God is searching for His people in these latter days. Granted, He loves the whole world and everyone in it, but there is only one people on the face of this big wide earth that He is actually searching for. It is the people He chose way back in Abraham’s day, who would be called by Abraham’s grandson’s name—Israel, meaning “Prince with God.” Yes, salvation is open to all of His creation, but He has “not cast away His people which He foreknew.” He is searching for them now. To understand His heart and the importance that His people have in His plan for our day, we must rehearse their trail through Bible history.
You know the story about His chosen people—how Yahweh the Creator chose out a people to reveal Himself to and through—a people who came out of the loins of Adam and Eve about 6,000 years ago, a special creation with a special purpose in the mind of God. How Abraham and Sarah were promised a miracle son in the book of Genesis—how he would be called Isaac, and he would have Jacob, whose name was changed to Israel. And Jacob/Israel had 12 sons, and they multiplied and remained the chosen people of God.
And then for most people it gets fuzzy. Most remember a few “Bible stories.” Few study the Bible in depth to see where the thread of prophecy leads. The 12 sons married and multiplied into small clans or tribes. Jacob/Israel’s favorite son Joseph was sold into slavery by his jealous brothers. Famine gripped the land and Jacob/Israel and his 11 sons and their families had to go down to Egypt to buy food. In the mean time, Joseph had by the miraculous hand of God become the governor of Egypt, Pharaoh’s right hand man.
Joseph, a type of the Messiah, has mercy on his brothers and their families, forgiving them and setting them up. The Hebrews then stay in Egypt and have it good there and grow over the next 400 years to 3 million, a country within a country. In the course of time, these 12 tribes of people, all the offspring of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob/Israel, are enslaved by the Egyptians. Moses, a Hebrew child reared as an Egyptian prince by Pharaoh’s sister, is called by Yahweh to deliver the children of Israel (all 12 tribes). Through many miracles like the parting of the Red Sea, Moses leads God’s people into the Promised Land, into the land of Canaan.
After much adventure and misadventure, Joshua, Moses’ protégé, leads them on in, and they conquer the land. Each of the 12 tribes gets an inheritance of actual real estate and they take up residence.
Their form of government is a theocracy—God ruling them through His representatives, the prophets and the judges. They are, however, extremely unruly, and seek after other gods and provoke Yahweh to anger and jealousy. When things go bad for them, they cry out to Yahweh and He comes to their rescue. When things are good, food and prosperity plentiful, then they forget Him and, what He calls, “whore after other gods.” He likens them to His wife.
This goes on for about 500 years, from about 1500 B.C. to 1,000 B.C. At this time they want to be like the other nations around them; they want a king like they have. And so, against Samuel the prophet’s warning, God gives them King Saul, who is later deposed for His sins, and then has Samuel anoint “a man after God’s own heart,” the illustrious David, the son of Jesse, the ancestor of Jesus/Yahshua.
Later, David’s son Solomon is crowned King of Israel, meaning he is the king of all twelve tribes of Jacob, whose name was changed to Israel. Solomon was a great man, but his kingdom would be torn in two because of His idolatry. For he “loved many strange women…of the nations concerning which Yahweh said unto the children of Israel, Ye shall not go into them…” (I Kings 11: 1-2). So God told Solomon that because you have done this, “I will surely rend the kingdom from thee” (v. 11). For David’s sake, Yahweh waited until after Solomon’s death to divide the 12 tribed kingdom.
In about 975 B. C., a civil war broke out and it split into two kingdoms, the Kingdom of Israel with ten of the twelve tribes, and the Kingdom of Judah with the other two tribes. The Kingdom of Israel (10 tribes) lay to the north with its capital Samaria. The Kingdom of Judah lay to the south with its capital Jerusalem. They both had their own kings, with their own religious and political systems. In fact, one can read about them at war with each other in many parts of the Bible.
Yahweh warned them that He would punish them for their evil ways going back hundreds of years. And really nothing changed after the split. Both Houses, both the House of Israel (10 tribes) and the House of Judah (2 tribes), kept doing evil in God’s sight over the next 300+ years. They kept breaking His 10 commandment law. Yet He was faithful, sending prophets to both kingdoms, admonishing them to turn from their evil ways.
Until, finally, Yahweh had had enough. For His chosen people’s own good, He would do the unthinkable. He would scatter them to the four winds. He would raise up terrible nations to sweep down upon their little kingdoms, and to gobble them up and slay some of them and to lead them into captivity. He had warned them through His prophets of this very detestable thing, yet they would not hearken. Prophets like Elijah, Isaiah, and Jeremiah, among many others cried unto them, reminding them of the great heritage, and warning them to repent and turn their hearts back to God, but they would not hear of it. They were smug in their assurance that their new way of worship was proper. But they had other gods before the true Creator God, and had forgotten the Rock “from which they were hewn.”
