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Hiding the Truth in Plain Sight — Understanding God’s Methods of Hiding Information in the Bible! Pt 2
(Ver 2.1) This is part two of a series of lessons on methods that God has used to conceal information in the Bible for us to find. By studying these methods we will greatly increase our ability to understand the truth of God’s Word. Today I want to talk about a subject that I have taught on before, but this is so important and you should be able to see why I feel that it fits with this series to do again. If you did not read from the beginning I would strongly suggest that you go back and start with “Part 1“.
Technique 2: Symbolism and Symbolic References
Another technique in the Bible widely utilized by God is the usage of symbolism. Symbolism is usually an interesting coded message. Biblical symbols often times describe spiritual things in the terms of natural things, events or people. God uses symbols of things that we can naturally see and understand to describe and point us to the things that we cannot see in the spiritual realm. Daniel and Revelation are both covered with symbolic references and are probably the books of the Bible that come to people’s mind when describing this subject. In Revelation we have a harlot, the great dragon, a beast, the serpent, the sun, the moon and the stars, a woman, a city, a bride as well as many other symbolic references. Why did God use this type of writing? It is interesting to see how this writing style makes it so challenging for us to figure out what God is talking about. Most people who just read the verses in Revelation without studying them are very confused and do not understand very much about what is being said. So interpreting symbolic references correctly is critical to understanding these references in the Bible. So how do we interpret symbolic references correctly? I believe that we must use other interpretation rules that I have not really discussed yet. One of these rules is that we let the Bible interpret itself. Another rule is, we use the law of first mention to help determine the definition. Still another rule is that we look at other descriptions and related dependent symbols to help point us to the true identity of the main symbol. Often times by figuring out a descriptive symbolic reference first, it will help us discover the bigger symbolic reference. For example, if you want to identify the symbolic woman in Revelation 12 you must first start by correctly identifying the “sun” that she is wearing and the “moon” that she is standing upon. By correctly discovering the identity of the sun and the moon we can only then correctly identify the woman. The error that most people make is that they assume that the woman is Israel and then try to make the other symbols fit their erroneous assumed interpretation. But, I learned by the help of God that this is not the correct approach to take.
I mentioned Daniel and Revelation as being heavily symbolic books. But there are symbolic references in almost every book of the Bible. For example, Genesis contains heavy symbolism in the first three chapters of the book and I will briefly go into a few examples to help you to start to look for and recognize them. You see the first three chapters are largely all symbolic references with some real events and people mixed in among the symbols. There are 6 days of creation and the 7th day God rests. If you read your Bible carefully you will discover these 6 days are all symbolic. The division of waters from land is a symbolic event. The division of day from might is a symbolic event. The Sun that rules the day and the moon that rules the night are both symbolic references to spiritual truths. The mention of fruit and trees are strongly symbolic. The serpent in the garden is symbolic coded reference to a hidden spiritual being. The woman is symbolic; the seed of the woman is symbolic. The marriage of the first woman and the first man is also a symbolic event. I could go on and on, but I hope you get the message.
But, please do not misunderstand me. I’m not saying these symbols did not occur in Genesis. Adam is a real man. Eve is a real woman. Dividing the waters was a real event. On and on I could continue to go. What I am trying to say is that there are parallels of truth in almost every statement. One truth is a natural truth and the other truth is almost always a greater spiritual truth. Anyone can see the natural, but the spiritual truths are the messages that were hidden from our plain sight. Let’ look at a new example of this next.
Let’s look at another important Bible reference which describes a different type of symbolism. But this time it speaks of another usage of symbolism that is called “allegory”. Allegory is always a Bible story with two meanings. The first meaning of the story is the literal description of the subjects given. The second meaning of the story is a symbolic reference to a much greater spiritual truth. Notice what God said in the book of Galatians:
Gal 4:22 For it is written, that Abraham had two sons, the one by a bondmaid, the other by a freewoman.
Gal 4:23 But he who was of the bondwoman was born after the flesh; but he of the freewoman was by promise.
Gal 4:24 Which things are an allegory: for these are the two covenants; the one from the mount Sinai, which gendereth to bondage, which is Agar.
You see from these verses God specifically shows us how he has used allegory in the story of Abraham to demonstrate a much larger spiritual truth. In these verses in Galatians 4, we are told that the story of Abraham having two sons is a story that contains an allegory. We are then told that the two women Sarah and Hagar represent two covenants. Sarah is called the freewoman, and Hagar the slave woman who is in bondage. Hagar represents the earthly Jerusalem and the Old Covenant wife of God. Therefore we know that Abraham represents God in this scenario. We are told that Sarah represents the heavenly Jerusalem who is called the spiritual mother of the church. There are certainly many other spiritual truths to learn from these verses, but I will not elaborate further in this blog. So an allegory is an extended metaphor in which actual people, places, objects, and actions in a story are equated to meanings and truths that lie outside of the realm of the story. In other words an allegory is a real story in which the people, places, and things represent spiritual concepts, individuals and moral qualities that we cannot see or perceive with our natural senses. We can see from this great example that God gives us a view of something that is of extraordinary value through an actual event and the people in a story that happened in human history without telling us this in the story.
You see there is absolutely nothing found in the book of Genesis that tells you the story of Abraham, Sarah and Hagar is a picture of God and his spiritual family, but when you read in Galatians 4 you discover that God has encoded this information within the story in a hidden format. Remember point 1 was widely dispersed truth and now point 2 is about symbolism and allegory. Therefore we can clearly see how God combined two different methods together to hide a greater spiritual truth. Do you understand these concepts?
This is a very important lesson key for correct Bible interpretation. These are very prevalent methods that God has created and used in concealing spiritual truths in the Bible. The story of Abraham, Sarah and Hagar is not the only allegory in the Bible. It is however, the only one that God tells you about so that He can give you a clue into how He has hidden information for you to search and to find. God uses real historical true stories with real people and places to reveal some very powerful spiritual truths that have been hidden in the Bible for thousands of years. The book of Ruth is heavily allegorical information. The book of Genesis has significant amounts of allegorical information throughout it. The books of Exodus and Numbers are widely interspersed with allegorical content. I do not understand how God is able to do this; I just know that He did it. God obviously is not bound by time and He could see human history before it happens. To say that God caused it to happen this way would violate man’s right to choose and his right to freewill; so I do not believe that God manipulated people to get things to happen the way he wanted them to happen. But, that is my opinion.
Please understand the difference between symbolism and allegory. A symbol is a reference to something that you might understand, but it might not actually exist in the natural realm. For example, in Revelation a prevalent symbol of Satan is a dragon and I have never seen one of these in the world, but I understand what they are because of books, movies and cultures like those that are found in China where they parade a large dragon figure down the middle of the street. So a dragon is a fictional character representation of the real spiritual being called Satan using a coded name. An allegory is quite the opposite, because it is always a real Bible story where each character named in the story represents something else in the spiritual realm. An “allegory” is always real historical people and “symbols” can be either real or fictional representations for real spiritual things. They are both very similar while being totally different at the same time. They both convey a truth that is well hidden on the surface only reading that most people do when they read their Bible.
The usage of symbolic references is widespread and can be found in almost every book of the Bible. Especially the books that contain prophetic scriptures where the prophesies concern the coming future events, people, things or places. Of course practically every book of the Bible contains some prophetic verses and you should be aware of that also. Because of God’s usage of allegory where any story found can represent a greater future spiritual story you will have to read every story in the Bible with new ways of looking for how does this potentially fit into what is going to happen in the future.
You see there are scriptures in the Bible that declares “the thing that has been, is that which shall be and the things that were done is that which shall be done again” (Ecc 1:9). In other words God said history will repeat itself. What happened naturally in the Bible is that which will happen in the spirit realm. This kind of information causes you to look at things in the Bible with some totally new perspectives; if it does not do this then you are clearly spiritually blind. Surely you can see the importance of learning how God has hidden information in the Bible and I pray that you will benefit as I have from knowing this.
If you would like to continue reading this series, please continue with “Part 3“.
Hiding the Truth in Plain Sight – Understanding God’s Methods of Hiding Information in the Bible! Pt 1
The Introduction:
(Ver 1.5) This is Part 1 in a series of basic important Bible lessons that deals with the question “Why is the Bible so Hard to Understand?” Many of us have certainly discovered by reading and studying the Bible, that everything that is presented in the Bible, is not always clearly perceived or self evident. In other words, everything in the Bible is not easily understood using natural human reasoning or logic. I am personally convinced that the Bible contains many outstanding truths, even though the Body of Christ hasn’t been able up to this point, to agree on a lot of them. I can at least hope that you too can see and understand the challenge that we all face in studying the Bible. Based just upon the number of Christian denominations in the world you can see that God has chosen to conceal Himself not only from the people in the world, but He has also chosen to hide Himself in His Word to give the church, the opportunity to search for Him and to discover Him. By searching for the truth we come to know Him who is the Truth (John 14:6). We can conclude that God, if He wanted to remain a mystery forever and keep men in the dark all that He would have to do is to stay silent and not speak to us. But we can clearly see by the Bible alone that He has given to us, that He has not chosen to do that. Let’s briefly establish the fact that God has hidden information in the Bible.
Pro 1:23 Turn you at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you.
To make something known implies something was first hidden from plain view. To make God’s Words known implies that what we read in the Bible we need God’s help to understand. There is an implied unveiling process in this act. There is an intentional act of uncovering also implied. To “reveal” that which was hidden. The Bible is God’s Words written down by chosen men. These words are not encrypted in a modern coded system of unreadable text. Yet these words according to the Bible must be revealed in order to be understood.
Eph 6:19 And for me, that utterance may be given unto me, that I may open my mouth boldly, to make known the mystery of the gospel,
In Ephesians we are told that the Gospel of Jesus Christ was a mystery. Even Jesus confirmed this reality when he told the Jews to search the scriptures because these were words that testified about him (John 5:39). If they had to search to find Jesus it is very clear that Jesus was hidden in the words that were written in the O.T. As we have seen the Jews did not understand the scriptures and did not embrace the Gospel of Jesus. We can clearly see that while Paul and the other apostles used the Old Testament as the basis for their message, very few of the Jewish leadership understood it. So was it hidden from them only? Or did they just choose not to see it?
Rom 16:25 Now to him that is of power to stablish you according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began,
In this letter to the church, God declares that which was being preached came as a result of a revelation being given. A revelation is a revealing of that which was hidden from plain view. It was written in their language, but they did not see it or perceive it. Why is that so important to understand?
Pro 25:2 It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter.
Here is an Old Testament reference that describes the nature and character of God. This verse declares that it is to God’s glory to conceal or hide information. But in the same sentence it also declares that “kings” are intended to search it out? Who is the King of kings? Jesus is the King of kings. Who are these “kings” that Jesus is King of? Who are these kings that need to do this searching for this hidden information? I believe we are these “kings”. So I have given you several scriptures that all point you to hidden information in the Bible. There are certainly many other scriptures that I could have included and you can find them if you search.
There are a large number of reasons that I believe God has hidden information in the Bible. One reason is to conceal the information from His enemies. Another reason is to give man a choice in what they believe. Still another reason for hiding information is to allow God to reveal the information at the right time to the right people. There are certainly other reasons for God doing this, but as long as you see and understand that He has done it, you will at least be far ahead of a lot of other Christians in the world that do not understand this.
So knowing God has concealed spiritual truths within His Word, we should be smart enough to recognize some of the techniques that God has used to hide these truths. I call this concealing or hiding the truth in plain view. Every word in the Bible is clearly readable by anyone that picks the book up, but every word is also equally hard to understand because of the methods and techniques that God has selected to record His words in a book format. It is much like a game of hide and seek where everyone that you are looking for is out in the open in plain view, but many of them are wearing camouflage and have blended into their surroundings so that you don’t see them clearly. They are there right in front of you, yet you walk right by them. So it is with the Bible, just because we can see all of the words and read them, it is clear to me that we need to follow some very strict rules in order to understand what they say, correctly. Satan can read the same words that we can and he didn’t understand them and he is doing everything in his power to make sure that you don’t understand them either. If Satan would have understood what was written, he would not have crucified Jesus.
In reading Proverbs 25:2, it reveals to us one of God’s intentions and purposes for giving us the Bible. This verse specifically informs us that it is God’s Glory to conceal information. This Hebrew word translated as “conceal” means to keep secret, or to hide from plain view.. When you conceal something that means it is not clearly visible or self apparent. The US army often times camouflages themselves and their equipment to conceal them from or cause themselves not to be seen by the enemy. If a government in our world wanted to conceal information from their enemies they would have probably created a code or an encryption system that would in effect make the textual message unreadable to others. In this way the encoded message is only readable to the intended person to whom the message is sent using the decryption method and the key that would unlock the true meaning. While many have done crypto analysis of Old Testament scriptures and have seemed to have discovered encoded messages, I am not talking about this method of hiding information. While I do not discount these or attempt to preach against them in any way, this is not the information that is hidden in plain sight that I am talking about. Being a computer programmer I understand the complexity behind creating a readable textual message with embedded ELS coded messages. Without a very, very powerful computer it would be impossible to find them, much less try to create them. The Bible Codes are to me just an additional proof that God exists and He has written something for us, to us that only He could have done. To those who don’t believe in God, it is a sign that someday they will understand.
So what I want to do in this blog series, is to explore some of the primary ways that I have discovered how God has hidden Himself in plain view for us to find. By studying some of these methods we can use them to unlock more of the truth and to see and know Him better. So did God encode things in the Bible for us to discover? You might still not understand code concepts, and that is OK. I’m not here to teach you computer algorithms. What I want you to see is some general concepts and methods that God has implemented in the Bible to hide information and truth. By understanding these concepts we can then apply them to our Bible study and hopefully learn whatever God wants us to know before Jesus comes back for us very soon.
Earlier I mentioned a common trait of codes and encryption. This has to do with knowing the key that unlocks the code. The key is the electronic word, phrase, numbers, symbols, or combination of all of these that we use to unlock the encrypted information. That is what we are going to explore in this series of lessons. I want to show you some keys. By understanding the methods that God has used to hide information it will give us the keys that we need to unlock it and to understand it. Jesus makes this statement:
Mat 16:19 And I will give unto thee the keys of the kingdom of heaven:
I know I pulled a part of a verse to make a point, but take this information and understand the concept given. Jesus tells us that there are keys to the kingdom of heaven. That implies there are hidden or locked things within the kingdom that are not readily available to all. What Jesus is doing is giving us a simple concept lesson and He is telling us that it is our responsibility to open the doors that these keys are associated with. You never hand someone a key, either a physical key that unlocks a lock or an electronic key to unlock a code and not expect them to use it. Are you grasping the concept? So let’s explore some of the key methods that God uses to hide information in the Bible.
Technique 1: Widely Dispersed Truths
One method that God uses frequently to hide truths in His Word, is to spread out the information so that a subject is not completely covered in any one location of the Bible. The Bible is a significantly large book with a lot of words and subjects within it. Finding specific related scriptures is not always as easy as you might think. By spreading the information out in a widely dispersed random pattern, it become exponentially more difficult to grasp the correct meaning of anything. Spreading out information in the Bible is just one of the many techniques that God has used to hide things for us to find. One advantage that we have today over previous generations, is the proliferation of computers within our society. By using a computer’s database indexing and search engine capabilities, we are blessed with a tool that makes it much easier to explore the Word of God and to find truths that are spread out over 783,137 words in the King James Bible. If you don’t study the Bible using a computer you should, it will help you tremendously once you get over the initial learning curve of using a computer to read and study the Bible. What we discover in our search is there are scriptures everywhere in the Bible that speak to, or comment directly on other passages in the Bible. In other words we have the commentary of the author, the Holy Spirit given to us on any given subject. God did not leave us in the dark, he just made it a little challenging to find. I also made mention that the commentary and related information may appear in any random order. Information can be given on any subject in any book of the Bible. This certainly is a very tricky method of hiding information.
Let’s take creation and the story of Adam and Eve. If you search the Bible you will soon discover that both Adam and Eve are referred to in other books of the Bible by name. These are God’s direct commentary on the Genesis story given to Moses. But by studying these verses we can gain a significant amount of insight into the original story. But of course that is not all the information, we would have to search for all of the subjects found in creation, like: man, woman, temptation, sin, serpent, gardens, fruit, seeds, trees, and all of the other subjects that are mentioned in the book. By omitting these facts from our study of the subject we are lacking vital clues to what God intended for us to understand. This example is just a simple sample of a much larger truth that God has spread out the information so that while it is in plain sight, it is not easily found, related or understood. This is one of the most important lessons from this blog that you should take away and learn to put into practice. Don’t read a single verse and attempt to say I understand that, without researching and looking for the related passages and God’s commentary on the subject.
Think with me and consider the hidden reference to the serpent in Genesis chapter 3. I have heard people say that this is not Satan while others say it is Satan. However, there is absolutely no way to know this by only reading this chapter of Genesis. If you read the Bible cover to cover, it would take you a long time to finally find the answer to who this serpent is. This infromation is not revealed until Revelation chapter 12. God finally sees fit to reveal the identity of the hidden serpent in the last book of the Bible. This is a clear example of a widely dispersed truth. Where God introduces you to a subject in the 3rd chapter of Genesis, but does not reveal the identity of the being until the 12th chapter of Revelation. I hope you are beginning to understand these tricky concepts that God has implemented in the Bible.
Widely dispersed truths are an essential part of finding the hidden information in the Bible. You see the Old Testament is a large set of books that Jesus told the Jews to search, for he said these are they that testify about Him (John 5:39). But if you read the Old Testament you will not find one chapter called the story of Jesus. While there are hundreds of prophetic verses of the coming messiah, not one said you will call his name “Jesus”. Yet if you have eyes that see, you can find Jesus on almost every page of the Old Testament in some form or reference. Some are more easily found than others, but none are in plain view and self apparent. The Bible is a complex tricky book written with complex and tricky techniques that record truths in a manner that is not easily recognizable. We have just touched on this subject in this blog and talked about one of these methods. By putting little pieces of information here and little pieces of information elsewhere in a large random order you can certainly understand that this would make it very challenging for us to find anything of value. This one technique alone would make the Bible very difficult to understand, but God has many other techniques of hiding information that we will get into later.
If you would like to continue reading this series, please go to Part 2.
Proverbs 1:22-23: I Will Make Known My Words Unto You!
(Ver 1.2) I will continue to talk about Unity and the Keys to Understanding today. Today I want to explore verses found in the book of Proverbs. Proverbs contains a lot of the Wisdom of God. It was written down by Solomon, the son of David the King and Bathsheba. God used Solomon to give us many valuable spiritual truths. I’ve heard several ministers recommend that we should read from the book of Proverbs on a daily basis to gain the wisdom of God. I believe, that by renewing your mind to God’s wisdom you will be able to make better choices and decisions in this life. Today I want to discuss the process that God uses to make His Word known to us. We will begin with the first chapter of Proverbs and verse 22:
Pro 1:22 How long, ye simple ones, will ye love simplicity? and the scorners delight in their scorning, and fools hate knowledge?
Who are these simple ones that God is talking to in this verse? If you did not know that was you, you are already deceived into thinking too highly of yourself. People on the earth are the simple ones that God is talking to. It doesn’t matter how many degrees that you have or how many universities that you have attended, God calls you a simple one. According to God, people love simplicity. They want everything served up fast in a simple neat package to them. However, God is not a part of your simple box concept. You may want God to come down to your simple level and He might for awhile to help you. However, God wants you to come up higher and to see and understand the more complex subjects found in God’s Word. The implication given to us in the beginning of this verse is that God’s word is not simple. I have heard many try to make it simple and reduce it to a human level of intelligence, but they were mostly just confused in what they thought God said. There are many complex spiritual truths in the Bible and these are not always presented in simple terms using simple methods. However if you learn this fact, you can at least become aware of what to look for.
Proverbs 1:22 says that fools hate knowledge. I have seen a lot of fools in the world today. We are in fact raising a generation of fools. It has been rare for me to run across a young person that is truly hungry for the knowledge of God. There are just so many distractions in the world today. Television, movies, games, electronics, music, concerts, the internet, entertainment, sports and on and on I could go. It would appear that words on the pages of the Bible are the last thing that anyone would really want to spend time with these days. There are a huge number of distractions that keep young people’s mind off of anything that is productive or valuable. School is the last thing that most of them would call fun. But, God said fools hate knowledge. Knowledge involves learning, Learning involves hearing. Then when you throw in understanding on top of all of this, that is beyond the mindset of any modern teenager.
Pro 1:23 Turn you at my reproof: behold, I will pour out my spirit unto you, I will make known my words unto you.
Here is a key to knowing and understanding God’s Word. It involves you doing something after God does something and then God doing something in response to what you have done to solve the problem. This is the way God works in most normal cases in the Bible. God offers man reproof or correction and people are required to “turn”. Notice that unless you turn, God will not do anything else. If you think He will, you would be wrong. So you knowing anything from God will involve you turning. To turn implies a correction in your course and action. It could be a new way to think about something. It definitely involves you changing. I believe this is a continual process within life. Since God rarely gives us very much information at one time, we may need to make many course corrections as we continue our walk with God.
Proverbs 1:23 ends with God making known His Word to us after we turn. The middle part of the verse says if we turn, then God will pour out His Spirit upon us. So we can clearly see and understand that in order to know God’s Word it will take the Spirit of God to reveal it to us. From these two verses in Proverbs I have learned several spiritual truths and I will list them again for you to see. Here is my TOP 10 List of THINGS I LEAREND FROM Proverbs 1:22-23:
- The Bible is NOT SIMPLE!
- The SIMPLE DO NOT Understand the BIBLE!
- FOOLS do not want to Learn the BIBLE!
- God offers ALL of US Reproof!
- We MUST Turn and make Changes in order to Learn!
- IF WE CHANGE, God WILL then Pour Out His Spirit Upon US!
- The BIBLE Contains HIDDEN and CONCEALED INFORMATION!
- God will MAKE Known these Secret Things to ceretain individuals that qualify.
- Only With God’s Help Will We KNOW and UNDERSTAND God’s WORD!
- Understanding the Word of God is CONDITIONAL!
I do hope that you can see and understand what these verses are telling us. In order for the Body of Christ to come into unity we will require God’s correction first. We WILL have to HEAR God’s correction. We will need to be OPEN to change. Then we will need to CHANGE. God will pour out His Spirit upon us and then we will all KNOW and UNDERSTAND the Word of GOD! It is not a long process, but it is a process none the less. People will need to put down their ego’s and become open to correction. Accepting reproof is not easy for anyone. Admitting you were wrong and changing will certainly be another challenge for others. What God is informing us in these verses is, that it is more up to us than it is up to God on how much we understand in the Bible. Understanding the Word of God is conditional. If you think UNDERSTANDING is automatic you will never achieve it. God is FAITHFUL, so He will do His Part, NOW YOU DO YOUR PART! God Bless!
Seeing they will not Perceive, Hearing they shall Not Understand!
(Ver 1.1) Why is it that there are so many varying opinions on what the Bible means? How can I see one thing in the Bible and you fail to see it? If we could somehow solve this dilemma we would all have to get into harmony and finally become one in Christ Jesus. Jesus prays this prayer to the Father concerning His bride and these are His words:
Joh 17:11 And now I am no more in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to thee. Holy Father, keep through thine own name those whom thou hast given me, that they may be one, as we are.
Jesus informs us that He and the Father were one in the same. Jesus said if you have seen me you have seen the Father (John 14:9). Jesus was claiming He was God. But now Jesus is praying and He makes a specific new request. He asks that all of those that are given to Him should also become one. Has this happened? Will it ever happen? Does Jesus get His prayers answered? That is some interesting things to consider. Looking around in the world today it certainly does not appear that the Body of Christ is one. What does it mean to you to be one? To me it means someone that is unified in purpose. The disciples after Jesus ascended were said to be in one accord while tarrying in the upper room in Jerusalem. I would have to say this is what Jesus was praying for, but what happened to this show of unity between believers? Is it just a problem of sheer numbers? Could 120 get into unity but 2 billion not do the same? Has God shrunk in size or ability? What does it mean to be in “one accord”? According to Strong’s this word means to be unanimous, to be of the same mind. Everyone doing the same thing for the same reasons and motivation. That so far does not resemble any of the church that I have seen in recent years. I have noticed some glimpses of partnerships and unity, but there certainly needs to more effort in unifying the Body.
So what is the main problem? Why does one denomination embrace speaking in tongues and one preach it is of the devil. Those kind of differences are clearly a huge issue to unification. One group of people see and perceive the truth and the other group chooses not to see it. What is the solution? Where do we start to amend? How can we resolve these differences? How can we become reconciled to become one bride who has made herself ready? I believe we can at least start by understanding the problem. By seeing what the Bible says the problem is we can hopefully avoid repeating a failing pattern. But of course even this involves seeing and understanding and therefore we are really back to the original problem. Unless God does something to help us overcome this problem we will not. But that was my opinion of the situation.
Here is a scripture from the book of Acts that describes the situation that they faced while teaching the truth of the God’s Word to the people in the nation of Israel. Paul tried to reach his own people, but encountered great resistance and opposition. Was what Paul was teaching the truth? Did it come directly from God? Was this the same God that gave these Jewish people their law? Was this the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob? So why was this new message so easily dismissed as being false and not from God? It would appear that by studying their reaction and reasoning we might see some patterns that could be avoided in our daily routines. After all is God still the same today? Does God still teach or reveal anything new? So in the book of Acts Paul is speaking and says the following about the nation of Israel:
Act 28:26 Saying, Go unto this people, and say, Hearing ye shall hear, and shall not understand; and seeing ye shall see, and not perceive:
Act 28:27 For the heart of this people is waxed gross, and their ears are dull of hearing, and their eyes have they closed; lest they should see with their eyes, and hear with their ears, and understand with their heart, and should be converted, and I should heal them.
You read these verses and it describes a people in a sad condition. These were people who had normal natural senses of sight and hearing, but they are described to be a people who were not using them to learn and understand. God is actually implying that we have a spiritual set of eyes and ears that need to be open and receptive. These people are described as their hearts being “waxed gross”. Here is the definition for this word in the Strong’s:
G3975
From a derivative of G4078 (meaning thick); to thicken, that is, (by implication) to fatten (figuratively stupefy or render callous): – wax gross.
It is a fascinating word that has a widely applicable association with the human spirit. It is really a symbolic reference given to us of a spiritual state that we are unable to see. To make thick or to fatten something implies a hardening process. If you think in modern medical terms and cholesterol and the ill effects that it has on the human body, then you can kind of see what this is referring to. The thickening of the arteries and blood vessels in the body with cholesterol causes the walls to become thick and eventually clogged. The results of this is a major physical problem and even death. Believe it or not this is describing a spiritual clogging and thickening process that will also result in another type of death. This word has a figurative meaning of being stupid or acting foolishly. That also applies to the spiritual realm and we all need desperately to learn this lesson. Finally another meaning of the word is to become callous. We can understand this term by looking at the process of creating natural calluses. By working with a specific tool for example long enough you repeatedly wear a specific surface of your skin. This worn area can develop blisters and eventually calluses so that the area is much less sensitive to feeling. This is another lesson to apply to spiritual principles. How can a spirit being become calloused against the truth?
Let’s analyze how people learn. The Bible tells us that “faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God” (Rom 10:17). This verse is a simple lesson in learning. People hear what their teacher says and either accept it or reject it. By rejecting the truth you cause a spiritual callous to begin to form. Your heart becomes thicker in that area and the next time you hear the truth it is easier for you to reject it since you have less feeling in that area. People’s heart eventually can become so hard in areas that they have absolutely no feeling when presented the truth of God’s Word. This is why the Bible speaks of God taking out the “stony” heart and putting in a heart of “flesh” (Eze 11:19). People have allowed their spirits to harden against certain things and even the truth and as a result have become very difficult to reach.
So learning starts with hearing. What is hearing and how does it work? Can we hear anything? Jesus taught us that we must be careful what we hear (Mark 4:24). Then Jesus told us to take heed how you hear (Luke 8:18). Jesus is saying there are two factors to consider about what we listen to. God says it matters what we hear and how we hear it. In other words don’t listen to every teaching from every religion and think that you are helping yourself to grow spiritually. All you end up doing is confusing your spirit, clouding your mind and deceiving yourself. No, hearing starts with listening to the Word of God and to those teachers anointed to teach it. If you can’t tell who those are then just study and read the Bible.
Learning starts with hearing or reading out loud to yourself. But there is certainly more to learning the Bible than just reading or hearing. The only part of the Bible that is going to do you any good is the part that you come to “know”. To “know” in the Bible is an important word that means an intimate relationship with. In the Old Testament it is often times used as “Adam knew his wife and they had a son”. You can see that to “know” a subject implies a deep understanding of it. The verse in Acts tells us that if the people would have heard and they would have understood what was being said in their “heart” or “spirit”, then they would have been converted and God could have saved them. However, since they closed their own eyes and refused to see, they were cut off. So understanding the Bible is the next key element to being saved. I believe this is the next key to unity also. If we can gain understanding from God we will be of one mind and then we will have a singleness of purpose.
Pro 4:5 Get wisdom, get understanding: forget it not; neither decline from the words of my mouth.
We are commanded to get wisdom and understanding from God’s Word. God’s Word contains all of the knowledge that we need to live. Wisdom and Understanding are two benefits of knowing God’s Word intimately. If you asked me why do I need to study the Bible, this would be my answer, “to get wisdom and understanding”. We have too many people on the internet that have neither of these qualities, yet they cloud our network with words of confusion. By introducing you to their opinions and personal interpretations to God’s Word they cause more harm than they do any good. This is what we are faced with, this is what we are challenged to do. We are commanded to get wisdom and understanding, so if a website or a blog is not helping you to achieve either of these goals I would recommend that you not waste your time in reading them. May God give unto you the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in the knowledge of Christ Jesus. May your eyes be able to see and perceive the deep spiritual things of God. May your ears hear from the Spirit of God so that you can clearly understand. May you understand with your heart and be converted and be healed.
Genesis 12: Was Abraham A Liar? Seeing the Truth in Genesis!
(Ver 1.3) Today is a subject that contains some very deep water concepts. As you can see from my diagram in this post, these are warning signs concerning water hazards. So please be advised that this is an advanced Bible study lesson with some new concepts that forces you to get into things that may be over your head. So many times I have heard ministers in the pulpit accuse Abraham of being a liar because of one story in the book of Genesis that they clearly misunderstood. In this story, we find that Abraham is faced with what he perceives as a threatening situation and he makes a decision that many have thought was a lie. But, what we have is an example of how preachers can take a part of a story and try to make it the whole story and as a result they have jumped to some erroneous conclusions and an incorrect interpretation of the Bible. I do not attack these preachers personally, I just attack their ignorance. Truth will always prevail if you want to see it. We will pick up with the story of Abraham starting in Genesis chapter 12 and verse 11:
Gen 12:11 And it came to pass, when he was come near to enter into Egypt, that he said unto Sarai his wife, Behold now, I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon:
We can see in this verse that Abraham is traveling about and he comes near the country of Egypt. Abram begins to speak to his wife and this is where it starts to get good. Abram tells his wife Sarai that she is very beautiful and this must have been the truth. No one that I know of has ever questioned the beauty of Sarai his wife.
Gen 12:12 Therefore it shall come to pass, when the Egyptians shall see thee, that they shall say, This is his wife: and they will kill me, but they will save thee alive.
Abram begins to speculate and imagine some very negative things as he approaches Egypt. Egypt is a type of the world, if you did not know that, keep that in mind as you read accounts in the Old Testament about Egypt. We can see that Abram’s fear is that the men of this country will see how beautiful his wife was and kill him in order to take her to be theirs. So Abram was very concerned about his own personal well being and safety and did not think much beyond that, it appears. So Abram comes up with a plan or so the ministers said, he lies about who his wife was.
Gen 12:13 Say, I pray thee, thou art my sister: that it may be well with me for thy sake; and my soul shall live because of thee.
We can see that Abram asks his wife to tell everyone that she is his sister and not to mention that they are married. Abram thinks that he will be spared and be safe if anyone in Egypt wants his wife Sarai. So this was Abram’s plan, a plan or work of some sort of alleged deception to save himself from being killed, or was it? You see if you only read these verses and come up with a sermon based upon this limited information you would probably conclude that Abraham was a liar. That he out of fear chose to purposely lie to a group of people because he was afraid of being killed. This would in affect make Abram a type of Satan, the deceiver. I just can’t go along with that picture because it doesn’t fit his character. Nowhere in the Bible that I know of is Abram ever called a liar. So if God does not call Abram a liar, I do not feel it is right that a preacher should call him a liar. So we have to come up with another explanation or interpretation of the verses or at least some more information that helps us to understand what the real truth is about Abram and Sarai. So we continue to read the book of Genesis and we read chapter after chapter and finally come to the answer later in Genesis 20. During these chapters and this time period, Abram and Sarai have a lot happen to them. God changes their names. Abraham enters into a covenant with God. But, it seems that Abraham repeats the same plan when he comes to another country called Gerar, ruled by Abimelech the king of Gerar. We can see that Abraham didn’t learn very much from his Egypt experience and he repeats the same plan.
Gen 20:2 And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my sister: and Abimelech king of Gerar sent, and took Sarah.
So Abimelech believed what Abraham said, that she is my sister and he takes Sarah to be one of his wives. God again saves the day and keeps the king from doing anything to Sarah with a dream.
Gen 20:3 But God came to Abimelech in a dream by night, and said to him, Behold, thou art but a dead man, for the woman which thou hast taken; for she is a man’s wife.
Apparently God frowns upon one man taking another man’s wife. I guess that is putting it very lightly since God told Abimelech that he was a dead man. Apparently God thinks it is very serious to take another man’s wife. That would be a very strong lesson for many Christians to learn, I don’t think God has changed his mind any time in the last 6000 years. So as we continue down the chapter we discover that Abraham gets his wife back and he is not killed. God saves the day again and preserves the linage of Christ. But did Abraham lie? We still haven’t resolved the situation or the circumstances that he was faced with. I believe the answer to the question and the solution to the problem is finally solved by reading Genesis 20:12:
Gen 20:12 And yet indeed she is my sister; she is the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother; and she became my wife.
You see from this verse the solution to the problem that Abraham never lied. Abraham did marry his sister. However, she was a half-sister, the daughter of his father, but not the daughter of his mother. Abraham had a different mother than Sarah, but she is still called his sister, legally and truthfully. Abraham could call her, his sister and omit the wife part and still not be called a liar. If you omit part of the truth and only tell a different part that is true, what would you call that? I call it being very tricky. I do not defend what Abraham did at any time. It seems if it was not for God saving the day that Sarah would have ended up in someone’s harem. God is faithful though to save them both.
I had one reader write me a comment that Abram was guilty of the sin of omission. In other words by not telling all of the truth he committed a sin. I thought that was an interesting misinterpretation of the Bible again so I spent time studying the subject in more depth. I looked for any scripture that said withholding information was a sin and I could not find any. Then I went and studied the subject of deception and I learned some new things found in the Bible that are very profound. While Satan is called a deceiver, the Bible does not indicate that every deception is a sin. I could give you more examples found in the Bible, but I wrote a blog on this subject and you should go and read that to find out more about the subject of “Righteous Deception“.
We can really learn a whole bunch from this story of Abraham if we look for it. I will not go into all of it, but I will tell you that Abraham is a type of Christ a picture of Jesus the man born of the natural woman Mary. God is both the spiritual and physical father of Jesus Christ. Mary is Jesus’ natural mother in the flesh. The church is called the spiritual children of the “heavenly Jerusalem” in Galatians 4. We can see that if there is a spiritual mother there also has to be a spiritual father in order to have spiritual children. So the picture of Abraham as being a type of Christ with the same father of his wife Sarah, but with different mothers, actually fits the pattern given to us of Christ and the church. The Bible is full of little complex imbedded hidden truths like this. If you understand how to look for them you can learn a lot. In another blog I told you that Jesus married his sister. I told you that Solomon was also a type of Jesus and that 3 or 4 times in the book of Songs that Solomon calls his lover bride to be his sister. Interesting isn’t it? Why are things like this written in the Bible for us to figure out? So I’ll end this blog with a picture diagram of Abraham’s family and hopefully you will that this is a pattern of another family that I will talk about in the future:
Who Sinned This Man or His Parents? John 9 Part 3 Understanding the Spiritual Heart of Man!
(Ver 1.2) This is now Part 3 in this Bible series on understanding the subjects of Night and Day and the spiritual heart of man and this will be different than anything that you have ever heard before. If you have not read from the beginning of this series I would suggest that you go back and start with “Part 1“. Today’s lesson wa a revelation that God taught me almost 20 years ago, when I was working for a small software company. I had a co-worker that had graduated from a large seminary and he was a very confused individual. For someone who could quote a large part of the Bible, he understood practically none of it. He even studied the Hebrew and the Greek and still knew nothing of who God was or what He said in His Word. He was a prime example of a man with two good eyes that could read but who couldn’t see what the words meant. God and I tried to help him and teach him the truth, but he did not want to see it. It is funny how God does things, especially for people who trust in their own ability or their own wisdom. God will most of the time send some lowly nobody that does not fit the pattern that they esteem or hold as valuable. You can recognize this was the same problem that the Jewish leadership had when Jesus walked among them. Most of them looked down on Jesus as a nobody man from Nazareth and he certainly did not fit their inner circle of self appointed importance. So what did they do? They crucified their God and their creator. They did not recognize the one that gave them their Holy Book of the law. Even though this book contained so many verses that pointed them to Jesus, they did not see it. I hope you are not like any of them. Look for foolish things sometimes as a source for the greatest wisdom and you will more than likely see it is from God.
So today I am going to talk about spiritual blindness from a familiar story found in the Bible in John chapter 9. In this story Jesus is said to heal a physically blind man. My seminary co-worker told me that this chapter proves that God causes some people to be sick, so that Jesus could heal them. That was a very confused interpretation and from what God showed me a clear misunderstanding of what this chapter was about. People read and see what they want to see. The seminary graduate was looking for verses that proved God caused some people to be sick for His glorious purpose. It was very sad to see people treat God with such disrespect. According to him, God would do something so perverted and illegal in the eyes of our court system that if tried, He would have to be found guilty and thrown into jail as a child abuser. Let’s start reading this story starting with verse 2:
Joh 9:2 And his disciples asked him, saying, Master, who did sin, this man, or his parents, that he was born blind?
In this verse the disciples asked Jesus a difficult question. It is apparent that the disciples believed that sickness came as a result of someone’s sin so they asked Jesus as they passed by a blind man, who sinned? This man or his parents to cause him to be born blind? So here is the answer that Jesus gives to their question:
Joh 9:3 Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him.
Here is where you need to start to pay attention to what is said very closely, for Jesus does answer their question, but not the question that they had in their mind. Jesus told them “Neither this man sinned, nor his parents; but that the works of God should be made manifest in him”. You may recall that the Bible says in Roman 3:23 that ALL have sinned and come short of the glory of God, so we know Jesus is not saying these people never sinned. You see Jesus answered the question that He heard in His mind and not the question that come from their minds. Do you understand the difference? If you do you are doing better than most. The answer was from God’s perspective on the situation. God’s perspective is always a spiritual perspective first and foremost. This is an extremely valuable lesson in correct Bible interpretation. God tells us in His Word, “My thoughts are not your thoughts and my ways are not your ways” (Isa 55:8). So Jesus, who was God in the flesh was not thinking naturally like they were. The disciples were seeing a naturally blind man and asking a question about what caused his physical blindness. But, Jesus was looking at the man’s heart and what caused his spiritual blindness. The disciples asked a natural question and Jesus gives a spiritual answer. My co-worker from the seminary never saw it either. Jesus told the disciples that his spiritual blindness was not caused by anyone’s sin and then starts talking about working the works of God. Verse 3 is where the seminary graduate said it proved that God made him blind so that Jesus could work and heal him. But, look at what else Jesus teaches us as he continues to answer their question. Notice Jesus did not stop talking, but says the following:
Joh 9:4 I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.
Jesus starts by talking about working God’s work and we will look at that in a second. But, you see in this verse Jesus starts talking about the spiritual day and night. This is not the natural day and night that Jesus is talking about. If you start to realize that Jesus is speaking symbolically of the spiritual day and night then you will begin to understand the rest of this chapter. Again in this verse Jesus mentions the “work of God”. Automatically preachers and readers (as well as the disciples of Jesus) think naturally and see the work of God as being a physical healing. But, let’s continue to the next verse and the final statement in the answer to the question of who sinned?
Joh 9:5 As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.
This statement is an incredibly informative verse that is a combination of natural and spiritual things. You see Jesus was in the natural physical world. God made manifest in the flesh. But, then he says “I am the light of the world”. Did Jesus tell the disciples that he was our Sun that lights our natural day? Or did Jesus continue to show them a spiritual truth. I believe Jesus was speaking that He was the spiritual Sun light of the world. This is exactly why the Bible is so tricky to correctly interpret. We have a verse that combines natural things and spiritual things and we are given the assignment to figure it out. This is an example of rightly dividing God’s Word. Thank God, He helps us.
If you continue reading in the next few verses in the chapter you see that Jesus spits and makes mud from the ground and then rubs it in the blind man’s eyes. Jesus tells the man to go and wash in the pool of Siloam and the man did and it says that the man came back seeing. So was that all of the story? Is that where the story ended? Of course it is not and that is the problem with trying to take one Bible verse and trying to say God made him blind so that Jesus could heal him. People need to do a much better job of studying and seeing what the Bible says. According to a lot of preachers I heard this is where the story should end. They were focused in on Jesus healing the natural man’s blindness and did not see the rest of the story. What if Jesus healed the man physically and 35 years later the man dies and goes to hell? Would Jesus have been pleased with giving this man sight for 35 years and him still going to hell for an eternity. No you see Jesus was focused in on people’s spiritual blindness. Jesus cared more about the man’s spiritual eyesight than He did about healing the man’s physical blindness.
