing so, they cut themselves off from the very Vine from which their fruitfulness was designed to flow.

The True Vine and the Law of Fruitfulness

Jesus declared plainly and solemnly to His disciples — and through them, to all who would claim the heritage of the Kingdom — "I am the true vine ... Abide in me, and I in you. As the branch cannot bear fruit of itself, except it abide in the vine; no more can ye, except ye abide in me" (John 15:1-4). This is the inescapable spiritual law: fruitfulness is inseparable from union with Jesus.

The tragedy of the modern Jewish presence in the land is the attempt to find life, security, and identity apart from the Vine. The evangelical community has long looked upon the return of the Jewish people to Palestine with hope and wonder, seeing in it the sovereign orchestration of God moving history toward its climax. And rightly so — for God does not forget His promises.

But the "Israel of God" spoken of in Galatians 6:16 is not defined by ethnicity or borders alone. It is defined by faith in the Messiah. The seed of Abraham who inherits the blessing is, according to Paul, not the one who possesses the land, but the one who belongs to Christ (Galatians 3:29). If the calling of Abraham's seed is to be a blessing to all nations, then that blessing must ultimately be the Gospel — the good news of reconciliation with the God of Abraham through His Son.

When we look at Jerusalem today — torn by conflict, tightened by military necessity, a city where the name of Jesus is often met with either indifference or institutional hostility — we must ask: Is this the city that is "a praise in all the earth"? Isaiah 62:7 calls us to give God no rest until Jerusalem be made a praise in all the earth. But what kind of praise could Jerusalem offer the nations apart from the Messiah who wept for her?

The Barren Fig Tree: Judgment and the Two-Thousand-Year Intercession

Jesus told a haunting parable of a fig tree planted in a vineyard (Luke 13:6-9). For three years, the owner sought fruit and found none. His verdict was clear: "Cut it down; why cumbereth it the ground?" Only the intercession of the dresser bought it one more year. The Church, for two millennia, has been that dresser — digging, manuring, pleading, and praying.

This parable was illustrated in a shocking prophetic act when Jesus, walking toward Jerusalem, saw a fig tree full of leaves and found it without fruit. He said to it, "Let no fruit grow on thee henceforward for ever" (Matthew 21:19). The tree withered from the roots. This was not a capricious act of anger — it was a visual sermon, a living parable of the nation that displayed the foliage of religious ritual while bearing no fruit of faith and repentance.

For nearly two thousand years, the Lord has been patient — breathtaking in His longsuffering. The evangelical church, moved by a deep and abiding empathy for the Jewish people, remembering the horrific wounds they have suffered throughout history — the pogroms, the Holocaust, the centuries of terrible injustice — has laboured to "provoke them to jealousy" with the Gospel (Romans 11:11). We have sent missionaries. We have published Scriptures in Hebrew. We have stood with Israel diplomatically and politically. We have prayed for the peace of Jerusalem with genuine tears.

Most movingly, we have come to Israel and to Jewish communities around the world and said, with the words that Jesus required: "Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord" (Matthew 23:39). Jesus declared that Jerusalem would not see Him until they uttered that confession would be the key that unlocks His return to Israel.

Luke 13:35: Jesus says this earlier in His ministry, also while lamenting over Jerusalem. The passage reads, "Behold, your house is left unto you desolate: and verily I say unto you, Ye shall not see me, until ye shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord".

Evangelical Christians have, in a beautiful but sobering sense, fulfilled their role: they have come to the Jewish people in the name of the Lord, bearing the message of the Gospel of salvation.

And largely, that message has been rejected. In the modern state of Israel, the proclamation of the Gospel carries legal risk. The name of Jesus is often treated as a provocation. The evangelicals who have come with love and tears have been turned away. This is not a statement of condemnation — it is a statement of grief. It is the grief of God.

Which is why their house will be once again be left unto them desolate. He has already destroyed Jerusalem and the Temple twice before because they bore no fruit. Jesus is the same yesterday today and forever.

Therefore, Judgment Is Now Coming on Israel

This is not a verdict delivered from hatred. It is delivered from the same sorrowful love that moved Jesus to weep, that moved Paul to cry out that he wished himself "accursed from Christ" for the sake of his kinsmen (Romans 9:3). The judgment is not a repudiation of the Jewish people — God forbid. It is the judgment that comes upon every people, every nation, every individual who, having been given the light, turns away from it.

The Jews in the land of Palestine today are not yet the "Israel of God" in the fullest Biblical sense — not because God has abandoned them, but because the condition of fullness has not yet been met. They are, as Paul describes, "enemies for your sakes" concerning the Gospel, even while they remain "beloved for the fathers' sakes" concerning the election (Romans 11:28). These two truths must be held in tension. To abandon either is to distort the Gospel. But they must be grafted back into the true vine, the Branch, to become fruitful by accepting the Lordship of Jesus...they need to proclaim Him "King of the Jews".

God is coming in judgment upon the fruitless fig tree. The judgment on Israel is, paradoxically, the mercy of God working in extremity. The missles that fall on Tel Aviv, the instability of the Gulf, the grinding pressure of history — these are the dresser's spade at work, loosening the soil, creating the conditions for national repentance.

Evangelical Christians must hold their ground. We must not retreat into a comfortable theology that excuses fruitlessness in the name of unconditional election. Election is unto holiness, not to the exemption from it. We must speak the truth in love — and the truth is this: there is no safety, no peace, and no future for Israel apart from Yeshua ha-Mashiach, Jesus the Messiah, the Branch of Jesse, the Nazarene who hung upon the cross as King of the Jews.

And it must start with Israel acknowledging that the evangelical Christians who are supporting them with prayers and intercession are those who come "In the name of the Lord" to bring the gospel that will graft them back into their destiny. And therefore allow it legally to preach that Gospel of reconciliation, allow churches to be established and Jews convert without persecution.

And with the great revival spreading among Iranians that is the only hope for peace and blessing for the region, Christian Jews and Christian Arabs and Iranians. Blessed of the Lord with peace and prosperity for all.

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