The Christ in Prophecy Journal

Jonathan Cahn on America: The Puritan Covenant

Jonathan Cahn on Christ in Prophecy


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What is the Puritan Covenant and what has it meant to the United States?

To answer that question, were were blessed to have on our program Christ in Prophecy Messianic Rabbi Jonathan Cahn. Rabbi Cahn is the spiritual leader of the Beth Israel Worship Center in Wayne, New Jersey and best-selling author of the book The Harbinger and a new book titled The Mystery of the Shemitah. Both books have been best sellers and highly controversial in Christian circles.

The Bible teaches that God never pours out His wrath on a nation without first sending remedial judgments and prophetic voices to warn of God’s impending judgment and to call the nation to repentance. Rabbi Cahn believes that when it comes to the United States, God already has been emphatically warning us, and since we haven’t listened, is delivering us from judgment to destruction. And, as always has been the case with anyone who historically speaks out in prophetic manner calling people for repentance, Jonathan has of course been severely attacked.

In this series we are going to discuss his basic message concerning God’s warnings to America and also ask him about some of the accusations that have been hurled against him.

[Note: The interview has been put into article format for ease of reading. For an unedited transcript, please click the PDF button above.]

The Puritan Covenant

Dr. Reagan: Jonathan, let me read you a passage from the Old Testament and get your response to it. This passage to me contains two of the saddest verses in all of the Old Testament. “And the Lord the God of their fathers sent word to them again and again by His messengers because He had compassion on His people and on His dwelling place. But they continually mocked the messengers of God, despised His Words, and scoffed at His prophets until the wrath of God arose against His people until there was no remedy.”

Jonathan Cahn: Yes, here God is pleading with His people to repent and reconcile with Him, but when you reject the pleading and when you reject the warning, there is nothing left for God to do but bring about His sentence. That has been the principle when 9/11 happened. We responded by rejecting any kind of coming back to God, and as a matter of fact, we have so descended so much worse than beforehand. We’re so much worse morally than before 9/11.

People ask since the harbingers are appearing if there’s any hope? I say it is the opposite. The fact that there are harbingers which act as warnings, why would God waste His warnings? Up to the point where He’s warning there is still hope. But, if you reject all the warnings, then there is no hope.

Nathan Jones: People sometimes point out to our ministry after reading your book that the cycle of “blessings-falling away-warnings-jugdment” was just for Israel because Israel was in a covenant relationship with God. When the founding Puritans and the Founding Fathers of this country called it a “City on the Hill,” they were proclaiming that this nation was also in a covenant relationship with God, and therefore we fall under the same blessings and curses as Israel. True, or do you see that it’s more about how we were supposed to be a Christian example and when we fell short of that is when we fell under the blessings and curses?

Jonathan Cahn: Well, a few things. One is that the Puritans did believe that they covenanted with God. They actually made a covenant. We can’t say what God did on His side, though. We know from the Bible there is only one nation that God says, “I have made a covenant,” and that was Israel.

Did God honor the Puritan covenant? I believe He did. They dedicated America to God, and He blessed America. There’s a real parallel with America and Israel. It’s not that one replaces. America is not Israel. The Puritans even saw America as patterned after Israel. They at one point even considered Hebrew as the national language.

Dr. Reagan: That’s right, absolutely.

Jonathan Cahn: Did you know that Thanksgiving is really the Feast of Tabernacles? You cannot take those type of historical Christian parallels away. Christianity is embedded in our nation’s DNA. It’s irrefutably there.

So, there are patterns regardless of the issue of covenant. Covenant is not foundational to God’s judgment. The point is that the Puritans did dedicate our nation to God, and there is this recognizable pattern that parallels God’s dealings with Israel. God has blessed us and God is consistent with His dealings. He has blessed us as He blessed Israel. The principles works.

So, therefore, in a sense any nation that has been blessed by God and turns away and defies God is subject to judgment. Any nation! But, the fact that the United States has so many parallels to Israel makes it even more compelling. The fact that John Winthrop literally said that the same judgments that came on Israel would come on us, well the harbingers are also saying that. There is a replaying. It’s not that we are Israel, but there is a replaying. God is consistent. There’s a template of national judgment. It’s happening not generally, but it’s happening specifically.

Dr. Reagan: One of the things that has really astounded me is the speed at which America has begun to secularize and paganize. We’re on an exponential curve. Who would have ever have believed 20 years ago that we would have a president who every June would issue a proclamation of the celebration of sexual perversion? And yet, President Obama has done that every June.

Jonathan Cahn: After his proclamation that we are to celebrate LGBT, it says at the bottom of the document “in the year of our Lord.”

Dr. Reagan: I got so upset that I would write Pres. Obama every year, and of course I wouldn’t get any response except for an IRS review. But, nonetheless, I finally decided to try sarcasm. So, the last time he proclaimed it I wrote to Obama and I said, “Sir, you are supposed to be a man who believes in equality for all and so forth. Why are you discriminating in this proclamation? Why are you just celebrating lesbianism, homosexuality, bi-sexual and transgender. Why don’t you add prostitutes? Why don’t you add those who have sex with animals? Why don’t you add those who are adulterers and those who are fornicators? We might as well celebrate it all, right?” I didn’t get a response to that either.

Jonathan Cahn: You didn’t? Well, wait until next year. Maybe he will decide to add them in. You never know.

In the fourth segment of our interview with Jonathan Cahn on America, we’ll see if as the United States descends into evil there’s hope for a revival.

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Dr. Nathan E. Jones

As the Internet Evangelist at Lamb & Lion Ministries, Nathan reaches out to the over 4.5 billion people accessible over the Internet with the Good News of Jesus Christ. He also co-hosts the ministry's television program Christ in Prophecy and podcast The Truth Will Set You Free.

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