"21 Then shalt thou say in thine heart: Who hath begotten me these, seeing I have lost my children, and am adesolate, a captive, and removing to and fro? And who hath brought up these? Behold, I was left alone; these, where have they been?"
I believe that the house of Israel is talking about those that have been gathered in during the last days (our day). Apparently some will not be able to have children or know about their posterity. To know a little more about this point, we look at the two scriptures found in the footnote, 21a:
1. From Isaiah 54:1, we have:
"1 aSing, O bbarren, thou that didst not bear; break forth into singing, and cry aloud, thou that didst not travail with child: for more are the children of the desolate than the children of the married wife, saith the Lord."
Here the important point is that those who do not know or have posterity will in the end have more than those who are married and do have posterity. It is an interesting promise because one might think the other way around. But this shows that the Lord knows His people and blesses them.
2. From Galatians 4:27, we have:
"27 For it is written, aRejoice, thou bbarren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which hath an husband."
This verse reiterates that through the covenant with the house of Israel made with God, this will come to pass and that those that could not or do not know their posterity will have more and those who do in the end.
We now turn to a small part from the Institute manual on this verse:
"Thus the reaction voiced in verse 21 is quite real [because of the overpopulation at the gathering]: 'Who hath begotten me these . . . ; where had they been?' In other words, where in the world did all these people (Israelites) come from?"
There will be so many gathered that those who have been in this thing forever will wonder at where the lost have been.
I think that we should work our hardest at gathering in the house of Israel in order to make this prophesy come true, and that comes with hard missionary work. It is hard, and good missionary work is not convenient and easy. We need to take leaps of faith, because there are many who don't become converted because we haven't asked them to commit to follow Jesus Christ. We may get turned down, and it seems almost necessary that we get turned down a number of times before someone says yes. And that person that does is the key. They are the ones that make it all worthwhile. Statistics show, I believe, that such a question usually does not negatively affect a friendship. It can only make it better! I am including myself in the call as much as anyone else. : )
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