So what was the work of God that Jesus was interested in doing? Was it healing the people’s physical bodies or was that just an introduction to help them to see who they were dealing with. Jesus gives us a definition for the work of God in this same book of the Bible. So instead of making a wrong assumption by thinking we know what the work of God was that Jesus was here to accomplish, let’s go find out what God said about why He was here. If you can find it, this will be an absolutely critical piece of the puzzle. In order to correctly interpret the Bible you must get God’s definitions for every subject. Let’s go and find that definition and see what Jesus said was the work of God that He came to do:
Joh 6:28 Then said they unto him, What shall we do, that we might work the works of God?
You see the disciples ask Jesus another question and this time they want to know how to work the works that Jesus was here to do. Jesus is about to give us the definition for the work of God in his answer and it is not the answer that most are expecting to hear:
Joh 6:29 Jesus answered and said unto them, This is the work of God, that ye believe on him whom he hath sent.
Here is God’s definition for work and it is not healing people physically. Jesus tells his disciples that the work of God that He was here to do was to get people to believe in the one that God had sent. This of course was Jesus speaking of Himself. Learning this truth alone changes your perspective on the entire story of the blind man in John 9. Once you see that Jesus only heals the man physically to get him to see spiritually you can begin to see the true meaning of the chapter. Now we know what to look for. We also can begin to understand how Jesus did what he did and why. Jesus said that the Work of God was to get men to believe in the One that God sent. So why didn’t Jesus just open the eyes of the blind man and ask him if he believed? You see the man would not have had any opportunity to believe anything. Jesus spit and made mud and rubbed it into his eyes to get his attention. When Jesus told the man to go and wash. The man had an opportunity to say “what are you crazy, I’m not going to waste my time”. The man obviously believed something by traveling to the pool of Siloam. The pool was not that close and the walk to the pool would present many opportunities for the man to question what he was doing. If he would have doubted and not gone to the pool he would have never been healed. The blind man had exhibited some level of faith by just obeying Jesus’ instructions. That is believing in something that you haven’t seen yet.
Let’s quickly review spiritual blindness. We know from the New Testament that Satan is the source for spiritual blindness.
2Co 4:4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
You see in this verse God tells us that Satan who is called the god of this world has blinded the minds of everyone that refuses to believe on Jesus as the Messiah. Jesus is again called a light in this verse that will shine into the hearts of men who let him in. But, we can see that is why Jesus could answer in John 9 that neither this man sinned or his parents to cause the man’s spiritual blindness. It was Satan that caused the man not to see spiritually. Jesus was answering their natural question with a spiritual answer.
So what happens in this story of the man that was born blind? How does it end? The blind man goes and washes in the pool and comes back seeing. Everyone is amazed and there arises a great debate of the religious minds and leaders of the day. They question the man repeatedly and bring in his parents and question them. They have tremendous curiosity of what happened and they are focused in on the fact that Jesus did all of this on the Sabbath. They call Jesus a sinner for working on the Sabbath and not keeping God’s law. If they only could see who they were talking about. Well the conversation and questions continue for many verses and they eventually end up with them casting the formerly blind man out of their church. I guess it was technically a synagogue, but I just wanted to get your attention. What did Jesus do immediately after all of this? You notice Jesus did not show up to defend the blind man or to testify to the religious zealots. Jesus in effect knew they were not reachable and he did nothing to defend himself either. Jesus finds the formerly blind man and asks him this question:
Joh 9:35 Jesus heard that they had cast him out; and when he had found him, he said unto him, Dost thou believe on the Son of God?
Did you see what Jesus was interested in? Jesus didn’t ask him about how do you like seeing the world. No, Jesus said “Do you believe in the Son of God?” Jesus is dealing with his spiritual blindness and solving the problem of the man’s eternal destiny. We can finally see the real work of God being performed. Jesus was interested in getting the man to believe that He was sent from God. The man immediately asks who is this Son of God that I might believe and Jesus tells him it is the one that you are looking at right now and talking with. So the man says “Yes Lord I believe” and worships him. This was a man whose spiritual eyes were opened to know the One True Living God of Creation. His eternal destiny is established and I plan on seeing him in heaven some day.
The religious leaders of Jesus’ day were spiritually blind, but Jesus couldn’t help them to see. Real seeing is an act of the human spirit. Believing in someone that you have only heard about and have never seen. This is God talking to you right now. Do you believe? I’m not God, but He is using me right now to say something to you. Believe in Him!
Luk 8:12 Those by the way side are they that hear; then cometh the devil, and taketh away the word out of their hearts, lest they should believe and be saved.
Choose to be a believer!
Night and Day Defined! Understanding the Spiritual Heart of Man! Part 2
(Ver 1.2) This is a series of lessons on a basic spiritual truth that reveals the hidden conditions of the hearts of men and women in the world. God reveals this spiritual truth using the things created and found in the natural universe. These natural things are clearly symbolic and represent a far greater spiritual truth. I am convinced that this is an essential basic truth that every Christian should become intimately familiar with. This is now part 2 of the series and I would suggest that if you have not read from the start that you go back and start with Part 1.
There is a real man or a real woman inside of the physical bodies of every person on the earth. These real people are spirit beings that will live forever somewhere after their body dies. However, most people in the world today don’t know about this fact and are oblivious to this stated reality found in the Bible. The Bible often times speaks of these spiritual individuals in the hidden terms of the “heart”. The “heart” of a man is the spirit of the man. God is not talking about the physical blood pumping organ, God is talking about the center of your being, as in the heart of an apple or the heart of a tree. The “heart” term used by God is a figurative Bible term and describes the center of a human. This center of your being is the real you that you can not see. When a physical body dies, the person’s spirit is immediately transported to one of two possible places. One place is very good location called heaven and the other one is a very bad location called hell. The spiritual things are the real eternal things, the natural things are the temporary things (2 Cor 4:18). God has designed a system in the world that limits humans to a three dimensional realm with specific time constraints. All of these constraints represents natural boundaries and laws. When your body dies, you leave the natural realm you enter into the spiritual realm and you normally never come back (2 Cor 5:8). I have heard of a few people dying and going into the spiritual realm and then they are revived or come back to life in their physical bodies, but I would not put all my eggs in this basket hoping that is what will happen to you. Many times these people can see in both realms simultaneously. These people can see the hospital room, the doctors, the nurses, their family and their body but usually they are above all of this looking down on it all. These people are either sent back by God or God has allowed them to see and experience this in order to tell others that there is more to life than these few years we have on the earth. So this was a brief explanation of the spiritual realm.
In my last blog I introduced you to a number of scriptures that reveal the hearts of people to be either in darkness or in the light of the knowledge of Jesus Christ. Darkness and Light are symbolic references and are synonymous terms for Night and Day. Today we will explore more scriptures found in the New Testament that further enlighten us to these truths.
Isa 9:2 The people that walked in darkness have seen a great light: they that dwell in the land of the shadow of death, upon them hath the light shined.
I’ll start with this prophecy from the Old Testament. This verse is speaking about Jesus coming to the earth personally walking among us. This verse calls Jesus Christ the “great light” and that is of course a very significant statement. In my last blog we read verses that showed Jesus to be the spiritual Sun, the spiritual light of the world. Just as the physical sun is the source for all natural light on our planet, Jesus is the only source for all spiritual light on our planet. In this verse in Isaiah the people are described as being in the darkness. The darkness is caused by something that is blocking the light and causing a shadow. You do understand the concept of shadows? A shadow is an area where the direct light is not shinning. The direct light has been blocked by another object that casts a shadow on the ground. We were the people in this shadow and this shadow was caused by “death” and Satan. If you read the New Testament you will find verses that describe Satan as holding the power of death. So that is why I related the two together. The Bible says Jesus was made manifest in order to destroy him that had the power over death (Heb 2:14). So we can clearly see who is causing the darkness in the spiritual realm, it is Satan. So the term “great light” let’s explore that term to learn more about the spiritual hearts of men.
Gen 1:16 And God made two great lights; the greater light to rule the day, and the lesser lightto rule the night: he made the stars also.
You see in the fourth day of creation God makes a prophetic and symbolic reference to spiritual things that were to come. God makes the “greater light” AKA “great light” to rule the “day”. God then makes a “lesser light” to rule the “night”. These lights are very significant to see and understand for other Bible interpretations. The “greater light” is the Sun and represents Jesus Christ. The “lesser light” is the moon and represents Satan. These two spiritual rulers are over their own separate domains or kingdoms. The Sun rules the Day (Ps 136:8), the moon rules the night (Ps 136:9). These separate 12 hour periods represent two different spiritual realms and conditions of the hearts of people. So the planet earth is a type and pattern of the human heart. The sun shines on the earth in a constant and consistent manner and the earth revolves and is either in the shadow or darkness or in the light depending on how it is positioned at any given time. The earth represents the hearts of men that have the opportunity to change and allow the light to shine or to turn away and stay in the darkness. When Jesus was walking the face of the planet some 2000 years ago he told us this:
Joh 8:12 Then spake Jesus again unto them, saying, I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life.
Jesus made a bold and direct statement that He was the Spiritual Sun, the Greater Light that shined in the world. Jesus said by following Him we would never again walk in the darkness but always have the “light of life”. So light represents Life and darkness represents death. Life and death are very strong analogies and very important to understand.
Act 26:18 To open their eyes, and to turn them from darkness to light, and from the power of Satan unto God, that they may receive forgiveness of sins, and inheritance among them which are sanctified by faith that is in me.
We can certainly see what I told you about the hearts of men having to be turned from darkness to light. It is clearly the responsibility of the men and women to do the turning, God will not force you to turn, but He will help you if you ask. Then there is another stark contrast given between these two realms. Satan has the power to rule in the darkness. To say Satan is powerless would be an error. But what is important to note is that his power is limited to the realm of “darkness” and the “night”. If you are in the light you are outside of the realm of his influence and power, or at least you should be. Satan will still attempt to deceive you and influence power over you until you learn not to let him.
Col 1:12 Giving thanks unto the Father, which hath made us meet to be partakers of the inheritance of the saints in light:
Col 1:13 Who hath delivered us from the power of darkness, and hath translated us into the kingdom of his dear Son:
You see these two spiritual realms being starkly contrasted again. The power of darkness is where, we the church use to be, but we are now called “saints in light”. These two spiritual domains are also called different kingdoms. The Kingdom of Light and the kingdom of darkness. Again day and night are symbolic references to two separate and distinct spiritual states or places to be. Even though we walk the same planet with those who are still in darkness we are not of the darkness and darkness is no longer ruling our hearts and minds. To be in the world but not of the world as the Bible says.
Eph 6:12 For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places.
So Satan and his demons are spiritual forces that rule the darkness of the world around us. This verse clearly confirms that Satan is the moon, the lesser light, the ruler of the darkness that we referred to from Genesis 1. A ruler clearly implies a kingdom, a kingdom of darkness. Satan has been trying to establish his own dominion and kingdom outside of God since the beginning when sin was found in him.
1Jn 2:8 Again, a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in him and in you: because the darkness is past, and the true light now shineth.
In this verse in 1st John we are told for those who are in the light that the darkness has passed. It is interesting to note that when the lights are on you don’t have any darkness. But this verse also tells us that Jesus is the “true light”. The Sun of Righteousness has arisen in our hearts and He is shinning a true light that we might see the truth. It is interesting that the characteristics of the moon is used to describe Satan symbolically. The moon has no life or produces any light of itself. The only reason we can see the moon at night is because it reflects or masquerades as an object of light. The moon is a pretender and shadow caster and a false light. It is so different than the sun that is the key to the source of our life on this planet. But as the Bible says, men who love the darkness are deceived by it and succumb to the trickery of the ruler of the darkness. But here is some good news and hope for those that are in the darkness:
Eph 5:14 Wherefore he saith, Awake thou that sleepest, and arise from the dead, and Christ shall give thee light.
You see God says that those who are in the darkness are simply asleep and capable of waking up and seeing the light. This is a very strong typology and the spiritual information is significant. Pray for those in the darkness to wake up and see the light of day. To turn and allow Christ to arise in their hearts. Again if people do this they are translated into the light and the life of God. If they refuse to turn they are already dead. That is a very sad state of many people in the world today.
There are many other verses in the Bible that speak to us on this subject of Day and Night and I would suggest that you get your Bible search program and look for the key words, like day, night, darkness, light, sleep and any other word that you can think of that are associated with these spiritual realms. By studying the subject you will better understand why people don’t see Christ like you see Christ. Why they have been turned off when the light shines in on them. Jesus told us that “now ye are the lights of the world” so it is our responsibility to be a light to others. But this should be done in a Godly manner using the same ways that God worked through Jesus. Learn to be like Jesus and walk like Jesus and you will get others attention by just being so radically different than they are. Here is a quick chart of some of the lessons we have learned about the spiritual realms of Day and Night:
Day And Night Characteristics
| DAY | NIGHT |
| Light | Darkness |
| Sun Rules the Day | Moon Rules the Night |
| See | Blind |
| Awake | Sleep |
| Sober | Drunk |
| Life | Death |
| Good | Evil |
| Love | Hate |
| True Light | False Light |
| Greater Light | Lesser Light |
| Righteousness | Unrighteousness |
| Power of God | Power of Satan |
If you would like to continue reading in this series of lessons, you can continue with “Part 3“.
The True Identity of the Woman in Revelation 12! Pt 4
(Ver 2.4) This is Part 4 in a very advanced Bible study series on the Book of Revelation concerning chapter 12 and the True Identity of the Woman. This woman was described by God with a crown of 12 stars, clothed in the Sun and standing with her feet on the moon. We have covered so very much important information on this subject already. There is absolutely no way that I can teach it again today. Therefore I would strongly recommend, if you have not read from the beginning that you stop and begin your study with “Part 1“.
INTRODUCTION AND QUICK REVIEW
I knew this subject would take a lot of effort to get people to begin to understand it and accept it. The main reason for this resistance is that I have never heard anyone else teach the chapter this way. We have been using very important new Bible revelations that are focused upon 6 key symbolic elements that surrounded the woman. These were the crown on her heard, the sun as clothing on her body and the moon that was found under her feet.
This is now the fourth lesson on the subject in the search for the true identity of the woman in Revelation 12. There are so many diverse opinions to who this symbolic woman in Revelation 12 represents and all of these can produce a presupposition that can become a mental stronghold. These prejudices can be used by Satan to block any new information from entering our human mind. Any previous knowledge on a subject can potentially produce a state of human “bias”. “Prejudice and bias is a human condition that occurs when someone is prejudging someone or somethings before all of the facts are given, known and understood.
For example, many people today hate the Jewish people and most of these haters have never really even met a Jewish person and talked with them. That is usually one form of racial prejudice, injustice and bias that is easily utilized by Satan due to our ignorance of not knowing the full truth. This type of hatred must have been passed down from someone’s parents, or from teachers, or from other groups of influence that we associate with. This type of prejudice does not come from birth or from God. Almost every little child if raised in a good family without prejudice, will like everyone regardless of their gender, race, education or whatever. But, this open early attitude of like and trust can change when someone does or says something evil to us personally. Then there can come a new problem of thinking that everyone that is similar to them, is the exact same type of evil. This is called lumping everyone of the same type of category to be all equally good or evil with knowing any of them very well. What a complex world we live in.
There is really so much more to explore on this subject of the woman in Revelation 12. We have only touched on a few of the subjects and there are so many more questions to ask and answer. Why is the woman pregnant? Who is the child? Why does she appear in heaven first in verse 1 before any other description? I try to write and teach using progressive revelation, where truth builds upon truth. This means if you missed the beginning lessons you missed the foundation to all the other building blocks. I don’t claim to have all of the answers, but I’ll tell you what I do know and we will trust the Spirit of God to answer the questions that have not yet been answered.
In Part 1 we focused on the answering the question of when these events occur and found God said they are in the future. We continued to study and discovered the identity of the “Sun” clothing to be Jesus Christ the ruler of the Kingdom of Light. We have also found why this woman is clothed with the Sun. Then in Parts 2 and 3 we talked about the moon being the ruler of the darkness, a kingdom that is directly opposed to God’s kingdom of light. Then we looked at the specific meaning of how the moon is found in relation to the woman as being under her feet. I believe this is so very important to understand what this means.
I have shown scriptures that spoke about the church bruising the head of the serpent (Satan). I talked about Jesus delegating His authority to the church to tread on (walk on or over) the serpent (Luke 10:19) who we know is Satan (Rev 12:9). I then showed how Jesus today is seated at the right hand of Majesty in heaven, still waiting for all of His enemies to be made His footstool (Acts 2:35, Heb 1:13). All of these are scriptural references, patterns and pointers that God uses to help us identify the woman in Revelation 12. Today we are going to go into more detail concerning how the books of Genesis and Revelation are divinely designed to be connected bookends. We were introduced to this concept previously. But since this is a potentially new concept, I believe we need more information and that requires a deeper study. Let us get started.
GOD’S GENESIS AND REVELATION CONNECTIONS
I want to readdress some things that were potentially new to some people. Previously, I talked about the “seed of the woman” found in Genesis 3:15 as possibly being a spiritual seed and the woman being a prophesied picture of the church. Today in this lesson, I want to teach some things that I believe the Lord has taught me on this subject that could potentially help us to see some things from a new and fresh spiritual perspective. These are absolutely fascinating and completely related to our subject of the identity of the woman as being related to the Genesis 3-woman prophecy. This is why I called this section “God’s Genesis and Revelation Connections”.
In Revelation 12, the very first verse is focused upon our suspect mystery woman in question. But we can also see and know that the very last verse 17 is about the same woman. In fact, it is very important to see that at least 10 of the 17 verses of Revelation 12 mention the woman directly. She and the dragon are the two primary subjects.
Also, note that there is a new truth that I did teach you before. The Greek word that occurs in 10 verses in Revelation 12 for “woman” is G1135 and yes, it is correctly translated as woman. But it is normally associated to be a married woman called a “wife”. Ok, you may think that this does not really help us that much because after all, the woman is pregnant. And all of our suspect women candidates were all married wives. But I still feel like this is important to study.
From this information we learn that this woman in Revelation 12 is not an unmarried woman or more specifically not a virgin. Or we could say more positively that she is a woman in covenant with a man. Finally, notice that this Greek word G1135 translated as woman in Revelation 12 is again used in Revelation 19 to describe the Lamb’s wife. But this time the word was chosen by translators to say “wife”. Just keep that in your mind as we continue. I believe this could be a significant connection to apply to our study.
I have mentioned previously the direct connection of Revelation 12 to Genesis 3 by God’s designed purpose. God designed the Bible with concealment of related subjects, by spreading out much of the connected information for us to discover by searching the Bible. We are so very blessed to live in the last days when computers, phones and tablets are available to help us in this task. Remember, Daniel 12:4 informs us that in the last days knowledge will increase. God knew computers would exist and He prophesied it accordingly. Praise the LORD!
We understand truth connections do exist simply because the book of Genesis was written by Moses nearly 1600 years earlier than the book of Revelation which was written by John. These two men did not know each other personally, yet their books go together with exact precision. I’m going to repeat something that I have said several other times. But it is important to know and understand. In the book of Genesis, God usually introduces us to every major Biblical subject. Then in the book of Revelation God concludes the discussion on these subjects to conform to how He desired them to be and remain from the beginning. That is why I like to call them bookends. It is like a modern fiction author writing the introduction to the characters and subject in chapter 1 and then concluding with the last chapter and all of the surprises, twists and turns.
The information from the chapters, books and authors that come in between the book of beginnings and the book of the revealing can also provide us additional clues to the subject in question and they usually do. This introduction and conclusion of divine subject information is popularly known as the “Laws of First and Last Mention”.
We need to notice in Genesis 3 the direct connections found in our woman suspect subject study. In Genesis 3:15, we can see that God is introducing us to 1) a woman (other than Eve), 2) her seed, 3) Satan called a serpent, and 4) Satan’s seed. Then in addition to these main characters there is a described 5) great prophesied enmity (hatred) between them. It would probably be good to go back and reread the entire chapters of Genesis 3 and Revelation 12 to see the common subjects, noun and verb connections. Make a list of nouns, verbs and adjectives and then compare the two lists. Sometimes subjects are implied and not directly mentioned so it is good to note the implications. For example, in Revelation the woman is said to be a pregnant wife, and this would imply a husband, even though he was never mentioned directly in the chapter. Let’s examine some of the direct important connections that I found next when reading.
In reading Genesis 3:1 we should easily learn of God’s introduction of “the serpent”. We are never told who this creature is, or if he is literal, or symbolic in this chapter. There are several other Bible studies on this subject that contain additional information, on the subject of the serpent. But we can conclude and believe that this serpent in Genesis 3, was only a symbol for Satan and he was not physically manifested in the garden through a body of a physically created beast of the field. I would highly recommend you go read the Bible lesson “Genesis 3 – Was there a Literal Talking Snake in the Garden”.
We learn from the introduction of the serpent in Genesis that there is a connection to Revelation 12 because this unknown serpent is finally defined and identified to be the dragon in Revelation 12:9. Because God chooses to give us the true definition and identity of the “old serpent” as being the dragon and Satan we should automatically begin to examine what else could also be connected here in these two chapters. This is how God gives us clues to discovering truth, and it is amazingly wise.
This direct connection teaches us clearly, that this “old serpent” in Genesis 3 had to be a symbolic representation for the now implied much larger symbolic “red dragon” in Revelation 12. Both the serpent and the dragon are symbolic names and descriptions of the same evil being named Satan. Also note that there are two verses in Revelation that define the serpent’s identity. Ask yourself, could both of these be a connection? These verse definitions are Revelation 12:9 and Revelation 20:2. These are the only two verses (currently know) in the Bible where God chose to define the true identity of the “serpent” introduced in Genesis 3. This is a very common method that God uses to hide truth in the Bible for us to find. God will talk about a subject in one place and then will suddenly define the subject in a completely new and different place later in the scriptures. This can even occur in a completely different book using a new inspired author like we find in the book of Revelation.
It is just interesting to note that these two referenced definitions of Satan occur in the vicinity of two described women. Revelation 12 is where the woman is mentioned first and then the dragon is introduced with the connection of the serpent definition. Both occur together within one verse in the same chapter. Notice in Genesis 3:1, the serpent occurs first and then immediately followed with him speaking to a woman. This is typical bookend patterns. I pray you know what bookends look like. I placed a sample picture in this paragraph to help. Bookends exhibit a pictured image, but in the reverse order. Wow, that is very similar to what we see in these two chapters. I do not believe that is a coincidence.
Then in Revelation 20 we find the dragon and the serpent definition being preceded again in Chapter 19 by another woman. But this woman in Revelation 19 is called the “Lamb’s Wife”. The word “wife” was the same Greek word translated as “woman” in Revelation 12. Isn’t that interesting? I do not believe that these are accidents either. These are the signs of highly intelligent design connecting related subjects and patterns together.
But, in Revelation 19 and 20 there is a new person that comes between the woman and the dragon. He is the LORD Jesus coming back to the earth with His saints riding on a white horse. Since chapters and verses were numbered and added by imperfect humans long after the writings of the scripture, we can understand that Revelation 19 and 20 are still connected together by verse association and context.
I am not making a fixed declaration of doctrine or a statement of “I’m right and you are wrong” type of conclusion. But I believe that both women mentioned near the dragon and serpent definitions are the exact same woman/wife. I hope you find it very interesting where and how God put them close together for us to discover and learn from.
While it would be nice to go through all of the 10, Revelation 12 verse references today of the woman, we will not because of the increase of the size of the lesson. However, let’s change our focus in Revelation 12, to the woman found again in verse 17 for what God reveals to us to be more directly connected words and subjects found in Genesis 3. This is the last verse in the chapter, and it would appear the subject changes in Revelation chapter 13 to something new.
Revelation 12:17 And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.
I personally see so many similar subject subjects, characters, descriptions, nouns, adjective and verbs as what we found in Genesis 3:15. This might not be an exact quotation, but the synonymous comparisons are amazingly parallel. We should all be able to see how there are enough overlaps for us to confirm that they are speaking of the same subjects. Can we notice what it says?
Verse 17 starts with a statement that declares Satan to be very angry with this woman. The statement or word in the KJV is actually “wroth” (G3710) and it means to be enraged and angry. That really sounds analogous and synonymous to God’s phrasing of “enmity” and “hatred” (H342) we found in Genesis 3:15. I know that these are slightly different words, but they synonymously connect us with a similar meaning of hatred toward two enemies. Next, we then see within the context of this verse that Satan is said to be at “war” with the remnant of this woman’s seed. Again, this signifies an adversary relationship with the seed of a woman. We learn from this that Satan and the woman are direct enemies in conflict against each other.
That statement is absolutely essential to see and understand, “….and went to make war with the remnant of her seed”. Did you notice that we have been talking about the “seed of the woman”? In Genesis 3 we clearly observe scripture where God prophesies that Satan, and his seed will be at odds with a woman and her seed. Isn’t that what Genesis 3:15 said? God said, “I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between her seed and your seed”. Fascinating, isn’t it? Clearly this is not a chance occurrence.
Here in Revelation 12:17 we have God’s very specific mention of 1) a woman, 2) her “seed”, and 3) Satan (the serpent). But this time it is in clear context and relationship to a new symbolic woman revealed in Revelation 12. Or is it a new woman? I have concluded from this information God is connecting the Revelation 12:17 woman with the Genesis 3:15 woman and that they are the exact same woman being spoken of by God. Therefore, whoever the Genesis 3:15 woman represents, the Revelation 12:1 woman must also represent. I believe that God was first introducing us to her in Genesis 3:15 and is now confirming the fulfillment of the prophesied pattern here in Revelation 12. This must be the same woman that God was talking about in Genesis 3:15. We should be able to see that there are too many connections being given to us in these two chapters by divine design and purpose to deny it.
Now how does this verse Revelation 12:17 end? The ending words of the chapter provides us a clear window to the view of the identity of the woman. Who does this verse claim that the Revelation 12 woman is? God in this verse gives us two very specific dependent qualifications for the identity of the Revelation 12:1 woman. These are two distinguishing characteristics of determined truths that must be applied correctly in order to understand (interpret correctly) the identity of the woman in Revelation 12 and here they are:
- She keeps the commandments of God
- She has the Testimony of Jesus Christ
How can we read these statements and not know who God is talking about? Does this describe the Old Covenant natural nation of Israel who practices Judaism? Perhaps you see that it does. If so, please explain why you see it this way to us. Where can you find verses that back this belief? Have you seen any that describe this natural nation of Israel, have succeeded in following all of the laws and the commands of God? It is interesting that only Jesus Christ succeeded 100%. Praise the LORD!
Of course, we might say the same thing about the church also. Has the New Covenant Bride of Jesus Christ completely followed every command? I don’t know of any Christian that is yet perfect and never makes a mistake or sinned. Do you know one? I believe Jesus was the only one and we all should be rising to His living example. But Christians do have an advantage over the Old Covenant. True Christians should be following Jesus Christ their Great Shepherd and listening to His voice on a daily basis (John 10:27). Christians should have the Spirit of Christ living on the inside of them guiding them and this is the help that we need to become more like Him. Also, there are many natural Jewish people that have become Christians by believing in Jesus. The church began with 120 Jewish people in an upper room in Jerusalem (Acts 2) and then they began to spread to Gentiles later with God’s help. So, no one is being anti-Semitic at all. We love all people especially the Jewish people and we want everyone to come to the saving knowledge of Jesus.
Every human has the opportunity to repent and believe in Jesus Christ to be saved. This begins the walk with Him. When we start down this narrow path, we should be led by the Holy Spirit to become like Him and that means to become holy. Now that is when we change to begin to possess the “testimony of Jesus Christ” as God reveals to us in Revelation 12:17. Ask yourself this question; “Does Natural Israel have the testimony of Jesus Christ?” Maybe some teach and believe that this will come to fruition in the tribulation because Revelation mentions the 144,000 from every tribe to prove that will occur. We can’t dispute that. But we should believe that this woman mentioned in Revelation 12 will have Jew and Gentile, bond and free, male and female (1 Cor 12:13, Gal 3:28) and we will all jointly be called the “Bride of Christ”.
I’ll briefly discuss another factor of Grace that is important to know. We are not made righteous because we are perfect. We are made righteous by Grace. It was a gift. 2 Corinthians 5:21 informs us that “He was made sin who knew no sin, so that we might be made the righteousness of God in Him”. Wow, that is amazing. I do not have time to teach this subject fully. Just understand righteousness was a gift, but it was given so that we could change to become dead to sin aka holy, like Him (1 Peter 2:24).
Then there is another verse in the middle of chapter 12 of Revelation that is also related to the identity of the woman with her enemy relationship to the serpent and the dragon:
Revelation 12:11 – And they overcame him (Satan) by the blood of the Lamb, and by the word of their testimony; and they loved not their lives unto the death.
When I read this verse, I see the corporate church described as an overcoming, victorious body of believers. This can only be describing those that have received the Lamb of God as their personal savior and Lord (Jew, Greek, male, female, bond or free). This must be speaking of people that have applied and appropriated the shed blood of the Lamb of God to the doorposts of their spiritual hearts. When someone is described as having overcome something, that denotes a clear sign of victory at someone else’s ominous defeat. Here we have another confirming picture of the woman in Revelation 12: 1 standing with her feet upon the moon (Satan). Currently there is still just one woman in the Bible suspect list that qualifies to be this woman and it still is only the church the Lamb’s wife!
I would also like to make another quick point about Revelation 12:11. The blood of the Lamb, was just one enemy overcoming factor. The second part of that verse says “… and the word of their testimony”. Do you realize what that says or at least implies very heavily? The Greek word translated as “word” in this is G3056 and it is transliterated as “logos”. The definition literally means “something spoken” but it is used in reference to the Word of God numerous times. It is specifically used by Jesus in Mark 4:20 to describe the “seed” that was sown on good ground to produce fruit. This means real Christians.
We have just discovered a new connection to the woman in Revelation 12. I believe that Satan is in an all-out battle with anyone that professes the Word (seed) of God. Therefore, when we get to Revelation 12:17 I believe this is who Satan is fighting against on the earth. There will be people that were not truly saved after the rapture takes place that will understand what a mistake they have made and attempt to come back to the LORD. These people will have a very difficult time on the earth, but God will help them.
Notice in Revelation 12:15 when God is trying to help these people left on the earth that we are told that Satan the serpent spews water like a flood out from his mouth to try to overcome the woman. Wow, please realize this flood represents “spoken words”. The words could be lies, they could accusations, they could be threats, tricks and deceptions. There are a lot of tactics that could be used to try to get people to turn from their beliefs. However, again God helps the woman by opening the earth to swallow his words. Again, we see a prophecy that they overcame Satan by applying the blood and speaking the Word.
We have just learned of two weapons that can be turned against our enemy Satan. This applies today as well as during the tribulation. These weapons can be transferred back into us wearing the Armor of God. We are told to wear this armor in Ephesians 6. I believe all of the armor of God is based upon the Word of God. So, we have just confirmed how this chapter 12 of Revelation is in parallel to the Genesis 3:15 prophecy. We definitely have a woman versus a serpent and her seed (words) against his seed (words). But let’s go into some verses about the blood next. How many scriptures in the New Testament can you recall that speak of the blood of the Lamb, Jesus Christ?
Romans 5:9 – Much more then, being now justified by his blood, we shall be saved from wrath through him.
1Co 10:16 The cup of blessing which we bless, is it not the communion of the blood of Christ? The bread which we break, is it not the communion of the body of Christ?
Eph 1:7 In whom we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of sins, according to the riches of his grace;
Eph 2:13 But now in Christ Jesus ye who sometimes were far off are made nigh by the blood of Christ.
Col 1:14 In whom we have redemption through his blood, even the forgiveness of sins:
Hebrews 9:12 – Neither by the blood of goats and calves, but by his own blood he entered in once into the holy place, having obtained eternal redemption for us.
These are just a representative sampling of verses in the Bible that speak of the work of the blood of Jesus for His church. Understanding the power of the blood of Jesus is an essential part of a successful and victorious walk with Christ on the earth. Knowing what the blood of the Lamb purchased is critical to knowing who you are in Christ. Understanding the purpose of the blood of Christ is essential to a successful earthly Christian life. After understanding these verses, I hope that you can see the direct relationship to the descriptive qualities of the woman especially being clothed with the Sun of Righteousness in Revelation 12:11.
I am not going to go through every verse, but I would like to make a quick point on the first verse from Romans 5:9. Did you notice the connection from the church appropriating the shed blood of Jesus to be justified and to us missing the tribulation? I know it does not say tribulation but please understand this is when the wrath of God will be poured out on the ungodly upon the earth. This 7-year time period is divided into two 42-month periods. The greater tribulation occurs at the last 3.5 years. But yet I believe the church will not be here for any of it if we overcame Satan already using the blood of Jesus and God’s Word. It is a mystery of sorts when people believe the tribulation will occur with some even thinking that God will send His beloved bride through His time of wrath and judgement. But what loving husband would do that to His bride/wife?
If God did this He would violate His own written word. Remember in Ephesians 5 God instructs husbands to love their wives like Christ loves the church. So, if Christ sends His bride through brutal judgment to be murdered then we should do the same! I am being very sarcastic with that last comment. No, we should not do that at any time. Therefore, is the church the bride of Christ? I believe she is! Is the church going to encounter God’s fierce wrath? Not according to the Bible. Wow let’s please wake up and see the true heart of God.
Finally, here is what the Bible says in relation to the qualifications of the identity of the woman described in Rev 12:17. In these verses we will see instructions for the church to obey God’s commandments. God told Israel the basic same things, but this time in the New Covenant He came inside the hearts of people removing their hard hearts of stone to place tender hearts of flesh. This is where He writes His laws on them for us to follow. I just quoted a lot of Old Testament prophetical statements written about the church. But let’s read the instruction in the New Testament:
1Jn 5:2 By this we know that we love the children of God, when we love God, and keep his commandments.
1Jn 5:3 For this is the love of God, that we keep his commandments: and his commandments are not grievous.
Joh 15:10 If ye keep my commandments, ye shall abide in my love; even as I have kept my Father’s commandments, and abide in his love.
Joh 14:15 If ye love me, keep my commandments.
Joh 14:21 He that hath my commandments, and keepeth them, he it is that loveth me: and he that loveth me shall be loved of my Father, and I will love him, and will manifest myself to him.
We can see from these sample verses that the Church has been directed (commanded) to keep God’s commandments. They all say something like, if you love me, you will keep my commandments. This is how we know we love God, because we keep His commandments. We know of course that this does not mean that the Church is supposed to keep the law of Moses, but rather the new law of Jesus Christ. Jesus taught us that all the law is summarized in two statements. Love the Lord your God with all of your heart and then love your neighbor as yourself. Jesus gave the church a new commandment to love one another. This new commandment fulfills all of the Old Testament law. If you love your neighbor, you are not going to steal from them, you are not going to cheat them, you are not going to commit adultery with their spouse, you are not going to do anything that will harm them or cause them pain, emotionally, physically, mentally or spiritually. This is the law of LOVE! So let’s look at scriptures concerning those who have the testimony of Jesus Christ, who could this describe?
1Co 1:6 Even as the testimony of Christ was confirmed in you:
2Ti 1:8 Be not thou therefore ashamed of the testimony of our Lord, nor of me his prisoner: but be thou partaker of the afflictions of the gospel according to the power of God;
Rev 1:9 I John, who also am your brother, and companion in tribulation, and in the kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ, was in the isle that is called Patmos, for the word of God, and for the testimony of Jesus Christ.
Rev 19:10 And I fell at his feet to worship him. And he said unto me, See thou do it not: I am thy fellow servant, and of thy brethren that have the testimony of Jesus: worship God: for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.
Here are just a few of the scriptures related to those who have the testimony of Jesus Christ. We can see that the testimony of Jesus Christ was confirmed in the church members of Corinth. We can see Paul’s instruction to Timothy for him not to be ashamed of the testimony of the Lord Jesus Christ. Then in Revelation 1:9 we can see that John was imprisoned on Patmos for having the testimony of Jesus Christ. Finally in Revelation 19:10 in context with the description of the New Jerusalem, the bride of the Lamb, the angel of the Lord tells John not to worship him, but worship God with his brothers that also have the Testimony of Jesus Christ.
So, we have seen numerous scriptures that indicate directly and indirectly that the church are the people that are supposes to keep God’s commandments and keep the testimony of Jesus Christ. They were also confirmed to be people that must overcome the serpent (Satan) using the blood of Jesus and the Word (Seed) of God. So, we can see from all of these descriptive elements that this certainly narrows the potential identities of the woman in Revelation 12 to only one woman. Using the Word of God to explain the Word of God is the key to understanding the Bible. Perhaps you will join me in my next lesson. Thank you for reading and commenting and may God Bless you tremendously with the Spirit of wisdom and revelation in knowing Christ Jesus. Amen.
If you would like to continue reading this series, you can go to Part 5.
Night and Day Defined! Understanding the Spiritual Heart of Man! Part 1
(Ver 1.4) This is Part 1 in a series of basic Bible lessons on understanding the Spiritual Heart of Man. These lessons are some of the essential foundational concepts found in the Bible that permit us to understand many other more advanced subjects found in the Bible. This Bible lesson today will be some additional information on a subject that I have mentioned before briefly, but these lessons will be a much more in-depth study of the subject. I have learned from my Bible study that “Night and Day” represents the symbolic spiritual conditions of men’s hearts in the world today. I of course mean the term men as a form of mankind, meaning both men and women. This is a key subject to understand because it gives us a new perspective viewpoint into the spiritual realm that we cannot see or perceive with our five natural senses. The Bible says God is a Spirit (John 4:24). The Bible teaches us that no man has ever seen God (1 Jn 4:12). How then are we on the earth supposed to learn about this God and the spiritual realm that we have never observed? God actually tells us if we open our eyes to see Him. God created things in the natural world to give us clues of the unseen things in the spiritual world. God tells us in Romans 1:20 “The invisible things of him from the creation of the world are clearly seen, being understood by the things that were made”. So to understand spiritual things we need to recognize how God created natural things to operate. The Bible informs us that the natural world is a temporary place (2 Cor 4:18). The earth is a place that will change dramatically in the future eternal dimension beyond time. But for now you must realize that we live within in the constraints of time and that God has put everything here in this world by design for a specific purpose to teach us about the things we cannot see. God does nothing by accident and everything that He created hid a view of something we don’t understand. We of course should also realize because of our human ignorance, we do not completely understand all of the motivations and purposes for everything that God has created. But, we can at least begin to understand the things that God has taught us in His Word. So that is what I will attempt to do today to teach you on the subject of Night and Day and what it means in the spiritual realm.
1Co 4:5 Therefore judge nothing before the time, until the Lord come, who both will bring to light the hidden things of darkness, and will make manifest the counsels of the hearts: and then shall every man have praise of God.
You see in this verse God recorded a simple truth on the condition of the hearts of people in the world today. These things are referred to as “hidden things”. Hidden things are those that we cannot see clearly with casual observation. Do you understand that anything that was hidden was removed from our view intentionally by someone? It is like hiding easter eggs for your children to find. Some eggs you might place in plain sight but other eggs you might make very difficult to find and that is exactly what God has done with His creation and His Word. God hiding things is a prevalent themed pattern found in the Bible. In 1 Corinthinians 4:5 notice that God tells us that these things being spoken of (light, darkness and the hidden things) are matters of the heart of man. The heart in the Bible will almost always be a reference to the unseen spirits of men and women. God calls this a state of darkness before we are saved and Christ has entered into our spirits. We are said to be in a state of symbolic darkness or night. This of course is only a symbolic reference to a spiritual condition that we are unaware of in our unsaved and ignorant conditions. Technically unsaved people are spiritually asleep and saved people are spiritually awake and I will try to get into that later since both individuals still have spirits that exist forever.
2Co 4:6 For God, who commanded the light to shine out of darkness, hath shined in our hearts, to give the light of the knowledge of the glory of God in the face of Jesus Christ.
You see in this verse God tells us about an event that occurred in Genesis 1 on the first day of the creation account. We can clearly understand from this verse in 2 Corinthians that this event in Genesis was prophetic and had a double meaning. We know that there are many symbolic and prophetic events in the 1st chapter of Genesis if you have read my many other Bible lessons. God says that He has commanded the “light” to shine in our hearts and that was described in Genesis 1:3 when God said “Let there be light”. This light was the knowledge of the glory of God that it says was found in the face of Jesus Christ. We are told that the face of Jesus Christ shines as the “sun” in Revelation 1:16.
Rev 1:16 And he had in his right hand seven stars: and out of his mouth went a sharp twoedged sword: and his countenance was as the sun shineth in his strength.
You can see in this descriptive symbolic verse in Revelation, Jesus is described as the sun. We will certainly see many other verse in the Bible that further confirm this fact to us as we continue to study the subject. The physical sun is one of the key sources for our existence on this planet. Of course Jesus, the spiritual sun is certainly the key reason for our salvation out of this world. What we are seeing is a pattern of spiritual truths being revealed to us using God’s created realities. Those who are in darkness that do not know Jesus Christ verssus those who are now in the light of Jesus Christ. Here is another very key verse on this subject:
2Co 4:3 But if our gospel be hid, it is hid to them that are lost:
2Co 4:4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
Jesus Christ is described as a light that shines into the hearts of men again in this verse. This verse also says that people who have not believed on Jesus have been mentally blinded. Blindness is of course just a symbolic state of darkness. Darkness will simply be defined as the absence of light. The absence of light is synonymously just the inability to see the light or it is called blindness. Have you ever been deep in a cave when they shut the lights off? I mean you can’t see your hand in front of your face. This absence of the spiritual Light of Jesus is equated to spiritual blindness. If Jesus is the light and He certainly claimed to be the light of the world, then Satan has done something to the unsaved world to affect their spiritual ability to see and understand. God clearly tells us that the Gospel has been hidden to them. Satan has blinded their minds so that they are unable to understand. Your mind is just an internal part of your soul. The soul of man is made up of three parts, the mind, the will and the emotions. This three part internal component of man is not your spirit. Maybe I’ll get to that in another lesson, but for now we will continue on. If you notice Jesus is again implied to be the sun that shines into the hearts of men in this verse. Here is what Jesus said about light and darkness in the Gospels when He walked amoung us:
Joh 3:19 And this is the condemnation, that light is come into the world, and men loved darkness rather than light, because their deeds were evil.
