Highlights of the Bible by Ray C. Stedman
It's no exaggeration to say that there are no writings more important for the proper understanding of history and man than the first chapters of Genesis. Here is hidden the secret of man's sinfulness, that terrible mystery of evil and darkness which continually confronts us in this modern world. In this section is the key to the relationship of the sexes, the proper place of man and woman in marriage, the solution to the problem of mounting divorce rates and other marital issues that abound in modern society. Here, also, is the explanation of the struggle of life and here great light is thrown on the problems of work and leisure. In these opening chapters of the Bible is the first and fundamental revelation of the meaning of divine redemption and grace, and here the essential groundwork is laid for the understanding of the cross of Jesus Christ. Therefore, it is clear that this whole section is unprecedented in its importance.
INCOMPLETENESS OF MAN
Genesis is the book of beginnings. That is what the word itself means, and it takes us back into the very dawn of human history. It traces the story of man from his beginnings within the natural world and follows his history in a continually narrowing process down to the story of four great men of the past: Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, and Joseph. These men are not mere mythical figures of the past, but are living, breathing, flesh and blood personalities whom we can all relate to. This marvelous account preserves accurately for us not only the facts of these men's lives but the color and depth and the tone of life in their days.
But Genesis is not only history, it is also a book with a single message, and a message which can be declared in one brief statement. It reveals to us the need of man for God. That is the whole purpose of the book and as such, it strikes the keynote for all subsequent revelation concerning God and man throughout the Bible. Genesis reveals that man can never be complete without God, that he can never discover or fulfill the true meaning of his life without a genuine and personal relationship with an indwelling God.
Throughout the book this incompleteness is revealed to us in three realms--realms in which each of us personally and daily live.
First, our incompleteness is revealed in the realm of natural relationships, that is, the area we call the natural sciences. These consist of cosmology (the study of the universe, its origin and makeup); geology (the structure of the earth itself and its major features); and biology (the study of life in all its divisions and manifestations). These natural relationships circumscribe our lives with regard to the physical world around us, and yet within them man is seen to be inadequate without God.
The second area is the realm of human relationships. This would include the sciences we call today sociology, psychology, anthropology, demonology, etc. The beginnings of all these are traced in the opening chapters of Genesis and again man is set forth as inadequate to function within them without a relationship with God.
The third area is that of spiritual relationships, encompassing the studies of theology, philosophy, soteriology, angelology, etc. The beginnings of all these themes are explored in Genesis and yet the one message of man's inadequacy apart from God echoes throughout the book like the sound of a bell.
UNIVERSALITY OF MANKIND
Genesis opens with an awareness of the greatest material fact in all human life; a fact that we are all subconsciously aware of almost every waking moment, that is, that we are living in a universe. We quickly become aware that we are living on a planet shared with millions of other human beings like ourselves. As we come to know more about modem science we become aware that our planet is part of a solar system. In some strange, mysterious way this mass of earth upon which we live is winding its way on a prearranged path about the sun circling continuously and precisely on schedule.
We are also told by astronomers that the whole solar system itself--the sun with all its planets--is making its way through a great whirling body of stars called a galaxy, a vast almost incredibly immense system of stars some 300,000 light years across. Then this galaxy itself is moving at incredible speed through the vastness of space in conjunction with millions (and some astronomers say even billions) of other galaxies like ours. It is precisely at that point that the Bible opens in a majestic recognition that man is part of a universe." In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth" (Genesis. 1:1).
What a strange conjunction--to put all the . vast heavens on one side and our tiny planet Earth on the other. But the book moves right on to tell us that man-- insignificant man--this tiny speck of life living on a minor planet in the midst of this unthinkably vast universe, is the major object of God's concern.
One of the marvels of the Bible is that it uses language that communicates with people of the most primitive and limited understanding. while at the same time it has significance and is inexhaustible in its meaning to even the most erudite and learned of men. It addresses itself with equal ease to all classes of mankind. This universality is evident in the phrase "the heavens and the earth." That has meaning for a savage in the jungle when he simply perceives the land on which he lives and the sky over his head. He would describe it as "the heavens and the earth." On the other hand, a modern astronomer looking out into the far reaches of the universe through a great telescope would also use the phrase, "the heavens and the earth." Thus the Bible consistently remains true to the most complex discoveries of science at the same time retaining a simplicity of statement that the most uneducated can understand, even though it is not the intention of the Bible to be a textbook on science.
God has deliberately made the physical universe to reveal and manifest an inner spiritual reality. There is a direct correspondence between the two. This correspondence between the outward physical reality and its invisible spiritual counterpart is fundamentally the reason why "All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction, and for training in righteousness; that the man of God may be adequate, equipped for every good work" (2 Timothy. 3:16,17). Since the world is made for man it constantly reflects truth to him. This is, without doubt, why Jesus found the world of nature such an apt instrument to teach men spiritual realities, as His parables reveal.
Dr. F. A. Filby, senior lecturer on inorganic chemistry at an English technical college, has put this very accurately: "The material world is designed to produce parallels--parables--of the spiritual. There is indeed a spiritual law operating in the natural world and God put us on a planet where light is separated from darkness for our spiritual education as well as for our physical needs. There is a spiritual as well as a physical reason for the pattern of creation, and he who divorces science from true religion will never be able to come to a real understanding of the world."
Granting this to be true, then the first truth God would suggest to us, manifested in a material universe all around us, is that there is a heavenly as well as an earthly life. There is a difference between the heavenly life of God and the earthly life of man. The supreme subject of the Bible will be how to move from the level of earth to the life of the heavens. This difference is declared by Isaiah where God says, "'For My thoughts are not your thoughts, neither are your ways My ways,' declares the Lord. 'For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways, and My thoughts than your thoughts'" (55:8,9). That is the great truth with which, symbolically, the Bible begins.
THE CREATION
We have seen that the greatest observable fact known to man is the existence of the universe, "the heavens and the earth." To this, verse I links the greatest fact made known by revelation: the existence of a God who creates. There is thus brought together at the beginning of the Bible a recognition of the two great sources of human knowledge: nature (including human nature), discoverable by the five senses; and revelation, which is discoverable only by a mind and heart illuminated and taught by the Spirit of God. Both of these sources of knowledge originate with God and each of them is a means of knowing something about God and man. The scientists who study nature are searching ultimately for God. One great Christian scientist declared, "I am thinking the thoughts of God after him." That is an excellent way to describe what science basically is doing. So also those who seek to understand the Bible are likewise in search of God. Nature is designed to teach certain facts about God, but revelation is designed to bring us to the God about whom nature speaks. The two are complementary and are not contradictory in any sense.
