Our Guest Jonathan Bernis
JAMIE: Welcome back to “Something More”. I’m your host today, Jamie Galloway. We have Jonathan Bernis with us. We’re talking about unlocking the prophetic mysteries of Israel. Jonathan, I feel like we’re on a cliffhanger, right there and you know—why is it important to find the lost tribes?
JONATHAN: Well, I think that this is a mystery that God wants to unlock and that is the regathering of the Jewish people, back to their land and back to God spiritually. It’s about restoration and that restoration affects the rest of the world. Now Jamie, if you go back and you read the prophets and I’m telling you, you’ll see this everywhere you look, once you catch hold of this, the prophets of the Old Testament spoke a lot about the phrase “bayom hahu” in Hebrew. It means in that day. What day? The day that ushers in the Messianic age, we know it as the millennial kingdom, same thing. It’s the kingdom of God coming to this earth. We all believe in that. We believe there’s going to be a literal kingdom where Jesus is ruling and reigning. Well, what has to happen before that occurs? Well, the prophets give us the answer. They spoke a lot about the Jewish people coming back from the dispersion. If you disobey Me, I’ll disperse you to the uttermost parts of the Earth, but in that day, I will bring you back. Isaiah 11, talks about this restoration. Jeremiah 16, talks about this restoration. In fact, just about every prophet talks about this restoration and that means they have to be identified. In 722 BC, a long time ago, when the Kingdom of Israel was divided, after the reign of Solomon, there were ten tribes, the Kingdom of Israel in the north and the two tribes, the southern Kingdom of Judah. And in 722 the Assyrians overran the ten tribes in the north. They were taken into captivity and we never heard from them again. They were lost to the world. Now God knows who they are, God knows where they are, but we’re not told in Scripture. That’s the mystique of the ten lost tribes of Israel. The ten tribes of the northern kingdom that disappeared after the Assyrian captivity and then the two were taken into captivity by the Babylonians and a remnant returned and rebuilt the temple. The lost ten tribes are being restored today. There are communities that have been isolated, that are saying, “Hey we’re here and we’re from the tribe of Manasseh.” The Beta, Israel, in Ethiopia, are saying, “We’re from the tribe of Dan.” Now, we don’t know for sure if those claims are authentic, but the rabbis are saying, “Yes, we accept the B’nai Menashe.” Now there’s 7,000 living in Israel. This is a recent decision. And the Ethiopians, back in the 1980’s, the rabbis said, “Yes, they’re historically part of our people. Bring them home.”
JAMIE: So traditional rabbis are responding very positively to this?
JONATHAN: Absolutely! There are these groups of orthodox Jews that are now seeking for these tribes. And of course, they now have to go through some kind of a conversion back, but they are looking for them and this is a very real thing. And Jamie, it’s a restoration of Israel prophecy, that’s being fulfilled. 1948, when Israel became a nation, we saw prophecy fulfilled; a nation was born in a day. Jerusalem restored in 1967. Jesus Himself said Jerusalem will be trodden down by the Gentiles until the time of the Gentiles be fulfilled. It happened in 1967. And during this whole time, continuing to this day, there’s been regathering’s of the Jewish people and it is Bible prophecy being fulfilled before our very eyes.