Joh 3:20 For every one that doeth evil hateth the light, neither cometh to the light, lest his deeds should be reproved.
Joh 3:21 But he that doeth truth cometh to the light, that his deeds may be made manifest, that they are wrought in God.
In these verses found in John, God is contrasting why people are like they are. God says that those who are blinded by Satan love the darkness. These people are incapable of seeing the light because they hate the light. Whenever, light is presented to them they close their spiritual eyes and refuse to see it or even look at it. It is a very similar experience to people walking out of a dark theater to suddenly see the brigh sunshine. It is so bright that they just have to close their eyes. God’s Word is like that to many unsaved people, it can be presented in ways that are too bright and blinding to people who live in the darkness of this world. Jesus is talking specifically about this spiritual condition of the hearts of people in these verses. Even though He does not directly mention the terms of Night or Day, they are certainly indirectly implied.
So we have two conditions of men’s hearts given to us. Those that are blinded and in darkness and those that can see the light of Jesus Christ. There is a sharp and distinct contrast given between these two states of the heart. The difference is literally night and day. Those in the darkness are called lovers of evil. Those in the light love the truth. That would imply that the darkness is a lie or a falsehood. A false state of being. A fantasy world of the imagination. When you start to think in spiritual terms using this analogy you will begin to understand the spiritual realm with much greater clarity. There are many scriptures that we still need to explore and to see. Here is a very relevant verse found in 2 Peter:
2Pe 1:19 We have also a more sure word of prophecy; whereunto ye do well that ye take heed, as unto a light that shineth in a dark place, until the day dawn, and the day star arise in your hearts:
We can see in this verse that God is telling us that we who are in the church use to be in darkness, but now the day has dawned in our hearts. The Day Star of course is Jesus Christ. The Day Star is a significant reference to the earth’s closest star. This Day Star represents our sun in other descriptive words. The natural sun is said to rise in the east and set in the west. We of course know from science that the sun does not move, but the rotation of the earth causes the sun to appear to rise and set. It is the movement of the earth that determines the light or darkness we experience in the natural. The same is true for the spiritual, God is always shining in a constant, consistent ever present way to every human on the earth. However, men and women choose to turn either to allow the light to come in or turn and keep the light out. It is the movement of the individual that allows God to shine in their hearts and not the other way. 2 Peter 1:19 says we were this dark place, but that God has commanded the light to shine out of darkness. However, we still have a choice to make. It is always a partnership of people receiving what God has given to them. God will not force the light down your throat.
1Jn 2:8 Again, a new commandment I write unto you, which thing is true in him and in you: because the darkness is past, and the true light now shineth.
1 Jn 2:9 He that saith he is in the light, and hateth his brother, is in darkness even until now.
1Jn 2:10 He that loveth his brother abideth in the light, and there is none occasion of stumbling in him.
1Jn 2:11 But he that hateth his brother is in darkness, and walketh in darkness, and knoweth not whither he goeth, because that darkness hath blinded his eyes.
God again contrasts two states of men hearts in these verse found in 1 John. Those in darkness are contrasted to those in the light. To those in the light it declares that our nights have passed and the true light of Jesus Christ is forever in our hearts. However, God tells us a another secret, when He says that there will be some that say they are in the light and who are not. That is of course a challenge we are faced with on a daily basis in this world. We cannot see the spiritual condition of someone’s heart. Someone in church can appear very Godly and Holy and even say some really good things. But God informs us that what people say is not necessarily what is really in their hearts (Mar 7:6). Too many Christian make this mistake every day. It seems that a great number of people in the world made that mistake in the last election. We had candidates saying one thing that they are a Christian and yet they do everything they can to oppose God’s ways and His Word. But we can see that God tells us that there is a difference. It has to do with good vs. evil and love vs. hate. Those in the light actually love their brothers. We can clearly see that this state of darkness causes people to be unable to perceive spiritual things and I can see this all over the internet and in people’s blogs and other parts of their life. I guess I’ll end this post here and continue this subject in my next blog.
If you would like to continue reading this series of lessons on Night and Day you can go to “Part 2“.
The Bride of Christ Revealed – Part 10 The Bride in the Old Testament 2
(Ver 1.1) This is now Part 10 in the series of advanced Bible lossons on the subject of The Bride of Christ Revealed. Today will be a lesson on more Old Testament references to the Bride of Christ. I have already covered a lot of infromation in this series. For example, if we are talking about someone being a bride then there are implied subjects that we needed to be covered. For example, an implied bridegroom and an implied wedding or marriage. I went over the subjest that Jesus was the Bridegroom of the bride providing you with many scriptures. I then defined what a spiritual woman or a spiritual bride was in the eyes of God using the Bible to help us to understand her. I further have defined the reality that a marriage in the eyes of God is a covenant between God and his bride using several verses. If you have not been following this blog series from the beginning I would strongly suggest that you go back and read it from the beginning Part 1 The Introduction.
As we have seen, we know from the Old Testament prophets that God was married to the natural nation of Israel and the people of the earthly city of Jerusalem. Maybe you didn’t realize that, but it is there. What we see is a natural example of a marriage covenant between Israel and God the Father. This is a pattern and a foreshadowing of the New Covenant that was to come. When Jesus was crucified He implemented a new covenant, which represents a spiritual marriage to a spiritual woman called the new Jerusalem. The parallels between these two women are numerous and I really think they are obvious if you look for them. Here are just some of the parallels I found from studying these two women:
| Old Covenant | New Covenant |
| Physical People | Spiritual People |
| Natural Nation of Israel | Spiritual Nation of Israel |
| 12 Sons of Jacob | 12 Disciples of the Lamb |
| Earthly Jerusalem | New Jerusalem |
| Unholy Jerusalem | Holy Jerusalem |
| Solomon Builds God a Natural Temple | Jesus Builds God a Spiritual Temple |
| Priests unto God | Jesus our High Priest |
| Blood of the Lamb on the Doorposts | Blood of the Lamb of God covers our Sins |
| Offers Yearly Sacrifices for Sin | Jesus the Lamb of God once for all Sin |
| Described as a Natural Woman | Described as a Spiritual Woman |
| Married to God the Father | Married to Jesus the Son of God |
| Abraham The Natural Father | Abraham the Spiritual Father |
| Called the Natural Seed of Abraham | Called the Spiritual Seed of Abraham |
| Circumcised in the Flesh | Circumcised in the Heart |
| Covenant of Mt Sinai in Arabia | Covenant of Mt Zion in Heaven |
So who is this new covenant with? It has to be the church, those who have accepted Jesus Christ as their Lord and Savior. The parallels and patterns between these two women are very significant and intentional by God’s design. God implemented an Old Covenant to give us patterns into the New Covenant. Let’s go through some verses in the Old Testament now and look for the bride of Christ. Here is an Old Testament scripture that I believe is very relevant to the subject of the identity of the bride:
Isa 54:5 For thy Maker is thine husband; the LORD of hosts is his name; and thy Redeemer the Holy One of Israel; The God of the whole earth shall he be called.
We see a clear reference that God our maker is called the husband. I know this verse could be taken as directed at Israel and God, but I believe by the law of double reference it is referring to Jesus and the church. This is a prophetic verse of scripture for it speaks of God being “our” husband. How did I get to “our”? Because it says “thy Husband” is also called “thy Redeemer”. So who has redeemed us? Did you know we were redeemed from something, maybe that ought to be my first question. Here is a familiar scripture to some and others might not have seen it:
Tit 2:14 Who gave himself for us, that he might redeem us from all iniquity, and purify unto himself a peculiar people, zealous of good works.
You see in this verse that Jesus is called our Redeemer. God writes to the church and tells them that Jesus gave himself for them. Jesus did this to free them from their captive state and from the consequences of their sin. Here is another verse that speaks along these lines:
Gal 3:13 Christ hath redeemed us from the curse of the law, being made a curse for us: for it is written, Cursed is every one that hangeth on a tree:
So we see from Galatians 3:13 and Titus 2:14 that Christ has redeemed “US” the church. So who did Isaiah say our husband would be? He said our Redeemer would be our husband. These kind of scriptures are all over the Bible if you look for them. I know it can be like putting a big jig saw puzzle together, but the pieces of the puzzle only fit together correctly one way so keep trying them to figure out what is right and what works. God didn’t give you a puzzle that couldn’t be solved. I hope you can see why I included this scripture right here and how it also fits with the story of Ruth in the Old Testament. I talked about the story of Ruth in the last blog. Christ is our redeemer and he is now also our husband. We can see that this verse is one of those that I referred to as applicable to the church by the law of double of reference. It was historical and prophetical at the same time. You can learn so much if you can accept these simple truths. I think I should briefly talk about what “redeem” means. If you look this word up and see the definition, it informs us that God buys us out of an impending doom or disastrous state. The word states that the item being bought is on the verge of being lost and the buyer paid the price to save it. We were that item on the verge of being eternally lost and Jesus Christ with His blood bought us out of our impending disaster.
So many times people do not think when they read the Bible. If God had to buy us out of our sin and pay the price for our freedom, who did this payment go to? If you have never been in a pawn shop perhaps you do not know how they work. Someone takes in an item into the pawn shop that has some value to it. This item is pawned for a specific time period. The shop owner gives the owner of the item some amount of money, usually pennies on the dollar for the item and keeps the item in their vault until either the owner comes back and buys the item back or the time period elapses. If the time period elapses the pawn shop owner is then free to take the item and sell it for more than he paid for it and that is one way that they make their money. If the original owner of the item comes back for his item he usually has to pay what he was loaned plus interest to get the item back. So what does this have to do with God redeeming us? We were that item of value that was pawned and held for ransom. God in His infinite mercy paid the price for our redemption. Perhaps I’ll do a blog on this showing you the Bible verses in the future.
Let’s get back to the bride in the Old Testament. The book of Isaiah has several scriptures that can be taken to heart by the church and here is another example of one of these:
Isa 62:5 For as a young man marrieth a virgin, so shall thy sons marry thee: and as the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy God rejoice over thee.
This verse gives us a scriptural comparison of a natural and a spiritual truth. We can clearly see a reference given to a marriage between a natural man and a natural woman. We can then see that compared to a covenant marriage between God and his wife. By the law of double reference we can easily make the leap and see that this is Jesus and the church. Jesus as you recall was called the bridegroom with a bride in book of John. So as this verse says it says the bridegroom will rejoice over you. Who do you think “you” is? Of course it is the church. Who do you think the bridegroom is, who rejoices? Of course that is Jesus. Verses like this are so easily overlooked and ignored and people do it every day. But, when you see the truth it makes it easier to see other related truths in the Word of God.
We have seen two very significant verses in Isaiah that are relevant to the church, but there are also other verses and other prophets which can be viewed in more than one way by “the law of double reference”. What does this law of double reference mean to us? It simply means that it can be taken in a natural and a historical way according to the natural nation of Israel and then it can be taken in a spiritual or prophetic way that relates to the new Jerusalem and the new Covenant people of God. Here are a couple of verses that I think further reflect what I am telling you.
Jer 50:4 In those days, and in that time, saith the LORD, the children of Israel shall come, they and the children of Judah together, going and weeping: they shall go, and seek the LORD their God.
Jer 50:5 They shall ask the way to Zion with their faces thitherward, saying, Come, and let us join ourselves to the LORD in a perpetual covenant that shall not be forgotten.
We know reading this scripture in verse 4 that this appears to be addressed to the natural people of Israel and Judah. During this time period the prophet Jeremiah had seen the natural nation of Israel split into two opposing factions. This involved the 10 tribes of Israel to the north and then the two tribes of Judah and Benjamin to the south. Israel experienced a split and we won’t get into any of that because even though it is important, it is not relevant to the identity of the bride of Christ at least as far as we know right now. For you see there is a verse in the New Testament that gives us some clues into this statement:
Heb 8:8 For finding fault with them, he saith, Behold, the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah:
We can see from this verse written to the church that God is speaking of the New Covenant. God states that this new covenant is with the house of Israel and the house of Judah. But, since this is written to the church we can very easily say that we are them, the spiritual Israel and the spiritual Judah.
Look back at Jeremiah 50. We can see a stark change in context in Jeremiah 50:5 with these natural people being previously mentioned. Did you notice what they said? Probably you don’t fully grasp what was said without studying and finding out the significance of the words. It starts by them asking the way to Zion. They end with a statement that says let us join ourselves to the Lord in a perpetual covenant. A perpetual covenant means an eternal, everlasting, never ending covenant. We know from study that to join with another is a part of a marriage covenant. The wife is joined to her husband they become one flesh by the law of marriage in Genesis 2. So we are definitely talking about a bride and a her husband in this verse. But, do you understand what Zion is? It has far reaching implications that are very significant. I do not feel I can fully explain everything in this blog, but I will try to give you enough information to help you see what I am talking about. I’ll start by saying that Mt Zion has an earthly reference to a mountain in Palestine called Mt Hermon. This is not the mountain in this verse that the people are asking for directions to. If you think it is you are probably just confused. Let’s look at some key verses in the New Testament that will help us unlock the meaning. Here are two verses that are quotes from the Old Testament:
Mat 21:5 Tell ye the daughter of Sion, Behold, thy King cometh unto thee, meek, and sitting upon an ass, and a colt the foal of an ass.
Joh 12:15 Fear not, daughter of Sion: behold, thy King cometh, sitting on an ass’s colt.
Both of these verses say basically the same thing. But, it give us a key phrase or wording that maybe you don’t understand fully yet. These words are addressed to the daughter of Zion. Do you know who the daughter of Zion is? This may be news to many of you, but the daughter of Zion is the church. I think several readers just choked on their drink. Jesus is prophesied to be riding on a donkey into the city of Jerusalem. But, it says look daughter of Zion here is your King. Who is the King of kings and the Lord of lords? If you don’t know the answer to that you may need to do more Bible study. Who are the kings and lords that Jesus is King and Lord of? This is not a trick question. Let’s look at some more verses and this will become clearer as we do further study. Let’s first establish the location of Mt Zion. Where is Mt Zion, this mountain is not in Palestine or the natural nation of Israel. Here is a clue and a verse that might help you see it.
Rom 9:33 As it is written, Behold, I lay in Sion a stumblingstone and rock of offence: and whosoever believeth on him shall not be ashamed.
Isa 8:14 And he shall be for a sanctuary; but for a stone of stumbling and for a rock of offence to both the houses of Israel, for a gin and for a snare to the inhabitants of Jerusalem.
The Bible is so much more complex than we give it credit for many times. When we read the Bible most of the time we see Israel and Jerusalem and only think in natural terms of the physical country and city on the earth. However, there are more than one of both of these in the Bible. From what I have seen in the Bible there are three cities in the Bible all called by the same name Jerusalem. One is physical and two are spiritual. I really don’t have time to teach you this in this lesson. I have included more information on this in other blogs so go read and study. So who or what are these verses speaking of? Who is the stumbling stone? Who is this rock of offence? Here is another scripture from Isaiah that also speaks of this stone:
Isa 28:16 Therefore thus saith the Lord GOD, Behold, I lay in Zion for a foundation a stone, a tried stone, a precious corner stone, a sure foundation: he that believeth shall not make haste.
You can see that God has laid a stone in Zion to start a foundation for a building project. This stone was tried, which has all kind of implications on it. Jesus was tried by Pilot and sentenced to death. Then it refers to this stone as a corner stone. A corner stone in terms of building is the stone that all the other stones are aligned from. It is the first stone laid in a building project. God is talking about a building project, yes? Sure He is! However, God is building a spiritual building, a spiritual city which is to be His eternal dwelling place. This dwelling place is the church and it is called the New Jerusalem. Let’s read some very important verses in Ephesians 2:
Eph 2:20 And are built upon the foundation of the apostles and prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief corner stone;
Eph 2:21 In whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto an holy temple in the Lord:
Eph 2:22 In whom ye also are builded together for an habitation of God through the Spirit.
You can clearly see a reference to a very, very large building project in these verses. This is a large building project because we have a really big God. God is building an eternal city, a holy city to dwell in. This city is of course the New Jerusalem. This city will be His eternal dwelling place and will be a glorious place to be forever. As you recall this city is described in great detail in Revelation and is called the Holy Jerusalem, the New Jerusalem. It is New because the Old is going away and being replaced totally and completely.
Heb 8:13 In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first old. Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away.
So God tells us that the New replaces the Old. The New is not an augmentation or a modification of the Old or even an upgrade from the Old. The New is a better covenant, built upon better promises. God tells us that the Old will soon vanish away completely. We can see this repeated in the New Testament if you look for it. God tells us there will be a new Heaven and new Earth. So obviously both of these will also be completely replaced. It would appear to me that God is preparing a new spiritual world that replaces the old spiritual world.
So we are still talking about Mt. Zion and where it is. Who was this “Stumbling Stone” that Isaiah 8:14 is referring to? Of course it is Jesus Christ? Where is Jesus Christ today? He is in heaven sitting at the right hand of the Father. Do you agree? So apparently Mt Zion is in heaven. Here is a verse that will clear things up better for you since it tells us exactly where this Mt Zion is located:
Heb 12:22 But ye are come unto mount Sion, and unto the city of the living God, the heavenly Jerusalem, and to an innumerable company of angels,
Heb 12:23 To the general assembly and church of the firstborn, which are written in heaven, and to God the Judge of all, and to the spirits of just men made perfect,
This verse is so clear and so informative that I wonder why we haven’t seen it before. Of course this verse is written to the church and it declares us, the church as having come to this Mt Zion. Then it reveals the location of this Mt Zion as being the city of the living God. This time it names the city directly as the Heavenly Jerusalem. As I hope you recall we have already seen this city named in Galatians 4, where it was called the Jerusalem that is Above. Who was this city according to Galatians? Wasn’t it the “Jerusalem from Above” that was the mother of the Church? Uh Oh? We are beginning to put together pieces of the puzzle that have huge implications to challenge our current understanding of God’s word. If you use your brain a little bit you realize that every covenant of God has a corresponding mountain associated with it. From reading in Galatians 4 the Earthly Jerusalem is tied to Mt Sinai where Moses received the law from God. This heavenly Jerusalem also has a mountain associated with it inferring there was another covenant that most of us don’t know about. If the heavenly Jerusalem contains the mountain named Zion and this city is said to be the mother of the church, could the daughter of Zion also be the church? If you keep studying longer you will come to the conclusion that it is, as I have.
Son 3:11 Go forth, O ye daughters of Zion, and behold king Solomon with the crown wherewith his mother crowned him in the day of his espousals, and in the day of the gladness of his heart.
The daughter of Zion is mentioned in the Song of Solomon when speaking of his wife that he loves. Solomon is an O.T. type of Christ and a pattern for Jesus’ marriage to the church. The “daughter of Zion” again is a reference to the church a spiritual name for a spiritual woman.
I have in a roundabout way gone in a complete circle in this teaching about the bride of Christ. As you may remember, we started out very early with a definition of a woman coming from a description of the woman in Revelation called the New Jerusalem. This woman has suddenly reappeared from Old Testament references thus completing the circle. If you have been following this you will soon begin to understand the connection and the process of how we got to where we did. God does things like this on purpose to teach us. This woman called the New Jerusalem is the Holy City of God. The eternal dwelling place for the Spirit of God. The eternal covenant wife of Jesus Christ the Son of God. This city is a new spiritual habitation for God because the Old spiritual city in heaven will soon pass away. Why was it necessary for God to create a new spiritual city? Why was is necessary to create a new heaven and a new Earth? Why did God have to marry a new wife through His Son Jesus Christ? Why was the Church a necessary part of God’s plan as a woman and a wife? There are just so many questions to answer and research. Before I close out this incredibly long lesson, I’ll leave you with one more set of scriptures about this city called “New Jerusalem”:
Isa 52:1 Awake, awake; put on thy strength, O Zion; put on thy beautiful garments, O Jerusalem, the holy city: for henceforth there shall no more come into thee the uncircumcised and the unclean.
Isa 52:2 Shake thyself from the dust; arise, and sit down, O Jerusalem: loose thyself from the bands of thy neck, O captive daughter of Zion.
Isa 52:3 For thus saith the LORD, Ye have sold yourselves for nought; and ye shall be redeemed without money.
Here God is speaking to the New Jerusalem. If you noticed He again called it the “Holy Jerusalem” like He did in Revelation. There is a parallel given to us of a spiritual truth. We know the uncircumcised refers to those not in covenant. But, in the New Testament God informs us that we who have been circumcised in our hearts are the true Jews (Rom 2:29). So God is speaking prophetically as well as naturally. Then in verse 2 it says to free ourselves from the captivity of sin. Where we were bound in darkness to Satan we have been purchased and redeemed by God. As you can see in verse 3 it says we sold ourselves for nothing to Satan, but God has bought us back without paying any money for us. It didn’t cost God any money to redeem us, but it was not free either. God shed His blood, which was more valuable than anything else that He could have given and paid the price to buy us out of our dilemma.
So we have gone full circle and ended where we started. Funny how God does that. The City of New Jerusalem is the New Covenant wife of the Lamb of God and this spiritual woman is the church. There are certainly many other scriptures that I did not cover, but I know I have run very long in today’s lesson, so I will stop here.
If you would like to continue reading this series, you can go to “Part 11“.
Why Did Jesus Leave Heaven and Come To the Earth?
(Ver 1.3) There are several possible answers to this question and I am only going to address one of them today in this Bible study. I have already established the fact that Jesus was God present in the flesh in other Bible lessons. Therefore, I will not repeat that information again today. Just know that God the supreme creator, became a human male and was born into the world in a Bethlehem manger approximately 2000 years ago. Jesus walked the planet in the form of human flesh for approximately 33 years and was then willingly crucified on a cross by the Roman Empire and the captive nation of Israel. That was just a quick synopsis of some of the Bible Christian theological basics that you should already be intimately familiar with. But, why was it necessary for God/Jesus to come to earth in the flesh and to shed His blood? What transpired or made it necessary for only God Himself to appear on the planet to solve the problem? Couldn’t God just create something new, or say something or do something or send someone else? Isn’t God still God? Why was it so important for the supreme God to do this personally? I think that is an amazing question to consider and one that if you really understood the answer, would explain so many other questions that you have yet to figure ask.
Today I will introduce you to just one of the most important answers to this question and I hope that you can at least begin to grasp these basic concepts. What we see from the Bible is that God had a problem. Of course we know that God is all powerful, all knowing, ever present and capable of doing practically anything. I did say “practically anything” and that will probably rock some people’s religious boats (minds). You see extremely religious people like to believe that God is capable of doing anything and everything and there is nothing that is impossible for Him. That would be a great truth if that was what the Bible really said, but since the Bible doesn’t say that I can’t agree with any of that kind of thinking. You see in one part of the Bible God says that it is impossible for Him to lie (Heb 6:18). If you understand what the definition of “impossible” means it clearly states this will never happen under any circumstances. I’ve heard some very religious theological ignorant people who have tried to explain this away using human reasoning that whatever God says, if it was not previously true when He said it that it would become true after He said it. After all He is an omnipotent God and truth is always relevant to what God wills. In other words if God says the sky is Green in color when it is not, then yesterday the sky might have been blue but tomorrow it would suddenly appear to us as green. So God would change things to fit what He said today and if tomorrow He wants it a different way He would change to cause it to be different. However, that reasoning just does not conform and balance with other scriptures either. The Bible clearly says that God is God and that He does not change (Mal 3:6). In other words He is a constant and consistently good God who does not change His mind or do one thing today and another totally different opposite thing tomorrow. I guess I got off of the main subject so let’s get back to why Jesus came to earth in the flesh.
Here is a key verse that informs us of at least one of the main reasons why God came to earth in the flesh. Open the eyes of your spirit to see what the Holy Ghost has to say to you about this reality. This verse is found in 1 John and it states the following:
1Jn 3:8 He that committeth sin is of the devil; for the devil sinneth from the beginning. For this purpose the Son of God was manifested, that he might destroy the works of the devil.
We can determine from the context of this verse that one of the primary themes being communicated to us is concerning SIN! We can see that God is telling us about the source of sin, how and where sin originated. This verse calls the source the devil, but this is just another name for the ancient serpent also called Satan. If you read Revelation 12:9 you will see the true identity defined of this evil one, with several of his other names and symbolic descriptive titles being also connected together. What we begin to learn from this verse is the origin of God’s problem and the root cause for every evil that has entered into our world. I know that some are still struggling to see how God could have a problem. I’ve heard many religious minded theological people say that God is simply using Satan as a pawn and Satan doesn’t do anything unless he first checks with God and asks permission and God grants it or rejects it. In other words God is in ultimate control of everything and everyone and nothing happens unless God has a specific plan and purpose for it. That deceptive reasoning is ignorance gone to seed and borderline stupidity. That line of thinking doesn’t fit what God says in the Bible and doesn’t match in a balanced way with the description of a God who is called LOVE (1 Jn 4:8). Many humans have a very perverted concept of what true LOVE is because they based their concepts of love on their experiences here in this world. They then misapply these wrong concepts to explain why God does or does not stop bad things from happening in our world. When the earthquake hit Haiti I heard one minister on TV say something like this was God’s judgment for their sinful lifestyle. In other words God specifically caused this event to happen to punish some very wicked people. That is just idiotic when people think like that. We haven’t really talked about why Jesus came to earth, but it was for many reasons and one of them was to pay the price for all of our sins, past, present and future. His blood was a ransom payment for the sin of the world. So if God is now killing people because of their sin, then why did He come in the first place? We are all sinners, why didn’t He just kill us all and start over?
So let’s get back to our primary Bible verse of the day. In this verse it tells us that the Son of God was made manifest because God had to destroy the works of the devil or Satan. If Satan was the problem why didn’t God just throw Satan into hell and that would be the end of him? I think that is an excellent question that people do not know the answer to either. If you understood the answer to that question you would realize that God has a major problem on His hands, but one that He is still capable of solving. The term “destroy” in this verse has a different meaning than what most people think of when they think of something that has been destroyed. To destroy something in our world would mean that it has been obliterated or that it was blown to millions of little pieces. But that is not what this Greek word (G3089) is saying to us. This word translated in the KJV as “destroy” actually means to “loosen”. To loosen something implies that something was first held captive or prisoner that needed to be freed. Knowing that alone dispels the theory that God is in control of everything in this world. If whatever was held captive was in God’s control, God would not have had to come personally to earth to “loosen” it, would He? So who or what was being held captive? We can find the answer in the Bible:
Isa 52:2 Shake thyself from the dust; arise, and sit down, O Jerusalem: loose thyself from the bands of thy neck, O captive daughter of Zion.
This scripture in Isaiah is prophetically speaking to the New Jerusalem city described in Revelation as the Lamb’s wife. You can clearly see that if you read and study the context. But notice the instructions given to this woman. She is told to get loose from the bonds around her neck. That implies a woman who is a prisoner or a slave to something or someone. If the human race was in covenant with Satan and in the bonds of sin, as I believe we were, then you can begin to see the problem that God is faced with. God cannot do anything to Satan without doing the exact same thing to all of his captives. But it is really more complex than that. You see I believe that God was also in covenant with Satan. So God could not do anything to Satan that He wouldn’t also have to do to Himself. When you start to think along these lines you begin to see a lot of things in the Bible differently. You begin to think in a new way and see things that God is revealing to us in some very important verses in the Bible. For example, God tells us that Satan would not have crucified Jesus if he would have known what was going to happen or result from His death (1 Cor 2:8). Apparently God did something unexpected that was very strong and powerful through Jesus’ death on the cross and when He was raised from the dead. This one man’s action caused Satan to regret greatly killing him. The Bible says that God used death to destroy him that had the power of death. We learn from the study of the book of Ruth that death represents a force that breaks a covenant relationship. In most marriage ceremonies there is a clause spoken “until death do us part”. That means in our marriage covenant relationship we will always be together until one of us dies. Since Jesus was God in the flesh we can begin to understand that Jesus through His death severed any previous covenants that He was in. God used death as a legal termination of the covenants that He was in prior to His death. When Jesus was raised from the dead He was now legally able to enter into a New Covenant that did not include Satan in the family. Jesus said something very profound after he was raised from the dead and it is found in this statement “all power both in heaven and in earth has been given to me” (Mat 28:18). But, I thought Jesus was God and that God already had all power both in heaven and on the earth? Why would it be necessary for God to transfer all His authority to the risen Lord Jesus? Do you understand that difficulty presented in this information? Apparently we learn from this statement that God did not have all authority in both realms or it would not had been necessary for it to be given it to Jesus. Do you see how complex the Bible can get on such a simple subject? Let me show you another verse found in the Bible that further confirms this reality of truth:
Heb 2:8 Thou hast put all things in subjection under his feet. For in that he put all in subjection under him, he left nothing that is not put under him. But now we see not yet all things put under him.
Here we have another paradox being presented. God says everything has been placed under the feet of Jesus and then reveals not everything is yet there. Do you understand that statement? Well, probably not! First again why is it necessary for everything to be placed under Jesus if everything was already under God in heaven? This verse goes along with what Jesus said to us Matthew 28:18 that ALL power has been given to Him but yet we still read in many other verses that Satan remains present on the earth and that Satan still has power (Luke 10:19). This presents some very difficult scriptural and theological conflicts to resolve.
What we see from this short lesson is the fact that God had a problem. God’s problem originated with Satan or Lucifer as he was also called. Satan did something that caused the human race to be in a terrible self-solvable dilemma. Satan had corrupted God’s creation and became the “god of this world” (2 Cor 4:4). Being called the god of this world implies that he had taken control over everything that God had previously given to Adam in Genesis 1:26. However, God had a planned solution in place already from the beginning to get it all back in a legal way that not only solves our problem, but also solved God’s problems simultaneously. Our problem was sin and death and God’s problem was primarily Satan. God used Jesus to fix both of these problems. Jesus redeemed us from the consequences of sin. Through His shed blood our sacrificial lamb was slain and the payment for sin was made once for all. But through the death of Jesus on the cross, God’s covenant with Satan was also terminated and now Satan can be thrown into hell legally. I know I said a lot and I quoted a lot of scriptures and didn’t give you references to a bunch of them, I’m sorry about that. I also know this is a lot of new things to think about and study in the Bible and I hope that you do the research to see if these things that I said are true or not. I challenge you to study for yourself and not to take my word for anything.
The Bride of Christ Revealed – Part 9 The Bride in the Old Testament
(Ver 1.1) This has been a very long extensive advanced Bible study about the identity of the bride of Christ. This is now Part 9 in the series and is my 100th blog on this site. I have been going through an intentionally designed set of information to step you through a process so that you could clearly see and understand the identity of the Bride of Christ. We have discussed a lot of subjects and a lot of scriptures. These are absolutely critical for you to understand so that you know who you are in Christ. By knowing who you are spiritually, it clearly indentifies you and your responsibility in the spiritual realm and helps you to understand your covenant relationship with Christ. If you have not read these blogs from the beginning I would strongly recommend that you go back and start with Part 1 The Introduction and then continue forward in progressive blogs so that you can clearly see and understand what God is saying.
Within the Old Testament there are several styles of writings found within the pages. First we should realize that God originally started by giving the first part of the Old Testament to Moses. Moses wrote the first five books of the Bible and these are many times referred to as “the law”. The law represents commandments and instructions given to the nation of Israel so that they would learn and know of God and His ways. There is a lot of information contained within the law, but most of it does not apply directly to the church. We know from the New Testament in verses like Romans 6:14 that it says the church is not under the law, but under grace. So we have to understand the law, but not live thinking that by obeying the law that is what saved us. Jesus also said that a new commandment I give to you and this was the commandment of Love. Jesus told us that in this one new commandment was summed up all the other commandments of the Old Testament. Next, we should see the Bible as a historical document with actual events, places and people recorded for our benefit. The Bible says these things were written to us for examples (1 Cor 10:11) so that we could learn from what they did right or wrong. Learning from History will help us to not repeat it, so the saying goes. So we should read first and foremost for examples that we could learn from. Next, there are prophetic words recorded of events and things which have not yet occurred. Jesus of course fulfilled many of the prophetic writings when he was born a man and walked the earth. Then he was killed and rose from the dead and these were all prophesied events. Events that were written hundreds of years earlier. So we should be reading the Old Testament for events that are soon to occur. The next type of Old Testament writing that we should be aware of when reading, is the fact that God has developed patterns, types and shadows of future events and people. Many times it is a natural occurrence of a specific event that parallels a future spiritual event. God informs us that the thing that has been is the thing that shall be again ( Ecc 1:9). He told us that there is nothing new under the sun. So what we can determine from this is that God has given us glimpses into future spiritual events by showing us previous natural events. So as we read the Old Testament keep this in mind and look for natural patterns, types and shadows of people, places and events. I believe there are many other types and styles of writings in the Old Testament, but there is only one more that I want to point out. The last type of writing that I want to make you aware of are scriptures that many call double references. In other words they may be words that are originally given to or directed at the natural nation of Israel, but these words can also be applied to the spiritual nation of Israel or the church as it is also known. The law of double reference represents words that come from God that can be viewed historically and prophetically simultaneously. The Bible declares that all of the promises of God are yes and amen to us (2 Cor 1:20). For example, some of these promises were from the Old Testament given to Abraham and his seed (Gal 3:14). But, we know from Galatians that now we (the church) are the seed of Abraham and whatever God said to him, he said to us also (Gal 3:29). We can see from this example, that the story of Abraham has vast spiritual implications for the church. However, without reading and understanding double references and O.T. writings styles, you would never know these promises were yours without Galatians 3. So let’s look at some Old Testament scriptures and see what God has revealed about the identity of the bride of Christ.
There are so many Old Testament references as well as specific patterns, types and shadows that reveal the identity of this woman called the bride of Christ, but unless you are looking for them you will probably glide right over them and not even realize it. For example, have you ever read the Song of Solomon? This man goes on and on about a woman, describing her in detail and speaking of his deep feeling of love for her. I really don’t know how you can read that and not realize that woman’s true identity, that woman is the church. The man speaking is God in the flesh. Jesus died and gave himself for payment to purchase the church with his blood. I think for time sake I will not go through that book, but it does have many verses that are relevant. I would strongly recommend that you read this book with a new perspective and focus and look for examples of the bride. We can easily tell because we know who the author is, who the male or bridegroom is in the relationship. Jesus made this statement,
Joh 5:39 Search the scriptures; for in them ye think ye have eternal life: and they are they which testify of me.
So as you read stories about the man in the Song of Solomon, remember what Jesus said. Search the scriptures, but keep this in mind for they are written about Him. That will help you a whole bunch in figuring out what they mean. I’ll give you a hint that will help you maybe in your study of the Song of Solomon. The woman in the story is many times referred to as the “daughter of Jerusalem” or the “daughter of Zion”. In the King James Translation it is incorrectly translated as “daughters of Jerusalem”, but if you look up the word you will see that it should have been singular. So who was the daughter of Jerusalem? If you recall we read in Galatians 4:26 that the Heavenly Jerusalem, is the spiritual mother of us all (the church). That would of course help confirm the identity of the Bride as being the daughter of the Heavenly Jerusalem in the Song of Solomon. There are many other interesting things to read in the book of Song of Solomon so I recommend that you spend time in studying this book in great depth. For example, six times in the Song of Solomon the woman is called his “sister” and his “spouse”. The term “spouse” is obvious and it means wife. The term sister is of course is more difficult for religious people to grasp. However, the church has to be a spiritual sister to Christ since we have the same spiritual mother and father. But I guess I won’t elaborate anymore and get you upset at me.
Another classic Old Testament type and shadow of Christ and the Church is given to us in the book of Ruth. The entire story is about a woman who is the primary named character. This woman is a gentile woman and ends up marrying her Jewish Redeemer. Sounds kind of familiar to another story in the New Testament. People who don’t see the Church as this woman must be ignoring the obvious or just blinded by the enemy so that they won’t see it. The book of Ruth is not a very big book, it is only 4 chapters and you can read it without spending much time doing it. However, reading is not the same as understanding it. You are going to have to study to show yourself approved a workman unto God. Study involves digging for the big hidden nuggets of truth and not just scanning the surface for the easy stuff. Study will always involve work on your part. If you would like to read my blog series on this woman Ruth you can go to “The Book of Ruth“.
Here is a quick synopsis of the story of Ruth. It seems that this story begins when there was a time of famine that existed in the land of Israel. A man, his wife and two sons moved out of Israel to find food. They went to the land of Moab and settled down. The father of the family dies there. His two sons marry Moabite women to start their own families. However within 10 years time, the two sons also die leaving no heirs. With all of the Hebrew men dead that left the mother-in-law and her two daughter-in-laws only. Naomi, the older widow then attempts to convince her two daughter-in-laws to go back home and find new husbands because she can’t have any more children for them to marry. One daughter-in-law takes her up on this and one does not. The one daughter-in-law named Ruth declares where ever you go I will go, where ever you die I’ll die, your people will be my people and your God will by my God. This is covenant talk if you didn’t realize that. So Naomi and Ruth return to Naomi’s homeland where her relatives lived. This so happens to be in and around the city of Bethlehem. This is the exact future birth place of Jesus. This is certainly not a coincidence. Ruth must have become familiar with the law of Moses being married to a son of Israel or from her mother-in-law Naomi, because everything she does going forward follows the things written in the law.
The law of Moses provided for a method of raising up an heir in the case and circumstances that Ruth was experiencing. A man called a kinsman redeemer was responsible to marry the widow of the dead relative and have children with her. This child would become an heir for the dead husbands family. This kinsman redeemer was named Boaz in the book of Ruth. Boaz was a very wealthy man and owned a large field that Ruth would gleam from in order to get food to survive. Boaz ends up meeting this woman Ruth and finds out who she is. The net result of this meeting is a marriage. Boaz redeems Ruth from her widowhood and they have a child and an heir. This natural child becomes the great grandfather of David the king and eventually directly in the lineage of the birth of Jesus, our redeemer. You might be able to recognize the types of some of the characters in this story fairly easily and others will be much more difficult to see. Boaz is definitely a type of Jesus, the redeemer. Ruth the gentile is a type of the church. Naomi the mother-in-law would be a type of the nation of Israel. I don’t know of any type and shadow that is a perfect match otherwise it wouldn’t be a shadow it would be the object that is making the shadow. Everything may not fit exactly like you think it should, but I guarantee you everything is significant and has meaning, you just don’t know what it means yet. I could attempt to explain more things in this blog, but since it is not my primary subject it would just cloud the issue at hand. If you go and read the story of Ruth closely you will find that I didn’t include every character mentioned. I didn’t include every interaction between these characters either. There are certainly many more things to learn from this book, but you will need to wait.
I would highly recommend if you haven’t read those two books that you go back and read them and pay very close attention to what is being said. Take note of who the characters are and what they do. The patterns, types and shadows given are very relevant to our subject of the identity of the bride of Christ. Both books are about a male and a female relationship. Both books are about love and marriage. Both represent types of Jesus and the church.
So that was an introduction to two major patterns of Christ and the church in the Old Testament. You should be intimately familiar with these stories and have a really good understanding of them so that you will know who you are in the spiritual world. We will continue looking at other Old Testament scriptures for the bride in my next blog.
If you like to continue reading this series, you can go to “Part 10“.
The Bride of Christ Revealed – Part 8 The Bride in the New Testament 2
(Ver 1.1) This is now Part 8 in the series of lessons on the Bride of Christ Revealed. I have been going through an intentionally designed set of information to step you through a process so that you could clearly see and understand the identity of the Bride of Christ. We have discussed a lot of subjects and a lot of scriptures. These are absolutely critical for you to understand so that you know who you are in Christ. By knowing who you are spiritually, it clearly indentifies you and your responsibility in the spiritual realm. If you have not read these blogs from the beginning I would strongly recommend that you go back and start with Part 1 The Introduction and then continue forward in progressive blogs so that you can clearly see and understand what God is saying.
I heard a minister say that speaking of Saul in the book of Acts when Jesus appeared to him on the road to Damascus, that those scriptures prove we (the church) represents Christ. Jesus says to Saul “why persecuteth thou me” in the book of Acts and if Jesus said you are doing something to me that proves we are Him. But, you see the reason that Jesus could make that statement, is because it says in Corinthians that the church is one spirit with Christ because they were joined or married to him. So we are not Christ, but have been joined to him by a marriage covenant, making us His body. This is the law of Genesis 2 concerning marriage, where God said the two will become one body. I tell you if you ignore these easy scriptures, you are going to have a lot of problems with the harder stuff in the Bible. In the last lesson we looked at the verse in 1 Corinthians:
1 Cor 6:17 But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit.
This verse says that the church was joined to the Lord and became one Spirit. To be joined to someone is different than actually being someone. A wife is always joined to her husband and she becomes his flesh and bone. But that never means her role changes. She is never the husband or the head in the relationship. This is just basic reasoning and logic based upon scripture that we have read in Ephesians. Look at the Greek G2853 word translated as “joined” in the Strong’s dictionary:
G2853
From κόλλα kolla (“glue”); to glue, that is, (passively or reflexively) to stick (figuratively): – cleave, join (self), keep company.
The word translated as “joined” means to glue, cleave, or to stick together. This is another clear definition of marriage which is the act of taking two separate distinct people and making one out of them. That’s marriage in the clearest form of God’s definition given to us by God himself in Genesis 2, Matthew 19:5, Mark 10:7-8 and Ephesians 5:31. The two shall become one flesh. Glue is the joining substance and this could very well represent the Holy Spirit. But the purpose of glue is to take two separate and distinct pieces and join them or put them together and make one piece out of them. It is interesting that this Greek word is different than the previous Greek word that we looked at and since I am not a Greek language expert I don’t really have an explanation of why and how it is different. However, I did notice that the Greek word G4347 which is used in Ephesians 5:31, Matthew 19:5 and Mark 10:7 in the marriage law from Genesis comes from G2853 so they are definitely connected and definitely related and they definitely say and mean the same thing.
I don’t know how to make this any clearer. So if you think the church is still not the bride based upon these great witnesses I sure hope you will begin to see it someday. There are certainly more scriptures in the Bible that indicate that the church is the bride of Christ and I will give you some more for the stubborn and those who have chosen to close their eyes to the truth. Here is one that I found that I thought was very interesting and certainly fits together with a bunch of what we have been studying. This scripture is found in the book of Revelation and here we have Jesus himself again speaking to the church. Notice the words are in Red and then notice closely what Jesus is saying to us.