Verse 2 adds the information that the earth began as a planet covered by an uninterrupted ocean which was itself wrapped in darkness. Revelation says that it was "formless and void," that is, without life. There was no land, there were no promontories, nothing to catch the eye. It was simply one great, vast deep of water covering the whole world with no life in it. With that picture science fully agrees. But revelation as a key factor that many scientists do not acknowledge. Revelation says, in addition, "the Spirit of God was moving over the surface of the waters." God was at work in His universe interacting and interrelating with it. Notice that in these verses of the first chapter there is a moving toward order out of disorder and form out of formlessness. Something comes out of nothing. God is moving. The Spirit of God is producing an intended end. He brings light out of darkness, shape out of shapelessness, form out of formlessness.
The first step God took, according to the record, was to create light, "'Let there be light'; and there was light." Light as we know now is absolutely essential to life of any sort. Without light there can be no life. With the advent of light we are now ready for the record of the six days of creation. Each of the days, except for the seventh, includes an evening and a morning and each, except for the seventh, records a progressive order of creation.
How are we to view these days? Are they 24-hour days, constituting one literal actual week, or do they represent long and indefinite ages of time as science would claim today? It is my conviction that the controversy which has endlessly raged upon these questions has been largely responsible for missing the real purpose for which God gives to us this first chapter of Genesis. It should be clear to anyone upon reading the passage that the chapter does not focus upon the question of time. Important as this may seem to us it is not the focus of God, and if we center upon it we shall miss the point that He intends to make. God is moving toward a goal which He has clearly in mind from the beginning and toward it all the physical universe is moving. The steps God takes to accomplish this goal are recorded as several great creative acts occurring in certain progressive stages which logically succeed one another. It does not all happen at once. God did not bring the world and the universe into being with a snap of His fingers or with one sentence from His lips. He chose to do it in stages and these stages are very clearly evident throughout this passage.
Each of the days of creation include an evening and a morning and the evening comes first. This suggests a period of incompleteness moving toward completeness, of gradualness coming at last to completion. Furthermore, let us remember that these physical things which God makes are reflections of an inner greater reality. God made the physical universe to reflect spiritual realities so that as we look around us and observe and assimilate with our senses we are constantly to be reminded of the great things that are to take place within us in the invisible kingdom of spiritual truth.
If this be the case then Genesis I becomes a kind of table of contents, if you like, for the rest of Scripture. It introduces in physical symbolism the great themes which will be amplified throughout the rest of this amazing book. In other words, there are great lessons which God has deeply etched in nature in order to remind us of corresponding realities in our lives which the physical processes around us are designed to picture. Let us go through the creative days from this point of view and we will see what I believe to be the real point of this passage.
Day one describes the creation of light and darkness. The light is said to be good and the darkness by definition is not good. Both these words, light and darkness, are used subsequently in Scripture to picture good and evil. There is good in the universe but there is also that which is "not good," which is darkness. Thus a fundamental fact we must continually bear in mind is that throughout our lives we will need to discern between good and evil, right and wrong, truth and error. We are reminded of it every day and night.
On day two we learn of the firmament which separates the waters below from the waters above, and this firmament is called heaven. Physically this is a description of the creation of the atmosphere around the earth which supports great quantities of water in evaporated form :- above the earth and separates it from the oceans below. This ocean and sky, divided asunder, picture for us the - reality of human physical life (elsewhere frequently symbolized by water), and a subsequent heavenly life. There is a life now and a life to come and one passes into the other. Human existence is not complete when this earthly life is fulfilled. The two levels of human existence are tied together with invisible but very real links and one merges into the other as oceans, by evaporation, move into the waters of the air.
It is striking that it is the forgetfulness of these two facts, revealed in the first two creative days, that is the root cause for the violence and moral decline of our day. Men no longer seek to distinguish between good and evil between light and darkness. Though every 24 hours these reminders come to us, we continually blind our eyes to them and seek to blur these distinctions. It is also increasingly evident that men no longer want to think about the life to come. We want everything now. Instant happiness! That is what the world is seeking. We do not wish to anticipate a future or to prepare for a life to come. But we must remember that this present earthly life will find its culmination and fulfillment only when the intended lessons are learned here below and then all God's great provisions for man will be available to him. That is what God is teaching us in the first two creative days.
Day three is a different kind of day from the first two. It is a double day in which there is first the emergence of the land from the oceans and second, the first appearance of life upon the earth in the form of plants, trees and vegetation. As we have seen, on the physical level this is but a manifestation of a parallel spiritual and moral reality. We are to learn that human life on earth between the period of birth and death is itself divided, pictured by the land rising up out of the oceans. Thus, there will be land which is capable of producing fruit surrounded by vast oceans which are incapable of doing so. The truth God wants us to learn from this is that there is an old humanity which by nature is incapable of bringing forth what God desires, but there is also a new humanity, called out of the told, which will be capable of producing the fruit God envisions. In the second part of the day, that fruit actually appears and is pronounced by God to be good. It appears in three divisions: general vegetation, seed bearing plants, and fruit trees. Perhaps this reflects the divisions of the apostle John who describes Christians as "little children, young men and fathers" (see I John 2:13). At any rate, this fruit is pleasing to God and is a result of the activity of the Spirit upon the barren waters of humanity.
Day four describes the creation of the sun and moon and the stars, and the placing of them as lights and signs to govern the seasons of earth. The sun clearly pictures Jesus Himself (called in Mall 4:2 "the sun of righteousness") as the light of the world; and the moon, reflecting the brightness of the sun and shining in the darkness of the night, is a symbol of the church shining in the moral darkness of this world. The stars are used repeatedly in Scripture as symbols of individuals who shine with great moral influence upon others.
The fifth day describes the creation of birds flying in the heavens above the earth and great living creatures that swarm through the waters of the seas. Since the atmosphere above depicts the heavenly kind of life and the waters, as we have seen, are a picture of unregenerate humanity, this created day symbolizes to us the possibility of living triumphantly in either an alien or a hostile environment. Both birds and fish are used symbolically of believers in the Bible. The spiritual life is alien to natural man but by the redemption of God he can "mount up with wings like eagles" (Isaiah. 40:31). The world is a hostile environment to him but he can learn to live in it as effectively as a fish reams to swim in the sea.
