Tucker Carlson and Senator Ted Cruz clashed over Israel, Iran, and U.S. foreign policy. The whole interview (more like an informal debate) was entertaining, but the most intriguing part for me was when Cruz talked about the alleged biblical foundation of his support for Israel.
While I usually write about economic topics, I’m wading into some theological waters here because I, like Senator Cruz, am an evangelical protestant. He didn’t refer to it by name, but the view he was espousing in his interview reflects dispensational theology. My purpose in writing this is merely to show that not all evangelical protestants espouse dispensationalism and that there is a more coherent interpretation of scripture through the lens of covenant theology that does not lead to dangerous U.S. foreign policy.
Here is a bit of the heated conversation between Senator Cruz and Tucker Carlson:
Cruz: “When I came into the Senate I resolved that I was going to be the leading defender of Israel and what you didn’t ask is why, so let me tell you why. […] The reason is twofold: Number one, as a Christian growing up in Sunday school I was taught from the Bible those who bless Israel will be blessed and those who curse Israel will be cursed, and from my perspective I want to be on the blessing side of things.”
Carlson: “Where is that?”
Cruz: “I can find it for you. I don’t have the scripture off the tip of my [tongue]. You pull out the phone and..”
Carlson: “It’s in Genesis.”
They are referring to one of the most important passages of scripture, Genesis 12:1-3, in which God makes a covenant with Abram, whose name would later be changed to Abraham:
Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
Similar pronouncements from God were given to Abraham’s descendants. God told Abraham’s grandson, Jacob (whose name would later be changed to Israel), “in you and your offspring shall all the families of the earth be blessed” (Genesis 28:14b).
This, then, is the basis for Senator Cruz’s resolve to be “the leading defender of Israel,” guiding his foreign policy views in the 20th and 21st centuries. This view (an element of dispensationalism) is not unique to Senator Cruz—it’s espoused by many politicians and their constituents in the U.S., which helps explain why the U.S. maintains such an entangling alliance with the current government of Israel.
Dispensational theology is relatively new, originating in the 19th century. It’s adoption by many in the U.S. can be attributed to the Scofield Reference Bible, published in 1909. It teaches that God “dispenses” grace and reveals himself in distinct ways for distinct people over distinct periods in distinct places. For example, the Abrahamic covenant applied to certain people (Jews) in a certain place (Canaan) starting with Abraham and lasting until Moses. It leads to the conclusion that God has separate plans for Israel and the church.
Covenant theology explains that after the fall of Adam and Eve, God made an overarching covenant of grace, “wherein He freely offered unto sinners life and salvation by Jesus Christ” (see chapters 7 and 8 of the Westminster Confession of Faith). You might be thinking, “But Jesus was born thousands of years later. How was this covenant offered to all the people we read about in the Old Testament?” Answer: “This covenant was differently administered in the time of the law, and in the time of the gospel: under the law it was administered by promises, prophecies, sacrifices, circumcision, the paschal lamb, and other types and ordinances delivered to the people of the Jews, all fore-signifying Christ to come” (emphasis added). Thus, Jesus was the perfect fulfillment of the promise to Abraham, but even for Abraham, his faith in God is what mattered, not his works under the law. In short, God does not have separate plans for Israel and the church. God has one plan for his people, and “his people” includes all who have faith in the God who saves them, Jews and Gentiles.
Evangelical protestants believe in the sainthood of all believers and that each believer must interpret scripture under the guidance of the Holy Spirit. Where difficulties arise, believers should use clearer passages to help make sense of less clear passages. I invite those Christians who agree with Senator Cruz to consider the whole of scripture and what passages like Genesis 12:1-3 mean in that light.
Who or what is “Israel”?
“Israel” could refer to a single person: Jacob/Israel. It could refer to the land that was promised to Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. It could refer to the genetic offspring of Abraham throughout generations.
Senator Cruz’s dispensationalism leads him to view the promise to Abraham about blessings and curses as one that belongs to ethnic Jews and the land on the eastern shore of the Mediterranean Sea. Covenant theology, on the other hand, holds that the entirety of scripture shows that this covenant with Abraham was for the spiritual offspring of Abraham.