Rev 3:12 Him that overcometh will I make a pillar in the temple of my God, and he shall go no more out: and I will write upon him the name of my God, and the name of the city of my God, which is new Jerusalem, which cometh down out of heaven from my God: and I will write upon him my new name.
I want you to first notice who this is written to, to whom is Jesus speaking? According to verse 13 of chapter 3 it is written directly to the church. That is certainly a critical point to understand up front. Then let’s go back to verse 12 and see what Jesus said to the church. The primary subject or theme of the verse appears to me to be a name changing operation. He says to them that have overcome, He will do what? He is going to give these people a new name. From what I see it could be three different names or all three new name references could also be the same. But did you notice the relationship to the new Jerusalem? This is definitely a part of the naming process. Who gets a new name in a normal wedding and marriage? Of course it has traditionally been the bride that takes the name of their husband. If the church was already the body of Christ, I don’t think there would be any need to write a new name on his body if the head already has a new name, then the body also has a new name. But, somehow Jesus finds it necessary to write a new name on the church, that sure sounds like a marriage to me. Putting the pieces of the puzzle together correctly sure seems to make things work together better. One of the main take away from this verse would be to see the association of the name “New Jerusalem” to the church. Are you one of the overcomers Jesus is speaking to? Jesus is telling you if you are, then you are the New Jerusalem of God. You are the city called New Jerusalem. You are the new house and temple of God. You have become a pillar in the temple of God. A pillar is a key part of a structure that holds the other parts together and keeps it from falling down. That is a major responsibility being given to us. What I wanted you to see was a verse of scripture that implies a marriage between a bridegroom and a bride. The bride should be willing to take the new name of her husband and this is what Jesus is telling us to do. What we have is a confirmation to the fact that the bride of Christ is a spiritual city of people called the New Jerusalem. This New Jerusalem is a New Covenant marriage between Jesus Christ and the church.
I want to show you some verses in the Bible written to the church that clearly reveal us to be a chosen woman. Do you realize that when a man asks a woman to marry him, that man has already made a choice. Out of all the women on the planet, that man chose this one. That was a selection of one and the rejection of all the rest. This is what Christ has done and you can find that in the Bible if you look for it. Let’s read this verse:
2Jn 1:1 The elder unto the elect lady and her children, whom I love in the truth; and not I only, but also all they that have known the truth;
So what do you do with a verse like this? It is easily explained away or it can be taken and understood to be very profound. God is writing a letter to the church through the Apostle John and he calls all of us the “elect lady”. If you think only naturally you will try to say this is a letter written to a dear friend of John or maybe his wife. It is a great error to conclude that based upon the context of the words that are written. The “elect lady” being called “her” is the spiritual church of God. A lady by definition is a woman with character and moral standards. It would be the opposite of calling a woman a “whore”. Uh oh, I guess I won’t go there.
2Jn 1:5 And now I beseech thee, lady, not as though I wrote a new commandment unto thee, but that which we had from the beginning, that we love one another.
As you can see John and God calls the church a lady. The commandment of love was the same new commandment that Jesus gave to John and the rest of the disciples. This commandment is now being passed on to the rest of the body of Christ. However, you have to see that the church is called “a lady”. A lady certainly qualifies to be the bride of Christ.
It seems that there are numerous other scriptures that imply marriage even though they don’t say it directly. Here are some of those that I have found, you of course can disagree and ignore them if you like. Remember in the Old Testament the word “Knew” was used numerous times for a sexual act between a husband and a wife. It says “Adam knew his wife Eve and they had a son”. That of course represents a covenant act between a husband and his wife as we have seen before. There are numerous scriptures in the New Testament that could very easily be taken to mean the same thing but in a spiritual context, not a natural physical act. After all God is a Spirit. His Spirit resides in the believer and as we have seen they become one Spirit with Him.
Gal 4:9 But now, after that ye have known God, or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage?
You can see from this verse that there is a two way street being spoken of. We the church are now said to know God and now God also knows us. This is spiritual knowledge and represents a spiritual consensual covenant act. This is marriage in the purest spiritual form. We can easily ignore verses like this or overlook them or we can figure out what they are saying and believe them. Here is another example of God knowing us the church.
2Ti 2:19 Nevertheless the foundation of God standeth sure, having this seal, The Lord knoweth them that are his. And, Let every one that nameth the name of Christ depart from iniquity.
We can again see a covenant act of consensual spiritual knowledge being expressed in this verse. It said the Lord “knows” them that are his. It would be the same as saying Adam knows his wife and they had a son. I guess some might say we shouldn’t be talking about this kind of stuff in a lesson about God. I think they forget who invented and created sex. You can see God all over it if you look at it the right way. The other critical piece of information in this verse is the reference to a name change again. Again this describes a marriage covenant act of a name change performed by the bride. This verse in 2nd Timothy 2:19 says that they (everyone) have taken the name of Christ. Here we can see another reference to how the church became the body of Christ, by taking his name in marriage. Moving on to a couple of other example, I found in the book of 1 John these verses.
1Jn 2:3 And hereby we do know that we know him, if we keep his commandments.
1Jn 4:7 Beloved, let us love one another: for love is of God; and every one that loveth is born of God, and knoweth God.
As you may or may not know, John wrote and delivered a thematic message of Love. Love was his primary theme throughout all of his writings. We again see the covenant act portrayed in verses like these in direct relationship with love. This of course fits precisely with God’s definition of a covenant marriage. It’s amazing how many verses you can find that speak of the church in terms of the Bride if you look for them. I hope I am helping you to see these verses in a new light. Here is another interesting scripture reference that also speaks of the church as the bride of Christ in a clear but indirect reference:
Rom 9:24 Even us, whom he hath called, not of the Jews only, but also of the Gentiles?
Rom 9:25 As he saith also in Osee, I will call them my people, which were not my people; and her beloved, which was not beloved.
You can see in verse 24 of chapter 9 of Romans that it is speaking to those God has called? I cannot speak for you, but I know that is me. He then informs us that this group of called individuals are made up of both Jews and Gentiles. That is correct, isn’t it? Then in verse 25 He speaks of the prophecy of Hosea and that is an interesting reference that we really haven’t explored very much. Let me first point out the last statement in that verse, that says I will call her my beloved who was not my beloved. That sure sounds like a marriage to me. If you recall, Hosea was commanded by God to marry a whore. He went and bought her out of whoredom and married her. While this could indirectly relate to the Gentiles, we know for sure that it is speaking of Israel as being the whore. The Old Testament quote is given that I will call them my people who were not my people. Right here we miss something that is implied and is dramatically different than what I’ve heard many teach. Many preachers speak of the nation of Israel as being God’s people today. I certainly believe that in the Old Testament, Israel were God’s people. But this verse says that I will call those that are not my people, my people. Do you understand the reciprocal truth given here? What is an inverse or reciprocal truth? I’m not sure if you’ve ever thought about that question or not. It is mathematical in its roots. The inverse or reciprocal of a number is the measurable opposite of what is given. In other words it is the opposite or negative truth of the positive truth that is given. It means the verse says more than what is on the surface. If the people who were not God’s people are now God’s people, what happened to those that use to be God’s people? The inference is that they are now not God’s people and can never be God’s people again because they were once God’s people. You see something that is pretty hard to grasp if you are not a logical, mathematical type thinker, grasping concepts and laws that are based in these verses can be difficult.
Since Israel is not my primary subject, I really can’t elaborate any more on verses like that one in this blog. I will recommend that you do some additional research on your own about Israel and their fate. I think where we need to go now is to review some more Old Testament types and shadows of the bride of Christ. So let’s dive into the Old Testament. In my next blog we will go back into the Old Testament and look for patterns, types and shadows for Christ and the church as the bride. We have already seen the Old Testament reference to the nation of Israel as being a woman, a wife and a bride to God in the Old Covenant. That is certainly a great pattern for the New Covenant, but there are other verse in the Old Testament that we should also be aware of. So until next time I hope you are having a great day.
If you would like to continue reading this series, you can go to “Part 9“.
The Bride of Christ Revealed – Part 7 The Bride in the New Testament
(Ver 1.1) This is now Part 7 in this series on the subject of the Bride of Christ Revealed and I have covered a lot of information on the subject. In my last blog on this subject I introduced you to some very strong New Testament verses that confirm the identity of the Bride of Christ directly as being the church. Ephesians chapter 5 is predominately about the subject of marriage and the relationships between husbands and wives. We went verse by verse through key verses in this chapter and counted the references to see how many times natural husbands and wives were mentioned and then we looked at how these natural marriages fit a pattern for a greater spiritual truth. Jesus is clearly given to be the head, the husband and the bridegroom in these verses. The church is clearly given to be his bride, his wife and his body by marriage. If you have not been following this series from the beginning I would strongly recommend that you go back and start reading from Part 1, The Introduction. This series is designed to step you through the subjects in a way that you can more easily see and understand this very deep and complex topic. So read each part of the series in order and hopefully you will grasp all of the spiritual concepts.
I heard more than one preacher say “search the Bible and you won’t find one scripture that says the church is the bride”. I sometimes wonder what Bible they are looking at, for I found a bunch of verses that tell me the church is the bride of Christ. These were well known ministers and men who have been teaching and studying the Bible for 50 years. The main problem they are experiencing is one that Jesus said you will always find what you are seeking. Jesus actually said seek and you shall find. But the problem is when people seek wrong things you find wrong things. If you are looking for no verses that say the church is the bride you will find no verses that say this. You always get what you seek and not necessarily what is the truth. That is how God designed the Bible to give you a choice to believe whatever you want to believe. That is a law of Bible research and study. Here is another law of Bible interpretation, it tells us that in the mouth of two or three witnesses let every word be established. I already showed you Ephesians 5 about Christ and His bride. So what other scriptures can we find in the New Testament that reveal the church to be the bride of Christ? Read these next scriptures very carefully, for they too are written directly to the church in Rome and they reveal very clearly the identity of the church as being the bride of Christ.
Rom 7:1 Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth?
This is an incredibly critical verse to understand fully. It speaks about the law. Here is the important thing to grasp, it says as long as a man is alive the law has dominion over him. Do you understand that statement? The implication is that when a man dies, the law is no longer in effect over his life. But did you notice who Paul and God wrote this verse to? It says “brethren” and that would be the church, except then it qualifies it further and says to only my brothers who know the law. Do you understand that statement? I bet you don’t fully get it. You see to “know” is a covenant term between a husband and a wife. Adam “knew” his wife and she had a son. To “know” is a sexual type reference, but God is not talking about a physical intimacy but a spiritual intimacy. What God is saying in this verse is, these next verses are written to members in the church who were previously under the law of Moses and the Old Covenant wife of God.
Rom 7:2 For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband.
So we see some more important information concerning marriage and the law. If you recall in an earlier blog I discussed the law of marriage using Genesis 2. This verse confirms that there are laws in the Old Testament that govern marriage relationships. This verse says that a woman is bound by the law to her husband as long as her husband is alive. Why is that? The law of marriage said that they are one flesh. You can’t cut off a piece of your own body and get rid of it and still be whole. In most marriage ceremonies there is usually a phrase “until death do us part”. God informs us that death is a legal separation of a marriage covenant. There is really a tremendous number of applications of this scripture to the women in the Bible. If you recall Israel was called a woman married to God. That is exactly why God is using Paul to write these verses to Messianic Jewish believers. He is informing them of something that is very profound and relevant so let’s keep reading:
Rom 7:3 So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man.
I really don’t want to get off of the subject and go into a lot of detail right here concerning Israel, but I guess I will mention it so that you can do further research and see that it does apply. If you read Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel and Hosea to name a few good examples you will see God called Israel a whore because of her unfaithful interaction with foreign gods and idolatry. God considered these acts as adulteress conduct of sexual perversion. God also considered these acts as covenant acts of marriage to these foreign gods and idols. So I gave you a lot to research, but let’s get back to this verse and what it says. It is speaking to those under the law and it tells them that as long as their husband is alive if they are in covenant with another then they are committing adultery. But then it says if a woman’s husband is dead, then she is free to marry or enter into covenant with another man. Remember these verses are written to brothers, males and these men are referred to as a woman. I think sometimes people don’t see this and miss out what God is saying.
Rom 7:4 Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God.
I hope you are getting what these scriptures are saying for they end in a very clear statement in Romans 7:4 that says you are now married to another, the Lord Jesus Christ! Try to explain that away! I’m sure you’ll come up with something if you don’t want to see the truth. I could say a lot more about these scriptures because they reveal so much more that we haven’t seen, but since that is not my primary purpose in this lesson, I will not weigh you down with any unnecessary things to think about. The main thing to take away from these verses is the reference to a man married to woman and how she is bound to that husband until he is dead. If she marries another while he is alive she is called an adulteress. However, Paul clarifies the problem because he says the first husband died by the body of Jesus Christ. So now they are free to be married to another and that is to him that was raised from the dead. This is an incredibly detailed discussion about the law and the law in specific relation to marriage covenants. Only people under the law would have been concerned to this level of detail. Gentiles were never married to the law or God, so they are free to marry Jesus the same as a natural Jew is now free to marry the Lord. The primary point to see is that the New Covenant is a marriage. But instead of a covenant with the Father God, it is with the Son of God, Jesus Christ and that is a very important concept to note and pay attention to. There is always a reason for everything that God says and does and this is no exception.
So is the church the bride of Christ? Some sure have gone through great extents to try to prove that we are not. I don’t know how they don’t see it, it sure seems to be there to me. Are you seeing it? Let’s start going through some more scriptures and continue by looking at this important verse:
2Co 11:2 For I am jealous over you with godly jealousy: for I have espoused you to one husband, that I may present you as a chaste virgin to Christ.
This verse is another that some Bible teachers are determined to explain away not letting people know what it really says. All the ingredients of marriage are mentioned in this verse. The identity of the bridegroom is clearly given as Jesus Christ. The mention of being married or “espoused” to Christ is a very clear reference. So who is the verse directed to? The verse is written to the bride. Bible teachers who don’t believe this verse say it is just making a comparison with the word “As”. You of course know if you can read that the word “as” is added by the translators and is not in the original Greek language so that argument is shot down pretty easily. We can clearly see that it is not making a comparison but it is identifying the church to be the chaste virgin. The Greek word translated as “virgin” has the following definition in the Strong’s:
G3933
Of unknown origin; a maiden; by implication an unmarried daughter: – virgin.
The description of an unmarried woman is clear from this definition. The reference is specifically to an unmarried daughter being presented to Christ. The word “present” in this verse is the same word we looked at in Ephesians and it means to stand beside. So we again see the reference to a marriage ceremony. Then there is the Greek word translated as “chaste” in the King James Bible and here is what Strong’s says about it:
G53
From the same as G40; properly clean, that is, (figuratively) innocent, modest, perfect: – chaste, clean, pure.
Wow does that describe the church you know, it’s not a whole lot of the church I know. So you can read this verse in 2 Corinthians and do what you want to with it. But it clearly has all the necessary ingredients and parties of a wedding ceremony and a marriage covenant. The clear inference is this bride is unmarried and a virgin that has not been touched by another man. The reference is basically the same as a woman dressed in clean and white fine linen that has made herself ready for her husband. But I guess that is just me speaking isn’t it? I can’t prove it to you, either you see it or you don’t. It is so funny how that you can’t make anyone see the truth if they don’t want to see it.
I tell you if you look for scriptures that identify the church as the bride you will find them, the trouble is so many are just not looking for them. I know sometimes that verse can say things indirectly and sometimes not be totally obvious when you read it. Look closely at this scripture because you will find another reference to the church being the bride of Christ:
1Co 6:15 Know ye not that your bodies are the members of Christ? shall I then take the members of Christ, and make them the members of an harlot? God forbid.
1Co 6:16 What? know ye not that he which is joined to an harlot is one body? for two, saith he, shall be one flesh.
1Co 6:17 But he that is joined unto the Lord is one spirit.
Verse 15 starts with confirming the church is the body of Christ. God tells us that our bodies are like individual cells in the bigger body of Christ. We make up the pieces that His body is comprised of. It is a spiritual truth using a natural pattern of the human body. The natural human body consists of many different organs, tissues, bones, cells and other components that when working with each other make up a healthy living body. But as we have already seen we know how we got to be the body of Christ was by the law of marriage found in Genesis 2. That law states that two shall become one body after they are married. This marriage covenant between Adam and Eve was a pattern for the Jesus and the church. Finally, in this verse the subject of harlots come into play in direct relation to the body of Christ. The implication is given that the church now that they are married in covenant with God can still have spiritual sexual relationships with other gods and other spiritual entities. I will agree that these verse seems to go both for natural relations with whores as well as spiritual relations with whores. I believe there is a clear application to the law of double reference. Where a verse of scripture can be taken naturally and spiritually and both points of view are true.
Within the context of these scriptures here we see another direct reference to a physical relationship between a man and a woman. The reference is purely sexual in nature and contains an inference of a woman being joined to her husband by covenant. In 1 Corinthians 6:17, the husband is clearly the Lord Jesus so who is Paul writing to that has been joined to Him? What does it mean to be joined together in Holy Matrimony? Doesn’t this verse have the same contextual relevance to our subject of marriage between a man and a woman? God contrasts the union of Christ and the church to that of a man to a harlot. This is certainly a significant comparison and gives us a lot of information that we should be aware of. For example, having a sexual relation with a whore is called a marriage in the eye’s of God. The sexual act is a covenant act. So if the man has a one night stand with a whore, it declares that in the eyes of God they are joined together as husband and wife. I was watching TV and to my surprise there was a group of individuals sitting around a table and discussing how many sexual partners some of them had. Of course in the unsaved world to men it is a matter of conquest to say they have had a lot of female partners. Who knows who was lying and who was telling the truth, but a couple of them had estimated they had 40 to 60 different women in their lives. According to scripture God sees each of these relations as a marriage covenant act. Obviously men and women don’t see it the same way or they wouldn’t be so casual about who they married. If the courts viewed sex as God views sex, there would be a lot more alimony going out of some of their pockets.
Going back to the verse in 1 Corinthians 6:17 we see the same sexual act reference given but this time to the Church with Jesus Christ. If you don’t see this it is because you don’t want to see it. The difference or contrast is given that we the church have become one spirit with Jesus and the man with the harlot has become one flesh with her. Both have become one by a marriage covenant act. There is a very clear statement of the church being joined to the Lord Jesus. To be joined is of course a marriage. A marriage is always where God takes one male and one female and makes one body out of them. This is so critical to understand.
I have given you at the minimum three great witnesses found in the New Testament that all deal with the church being called the bride of Christ by a marriage covenant act of God. The law of marriage is applicable and helps to explain a great number of other Bible verses, like how the church became the body of Christ? So we have explored more than enough witnesses to confirm this truth, but I might give you some more unique points of view in my next blog on this subject. I think I have said enough today so I hope you have a great day.
If you would like to continue reading this series, you can go to “Part 8“.
The Bride of Christ Revealed – Part 6 Presenting the Bride
(Ver 1.2) Today I want to begin to explore the New Testament references for the identity of the bride of Christ. I want to “present” you to the identity of the bride of Christ. You will see later why I said that so look for it. There are certinly many scriptures that identify the Bride to us, but I want to start with the strongest verses first. If you have not been following this series from the beginning I would strongly recommend that you go back and start reading from Part 1, The Introduction.
Here it is, one of the strongest scriptural evidence that I’ve seen concerning the identity of the Bride of Christ and it’s found in the New Testament in the book of Ephesians and chapter 5. These are words written directly to the church and specifically about the church so read them very, very carefully. Understanding Ephesians 5 is critical for you understanding your identity in the spiritual world. Pay close attention to the subject being discussed and then see how they fit together: I will go verse by verse starting with verse 22. I will keep a running total of references that I find on the primary noun subjects being discussed. So help me count as we go. Let’s start reading in Ephesians chapter 5 and verse 22:
Eph 5:22 Wives, submit yourselves unto your own husbands, as unto the Lord.
We can clearly see that the primary subject of this verse is marriage because it is talking to wives and husbands. But did you notice who this verse is written to? It is written to the church, the wife of Christ. If you notice in this verse, it ends with “as unto the Lord”. The implied reference is that the church is the bride and Christ is the husband. There are clearly two patterns given to us; one is a natural pattern and the other is a spiritual pattern. The church is clearly commanded to submit to their husband, the Lord Jesus Christ. So while “wives” are mentioned only once, the implication is given that we the church are also a wife to Christ. If we count the references to noun subjects we have the following totals:
| Direct | Implied | |
| Husbands | 1 | |
| Wives | 1 | |
| Church/Body | 1 | |
| Christ | 1 |
You will notice the primary nouns given in this verse is concerning wives, husbands and Christ. There is one implied or indirect reference to the church as being a wife. I hope you can see what this verse is talking about and who it is talking to. So let’s go to the next verse and see what it says:
Eph 5:23 For the husband is the head of the wife, even as Christ is the head of the church: and he is the saviour of the body.
So we have a continuation of the primary subject of marriage still in the context of husbands and wives being given to us. Again we see a direct relationship being established between the natural and the spiritual. The husband is said to be the head of the wife in the natural world and I refuse to comment on that statement. However, Christ is the implied husband of the church given the clear context of being the head of the body. The church is clearly given to be the body of Christ which is a direct parallel that we learned about when we studied about Eve being the body of Adam. We know that these are patterns for spiritual truths that God is communicating to us from natural truths. So let’s update our total number of noun reference counts.
| Direct | Implied | |
| Husbands | 2 | |
| Wives | 2 | |
| Church/Body | 2 | 1 |
| Christ | 3 |
So we are up to 2 direct references to husbands and wives and 3 direct and indirect references to Christ and his bride. Let’s continue with verse 24:
Eph 5:24 Therefore as the church is subject unto Christ, so let the wives be to their own husbands in everything.
Again in this verse we have two parallels given to us. Both of these patterns are implied covenant marriages given from the context of the subject being spoken of. The church is said to be subject to Christ and that is just another way to say we are to submit. We can clearly see that this implies Christ is the husband and the church is the wife, given the ending statement of the verse being directed to natural wives to be submitted to their natural husbands. These are God’s words and not mine so don’t shoot the messenger. Just read them and accept them. Let’s update our total reference count from this verse:
| Direct | Implied | |
| Husbands | 3 | |
| Wives | 3 | |
| Church/Body | 3 | 1 |
| Christ | 4 |
I do not know how ministers have read these verses and refuse to see what they clearly say, but that is the way the Bible is written, men see what they want to see. Let’s continue with the next verse in the chapter:
Eph 5:25 Husbands, love your wives, even as Christ also loved the church, and gave himself for it (her, the Church);
This verse repeats the pattern and speaks to husbands and wives again. It clearly implies that Christ is the husband that loves his bride, the church. It clearly says that He proves his love for her by giving Himself as a sacrifice for her. This verse should have used the personal pronoun “her” instead of “it”. The church is not an “it”. God did not send Jesus to die for an “it”. Let’s update our total noun reference count:
| Direct | Implied | |
| Husbands | 4 | |
| Wives | 4 | |
| Church/Body | 5 | 1 |
| Christ | 6 |
Let’s take a brief look at verse 26 even though this is a bit off the main subject of marriage. Take a look at what this verse is saying:
Eph 5:26 That he might sanctify and cleanse it with the washing of water by the word,
According to this verse “it” is again mistranslated as being a reference to “her”, the church. This verse is saying that Christ is sanctifying and cleaning the church by a washing process that involves the Word of God. This implies that the Word of God is a liquid like pure water with a power to clean dirty spots out. Isn’t that an interesting statement? Aren’t we talking about the church? I mean I can clearly understand it, but can you? If the church is the body of Christ, why would Christ need to give himself a bath to make himself clean? You see the problem with that logic, don’t you? That is why people who teach that the church is the body of Christ and only the body of Christ are severely mistaken. This is just further proof to me of how preachers have taught some incredibly stupid things. If the church was just the body of Christ we wouldn’t need cleaning or washing. Jesus is already clean and righteous. We are the ones with the faults and blemishes, the dirty spots that need cleaning off. But since we have become His body by a marriage covenant and we are a separate individual that still needs cleaning, we can more clearly see how we fit into all of these verses and not just some of them. As we continue with verse 27 we see more marriage terminology given to us about Christ and the church:
Eph 5:27 That he might present it to himself a glorious church, not having spot, or wrinkle, or any such thing; but that it should be holy and without blemish.
In reading this verse I think of many weddings that I have been to. The bride comes walking down the center aisle and is presented to the husband usually by the father of the bride. Ephesians 5 is primarily about marriage so we can know that Christ is talking about His bride in this verse. What we have seen in the last three verses are a extraordinary effort being put forth by Jesus to give himself completely for His wife. This is a process that involved Him suffering and experiencing tremendous pain and death on a cross. He shed His blood for us, because He loved us that much. Verse 27 informs us why He was willing to go to this extraordinary effort. Verse 27 declares so that He might present “it” to himself. We of course lose a lot by not studying the Greek to determine what this actually means. From the English translation in the KJV it sure sounds like a term for marriage. In many marriage ceremonies I have heard it said by the minister after the final vows, “may I present to you Mr. and Mrs. fill in the name. However, the Greek word translated as “present” actually has a literal meaning “to stand beside“. That is actually a fascinating contradiction of terms. How can the body of Christ stand beside Himself? You see it just doesn’t really make sense unless you put it into the context of a woman standing besides her husband in a marriage ceremony and the two becoming one flesh that way. Several times in these verses the church is referred to as “it” and this again is a mistranslation and the same word should say and mean “her” and it is translated that way in the New Testament many times. In fact it is translated as “her” in Revelation 19:8 when referring to the woman called the “New Jerusalem”. Isn’t that a coincidence? Let’s look at this verse just for grins:
Rev 19:8 And to her was granted that she should be arrayed in fine linen, clean and white: for the fine linen is the righteousness of saints.
I hope that you see why I included this verse, because it is so very similar to the one we just looked at in Ephesians 5:27. The first thing I wanted to point out is the term “G846” is translated correctly this time as “her” and not “it”. So how can translators make such obvious mistakes in one verse the word is “it” and another one it is “her”. That is a question that I suppose we all need to understand and see that translators are just men capable of making mistakes. Then the next thing I wanted to point out is what are the terms “clean and white” saying, is this describing what we read in Ephesians 5? Obviously they are references to what she is wearing a type of extraordinary piece of clothing or fabric. So how does that compare with what the woman in Ephesians 5 is wearing, it says “without spot or wrinkle” and this implies fine nice clothing also that does not have any dirty spots. I think we can clearly see that these two verse are speaking of the exact same woman. So again, what did Paul tell us that Christ was presenting to himself, a church without spot or wrinkle, clean by the washing of the water of the Word. It’s amazing how the Bible fits together, isn’t it? Both of these are describing the same wedding apparel if you ask me. What we see is that both of these women are described as being in perfect condition, wearing the finest clean garments. This is a clear picture of the church and this truth is reflected to us in the book of Revelation 19 when it speaks of the bride being adorned for her husband and how she has made herself ready. These are all pictures and patterns into a spiritual truth that I hope you are seeing and understanding. So let us update our running count of references that we have observed in these verses and see the new totals:
| Direct | Implied | |
| Husbands | 4 | |
| Wives | 4 | |
| Church/Body | 6 | 2 |
| Christ | 7 |
Let us continue with the next verse in Ephesians for it is really getting good now. In this verse we start to again see the law of marriage being restated in context with the husband and the wife in marriage:
Eph 5:28 So ought men to love their wives as their own bodies. He that loveth his wife loveth himself.
Are you understanding these concepts? God is reaffirming the law of marriage from Genesis 2 in this simple verse of truth. This verse speaks to men and instructs them to love their wives because they are his body. Since Eve came from Adam’s body, so a wife is joined to her husband and the two are now said to be one flesh. If a husband physically abuses his wife it is like him hitting himself in the head, and that is idiotic and crazy behavior. In this verse we have several direct and indirect references to husbands and wives and this now is reflected in our total reference count in the following:
| Direct | Implied | |
| Husbands | 7 | |
| Wives | 6 | |
| Church/Body | 6 | 2 |
| Christ | 7 |
The next verse continues with more about the law of marriage from Genesis 2, but now concludes with the revelation that this also applies to Christ and the church:
Eph 5:29 For no man ever yet hated his own flesh; but nourisheth and cherisheth it, even as the Lord the church:
You see from this verse further confirmation that the woman and the husband are said to be one flesh or one in the same body. Whatever happens to one affects the other directly. However one treats the other is how they treat themselves. God is really saying to them to treat the other like he or she is you, because you two are one body. God then concludes this verse with the revelation that this applies to Christ and the church. Christ the husband and the church is the wife. Christ cherishes His bride, the church with great love and affection. The church is the Body of Christ. Christ dwells in us right here and right now if you are born again. Christ therefore loves the church because she is His body and His wife.
| Direct | Implied | |
| Husbands | 8 | |
| Wives | 6 | 3 |
| Church/Body | 7 | 2 |
| Christ | 8 |
I hope you are following my count and seeing the references, both direct and indirect implications being given to us. These scriptures are very important to understand. We are finally getting to some great scriptures that we have been working up to and the anticipation has been building with great excitement:
Eph 5:30 For we (the church) are members of his (Jesus Christ) body, of his flesh, and of his bones.
You finally begin to see what God is speaking of about Christ and the church. This verse informs us in very clear language that we are the body of Christ and indirectly tells us how we became His body. But then did you notice that it also calls us his flesh and his bones. Isn’t this what Adam said about Eve? Adam said she is bone of my bone and flesh of my flesh. Do you understand the context? I put the description of who this verse was talking about in parenthesis so that you could better understand it. What we clearly see is a reference to the natural law of marriage given to us by God in Genesis 2. To reaffirm the connection to Adam, God repeats the law from Genesis in the next verse:
Eph 5:31 For this cause shall a man (Jesus Christ) leave his father (God) and mother (Israel), and shall be joined unto his wife (the church), and they two shall be one flesh (body).
God is directly saying that what happened with Adam and Eve was a pattern for Christ and the church. I included the participants in this verse and named names. I put these in parenthesis so that you would not confuse them with the original verse. I did not add to the verse I only clarified the subjects and references so that you could more easily see them. Did you see them? Did you understand them? That is the main part we are going for, if you can understand them, then Satan can’t steal them away from you. One of the key words in this verse is given to us and it is that the two will be “joined” together to be one flesh (body). The Greek word for “joined” literally means “to glue”. That is God’s definition of marriage, creating one body, taking two separate pieces and gluing them together to be one piece or one body. This is again basic math God’s way. With Adam he took one and made two, however God still called them one. You can see this from a multiplication perspective. One man times one wife equals 1 body. I’ve done wood working before, and I have taken two pieces of wood and using dowels and glue I’ve put them together or “joined” them and clamped them and let them dry. After sanding and staining it is incredible the strength and beauty of the one new piece of wood. There are in fact some glues that are so strong that if you would try to pull them apart the wood would usually break in a new spot. This is what God is trying to communicate to us. To join together is a process of marriage. Taking two separate individual pieces and creating one new piece. Here is a revised count of direct and indirect scripture references to the subjects in marriage:
| Direct | Implied | |
| Husbands | 8 | |
| Wives | 6 | 3 |
| Church/Body | 9 | 2 |
| Christ | 13 |
We can see that from this total sheet that we have an overwhelming number of witness to the subject matter of marriage in context with all of these participants. God declares that just as husbands and wives are in covenant and become one flesh so it is with Jesus and the church. The next verse in Ephesians actually declares to us some very valuable information. This verse is the overwhelming climax to the subject of marriage in this chapter of Ephesians:
Eph 5:32 This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church.
You see in this verse Ephesians 5:32 God lets us in on a secret that has been kept hidden since the foundation of the world. God had a plan and He patterned this plan after things that He created for us to see. God created a man and a woman and established the law of marriage. God declares that just as one wife becomes one flesh or body with her husband, so all wives become one flesh with their husbands. God declares this to be a Great Mystery. The Greek word for mystery here means “to shut the mouth” as in “keep a secret” from someone. Did you know God had secrets? God must have not wanted someone to see his plan and I believe this was Satan. God says that all of this chapter is about marriage covenant relationships and that this is or was a great secret, but He lets the proverbial cat out of the bag so to speak by telling us that this all has to do with Christ and the church. Jesus Christ is the bridegroom and the church, the bride. The New Covenant is a marriage and the result is the establishment of new family unit. Why did God have to establish a new family? Apparently He had a major problem with his old family. If you can see this and understand it you will be far beyond a lot of other Christians who do not yet know who they are. Satan has tried to confuse the identity of the Bride for many reasons. Even preachers have helped Satan to confuse us. God is doing a new thing in these last days, He is getting the truth out for us to see and to understand. I hope and pray that you can see it. We will continue in the next blog on the mystery of the identity of the Bride using more New Testament verses that confirm our true identity.
If you would like to continue with this series, you can go to “Part 7“.
The Bride of Christ Revealed – Part 5 The Law of Marriage
(Ver 1.3) In the last blog on this subject we talked about a covenant being a marriage. Before that, I talked about a woman being a nation of people and a city. We have been building our scriptural knowledge base to understand the identity of the bride of Christ and today I want to talk about the Law of Marriage. I hope you realize that the Old Testament holds the law of God written down by Moses. In these books God has established principles, concepts, definitions, and laws concerning every subject you can think of. So today I want to establish what happens when God enters into a marriage blood covenant with a group of people. If you have not been following this series from the beginning I would strongly recommend that you go back and start reading from Part 1, The Introduction.
I know this is a very new advanced study of a complex subject. I know that it will be difficult for some to see and understand. Based upon your current spiritual level of maturity, that alone will determine if you are able to fully grasp what is in this lesson series. Many times I know people read my stuff and think it is not true. It is funny how Jesus would go around and tell people “let him who has ears, hear”. Jesus was not talking about just hearing sounds with their ears, he was talking about them understanding with their hearts and that is something completely different. Too many people know how to read, but do not know how to see what was written. Getting understanding is the key to growing in spiritual maturity. Just as you cannot hand a first grader a college calculus book and say learn this, if you are struggling with the things that I have been saying you are probably not ready for this lesson. I would recommend that you either go back and study the basics some more until you fully grasp the foundational truths before you attempt to tackle any of the advanced subjects found in the Bible.
Let’s get into the second chapter of Genesis and see the account of the creation of woman and the first recorded marriage covenant and what happened to all of the participants. After all, we are talking about the identity of a woman called the bride of Christ, so where did the woman come from?
Gen 2:21 And the LORD God caused a deep sleep to fall upon Adam, and he slept: and he took one of his ribs, and closed up the flesh instead thereof;
Gen 2:22 And the rib, which the LORD God had taken from man, made he a woman, and brought her unto the man.
We can clearly see from these famous well known verses where God says woman came from? You’ve read this before I’m sure, but I doubt if you really fully understood what you read. You see these verses declare that woman was taken out of a man. That is representative of a mathematical operation of division or subtraction. You could say God took one and made two. One divided by 2 gives the same answer as one subtracting one half. Using either division or subtraction the result could still be two halves. But here is another perspective of division and mathematics. If you divide one by one you get one. Isn’t that an interesting concept. The reverse multiplicative principle would be to multiply one by one and you would still get a result of one. One male times one female equals one flesh and here is why I say that. Look at the next verses in Genesis in what Adam has to say about his wife:
Gen 2:23 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
Gen 2:24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
Since the woman was taken from his body, Adam then declares that she was his body. Did you see that? What is flesh and bones? His flesh and bones is the same as his body. Adam’s body consisted of flesh and bones. God took a portion of his body and made her body. Flesh and bones are the primary parts or pieces that make up his body. I hope all kind of light bulbs are going off in your mind based upon this revelation. Flesh and bone and the body are different terminology for the same thing. There are so many ways to describe, label or name the same things that we have to be smart enough to know when they are the same and when they are not. When Adam looked at his wife he called her the body of Adam. This is a pattern for another New Testament marriage we will see later. If God took a part of man out and created a woman who became the mother to all the natural living descendants on the planet earth, then you might say it would be legal for God to put back a woman into his son Jesus Christ. I’m sure you are wondering how I came to that reasoning and conclusion. It starts with this fact, did you know that Jesus is called the “last Adam” in the New Testament? Read this verse:
1Co 15:45 And so it is written, The first man Adam was made a living soul; the last Adam was made a quickening spirit.
Not only is Jesus called a quickening spirit in contrast to a living soul, but Jesus is specifically called the “last Adam”. Meaning there is a direct and specific relationship and connection to the “first Adam”. The distinct parallels and patterns between the two Adam’s are quite profound. I hope you are grasping this concept. 2 different Adams, one natural and one spiritual. If it was legal for God to take one man or as we have seen one Adam and create one male and one female, then the reverse logic would be to take one male and one female and multiply them together giving you one flesh again. Multiplication and division of 1 and 1 always results in 1. It is the only set of numbers that I know of that you can do this with. 2 times 2 doesn’t equal 2. 2 divided by 2 doesn’t equal 2. This is of course, very basic math truths, but it is amazing how God does things. Sometimes it is the really simple things that God uses to confound the wise.
When Jesus is called “Adam” in the New Testament, this of course is the same Hebrew word that we looked at earlier. This Hebrew word can be translated either as “man” or it can be translated as “Adam”. Both translations originate from the exact same word and this makes understanding the Bible much more complex. It is a puzzle of sorts, but that is the way God works. God is much smarter than we are and he could have chosen any words that fit, but he specifically selected these words to describe a man/Adam.
So, what other relationship do these two Adams share? I’ll probably lose some of you right here, but here goes. Both Adam’s were sons of God and therefore they are natural brothers. Both Adam and Jesus had the same Father. If you don’t understand that, don’t throw it away because it does have significance. There are things in the Bible that are difficult to grasp and understand at first because they are so different. The more religious you are the harder it will be for you to grasp certain things in the Bible and this is probably one of them and there are many others. I did not say Adam was God, but I will say Jesus was. Jesus the Last Adam was also the son of Adam. Jesus walked the face of the planet and constantly called himself the “son of man”. You lose the meaning and significance of that statement by reading an English translation. Jesus being a Hebrew and of the house and lineage of David was saying I am a son of Adam. The Hebrew word for “Adam” can and is translated as “man” several times. It’s the same word “H120” and “H121”. Sometimes translated as “Adam” and other times as “man”. How can the Son of God also be the Son of Adam? The Son of Adam and the brother of Adam? It’s pretty tough to grasp, but nevertheless this is what the Bible says. Nobody ever told you that the Bible was easy to understand. If they did they lied to you. If you look at the family lineage of Jesus given to us in Luke you will see that it goes all the way back to Adam and then to God. There is a clear implication that Adam was also called a “son of God”. Not God, not “The Son of God” either just a “son of God”.
Luk 3:38 Which was the son of Enos, which was the son of Seth, which was the son of Adam, which was the son of God.
Reading this verse is very informative, even if the words “son of” are added by the translators. Some say since these words are not in the original Greek we can explain away what actually is being conveyed. However, I believe the words “son of” do assist us in correctly interpreting the meaning. The clear implication is that Adam is called a son of God. You don’t go through a long list of names in a genealogy and every named pair represents a father and a son relationship except the last one. That would be idiotic to attempt such reasoning. I’ll say it again, be consistent a list is a list and every entry in the list should be treated the exact same. I know I got off of the subject for a side trip, but I believe it was important. Let’s get back to the original husband and wife.
We can sometimes ask questions that help us in our discussion. When God formed Adam’s body from the dust of the ground as it says he did, why didn’t God also make the female’s body from the dust of the ground? He wasn’t out of dirt or dust? It is of course an interesting puzzle? Why take out a part of something you already made to make another complementary piece of work? That of course is a hard question. Obviously God had a good reason, or He wouldn’t have done it. Let’s figure out why he did it?
Believe it or not the verses that we read in Genesis 2, gives us an established foundation of how we the church became the body of Christ. If the first Adam has a wife, God is saying it is Ok, for the “last Adam” to have a wife. The first Adam’s wife was a physical woman, the last Adam’s wife is a spiritual woman. Let’s go back and reread verses 23 and 24 in Genesis 2, because these are absolutely critical to understand.
Gen 2:23 And Adam said, This is now bone of my bones, and flesh of my flesh: she shall be called Woman, because she was taken out of Man.
Gen 2:24 Therefore shall a man leave his father and his mother, and shall cleave unto his wife: and they shall be one flesh.
We see again in verse 23 that Adam declares his wife’s body to be his body and obviously that is where it originated from. God purposely selected this way to create the woman. This was a prophetic event of Biblical proportions. Again I will reemphasize that “flesh and bone” is the same terminology for the “body”. In other words a human body consists of both flesh and bones. Jesus actually confirms this with words in the New Testament when he used this terminology in the Gospels, he told his disciples, “handle me, for a spirit does not have flesh and bones”.(Luke 24:39). So Jesus confirms that he has flesh and bones and the clear implication is that is also called his body. If Jesus says “touch me” where would a man put his hand on Jesus to see if he was real? It seems obvious to me that Jesus is referring to his body as being flesh and bones. This is not rocket science, and you should be seeing something new by now.
Moving on to verse 24 in Genesis 2 we see God’s law of marriage being established. This is the first reference in the Bible of the marriage covenant relationship between a man and a woman. This again sets the “type” or “pattern” for every marriage relationship between a man and a woman in both the natural and the spirit worlds. I call this God’s “Law of Marriage”. God gives us a rule or a law for a blood covenant marriage. God said that a man in this case Adam would leave his father (God) and his mother (the earth) and would cleave unto his wife (the woman). I probably lost some of you again by including explanations in that preceding statement. I’ve already dealt with who Adam’s father was so you should already understand that. Since Adam did not have a birth mother and God formed his body from the dust of the ground I consider “the earth” to be his mother. That of course is my opinion, since I don’t have a Bible verse for that statement. You’ve heard the common term “mother earth” before haven’t you? Then the verse finishes up with the most critical thing that you should learn on the subject of marriage with a woman and that is it says the two (the male and the female) would become one flesh (body). This reveals how the church became the body of Christ, it was by marriage. You can obviously still reject everything I’ve said up to this point and say I don’t believe it. However, I’m not through though and I have many more scriptures that confirm what I just said. Is this what God really meant? Did Jesus believe this? Well guess what, I think so, because here is what Jesus said to us on the subject. If you notice these words are in Red, meaning Jesus in person spoke them directly.