MAN'S UNIQUENESS
There is a sense of heightened anticipation as we come to the sixth day of creation, for it is on this day that man makes his appearance. This sixth day is parallel in some respects to the third day in that it is also a double day. It has, as do all the days, an evening and a morning, and during the first part of the day God created the land animals--from the larger beasts (called "the cattle") to the creeping things, including the world of insects, reptiles, etc. It is quite obvious that all this is aiming toward the creation of man and is in exact accordance with the fossil records. Man makes his appearance last in the order of life. But there are some distinctive things said of him that are never said of any of the animal creation.
First, God holds a divine consultation about Him saying, "Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness" (Genesis. 1:26). This divine conversation clearly is the first hint given to us that God consists of more than one person. This revelation is given only in connection with the emergence of man upon the earth for only man can understand and enter into an experience with a triune God and is seen also as the link between God and the rest of His creation. The first man, Adam, is a mediator between God and the animal world just as later the last Adam (Jesus Christ) will be seen as the mediator between fallen man and God. The first Adam was made to reign over the world of nature as the last Adam also makes it possible for those who are in Christ to reign in life through Him as Paul puts it in Romans 5:21.
The key phrase about man as created on the sixth day is the "image" and '`likeness" of God. That image is found not in man's body or his soul, but in his spirit. For, as Jesus told the woman at the well in Samaria, "God is spirit; and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth" (John 4:24). But what is godlike about our spirit? If the spirit is made in the image of God, then it can do things that God can do but no animal can. Three things are suggested throughout Genesis I which God alone does: first, God creates; second, God communicates; and third, God evaluates, pronouncing some things good and others not good. It is here that the image of God in man appears. Man can create. Inventiveness clearly marks him off from the world of beasts. Further, man communicates as no animal can possibly do, sharing ideas which affect (and infect) others. Finally, man is the only creature that has a moral sense, recognizing some things as good and others as bad, feeling the impact of conscience upon his own actions. Thus, man shares the image of God.
However, though he has retained the image, he has now lost the likeness of God. Image is the capacity to be godlike, but likeness is the proper functioning of that capacity. Adam, formed by the creator, stood before God as a spirit dwelling in a body and exercising the functions of a soul. He had the ability to be creative, to communicate, to make moral choices, but he not only had that ability, he was actually doing it. He was exercising the function of God-likeness. The secret, as we learn from the rest of Scripture, lay in an inner dependence that continually repudiated self-confidence.
The seventh day is clearly quite different from all the preceding six. It is a day without an evening or a morning. There is no movement within, no advance from incompleteness to completeness. It is, instead, a day characterized by rest; God ceased from His labors, intending it to be a picture of what is called later in Scripture "the rest of faith." Hebrews 4:10 declares "For the one who has entered His rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His."
Here is pictured a revolutionary new principle of human behavior on which God intends man to operate, and which was His intention from the very beginning of history. It is from this principle that man fell and it is to this in Jesus Christ that he is to be restored. It is the principle of human activity resting upon an indwelling God to produce extraordinary results. The weekly observance of a Sabbath day is but a shadow, Paul says in Colossians 2: 17, of this principle of activity, resting upon God's willingness to work in and through what we do. He who learns to labor on those terms is keeping the Sabbath as God intended it originally to be kept.
Chapter 2 finds man walking in the Garden in communion with God, functioning as a spirit living within a physical body and manifesting the personality characteristics of the soul. At this point, God gives him a research project, to investigate the animal world in search for a possible counterpart to himself. God knew that man would not find what he was looking for but in the process man discovered at least three marvelous truths.
First, he learned that woman was not to be a mere beast of burden as the animals are, because that would not in any way fulfill his need for a helper and companion.
Second, it became evident that woman was not to be merely a biological laboratory for the producing of children. This is what the animals use sex for, but that was not sufficient for Adam's needs. Sex in mankind, therefore, is different from that among the animals.
Third, Adam learned that woman was not a thing outside himself--she is not something to be used at the whim of man and then disposed of. Women are to be helpers, fit for him, corresponding to him.
So, in a remarkable passage we are told that Adam fell into a deep sleep and God took a rib and from it made a woman and brought her to him. This period of Adam's unconsciousness strongly suggests what modern psychology also confirms, that the relationships of marriage are far deeper than mere surface affection. They touch not only the conscious life, but the subconscious, even the unconscious as well.
Chapter 2 ends with a marvelous statement of the principles God intends for marriage. The first and most fundamental is that marriage involves a complete identity of the partners. The two are to become one. This is not an immediate act of magic happening during or immediately after a wedding, but takes place as a couple lives together, blending their psyches, merging their lives, and creating a single history.
The second principle is that of headship which marks the role of man as the leader in determining the direction in which a home should go and the woman's responsibilities to support and sustain that leadership. The third factor emphasized is that of permanence. Men and women are to cleave to one another--he is to stay with her and she with him, because marriage is a permanent bond. The fourth factor is revealed in the verse, "And the man and his wife were both naked and were not ashamed." This speaks clearly of openness and free communication.
MAN'S LIMITATIONS
In chapter 3 of Genesis we have the explanation for over 100 centuries of human heartache, misery, torture, blood, sweat and tears. Remove this chapter from the Bible, and the rest of it is beyond explanation. But the most striking thing about it is that we find ourselves here. The temptation and the fall are reproduced in our lives many times a day. We have all heard the voice of the tempter and felt the drawing of sin and we all know the pangs of guilt that follow. This is why many have called this story a myth. In one sense this is true. It happens continually because it did actually happen once to our original parents and thus we, their children, cannot escape repeating it.
Many biblical scholars feel that the tempter in the Garden was not a snake, but a "shining one" which the Hebrew word means. Snakes were undoubtedly created to represent the punishment that fell upon this being when he brought about the fall of man by his cunning and his deceit. It is clearly the devil, in his character as an angel of light, who now confronts the woman in the Garden of Eden. His tactic with her is to arouse desire. First he implanted in her heart a distrust of God's love, "Has God said, 'You shall not eat from any tree of the garden'?" (Genesis. 3:1). Next, he dares to deny openly the results that God had stated will occur, "You surely shall not die" (v. 4), he says. Then he clinches his attack with a distorted truth, "God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil." All the devil wishes to do is to leave Eve standing before the fruit, hanging there in all its luscious fascination, tantalizing her, offering her an experience she never dreamed would be possible.
