{"id":840,"date":"2023-10-18T07:58:05","date_gmt":"2023-10-18T11:58:05","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/?p=840"},"modified":"2026-04-01T16:20:57","modified_gmt":"2026-04-01T16:20:57","slug":"the-land-belongs-to-the-jews","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/2023\/10\/18\/the-land-belongs-to-the-jews\/","title":{"rendered":"The Land Belongs to the Jews"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>The Jews and the Palestinians have been fighting for many years over which one of them is the rightful owner of the land the Bible refers to as Canaan (modern-day Israel). When you look to Scripture you quickly learn that God promised the land to Abraham <em>and his descendants<\/em>. It seems pretty straightforward but here&#8217;s the rub. The Arabs and the Jews <em>both<\/em> descend from Abraham (the Arabs through Ishmael and the Jews through Isaac). So which group does the land truly belong to? That is the question I aim to answer in this post. Follow my line of reasoning&#8230;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>1) GOD CREATED THE EARTH&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Genesis 1:1 NLT, In the beginning, <em>God<\/em> created the heavens and the earth.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>2) GOD CREATED ALL THE LAND ON THE EARTH&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Genesis 1:9-10 NLT, Then God said, \u201cLet the waters beneath the sky flow together into one place, so dry ground may appear.\u201d And that is what happened. <sup>10&nbsp;<\/sup>God called the dry ground \u201cland\u201d and the waters \u201cseas.\u201d And God saw that it was good.&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>3) SINCE GOD MADE IT, GOD OWNS IT&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Psalm 24:1, \u201cThe earth <em>is the Lord\u2019s<\/em>, and everything in it. The world and all its people belong to him. <sup>2&nbsp;<\/sup>For he laid the earth\u2019s foundation on the seas and built it on the ocean depths.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>4) GOD GAVE THE LAND TO ABRAHAM AND HIS DESCENDANTS&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Genesis 12:5-7 NLT, When they arrived in Canaan, <sup>6&nbsp;<\/sup>Abram traveled through the land as far as Shechem. There he set up camp beside the oak of Moreh. At that time, the area was inhabited by Canaanites. <sup>7&nbsp;<\/sup>Then the Lord appeared to Abram and said, <strong>\u201cI will give this land to your descendants.\u201d<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Genesis 13:12-17 NLT, So Abram settled in the land of Canaan, and Lot moved his tents to a place near Sodom and settled among the cities of the plain. <sup>13&nbsp;<\/sup>But the people of this area were extremely wicked and constantly sinned against the Lord. <sup>14&nbsp;<\/sup>After Lot had gone, the Lord said to Abram, <strong>\u201cLook as far as you can see in every direction\u2014north and south, east and west. <\/strong><strong><sup>15&nbsp;<\/sup><\/strong><strong>I am giving all this land, as far as you can see, to you and your descendants as a permanent possession.<\/strong> <sup>16&nbsp;<\/sup>And I will give you so many descendants that, like the dust of the earth, they cannot be counted! <sup>17&nbsp;<\/sup><strong>Go and walk through the land in every direction, for I am giving it to you.\u201d&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Genesis 15:7 NLT, Then the Lord told him, \u201cI am the Lord who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans <strong>to give you this land <\/strong>[the land of Canaan]<strong> as your possession.\u201d&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Genesis 17:8 NLT, And <strong>I will give the entire land of Canaan, where you now live as a foreigner, to you and your descendants.<\/strong> <strong>It will be their possession forever<\/strong>, and I will be their God.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>5) GOD GAVE THE LAND SPECIFICALLY TO THE DESCENDANTS OF ABRAHAM THROUGH THE LINE OF ISAAC <\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>God said to Abram in Genesis 17:15-16 NLT, \u201c\u2026Sarai, your wife\u2014her name will no longer be Sarai. From now on her name will be Sarah. <sup>16&nbsp;<\/sup>And I will bless her and give you a son from her! Yes, I will bless her richly, and she will become the mother of many nations. Kings of nations will be among her descendants.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>God is letting Abraham know that Hagar wasn\u2019t part of His plan. God\u2019s plan involved Abraham and <em>Sarah <\/em>(the mother of Isaac)<em> <\/em>not Abraham and <em>Hagar<\/em> (the mother of Ishmael).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Now for Abraham and Sarah, they had in their mind for 13 years that <em>Ishmael<\/em> was the beginning of the fulfillment of God\u2019s promise (that a great nation would come from Abraham) and God has now thrown them a huge curveball that they\u2019re having trouble accepting, which is why Abram said to God in Genesis 17:18 NLT <strong>\u201cMay <em>Ishmael<\/em> live under your special blessing!\u201d&nbsp;<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>But God replied in Genesis 17:19-21 NLT, \u201c<strong>No<\/strong>\u2014Sarah, your wife, will give birth to a son for you. You will name him <strong>Isaac<\/strong>, and <strong>I will confirm my covenant <em>with him<\/em> and his descendants<\/strong> as an everlasting covenant. <sup>20&nbsp;<\/sup>As for Ishmael, I will bless him also, just as you have asked. I will make him extremely fruitful and multiply his descendants. He will become the father of twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation. <sup>21&nbsp;<\/sup>But <strong>my covenant will be confirmed with Isaac<\/strong>, who will be born to you and Sarah about this time next year.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Genesis 21:12 NLT, \u201c\u2026<strong>Isaac<\/strong> [not Ishmael] is the son through whom your descendants will be counted.\u201d&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>God\u2019s covenant was that He would turn Abraham into a great nation, give that nation a great big chunk of land, and then one day provide a Savior from the nation that would be born in the land God had given them (the land of Canaan). And Scripture could not be more clear that <strong>the land belongs to the descendants of Abraham through the line of Isaac (the Jews), not to the descendants of Abraham through the line of Ishmael (the Arabs). <\/strong>So the modern-day land of Israel truly does belong <em>to the Jews<\/em>, not the Palestinians. God created the land so He owns it, and He has given what\u2019s His (Psalm 24:1) to the Jewish people forever. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The Jews and the Palestinians have been fighting for many years over which one of them is the rightful owner of the land the Bible refers to as Canaan (modern-day Israel). When you look to Scripture you quickly learn that God promised the land to Abraham and his descendants. It seems pretty straightforward but here&#8217;s [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-840","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-scripture","7":"entry"},"featured_image_src":null,"featured_image_src_square":null,"author_info":{"display_name":"Mike","author_link":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/author\/mike\/"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=840"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1187,"href":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/840\/revisions\/1187"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=840"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=840"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/withskillfulhands.com\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=840"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}