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The "Lo Ammi"Condition of Israel
Coincident with the growing conviction that these evidences for the "Frontier" position of Acts 28 induce, is the prophecy of Hosea, which makes
it clear that at some time in their history, Israel must go into a state indicated by the word, "lo-ammi," "not My people," a condition that could only be resolved by the full
restoration of Israel as a nation and people, in other words, the restoring again of the kingdom to Israel, as expressed in Acts 1:6. There is no other point of time in the record of the New
Testament that fits all the requirements of Hosea's prophecy before Acts 28, and inasmuch as a few years after Acts 28 Jerusalem was destroyed, there can be no other point of time after it that
will fulfil all Scriptural requirements. Let those who deny that Israel became lo-ammi at Acts 28 tell us when that event happened. Let us examine this prophecy of Hosea and see what are
the conditions of this lo-ammi position.
The Hebrew words lo-ammi mean "not My people" and is the symbolic name given to one of the prophet Hosea's children. "Call his
name Lo-ammi," the reason and purport of this name being "For ye are not My People and 1 will not be your God" (Hos. 1:9). The verse that follows makes it clear that however long
the rejection may last it will not be forever, for it looks forward to the day of Israel's restoration and to the fulfilment of the promise made to Abraham that his seed should be as the sand of
the sea for multitude. The second chapter ends on this high note of restoration. Israel is to be betrothed in righteousness forever; the lo-ammi condition is to be reversed; the Lord will
say, "Thou art My people," and they will say, "Thou art my God" (Hos 2.18-23). From the days of Hosea, unti! the scattering of Israel at the end of the Acts, no such
condition has been recorded that fulfils all that Hosea has predicted. Under the "New Covenant." Jeremiah declares:
"Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that I
sow." (See the name, "Jezreel," in Hos. 2:18, where this sowing and this covenant include both Israel and the beast of the field.) . . "I will make a new covenant with the house
of Israel, and with the house of Judah." (Jer. 31:27-37)
In the third chapter of Hosea, the prophet throws further light on this lo-ammi condition, after telling his wife that she would
"abide" as a sequestered woman (see Deut. 21 :13). He proceeds:
"The children of Israel shall abide many days without a KING, and without a PRINCE and without a SACRIFICE,
and without an IMAGE, and without an EPHOD, and without TERAPHIM."
During the last 1,900 years, since the rejection of their true KING, Israel has had no territory and no king, yet by
reason of their dispersal in many lands, no Ruler has been able to claim their allegiance. Since the destruction of the temple at Jerusalem in A.D.70, soon after Acts 28, the Priestly office in
Israel has become a cypher. Yet, on the other hand Israel through all these dark years have never again lapsed into idolatry. The introduction of the seraphim over against the ephod,
supports the idea that these were ancestral tablets, no one being permitted to officiate as a Priest in Israel who could not produce his genealogy (Neh. 7:64), and as these genealogical records which
were stored in the temple perished in the destruction of the city soon after Acts 28, the position of the Priest in Israel lost all significance. We are assured however that after this period of
sequestration and suspension, Israel shall seek the Lord and David their king "in the latter days" (Hos 3:5), which latter days by all the signs around us are drawing very near. The
actual length of Israel's blindness is unrecorded, Paul speaks of it as "a mystery" (Rom. 11:25), and this period of the mystery of Israd's blindness is parallel with the
period and character of that phase of the kingdom of heaven, called, "the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven," both aspects terminating at the same moment, Israel's
restoration.
We conclude this survey of the position of Acts 28 by exhibiting the structure of the section. This can and should be tested by the reader line by line. If any item is
wrongly placed, if there appears the slightest evidence that the Scriptures have been forced into bearing false witness, then this structure must be rejected. If, however, it is seen to be an
honest exhibition of what is actually found in Acts 28:23-31, we hope that the reader will accept it and its obvious conclusions.
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