And so, in 721 B. C., the fierce Assyrian Empire swooped down upon the northern Kingdom of Israel (ten tribes) and led them back east to their capital city of Nineveh. And these enslaved offspring of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob/Israel became lost. They lost their identity as part of God’s chosen people. They disappeared into the mists of time, and modern scholars are hard pressed to shed light on just where they went or what happened to them. But “God has not cast away His people which He foreknew” (Rom. 11: 2).
They are mentioned in the “New Testament,” however. Christ said, “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the House of Israel” (Matt. 15: 24, NIV, ESV, RSV). He spoke no idle words. The lost tribes of Israel are extremely important to Christ, and consequently, to the Father. And the apostle James addresses his book “to the twelve tribes scattered abroad, greeting” (1:1). That has to be the descendants of the Kingdom of Israel (ten tribes) or to the whole House of Israel (12 tribes). James, who had the same mind of Christ, cleared that up by writing to the 12 tribes that were already scattered all over the world. Also, the apostle Paul said that as of A.D. 62, the twelve tribes were not only in the earth, but were “instantly serving God day and night” in hope of the promise of the resurrection of Christ (Acts 26: 6-7).
Kingdom of Judah Carried Away
That same fate that happened unto the northern Kingdom of Israel (10 Tribes) happened to the southern Kingdom of Judah around 603 B. C. by the Babylonians. Citizens of this two-tribed kingdom, by now called “Jews,” were carried away captive, but they did not lose their identity. The original Hebrew religion instituted by Moses had by now changed into the beginning of the modern religion of Judaism, which, according to the Savior Yahshua, was hypocritical, evil, and was not pleasing to God (John 8:44). By 29 A.D. many Edomites (Idumaens) had converted to the Mosaic religion and had changed it into something altogether repulsive to Christ. In fact, He told them, “You are of your father the devil.” Judaism had become now the religion of the “serpents” and “vipers,” the Pharisees and Sadducees, who are the progenitors of the modern Jewish religion today. This is the “synagogue of Satan, who say they are Jews, and are not, but do lie,” spoken of by Jesus/Yahshua Himself (Rev. 3: 9). 85% of modern Jewry are not from the loins of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob (Arthur Koestler, The Thirteenth Tribe).
Because the Israelites (10 tribes) were lost to history, people now think that the only Israelites left are Jews. But the true Jews made up only two tribes out of the original twelve. That leaves the vast majority of the “lost sheep of the House of Israel” out here in the world, their identity lost, waiting for God to reveal it to them. For these of the lost ten tribes do figure prominently in prophecy for these latter days. 144,000 of them are detailed specifically in Revelation 7 and 14. 12, 000 from each tribe are mentioned by name. “Of the tribe of Judah were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Reuben were sealed twelve thousand. Of the tribe of Gad…” and on through Benjamin “were sealed twelve thousand,” to a total of 144,000. So a remnant of the lost tribes will be revealed in these latter days in order to fulfill these scriptures.
The 144,000 from the Lost Tribes of Israel
These have a very precious and wonderful calling, for they will be sealed by God as His servants before His throne (7: 3, 15). They will have “their Father’s name [Yahweh] written in their foreheads” (14: 1). They were “redeemed from among men,” meaning that they are not super heavenly entities, but came from the loins of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. They were washed in the Lamb’s blood like every other Christian, but they have grown to full spiritual maturity and are the “firstfruits unto God” (v. 4). They are “without fault before the throne of God” (v. 5). Without fault! Perfectly mature manifested sons of the living God!
And they come out of the twelve tribes of Israel. That may not be politically correct to say, but that is what Revelation 7 says. This is the reason that it is extremely important for us to study the prophecies concerning the “lost sheep of the House of Israel” out. Christ said that He was sent to them! It was important to Him. Is it important to us?
Some doubters will say that the 12 tribes are lost, and “What difference does it really make anyway?” Well, it would not make any difference if the future of His chosen people did not matter to Him. God says that His manifested sons will come out of these twelve tribes, and it does matter to Him. He said, “My ways are not your ways; my thoughts are not your thoughts.”
We are told to seek the mind of God. Know His thoughts. What is He thinking about? Is He still thinking about His people, the lost sheep of the House of Israel? Yes. “Has God cast away His people? God forbid…The gifts and calling of God are without repentance” (Romans 11:1, 29). Yahweh called them and a remnant of them will come back to Him in these latter days. The question for us is this: Are we one of them? Will we be one of the “firstfruits of God” who are very close to the Lamb and do the greater works that He promised some would do?
Kenneth Wayne Hancock {Please make a comment. I would love to hear from you and where you reside in the earth.}
Immortality Road 