Jerusalem, Center of All Things --Then and Now...

There are those who teach that Israel, and Jerusalem, it's eternal capital, are not of importance to the Lord this side of Calvary. They believe that since Israel rejected their Messiah, Yeshua, they are no longer eligible to receive God's blessings. Using Romans 2: 28,29 and Romans 10:11, they teach that spiritual Israel- believers in Jesus Christ-have replaced the Jews, and the only important Jerusalem is the spiritual one mentioned in Revelation. If you have heard these teachings, please search your Bibles and do a study about Jerusalem on your own. Here are just a couple of important passages I have been shown by the Holy Spirit through God's Word.

You cannot read these verses in Zechariah and spiritualize them or say they have already been fulfilled. And these are just two places in the Scriptures!! I have listed a few more for you to look up on your own. Do not be deceived in these last days. Many will seek to dismiss what is going on in Israel, especially as it pertains to Jerusalem, as immaterial to the believer...but nothing could be farther from the truth.

Zechariah 12:
¹ This is the word of the LORD concerning Israel. The LORD, who stretches out the heavens, who lays the foundation of the earth, and who forms the spirit of man within him, declares: ² "I am going to make Jerusalem a cup that sends all the surrounding peoples reeling. Judah will be besieged as well as Jerusalem. ³ On that day, when all the nations of the earth are gathered against her, I will make Jerusalem an immovable rock for all the nations. All who try to move it will injure themselves. ⁴ On that day I will strike every horse with panic and its rider with madness," declares the LORD. "I will keep a watchful eye over the house of Judah, but I will blind all the horses of the nations. ⁵ Then the leaders of Judah will say in their hearts, 'The people of Jerusalem are strong, because the LORD Almighty is their God.'

⁶ "On that day I will make the leaders of Judah like a firepot in a woodpile, like a flaming torch among sheaves. They will consume right and left all the surrounding peoples, but Jerusalem will remain intact in her place.

⁷ "The LORD will save the dwellings of Judah first, so that the honor of the house of David and of Jerusalem's inhabitants may not be greater than that of Judah. ⁸ On that day the LORD will shield those who live in Jerusalem, so that the feeblest among them will be like David, and the house of David will be like God, like the Angel of the LORD going before them. ⁹ On that day I will set out to destroy all the nations that attack Jerusalem.

¹⁰ "And I will pour out on the house of David and the inhabitants of Jerusalem a spirit of grace and supplication. They will look on me, the one they have pierced, and they will mourn for him as one mourns for an only child, and grieve bitterly for him as one grieves for a firstborn son.

¹¹ On that day the weeping in will be great, like the weeping of Hadad Rimmon in the plain of Megiddo. ¹² The land will mourn, each clan by itself, with their wives by themselves: the clan of the house of David and their wives, the clan of the house of Nathan and their wives, ¹³ the clan of the house of Levi and their wives, the clan of Shimei and their wives, ¹⁴ and all the rest of the clans and their wives.

Zechariah 8 is the same way:

¹ Again the word of the LORD Almighty came to me. ² This is what the LORD Almighty says: "I am very jealous for Zion; I am burning with jealousy for her." ³ This is what the LORD says: "I will return to Zion and dwell in Jerusalem. Then Jerusalem will be called the City of Truth, and the mountain of the LORD Almighty will be called the Holy Mountain."

⁷ This is what the LORD Almighty says: "I will save my people from the countries of the east and the west. ⁸ I will bring them back to live in Jerusalem; they will be my people, and I will be faithful and righteous to them as their God."As you have been an object of cursing among the nations, O Judah and Israel, so will I save you, and you will be a blessing. Do not be afraid, but let your hands be strong."

²² And many peoples and powerful nations will come to Jerusalem to seek the LORD Almighty and to entreat him." ²³ This is what the LORD Almighty says: "In those days ten men from all languages and nations will take firm hold of one Jew by the hem of his robe and say, 'Let us go with you, because we have heard that God is with you.' "

Zechariah 14 is a powerful chapter about Jerusalem in the last days. the Lord says He will gather all nations against Jerusalem. He will fight against those nations and shall be King over all the earth... ONE LORD. Those who are left of those nations will come to Jerusalem to worship Him!

Isaiah has mention of Israel's redemption and Jerusalem's importance to the Lord, for good and bad, in nearly every chapter.
The Psalms are full of verses about Jerusalem.