As Israeli Defense Forces prepare for an all-out retaliation on Hamas, the Gog and Magog scenario in Ezekiel 38-39 is one End Times scenario biblical scholars are noting. Psalm 83:2-5 is another:
See how your enemies growl,
how your foes rear their heads.
With cunning they conspire against your people;
they plot against those you cherish.
"Come," they say, "let us destroy them as a nation,
so that Israel's name is remembered no more;"
With one mind they plot together.
They form an alliance against you.
Jan Markell, founder and director of Olive Tree Ministries, wonders how this current conflict will grow.
"It could be that all of this is diffused because of American involvement, which of course was done by Mr. Biden reluctantly; you could tell," she notes. "American involvement and the [aircraft] carrier, the Gerald R. Ford — that's a terrible threat to the invaders of Israel that America is mobilizing our own troops. Not to mention she's sending SEAL Team 6 to help with hostages."
Israeli jets have already struck the airport used to supply the terrorists.
At this point, Markell says these anti-Israel groups could "back down and take their marbles and go play somewhere else," but she thinks it is potentially "a Mideast conflict that could spread."
For her, Isaiah 17, "which is the obliteration of Damascus," also comes to mind.
The mission remains
Shlomy and Miriam Abramov, who run the full-time Christian ministry Awake Israel, say they plan to continue to show the love of God to the people in Israel.
"We've been able to start a small humanitarian aid center," Miriam details about the ministry. "We share goods freely with schools and hospitals on several occasions, and it's an ongoing help that we provide to the Israeli people or the needy people."
The Abramovs had left Israel for the United States just 36 hours before last weekend's attacks.
"It was very unexpected, and we're very much in shock, [but] it's really not unbelievable," Mrs. Abramov submits. "When we look back on past decades, and even longer, it's really been a long time coming."
She knows there will be plenty to do when they return home in a couple of weeks.
"We have no food in the refrigerator to speak of, so we need to go out and get food," she tells AFN. "We pray that God will provide, that the stores have a little bit that we might be able to get some things to store up and that those would be replenished, that we might be able to hunker down safely should the war still be continuing. So that's the first thing we need to do, is take care of the house and make sure that we can live."
And the Abramovs know there will be plenty of others to minister to when they return to the Holy Land.
