In that glorious day, after the western hemisphere which had been inundated by the Gentiles, it will be restored by the Father to the seed of Joseph. But we automatically ask what happened to the Gentiles?
We now come to the point where Jesus picks up on the theme he introduced in chapter 16. He wants to talk about the destiny of the Gentiles who will dominate the promised land in the latter days. In the rest of this chapter and all of chapter 21, Jesus presents two climactic scenarios concerning the future destiny of the Gentiles. The first scenario is awful. It describes what will happen if the Gentiles in America abandon the Lord and become profligate and an apostate people. Jesus indicates that this point in history will be after the Gentiles have shared the gospel with the Lamanites and if the Gentiles then become wretchedly wicked it will be the seed of Jacob or the Lamanites who will be required to cleanse the land.
However, Jesus then presents the second scenario which comes toward the latter part of the next chapter. This will be the window of opportunity which the Lord will offer to the wicked Gentiles if they will just repent. He says the ingredient of repentance is all the Lord will require to shower the Gentiles with unlimited blessings instead of extermination. Notice that Jesus presents the horrors of the first scenario as though the destruction of the Gentiles is the scenario most likely to occur. In fact, he then mentions the second scenario almost casually.
But we think that was done for a purpose. No doubt this approach is to impress upon the wicked Gentiles in modern times that they must take advantage of the window of opportunity when it is offered to them or otherwise their fate is sealed. God does not want to destroy the Gentiles but if they embrace the first scenario they will eventually be wiped off the face of the land. Now let us examine the first scenario which begins with the next verse.