Now the mind comes into action. Without Eve's realization she has already experienced an arousing of her emotions so that she longs for the tantalizing fruit before her. Thus, when her mind comes into action it can no longer do so rationally. Already the will has secretly determined to act on the facts as the emotions present them and thus the mind can only rationalize. It must twist the facts so that they accord with desire and the result was that Eve took the fruit and ate.
But there was still hope for the race. Adam had not yet fallen, only Eve. A battle has been lost, but not the war. But in the innocent but ominous words, "she gave also to her husband with her, and he ate" (v. 6), we face the beginning of the darkness of a fallen humanity--what the Bible calls "death" immediately follows.
The first sign is that Adam and Eve knew they were naked. This is the birth of self-consciousness, and the immediate result is an attempt to cover up, which is the invariable psychological reaction of mankind to self-exposure ever since.
The second mark of death is the tendency to hide. It reveals the fact of guilt--that inner torment we are all familiar with which cannot be turned off no matter how hard we try.
The third mark of death at work in human life is the beginning of blame--the passing of the buck from Adam to Eve and from Eve to the serpent. Behind both excuses is the unspoken suggestion that it is really God's fault. Thus man attempts to turn guilt into fate and make of himself a mere innocent victim suffering from a breakdown in creation for which God is responsible.
The fourth mark of death is the divine establishment of the limits of life: pain, sweat and death. Adam and Eve must learn the hard cruel facts of life lived apart from dependence upon God. At this point of repentance, God then clothes them with animal skins as a picture (as all animal sacrifices are, a kind of kindergarten of grace) to teach us the great truth that ultimately it is God Himself who bears eternally the pain, the hurt and the agony of our sins. This is followed by banishment from the garden, not as we so often imagine, to keep man from coming to the tree of life, but as the text specifically states "to guard the way to the tree of life" (v. 24). There is a way to the tree of life, but it is no longer a physical way. In the book of Revelation, we are told that the tree of life is for the healing of the nations (see Revelation. 22:2). It is surely to this that Jesus refers when He says, "I am the way." Spiritually and psychologically (in the realm of emotions and mind) we are to live in the presence of God because a way has been opened back to the tree of life.
We can thus summarize chapter 3 in the process it follows: beginning with temptation; followed immediately by death; leading to repentance and grace taken by an act of faith; and resulting in a public acknowledgment on God's part of acceptance; and ending at last in healing.
In chapters 4 through 11, relating early human history, we also see the underlying threads of all human society for all time. Without doubt there was a real Cain, there was a genuine 40-day deluge, there was a solid gopherwood ark and there was an actual tower of babbling confusion. There is no need to question the historicity of these events, but they are recorded so as to teach us graphically the principles on which man has built his society and the inherent flaws in those principles.
History, as we know it, is the chronicle of man's progress from the use of the primitive ax to machine guns, napalm and nuclear explosions. It is the story of wars battles and the bloodshed of mankind. The key to this 20 centuries of dilemma actually lies in the story that took place at the dawn of history--the story of two brothers: Cain and Abel.
The focus of the story is in the two offerings which these brothers brought to God. It is clearly indicated that there was a prescribed time for the bringing of an offering and a prescribed place for the offering of it; but Abel's offering of a lamb is accepted and Cain's offering of grain is rejected. Surely the commentators are right in indicating that God's reason for rejecting Cain's offering was that it was a bloodless offering and, therefore, could not take away sins, for "without shedding of blood there is no forgiveness" (Hebrews 9:22). But it is not clear that Cain understood that.
What is clear is that Cain was angry at God's action, and when given opportunity to repent refused to do so. Thus, when later opportunity finds him in the field with his brother, Abel, Cain's jealousy takes over and the murderous ax rises and falls and Abel sinks to the ground with a smashed skull, murdered by his brother's hand. Thus the roots of human warfare are seen to lie in the jealous and envious spirit in the heart, in the unwillingness to forgive and forget and the ease with which we utter Cain's contemptuous words, "Am I my brother's keeper?"
The blood of Abel cries from the ground for justice and God answers by cursing the ground in which Cain took such great pride and joy. Cain has lost his green thumb; the ground will no longer release its fruitfulness to him and he will therefore be forced to wander from place to place as the crops fail wherever he goes. To protect Cain from excess punishment, God set a mark upon him. It is not a mark of shame, as many interpret it, but a mark of grace by which God is saying, "This man is still my property; he is guilty, he is a murderer, but he is still mine, and don't forget it in your dealings with him."
EXPANSION OF CIVILIZATION
The next element we trace in Genesis is the beginnings of culture, or civilization, and especially the part city life plays in the shaping of human society. To Cain is born Enoch, who builds his city on ground that is yet red with the blood of Abel.
The city Enoch builds is certainly a most imposing one. Within it are found all the ingredients of modern life: travel, music and the arts, the use of metals, the organized political life, and the domestication of animals. These things look impressive, but they are all built on shaky ground. Polygamy appears with Lamech and his two wives. Violence and murder are justified on the grounds of self-defense. The state begins to replace the family as the focus of human interest. The trend toward urban over rural life is evident and increasing toleration of sexual excess appears.
But in the midst of this deterioration God has another plan ready. Adam knew his wife again and she bore a son and called his name Seth (which means appointed), and through Seth the redemptive work of God is traced in chapter 5 in a most remarkable sequence of names. There is difference among authorities as to the meaning of these names, but one authority gives an interesting sequence of meanings. Seth, as we have seen, means "appointed" Enoch, his son, means "mortal," and his son, Kenan means "sorrow." His son, Mahalalel, means "the blessed God"; he names his boy, Jared, which means "came down," and his boy, Enoch, means "teaching." Methuselah, the son of Enoch, means "his death shall bring"; Lamech, Methuselah's son, means "strength," and Noah, the end of the line, means "comfort."
When this is all put together, it tells the story of grace: It is appointed that mortal man shall sorrow, but the blessed God came down teaching that His death shall bring strength and comfort. The focus of the chapter is Enoch who learned to walk with God. Thus, a brilliant but wicked age ends with a single man having learned to walk in fellowship with God in the midst of a godless and violent generation.
