Fmr. Southern Baptist president J.D. Greear tells young Evangelicals Bible is clear: God loves Israel, has a plan for Israel, and Christians should love Israel even if they don’t agree with every decision Israeli leaders make
On my podcast, influential young theologian warns young Christian’s buying into ‘woke theory’ against Israel
JERUSALEM, ISRAEL — On our latest episode of Inside The Epicenter, the weekly podcast of The Joshua Fund, I interview J.D. Greear about his biblical perspective on modern Israel, why young Evangelicals are turning against Israel, why he’s teaching chapter by chapter through the Book of Revelation right now, and his encouragement to all pastors to teach this prophetic book as well.
We also talk about his new book, Everyday Revolutionary: How to Transcend the Culture War and Transform the World, which just released in paperback, eBook, and audio on Oct. 7.
By God’s grace – and through his bold expository preaching, winsome style, and passion for evangelism and world missions – Greear, 52, has emerged as one of the most influential younger theologians and authors in the U.S.
He pastors a megachurch – The Summit Church in Raleigh-Durham, North Carolina – which under his leadership has grown from about 300 to about 12,000 members.
Greear served as president of the Southern Baptist Convention, the largest Protestant Evangelical denomination in the world, from 2018 to 2021, and is determined to see the Lord use him and his team to plant 1,000 new church congregations by 2050.
WHY DOES GREEAR REJECT REPLACEMENT THEOLOGY?
“Sometimes people will replace every reference to Israel in the New Testament with the Church, believing that Israel's time – and the time of [God’s promises to] ethnic Jews – is over,” Greear warns.
Too many Christians, he told me, think God’s love and plan for Israel “ended essentially with the Resurrection of Jesus and the coming of the Holy Spirit, and now the Church – we are the new Israel.”
Greear rejects such “replacement theology,” also known as “supersessionism,” and is concerned by how widespread it has become in American and global Christianity.
“There’s so much biblical data, Joel, that tells us that God still has a future for His people – His literal people – meaning the Jews,” he said.
While he said he loves and respects Baptist and other brothers and sisters in Christ who disagree with him, Greear noted that he has carefully studied the Scriptures for years and examined a wide range of other theological perspectives.
In so doing, he has come to the firm and unmistakable conclusion that modern-day Israel is very much evidence of the beginning of the fulfillment of ancient biblical prophecies – prophecies that foretold Israel would literally be reborn one day as a sovereign nation-state and that millions of Jewish people would return to the Holy Land to live and thrive.
GREEAR: ISRAEL’S FUTURE IS CLEAR IN THE BOOK OF REVELATION
Greear notes that as he has taught through Revelation, he’s been fascinated by the specific and literal references to Israel.
In Revelation chapter 7, he points out, the Apostle John wrote, “I heard the number of the sealed, 144,000, sealed from every tribe of the sons of Israel” (7:4). Because of their gospel witness, “a great multitude that no one could number, from every nation, from all tribes and peoples and languages,” will be saved in the last days, go to heaven, and stand “before the throne and before the Lamb, clothed in white robes, with palm branches in their hands, and crying out with a loud voice, ‘Salvation belongs to our God who sits on the throne, and to the Lamb!’” (7:9–10).
Greear told me that’s a great example of God explaining how much He loves the specific, literal nation of Israel – and that He has a specific and literal, not symbolic or metaphorical, plan to save more and more Jewish people as we approach the return of Christ.
GREEAR: WHAT DID JESUS SAY ABOUT RESTORING THE NATION-STATE OF ISRAEL?
“I tie all that back to one other little biblical piece of data that’s really important in Acts chapter one,” Greear said.
“Here you’ve got Jesus getting ready to ascend to heaven, and He gives us what we call the Great Commission,” telling His disciples that they will be His witnesses in Jerusalem, Judea, Samaria, and to the ends of the earth.
“Well, it says right before that, as they’re all standing there on the hillside – Jesus resurrected – they’re like, ‘Hey, will you at this time restore the kingdom to Israel?’”
“This, if nothing else, tells you that after hearing Jesus teach on the kingdom for three years, they [His disciples] still thought there was an actual future for ethnic Israel.”
“Jesus’ response is actually pretty important because He does not say, ‘Hey, fellas, how do you still not get it? The Church is the new Israel.’ He doesn’t say that. He says, ‘That’s not what I want you to think about right now. Right now I want you to be witnesses, and the Father will restore this [the sovereign nation-state of Israel] in His own time.’”
“You put all that together,” Greear continued, “I just – without any hesitation – I mean, I respect my brothers in Christ who have a different interpretation; I consider them friends – but without any question, the way to make the most sense of all the biblical data is to recognize that God has a future for ethnic Israel, where they are going to lead the world in the proclamation of the gospel. And what a day that’s going to be.”
GREEAR: NO ‘FREE PASS’ FOR ISRAEL, THE U.S., OR ANY COUNTRY WHEN THEY MAKE MISTAKES
Greear notes that just because the Bible clearly teaches that God loves Israel – and that Christians are to love and seek to bless Israel according to the Abrahamic Covenant (Genesis 12:1–3) – that doesn’t give Israeli leaders or people “a free pass” from criticism if and when they go against biblical teachings.
“Joel, what I’ll say here is where I’ve always tried to be cautious with our church when it comes to teaching about modern Israel,” he said.
“I grew up in an environment that taught [biblical truth], but it was sometimes used inappropriately to basically validate anything and everything that the geopolitical nation of Israel did, as if it were like a free pass.”
“Obviously that’s not right,” he added. “The principles of justice are the principles of justice, and I don’t give Israel or the United States or anybody a free pass.”
GREEAR WARNS ‘WOKE THINKING’ AGAINST ISRAEL IS HARMING YOUNG EVANGELICALS
Greear told me he’s especially concerned by how hostile many young Evangelicals have become toward Israel and how much they are being driven by “woke thinking” when it comes to the Jewish state.
“It has become apparent to me that with a lot of Christians, particularly the younger generation, a lot of the discussion on Israel has been swept up into woke theory,” he said.
Greear said “critical theory” is deeply flawed, in part because it argues that Jews and Israelis are “a group of oppressive people that are oppressing everybody else,” and that “Jewish people are basically just another version of white people, and all the Palestinian people are non-white people,” portraying them as colonizers and imperialists oppressing Palestinians who supposedly have the true rights to all of the Holy Land.
“That’s just a poor reading of history,” Greear said. “And I would just encourage people to be a little bit more circumspect in their reading and to actually get the facts.”
Still, the pastor said he is optimistic that more and more young Christians will learn the truth about Israel from the Scriptures – as well as develop compassion for the Palestinians – and will develop a healthier approach over time.
I’m not sure he’s right about that, but I certainly hope and pray that he is.
Please watch or listen to the full episode of Inside The Epicenter and share it with others – especially young believers and your pastor.
Joel C. Rosenberg is the editor-in-chief of ALL ISRAEL NEWS and ALL ARAB NEWS and the President and CEO of Near East Media. A New York Times best-selling author, Middle East analyst, and Evangelical leader, he lives in Jerusalem with his wife and sons.
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