Mat 19:5 And said, For this cause shall a man leave father and mother, and shall cleave to his wife: and they twain shall be one flesh?
Mat 19:6 Wherefore they are no more twain, but one flesh. What therefore God hath joined together, let not man put asunder.
Again we see a clear reference to the exact same words spoken by God in Genesis 2. Within the context of these scriptures you will find that the subject being discussed is divorce and is it lawful? Jesus’ attitude toward divorce is the same as it is today, he says “can’t you read?”, “didn’t God create them male and female in the beginning?” “Aren’t the two joined together and are they not one flesh.” How can a man cut off a part of his own body and get rid of it, isn’t that what he is really saying? Are they not the same body? Jesus said there should be no divorce if it was done right. Jesus is saying that the man and the woman were two, but after they are married God considers them to be one body. This is the Biblical law of covenant marriage. Two people have become one body. This is why Jesus when he married the church with the New Covenant has become one body with her. We can now begin to see how the church became the body of Christ. Just as Eve was the body of Adam, so the church is the body of Christ. These are very important truths to learn and remember. We will continue this study of the identity of the bride of Christ in my next blog. I hope you are beginning to see and understand these important spiritual concepts. We have now laid a foundation for getting into the subject of the identity of the bride of Christ using scriptures we can search for in the New Testament. We have discovered that a covenant is a marriage. God when in covenant is always the male in the relationship. The people that God is in covenant with is always the female. A female in covenant with God is a nation of people consisting of males and females and is always associated with a city named Jerusalem. Then we discovered the law of marriage that states when they are joined together, they become one body. I have another lesson that might be good to go read now that might help clarify some things or give you more information on the subject. This lesson is called “How did the Church become the Body of Christ“. Within this lesson I actually answer many questions that I have presented in this series. I hope that you are learning and we should be able to move into the identity of the bride in the next lesson in the series.
If you would like to continue reading this series, please go to “Part 6“.
The Bride of Christ Revealed – Part 4 God’s Definition of Marriage
(Ver 1.2) This is now Part 4 in the series on this subject concerning the identity of the Bride of Christ. We are building a foundational scriptural knowledge for the identity of this woman and we will continue to learn more in this blog. Today, I have more new revelation from the Word of God on the subject of both what a woman is in the eyes of God and what a marriage is when in a relationship with God. In my last blog I introduced you to God’s definition of a spiritual woman using some verses you probably would have never used before, from Revelation 17 about Mystery Babylon and in chapter 21 that spoke about the New Jerusalem, a city, a woman who is called the bride of the Lamb. This was a New Testament definition so today I want to go back to the Old Testament and see what God says about marriage, expanding and confirming the definition of a woman that I gave you from Revelation. What we will be doing is looking for Old Testament patterns that confirm these New Testament truths that we have already discovered. I hope that you are beginning to understand how important it is to get God’s definition on the scriptures and subjects that we study. If you have not been following this series from the beginning I would strongly recommend that you go back and start reading from Part 1, The Introduction.
Did you know that God the Father was already married to a woman in the Old Testament? Probably you have read it before or maybe heard it taught, God was married to the nation of Israel in the Old Testament? So did God have a wife? Was God married to a woman in the Old Testament? Who was this woman? Does she fit the pattern that I showed you of the woman in Revelation 21? I wonder if you’ve ever seen this in the Old Testament, where God says to Israel I was your husband. It’s certainly there if you look!
Jer 31:32 Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which my covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD:
Here we have a very powerful verse of truth given to us by the prophet Jeremiah. These are the words of God spoken through the prophet and they call the natural nation of Israel a woman and the wife of God. I wonder what Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, Moses, Joshua and the rest of the males in the nation of Israel thought about being called the female bride and wife of God? Do you think they had a problem being called the female wife of God? Do you think they even knew they were called a woman? Do you think they really cared? They were the physical bride of the Jehovah God? The nation of Israel, a woman married to God, could this really be? God said in this verse that He made a covenant with their fathers, the males in the family. He then said He “took them by the hand” and led them out of Egypt. When you take a woman by the hand that is a marriage terminology or statement for a wedding proposal. God then made it very clear what this covenant represented, He says I was their “husband“. The Hebrew word H1166 here translated as husband comes from a root word that means “to marry”.
H1166
A primitive root; to be master; hence (as denominative from H1167) to marry: – Beulah have dominion (over), be husband, marry (-ried, X wife).
God married to a physical nation which consisted of both males and females. If you don’t see the significance in this scripture and the relationship implied to the New Covenant, I pray you will get it as we continue going forward. I will tell you right here and now that if the Old Covenant was a marriage to God, then the New Covenant is also marriage, but to Jesus Christ, the Son of God. Are you in the New Covenant with Christ? According to this verse a covenant is a marriage in the eyes of God. I’m going to say that one more time so that you will get it, when God enters into a covenant, He enters into a marriage. God is the Groom, the people in covenant are the bride. We can see a confirming witness to this revelation by reading a verse found in the book of Malachi:
Mal 2:14 Yet ye say, Wherefore? Because the LORD hath been witness between thee and the wife of thy youth, against whom thou hast dealt treacherously: yet is she thy companion, and the wife of thy covenant.
God is speaking to a husband in a clear reference to how he treated his wife. He informs him that she is the wife of his youth. You could apply this to many marriages today in the world and for that matter in the church. I think that I read that the divorce rate within the church is close to 50%. Meaning half of every marriage in the church is ending in divorce. This certainly should not be. Did you notice how Malachi 2:14 ended. God said this is the wife of your covenant. That is a powerful revelation which applies across the board to every marriage on the planet. In the eyes of God a marriage is a covenant. By the laws found in mathematics and algebra, we can also say that a covenant is a marriage. Maybe you didn’t take Algebra, but the principle is, if A = B, then B = A also. Some might think I’m making this stuff up, but we just read it in the Bible. The implications to this verse are far reaching. If the Old Covenant was a marriage to a people, the New Covenant would also be a marriage to a people. I did say people, and not a city, even though we will learn more about this as we explore more scriptures. We can clearly see that God said I was their husband in Jeremiah 31:32. God the Father would therefore be the Old Covenant Bridegroom. What is a husband except the one that was formerly known as the bridegroom. We could further call Israel the wife the former Old Covenant bride. We can also see in that verse that God has made a covenant with Israel and that He considered this covenant to be a marriage. So what is a covenant? The Strong’s definition of this word is as follows:
H1285
From H1262 (in the sense of cutting (like H1254)); a compact (because made by passing between pieces of flesh): – confederacy, [con-]feder[-ate], covenant, league.
We can see from this definition that it is describing the blood covenant event that occurred in Genesis 15, when God makes a covenant with Abraham. During this chapter, Abraham took 3 animals and split them into two pieces and then laid the pieces on the ground. We later read that the smoking furnace and the burning lamp pass through the pieces implementing the covenant. This is a blood covenant and it is also a representative type and shadow of the New Testament blood covenant, implemented by Jesus Christ. We know that the children of Israel while in captivity in Egypt, took a lamb and killed it and spread the blood on the doors of their houses and then they ate the lamb as a Passover meal. All of those are key types and shadows of the New Covenant implemented by the blood of the Lamb of God. I would certainly hope that all of this is not new to you and that you are intimately familiar with the subjects of blood covenants. There are good teachers that have done good jobs of covering the subject and I would strongly suggest that you take time and the necessary effort to gain knowledge on this subject.
So the Bible as you are aware is divided into two Testaments or Covenants. The first being the Old and the last being the New. Could it be that both of these represent marriages to God in the eyes of God? The first marriage was to a natural people, the last to a spiritual people. The first to a natural Nation and the last to a spiritual Nation. Could it possibly be? I think as you go on you will have to say it is more than possible, it surely is. Here is another scripture from the Old Testament prophets that we should be aware of:
Jer 3:20 Surely as a wife treacherously departeth from her husband, so have ye dealt treacherously with me, O house of Israel, saith the LORD.
This scripture is another witness to the relationship of God and what is referred to as the house of Israel. It speaks of a wife that is leaving her husband. You can see that the word “as” was added by the translators thinking they were making a comparison, but the true identity of Israel as being the wife to God is there. I heard one minister say don’t confuse identity with relationship. He was attempting to explain away a valuable Bible truth by claiming that I guess the church’s relationship to Christ was suppose to be that of a wife to a husband, but that didn’t mean we were a bride or a woman. But you know I always heard that if it looks like a duck, it walks like duck, it flies like a duck and quakes like a duck, then it in most likely hood, it is a duck. I’ll tell you who is confused and that is someone who reads the Bible and then attempts to explain away what it says. Heaven help that man for he is in danger of being held responsible for deceiving everyone that he has taught this to. Here is the dilemma, Bible teachers have encountered what appears to them as a major conflict on the surface. How can the church be the body of Christ and still be the bride of Christ. Rather, than looking for the Bible answer to the conflict they simply write off one position in favor of the other position and that is a wrong approach. Let’s look at another witness to the identity of Israel as being a woman and the wife of God:
Eze 16:2 Son of man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations,
Eze 16:8 Now when I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, behold, thy time was the time of love; and I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: yea, I sware unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord GOD, and thou becamest mine.
Eze 16:22 And in all thine abominations and thy whoredoms thou hast not remembered the days of thy youth, when thou wast naked and bare, and wast polluted in thy blood.
These scriptures are very revealing and again we see the clear reference to a husband and a wife relationship. The wife this time is called “Jerusalem”. Isn’t that interesting? Could this be the “Old Jerusalem” that we saw from the last blog? Doesn’t that sound familiar? Didn’t we read about another wife, a woman in Revelation called the New Jerusalem? We just read verses in Ezekiel that says God was married to a woman and a city named Jerusalem in the Old Covenant. The earthly city Jerusalem was related to the identity of a woman and within the marriage context of the Old Covenant. So was the covenant with the city or with the people in the city? Does God care about cities and building architecture or does God care about people? Did Jesus shed his blood for a city or for the people that make up the city? Would God marry a city and not the people in the city? I tell you there are so many questions that arise and I wonder if people have given any of these any thought?
There are really too many scriptures to give you all of them. If you study the subject for yourself and search your Bible you will see what I mean. Look for terms of marriage, look for the name of the women, Jerusalem. Look for terms like husband and wife, bride and bridegroom. Think of other terms that refer to covenants and marriages indirectly. Look for Israel and Jerusalem being spoken of in female terms of “she” and “her”. These scriptures will give you an expanded knowledge of what a woman and a marriage is to God. If you have the time read Isaiah, Ezekiel, Jeremiah and Hosea and see all of the references to the nation of Israel as being a woman married to God. Look for how many times she is called by adulteress names like, whore. The Hebrew definition of a whore is a woman who commits adultery. Did you know that you cannot be an adulteress unless you are married according to the Bible? You will soon discover that a marriage is a covenant and a covenant is a marriage. God is always the man and the husband and those in covenant with God are always the female, the bride and the wife. That is the way it is, whether you like or not and whether you want to accept it or not. I pray that you are learning these new radical concepts found in the Bible about God, the covenants of God and these women married to God named Jerusalem that are cities of people.
If you would like to continue reading this series, please go to “Part 5“.
What is a Bible Expert? Are there any Bible Experts?
(Ver 1.1) I received a comment on one of my blogs a while back asking if I was a Bible expert. I replied by asking for a definition of what he thought a Bible expert was. So far I haven’t gotten an answer to my question. You see it appeared by the arrangement of his question that this individual was not going to believe what I wrote, if he could not find an expert that also said what I was writing about. In other words it looked like to me that he was looking for a man to be his source for what he believed. I can only assume that if he found an “expert” based upon some unnamed criteria as to what makes one an expert, that he would suddenly accept something new to be the truth. I do not know about you but I feel that is a very dangerous position to take. You see anybody can say they are an expert. However, I do understand being cautious about accepting something that someone has written on a blog. If you do not know this person, their character, their background and their intention for writing the blog then you could be easily deceived into believing something that is not true.
So what do you do? Are there any Bible experts? What exactly is an expert? I guess since I didn’t get an answer to my question I can look in the dictionary and can get someone’s definition for what they consider to be an expert. So let’s start there.
Expert: A person with a high degree of skill in or knowledge of a certain subject
According to this definition this could apply to anybody about anything. It is obviously a general definition that goes across many boundaries. It also sounds very subjective. Do you understand what I mean by that? Something is subjective if it depends upon the perspective or opinion of someone else to whether or not anyone could be considered an expert. Yo Yo Ma could be considered an expert cellist. I guess this would be my opinion of the man based upon listening to him play the cello. However, since I do not play the cello does my opinion count for anything. Now there are other things like in certain sport fields like archery and target shooting, that people can be measured to determine if they are experts. Based upon the number of perfect shots that they pull off and judging the result from looking at their targets. This is not a subjective designation for being an expert. Bowling is another example, if you can bowl a consistent perfect game and never miss you would automatically qualify to be called an expert bowler. However, there is a huge difference in a subjective designation and a non-subjective designation that is quantifiable and measureable.
When you say somebody is a Bible expert, what are you saying? Let’s see if we can quantify it or measure it. You should understand that God is what I would call the ultimate Bible expert. Only God knows everything the Bible says and exactly what everything in it means. So if we would place God on the upper end of our scale as the ultimate Bible expert, where would you fall on the scale? Where would any man fall on the scale? I believe firmly that there are some men and women who know more than other people on this planet, but I would never call any of them experts as God is an expert. That also means I do not consider myself to be an expert. If I said I was an expert I would be saying I have confidence in my ability to figure out everything that I read in the scriptures. That would in fact make me no different than the man who wrote and asked if I was an expert. I would be placing too much emphasis on my skills and giving no credit to God who has given me the information that I blog in the first place.
I know men who are in their 80’s and who have studied the Bible and ministered for over 50 years. But I also know that as much as they know, they do not know everything. Sure I have learned from them and I do not say there is nothing that they cannot offer me. But, I have learned that God can show me a single verse in the Bible and ask me a simple question and I learned more from that one question than I could ever learn from the 80 year old man in a much shorter period of time. If you think that God doesn’t do that you would be wrong. If you think God doesn’t do that for you, you would be wrong again. I have studied the Bible in great depth for the last approximate 25 years. I cannot even count the number of hours that I have spent exploring the Book and asking God questions. In that time God has spoken some very direct things to me and revealed some awesome things that I have not told anybody. Some of it is coming out in my blogs, simply because I can’t help it. You have to teach what you know, that is just a basic principle of life.
So am I an expert? You be the judge if you want to, I know I am not. I am just a man who knows an expert God. I know I write a lot of things that are radically different than anything you will find in any Bible commentary or seminary. However, consider the source, if everybody got everything they taught from a seminary how would God ever introduce you to anything new? You might be amazed to find out that God does not always work through man’s organized systems. Why didn’t God recruit Jesus’ disciples from the priests, the scribes, the Pharisees, etc., the religious leaders of the day Too many times men have established set procedures and traditions that keep God from doing anything to help them. So what does God do? You would be amazed at how God uses the most unlikely candidates to bring out a new message. If you read your Bible and look you will see God selected a group of men, some fishermen, some business men, a doctor, a lawyer, every kind of profession God would surround himself with. God chose a shepherd to be the King of Israel. You can go on and on with who God used in the Bible and ask yourself, would any of these men have been your top candidate for the job? So is God any different today? I’ll ask you again, has God changed? Does He do things differently than He did in the past? Does God still use the foolish things to confound the wisdom of men?
What are you suppose to do? Do you believe something based upon the source qualifications of an individual or do you simply just read the Bible for yourself and see if it says what is being taught? I have written about this next scripture in several of my blogs and I’ll repeat it today because it applies to our subject. What did the early church do? Is this a pattern that we should be following? If you think about the situation of the early church you can learn a significant lesson. Here we have a group of people who do not have an organized seminary or theological group of experts to consult. These people were handed something that was completely new to them, a totally radical change to anything that they had ever heard before. They were taught about things that they had never imagined or even heard taught by anybody on the planet, especially the Jewish religious leadership of the day. These people faced an extremely important decision and probably the most important eternal decision that they would ever face. This is really no different than what you are facing right now. So you can learn this lesson and apply it or you can choose to ignore it and do what you want to.
Act 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
Paul and the other disciples were travelling about the countryside preaching the Word of God. They brought such a new radical teaching that I am sure it was immediately rejected by a lot of people just because it was completely new. However, this verse in Acts describes a group of people that God calls very noble. You could imply this also means brave and courageous. These people we are told, kept an open mind to the new things that were being taught them by Paul and the other disciples. Being open minded is an essential quality to a successful Christian growth process. But that is not where the verse ends, that was just the key essential ingredient that allowed them to be more noble. If you read the verse, we are given the key to Bible understanding in determining what we should believe and what we should reject. This verse says these more noble people heard what was being spoken and then they looked in the scriptures to see it for themselves. In other words they based their beliefs upon a personal knowing of what they saw in the verses and not based upon what an expert man was telling them to believe. Did you hear what I just said? Paul was probably the most expert man of his day and knew more about the scriptures than anyone else. But Paul never said believe what I say, because I’m an expert and you are not. Paul always pointed people to the scriptures and the Word of God. The Bible should be your only source for what you ultimately believe. You should never take the words of any man, even experts without finding out for yourself what the Bible really says. If this lesson applied to the early church it still applies to us today. We are still in the same church that they were in. We are still in the same body of Christ that they started, and what we believe must be based upon what God has spoken and not any man.
Having said all of that I should also tell you that God does use teachers to help you learn. God many times will pick one man, like a Paul and give him information and revelation from the scriptures to teach to His children. So God has anointed some men and women as pastors and teachers and He has given many of them specialties in specific areas of Bible knowledge. But, if they are not showing you Bible verses for you to see for yourself and for you to study, you should run away from them very, very fast. Stop looking for an expert to follow and follow God and your Bible. Use your relationship with God, the author of the Bible to help guide you into the truth that you need to learn today. Don’t try to make me or anyone else do your Bible studying for you. If you are depending on what I know for what you believe you will soon be deceived, if you are not already. I believe what I believe because I have studied it out in the scriptures for endless hours and I am confident in what I teach as being the truth because of this intimate and personal scriptural knowledge. You of course do not know everything that I know and cannot have the same confidence in anything that I say. I also understand that concept fully, and I hope that you do to. As we continue to follow God’s leadership through his Holy Spirit who indwells us, we will continue to grow in spiritual strength and faith and finally become the mature Christian that God is seeking.
So do I think that I am an expert, No! Are there really any experts in the world? None that I know of! After all what is there that we can measure that determines a Bible expert? Is it a title from a seminary or university? Is it a duration of a time of study? Does studying the Bible for 10 years make you an expert? How about 50 years of studying the Bible does that make you an expert? I hope that you see the problem with man’s qualification system. Make God your expert, and use the Bible as your source of knowledge and beliefs. Listen to God’s anointed teachers and then check out every word that they teach using your Bible and you’ll continue to grow spiritually with the rest of us. This is God’s system and design for getting people to see and understand the Bible. I have a responsibility and you have a responsibility. It is an equal partnership working with God and He will bring the increase from our labors.
The Bride of Christ Revealed – Part 3 God’s Definition of a Woman
(Ver 2.0) This is now Part 3 in the series of lessons on “The Bride of Christ Revealed”. In the last lesson, we learned about the identity of the bridegroom and established several great scripture verses that taught us that Jesus Christ is the Groom that is getting married. We have learned that Jesus Christ was God in the flesh and that He is marrying a wife. We understand that a wife is always a female woman. These are just some of the basics and today we will begin to explore the subject of what is a female woman in the spiritual eyes of God. This will involve getting God’s definition of the subject which should change how we think about her. Most of the time in doing Bible studies, I have discovered that God’s definitions do not normally match what we believe the definitions of the subjects are. This is mainly because God is a Spirit, and we have grown up on the earth, mostly as naturally dominated thinking humans. God clearly says to us that His ways and thoughts are much higher than our natural ways and thoughts. In other words, humans know and understand the natural realm usually much more than the spiritual realm normally. If you have not been reading this series from the beginning, I would strongly suggest that you go back and start with Part 1, The Introduction.
First Mention of a Woman in the Bible
Today’s subject ought to be fun. What does the Bible say about a woman? What does the Bible say a woman is? In this introductory section we will utilize the “Law of First Mention” to help us gain foundational information about our mystery bride. Where does God first mention a woman and how does this apply to our study. You might be amazed that it will enlighten us and inform us more than we can possibly imagine.
The first direct mention of a woman is found in Genesis 2 and this was concerning God’s focus on making the first created woman. This appears to be a natural woman being her physical body came from her husband whose body was formed from the dirt/dust of the ground/earth. There is another type of woman in the Bible and this one is a spiritual woman. We find this type mentioned in many verses but two that we will mention are the spiritual women described in Revelation 12 and the Whore of Babylon mentioned in Revelation 17. Both of these women are spiritual, with the first being righteous and the 2nd being very ungodly. So based upon this information we must conclude there are two kinds of women in the Bible and within each categorization they are divided into the subsets of the righteous and the unrighteous. What kind of woman are we focused upon if we are searching for a woman called the bride of Christ?
- A Spiritual Woman/Bride
- Who is and was Made Righteous
Most people have studied the book of Genesis and found out where the first natural human woman came from. We learn that this first created woman was eventually named Eve, and she was taken from the side (rib) of Adam, and she becomes Adam’s natural wife (bride). She certainly appears to fit the pattern for God’s point of view of what a spiritual female woman represents. However, we are viewing a spiritual woman through the lenses of a natural creation viewed perspective. We are learning that this first natural woman is a limited example of what God really considers to be His spiritual woman and bride. Since this series of lessons is about the identity of the Bride of Christ we must figure out if the church qualifies as being a candidate made in the likeness of Eve. We should learn soon that she does at least at the beginning of creation before sin. At the beginning before sin, she was:
- A Woman/Female (Rom 7:4, 2 Cor 11:2)
- A Bride/Wife (John 3:29, Eph 5:25, Eph 5:31-32)
- Called the body of her Husband (Rom 12:5, 1 Cor 12:27, Eph 5:30)
- A Virgin (2 Cor 11:2)
- Righteous (Rom 3:22, Rev 19:8)
- Pure (Eph 5:26, Rev 19:7)
- Was not a Whore (1 Cor 6:15)
- Has only one Husband (2 Cor 11:2, Eph 5:25)
All of these female qualities mentioned are references describing Eve and the church, believe it or not. I have included scripture references to confirm each female quality of Eve that is also a description in a typology parallel to the church. So, now we are ready to get past the basic introduction of the bride and the bridegroom and get into a brief explanation of what God says a spiritual woman is.
The Last Mention of Women in the Bible
Just as the first mention of any subject builds a foundation for God intended purpose of design, the last mention of the subject of women brings us to God’s conclusion or purpose of the designed subject. In other words, how a woman ends in the book of Revelation is how God intended the beginning of subject to remain or become. What we learn from reading and studying the book of Revelation is that there are two major women mentioned at the end of the book of Revelation.
Revelation chapters 14, 16, 17 and 18, speak of a woman called the Whore of Babylon who is also called the mother of all Harlots in Revelation 17:5. This does not sound like a virtuous woman. Therefore, whe is not the bride we are looking for. The last woman mentioned in Revelation does appear to fit the pattern of the woman and is actually called the Bride of the Lamb in Revelation 21:9. There are only 22 chapters in the book of Revelation so chapter 21 could be the last reference to a woman, but we can find another hidden woman in chapter 22. This woman called a bride in Revelation 22:17 is joined with the Spirit of God in unison saying, “Come”.
What is most interesting is that the church is never mentioned again directly by name after chapter 3. But guess who appear again in chapter 22? Yes, it is the “Chruch” The verse directly before the last mention of a woman called a bride, has the last mention of the church’s name “Ekklesia” in the Bible. Do you think this could be a clue to the identity of the Bride of Christ? It sure appears this way. Why else would God join the name of the church with the Spirit and a bride saying “Come”? Isn’t the Spirit of God joined with the spirits of the saints in the church right now? That is what 1 Corinthians 6:17 teaches us. This verse in Corinthians is a form of a quotation of Gensis 2:24 that says, “the man shall leave his father and mother and shall be joined to his wife, and the two will be one flesh”. However, in the church’s case we have become one “spirit”. Let us go explore this lady in Revelation further to discover how she is identified.
One of the greatest errors that Christians make in studying the Words spoken by the Spirit of God, is coming up with their own human definitions for far greater spiritual realities God was referring us to. Too many times, a preacher will teach the Bible and not consult God’s loving heart, His Spirit or His Word or even attempt to get God’s definition on the subject they are teaching. Hopefully you can understand what a poor choice that might be. God has designed the Bible in a way that it fully defines and interprets itself.
As a part of this process, God assuredly provides us spiritual definitions and descriptions on every conceivable subject. If the church is a woman and the bride of Christ this certainly will be relevant information and very important to know. I believe sometimes people look at a subject and think they already have it all figured out before they hear anything that is about to be taught. Hopefully, today in this lesson today this will be different.
As a warning again, please be reminded that many lessons do not follow traditional teaching methodologies or styles. Please come today to learn and be open minded to receive what the Bible says. Remain open even if it says something that you never heard before or have imagined could be true. But also, do not automatically accept anything that is written here as truth, just because it is written. Instead prove everything that is stated for yourself. Keep your eyes open and look it all up in your own Bible study time with God. He alone can cause your spirit to see what the real truth is.
Today we are about to review one of the major reasons why some ministers say the church is not the bride of Christ. We were introduced to this reason in the Introduction. In reviewing this reason, we will go again to the book of Revelation and see what we can learn on the subject of what God thinks about what a spiritual woman is, in the Bible. So, let’s turn to the book of Revelation in the 21st chapter and start to read with verse 2:
Rev 21:2 – And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.
Reading this verse is very informative and it is very important to understand correctly for many reasons. Some Bible teachers have read this chapter and concluded that here is the most important information concerning the “bride of Christ”. It is certainly important; however, the lenses of personal viewpoint can restrict the verse’s interpretation and can dramatically shift what is viewed as truth. For example, a natural lens view can potentially cause thinking to lean in natural terms and not in spiritual terms. Of course, with some teacher’s that could be viewing the verse naturally or also called literally, this can cause reasoning that says, “if the church is the body of Christ, this holy bride city in Revelation 21 is also the church’s wife”. However, this reasoning omits all of the contradictory verses to this belief. We will be addressing these in this series and hopefully you will be able to see the problem with this belief.
For example, some have raised the church in their mind to be the groom and this certainly contradicts what we learned about the groom’s identity in the previous lesson being Jesus Christ alone. Another problem is that yes, we can find verses that say the church is the body of Christ, but can you find a verse that says we are the groom? Or can you find a verse that says we are the Lamb of God? Perhaps some do have not seen all the verses that we are learning, or maybe some do not yet understand these scriptures we are learning today about a spiritual woman and the verses about Christ being the bridegroom.
What does this verse in Revelation actually say and reveal to us? Let’s look at the verse again and just simply see what it says with our spiritual glasses on. Verse 2 says that John saw a holy city coming down out of heaven from God and it calls her by name the “New Jerusalem”. That is a very interesting revelation right there. The first thing we should realize is these are largely symbolic references in this verse. If you do not understand, what symbolism is you should please spend time studying how God uses symbolism from cover to cover and then understand that the book of Revelation is almost completely symbolic natural references revealing spiritual truths.
Otherwise, for now, let’s please just at least try to agree on this, that there is a “symbolic” spiritual woman coming down out of heaven, she is called a holy city, she came from God, she has to be spiritual because heaven is a spiritual location, and her name is the “New Jerusalem”. Finally, it also says she is adorned or dressed for her husband. Of course, this is still symbolism and purely figurative language since we have already discovered that this woman is said to be a symbolic holy city and cannot be a literal city called a woman.
The implication given from this verse is that this woman is dressed as a bride adorned for her husband. Here is where some male preachers get the picture of them wearing a literal wedding gown in heaven fixed in their minds, but that is not what God is teaching us. This gown is described as clean and white and represents God’s gift of righteousness as we were given described in Romans 5:17.
I hope you can agree with those few statements that were just made about this first verse that describes this female bride. Let’s look at the next verse to see what God says immediately following these descriptive terms about this woman:
Rev 21:3 – And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God.
Wow, did God change the subject, or did someone just misunderstand what He just said? You see clearly within the context of a woman, the bride, a holy city that is being spoken of God immediately starts talking about a group of people being the temple of God. He calls these the “tabernacle of God” within the context that this tabernacle is a group of people. You can clearly see the implied meaning of the symbolic city as being a group of people who God indwells spiritually. This is so significant that I cannot even begin tell you. We will certainly explore what we have just learned later in much more depth. But let us skip down a few verses and go on to the next direct mention of the bride in this chapter in verses 9 and 10:
Rev 21:9 And there came unto me one of the seven angels which had the seven vials full of the seven last plagues, and talked with me, saying, Come hither, I will shew thee the bride, the Lamb’s wife.
Rev 21:10 And he carried me away in the spirit to a great and high mountain, and shewed me that great city, the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God,
We will not go word for word through these 2 verses, because they basically say the same things that we just read in verse 2. In verse 9, we do see the clear reference to the “Lamb of God” as being the Bridegroom. You should remember that the Lamb refers to Jesus Christ (John 1:29, John 1:36). Therefore, we have just identified again who the husband is. I’m going to stop right there and ask you this question again and maybe you can answer it because I haven’t been able to yet, “have you ever heard or read any scripture that says the church is the Lamb”? I haven’t yet found any scriptures that say the church is the sacrificial lamb that took away the sin of the world. So, are we (the church) “The” Lamb? The correct answer to this question matters greatly and we must determine it to understand what the book of Revelation is teaching.
There is a woman called the wife of the Lamb in Revelation 19:7. In Revelation 21:2 we are given the reference of a woman who is adorned for her husband. This verse does not mention Christ or the Lamb and claims she is a city. However, in Revelation 21:9 we begin to receive additional clarity. In Revelation 21:9 the angel speaking to John says, “Come here, and I will show you the bride, the Lamb’s wife”. This verse confirms without a doubt that this city is being referred to as 1) a woman, 2) a bride, and 3) a wife of the “Lamb”. Again there is no reference to the Lamb being Christ, even though we know Christ was the Lamb that was slain from the foundation of the world from verses like Revelation 13:8 and 1 Peter 1:19.
Hopefully, we can begin to see why it matters that Revelation is speaking of the Lamb’s wife and bride not “Christ’s” wife and bride. If God had written that the city was the Bride of Christ, we would associate that city bride to not be the church. This is because the church is definitely called the body of Christ but never the body of the Lamb. Therefore, anyone could conclude as some have, that this city must also be the church’s bride and wife.
But because God says plainly that this is the Lamb’s bride and wife, the church cannot have a bride because logically we are this bride as we will soon confirm. Let us begin this confirming by asking another question. What did the Lamb of God accomplish for the church? Remember the sacrifice Passover Lamb was the substitutionary payment made to keep the church from death in hell. We know this because it is written in 1 Corinthians 5:7 that Jesus is described as “our” (the church) Passover that is sacrificed for “us” (the church).
Here is another important Bible that must be addressed. In 1 Peter 1:18 God reveals that “we (the church) were not redeemed with corruptible things….”. Then in verse 19 God further confirms with a new revelation that it was the precious blood of Christ who was crucified who was the payment for our redemption. But this reference to “Christ” is now joined with the reference that Christ was slain as a lamb without spot exactly like Exodus 12 describes.
This fact causes us a new possible problem. We can clearly see the Lamb is Christ. Therefore, how do we resolve this now? Is the city in Revelation both the Lamb’s wife and Christ’s wife? The answer is really yes! But the whole truth is more complicated than a simple yes. You see we need to consider some additional new facts that many may have not thought of before. God required a sinless mortal man with blood to be the Lamb of God to redeem us (the church). However, before the death, burial and resurrection of Jesus, there was no church possible. Remember that God also required a resurrection and after Jesus was raised up from the grave, He took His remaining blood to heaven and offered it on the Holy spiritual temple once and for all. We know this is true by studying Hebrew 9:11-28. Please take the time to read and study these verses for yourself.
Finally, we have another Bible truth that is also in need of understanding to help us know who the bride of Christ truly is. At the resurrection of Jesus, He became the “Firstborn from the dead”. This initiated God’s New Covenant as well as His New Creation that never existed before. We can read about Jesus being the “first born from the dead” in Colossians 1:18, and Revelation 1:5. This is more important than can be taught in this lesson today. However, know from Romans 8:29 that Jesus was also the “firstborn” of many other brethren. These brethren are the church. Now we have learned a new problem that also needs resolution. How can brethren as in family members be called the body of Christ? Or better still, how can fellow brethren be called a “bride” of Christ? We will resolve this new problem soon!
That is really a most interesting fact to put in your mind going forward. Sometimes I think I can ask good questions. I do know God asks really good questions and I’m trying to learn from the best. Ok, so here we find the same basic confirming information we read in verse 2. We have a woman, she is called a bride, she is called the wife of the Lamb, she is called a great city, and her name is the “Holy Jerusalem”. I also found it interesting in verse 10, when it says John was carried away in the spirit in order to see this city. The implication is that we are looking at a spiritual reality and not a physical one. Chapter 21 of Revelation says a lot more and describes other characteristics that we may get into later in this blog series. But for now I just want you to agree with what I’ve said so far about what the Bible says about this woman. Until you learn some more I can’t go into the other parts of the description of this woman. Here is a quick synopsis of what we have just learned, see if you can agree with this:
- This woman is a city, this city is a woman
- This woman/city is to be married to her husband, who is the Lamb
- Her name is “New Jerusalem” or “Holy Jerusalem”
- This woman came down from God and Heaven
- This woman/city is a symbolic reference for a spiritual reality
Regardless of what else is in this chapter, can we agree with these basic facts from the scripture? If you have problem with any of these statements you are not going to do well going forward. If you can see what these verses are telling us then you will have a much easier time seeing the other verses that I will soon give you. Truth many times builds upon truth. So instead of attempting to figure out everything a verse or a chapter says all by itself, I try to write down the things that I learn from that verse and then go and look at other verses in the Bible that help to explain it. The Bible, like I said before interprets itself. That is why I reject men’s opinion so fast, if they can’t give me verses I really don’t want to hear what they thinks it says.
Where we are right now, if you did not realize it, we have just discovered the basic Bible definition for what a spiritual woman is in the eyes of God. There are many other things still left to learn and we will continue to build upon this definition with other witnesses from the scripture, but hang on to this basic definition for what God thinks a woman is. A woman is a city and a city represents a group of people who live there. We can fruther undersand that based upon the identity of the groom being Jesus the Lamb, that the bride city has a marriage covenant relationship with God. That is a spiritual definition of a woman to God and knowing this much changes our perspectives of many things found in the Bible and we will confirm what i have just talked about using many more scriptures.
Before I continue, I want to make a point and show what else these truths reveal to us from the verses that we just read. Many times you can read verses and never see what they indirectly are teaching us so I want to show you an example of this. Did you notice that the woman has been given a name? She has a name and she is called “New Jerusalem” and “Holy Jerusalem”. What does that tell you? If you understand the Bible and especially the Old Testament you know there is more than one city called “Jerusalem” in the Bible. Why would God call this city by the same name, but with qualifiers and prefixed descriptive adjectives? An adjective is a word class that qualifies a noun. So God uses adjectives of course to differentiate one city from any other city with the same name. It is unnecessary to call something “New” if there is not an “Old”. It is unnecessary to call it “Holy” if there is not an “Unholy” city with the same name. Did you understand what I just said? We have a city name being given to us with the clear implied truth that there is another city that is an opposite picture or a negative image of these positive adjective qualifiers. Wow, that is very strong language and I wonder who God is talking about? Or do you already know? This Old Jerusalem and Unholy Jerusalem must be something or someone else, a different woman in the Bible. I really hope you are understanding these very simple truths that you can read so plainly. I think I will give you another reference in Revelation to an unholy city for you to think about and to further confirm what we have just learned. This verse is found in Revelation 17 and verse 18 says:
Rev 17:18 And the woman which thou sawest is that great city, which reigneth over the kings of the earth.
Chapter 17 of Revelation is about a much different woman, but yet this woman still fits the pattern for our definition of a woman that we have just developed. This last verse in Revelation chapter 17 reveals to us that the woman God has been talking about in this chapter is a “great city”. This city is said to rule over the kings of the earth and I will not attempt to identify this woman at this time in this blog. If you read the first part of the chapter you see her name is a symbolic reference to “Mystery Babylon”. I just want you to see the pattern and the revelation that a city is a woman and a woman is a city. A city is made up of people, normally a nation of people consisting of males and females. A city can be the capitol of a nation. This nation and group of individuals live together in a named city and this city is called a woman in the eyes of God.
I understand that these concepts and definitions are not that complex, but since what I am saying in this blog is so radically new and different than anything you have heard before, it will probably be hard to understand. We have just seen two completely different cities described, these are two witnesses from the book of Revelation and both are called women. In my next blog we will expand our definition of a woman and research God’s idea and definition of marriage.
If you would like to continue reading this series, you can go to “Part 4“.
The Bride of Christ Revealed – Part 2 Identifying the Bridegroom
(Ver 2.0) This is “Part 2” of the series of essential Bible lessons on the subject of “Identifying the Bride of Christ” in scripture. Too most serious Bible students this should be an easy subject. But for a lot of people, they have never heard it taught or read about this subject. First, it should be obvious that if the primary subject of this series is to identify the Bride of Christ, that this subject is speaking of a covenant marriage between a female woman becoming joined to her male groom creating one new family. In every normal Bible marriage, there are always two participants, and always only a man and a woman. Any other type of marriage is a perversion of truth and scripture. This union of two opposite sexes, was established in the beginning and still is God’s design and definition of a marriage. Today in Part 2 we will learn more about this great subject. However, instead of focusing on the bride, today we will continue our study by identifying and confirming the bridegroom using the Bible and the scriptures that speak specifically about this marriage event. If you have not been reading this series from the beginning, I would strongly recommend that you go back and start with Part 1, The Introduction.
In every normal wedding that Christians have attended, there should only be two primary participants being married. These are the bride and the bridegroom. This is what God defines to be normal. Any other marriage type defiles God created design of marriage. We know this because Genesis 2:24 established this law of covenant union and marriage between one male and one female. This verse also they would be joined together as one flesh. Therefore, in order to establish the identity of the bride of Christ we might desire to start with the basics and confirm that Jesus Christ the groom? Hopefully, this will not be too difficult.
Basic theology is not the normal focus of Agapegeek. However, we might want to start with something more fundamental, like who was Jesus Christ? Was he God or was he just a man? Hopefully we can agree he is 100% man. But simultaneously we also must know that he is 100% God. In Romans 8:3 God writes through Paul, that Jesus was made in likeness of sinful flesh and this verse calls Him the Son of God. Jesus was both 100% God and 100% a man. While I was studying, I counted over 30 times just in the book of Matthew that Jesus is referred to as “the Son of Man”. Of course, the term “son” clearly indicates that he was a male and this then identifies Him be a child descendant of Adam, the first created man. You might not see that very clearly right now, but it is there, and we will probably get into that in more depth later.
When there are a lot of scriptures on a subject it seems it is easier for people to see what is taught to them. I believe that God was making a direct point of emphasis with an implied exclamation point that Jesus Christ was a human male due to the number of scriptures that are recorded with this revelation. So, let’s back up again and now scripturally establish the deity of Jesus. There are not as many clear references in the Bible that declare the specific deity of Jesus Christ as being human. Nevertheless, that doesn’t mean there aren’t any. Let’s start with one in Matthew the first chapter:
Mat 1:23 Behold, a virgin shall be with child, and shall bring forth a son, and they shall call his name Emmanuel, which being interpreted is, God with us.
This verse is of course speaking about Mary becoming pregnant with Jesus Christ. Here we have a very clear reference that he will be called by the name “Emmanuel” which is a Hebrew name meaning “God with us”. This of course is very controversial in various religions of the world and many of them would certainly deny that God would do something so ridiculous as becoming a part of His creation. It is funny how God uses these foolish things to confound the wise (1 Cor 1:27). So, we need at least one more good reference that Jesus was God, and I think there is a very good one in the first chapter of John.
Joh 1:1 In the beginning was the Word, and the Word was with God, and the Word was God.
Joh 1:14 And the Word was made flesh, and dwelt among us, (and we beheld his glory, the glory as of the only begotten of the Father,) full of grace and truth.
The first chapter of John is one of my favorite chapters in the Bible, it is really amazing what it says. In the very first verse of the chapter, God describes Himself as being “the Word”. This verse is a parallel to Genesis 1:1. John 1:1 and Genesis 1:1 both are written about the “beginning” of creation. However, they speak of God’s Work in different terms. John 1:1 identifies the contribution of God’s Spoken Word to create our world.
If you see what John 1 says, it is almost a paradox or a riddle. How can the Word be “With” God at the same time that it “Is” God. It is an interesting theological predicament, much like trying to explain the Trinity of God. It is usually advisable that if we do not understand a verse in the Bible fully and how it is possible, it is wise to just accept it for what it literally says and believe it just because it says it rather than to attempt to understand it before we believe it. God will always unfold the written words in due time to us in time if we ask, expect the answer to be shown to us, and then trust Him to show us this answer very soon.
As you read down the chapter of John 1, we find an amazing statement of truth in verse 14 about this God called “The Word”. Verse 14 informs us that “The Word” who is also known as “God” was made flesh and lived among us. The God who has purposely hid himself throughout the ages from our physical view, would take on the form of a human male and walk around like He was just one of us. That concept boggles the religious minds of many people to no end. However, what we can clearly see in this first chapter of John, is the fact that the man Jesus Christ was God in the flesh. Let’s look at just one more reference in the Bible where Jesus himself makes a statement to some men who couldn’t understand or accept what he was saying:
John 10:30 – I and my Father are one.
John 10:31 – Then the Jews took up stones again to stone him.