Who are the "sons of God" who are mentioned in Genesis 6 as coming in and marrying the daughters of men and producing a race of giants? Of many explanations, the best seems to be that of Jude who suggests that these are angels who "abandoned their proper abode" (rude 6) and, presumably, took up improper dwelling places. Human bodies in Scripture are called dwelling places. This would then imply that fallen angels (evil spirits) possess the bodies of men and these demon-possessed men married women and produced a race of strange beings called the Nephilim. The word means "the fallen ones," and thus explains the race of giants which are frequently referred to in mythical accounts as half men and half gods. But God immediately sets a limit to their existence of 120 years during which time Noah became a preacher of righteousness. Thus, the first mark of an imminent collapse of civilization is the appearance of demonic powers which manifest themselves in open and unchecked violence. The outward wickedness rests upon a deeper corruption within--"every intent of the thoughts of his heart" (Genesis. 6:5). Thus, demonic control, outward violence and inward corruption become the marks of a civilization so decayed it can no longer be tolerated.
God announces to Noah that He intends to judge the world and commands Noah to build an ark of safety which will be his means of deliverance from the coming catastrophe. When the ark is completed, Noah is invited to enter it with all his family, bringing also two of every kind of animal and seven of clean beasts. Noah demonstrated his faith by entering the ark in obedience to the word of God against the ridicule and contempt of his age.
The distinction between clean and unclean animals is an artificial distinction drawn in order to teach men a needed truth. As soon as the lesson was clearly evident in the work of Christ, the distinction disappeared. By certain functions of animals that were designated as clean, corresponding spiritual qualities which God loves are indicated; while the absence of those functions in unclean animals is intended to teach that God disapproves of their corresponding character in the lives of men. -So the flood comes with the fountains of the great deep bursting forth and the windows of the heavens opening. The whole earth is covered to the tops of the mountains and all life perishes except the handful of humans in the ark and those marine animals which could survive in the waters. The rain continues for 40 days and nights and then ceases. At the end of 150 days the waters begin to abate and on the seventeenth day of the seventh month, the ark comes to rest on the mountains of Ararat.
This seventeenth day of the seventh month is the same exact day of the year when, centuries later, Jesus rose from the dead. After the exodus from Egypt God changed - the beginning of the year from the seventh month (in the fall) to the first month (in the spring) when the Passover was eaten. Jesus rose on the seventeenth day of the first month, which would be the same as the seventeenth day of the seventh month in the old reckoning in this passage in Genesis. Thus, clearly, the emergence of Noah from the ark is intended to be a picture of the new beginning of life which every Christian experiences when he enters into the resurrection life of Jesus Christ by the new birth.
GOD'S INTERVENTION
Chapter 9 of Genesis records one of the major covenants of the Bible--a covenant made with Noah, but beyond Noah with all humanity. This covenant is the basis for all human government today. It contains God's provision for the ordering of human life.
First, nature is made to be dependable, secured by the promise of the rainbow from universal catastrophe. Then man's rule over the animal world through fear is disclosed and animals are given to man as food along with plant life
Next, human life is seen to be so sacred that only God has the right to take it, but He uses the state as His instrument and a foundation is thus laid for police work and capital punishment. Once again, the command is given to multiply and populate the earth. All this is to be lived under the constant reminder that "the intent of man's heart is evil from his youth" (Genesis. 8:21).
The strange story of the drunkenness of Noah and the curious action of his son, Ham, toward his father, followed by the cursing of Canaan and the blessing of Shem and Japheth contain much of great significance. Many scholars feel that Ham committed some homosexual act; at the very least it is clear that Ham looked upon his father in his exposed condition with a leering glance that had sexual connotations.
It is also noteworthy that Shem and Japheth would have nothing to do with their brother's lewd delight. They exemplify in action the verse in the New Testament, "Love covers a multitude of sins" (I Peter. 4:8). Literally, they covered their father and refused to look upon his shame, thus they honored their father and won the approval and blessing of God. If this is the case, then Noah knew that Ham's tolerance of perversion would break out in an intensified form in at least one of his children.
Thus, guided by divine wisdom, Noah unerringly selects the one boy of Ham's four sons in whom this perversion will find outlet and expression. So a curse is pronounced upon Canaan. That curse is not a black skin as many have mistakenly stated, but a tendency toward homosexuality which was clearly evident in the Canaanite tribes that inhabited the land of Palestine when Israel came into it, and which has broken out in human society in many places since.
In the prophetic words uttered by Noah concerning his sons, we have a key to the dispersion of mankind throughout the earth. Shem is given religious primacy and the Semitic people are responsible under God to meet the spiritual needs of mankind. It is most striking that the three great religions of earth all come from the Semitic family: Judaism, Islam, and Christianity.
Japheth was promised enlargement and the Japhetic people are in general the peoples of India and Europe. It is largely from this family that Americans come and it is most interesting that history has recorded their geographical enlargement. The entire western hemisphere of our globe is settled by Japhetic peoples and the Indians of Asia are of the same stock.
Ham is given the role of a servant in relation to the other families of earth, but not in the sense of enslavement. The sons of Ham fulfill a servant relationship as the practical technicians of humanity. The Egyptians, the Babylonians, the Mayans, the Aztecs all were Hamitic people, and they are the great inventors of mankind.
In chapter 10 God narrows the flow of history down to the Semitic races. In chapter 11 He will narrow it still further to one man--Abraham. From there it begins to broaden out again to take in Abraham and all his descendants, both physical and spiritual. The rest of the Bible is all about the children of Abraham physically and spiritually. We have, then, in these two chapters one of the most important links in understanding the Bible.
The atmosphere of this time is one of movement, migration. People are thrusting out from a center like spokes of a wheel radiating out into the corners of the earth. One branch of the Hamitic family settled in the land of Shinar or Babylonia. They soon discovered they could invent their own materials for building and they were fired with desire to build two things--a city and a tower. A city reflects the need of man for social intercourse where the hungers of the soul can be satisfied for beauty, art, music commercial and business life. A tower, on the other hand reflects the need to satisfy the spirit of man.
