Written by Dean C. Curry |
Wednesday, November 29, 2023
Indeed, there are many prudential reasons for Christians as Citizens to support Israel.  Among them, Israel is the only free, democratic nation in the Middle East.  Also, Israel is a close ally of the United States, sharing a similar cultural heritage, values, and interests.  Lastly is the moral imperative.  The meaning of Israel is powerfully captured at Yad Vashem – the Jewish holocaust memorial – located in the hills of West Jerusalem. The existence of Israel is a symbol of a people’s survival of tyranny and their quest for freedom.  The United States, therefore, has a moral obligation to ensure that Israel survives into the future.

A few days ago, a Facebook friend posted in all caps, “A MUST SEE!!”  The focus of my friend’s enthusiasm was a YouTube video of a prominent evangelical dispensationalist explaining “what’s next” in Israel’s war against Hamas.  My friend concluded his post repeating the video presenter’s closing Bible verse from Psalm 121:4: “He who watches over Israel, neither slumbers nor sleeps.”
George Marsden, the premier historian of American evangelicalism, has written extensively about the important role that dispensationalism played in shaping American Protestant fundamentalism, the precursor of contemporary American evangelicalism.  Central to dispensational theology is the belief that the 20th century return of Jews to Palestine, and the birth of the modern state of Israel in 1948, was a key prophetic marker pointing to the Second Coming of Christ.
Dispensationalism played no role in the actual creation of the modern nation of Israel. In fact, in 1948 American fundamentalists were cloistered in their era of cultural and political exile that followed battles with theological liberalism earlier in the twentieth century.  Nevertheless, fundamentalists and their evangelical heirs welcomed the birth of Israel as confirmation of biblical prophecy.  For their part, Israel officials have certainly welcomed evangelical support, as evidenced, for example, by Benjamin Netanyahu’s embrace of dispensationalist John Hagee.  Israel’s relationship with American evangelicals is strategic in nature and not rooted in any theological affinities. Relatedly, most American dispensationalists are likely ignorant – or at least unaware – of the secular roots and nature of the Zionist nationalist movement. As far as the Israeli Jewish population is concerned, only 20% of Israelis have a positive view of evangelicals while 75% have no opinion or are neutral in their perspective towards evangelicals.  However, it is worth noting that as Orthodox Jews become more influential in Israeli public life Israel may in the future become less hospitable to evangelicals.
While historian Daniel Hummel has recently pointed to the demise of dispensationalism among evangelical theologians, dispensationalism continues to influence the vast majority of evangelicals and profoundly shapes their attitudes towards Israel.  A 2022 Pew survey reveals that 86% of white evangelicals have warm views towards Israel, compared to 66% of Americans generally.  And 70% of white evangelicals believe that God gave the land of Israel to the Jewish people.
It is not surprising, therefore, that many evangelicals are relying on their dispensational theology to decipher current events in Israel.  This reality points to an important component of evangelical engagement of public life; namely, the importance of responding in a “Christian” way.  Dispensationalism provides a ready-made Christian framework for such a response for many, if not most, evangelicals.  However, it is not the only framework.  Tracking social media and listening to my evangelical friends, I read and hear other “Christian” responses. For example, some evangelicals seem reluctant to express outright support for Israel fearing that such support will betray the Christian mandate to “love mercy” which presumably includes even Hamas.  While some dispensationalist-anchored evangelicals embrace this perspective, it is especially evident among younger evangelicals who, according to most surveys, are much more sympathetic to Palestinians and less supportive of Israel than older evangelical cohorts.  There are also evangelicals who assert that since the Christians primary allegiance is to God, any response to the events in Israel and Gaza based on our national identification as Americans is inappropriate.
Finally, in assessing evangelical attitudes towards Israel and the current Israeli-Hamas war, we need to remember that while dispensationalism continues to cast a wide net of influence over evangelical thinking about Israel, not all evangelicals are dispensational.  This is especially true among many – though not all – in Reformed and Anglican traditions. I am not aware of polling of among these group, but I suspect that the majority – like their dispensational sisters and brothers – strongly support Israel, but with an important difference.  Their support is not grounded in a putatively biblical framework, but rather in prudential considerations.  Indeed, there are many prudential reasons for Christians as Citizens to support Israel.  Among them, Israel is the only free, democratic nation in the Middle East.  Also, Israel is a close ally of the United States, sharing a similar cultural heritage, values, and interests.  Lastly is the moral imperative.  The meaning of Israel is powerfully captured at Yad Vashem – the Jewish holocaust memorial – located in the hills of West Jerusalem. The existence of Israel is a symbol of a people’s survival of tyranny and their quest for freedom.  The United States, therefore, has a moral obligation to ensure that Israel survives into the future.
Dean C. Curry lives in the Lowcountry of South Carolina and has spent many years teaching and writing on subjects related to international relations, foreign policy, and religion and public life. This article is used with permission.
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MODERATE: Dear Presbyter, look!—it grows dark and the way seems far worse ahead. Whether you accompany me or no, I must turn back with all haste. Fare thee well and take care. I fear for your safety, dear brother. I must fly. 
An Excerpt From the P.C.A. Presbyter’s Progression:

