For more than a thousand years the Jewish people had awaited the Savior's coming. Upon this event they had rested their brightest hopes. In song and prophecy, in temple rite and household prayer, they had enshrined His name.
--And yet at His coming they knew Him not. The Beloved of heaven was to them "as a root out of a dry ground; He had "no form nor comeliness;" and they saw in Him no beauty that they should desire Him. "He came unto His own, and His own received Him not." Isaiah 53:2; John 1:11.
--Yet God had chosen Israel. He had called them to preserve among
men the knowledge of His law, and of the symbols and prophecies that pointed to the Savior.
--But the Israelites fixed their hopes upon worldly greatness. From the time of their entrance to the land of Canaan, they departed from the commandments of God, and followed the ways of the heathen.
--After the return from Babylon, much attention was given to religious instruction. All over the country, synagogues were erected. But these agencies became corrupted. During the captivity, many of the people had received heathen ideas and customs, and these were brought into their religious service.
They trusted to the sacrifices and ordinances themselves, instead of resting upon Him to whom they pointed. --Yet God had chosen Israel. He had called them to preserve among
--But the Israelites fixed their hopes upon worldly greatness. From the time of their entrance to the land of Canaan, they departed from the commandments of God, and followed the ways of the heathen.
--After the return from Babylon, much attention was given to religious instruction. All over the country, synagogues were erected. But these agencies became corrupted. During the captivity, many of the people had received heathen ideas and customs, and these were brought into their religious service.
--While the Jews desired the advent of the Messiah, they had no true conception of His mission.
They did not seek redemption from sin,
but deliverance from the Romans.
--Hatred of the Romans, and national and spiritual pride, led the Jews still to adhere rigorously to their forms of worship. *The people,
--in their darkness,
*and the rulers,
--thirsting for power,
longed for the coming of One who would vanquish their enemies and restore the kingdom to Israel.
-*-They had studied the prophecies, but without spiritual insight.
Thus they overlooked those scriptures that point to the humiliation of Christ's first advent, and misapplied those that speak of the glory of His second coming.
--Pride obscured their vision.
They interpreted prophecy in accordance
with their selfish desires.
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