Archeologists have now found that the Babylonians built great towers called ziggurats which were built in a circular fashion with an ascending spiral staircase terminating in a shrine at the top around which were written signs of the zodiac. Obviously, such a tower IS a religious building. Unquestionably there was a plaque somewhere attached to each which carried the pious words "Erected in the year to the greater glory of God." But it was not really for the glory of God. It was a way of controlling God, a way of channeling God by using Him for man's glory. This is revealed in what the builders said, "Let us make a name for ourselves."
The reaction of God is one of exquisite irony. God takes note of their unity and their creativity and comes to a startling conclusion, "Nothing that they propose to do will now be impossible to them." Thus, for man's sake, to keep him from destroying himself by ignorant ambition, God confused their language and man is scattered over the face of the earth. It is God's way of preventing the ultimate catastrophe. When man at last gets together again and under the illusion of technical ability thinks he can master all the great and intricate mechanisms of life, we will have achieved the ultimate disaster.
Highlights of the Bible by Ray C. Stedman
Imaginative writers of our day seek continually to depict what kind of world this would be after an atomic holocaust had completely wiped out all life as we know it. What would it be like to be the first people to start out in such a world? Noah and his family knew, for that is exactly what happened after the flood.
Physically and materially they began again to fulfill the original divine command to "be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth." Spiritually, having been on both sides of the flood, Noah becomes a picture of regeneration. He went through the waters of judgment, being preserved in the ark, and came out into a new world and a new life, as a Christian passes from death into life in Christ.
Genesis 12--50 traces three great truths that belong to this new life. In the lives of four men--Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Joseph, Genesis reveals what man is always seeking:
Righteousness, the sense of being right. Man dislikes the feeling of guilt or unrighteousness and wants always to be seen as acceptable by whatever standard he views as relevant. We see the fulfillment of this need in the life of Abraham.
Peace, a sense of inner well-being. Man is ever seeking a certain calmness and inner confidence which can only be described as peace. The story of Isaac and Jacob, who portray sonship and sanctification, are in themselves the secret of peace of heart.
Joy, a sense of gladness and happiness out of life. This is so evident as to require no documentation other than life itself. Joseph manifested the truth of glorification.
These three virtues are the unseen, almost unconscious goals of life everywhere. But where are they truly to be found? Romans 14:17 says, "The kingdom of God is not eating and drinking, but righteousness and peace and joy in the Holy Spirit." Only God can impart these things to men, and this is the story of the rest of Genesis.
MAN SEEKS RIGHTEOUSNESS (Genesis. 12-25)
Abram appears first as celled by God to exemplify in his entire life story the process of achieving righteousness by means of faith, or as the New Testament calls it, "justification by faith."
God appeared and conversed with Abram on seven occasions, beginning with Abram's call in Ur and ending with his offering of his son Isaac in obedience to God's command. Out of this relationship with God Abram learned eight lessons of faith. The parallel to all these is found in the life of every believer today. For this reason, Abraham is known as the father of the faithful and is called "the friend of God." He depicts forever the friendship which God desires to have in intimate communion with everyone who is made righteous by faith.
The first lesson faith must learn is that of obedience. It is not faith to simply say "I believe"; it is necessary also to add "I obey." In his first encounter with God, Abram is sent out on a march without a map to an unknown destination, but with the promise that God will go with him and show him the way. The promise includes seven specifics: 1) I will make of you a great nation; (2) I will bless you; (3) I will make your name great; (4) you shall be a blessing; (5)1 will bless those that bless you; (6) 1 will curse them that curse you; (7) in you shall all the families of the earth be blessed. Though Abram was 75 years of age when this call came to him, his obedience was immediate. He left Ur and went to Haran where his father Terah lived. There, after his father's death, he came into the land of Canaan in obedience to the call of God. The spiritual parallel of this in today's believer is found in a willingness to turn from the natural claims of family and friends, and to recognize the right of God to lead and direct his life.
In the land of Canaan God appears to Abram for the second time. He promises to give the land to Abram's seed, despite its present possession by the Canaanite tribes. Abram's life in the land is immediately characterized by two meaningful symbols: a tent and an altar. Whenever Abram is walking in faith these two symbols are always present. The tent is the symbol of the pilgrim character of his existence. He is never to own the land outright but is to be a sojourner in it, looking for that "city which has foundations, whose architect and builder is God" (Hebrews 11:10). The altar is the symbol of fellowship and communion with a living God. It is the secret of the ability to endure in a land possessed by enemies. Every believer must have such an altar, a personal time alone with God, for Bible reading and prayer, that he might endure in a hostile world.
The second lesson Abram learns in the life of faith is that of the sufficiency of faith to meet all human need. Abram's faith was tested by a famine in the land. He trusted God enough not to return to the land of Haran, but he does attempt to flee the famine by going down to Egypt. During his time in Egypt, there is no record of either the tent or the altar. His weak faith led Abram to resort to a lie to defend his wife's honor and finds himself a recipient of Pharaoh's rebuke (see Genesis. 12:1~19). Thus, through failure, Abram learns the necessary truth: God is able to supply his need, even in the midst of pressure and circumstantial difficulty. Humbled and repentant, Abram returns to the land and once again the tent and the altar appear.
Abram's third lesson of faith is that of humility, to learn to take second place. Abram and his nephew, Lot, illustrate different principles of Christian living: Abram was following God; Lot was following Abram--he was a tag-along believer. When a dispute arose between the herdsmen of the two men over the use of the land, even though Abram was the older and had the God-given right of first choice, he exhibited the humility of faith and allowed Lot to choose first. Lot chose his land on the basis of human measurements and ended up in Sodom. However, even though he obtained, he did not truly possess the land, because God gave Abram all the land, including that which Lot had chosen for himself (Genesis. 13:14-18). In this lesson of Abram's we see that God's children are called to risk the obedience of faith, believing that God will take care of them even though they apparently are giving up their rights.
Abram's fourth lesson was to exhibit the boldness of faith. Chapter 14 records the historic invasion of the valley of the Dead Sea by the five united kings from the east. Lot was captured and, through this, Abram learned this fourth lesson. Though greatly outnumbered, Abram gathers his servants about him and with a company of 318 he pursues the united armies as far north as Dan and overcomes them in a great battle.
On his triumphant return he is met by Melchizedek at the King's Vale (now known as the Kidron Valley outside Jerusalem). Melchizedek appears as the type of an eternal priesthood, to strengthen Abram to meet the most subtle encounter of his career so far: the offer of the king of Sodom to make him rich. Strengthened by the bread and wine which Melchizedek gave him (forerunner of the Lord's Table established centuries later), Abram refuses to be made rich except by God Himself, thus manifesting the fifth quality of faith.