John 10:32 – Jesus answered them, Many good works have I shewed you from my Father; for which of those works do ye stone me?
Johh 10:33 – The Jews answered him, saying, For a good work we stone thee not; but for blasphemy; and because that thou, being a man, makest thyself God.
From the mouth of Jesus himself, he spoke and said that God the Father and him were one in the same. That is an awesome statement of revelation that we need to get a hold of and understand the full implications given. The men that heard him wanted to kill him and took up stones to do so. Jesus just asked for what good work are you going to stone me for? But they said it wasn’t for anything that he did, just for what he said.
They could see that he was a man of flesh and based upon this fact and what he said they rejected his claim to be equal to God. Jesus in affect was saying I am the one that created the universe, and you didn’t recognize me. Jesus was God standing directly before them and they did not see it. Obviously, we can learn a lot from this lesson if we are open. In another place in the Gospels, Jesus said “If you have seen me you have seen my Father.” (John 14:7-9). Again, Jesus says He is God. There are certainly a lot of other scriptures that could have been included in this discussion, but for the sake of time we will end this part of the divinity of Jesus using three witnesses.
We could certainly say more and easily get off of the mainline of the subject, so let’s go ahead and look at verses about Jesus being the bridegroom. So, in every marriage, there should always be a male participant making a proposal to his desired female, and this is followed by a wedding ceremony if she willingly accepts. So, who is this bridegroom? Is it this God Man named Jesus?
Later we will go through an in-depth study of Revelation 21 where an angel takes John in the spirit to view the Lamb’s wife. In this chapter we are given a glimpse and a view into the spiritual realm to see a symbolic city who is described in elaborate terms to be a female bride who has finalized her marriage and is now called a wife. But like we learned earlier God does not say she is called the Bride of Christ; in this verse it only says she is the “Lamb’s Wife”. As we know from the Book of John and other New Testament books, only Jesus is ever directly or indirectly called the Lamb of God. Let us confirm this briefly:
John 1:29 – The next day John seeth Jesus coming unto him, and saith, Behold the lamb of God, which taketh away the sin of the world.
John 1:36 – And looking upon Jesus as he walked, he saith, Behold the Lamb of God!
Jesus is seen walking up to John and John stops in his tracks and says, “Behold the Lamb of God”. This is an awesome revelation. John knew that Jesus would soon suffer and die and become the one-time sacrifice for the payment of all human sin. Therefore, we can clearly see the reference that Jesus is indirectly called the “bridegroom” that will marry the bride shown to us in Revelation 21. We will certainly get into this in more depth soon. We could talk a lot about the significance of the lamb and about God’s usage of a lamb’s blood. There are a number of very significant typologies and parallels given to us in the Old Testament, that reveal Jesus’ substitutionary work, but we will not cover this today.
Now I want to go through other scriptural conformations found in the New Testament concerning the identity of the bridegroom. There are really several scriptures, and I will not attempt to include them all for the sake of time and space. We can see the identity of the bridegroom in the words of Jesus himself speaking to the disciples of John:
Mat 9:14 – Then came to him the disciples of John, saying, Why do we and the Pharisees fast oft, but thy disciples fast not?
Mat 9:15 – And Jesus said unto them, Can the children of the bridechamber mourn, as long as the bridegroom is with them? but the days will come, when the bridegroom shall be taken from them, and then shall they fast.
We touched on this subject briefly in Part 1. If you recall this was when the disciples of John ask Jesus why his disciples don’t fast like they do, Jesus’ reply was very important, and a simple truth. How can the children of the bride chamber fast when they are physically present with the bridegroom? The inference is clearly given that Jesus is calling himself the bridegroom and since he was present with them, they didn’t need to fast and this made them at least a part of the “bride”.
He then says there will come a time when I, the bridegroom would be taken from them and then they could fast. We can see that Jesus is looking forward to his crucifixion, his subsequent resurrection and his ascension, when he would be taken from this earth. These words in Matthew 19:14-15 are echoed in Mark 2:19 and Luke 5:34 also, so here we see three specific witnesses declaring Jesus Christ to be the bridegroom. In fact, all of these are quotes of Jesus himself declaring himself to be the bridegroom.
Also, if we look closely at these verses and the specific term “bridechamber” we will also see the implied inference to who the bride is. If you have been following the other blogs you can also see an implication of the “seed of the woman” by the reference to the children of the bride. But since we aren’t there yet, let’s look at another witness to the identity of the bridegroom. We can see that Jesus is again called the bridegroom by John the Baptist in the Gospel of John.
John 3:28 – Ye yourselves bear me witness, that I said, I am not the Christ, but that I am sent before him.
John 3:29 – He that hath the bride is the bridegroom: but the friend of the bridegroom, which standeth and heareth him, rejoiceth greatly because of the bridegroom’s voice: this my joy therefore is fulfilled.
We can see in verse 28 of John 3, that John the Baptist tells everyone that he is not the Greek word Christ, or the Hebrew equivalent word is Messiah. However, we now know the identity of the one who John is about to talk about. Then in verse 29, three times John the Baptist calls Jesus Christ the bridegroom. This verse actually has more revelation, but that is the primary point that you should accept as a great additional witness. John’s first statement is concerning the bride and declares that Jesus is the bridegroom that has her. While John does not directly identify who the bride is, he definitely identifies who the Groom is. Interesting, isn’t it? Also, the Greek word G3565 translated as bride in this verse has the following definition in the Strong’s:
G3565
From a primary but obsolete verb νύπτω nuptō (to veil as a bride; compare the Latin “nupto”, to marry); a young married woman (as veiled), including a betrothed girl; by implication, a son’s wife: – bride, daughter in law.
You can see that this word is related to the Latin word “Nupto” meaning to marry. We get English words like nuptial from this word. So clearly, we can see the association of a woman that is being married to the Lord Jesus Christ. This woman must be the bride of Christ since Jesus is the Christ. So, who is this woman that is married to the Lord Jesus Christ? Knowing who the bridegroom is, gives us a firm foundation for us to start an in-depth study of who the bride is. But let’s list some of the basic facts that we have just learned from the preceding verses:
- Jesus Christ was and still is, God in the flesh
- Jesus Christ was and still is a Man and is also called the Son of Man, causing Him to be a descendant of Adam God’s first created man.
- Jesus Christ is called the Lamb of God.
- Jesus Christ calls Himself the bridegroom.
- Jesus Christ is said to have a bride and a wife.
- A bride is always a female.
- There must be a marriage proposal and covenant established and then a wedding ceremony between Jesus and His bride.
I think these are basic scriptural facts, but yet maybe you haven’t seen them until now. So, knowing these facts we can now begin to explore the identity of the bride of Christ. Therefore, let us start by researching the subject in the Word of God. Two questions should come to our minds at this point in the study and I think answering these questions will help point us to where we should go next. Here are the two questions that maybe you thought of also and these are based upon knowing that God is a Spirit and any wedding that He is involved in as a bridegroom, is also spiritual in nature:
- What is a spiritual marriage in the eyes of God?
- What is a spiritual woman in the eyes of God?
I believe by focusing in on what God thinks are the answers to these two direct questions that it will help to provide us a firm foundation to the clear identity of the bride of Christ. In the next lesson we will begin to focus on these subjects.
If you would like to continue reading this series, you can go to “Part 3“.
The Bride of Christ Revealed – Part 1 The Introduction
(Ver 2.0) This is Part 1 in the Bible Advanced Study series revealing the identity of the spiritual woman called the Bride of Christ. Perhaps you have heard preachers and Bible teachers say, “There is nothing in the Bible that says the church is the Bride of Christ”. However, after we study this subject for ourselves like the more noble Berean Bible students mentioned in Acts 17:11, we should all begin to find and see this teaching is not Biblically accurate. It is interesting how one preacher will teach something totally opposite to what another will teach. But all it does is prove that at least one is wrong or possibly that both are wrong and only God is right. This however creates confusion, division and an atmosphere for deception in the Body of Christ. Satan is all too ready to pounce on error and use it to cause a split or an offense against other Christians in the church. We are going to start a new series of lessons today on why the Church was called to be the Bride of Christ. We will discover scriptural evidence and a lot of it so that it can be clearly understood. This will probably be the most in-depth and comprehensive Bible lesson series that many have ever encountered on the subject of the Identity of the Bride of Christ, and it will probably take a long time and a lot of lessons to cover based upon the information found in scripture.
I want to start this lesson by confirming one thing, the term “Bride of Christ” is not found in the Bible anywhere that I have personally found. That might shock some people to learn that truth. But neither are the terms abortion, homosexuality, rapture, demons or the trinity found in the Bible either. Does that mean none of these exist either? Does anyone think that God cares nothing about any of these subjects to discuss them directly by name? Many times, basic theological principles are not directly named or labeled with a clear title that can be found in the Bible. Many times, these theological terms come as a result of man naming them with titles that have stuck. These manmade titles and labels cause the subjects to be more easily taught and referenced and for others to understand them.
So instead of us looking for the term “Bride of Christ” in the Bible and saying it doesn’t exist and therefore concluding that the church is not the bride, let us become wise enough to learn the lesson of how God wrote the Bible and do a search for other information that is given to us using synonyms and implied references to marriage. The Bible contains an almost infinite number of mysteries, puzzles, riddles and hidden information. God used this technique for two primary reasons. First to hide this information from His enemies who were led by Satan and then second to conceal the truth for us (the Church) to find at the right time. If we can understand this, it will help us unify in trying to figure out what the Bible really says and means.
The “Bride of Christ” is of course a very deep subject with a lot of complex interwoven layers of truth, and it may be extremely challenging to be taught concisely in a blog format. Therefore, if length of the lessons is problem, this series may be offensive just by the volume of information that needs to be covered. But please note brevity was not always God’s motivation in the Bible. After all understand God wrote 66 books from over 40 authors and very few of them were short books. We can also learn from Jesus who taught a very large group of people for 3 days in Mark 8:2 and none of them had had natural food to eat. Is anyone today that hungry for what God has to teach? Do also remember Peter in Acts 20:9 who preached so long one man fell asleep in an open window to fall to the ground and died. However, this man was raised from the dead and lived to talk about it. If anyone gets tired reading this series, you are not going to die just break it into sections and learn when you can get the time. Thank you.
INTRODUCTION
Let us start our introduction of this subject by addressing the two main reasons why some preachers think that the church is not the bride. In this way we will not ignore the views and thoughts on the subject from others. This will hopefully allow everyone the fair ability to weigh the evidence from everyone, to determine which is the view that matches with the witness of the Holy Spirit living in each of our hearts. Or perhaps there will be elements of each teacher’s view that bears witness with our spirit or perhaps neither teaching view will bear witness with your spirit, and then you are free to believe as the Spirit leads you. Out of respect and in the name of love, we will not name any names other teacher’s views. So, if you want to listen to any of these teachers who teach these beliefs it is easy to find them by a search of the internet using the topic.
The first reason that has been popular to why the church is not the bride, is because they say the church is the Body of Christ. This may shock some, but I believe this too. The church is the body of Christ. This is irrefutable and this belief is definitely amazingly true. But we will soon discover that this truth does not contradictory with the belief that the church is also the bride of Christ. We all should know that the New Testament clearly gives an overwhelming number of scriptures that confirm this basic truth. Again, I believe these verses, and everyone should teach firmly that the Church is the Body of Christ.
Many people with limited knowledge believe the Bible contains contradictions. And when someone encounters these differences in scriptures this is when potential errors can occur and even carnal fights over theological beliefs of doctrines. It should be obvious to everyone that being the body of Christ is a contradiction to also being the bride of Christ. How one resolves these conflicts will possibly result in unity or division within the church depending upon if we allow the Holy Spirit to lead us into all truth or not.
What some teachers have concluded to resolve this conflict is that, if we are the body of Christ (Rom 12:5) and if Christ has a bride (Rev 21:9), then we (the church) also have a Bride. That belief would make us (the church) the bridegroom also. Jesus clearly claimed to be the bridegroom in Matthew 9:15. However, in this context Jesus is asked why doesn’t His disciples fast and Jesus’ reply is “How can the children of the bridechamber fast while the bridegroom is with them”. This statement clearly calls the disciples of Jesus those in the bride chamber and not the groom.
Therefore, we are observing thinking that brings us new contradictions in scriptures. A belief that says we are the bridegroom places us on equal ground with Jesus Christ and it causes us to be God as an equivalent in every aspect and feature. That logic should set off all kind of red flags in our minds. We are not the Creator God; we are His creation. What these teachers have done is a classic error of Bible Interpretation that many have fallen into without knowing it. They have taken “A” single truth and exalted it and have made it “The” complete truth. This happens very frequently and is a misrepresentation of what God desired us to know as truth. You see there are many truths in the Bible and if we take just one of them and exclude the rest of them, we are now in the potential of great error. That might be the most important thing that we can learn today from this lesson so don’t throw it away.
Now for the second reason why some preachers think the church is not the bride of Christ. They turn to the last chapters in Revelation and read about a city coming out of heaven from God (Rev 21:9). This holy city is called the “New Jerusalem”, and she is referred to as a woman. She is also called specifically the “Lamb’s Wife”. In their reasoning they have determined that since we are the “Body of Christ”, this is our (the church’s) wife also. In other words, God came to the earth in the flesh, suffered and died on a cross, went to hell and arose back to heaven all so that he could marry a city with buildings and houses that we could all live as one body happily ever after. Does this belief agree and balance with all scripture?
Would this teaching raise any questions in your mind with what you know about other verses found in the Bible? If this city New Jerusalem is the bride of the church, then we must also conclude that we are the Lamb. However, have we ever seen any verses of scripture that claims the church is the “Lamb of God”. In fact, we should have all been taught and know that the term “Lamb of God” refers to our spotless “Passover” sacrifice that only Jesus would qualify to make for our salvation (1 Cor 5:7, 1 Pet 1:19).
Let us quickly address the city called “New Jerusalem”. This city cannot be the bride. God uses this named city as a symbolic reference to the residents of the city. For example, if someone said on the news, “New York City” elected a new Mayor, did the buildings vote for them, or was it the people living in the city’s buildings? It should be obvious that only people are supposed to vote. But in our evil world the devil even tries to win elections in whatever way goes unchecked. Therefore, a city called the bride in Revelation is speaking of all of the inhabitants and residents of this city called New Jerusalem and collectively these people are called the Lamb’s “bride”, and we will find later the church is confirmed to be that city in other scriptures.
Let us now cover reason number three that is being taught to claim the church is not the bride of Christ. There are some modern Bible teachers that were clearly born a natural human male, and they feel if they are being referred to as a spiritual female bride, it removes their masculinity. One nameless pastor said, “I am a man, I don’t wear panties”. This clearly demonstrates a concerning level of carnal focus and thinking.
According to this pastor, he was struggling in thinking of himself as a spiritual woman or being called the bride of Christ, because he was a natural male, and any normal natural man should have a problem with being identified as any kind of female, even one that is female. I can understand that thought process, because I am a man also. There are so many natural people in the world that are so confused with their sexual identity, whether they are a man or a woman. These kinds of people ask, “Am I a man in a woman’s body” or vice versa. It seems this sexual identity crisis has also crept into the church by Satan’s design to produce confusion.
Is the church a man or is it a woman in the eyes of God? That is certainly the great debate that seems to be raging. You can so easily see why Satan wants to keep the church in confusion so that they don’t understand who they are and why they are here. If the church doesn’t understand the truth, then Satan is able to steal away their purpose and calling from our hearts and we will never be able to know our purpose according to what God’s Word and Jesus has taught us. As you read the rest of this lesson series, we will soon discover why Satan wants to convince the Body of Christ that they are not the bride of Christ. If he can convince us that we are not the bride, then we will not be able to fulfill the Biblical prophecies spoken by the words of God himself.
So normal men don’t like being thought of as a spiritual female. However, what we think, or would like or don’t like shouldn’t really mean anything. That also goes for how you and I feel about being called a woman. We must humble ourselves and submit to God realizing whatever He says about us and who we are is right, and we are the ones that are wrong. Therefore, we need scriptures to help us make our mind up who we are? Can we agree? This is us not making a prejudged decision, this is just us being open to receive whatever the outcome is that is found in God’s Word. Yes, or no?
Perhaps you have heard that a picture of the church being the bride, brings out an image of a woman dressed in a wedding gown, wearing combat boots. This one minister just couldn’t identify with such a thought being a male. Is there any natural female that may as a female woman have a problem if she is called a spiritual male (the body of Christ)? For some reason I’ve never heard a female complain. Therefore, why would a natural male have a problem if he is called a spiritual female (the bride)?
Isn’t this like having a natural carnal male chauvinist attitude, thinking a man is better and knows things better than God. Did you know that the Bible says in Galatians 3:28 that there is neither “male” nor “female” in Christ? If you are in Christ and you are worried about being called a male or a female you are could be thinking too carnally and naturally. If you are a male and have a problem identifying yourself as a spiritual woman and that did say spiritual, then you may need to repent and figure out what God thinks about it and not worry about your outward appearance or feelings on the subject.
What we must ask ourselves, is there precedence in the Bible for the Church to be the bride of Christ? Ok, that was a legal term and what is really meant to be said was, is there a valid Bible pattern, a type or a shadow given to us in the Old Testament that would mirror and confirm to us this New Testament truth being a spiritual woman?
In Legal terms, precedence is when a judge gives a ruling, he is obligated to explain why he ruled that way. Many times, a judge will normally give established case histories where similar rulings were given and then explain why he ruled the way that he did. Why does the Judge feel obligated to include similar case rulings in his decision process? That is an interesting concept if you think about it. When a judge provides supporting evidence for his decision, he is saying this is not just my lone opinion.
Precedence can also apply to the order of priority or sequence of importance. This is exactly how the Bible is written if you didn’t realize it. God is the ultimate Supreme Judge and Jesus is our Lawyer or Advocate. God does everything in an orderly legal fashion. He explains His rulings giving us His precedence on the subject in His Word. The Old Testament parallels the New Testament, as well as the Old Testament precedes the New. The Old Testament helps us explain the New Testament and vice versa. The Old Testament gives us natural pictures of actual living people that point us to spiritual truths. There are many natural examples in the Old Testament that point us to spiritual New Testament truths. In fact there is an Old Testament scripture that says, “The thing that has been, that is the thing that shall be” (Ecc 1:9) and God said there is nothing new under the sun. In this lesson series we will definitely explore some new foundational truths from both the Old and the New Testaments that confirm the true identity of the church, so get ready to learn.
Perhaps you recall in the Old Testament that the natural nation of Israel was named to be a female whore repeatedly? This was because they went whoring after other gods through idolatry. We can read in Jeremiah 13:27 where God is describing the earthly city named Jerusalem as going whoring and committing spiritual adulteries. Please understand that this is a natural city containing natural human males and females who at that time was in covenant with God and God refers to them collectively as a female. Did this female reference remove the masculinity of any of these males? Carnal thinking is a major enemy of receiving spiritual truth. God desires us to come up to a higher spiritual way of thinking and believing. Please let us not fall for this trick of Satan.
We can’t cover every scripture reference, and reason people believe and teach the church is “not” the bride, but I really do not want to dilute the truth. I must apologize if some lessons come across very blunt and to the point sometimes, there is never any intention to offend anyone, it is rather just an attempt to wake some sleeping giants up to the truth. Jesus who was God in the flesh and is called “LOVE”, said and did some things to religious people that was shocking blunt and direct. He called some a generation of serpents and vipers; he called others a den of thieves, and on and on we could go. Do you believe Jesus was being too tough and not walking in love? Could it be that people who get offended at the words of God are being challenged to change? Do you remember what Paul wrote in Galatians 4:16? He said, “Have I become your enemy because I tell you the truth?” That sounds like a bold statement, and some would call it prideful. People have the potential to learn more by not becoming offended than they do than if they do not allow offensive to control them. Therefore, if you read something that offends you in this series, it might be wise to forgive first and realize God might be speaking something that He desires for us to know.
Finally, learn the lesson from the US Secret Service. You know these people do not spend a lot of time studying how to make counterfeit money. Instead, they concentrate on studying the real money, its features, characteristics and qualities. If you become intimately familiar with the real you can automatically recognize the counterfeit. That principle works with the Bible in the same way. The more we study the truth; the false teachings become easily recognizable. What we have to do is to make sure that what we believe is firmly based upon 2 or 3 witnesses of scripture found in the Bible. If we do this, then we are standing on good ground that is able to recognize any false teaching influenced by the enemy.
Mat 22:2 The kingdom of heaven is like unto a certain king, which made a marriage for his son,
As you can clearly see, Jesus is describing a spiritual reality using a descriptive natural story found in the form of a parable. This marriage being described to us is what we will begin to study in this series of lessons. Jesus is telling us of the “Kingdom of Heaven” so He must be speaking about spiritual truths using natural descriptive terms that we are all familiar with. However, this is another reason why Satan is trying the destroy the God created institution of marriage between a male and female. This covenant marriage law is written in Genesis 2:22-24 and it is being attacked directly by Satan today. It is this amazing God created union that is the basis of our salvation. That is how important this subject of the bride of Christ is to learn.
In this parable there was a certain King what has arranged a marriage for His son. So, we must begin by understanding the King is representative of God the Father. The Son in this parable is clearly Jesus Christ and He is the “bridegroom”. The marriage must be to a “bride”. The bride can be referred to as a future “daughter-in-law”, or the King’s “son’s” wife. So now we need to determine what is a spiritual woman, who is this spiritual woman (bride) and what is a spiritual marriage in the eyes of God.
Before we can accurately understand the identity of the bride of Christ and confirm her existence we really need to step back and come to understand some spiritual basic concepts; like what does the Bible say a spiritual woman is, and how does a spiritual woman relate to a spiritual family unit. Obviously if we are talking about women and brides we are also talking about a marriage as Jesus begins to describe in the first line of the parable.
How is a son’s marriage to a bride related to this subject in the eyes of God. We also need to figure out scripturally who is the bridegroom? Please recall, that we were previously introduced to this answer in this introduction. What is a Blood Covenant and how is it related to marriage? I believe that Biblical blood covenants are also a key subject to study and understand for us to build the basic knowledge of the subject of the identity of the bride of Christ. I cannot fully expound in this lesson on all of the Bible basics that we should be aware of to more fully understand this subject.
This means that this lesson series is built upon other foundational teachings that are available and easily found on the site. Not all of this information can be retaught here. Please spend the time to review these lessons to gain the firm foundational understandings of the Bible about these subjects that were just mentioned. Most advanced studies of any subject must logically assume there are prerequisite subjects that are required for basic knowledge of the more advanced subject, so this lesson is no different. Anyone is free to study this lesson alone, but it is recommended that you go back and study the other subjects if you struggle with anything that is said that is difficult to understand.
Hopefully we all can agree that when we go to college and take an advanced class like Calculus or Statistical Probability, they don’t start the class with 1 + 1 = 2, we should have already learned that in elementary school. So it is in the Bible in many subjects. This lesson is a spiritual college level Bible course, and not much time will be spent on any elementary school basics. The bottom line is that if I say something that you don’t agree with, it is strongly recommended that before you reject it or write it off, that you do some basic study to see how the study has arrived at that statement.
So let us go back to one of the first major points of the introduction; This was “taking a truth and trying to make it the only truth”. This is a repeated error for many Bible teachers, and it is such a critical mistake because it closes our mind to look and examine other verses found in the Bible. When this happens our spirits become closed to new information that God wanted to teach us on the subject. Here is a God challenge for us all today. Realize that there is more than one truth written in the Bible.
Many of God’s truths found in the Bible are like the threads of a finely woven fabric or tapestry. It consists of many different threads (truths) that all fit together closely so that they overlapped with other threads (truths) and all of these fitted together correctly reveal the picture of God and His Son Jesus Christ correctly. In fact, the Bible is so complex that it is practically impossible for any human alone to fully comprehend everything that the Bible says. This is by God’s design. This causes us all to learn from each other.
But some saying the church is “only” the body of Christ and that’s it, simply closes our minds to anything else that the Lord wanted to teach us about the subject of Jesus and His bride. Also, weaving truths together incorrectly only produces a mixed-up confusing mess of individual truths not fitting together correctly in harmony.
You see, in the Bible God describes the church using many, many different names, titles and descriptions with each revealing several different new characteristics, qualities and features. We are described as “kings” and “priests” (Rev 1:6). In 2 Corinthians 5:12 the church is called “ambassadors” for Christ. In other places in the Bible, we are described as “saints” (Romans 1:7). The church is described as an “army” with armor and weapons (Eph 6:13). We are described as “children” and even “sons” of God in the New Testament. We are called “joint heirs” with Christ in Romans 8:17. In Romans 2:29 the church is called the spiritual “Jews”. In other places in the New Testament like 1 Corinthians 3:16 the church is called the “temple of God”. We could go on and on with other scripture references, but hopefully we get the point.
We can’t take any one of those truths alone and attempt to make it and it alone the entire truth of God’s word. And if we do this, we are in BIG trouble with trying to understand the rest of the Bible. Here is another good question for those who may teach that the church is only the body of Christ and therefore cannot be the bride. How can the church be called “joint heirs” with Christ if we are “Christ’s body”? Wouldn’t that make us the only heir and not a joint heir? Uh oh? That may be a problem that some have not given enough thought to resolve. A “joint heir” with Christ clearly implies a different heir and not the exact same one. So how can the church be joint heirs at the same time they are the Body of Christ?
This is just one example of a very significant puzzle and mystery, that we will get into and solve in this series. Hopefully you are learning a few things from this short introduction. I believe this series was designed by the Holy Spirit to introduce and teach us things in a specific order and sequence to hopefully help everyone more fully understand it. If you desire to know more of the Names, Titles, Descriptions and Symbols for the Church you can go to that lesson and research them in your Bible.
Conclusion
This has only been a short introduction to our subject of identifying the Bride of Christ as being a figurative term for the church. While this subject is controversial, there can only be one true identity of this spiritual woman, even if she is also symbolized by other identifying names, titles and descriptions. There is so much more to learn on this subject, and it is really amazing how much of it is unknown or ignored by many Christians.
If you are like many Christians, there should be a spiritual curiosity to desire to know the truth. Jesus called this being a true disciple in John 8:31-32 that will grow to find His truth. I have diligently sought to have this relationship with Christ intimately to know His truth and I pray you will also. Thank you for taking your valuable time to read and study the Bible with us. If you do not know Jesus Christ, there is a link at the bottom that will help you begin the journey to knowing Him. God Bless you.
If you would like to continue reading this series of lessons, you can continue with “Part 2“.
Gen 3:15 The Seed of the Woman! The Seed of the Serpent!
(Ver 2.6) This is Part 9 in the Bible study series on Understanding Genesis 3. If you have not read the series from the beginning you might benefit from starting at the beginning and reading “Part 1” first. I have given some important key points in the first lesson in the series that is needed for you to understand this lesson completely. This lesson concerns the words spoken to the serpent and you need to understand who this serpent is identified to be in order to understand how to interpret these words in this verse. One of the keywords in my title today is the subject of “seeds”. I have already touched on this subject in other Bible lessons that I have published, but since we are studying in Genesis 3, I feel that this needs to be discussed again so that people will understand it more thoroughly. It is disturbing to me how people can read the Bible and not see what it really says. In my opinion there are too many Christians that don’t have a clue what the Bible actually says. There is a great number of Christians who rely on others to tell them what to believe. If their preacher says it’s true then they are instantly on board with it without studying it for themselves. That kind of attitude has caused a bunch of people in the church to be deceived. Do not believe anything I say or anything anyone else says without you reading it in your own Bible and you seeing it for yourself; you must be able to determine if it is really true for yourself and no one else can do it for you. Here is today’s central Bible verse found in Genesis 3, let’s look at it carefully and consider what God says to us:
Gen 3:15 And I will put enmity between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed; it shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel.
From the context of this scripture we know that God is speaking. This verse occurs after the man and his wife had sinned by eating from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. God is speaking to each participant in the ordeal in the reverse order of mention found in the chapter. If you read all of chapter 3 you will see that Satan (the serpent) is mentioned first, then the woman and finally Adam. But, God comes to the man first, since he is supposed to be in charge of the situation. Did you know if you are just a member of a church that God will not come to you and tell you how to run the church? God always communicates from the top down and not from the bottom up. I just threw that in for good measure; there is no extra charge for any new information that helps you personally. So if you look at this verse God is finally speaking directly to Satan who has initiated the problem. We know that in Chapter 3 of Genesis Satan is referred to in the terms of a symbolic “serpent”. That only means that there was not a literal talking physical snake in the garden during this chapter. If you don’t understand that statement you need to read my lesson on the subject called “Was There A Talking Snake In The Garden“. In that lesson I gave at least 4 sound Bible reasons why there could not be a literal talking serpent. I will not repeat that subject in this lesson to try to prove to you what I have already taught and confirmed with the Bible. If you do not understand there wasn’t a talking physical snake then go and read about it and then come back to study this subject about the seed of the woman. So we can see that God is speaking directly to Satan in reference to a woman. If you automatically try to assume that this woman is Eve, you would be totally wrong. Even though at this point in time Eve is the only physical woman on the planet, we can clearly see that God is speaking of a prophetic woman and this woman has to be a spiritual woman, since Satan is her spiritual opponent. A physical woman is not capable of stepping on the head of a spiritual being. If you think so, you would be wrong again. There are too many distinct differences between natural things and spiritual things for you to think otherwise. Let us start an analysis of the verse by reviewing the nouns in this verse and see what God has said to us. We can see that there are 8 primary nouns given to us in this verse. Here they are in order of mention:
- I (God)
- Enmity
- Thee (Satan, the serpent)
- Woman
- Seed of the serpent
- Seed of the woman
- Head
- Heel
If you look at my list and you study the verse you might notice that I left off two nouns. One being “it” and the other being “his”. These I believe are mistranslated words and do not reflect correctly the true meaning of the verse so I left them off for now. The first noun in Genesis 3:15 is “I” and this is God and God tells us and all the other participants what He was going to do as a result of their actions. This is the first thing that you should recognize, if God says something you can believe it will happen exactly like He said it would. We can see that this is one of the first direct statements of God’s plan of redemption that has far reaching implications. You can also see that this is God’s Will in action. God says “I will” and then tells you what He is going to do or make happen. Now, here is a list of the important verbs found in the sentence:
- Put
- Bruise
We can see that there are far fewer verbs given than there are nouns. Let’s start with the verse’s first verb “put”. We can clearly see that this is something that God says He will do. This word has a meaning “to place”. For example, you can “put” something on a shelf. You can “put” something in the refrigerator. But this verse says God will put something between two other direct nouns. The implication is given that God will change the order of something from one thing to another. You could say a reversal of roles, for example? You could also say this is a division or a separation of one noun from the other noun being separated with something in between. You might see this more clearly if you read my other blogs. What we need to do at this point is see who God is talking to and then to see what was placed between them to cause this separation.
Let’s start by looking at the second noun in Genesis 3:15 and this is “enmity” and this word clearly means “a hatred” or “hostility”. These are words normally between enemies. What we can clearly see at this point is that God says that He will put ”hatred” between the next two nouns. These nouns are of course the “serpent” and the “woman”. You can clearly see that God who has not identified who the woman is, has told Satan that there will be a hatred between him and her. In other words these two will become great enemies who will do battle. These are implied meanings derived from the chosen words and wording from this verse given to us by God Himself. Please note these important items and then notice the next two nouns in the verse. God seems to shift into talking about something new, or does He? I believe what we have here is a new point of view being given but, God is still talking about the same original two nouns. Notice what God says, I will put enmity between you and the woman, between your seed and her seed. So did God change subjects? We are still talking about the same enmity, right? So what makes you think that the “seed” of the serpent is separate from the serpent? Have you ever thought about that? You see if you logically conclude that the enmity is the same between the serpent and the woman as the enmity between the seed of the serpent and the seed of the woman, then you could say that God is still talking about the same two individuals. Let’s look at the very first verse in the Bible that talks about “seed” and see what it reveals to us by the law of first mention:
Gen 1:11 And God said, Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding seed, and the fruit tree yielding fruit after his kind, whose seed is in itself, upon the earth: and it was so.
What we discover is a basic principle of the nature of seeds. A seed is something that when planted produces something else. But it only produces, based upon the law of Genesis “after his kind“. In other words apple seeds produce apple trees and not orange trees. Now here is the really important part of the verse, it says that the “seed is in itself”. In other words you cannot separate the seed from the tree or the fruit; they are considered to be one. An apple tree will produce apples, that have seeds that when planted will cause there to be more apple trees that produce more apples, that have more seeds that go on and on. These are the basic Bible laws surrounding seeds. If you do not understand them you can go read my blog series on “Understanding Seeds”. The principles of seeds are quite simple but the implications are vast and complex. If Genesis 3:15 is talking about the seed of the serpent, you have to go back to Genesis 1 and apply the seed law principles and see that they are considered to be one in the same. The seed of the serpent is in himself. The serpent is representative of a spiritual tree that has fruit with seeds in it. These seeds can be planted and will cause to multiply and grow and become greater in number. Yet this multiplication system still demands that no matter how many that are produced from it, they all originated from the one. If you have never studied the Bible on the subject of “seed” you should because it is a wealth of information. Most everything that God does is based upon a seed principle. Jesus told us a parable of a man sowing seeds and said if you don’t understand this one you will not understand any other.
So let’s go a little further with what a seed is in the relationship to a woman. If you search the Bible you will find some very interesting statements. I’ve heard preachers get up and declare that the “seed of the woman” is Jesus of Nazareth. That would mean that the woman in Genesis 3:15 would have to be Mary. Mary was the physical mother of natural Jesus, yes? Did God ever put enmity between Mary and Satan? I think you are smart enough to see that this does not fit the scriptures that we can read. Then you could say that “the seed of the woman” is Jesus Christ who was raised from the dead and called the firstborn from the dead (Col 1:18). That would mean the woman in Genesis 3:15 is the “Heavenly Jerusalem” who we are told is the spiritual mother of Jesus Christ and the church (Gal 4:26) and I hope you can see that this doesn’t work either. God never put enmity between this woman and Satan. So the seed of the woman cannot be Jesus just from thinking logically along these lines. Before we go any further let me show you a verse in Genesis that I think is the first actual reference to a woman having seed. This will at least establish that a woman can have seed. I’ve heard many ministers say that a woman cannot have seed and that only a man or male has seed and they are thinking of sperm as being the only type of seed there is in the Bible. What people don’t realize is there are many different types of things in the Bible all called seeds. Here is just one of them:
Gen 4:25 And Adam knew his wife again; and she bare a son, and called his name Seth: For God, said she, hath appointed me another seed instead of Abel, whom Cain slew.
Hopefully you can see from this verse of scripture a principle being established. A child that is born of a woman is called her seed. Eve is called the mother of all living human beings since she was the first woman. Given modern DNA research, most have concluded that every human being has originated from this one woman they called “Eve”. This is a basic implementation of the seed principle from Genesis 1. But of course it is more complex than that. Adam and Eve were one flesh, meaning they were one body in the eyes of God. Adam’s sperm or male seed was implanted into his wife, she bore him a child and this child was also their seed. This seed has the potential to reproduce after the original pattern and produce more seed; it is an endless perpetual self-sustaining model of life on this planet. But we know that no matter how many seed are produced, they are still considered to be one with the original model from whom they originated from. Whatever Adam did everyone he produced did, it is a very extensive spiritual and physical law. The sum of the whole is always equal to one. All of the separate and individual parts are still one in the same in the eyes of God. You can learn this principle in the N.T. by reading 1 Corinthians 15:22, where God says “For as in Adam ALL die…”. Did you notice that verse said you were “IN” Adam? That is the powerful concept of the seed being in itself. That means whatever Adam did you also did and that is why death passed upon all humanity by the acts of just one man. This is God’s definition of the natural seed always being within itself, whatever your father did, you did principle. Let me give you another N.T. example of this spiritual and physical seed law:
Heb 7:9 And as I may so say, Levi also, who receiveth tithes, payed tithes in Abraham.
Did you notice that Levi was in Abraham? Whatever Abraham did was what his future descendant Levi, also did. So when did Levi come into the earth? You should look at the genealogies given to us in the Bible and see that Levi was generations away from Abraham, yet Abraham paid tithes and therefore Levi paid tithes. We can confirm this by reading the next verse in Hebrews:
Heb 7:10 For he was yet in the loins of his father, when Melchisedec met him.
Hopefully you understand the principle of seeds a little bit better now. Levi is said to have paid tithes because his great grandfather paid tithes to Melchisedec. Levi a future descendant was in Abraham and therefore whatever Abraham did, Levi did. That is one of the most important things that you can learn from our lesson today and it is certainly indirectly related to our primary subject of who the seed of the woman and the seed of the serpent is in Genesis 3:15.
So let’s approach the subject of the seed of the woman as being Jesus Christ but, from a different perspective. If the seed of the woman is Jesus Christ then who is the seed of the serpent? We know the serpent is Satan, but who is the seed of the serpent? You see you cannot say one type of seed is an individual male child without saying the other is also an individual male child. You must be consistent in your interpretations and not try to make one noun a specific object type and then try to change the definition of the other identical noun to make it to be something else entirely new, do you get it? So if Jesus Christ is the seed of the woman in Genesis 3:15 as many preachers have said, then who can the seed of the serpent be? I do hope you see the logic behind that question. What the Bible says matters, every word and every detail matters and then how you interpret the Bible also matters. If you are not being consistent and treating every word the same, then you are being selective in what you teach and therefore getting it wrong by default. So pay very close attention to every detail; then ask questions. When you read across a detail that you do not understand, start to formulate questions and make notes on them. You never know when you will be reading a verse in the Bible and suddenly realize that you just read the answer to your question you had a few days or weeks ago. So I hope you can see logically that the seed of the woman cannot be Jesus Christ, because we have not named the “seed of the serpent”. Here is another difficulty that I have with saying that Jesus is the seed of the woman, I have not found any verses in the Bible that says that Jesus bruised the head of the serpent. Can you find one? What I discovered in studying the Bible, is that it says Jesus sat down at the right hand of God waiting for His enemies to be made His footstool (Hebrews 10:13). What we learn from this one verse is that Satan (God’s enemy) is not yet completely under the feet of Jesus. Do you get it? So what is God waiting for? So let me ask you again who is the seed of the serpent? Is this Satan’s physical child? I don’t think so. But you have to be consistent, if one seed is a man child you have to make the other seed the same. This is just a basic law of correct Bible interpretation, be consistent and apply what you do equally across the board to each occurrence of the word. If a word occurs twice in one verse interpret them equally.
Getting back to the problem with this KJV translation of Genesis 3:15 I alluded to the fact that two nouns “it” and “his” were mistranslated because some translators thought they were speaking about Jesus Christ and this idea crept into the translation. The word “it” in this verse is a Hebrew feminine word that is actually translated as “her” or “she” many times in the Bible. You can see that in Genesis 3:12 when Adam says “the woman that you gave me, SHE gave me of the tree”. This “SHE” is the same Hebrew word, so SHE is a valid translation for this word. Search your Bible and see it for yourself. Then the term “his heel” does not have an actual Hebrew word associated with it that tells you the actual gender of the owner of the heel. In other words “her heel” would work for this verse equally as well and I believe it could be a much better translation. It totally depends on whose heel we are talking about doesn’t it? Look at your Bible and see if these are true. Is there a Hebrew word for “his” that has a Strong’s definition? I couldn’t find one! So I am convinced based upon other scriptures in the Bible which I haven’t given you here that this verse in Genesis 3:15 should end like this: “she shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise her heel“.
If you need more scriptures I’ll give you a quick synopsis of more evidence from the Bible of who this woman is. In Luke 10:19 Jesus told his church “I give you power to tread upon serpents…“. Reading that verse you have all of the key elements and nouns repeated from Genesis 3:15. You have a woman, who is the church, you have the mention of the serpent who is Satan, and you then have the action verb of stepping on the serpent with your feet. This is just the exact same stuff that we read in Gen 3:15, using different words. I hope you can see it. Then there is another verse that is very critical to understand found in Romans 16:20, “The God of peace shall bruise Satan under your feet shortly…“. Again we have a verse of scripture written to a woman (the Church) whose feet are to be used by God to bruise the head of Satan (the serpent).” You see, these two verses alone tell me that Jesus Christ did not accomplish this already and they confirm to me who is directly prophesied by God to complete this bruising of the serpent’s head. The Church is a spiritual woman, in covenant with Jesus Christ. Here is another perspective to consider, the church is called the “Body of Christ”. Jesus Christ is said to be the Head and the church is said to be His body (Eph 5). Where exactly are the feet located? Are your feet located on your head or on your body? So if God is going to use anyone to bruise the head of the serpent, would He not use His body? It’s not rocket science you just have to read and see what it says.
I have already blogged on most of the rest of this information when I gave you information about the woman in Revelation 12. Maybe I should rehash it again so that you can see it more clearly. You see the Bible in Revelation 12 speaks about a woman and since we are talking about a woman in Genesis 3:15 we should approach this woman as a potential candidate for the prophecy that God has given to us. You do not know it is not this woman do you? What I found absolutely fascinating was all of the clues given to us in Revelation 12 that fit the pattern of the prophecy in Genesis 3:15. First God is talking to the serpent when He prophecies in Gen 3. God actually reveals to us the true identity of the serpent in Revelation 12:9. Knowing this fact alone should give you some clues that God is revealing something that is much bigger in that Genesis 3 and Revelation 12 are related. You should be able to see that Genesis 3 and Revelation 12 are closely related if you study both chapters very closely. In Revelation 12 we have two primary nouns being repeated. These two nouns are the woman and Satan (the ancient serpent). The dragon we are told in Revelation 12:9 is definitely the “old serpent” so we can now see that the woman certainly could be the same woman being prophesied about in Gen 3. Now skip down to the last verse in Revelation 12 and notice another direct mention that is certainly not a coincidence.
Rev 12:17 And the dragon was wroth with the woman, and went to make war with the remnant of her seed, which keep the commandments of God, and have the testimony of Jesus Christ.