From the Denomination That Was
To That Which Is To Come:
Delivered under the Similitude of a
DREAM
Wherein is Discovered
The manner of his setting out,
His Dangerous Journey; And
Surprising Outcome of His Travels
CHAPTER THE FIFTH – PRESBYTER ON THE SLOPE SLIPPERY
Now I saw in my dream, that when Confessionalist was gone back, Presbyter and Moderate went talking over the steepening track; and thus they began their discourse.
PRESBYTER: Come, neighbour Moderate, how do you do? I am glad that you are with me on this treacherous, beautifully-broken-but-orthodox way. You seem an authentic and plain man, and I am happy for your company. What think you of this way?
MODERATE: Well, good Presbyter, the views are certainly beautiful, but I fear this slope which falls away so sharply to our left as the trail grows more narrow and steep. The footing is not at all to my liking, what with loose stones of many sizes and types.
PRESBYTER: Now, now good Moderate, see you not these excellent Shoes I wear of hearty Evangelical stock? These shoes were made by the most excellent cobblers of the City Cultural for Mission and Progress. No such shoes are to be had in the country!
MODERATE: Well, Presbyter, the shoes are most beautiful. The design is lovely to behold and such a shine they have!— though I venture to say that the dust of this way does but begin to dull them. But the great thing about shoes is how they stand wear and how they protect one’s feet, is it not? And how (on so rocky and treacherous a track as this) they allow a man to keep his feet. It may be that a simple country cobbler knows the better how to fashion shoes for the wilds we now traverse.
PRESBYTER: Stuff and nonsense, dear Moderate! These shoes will serve me well. I have paid dearly for them, and they are all the rage in the City Cultural.
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For Christians who understand that human beings are more than matter that can be molded and medicated, the need for a book like this is even more obvious. Divine revelation and millennia of insight suggest that much of what passes for “psychological trauma” today is spiritual brokenness. Spiritual healing can take the form of counseling and medication, but to put it simply, no amount of psychotherapy alleviates our need for a Savior.  

As the old saying goes, “to a hammer, everything looks like a nail.” Among the hammers today is psychotherapy, and too many wielding it are convinced that every human problem is a nail. However, the unprecedented rise of mental health problems in Generation Z suggests that the overuse of this tool has done as much harm as good. 
In a bold new book, Abigail Shrier confronts the idea of psychology as an all-consuming ideology. In Bad Therapy: Why the Kids Aren’t Growing Up, Shrier argues that much of what is now taken for granted about psychological and emotional “trauma” is wrong and has left millions of young adults more “traumatized” than if they’d had no therapy at all.  
This thesis aligns with that of her previous book Irreversible Damage, which exposed the reckless push to medically transition gender-dysphoric kids, especially girls. This push has been driven by the mental health industry. In Bad Therapy, Shrier points out the many indications that the whole approach of our therapy-obsessed age is awry. Most obvious is that despite living in one of the most objectively prosperous and safe times in human history, our young people are, en masse, mentally sicker and emotionally sadder than ever. In fact, over 40% of young adults have a mental health diagnosis, twice the rate of the general population. So, the generation most treated for psychological wellbeing is doing the worst psychologically.  
How did we get to this point? In a podcast with former New York Times columnist Bari Weiss, Shrier told the story of her grandmother, Bess, who grew up during the Great Depression.
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