Faith is independent of all natural resources. Chapter 15 is the account of the fourth direct appearance of Jehovah to Abram. Abram had now passed through several testings of his faith and the divine voice declares that He is Abram's shield (for his protection) and his exceeding great reward (as Abram's ultimate resource). Abram's intimacy with God had grown to the point where he can now share the temptation to doubt that was in his heart. God's response is to promise him an heir from whom would come a progeny as numerous as the stars of the sky.
Despite his age Abram believed in the promise of a coming son and for the first time in Scripture we read the great sentence, "his faith was reckoned to him for righteousness" (see Genesis. 15:6). Abram is now the friend of God, not by his own merit but on the basis of his faith. Jehovah renews the promise of the land as Abram's inheritance and confirms it with a sign at Abram's request. The sign is a vision of a smoking furnace and a lamp indicating the furnace of affliction Abram's descendants would go through in Egypt before the land was granted to them. Here Abram begins to learn the sixth quality of faith.
Faith endures and has patience. Chapter 16 is the account of Abram's second major deflection from faith. After 12 years of waiting for God to fulfill His promise of a son, Sarai and Abram resort to a human expediency to help God along. Hagar, Sarai's maid, is given to Abram as a wife and from her is born Ishmael. No tent or altar appears in this chapter and Abram reaps the harvest of his folly by continual strife between Sarai and Hagar and the eventual exclusion of Hagar from the household. Thus the man of faith of chapter 15 becomes the man of flesh of chapter 16 and the far-reaching result visible today is the strife between the Arabs (of Ishmael) and Israel (of Isaac). Yet God tenderly cares for Hagar and sends her back to her mistress with a promise of divine support.
God then appears to Abram for a fifth time and an everlasting covenant is made, symbolized by the change of names from Abram to Abraham and from Sarai to Sarah. This is clearly what the New Testament calls "the new covenant," by which God undertakes Himself to be the total resource of the believer for daily activity. This is confirmed by a new revelation of God's name, that of El Shaddai, which means "the God who is sufficient." The sign of this new covenant is that of circumcision, which involves the cutting off of the flesh. It was the outward sign of an invisible inward truth. Abraham's faith falters slightly in seeking to bring Ishmael before God for blessing, but Jehovah patiently explains that he cannot be the heir of the promises since his birth does not rest upon faith, as does Isaac's. (The apostle Paul will base a great argument upon this difference in the letter to the Galatians 3:15-18)
The next chapter records the sixth appearance of God to Abraham, during which God announces the imminent birth of the promised son, and reveals to Abraham His plan to destroy Sodom and Gomorrah. The encounter grows out of Abraham's warm hospitality toward three strangers who appear to him as he sits in the door of his tent. As he shows them hospitality there gradually dawns upon him the realization that it is the Lord Himself who thus comes, accompanied by two angels.
Sarah, listening behind the tent door, hears the announcement that she would bear a son within a year. She laughed when she heard it. But God graciously meets her with a divine revelation upon which her faith may seize and rest. He asks the question, "Is there anything too difficult for the Lord?" (Genesis. 18:14). Sarah doubtless meditated on that for the intervening months, and by the time her son was born she was strong in faith, even as Abraham her husband.
Then Jehovah reveals to Abraham, His friend, the second purpose of His coming, that of the imminent destruction of the cities of the plain for their extreme wickedness and unbelief. This introduces a most helpful manifestation of the authority of faith, exercised in prayer by Abraham out of concern for Lot and his family and the inhabitants of Sodom. With obvious reverence Abraham intercedes with God on behalf of the doomed cities. This intercession is based upon Abraham's awareness of the character of God: " Shall not the Judge of all the earth deal justly?" (v. 25). It would be a mistake to view Abraham's prayers as reflecting more mercy than does God. We learn from the New Testament that it is the Spirit of God who prays within the believer, urging him to the specific requests that are made. Thus it is God's mercy, expressed through Abraham's prayers, that limits and tempers the Justice and wrath of God. The sequel shows that God goes beyond anything we ask. Abraham stopped at ten righteous persons, but God saved the two or three in whom there was any recognition of Himself.
Chapter 19 records in vivid detail the sequel of the two angels' visit to Sodom and Gomorrah. Lot himself is righteous, as the New Testament makes clear, but his righteousness has been compromised by his conformity to much of Sodom's ways and he finds himself unable to influence his city, even his own family, toward righteousness. The homosexuality practiced in Sodom reflects the curse of Canaan upon these Canaanite tribes, and the ugly story of Lot and his incest with his daughters reveals the degree to which such practices may pervert those who maintain only an external pattern of righteousness.
Again, for the third time, we see a weakness in Abraham's faith (Genesis. 20). Surrounded by the men of Gerar (who afterward were known as the Philistines) Abraham again lies concerning his wife Sarah. Once again the man of faith is censured by the man of the world as Abimelech, the heathen king, rebukes him for his lack of complete honesty. These deflections in Abraham's faith are never in the great things but in the smaller details of his life. Clearly they illustrate for us the danger we face in matters where we feel no compulsion to act in confidence and trust in the living God.
At long last Sarah's laugh of incredulity is turned into the laughter of realization. As Isaac, the child of promise grows, conflict breaks out with the son of bondage, Ishmael. Eventually Abraham must make a choice between the two and in simple obedience he sent forth the child and the bondwoman, and leaned back on the gracious provision of God to fulfill His promise.
Chapter 22 records the last great lesson of faith, the intimacy of faith. In this chapter we also find the seventh and last appearance of Jehovah to Abraham. A gap of perhaps 20 years is evident between chapters 21 and 22. Isaac has grown to young manhood and, as the pride of his father's heart, God asks that he be offered up as a sacrifice to Him whom Abraham serves. It is Abraham's greatest test and must have proved a stunning and desolating trial to him. But faith enables him to triumph as he rests upon the character of God and feels that God is able even to raise the young man from death. Thus, as Hebrews (11:17-19) tells us, in a figure of resurrection Abraham received his son back from the dead. It is most striking that, according to biblical scholars, the mountain on which Isaac was offered is the same mountain upon which the Temple was later built and upon whose summit, many centuries later, Jesus Himself was offered as the Lamb of God which takes away the sin of the world.