So now we have some information that the dragon hates the woman. The dragon is said to be at war with the woman and that makes him and her enemies. What did God say in Genesis 3:15? God said that he would put “enmity” between you (the serpent) and the woman. Again we see some amazing parallels being spoken of. Then here is the real kicker, did you notice that verse in Revelation 12 spoke of the “seed of the woman” again? Satan was at war with the woman’s seed. Do you understand that statement? It certainly sounds like this is the prophesied woman in Genesis 3:15. If you do not understand how the heel and the head of the serpent come into play you need to stop here and go and read my blog on “The True Identity of the Woman in Revelation 12“. Once you realize that the woman in Revelation 12 is standing on the moon with her feet you will begin to understand this is the woman that God spoke of way back in the beginning. I know this is different than anything you have ever heard before, but yet if you can read with your eyes open you will see that it is all true. I pray that this has been a blessing to you and that you will pass it along to someone who can learn from it also. God Bless.
If you would like to continue to read in this series concerning the spiritual subjects hidden in Genesis 3 please go to “Part 10“.
Gen 3:22-24 Guarding The Way To The Tree of Life Pt 2
(Ver 2.1) This is Part 7 in a study series on the subject of Understanding Genesis 3. It is also a continuation of the last lesson concerning the Tree of Life introduced by God in Genesis 2 & 3. If you have not read the Genesis 3 lesson series from the beginning I might suggest that you go and start with verse 1 and read Part 1 first. If you have not read this current subject on the tree of life from the beginning I would suggest that you go and start with “Part 6” first before you study today’s lesson. Studying the Bible is one of the greatest challenges we will ever face in life, God who is a Spirit writes us a book about both natural and spiritual things and we have to be smart enough to discern which words are speaking of which. This is by far one of the greatest challenge and the trickiest methods that God has implemented in this Book to conceal the truth. You can clearly see that God calls spiritual things and natural things by the same name and that He rarely ever tells you which one He is talking about. In my last blog I introduced you to some more complex subjects found in the Bible. We began trying to figure out if the trees in the garden in Genesis 2 and 3, were physical fruit trees or were just symbolic representations of spiritual truths. I am a firm believer that these trees, the tree of the knowledge of good and evil and the tree of life were symbolic spiritual representations. I have a number of reasons for this logical deduction based upon many verses that I have already given to you and then some more we will discuss today. In my last lesson on this subject I also showed how that God places a Cherubim to guard the way to the tree of life and how God was not keeping the way from the man, but from another spiritual being, someone who was interested in obtaining its power and benefits. If you understand compass directions and reading maps you can understand what I showed you last time about the differences between east and west.
Next I also took you to Revelation and showed you in the last chapter the clear reference to the tree of life. It is funny how things from the beginning are repeated in the prophecies of the end. It seems to me that God must have wanted it (the tree of life) to play a major role in His plan if it ends up the way it started. We can see that this information found in Revelation 22 seems to imply we are that tree, that produces fruit and drinks from the river of life flowing from the throne of God, but that is my opinion. Today I want to go through other scriptures found in the Bible that describes this tree. These are the verses that represent God’s commentary on the subject so I place great value upon them. Hopefully we can, by searching the Bible see who or what this tree of life is and who God was keeping from it. If you search your Bible using your computer you will discover around 11 verses that contain a direct reference to this “tree of life”. These three words occur, four times in Genesis, three times in Revelation and four times in Proverbs. It is absolutely fascinating what these verses say to us. We will start with the last verse in the Bible about this tree.
Rev 22:14 Blessed are they that do his commandments, that they may have right to the tree of life, and may enter in through the gates into the city.
In this verse that is written to the church it declares that those who keep God’s Words may have the right to the tree of life. The word “right” here is a very interesting word because it means authority, power, and liberty. But more than that, it can refer to someone who is a potentate, magistrate and superhuman. These are all terms of royal sovereignty and ruler ship; terms given to kings for example. I believe what God is saying is that He wants it to end how it started, but without the influence of evil. To me it goes along with Genesis where God said that Adam could stretch forth his hand (power) and take from the tree of life. God intended the man to eat from this tree of life from the beginning, but Adam made the wrong choice. Now let’s go to the first occurrence in Revelation and see what that verse says to us. Here we find Jesus speaking to the church:
Rev 2:7 He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the tree of life, which is in the midst of the paradise of God.
You see some more valuable information given to us. Jesus is speaking directly to the church and He tells us, that whoever overcomes, to him will be given to eat from the tree of life. Overcoming implies an enemy or opposition force that is opposing us, trying to keep us from eating and partaking of that which was promised. The prize of winning this battle or contest appears to be us eating from this tree of life. That sure seems to be the reward for overcoming these evil forces of opposition. Finally, we see the location of this tree given again. This time it does not contain any reference to or is any way associated with the Garden of Eden. Even though we do not know the actual location of this tree of life we can clearly see its relationship being repeated with it being in the “middle” of the paradise of God. Adam, when God told him of this tree said it was in the middle of the garden. So what was this garden? Where is this paradise? What does it mean to be in the middle? I feel that the term middle could be a symbolic reference to someone who is well centered. Not into the extreme of this or that, but one that holds on to a well-balanced understanding of God’s Word. Of course this is my opinion again and I would hope that you can at least understand how I arrived at that opinion. I would also make this suggestion for you to consider, Jesus when asked about the Kingdom of God always told people it is not here and it is not there, but the Kingdom of God is within you. People wanted to focus on outward things and God wants us to focus on inward things. Inward things would be things associated with the heart and the spirit of man. Keep that in mind when trying to figure out where this paradise of God is located. I believe that God’s garden is within us. We are the garden of God that produces the precious fruit that God places such great value upon that He purchased it with His shed blood.
We can now move to the only other direct references in the Bible to the tree of life and these are found in the book of Proverbs. Proverbs was written by King Solomon and holds great understanding and wisdom from God. This book contains extremely valuable spiritual information about which we need to better understand. I’m going to start with a verse found in the 11th chapter and it goes like this:
Pro 11:30 The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life; and he that winneth souls is wise.
This verse speaks to us about fruit in relation to a tree of life. But did you notice where the fruit was and what type of fruit it is speaking about? The clear implication is given to us that this is a spiritual tree with spiritual fruit. The church is declared to be the righteous ones by faith, in the New Testament (Rom 10:10, 2 Cor 5:21), so we can claim this verse as applying to us directly with great confidence. If we are supposed to produce fruit unto God as it says in Romans 7:4, then what kind of fruit is this that God is looking for? We can clearly assume it is spiritual fruit and that spiritual fruit only grows on spiritual trees. This is the “fruit” of the righteous and this verse says this comes from a tree that has eternal life. I guess I paraphrased that verse a bit, but we will get there eventually so hang in there.
Pro 3:18 She is a tree of life to them that lay hold upon her: and happy is every one that retaineth her.
Here we have another verse which has great spiritual implications. This verse points us to the origin for the fruit that we are supposed to be producing. God’s words are declared to be the spiritual seeds of life. If planted in our hearts and watered correctly it will produce this spiritual fruit. In this verse in Proverbs God speaks about a woman who is symbolic of a spiritual force to be desired. This woman if you look at the context of the chapter is called “wisdom” and “understanding”. To have a sexual relationship with this woman is a covenant act of knowing her. God declares that by knowing “wisdom” and “understanding” you will participate in eating from the tree of life. It is a spiritual system of planting and reaping. God’s word contains all of the essential ingredients necessary to produce this tree of life. It actually says that by us knowing and understanding His word it would cause us to live and eat from the tree of life. But it really says more than that, it implies that we are the trees of life that produces the fruit for God’s glory. It is fascinating that we have read a couple of direct references to the tree of life and that these point us to spiritual things and not to any natural fruit trees in a physical garden. God did make the natural fruit trees, to help us to understand these spiritual concepts, but too many Bible teachers have ignored the spiritual things to focus only on the natural. Let’s continue in Proverbs to the next reference to this tree of life found in chapter 13:
Pro 13:12 Hope deferred maketh the heart sick: but when the desire cometh, it is a tree of life.
Pro 13:13 Whoso despiseth the word shall be destroyed: but he that feareth the commandment shall be rewarded.
Pro 13:14 The law of the wise is a fountain of life, to depart from the snares of death.
Pro 13:15 Good understanding giveth favour: but the way of transgressors is hard.
These words again point us to spiritual things. In verse 12 it declares that “desire” is a tree of life. That to me is an interesting concept. If you look up this word in the Strong’s, we can learn that this word means “lust”. That implies there are certainly good and positive desires and things to lust after. Conversely it means there are bad or evil things that you should not desire to know or participate with. To lust after God and God’s Word are right desires that produce good results. By reading down to verse 14 we can see another reference to the waters of life that flow from God’s throne. These waters are again are God’s words and what He has spoken to us. So within the context of these verses we have a relationship established between the tree of life and God’s words. These are very awesome verses in Proverbs and we are at the last direct mention of the tree of life, given to us in chapter 15:
Pro 15:4 A wholesome tongue is a tree of life: but perverseness therein is a breach in the spirit.
This is probably the most important of all the verses that we have seen so far on this subject. This verse informs us that the words coming out of our mouths produce this tree of life. You see just because God says something good for you in the Bible, does not mean that you have to accept it. You can say something totally opposite to what God has said and you will not benefit from what God has said in any way. What you say is far more important than what you can possibly imagine. What you say affects you personally more than it affects anyone else. What you say personally determines if you are saved or not. If you recall from another verse I gave in an earlier blog, also from Proverbs that says “death and life are in the power of the tongue” and then it says “those who love it will eat the fruit thereof”. We can clearly see that God has given us the choice to live or die based upon what we say. God’s spiritual system is a word based system. Everything that God has done has originated from His spoken words. God’s words have dominion over all other words, but yet they do not overrule the words that you speak. God’s words are ultimate truth, but your words are what are true for you. God does not force His will on anyone. Your will and your words rule your life and determine your destiny. The subject of words in the Bible is probably one of the most important subjects you can study and yet many ignore it and close their eyes to it. Just because you ignore the subject doesn’t mean your words are not working for or against you. The law of gravity works for you regardless of whether you understand it or not; if you do not believe in the law of gravity and step off a tall building you will find that your fall will be met with a disastrous end regardless of your beliefs. It is much better if you cooperate with the laws of nature than if you ignore them. This is the way of spiritual laws found in the Bible also. Be smart enough to learn about spiritual laws and then let them rule your life. Perhaps someday I will get into more depth on this subject of words in a future Blog. I hope that you have been challenged to see these spiritual subjects today in some new light and that they have become more real to your spirit. I have believe that I have given you sufficient evidence that the church is the ones who partake of the tree of life and produce fruit unto God. There are many, many more scriptures in the Bible that speak to this subject and further confirm what I have been attempting to say to you. If you can you should go and search for them and see what they say. God Bless!
If you would like to continue reading the Bible study series on Understanding Genesis 3 please continue to “Part 8“.
Gen 3:22-24 Guarding The Way To The Tree of Life!
(Ver 1.5) This is Part 6 of the Bible lesson series on Understanding Genesis 3. I am going to take this subject out of sequence and teach a 2 part Bible Study series on the Tree of Life first mentioned in Genesis 2. From reaching in this 3rd chapter of Genesis we discover the story of how Eve was deceived by the serpent into eating from the spiritual tree of the knowledge of Good and Evil. Adam then listened to his wife’s voice and he also ate from the same tree. The Bible says Adam was not deceived (1 Tim 2:14) so whatever he did was an intentional rebellious act of disobedience to commit sin. If you have ever studied the Bible, you know that God shows up on the scene and places curses on each party involved in Genesis 3 and I have not taught on these subjects yet. However, we know from scripture (1 Jn 4:12) that no man has ever seen God. This fact would include Adam or 1 John 4:12 is not a true statement from God. So how did God curse everyone without making himself visible to them? That is an interesting point to consider, but since it is not my subject today, I’ll leave it alone for your consideration. Now after Adam’s sin, we have the man and woman in covenant with Satan, the symbolic serpent of old. We can now get to today’s subject from Genesis, guarding the way to the tree of life. Who was God trying to keep from eating from the tree of life? You can make the logical conclusion that if God wanted to guard the way to the tree of life, there must have been someone who was greatly interested in it. You don’t place guards on your garbage piles so it must have been something of great value to someone. So, who was after this tree of life? What exactly is this tree of life? Why is it important to keep it safely out of the hands of someone? So many questions to consider? Let’ start with the 22nd verse of Genesis 3 and see what God says to us:
Gen 3:22 And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever:
I’ve already addressed the 1st part of this verse in another blog so I will not rehash that part of the verse. It is just important to note that God says the man has become like Him, in covenant with good and evil. That is some very powerful information, and it helps give us some foundational information for why God came in the flesh. If you need more information, please go back and read the Blog on “Gen 3:5 You Shall Be As God Knowing Good and Evil!“. Now pay attention to how God ends that verse. God says “because the man might also eat from the tree of life and live forever…”. Then God abruptly stops talking. This is one of the only places in the Bible that I know of where God doesn’t finish His sentence or His thought. God stops talking and leaves us wondering what was He going to say? Based upon the creation account in Genesis 1, we can see that whatever God says happens, so I would venture to guess that God did not want what He was thinking to come to pass so He shut His mouth and stopped talking about it. But that is just my opinion on the verse. But, I do think that is a powerful lesson for us all to learn from.
Let’s briefly address whether this is a physical tree or a spiritual tree. If it was just a physical tree why couldn’t God have just cursed the tree like Jesus did with the fig tree in Mark and bam the tree would not be a problem anymore. You see I do not believe it is a physical tree, with physical fruit. In this verse God says that the man could have “put forth his hand” and taken from the tree. What does that reference invoke in your mind? Most would think that it is speaking of Adam’s physical hand reaching out and picking a natural apple from a natural fruit tree. But I do not believe this is what God is saying. The term “hand” is a reference to power and ability. Adam had the power and ability to eat from the tree even after they had eaten from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. The word hand is a very popular word in the Old Testament. It occurs over 1400 times. Many times it is used in reference to a individual’s power and ability. Here is just one example of this found in the book of Job. Satan is in conversation with God about Job and he makes this statement to God:
Job 1:11 But put forth thine hand now, and touch all that he hath, and he will curse thee to thy face.
You can see the reference here to God putting forth his hand. This is clearly the same terminology used in Genesis 3. Satan was telling God if he used his power to “touch” all that Job had, Satan thought that Job would curse God. Without getting into the story of Job, I will tell you that God did not take anything from Job. God did not hearken to the voice of his wife and do the wrong thing, like Adam did. What I want you to see is the reference that God has a hand that can be stretched forth. If the Spirit of God has a hand it must be spiritual. Just understand the difference between a spiritual hand and a physical hand and both are called a hand. This is one of the trickiest ways God has used to conceal information in the Bible. Speak of spiritual things in natural terms and then challenge your reader to figure it out.
Apparently, Adam had power and ability and was still capable of eating from the tree of life and living forever even after God said he would surely die. Obviously Adam did not understand what had happened, much less how to eat from the tree of life. We know from Genesis 2, that God had commanded the man not to eat from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. But God never said anything about not eating from the tree of life. There appears to be an assumption that eating from the tree of life is good. But now that Adam was in covenant with Satan, what does God do? Who is God attempting to keep from the tree of life?
Gen 3:23 Therefore the LORD God sent him forth from the garden of Eden, to till the ground from whence he was taken.
We can see from this verse that the man and his wife are sent out of the garden of Eden. They are returned to the ground from where he was originally created. Exactly where was that? Where was Adam created in relation to the Garden of Eden? The Bible tells us if you look for it and pay close attention. Let’s go back to Genesis 2 and read:
Gen 2:7 And the LORD God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.
You can clearly see that this is the creation account of the body of Adam. Adam’s body was formed from the dust of the ground. So where was Adam when this occurred? All you have to do is read the next verse and pay attention to the compass directions given.
Gen 2:8 And the LORD God planted a garden eastward in Eden; and there he put the man whom he had formed.
If the garden of Eden is located to the East of where Adam’s physical body was formed, what direction was Adam and Eve returned to after they had sinned? If you guessed back to the West, you would be correct. Why is east and west and these direction so significant? We can begin to ascertain the importance only after reading the last verse in Genesis 3.
Gen 3:24 So he drove out the man; and he placed at the east of the garden of Eden Cherubims, and a flaming sword which turned every way, to keep the way of the tree of life.
So God drives the man out of the Garden and then it says God places a Cherubim at the east of the garden holding a flaming sword to keep the way of the tree of life. Are you beginning to see the paradox? Where did God drive Adam? God put the man and his wife back to the ground where they were created and this was West of the Garden of Eden. So where was the guarding Cherubim placed? They were placed to the East of the Garden. It is so fascinating when you see things correctly, isn’t it? God is obviously not attempting to keep the man away from the tree of life, if he was he would have placed the Cherubim on the West side where the man was.
(North)
(West) Adam ——-> Garden of Eden ——> Cherubim (East)
(South)
I wrote an earlier blog about the differences between the east and the west. I will not rehash all of that, but if you study the earth from the context that Israel is the middle of the world, then east of Israel towards Asia you would see that the religions of the world become increasingly darker and in some countries non-existent. Generally speaking if you move west from Israel you see the majority of the Christian nations in the world being to the West of Israel. Knowing this fact alone should help you see who God is guarding from the way to the tree of life. It is not from the Christians, but it is from the enemy of the church, the devil that God is keeping from the way to the tree of life. If you didn’t realize it, Satan is still looking for a way out of judgment. Eating from the tree of life would by association mean the establishment of a new covenant relationship with those for who it is intended. If you have followed what I showed you earlier you know that by Adam eating from the tree of knowledge of good and evil, it established a covenant between Adam and Satan. So whoever is intended to eat from the tree of life, Satan is looking to get into covenant with to save his rear end. The tree of life is mentioned again in the last chapter of Revelation and this chapter starts with this statement:
Rev 22:1 And he shewed me a pure river of water of life, clear as crystal, proceeding out of the throne of God and of the Lamb.
We can see that this verse describes the throne of God and the Lamb. It declares that there is a river of water of life flowing from the throne. That of course is an interesting concept since Jesus told us in John 7:38, that out of our bellies will flow rivers of living water. Our bellies is referring to our spirits, the true inner man. This reference is about the words that we speak and them being a river of life to others in the world. So the river of life flowing from the throne of God must also be the Words of God.
Rev 22:2 In the midst of the street of it, and on either side of the river, was there the tree of life, which bare twelve manner of fruits, and yielded her fruit every month: and the leaves of the tree were for the healing of the nations.
Revelation 22:2 now directly mentions the tree of life. But did you notice where or what this tree is? It says this tree grows in the middle of the streets around the throne of God. Who walks the streets of heaven? I personally believe this is a reference to Christians. It further says that there are more than one of these trees of life. In fact if you look closely it implies there are many, many trees of life everywhere surrounding the throne of God. If you use your brain a little bit you might be able to see that the implication is given to us, that we are the trees of life. But that might be hard for some to see. Let’s approach it from a different perspective? It says this tree is suppose to produce 12 fruits monthly. Exactly what is fruit? To the natural mid it is just apples, oranges, grapefruits, etc. But to the spiritual mind it is much different. God being a spiritual being is speaking of spiritual trees that produce spiritual fruit. So what are the fruits of the spirit? Oh, that changes everything doesn’t it?
I guess I’ll end this blog here and just leave you hanging. Maybe I have given you some new things to consider and challenged you to think on a higher dimension. God had to guard “the way” to the tree of life from Satan. Satan is still after this tree, but I don’t believe he has a shot at it. You see Jesus said “I am the Way”, so nobody can come to God except Jesus allows him access. Jesus Christ is the only legal way to this tree of life and if you belong to Him, you now have access to this tree of life to produce the fruit of the spirit. I’ll try to continue this in another blog to help expand our understanding of this deep subject.
If you would like to continue reading this series on Understanding Genesis 3 you can go to “Part 7“.
Bible Basics: Recognizing the Voice of God!
(Ver 1.3) This is a inttoduction to an important Bible subject for every Christian to understand on “How to Be Led by the Spirit of God”. I generally don’t get into Bible basics in any great depth. But I realize that there are many people who are new to Christianity so we should try to help them in their spiritual growth. There are so many people who want to hear from God. So many people that want to know that God is real. So many people that want God to speak to them from a cloud or a burning bush. These people want proof that God exists and that He cares. However, the system that God has designed is based upon faith. God purposely hides Himself from our view. God has not revealed himself to us in order to challenge us to believe in the One that we have not seen. But that does not mean that God has not spoken to you. It means only that you probably didn’t know it was God when it happened. So how does God speak to us? Why don’t we hear it normally with our outer ears? We can see that people in the Bible also struggled with this reality and often times questioned God, “Where are you?”. One significant story that has great meaning is given to us in the Old Testament book of 1st Kings. Here we have the story of Elijah the prophet in a struggle with the children of Israel who were rebelling against God and His covenant. Israel would even kill the prophets of God whenever they would bring words of condemnation against them. They didn’t want to hear about their sin or the error of their ways. This resulted in Elijah asking God where are you? How come God who has all power, cannot or will not do anything to stop evil in this world? It is still happening today and people are still asking the same questions. We have murderers, terrorists, child predators, and just a multitude of evil at work in the world today. Why does God not stop any of it? It is a fascinating question, but since it is not my subject I’ll leave it for another blog. Today is about hearing the voice of God. Do you think that God only speaks to a few? Are there any requirements that are necessary for God to speak to you? Or could it be that God is speaking and most people are just not listening or just not hearing His voice? I am a firm believer that God speaks if we will only be quiet and listen.
In the story of Elijah you find some very powerful truths about how God speaks and these can be directly applied to us today. Let’s start by looking at chapter 19 and verse 11 of 1st Kings:
1Ki 19:11 And he said, Go forth, and stand upon the mount before the LORD. And, behold, the LORD passed by, and a great and strong wind rent the mountains, and brake in pieces the rocks before the LORD; but the LORD was not in the wind: and after the wind an earthquake; but the LORD was not in the earthquake:
Here we have a statement that declares a pending interaction between the natural and the supernatural is about to take place. The prophet Elijah is standing before God, but we know from scripture that NO MAN has ever seen God (John 1:18). So we know that God while speaking to us can not normally be perceived by our five physical senses. This verse then declares a strong wind comes with great force. It sounds like a tornado or a hurricane force wind. But the verse says God was not in the wind. That should tell you something about who originates these storms. Then comes a mighty earthquake, but it informs us that God was not in the earthquake. Today in the news a large earthquake leveled Haiti. This was not an act of God either. God was not in the earthquake. As we continue in the chapter we are given more information.
1Ki 19:12 And after the earthquake a fire; but the LORD was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.
Then comes a great fire, but the Lord God was not to be found in the fire either. We can see in these verses some of the greatest natural disasters given to us and each time the Bible clearly says that God did not have anything to do with any of them. It is the mention of these three most destructive forces in our earth system that God teaches us that He is not found in them. But now we are finally told how God comes to us and to speak. The Bible declares that God was found in a “still small voice”. I think that is what trips most people up when desiring to hear from God. God doesn’t speak to them in a thundering voice that knocks them off of their feet and thus they conclude in error that God did not speak. I believe most people are looking for the hugely spectacular demonstrations of God’s power and missing the greater supernatural small things that God does every day to help them. You see when God says something to you, it will be easily overlooked and easily ignorable. Why, because God does not interrupt or do things in a rude or obnoxious manner. God is the ultimate gentleman. God will normally always wait for you to get quite enough to hear before he actually says anything. Then He will normally only speak to you in a really quite whisper. Many times if you are a Christian you will find this voice originating in and near your heart or the center of your spiritual being. Sometimes these words will rise up to your mind as a thought. Many times you will wonder where did that come from? God might tell you not to take a certain flight today. God might tell you not to take a certain way home today. God might tell you to slow down and drive 10 miles an hour slower. These are all just small examples of God trying to keep you out of harm’s way. God knows that an accident will occur at a specific time and place, because of a drunk driver and if you only turn one block sooner than normal you would miss it. The problem is people don’t understand that these things are from God and they ignore them and follow their own agenda and normal routines. Then when they are laying in the hospital they ask God why did you let this happen to me? Most of the time if they would just think back and analyze what they were thinking before it happened they would understand that God was trying to stop it.
Too many times people are wanting some spectacular sign. They want the earth to open up or the clouds to part. They want a bright light to shine down from heaven or an angel to suddenly stop them from getting hurt. Most of the time God refrains from the spectacular demonstrations of His power, in order to get you to hear this quite whisper. If you learn that this is God’s Modus Operandi, you could possibly be saving your life from a tragic outcome. Evil has a covenant right to be in this world, until the time comes when Adam’s allotted time period expires. We are truly almost there, the end of the age is very near. I hope you will begin to pay close attention to the still small voice and then learn to obey it. Many times it is called intuition. Just a knowing, that I should do this and not that. Other times it will be a whisper to do this. Learning to hear from God involves you learning how God speaks. Then it involves you learning to listen. These are valuable truths that will help you tremendously if you learn to recognize and follow them.
If you would like to continue reading about How to Be Led by the Spirit of God you may go to “Part 1” in the series.
Gen 3:5 You Shall Be As God Knowing Good and Evil!
(Ver 2.2) This is Part 5 in the series about Understanding Genesis 3. The Bible has so much information in it, it is challenging just to know what to teach. Genesis 3 is about the spiritual downfall of Adam and Eve. But there are a number of other good lessons to learn from this chapter also. I am shocked sometimes at how people don’t see what the Bible really says and I think today will be another example of that. You can tell if you have read my blogs on Genesis that we are faced with a challenge by God to recognize the difference between spiritual things and natural physical things being described to us. Many times men tend to look at everything in the Bible naturally, but since the author of the Bible is a Spirit, God’s perspective is the only one that should count. Most of the time wrong interpretations of the Bible revolve around private interpretations from the natural minds of men. But, if we use the Bible to help us determine the true meanings, we are far more likely to get it right. In my last blog on Genesis I talked about spiritual fruit being different than natural fruit. I gave you several scriptures that declare that it is not what we eat physically that causes us to sin. We can therefore conclude that God did not command Adam and Eve to not eat of a natural physical fruit tree in the Garden. We can further conclude that God when He was speaking of not eating of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil, was telling them not to eat of a spiritual tree. If you didn’t realize it, God is more concerned with spiritual things than He is with natural things. People want you to save the planet, save the trees, save the environment, save the whales, etc., but God wants us to produce spiritual fruit and become a mature Christian, to be a laborer and to help prepare for His spiritual harvest. So when we read the Bible we need to become more spiritually aware and less naturally focused. Focus only on spiritual things in context with the subject given. Recognize how God applies natural things to give us glimpses into the spirit world.
Today I want to expand on verse 5 in Genesis 3. This verse has some profound truths written in it, that I believe we need to understand. This verse is Satan, the symbolic serpent speaking to the mind of Eve. If you didn’t know the serpent was a symbolic representation for a spiritual being, then you need to read my blog, “Was There a Talking Snake in the Garden?” Many times people overlook what Satan says because he is called the father of lies and they don’t realize that Satan will use the truth, if he thinks it will work to his advantage. Satan actually knows more truth than you do, that is why he can lie so well. Here are the words of Satan spoken to the mind of Eve as a thought:
Gen 3:5 For God doth know that in the day ye eat thereof, then your eyes shall be opened, and ye shall be as gods, knowing good and evil.
Satan is of course very presumptuous to think that he knows what God knows. I do believe that God taught Satan everything that Satan knows, however, I do not believe that God taught him everything that God knows. I think people need to learn that lesson, if they don’t learn anything else in this blog. We then see a statement that declares that their eyes would be opened. I would hope that you could see that Satan was not speaking of their physical eyes, but Satan was referring to their spiritual understanding. Here is a scripture from the New Testament which speaks to us along these lines:
Eph 1:18 The eyes of your understanding being enlightened; that ye may know what is the hope of his calling, and what the riches of the glory of his inheritance in the saints,
Our spirits have the ability to see, perceive or as it says in this verse to understand. To see with our spirits is the ability of our spirits to understand the spiritual truths being spoken to us. The term is repeated to us in this verse “to know”. Isn’t that what Satan said to Eve? Satan told Eve that they would “know” good and evil. So what does this Hebrew word translated as “know” mean? If you have been reading my blogs you already understand the answer to that question. To “know” something is a covenant term. To know something represents an intimate sexual knowledge. God uses this same Hebrew word when He describes “Adam knew his wife and she had a son”. To “know” someone is to be in covenant with that individual. So what was Satan telling Eve? According to the wording and the underlying meaning, Satan said to Eve you will be just like God, in covenant with good and evil. I know I probably lost several readers with that statement, but if you keep reading in the chapter you will see that God did not contradict that statement, but He actually confirms it. You see if this was a lie or a deception of Satan, then God had the opportunity to confront the lie when He was talking to each of the participants after Adam had sinned. But, never do you see any confrontation or rejection of that statement in the chapter discourse. As you continue in the chapter you actually see that God confirms what Satan said to Eve in verse 22:
Gen 3:22 And the LORD God said, Behold, the man is become as one of us, to know good and evil: and now, lest he put forth his hand, and take also of the tree of life, and eat, and live for ever:
I should probably go back and address one modification that I made to the verse 5 translation before I talk about this verse 22. In verse 5 the word “gods” is the Hebrew noun “Elohiym”. This is a plural word that is often times used for one of the names of God. God being a triune being is a plural being and not a singular one. It is a complex paradox that God is directly called three personalities, but is still just one God. In contrast there are many gods, but there is one “Elohiym”, the Supreme God. In the first chapter of Genesis, this word “Elohiym” is translated as God around 26 times. So the KJV translators instead of making this word say “God” as they did the majority of other places in Genesis, they chose to make it say “gods”. But the problem with that reasoning was Adam and Eve were already gods, but they were gods that only knew good and not evil. The only thing that Adam and Eve would gain from eating this spiritual fruit was the covenant with evil and what a dumb mistake that was. So translators got the word wrong in verse 5 and focused in on the wrong noun. Instead of saying Adam and Eve were “elohiym” (gods) they should have just made it say “God”.
So why did I have to go into all of that explanation? Because if the translators would have just put these two verses, 5 and 22 together correctly they would have seen what God said in verse 22 “Look, the man has become like Me!”; in covenant with good and evil. God actually repeats exactly what Satan said would happen, so it could not have been a lie. God declares that Adam was now in covenant with evil and therefore we can determine based upon our knowledge of Bible covenants, Satan was now married to man. Whatever Adam was given was now given equally to Satan. There are many verses in the Bible that confirm this statement; I’ll give you one found in the temptation of Jesus:
Luk 4:5 And the devil, taking him up into an high mountain, shewed unto him all the kingdoms of the world in a moment of time.
Here in the temptation of Jesus by Satan, Satan takes Jesus on a mental journey to the top of a very high mountain on earth. On the top of this mountain Satan shows Jesus all the kingdoms of this world. That would include every race, creed and inhabitant of the planet. There was nothing omitted or left out so that goes along with a true Bible covenant relationship between the two parties Adam and Satan. Then after showing Jesus these kingdoms, Satan makes this statement:
Luk 4:6 And the devil said unto him, All this power will I give thee, and the glory of them: for that is delivered unto me; and to whomsoever I will I give it.
We can clearly see that in Luke 4:6, Satan tells Jesus all of this which I just showed you has been given to me, and I have the power to give it to whoever I want. These were all true statements and Satan thought that he was in control of the situation, but God had a different plan. Now let me give you one more example of what I am saying found in 2 Corinthians:
2Co 4:4 In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them which believe not, lest the light of the glorious gospel of Christ, who is the image of God, should shine unto them.
You see God shows us that one of Satan’s titles is “the god of this world” in this verse. Or actually I should say that this is the title that Satan stole from Adam and God just informs us of this. Adam when he was created was given dominion over all of the creation of God’s handy work. You can read this in the 1st chapter of Genesis as well as verses found in Psalms. God transferred complete control and responsibility over the planet to Adam and in effect made him the “god of this world system”. Adam had complete control over his own destiny and whatever he decided carried the decision for every one that descended from him. So after Adam dies, Satan becomes the “god of this world system”. Jesus gives us some very strong insight into this spiritual transaction between Adam and Satan in the book of John:
Joh 10:1 Verily, verily, I say unto you, He that entereth not by the door into the sheepfold, but climbeth up some other way, the same is a thief and a robber.
You can see from this statement a very powerful spiritual truth being revealed to us. Jesus is telling us that Satan did not enter into our world legally. He took advantage of Adam and Eve and entered in the world that God had given to them by deception. Jesus is calling Satan a thief that has robbed someone of something that didn’t belong to him. Jesus was also contrasting His presence on the earth as being legitimate, while Satan’s presence on the earth as being illegal. You see God could not come to the earth the same way that Satan did and just take back everything that was given to Adam, without being called a thief and become just as guilty as Satan. So we can see a puzzle being revealed to us. Jesus says whoever enters into the world by the door is legitimate. So what is this legal door into this world? It is only being born here by a natural woman that has given birth to you, and that makes you legally here. You have to be a direct descendent of Adam and Eve to be here legally. God is so very tricky and smart. God knew that He could come into the world and pay for our salvation, if He came as a son of Adam. So we have a man that was born into this planet that was both 100% man and 100% God and this was legal. So I got off track giving you some insight into Satan’s illegal entry and God’s legal introduction into our world. So let’s go back to Genesis and look at this covenant relationship.
What are the spiritual implications given to us from what we just learned? A Bible covenant relationship represents a marriage in the eyes of God. So Adam became married to Satan. Whatever God had given to Adam now belonged to Satan. After Adam’s death, Satan had complete control of it all. A converse truth was whatever Satan had now belonged to Adam, and that was really not a good trade. Adam was originally created to know only good, the things that God had provided for him. But now whatever happens to Satan will happen to Adam and vice versa. Fortunately for us, God had a plan of salvation that would destroy the works of the devil and make a separation from all the consequences that Satan now faces in the future. As soon as the prophesied 6000 year time table of Adam’s dominion is up, Satan will be cast out along with those who are now in covenant with him. The time is very short, and Satan knows his time of reigning on this earth is almost ended and guess why he is so very angry with the church. Lucifer who was once second only to God himself will not enjoy his eternal destiny.
We can see from a previous blog a conformation given to us in these verses in Genesis 3. God is in covenant with the angelic beings. This would include the good and the evil ones. In one of my last blogs I showed you that death is a legal separation of a covenant marriage relationship. Because of the death of the Lord Jesus Christ, God’s covenant relationship with evil was terminated. Through the resurrection of Jesus Christ, our salvation was confirmed. All of those who believe in Him will be saved, but all of those who do not will be damned with Satan. It is a covenant reality, you are either joined to Jesus Christ and one with Him, or you are joined with Satan and one with him. These are powerful truths and help to explain a lot of the hidden things found in the Bible.
I know I teach a lot of new things, that you have probably never heard anyone teach before. The disciples in the Bible made a statement that is very profound, they said “Silver and Gold have I not, but such as I have give I thee”. Just as the disciples could only give what they had, I can only give you what I have. This is just a simple but basic Bible truth; everyone gives from only what they have. I hope and pray you enjoyed my Bible lesson today and grasped something from it that you can hold on to. If you liked it please share it with others that can also benefit from knowing the truth. God Bless.
If you would like to continue in the lesson series on Understanding Genesis 3 please proceed to Part 6.
A Modern Example of Deception to Avoid in the Church – Part 3
(Ver 1.2) This is now “Part 3” in a Bible study series about Christians that follow other Christians blindly without confirming what is being taught in the church is really the truth that the Bible teaches. These are examples that no real Christian should follow. In fact these are examples for Christians to greatly avoid becoming. If you have not read from the beginning of this series you may like to go read from “Part 1” first. But know this Bible study is not dependent upon a previous lesson to be understood and applied. Our subject in this lesson series concerns traps and tricks of deception that Satan uses to get Christians to not know or believe the truth. These are examples that need to be understood so that we don’t fall for them.
We can all learn from positive or negative examples. The Bible is full of both types of people. God wrote the Bible this way to teach us that we are all humans that make mistakes. But He also does this so that we can learn not to repeat their mistakes. Perhaps you recall the classic quotation of Edmond Burke “Those who do not know history are doomed to repeat it”. This is a wise saying because it is much wiser to learn from someone else’s mistake rather than to repeat it and reap the same consequences.
INTRODUCTION
Hopefully you should know that I do not enjoy criticizing others and it is my goal to never name any names in what is written. I have learned that there are no perfect people in the world and everyone including me, has made mistakes. But today I want to give an example of a Christian that was living an example that all should avoid. I want to address a stereotypical group of Christian people that are good examples of people doing very unbiblical things. It seems within this Christian group a large portion of these people believe things and even do things blindly without any scriptural basis for their beliefs. In other words they automatically believed in doing something that they were taught in their church without finding out if it is really true. For too many it actually goes much further than that. If they do accidently find out the truth about something in their Bible that disagrees with what they have been taught, they choose to ignore it and refuse to believe it. In other words they put more faith in their deceived church teacher than they do their God and their Bible. That just seems very dangerous to me. How do you know that your church teacher is not another Jim Jones or a David Koresh leading you into a path of deception, destruction and death? Some people want to trust and place all of their faith in a human teacher because of their admiration for their outward looks. We having people in the U.S. voting for people to be president because they like the way they look. Who cares what they stand for or if they are telling us the truth, he is just so good looking. Wow what a deception that is taking place. This is not what the Bible teaches us to do. Read this verse and see what made these people more noble Christians:
Act 17:11 These were more noble than those in Thessalonica, in that they received the word with all readiness of mind, and searched the scriptures daily, whether those things were so.
Here we have a story written by Luke where it describes Paul who wrote 2/3 of the New Testament preached to two groups of people. The first group called “Bereans” were described to be more noble that the second group called “those in Thessalonica”. I guess Paul named names and maybe I should also. But the Bereans do not follow Paul’s teachings blindly. The wise listeners to God’s teachers proved everything that was being taught by searching for them self in their own scriptures in order to prove if they were true or not. That is what I ask you to do also. Don’t believe anything that comes from me blindly. Get your own Bible, your own computer, phone or tablet and search to prove if it is really what God is saying to you. The Bereans were positive examples to follow after but let us move to a modern negative example to avoid.
A MODERN CHURCH EXAMPLE TO AVOID
As soon as I start describing this negative example church to avoid you will probably know who I am talking about. So even though I am telling you who it is, it will probably be very obvious and I really don’t know how to avoid this. In speaking with someone the other day they told me about a conversation that they had with their Christian friend. The conversation was about a Bible subject that everyone should know of. If you have been a Christian for long or you were raised in this church, you know exactly what we are about to learn. Hopefully you have already abandoned this teaching and moved far from the deception that is still being taught.
Blindness is defined as a person’s inability to see the light and this is true for physical or spiritual blindness. Sometimes the light is too bright and it forces some people to close your eyes. Many times our eyes have to adjust to different levels of light intensity before we can see things clearly. But sometimes people see the bright light of what the Bible says and then they just choose to close their eyes to it. They reject God’s bright truth for what they have chosen to believe called man’s traditional teachings. Jesus warned us in Matthew 15:6 that our “traditions can nullify the commandments of God”. To me that does not sound good.
People embrace traditions because of their trust in their teachers and their church. This is just wrong deceived behavior. And this type of behavior confirms the scripture that says “In whom the god of this world hath blinded the minds of them that believe not…” (1 Cor 4:4). You can discover how successful Satan has been in blinding someone, by observing how they react to new Bible truth when you present it to them.
So here we go! In a recent conversation with a friend someone told me that the subject of Mary the mother of Jesus came up. It seems that this deceived person had been taught that Mary is still a virgin and that she was at the same level of importance as her Son, Jesus. This would mean that Jesus didn’t have any brothers and sisters on the earth and that Joseph (her husband) never had sex with his wife. I really do not understand the reasoning or logic behind this belief of the departure of common sense at all. Not only is this a direct contradiction to what the Bible says, it would defy basic human needs created by God. For example, a man not being able to touch his wife after marriage is not normal behavior. We will soon learn that this also goes against what the Bible says about healthy marriage relationships.
The net results of this type of church teaching was the deification of a human woman. Mary now becomes a spiritual being that we are to pray to and can ask to talk to God for you. Mary has been exalted beyond human creation and now becomes the path way to God and equal with God. Now people can say instead of Jesus being the only path to God they have been deceived into believing their are other ways to reach Him. You see I’ll tell it to you very straight, if you are praying to Mary, Mary IS NOT LISTENING. Mary is NOT GOD! Mary can’t hear you. Mary does not appear to people in the world today. Mary could very well be in heaven and could be in the presence of God right now, but there is no way that she is in control of anything or can do anything to affect your outcome or situation here on the earth. This is a deception from Satan and a way that he uses to distract people from the truth of praying to God correctly to get an answer.
I can be very blunt at times and I’m sorry. Sometimes I think you have to shock people in order to get their attention. I guess it is also possible that people don’t realize that the Bible contains God’s words spoken directly to you and I and we need to learn what He says and not a theory being taught to us in a church. If Christians do learn the truth to know and understand it, and still reject it, then they need to know that they are also rejecting the True God Himself. So let’s go through the Bible and see what God said on the subject of Mary:
Mat 1:20 But while he thought on these things, behold, the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a dream, saying, Joseph, thou son of David, fear not to take unto thee Mary thy wife: for that which is conceived in her is of the Holy Ghost.
We know from several verses found in the Bible that Mary was a virgin girl and that the Spirit of God came upon her and she conceived a child. Mary was a normal human female when she was visited by the angel with God’s message. But she was special in that she qualified to be in the right place at the right time with the right genealogy to be used by God. It was important that Jesus be born of a virgin, since He was the Only Begotten Son of God. I really do not want to attempt to explain all of the theological reasons for the virgin birth in this lesson. If you do not understand these I would strongly suggest you find the lessons on this website about the virgin birth and study them in depth. Continuing to read in Matthew the 1st chapter we see that the angel of the Lord appears to Joseph in a dream also and tells him it is still God’s plan for him to marry this woman named “Mary”. He is informed that this child is from God and not from another man and then we are told this statement:
Mat 1:25 And knew her not till she had brought forth her firstborn son: and he called his name JESUS.