The Apostle Paul, in his letter to the Galatians, makes this very clear: “Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, ‘In you shall all the nations be blessed.’ So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith” (emphasis added). This is exactly what covenant theology teaches.
While it was clear for Paul, a former religious authority who persecuted the early Christian church, he indicates that this is a part of the “mystery of Christ” that was unveiled by Jesus Christ (this implies that Old Testament passages ought to be interpreted in light of the person, work, and ministry of Jesus as revealed in the Gospels and the rest of the New Testament). In his letter to the Ephesians, he says, “This mystery is that the Gentiles are fellow heirs, members of the same body, and partakers of the promise in Christ Jesus through the gospel.”
This view is not unique to Paul, nor are they cherry-picked from Paul’s writing. He goes into more detail in his letter to the Romans and he discusses this mystery in theological discussions throughout his letters. Peter, one of Jesus’s disciples, also confirms this view in a letter to “born again” (1 Peter 1:3 and 23) Christians in various regions in modern-day Turkey (i.e., not Jews in Israel):
But you are a chosen race, a royal priesthood, a holy nation, a people for his own possession, that you may proclaim the excellencies of him who called you out of darkness into his marvelous light. Once you were not a people, but now you are God’s people; once you had not received mercy, but now you have received mercy.
Jesus himself taught in line with this view. Shortly after his famous pronouncement, “I am the way , and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me,” Jesus provided an analogy of a vine: “I am the true vine, and my Father is the vinedresser. Every branch in me that does not bear fruit he takes away, and every branch that does bear fruit he prunes, that it may bear more fruit.” Thus, being born Jewish (or born of Christian parents, for that matter) is no guarantee of God’s blessing or salvation. Those who trust and obey Jesus are a part of his “true vine.”
What constitutes the blessing in Genesis 12:1-3?
Senator Cruz believes that God’s promise to Abraham circa 2000 B.C. means that money from U.S. taxpayers should be used to bolster Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s military actions in 2025 A.D. Once again, a full view of scripture casts doubt on Cruz’s perspective, this time on what constitutes “blessing.” We need look no further than Jesus’s Beatitudes, the preamble of sorts to his Sermon on the Mount: “Blessed are the peacemakers, for they shall be called sons of God.” Nowhere in Jesus’s teaching is “blessed” or “blessing” used to refer to taxpayer-funded military defense of Israel or offensive wars against other nations.
Should Christians in the U.S. feel obligated to defend the land promised to Abraham? Jesus dismissed the idea that the land of Israel is especially reserved for worshipping God. In his conversation with the Samaritan woman at the well, she pointed out that a common view among Jews at the time was that “Jerusalem is the place where people ought to worship.” Jesus said that “the hour is coming when neither on this mountain or in Jerusalem will you worship the Father.” He said that “God is spirit, and those who worship him must worship in spirit and truth.” Jesus’s Gospel is an open door to Jews and non-Jews in the land promised to Abraham and around the world. What matters is that believers worship in spirit and in truth, not that they are located in a particular region on the Mediterranean Sea.
Covenant theology holds that the blessing from God described in Genesis 12:1-3 is fulfilled in Jesus Christ, and a great summary of the blessings of Christ is found in Ephesians 1:3-14. God’s “plan for the fullness of time [is] to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.” There is no special designation for a particular plot of land. Our “inheritance” is not a plot of land but Christ himself and, through him, adoption into his family, reconciliation with God, grace and forgiveness, etc.
Conclusion
God promised Abraham that through Abraham, “all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” Jesus Christ, whose family lineage goes back to Abraham, is the fulfillment of that promise. The entirety of scripture points to Jesus as the focal point of human history because Jesus revealed that God saves his people by grace through faith—not through works, family lineage, or geographic location.
Senator Cruz is trapped in dispensationalism, which leads him and others into a dangerous relationship with the modern-day government of Israel. The U.S. government has committed terrible atrocities in the Middle East because of the sway of dispensationalism over too many U.S. politicians. If we can judge an -ism by its works, dispensationalism should be dispensed with.