You see in this verse there is a specific reference to sex. This verse tells us directly that Joseph did not have sex with Mary “UNTIL” after she gave birth to Jesus. That means she remained a virgin woman “until” after the birth of her firstborn son that they named “Jesus”. But this statement also means Joseph had sex with her (aka knew her) sometime after Jesus was born. If you want to ignore the Bible for your personal beliefs, then go right ahead and abide in your ignorance. The term “knew” her is a sexual reference. In Genesis 4:1 Adam “knew” his wife and they had a son. This sexual relationship between a husband and a wife is a normal part of the system that God created. To “Know” is a term that means to have carnal knowledge of, to be intimately physically connected with them and literally means sexual intercourse. It clearly means that Joseph was intentionally permitted to have sex with his wife Mary after Jesus was born, but not before. Why was this? Once a woman is pregnant you can’t get pregnant again? I guess I won’t attempt to elaborate on the why, for now. We can clearly see in other verses in the Bible that Joseph did have sex with his wife because it names some of their children. Here is a verse that speaks about Jesus and His earthly family.
Mat 13:55 Is not this the carpenter’s son (Joseph)? is not his mother called Mary? and his brethren, James, and Joses, and Simon, and Judas?
We can see that these people clearly think that Jesus was Joseph’s son. They did not know that Jesus was not his son, they just assumed it based upon how they lived as a family unit together in a traditional household. Joseph is called the carpenter so Joseph was a normal man that had a normal occupation. As far as we can tell Joseph being a normal male would have had normal male sexual desires. So far we see all the aspects of a normal earthly family. Then we are given the names of 4 other males that are called Jesus’ brothers. These four are called James, Joses, Simon, Judas.
Now here is another plan of Satan deception where people are used to try to explain away what we can all read in the Bible. Satan uses our desires for our traditions to establish our beliefs of truth. This deceptive reasoning is that there were no Greek or Hebrew words for cousins, so they conclude that these brothers were actually Jesus’ cousins. Using this perverted logic they can preserve the virginity of Mary and continue to exalt her to a god. That is another example of ignorance gone to seed and growing into multiplied tricks of the devil. Truth always builds upon Truth and lies must be built upon other lies and the cycles usually never cross paths.
Just because the Bible does not have a word for cousin does not mean there are other ways of stating the truth if it was His cousins. If God wanted us to believe that these named men were Jesus’ cousins he could have said His mother’s brother’s sons or He could have used the Greek word G4773. This word was used by the Holy Spirit in Luke 1:36 to describe Mary’s cousin Elizabeth. There are certainly more than one way in the Greek and Hebrew words to describe relatives in the correct terms if God wanted to say something besides “brothers”. God used the Greek word G80 and this word means a “brother”. No you see people want to make Mary their god so they invent reasons to dispel what the Bible teaches for what they want to believe. If we continue on to the next verse we also discover more information about this family of Joseph:
Mat 13:56 And his sisters, are they not all with us? Whence then hath this man all these things?
In Matthew 13:56 we are not only told that Jesus had 4 half brothers, we are also told that he had sisters. We are not told how many, just that there were more than one. So apparently Joseph had a lot of sex with his wife over the years. We can clearly see that Jesus had at minimum 6 half brothers and sisters. If we think logically we can calculate that Jesus was approximately 30 years old when this verse was written. That means Joseph and Mary were potentially a husband and wife for 30 years. During this time period if they only had 6 children that would be pretty amazing in a era of no birth control or abortion. However, we do not know what happened to Joseph, he becomes obscure and hidden from mention after Jesus’ twelfth birthday. So even in a 12 year period to only have 6 children would be amazing. That would be one new brother or sister almost every other year.
Satan is very tricky. His methods of deception are very subtle. Most of the time Satan does not come at us with direct and obvious lies, but he likes to introduce little nuances to the truth to get us to focus on something else other than what God says. The Jewish leadership was tremendously guilty of doing this. They would take the laws of God and add to them. The Jewish leadership would write their own rules, thinking that if they followed all of these added rules, there would be no way that they would break God’s laws. Jesus called this the leaven of the Pharisees (Luke 12:1). This would represent a combination of untruths together with some truths. Satan likes to intermix some of the truth with some subtle lies in order to dilute the pure and render it ineffective. This is still one of the greatest deception techniques of the enemy today and everyone in the church is faced with these same issues.
There are so many churches that teach a watered down version of the Bible. There are way too many preachers and teachers that interject their opinions instead of just teaching the Words of God. If you go to a church that teaches something that the Bible doesn’t say, you are subtly being deceived and totally distracted from knowing the truth. Jesus taught us that it only takes a little bit of leaven to corrupt the whole loaf of bread. I have heard this truth taught and I agree with it whole heartedly. If you want to poison a dog you don’t throw them pure arsenic. You wrap the arsenic up in a steak so that they do not realize they are being poisoned. This is the trap of the enemy and a standard ploy of effective deception. Give the listener a bunch of what they want to hear and then mix in the lies a little bit at a time so that they are hard to recognize. People fall for this more than you think. It is all over the internet, it is all over some church pulpits.
You see this friend that believed Mary was good to pray to, would probably not read a book like Dan’s Brown’s “Da Vinci Code” because it is a totally opposite approach at deception. The Da Vinci Code is a totally fictitious book of lies with just a little bit of truth mixed with it. So while my friend was smart enough not to read that kind of material, they were easily deceived when someone just mixed in just a little fiction with a bunch of truth. I think there are many Christians who need to learn these lessons. Stay away from the Harry Potter CRAP! The Twilight Saga is another good example of material to avoid like the plague. If you are allowing your children to participate in these dangerous forms of entertainment you are making a huge mistake.
CONCLUSION
So this is a lesson about our next type of deceived Christian to avoid becoming. Learn how Satan is working to deceive others and implement safeguards to not repeat examples of failed behaviors. Read your Bible for your self. Study to show your self approved a workman that needs not to be ashamed. Prove everything that is heard in church with your own scripture research. Look for at least 2 or 3 verses that prove what was sad is actually what is true in God’s Word. Then go and search for verses that could contradict what was said. Study, study and study the Bible! And Pray, Pray and Pray! That is the only way that anyone will not be deceived.
Let us all pray for my friend and for friends you may know. Maybe you know some Mormon people. They are some of the nicest deceived people that I have ever met in my life. Whoops I named a name of a cult church. But this is important to know. These people have disregarded the Bible for a book called the “Book of Mormon” that they say came by special Revelation from Joseph Smith in 1830. Mormons call people who only read the Bible deceived but I say people who add to the Bible their own books to take away from reading the real are the ones that are deceived. So let us learn to avoid other books that try to take us away from the Bible also. Anything that distracts you from the Bible is a lie and trick of deception. Let us pray for these people.
LORD, we come boldly to the throne of Grace to ask for your mercy for ________ (add name). I pray that you will open their spiritual eyes of their understanding to have the ability to see and know the truth (Eph 1:17). Satan I bind you from blinding their minds and command you to release your hand deception from their life and mind (Mat 16:19). I repent for every sin that can be used to hold them in deception and ask that it be covered by the blood of Jesus to cleanse them from all unrighteousness in their heavenly record (1 Jn 5:16). I ask you LORD to send forth a laborer across their pathway as you commanded us to pray in Matthew 9:38 so that they may hear the Gospel of Jesus Christ clearly to receive the truth. In Jesus name I pray. Amen.
Thank you for reading and studying the Bible with us and we are blessed to hear from you and everything the Lord is doing in your life. God Bless you until the next lesson.
PERSONAL APPLICATION
LORD, I thank you because I have the mind of Christ. The Spirit of the Living God abides in me. He is my great Shepherd and I hear and know His voice. I am led by the Spirit of God only and the voice of a stranger I will not follow. Thank you for keeping far from deception by granting me the ability to spiritually discern the difference between right and wrong, truth and lies and good from evil. If there is any time when someone is attempting to distract me with an untruth, bring to my remembrance a Bible verse that will clear any confusion. Thank you for saving me and filling me with your precious Holy Spirit and I love you because you first loved me. In Jesus name I pray, Amen.
If you would like to continue to read in this series about avoiding deception, please go to “Part 4“.
Understanding Bible Covenants! Part 5 Until Death Separates Me from Thee!
(Ver 2.3) This is now Part 5 in the advanced study series on Understanding Bible Covenants. If you have not read from the beginning, I would recommend that you go and start with “Part 1“. We have been discussing Bible covenants as being a marriage covenant relationship between two individuals. We can see that these individuals can be either spiritual beings, natural beings individuals or groups or any combination of them. Covenants with God always result in God being the husband and the people in covenant as being the wife in the relationship. We know that Jesus is the mediator of the New Covenant (Heb 12:24). Jesus is therefore the Bridegroom and the church is His bride. Many have agreed with the scriptures in the New Testament that declare the church to be the body of Christ without understanding how the church became the body. This transformation was accomplished by marriage, when God declared in Genesis “that the man shall leave his father and mother and cleave to his wife and they two will become one flesh”. One flesh is a synonymous term for one body. Therefore one flesh refers to one body. A body consists of flesh and bones. Adam was opened up and his wife was taken out of him and Jesus the Last Adam was opened up and His wife was joined to him on the cross. The Bible actually says we were crucified with Christ, yet none of us hung on the cross physically as He died.
So in the eyes of God a covenant is a marriage and a marriage is a covenant. I gave you many scriptures that confirm this reality. As a marriage God provided us natural things to help us to understand spiritual things. Marriage covenants are a complex system of many dependent and interrelated aspects. Sex is one aspect of a marriage that demands and expects faithfulness of those in the relationship. Faithfulness is an essential aspect of marriage that applies to a covenant relationship with God. As your spouse trusts and expects you to be faithful to them, God expects and trusts you to be faithful to Him.
We can clearly see that the natural nation of Israel was not faithful and as a result had spiritual intercourse with other gods, religions and idols. This unfaithful infidelity resulted in God divorcing His Old Covenant wife. The net result of the divorce was a termination of the marriage/covenant relationship without any hope of reconciliation. I base that statement on the law of divorce given to us in Deuteronomy 24 where it says the first husband is forbidden to marry his divorced wife again after she has been married to another. I then attempted to give several scriptures that showed that Israel according to established spiritual laws was in a covenant relationship to another spiritual being other than God.
These are all very deep things that God has taught us from the Bible and I know it will be difficult to get people to see them. It is not my responsibility to make you understand or to make you see the truth. I simply present the information found in the Bible the best that I can and it is up to you to prove it, accept it or reject it. That is the way God designed the system and I can’t improve on it. I have found that people can read the same verse of scripture and pull out whatever they want to hear and close their eyes to whatever they don’t agree with. It is funny that God wrote a book that allows people to believe wrong. God will always enforce our right to be ignorant and foolish. God never forces us into knowing the truth. We are free to act and believe foolishly and God will not stop us. Ok, let’s get back to our subject.
I know there are many other aspects of marriage that also apply to the subject of covenants and perhaps someday I will expand to include them in this teaching. A marriage covenant is the establishment of a new family unit. Marriage always results in a new household, with a new head of the house. These two married covenant individuals enjoy a sexual knowledge that is only experienced between the two in covenant. Physical sex is just a pattern of a spiritual knowledge that Jesus desires to have with His wife. I showed you earlier that Adam “Knew” his wife and they had a son and I told you this was a pattern for the Last Adam, Jesus and his wife. These are all new concepts, new ideas and new thoughts based upon a new perspective from God’s Word. You can read the Bible and study it for yourself. All of this has been a review of stuff that I have already covered so I hope you understand them.
UNTIL DEATH DO US PART!
In this lesson we want to explore another aspect of marriage and covenants to show us some new information based upon what we have learned about the subject so far. This section will be about the subject of death as a legal separating force/power that terminates a covenant relationship between two legally bound parties or individuals. I’d like to begin this section with the foundational verses from the book of Ruth:
Rth 1:16 And Ruth said, Do not beg me to leave you, to return from following after you. For where you go, I will go. Where you stay, I will stay. Your people shall be my people, and your God my God.
Rth 1:17 Where you die, I will die, and there I will be buried. May Jehovah do so to me, and more also, if anything but death parts you and me.
These are covenant words being spoken by Ruth to her mother-in-law Naomi. Ruth pledges “faithfulness” to the God of her mother-in-law Jehovah. She places such a strong commitment that she claims that only death could separate her from the God and religious ways of over mother-in-law. If we read the rest of the book of Ruth and the genealogy of Jesus in Matthew we will discover that she is blessed and rewarded by God tremendously for making these covenant statements of commitment. She becomes the wife to Boaz, a type of Jesus Christ, and the great-grandmother to the great King David.
I believe this is a good time to introduce the fact that Bible covenants are entered into by speaking words. Words can be spoken to initiate a good covenant with God or an evil covenant with Satan. For example, if we read Romans 10:9-10 God informs us how we entered into a covenant with Jesus Christ by believing in Our heart and confessing with our mouth the LORD Jesus. Then in Proverbs 6:2 God informs us that humans are taken captive prisoners by also speaking words. In Proverbs 18:21 God declares that “life and death are in the power of our tongue”. Jesus informed us in John 10:10 that the thief came to kill, steal and destroy us, but that He came to give us life and that life in more abundance. God appears to be teaching us that our words spoken matter.
Knowing God gives us life and knowing Satan gives us the sin punishment of death (separation from God). Speaking right words are one key part of entering into Bible covenants wit God. These words can be called vows, promises, commitments, oaths, pledges or guarantees. Speaking words and entering into covenant relationships with anyone should be taken very seriously and never lightly or casually. I believe that God holds us responsible for our promises made to Him and to each other. There are numerous examples of this found in the Bible.
For example a famine of three years occurred to the nation of Israel in 2 Samuel 21:1-2. When David inquired of the LORD why this was happening, the LORD told him it was because of bloody Saul that attacked and killed the Gibeonites. God informs King David that Israel had made a covenant with these people a long time before. God obviously believed that this covenant that was made before Saul or David was born was still in effect and could not be terminated by either of the parties in the covenant. Therefore, judgement fell upon the natural nation of Israel for something that happened long before King David became king. Wow, this sounds very important to know in our education of understanding the serious nature of Vows and covenants. The covenant was entered into by Joshua and it was disavowed by Saul and the negative consequences fell upon Israel during King David.
Most modern marriage ceremonies include speaking words to each other. These words are often called “vows” and many of them are based upon Bible covenant principles. For example, many say “until death do us part” in their wedding vows. Wedding vows are considered covenant words of complete commitment made to each other. Just as Israel violating a covenant that they had made with another nation had consequences, I believe the breaking of covenant vows today will also result in negative verdicts of judgment at some time in the future. We just learned that Saul had murdered a people in covenant with Israel and Israel in the next King’s reign reaped a famine. I believe that this is possible even today that two people ending a marriage covenant can cause judgement to occur on future descendants. But, that is a different subject for another lesson.
We can clearly learn from the book of Ruth that death represents a legal termination of a covenant relationship and commitment. If one spouse dies, the other is said to be free to marry another. So death represents a legal point of covenant division. It represents a separation of the two that were said to be one when they were joined in covenant by the Law of Genesis 2:24. I’d like to cover an essential set of N.T. verses that confirm this truth. We will be reading from the book of Romans and chapter 7:
Rom 7:1 Know ye not, brethren, (for I speak to them that know the law,) how that the law hath dominion over a man as long as he liveth?
Rom 7:2 For the woman which hath an husband is bound by the law to her husband so long as he liveth; but if the husband be dead, she is loosed from the law of her husband.
Rom 7:3 So then if, while her husband liveth, she be married to another man, she shall be called an adulteress: but if her husband be dead, she is free from that law; so that she is no adulteress, though she be married to another man.
Rom 7:4 Wherefore, my brethren, ye also are become dead to the law by the body of Christ; that ye should be married to another, even to him who is raised from the dead, that we should bring forth fruit unto God.
Wow, these verses help explain our subject of covenants and the power of death separation precisely. Notice that Paul in verse 1 is speaking to believers that “know” the law. This phrase “to know” represents covenant relationship. Paul in this short passage was directing the next few verses to only former Jewish Old Covenant people. God writes this to teach them that because Jesus died (God in the flesh) on a cross, they were now freed from the bondage of that covenant in order to legally remarry in covenant the risen from the dead LORD Jesus Christ. There are people that claim Jesus was not God but 1 Timothy 3:16 informs us plainly that “God was manifested in the flesh”.
Paul was writing in Romans 7 by the inspiration of the Holy Spirit to teach us the legal fact that since Jesus (God manifested in the flesh) experienced death for them all, they could now be legally joined in Covenant marriage with risen Jesus and not be called an adulteress. This truth simply confirms that a marriage is a covenant and a covenant is a marriage and if they enter into another covenant while their husband was still alive, God called this adultery. Therefore we have all the subjects that we have been learning, marriage covenants, faithfulness, death separation and termination and remarriage in a New Covenant. Wow, Wow & Wow!
Can we begin to see what these verses in Romans say and learn how they apply to covenants both natural and spiritual? I believe these are amazing and especially important to how God eliminated Himself from the covenant of Israel and the angelic beings.
MARRIAGE, DEATH AND WIDOWHOOD
I alluded in previous lessons to this subject when speaking of the Heavenly Jerusalem who was described to be a free woman that came from an allegory given to us from Galatians 4. This Genesis allegory used Sarah’s relationship to Abraham. This relationship was a physical picture and representation of God’s spiritual relationship to the city called the Heavenly Jerusalem. I concluded that this free woman was the first wife of Jehovah God and therefore in covenant with God long before Hagar. In looking at other verses in Hebrews 12 we determined that this Heavenly Jerusalem consisted of the angelic beings too numerous to count. This means that Lucifer the top angelic being in the past was included in this covenant relationship. So how does God terminate an eternal marriage covenant relationship to eternally created angelic beings without the law? We know that the earthly Jerusalem (type of Hagar) is now in bondage with the law and that God used the law to end/divorce the Old Covenant marriage relationship because of her continued unfaithfulness (Isa 50:1, Jer 3:8).
But the heavenly Jerusalem was called the free woman or the woman outside of the law. We also learned from verses in the New Testament that without the law there is no punishment for sin. So how does God terminate a marriage covenant relationship with a group of sinful eternal spiritual beings that cannot ever die, without any law or legal precedence? It is a fascinating problem to consider and it is very perplexing puzzle to solve, but God always has a plan and an answer. We should be able to answer this question already but there are two solutions presented to us that can be utilized. The first solution is to get Satan to place himself into a covenant with the Law. The second potential solution is for the husband in the covenant to become a a being that could experience death on a cross to terminate all previous covenants.
If we recall from the previous lessons, we saw numerous scriptures from Galatians 4 that spoke about these two women in marriage covenant with Jehovah God. The one bond woman (Hagar) was directly said to be the natural nation of Israel and corresponded to the earthly city of Jerusalem. We just read about her in the last section of this lesson that was now freed from her covenant by the death of Jesus. Wow again! Then the other woman was the free woman and she is called the heavenly Jerusalem. It is essential to understand that both covenant women were married to the same God Jehovah and their covenants overlapped for a short time just as the allegorical type of Hagar overlapped with Sarah’s marriage. Now recall this O.T. quotation concerning this allegory:
Gal 4:27 For it is written, Rejoice, thou barren (Heavenly Jersualem) that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate (free woman Heavenly Jerusalem) hath many more children than she which hath an husband (bond woman: natural Israel).
What we can see in Galatians 4:27 the presentation that the bond woman had a husband with the implication that free woman did not. In fact the Greek word translated as “desolate” in this verse literally means “lonesome” and “solitary”. This is describing a woman that is not in covenant with anyone. Notice also the Greek word translated as “barren” is transliterated as “steiros” and we get our English word “sterile from it. These words are used by God to describe the Heavenly Jerusalem covenant wife. Finally, notice the prophecy that tells this woman to rejoice because her children will be many more than the children of the bond woman (Earthly Jerusalem). Who were we told that these many more children were? God teaches us in Galatians 4:26 that the spiritual free woman’s children were all of us in the church. That confirms and explains why Jesus said in John 3 that we must be “born again” in order to enter the kingdom of heaven. Everyone in the church has been first born naturally into the world and then next born supernaturally into the Spiritual Kingdom of God. It is important to note that if we are born once we can die twice, but if we are born twice we can only die once.
Galatians 4:27 seems like a paradox or a contradiction to what was said that both of these women were in covenant and married to God in the past. What happened to the husband of the woman in heaven? And I thought God divorced the woman natural Israel and here He says she has a husband. These are a really good questions. We have already explored how natural Israel may have entered into a covenant with Satan. But, let’s figure out the other question by going back to the Old Testament.
Isa 54:1 Sing, O barren, 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.
We can see that these are the direct words of God himself spoken through the prophet Isaiah. We can see again this verse is speaking of two different women. I find it fascinating that nowhere in these verses does it claim this is an allegory of Sarah and Hagar. However, God reveals this to Paul in Galatians 4. This is just one way that God hides truth in the Bible.
We could conclude that only one of these women is now married by just reading this verse. However, we know from God’s explanation in Galatians that these women are Sarah and Hagar, and both were married to Abraham. If we recall from New Testament verses that were discussed in previous lessons, if anyone has sex with someone, God considers them to be married to that someone (1 Cor 6:16). Having casual sex has major covenant consequences in the eyes of God because of the experience of having “carnal knowledge” of that person. So far this was some review, but as we read down in the rest of Isaiah 54, we can begin to see the solution to God’s puzzle. The answer to what happened to the husband of the Heavenly Jerusalem is found in context of verse 1:
Isa 54:4 Fear not; for thou shalt not be ashamed: neither be thou confounded; for thou shalt not be put to shame: for thou shalt forget the shame of thy youth, and shalt not remember the reproach of thy widowhood any more.
Here in verse 54:4 of Isaiah we see the answer to the question. The heavenly Jerusalem who was called the barren wife and the free woman in Galatians 4, is now declared to be a widow in the context of Isaiah 54:1. What exactly is a widow? This is not a trick question. A widow is a wife whose husband has died. Uh oh? That sure makes life difficult for many ministers that we have heard, who claim that God can’t die. Have you ever heard this before? That claim appears to contradict verses that we have been studying.
What is death? That is of course the million dollar question? We know from the book of Ruth that the only separation of Ruth from her mother-in-law covenant was going to be by death. We know Ruth said to Naomi, “until death part me from thee”. Without death we know that the wife is bound to her husband and if she marries another while her husband is alive then she is considered an adulteress.
We saw in Romans 7 that Israel can only be called an adulteress if while her covenant husband God is alive, she has sex with another man and becomes his wife. We know this harlotry is what happened in the O.T. many, many times. But, Romans 7 says because Jesus died Israel was now freed from that covenant to marry the risen from the dead LORD Jesus in the New Covenant.
No one can deny that based upon scriptures in Jeremiah, Isaiah and Hosea that Israel is called a whore, harlot and adulteress because she has committed sexual union and become married to other idols and gods while God was alive and in covenant with her. The Living God then divorced Israel His wife, and ended that covenant using the law. We also know that this heavenly woman if she was married to God, she would be bound by the law of marriage as being one spirit with her husband also. So if this heavenly Jerusalem consisted of good and evil angelic beings, how would God get rid of the evil angels, while keeping the good angelic spirits? Fascinating, isn’t it?
By Jesus Christ being crucified, God accomplished a major accumulation and combination of things simultaneously. This was God’s demonstration of His true wisdom and power. Through the death of Jesus Christ, God multi-tasked salvation for us with the termination of His covenant relationship with Satan, simultaneously. Through this death, it resulted in the heavenly Jerusalem becoming a widow. She is now free to marry another. The heavenly Jerusalem was now the widow and that makes it legal for her to marry another by the definition from the Word of God. But by Satan becoming entangled with Israel under the law, we now see that his relationship with God has now completely ended being separated the separation of death. Because Jesus Christ was God in the flesh, God died in Jesus Christ. I guess I could say God tasted death through the body of His son Jesus Christ hanging on the cross (Heb. 2:9), since spirit beings do not actually die as in cease to exist. Nevertheless, we can see that Satan’s future was sealed due to what transpired on the cross. So while it is technically impossible for a spiritual being to cease to exist, it is not technically impossible for a spiritual being to experience death. Through death, He destroyed him that had the power over death (Heb 2:14). This is why the Bible says if Satan would have known the consequences, he would not have crucified the Lord of Glory (1 Cor 2:8).
We should be able to easily begin to understand now why the Heavenly Jerusalem is called a widow and why God did this. God would have been one with this spiritual city and all of its inhabitants (angels). So God could not have legally punished Satan without punishing Himself along with Satan.
CONCLUSION
God found himself with a problem that needed to be resolved. Without the law of divorce how did God terminate His covenant marriage with Satan and his evil angelic beings? I really hope we are seeing this spiritual reality. Death is a legitimate separation for every covenant. Because Christ died, we died. Why was it necessary to be born again? To be born again represents another new beginning and an opportunity for a fresh start. Jesus was called the first born from the dead, so being the firstborn He is the head of this new family. Jesus now had preeminence over all other spiritual beings. In heaven Lucifer/Satan use to be the one with the Father, but he is now no longer in covenant with God because of the death of Jesus Christ. Since we were also crucified with Christ, we too are no longer in covenant with death, hell or Satan, either. The work of God was full and comprehensive. By Jesus being crucified on the cross, God accomplished 1) salvation for us, 2) the full payment for sin past, present and future, 3) reconciliation of our relationship with God and 4) the termination of our and His former flesh covenant relationship with Satan. God is so much smarter than we are and if we can see these things that was just described, we will increase our understanding of the Word of God by leaps and bounds above where we use to be.
Jesus said if you continue in my Word, then you will be my disciples and then you will know the truth and then Jesus said the “truth” that you “know” will set you free. I pray that the eyes of your understanding will be enlightened in the knowledge of Him.
Key to Understanding! NOT Getting in Over Your Head!
(Ver 1.1) 
Reading and studying the Bible is like learning to swim. If you don’t know how to swim, it is a very, very good idea not to jump into waters that go over your head. Waters can be a type of the subjects found in the Bible. Some subjects are shallow and much easier to grasp. While other subjects can be very complex or more challenging to understand and these can represent the deeper waters. For example, I use to never go into the book of Revelation and try to study that book, because it was so far over my head. Over the years, I have learned a lot more. Now by using what God has taught me, I can venture into these deep waters of the book of Revelation. Does that mean I understand everything in the book of Revelation? Definitely NOT! It only means that I have learned enough to start learning more. I have heard stories of many people who say that their dad threw them into the deep end of the pool and said learn to swim or drown. Of course you would realize that if they had drown he would have gone to jail for murder. Physically speaking it is not a good idea to learn to swim in the ocean. There are too many waves, currents and tides that can cause someone to more than likely die in the attempt. In other words people are less likely to survive than to learn how to swim in the deep ocean. These are all physical truths that are related to spiritual things that we face every day in our growth with God. We can learn some very valuable lessons that will help us tremendously, if we apply these principles correctly.
Start by evaluating where you are now in your spiritual growth. Are you new in Christianity? If yes, then it is not wise to try to study advanced deep subjects found in the Bible. Most of my lessons are very advanced and very deep. I deal with many complex subjects that a lot of people don’t have a clue on what they really mean. As a result, I would strongly suggest that if you are not an advanced Bible student, that you not read my lessons. Go away and study the basics, and after a few years of studying the Bible on the basic foundational Christian concepts, then come back to the advanced stuff. I generally do not spend a lot of time trying to teach basic concepts of salvation, sin, good versus evil, just to name a few of these basic topics. I do however have a few lessons on Bible Basics. These are here for foundational spirit building and growth. If you like this website, go and read the basics first and then go into the deeper waters.
This is what God said on the subject of getting in over your head when Paul wrote to the church in Corinth:
1Co 3:1 And I, brethren, could not speak unto you as unto spiritual, but as unto carnal, even as unto babes in Christ.
Paul tells the church in Corinth they were not ready for the deep spiritual things of God because he said they were just baby Christians. God relates spiritual growth to physical growth of new born babies. When a baby is newly born we can’t give them a big hotdog or a piece of corn on the cob and say here is your dinner. Enjoy it and I’ll see you in an hour. Why is that important to note? If you have had children you already know the answer. God relates some subjects in the Bible to be advanced topics that babies can’t grasp and use. These topics are not good for them in fact. Because they are not ready for the complex foods in God’s Word. Baby Christians should avoid them. Otherwise, they could spiritually choke on them and this could cause them spiritual harm instead of helping them to grow up spiritually. God goes on in the next verse to differentiate between two distinct types of spiritual food:
1Co 3:2 I have fed you with milk, and not with meat: for hitherto ye were not able to bear it, neither yet now are ye able.
We can see that there are two contrasting views of God’s spiritual food. These are equated as being either milk or meat, or we could call them liquid food versus solid food. Just like we wouldn’t give a baby a steak off of the grill to eat, we don’t give baby Christians spiritual steak either. Steak or meat is equated to the more complex subjects found in the Bible. The milk is representative of the simple or basic subjects that we should all have intimate knowledge of to build a firm spiritual foundation upon. These are tremendously valuable lessons to learn and fully grasp. We must understand the basic subjects before we ever attempt to swallow the advanced subjects. To many times I read or listen to Bible lessons and books that we can clearly see the author doesn’t know the basics. So, how can they attempt to try to get anyone to see anything advanced. If we don’t understand the basics we will never understand the advanced topics. In fact to a baby Christian, the advanced topic is dangerous.
Learn the lesson of swimming. Before you get in over your head make sure you are familiar with the shallow basic concepts found in the Bible. The deep things of God will come much easier and you will not spiritually drown because you panicked in waters that were over your head. But, here is another aspect to consider. Most babies don’t know they are babies. Because babies don’t understand the dangers of deep waters they will many times wander into them and not be able to get out. Many children have died because they were unsupervised and fell into the water and could not get out. If you are a mature Christian or at least a maturing Christian, keep this in mind when talking to others who are new to the faith in Christ. Help to guide the new Christians into the right paths of study. That is exactly why I recommended many not read my lessons. If you are a new Christian you will be much more comfortable with someone’s ministry that is geared at your level of spiritual development. That is in fact a lesson from life, children must go through kindergarten before they go to high school or even 1st Grade. There is a progressive learning experiences that we must develop in. Most immature Christians will reject advanced spiritual topics, simply because they are not at their level of development. If a 1st grader sat in a college level Algebra class, they wouldn’t get anything out of it. So it is with Bible topics.
I’ll try to end this blog with another contrasting bit of information of how to determine your level of spiritual growth. God gives us some very specific clues to judging ourselves based upon the next scripture in 1 Corinthians:
1Co 3:3 For ye are yet carnal: for whereas there is among you envying, and strife, and divisions, are ye not carnal, and walk as men?
God contrasts those who are focused on carnal and natural things with those who are focused on spiritual things. Baby Christians tend to be focused on natural things that occur in the world, while spiritually maturing Christians look beyond these natural things and focus in on the things of God only found in His Word. The difference is where they place their emphasis and focus. This verse in 1 Corinthians said these people were jealous of one another. They were fighting and bickering about stupid things that didn’t matter. If you read people’s blogs you can see examples of this type of behavior everywhere. Trivial stuff is promoted to a level of importance that is worthless to our spiritual growth. People fight over what they think is right and ignore what God said. Then there are naturalist who want the church to focus on saving the environment, the planet, the trees, or the whales. Too many times people are focused on less important things while God desire us to grow to see higher and greater things. For example, if people would see what God cares about, there would not be any legal abortions.
1Co 3:4 For while one saith, I am of Paul; and another, I am of Apollos; are ye not carnal?
God asks a very simple question here and makes a spiritual point that is beyond many people’s understanding. We have broad examples of this verse in our world today. One says, I am a Catholic. One says I am a Baptist. Another one says I am a Methodist, or whatever. Everyone echoing the same thought process that Paul confronted in Corinth. If you think your church is the only true church and everyone else is going to hell, you are deceived into believing a lie. The church of Jesus Christ is not a denomination. There is only One Body of Christ, there is only One Bride of Christ and these two are one in the same. There are legitimate and true Christians in every division of the body, but there are also false teachers and deceivers in every denomination out there. How will you know the difference? Jesus said you will know them by their fruit. Watch their natural life over time and see if they live according to the Bible. Judge what they say and do by what you know and understand in the Bible. You must focus in on the Bible and learn it and use it and only it to control what you think and do. The Bible contains the only truth that you will ever find on this planet. As you continue in the Word of God you will grow spiritually and become more spiritually mature. As you continue to feed your spirit using God’s spiritual food you will see that many good fruits will begin to spring forth and start to dominate your life. It is time for us to grow up spiritually:
Heb 6:1 Therefore leaving the principles of the doctrine of Christ, let us go on unto perfection; not laying again the foundation of repentance from dead works, and of faith toward God,
Paul in this verse written to the church, informs them that there are many basic things that we should be moving beyond. God describes to us a process of growth as well as the goal of spiritual maturity. “Perfection” is just a word that means to become mature. Not a child anymore, not acting like a child, not dressing like a child and not doing childish things. The process of spiritual growth is patterned after natural growth. Eating properly and getting spiritual exercise will go a long way to helping us grow spiritually.
These are all valuable spiritual lessons for us to apply to our understanding of the Bible. I hope that you at least grasped the concepts and that you will continue to grow in the knowledge of the One True Living God. If you do not know Jesus Christ as personal Lord and Savior, please go to the menu and click on “Are You Saved?”. Read the verses and pray the prayer. God bless you and please leave us a comment. Share this lesson with a friend.
We Are God’s Garden! God’s Farm System for Spreading the Word!
(Ver 1.1) This is now “Part 4” in the Bible study series on Genesis 3. Today will be a different perspective to the study of the Garden of Eden. If you have not read the lessons from the beginning I would recommend that you go and start with “Part 1” first. I believe today’s modern families miss out on the concept of farming and raising your own food to eat. In our modern society, if we are hungry we go the restaurant or go to the grocery store and everything is nicely packaged and easy to buy. Less than a hundred years ago, people normally didn’t have it so easy. Many people grew up on farms that planted crops that not only fed them but were used to sell to others to earn a living. The modern farm has everything heavily mechanized and machines take the place of what use to be done by hand. These large corporate giants have eliminated the need for people to grow their own food to eat and have created a population that is totally dependent upon someone else for what they eat. Someday when the antichrist shows up, he will certainly use this leverage to gain control over the population.
For thousands of years, farming and growing food was the normal everyday life style of the majority of people. When Jesus was physically present on the earth he taught many lessons using principles found in farming and raising crops. These natural elements and systems that God had created pointed us to spiritual truths and reveal to us the spiritual principles we are confronted with on a daily basis. So even though we don’t normally grow our own food these days, it does not mean it is not important to fully understand these concepts.
1Co 3:6 I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.
1Co 3:7 So then neither is he that planteth any thing, neither he that watereth; but God that giveth the increase.
1Co 3:8 Now he that planteth and he that watereth are one: and every man shall receive his own reward according to his own labour.
1Co 3:9 For we are labourers together with God: ye are God’s husbandry, ye are God’s building.
The Bible actually declares that God has a garden. This is obviously not a physical garden but a spiritual garden. The term translated as “husbandry” in the KJV of the Bible is a Greek word that means “farm”. This term is referring to a place where things can grow. These verses in 1 Corinthians 3 are describing to you a farming process, using farming methods. To clearly understand what is being taught you really need a firm grasp of how farms operate. I am not an expert, I have learned a few things from some who were farmers so I’ll just hit the highlights of what I have learned. Farming is a multi step process. It involves many factors and while it seems simplistic, it is actually very complex to do it correctly. The ground or soil must be prepared. It normally involves a process that breaks up the hard surface and turns the soil revealing the parts that are covered. We can then begin the process of sowing or planting seeds. There are many ways of planting seeds and the exact method used depends upon the seed that is being planted. The depth of the seed can vary depending upon anticipated amounts of rain that you are expecting. The number of seeds per inch or foot can also vary depending on the crop. Then there is the time factor. Time is a necessary component to allowing the plant to develop. The amount of time can vary tremendously based upon the type of seed planted. Another key factor for planting is the timing or season to plant in. There are designated times to plant specific crops, some are in the spring, some in the summer and even some in the fall. So timing is everything in the process of getting a crop. The other essential element to a successful crop is rain and water. In 1 Corinthians 3 6, it implies that is what Apollos was doing, even though it was the exact same thing that Paul did, the first one planted, the second one watered. Too much water is not good and not enough can be detrimental to the outcome. In these verses it strongly suggests that farming is work. A laborious task and an extraordinary effort to produce a crop. But these verses also speak that it is not just one’s effort that produces the crop. The other factors are the seeds that you are sowing, the timing of the planting, the amount of water the seeds get, the amount of sunshine that these growing plants get, the fight to eliminate pests and creatures that eat you crop before you get to harvest, then there are climate and temperature variations that can cause harm to crops. The lessons of farming and the implications to sharing God’s Word are phenomenally important.
Mat 15:13 But he answered and said, Every plant, which my heavenly Father hath not planted, shall be rooted up.
How many know that Jesus is not talking about a natural farm crop? Jesus is speaking of a spiritual crop of people. Those that belong to God will be harvested, those that do not will be burned. This verse declares that God has specifically planted seeds into the hearts of men and women. It also implies there are some plants that God did not plant also. Where did these plants or weeds come from? You see in natural and spiritual farming there are a number of known enemies to the expected outcome. You didn’t have to plant a thing for these enemies to show up and they are not what you want to grow in your soil. I noticed I don’t have to plant thistles and wild flowers in my yard, they somehow just magically appear. Isn’t that amazing?
Lessons from the Parable of the Wheat and Tares
Jesus tells us a parable that has a direct relationship to the Garden of Eden. In this parable Jesus describes to us a spiritual garden. This garden is a place that we are told where God has sown good seed and an enemy has come in and sown bad seeds. We understand from other parables that the good seed is the Word of God. The soil is the hearts of men and women. The fruit that is produced from the good seed represents the harvest and the tares are those that will be damned to hell and burnt. Here is the story that Jesus gives us:
Mat 13:25 But while men slept, his enemy came and sowed tares among the wheat, and went his way.
Jesus tells us in this parable that God’s garden has an enemy. It implies that while God was away from the garden, his enemy came in and sowed tares among his wheat crop. There is an amazing truth given to us in this verse if you understand farming. By only looking at the surface of the ground you cannot tell what has been planted. The wheat represents the desired crop of the seed that God has purposely planted. But, the tares are the result of the seed of God’s enemy. We can learn a valuable lesson from just this one verse. You are wise if you recognize that not everything in the world is intended to help you. Every false religion and philosophical writing that is out there are the seeds of the enemy. I’ll go so far as to say that every Hollywood movie and non-Christian television show are seeds of the enemy. I know that went over big?
Mat 13:26 But when the blade was sprung up, and brought forth fruit, then appeared the tares also.
Jesus then tells us that both of these seeds are growing together, in the same soil, competing for the same water supply, competing for the same nutrients of the soil and existing in the same duration of time. It is only after some time that you can even tell that both are present. This process speaks to the power of God as well as the subtly and deceptive power of the enemy.
Mat 13:27 So the servants of the householder came and said unto him, Sir, didst not thou sow good seed in thy field? from whence then hath it tares?
In verse 27, Jesus, describes us, the servants of the householder asking God a question. This is obviously a great question and one more of us should be asking today. Where did all of these things come from that are opposed to the truth? Where did all of these things come from that distract us from what we should be focused on? Oh well, I guess I will move on.
Mat 13:28 He said unto them, An enemy hath done this. The servants said unto him, Wilt thou then that we go and gather them up?
Jesus reaffirms to us that these weeds are a result of what Satan has done in the earth. Then in verse 28, the servants ask another question of the LORD. Many have asked the same question but in different terms. We have all questioned God why, when something bad has happened to us? Here we have a bad plant in the garden and what would you normally do with a weed in your garden? The servants want to know if it is OK to pull up these weeds and get rid of them. I’ve often times have pondered the same reality in the earth, why after the resurrection of Jesus Christ did God not eliminate evil from the planet. There must have been a legitimate reason for leaving it here.
Mat 13:29 But he said, Nay; lest while ye gather up the tares, ye root up also the wheat with them.
So Jesus’ reply is No! Many times in war the Generals are faced with acceptable casualty rates. Acceptable civilian casualties. According to God’s philosophy, there are no acceptable loses. Every plant is important. If you have ever had a garden you know that pulling weeds can sometimes hurt the real plants that you want to grow. The roots are many times intertwined with each other. So if you pull one you may destroy the other. In God’s garden this is not acceptable. God wants every plant that He can get.
Mat 13:30 Let both grow together until the harvest: and in the time of harvest I will say to the reapers, Gather ye together first the tares, and bind them in bundles to burn them: but gather the wheat into my barn.
Finally, we see the anticipated end to the world described to us. To those that teach there is not a hell, I don’t know how they ignore verses like this. According to Jesus there is a time of harvest coming. We know from basic farming practices that plants are harvested normally when they become mature. That is an interesting spiritual concept. God’s garden will be harvested when it becomes mature also. This verse in Matthew clearly indicates there is a difference coming, a division into two different groups. Those that are to be discarded and to be burned and those that are going to be put into the barn. The barn is a storage facility a home for mature crops. The analogies and lessons of farming are immensely important. I have only grazed the surface of the subject so I pray that you continue to research and learn from what God has done in His Word. I’ll end this blog with this:
Jas 5:7 Be patient therefore, brethren, unto the coming of the Lord. Behold, the husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain.
In this verse in James, our God is called the husbandman. A husbandman is a term for a farmer. The Greek word literally means a worker of the land or ground. The husbandman is the one that harvests what he plants. He plants, he cares for his harvest, he works the harvest and brings in the fruits of his labors. These are all farming concepts and methods. We can see that God who is a spirit has planted a spiritual garden and He expects to receive the fruits of His labors. So these are spiritual Bible concepts, sow the seeds, water them, care for them and expect God to produce the fruits to harvests.
Now go back and reread Genesis 2 and 3. See how God plants a garden, what kind of garden do you believe this was? If God is a Spirit which the Bible declares is accurate then God planted a spiritual garden.
If you are reading and studying in the Genesis 3 series you may continue to Part 5 now.
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