This last experience ended the testing of Abraham's faith. He had learned his faith lessons and there are no more failures of faith on his part. The testing however is followed by the repetition of God's great promises to Abraham, with the addition of a promised seed, as numerous as the sands of the seashore (22:17). It is clear from this that Abraham is to have two lines of descendants: a heavenly line, symbolized by the stars of the heavens; and an earthly line, symbolized by the sands of the seashore. Thus the writer of Hebrewswill later reflect upon a heavenly Jerusalem which is above, and an earthly Jerusalem which is below. Those who by faith are the children of Abraham, whether Jew or Gentile, are of the heavenly seed. Those who belong to the earthly Jerusalem are the physical descendants of Abraham, the Semitic nations of today (see Romans. 4:9-16; 9:6-8).
Chapters 23 through 25 record the death of Sarah and Abraham's sorrow at her passing. For her burial Abraham purchases the cave of Machpelah from the Hittites. Thus Abraham's first actual possession in the land is a grave.
In the story of Abraham's servant, Eliezer, sent to find a bride for Isaac, we have a beautiful Eastern idyll, picturing in accurate terms the sending of the Holy Spirit from the Father to seek the church as a bride for His own dear Son. Running throughout the account is the theme of the sovereign call 'of God. This alone accounts for Rebecca's willingness to leave her home and family to join a man she has never seen, in a land to which she has never been before. She finds Isaac waiting for her, meditating in the fields at evening time. Abraham's faith is rewarded by seeing the union of his son with a woman of his own kindred, who, though they are of two different temperaments, would walk together in the fulfillment of the divine purpose.
The final years of Abraham's life are gathered up for us in chapter 25, following his marriage to Keturah. From this union there came six more sons who also fathered tribes that later appear in the record of Israel. They form no part of the heirs of the promises made to Isaac, but are nevertheless given, by God's grace a place to dwell and made to flourish as nations.
Finally, at the age of 175 Abraham dies and is buried by his two sons Isaac and Ishmael in the cave of Machpelah, beside Sarah his beloved wife. Throughout the rest of the Bible, the figure of Abraham looms as preeminently the man of faith. By his experiences with God, and even by his failures, he has been taught the ingredients of righteousness which come by faith alone. These, as we have seen, may be summarized as: the obedience of faith, the sufficiency of faith, the humility of faith, the boldness of faith, the independence of faith, the authority of faith, and finally, in the sacrifice of Isaac, the intimacy of faith.
MAN SEEKS PEACE
Isaac symbolizes the condition of those who are the sons of God by faith in Jesus Christ. He dwells in the land in the midst of God's blessing and is refreshed by a continual supply of water in the wells that he digs in various locations, despite the opposition of his enemies. This truly depicts one who has found peace.
There is another aspect to Isaac: the principle of sonship. While his father was alive Isaac was the darling of his father's heart, and after Abraham's death he becomes the heir of the promises to Abraham and of the blessings of God. But Isaac's sonship also reflects the weaknesses of his father. For in the land of Gerar he repeats his father's sin: he lies about his wife Rebekah. Abimelech--not a proper name but the title of the kings of the Philistines--was the man of the world who rebuked Isaac.
As the heir of the promises, Isaac is given authority to pass these along to his posterity. When he was an old man, nearing the end of his life, he called his sons before him to give them his blessing. Before his twin sons, Jacob and Esau, were born, God told their mother Rebekah that the elder would serve the younger. Even though Isaac must have been aware of this prediction, when the sons appeared for their blessing Isaac sought to reverse the divine command. He intended to give the greater blessing to Esau, the firstborn.
Through a series of deceptions, masterminded by Rebekah, Jacob appears before his blind father in the guise of Esau, and receives the blessing of the firstborn. When Isaac found out that he had been tricked, he dares not alter the blessing he has pronounced. Instead he confirms to Esau the fact that he must serve his brother, but assigns to him the role of rebel and proud overthrower of his brother's yoke.
When Isaac died, the story centers on Jacob. Isaac has been a man of peace, quite content to enjoy his close relationship with his father and to experience his own spiritual relationship with God, distinct from those of Abraham or Jacob. He has learned how to pray and receive God's answer and to obey God's word and experience His blessing. In the brief record of his life we learn the secret of being a son and enjoying the inheritance of a great and glorious father.
Just as the life of Abraham vividly illustrates what is involved in the teaching of justification by faith, and that of Isaac, his son, portrays the meaning of sonship, so the life of Jacob describes and illustrates for us in exceedingly helpful ways the doctrine of sanctification by faith. Jacob's story is that of the struggle of two natures within him. His natural disposition was one of cunning and self-centered shrewdness. When he was born he emerged from the womb with his hand upon his brother Esau's heel and thus was given the name Jacob which means "heelcatcher" or "supplanter," one who seeks to take another's place. But Jacob had another bent within him which Esau, his twin brother, seemed totally to lack. Jacob had a hunger for spiritual relationships. He valued his brother's birthright which he took from him by trickery. He had a strong personal faith, was a hard worker and an intensely loving person. The story of Jacob, therefore, is the story of how God so dealt with a man of like passions with ourselves that He taught him how to rise above his lower nature and to become a man of God and a man of respect and dignity in his own generation.
Jacob's life can be seen in three clear stages. The first stage is his early years at home when he was basically a deceiver of others, living up to his name. In the second period of his life he learns what it is like to be deceived. Finally, Jacob learns to live as a man devoted to the word and will of God.
Jacob, the Deceiver
Esau, the older of Isaac's twin sons, was a man of the field, a skilled hunter, hairy and of ruddy complexion; he was also called Edom, which means red. Jacob, his brother, on the other hand, was a quiet lad and content to live in the tent around his mother. As the firstborn, Esau had the right to the blessing of Isaac, but God had told Rebekah that the "elder shall serve the younger." So Rebekah was determined that Jacob would receive the inheritance.
One day, in a moment of hunger, Esau traded his birthright to Jacob for a mess of pottage. The Bible said that "Esau despised his birthright." So when the time came for her sons to receive their father's blessing, Rebekah decided to make sure that Jacob would get the firstborn blessing. Isaac, old and blind, had sent Esau out to the field to hunt game "and prepare a savory dish" for his father. While he was gone, Rebekah told Jacob to dress in Esau's clothes. She covered his hands with hair. Then she prepared a savory stew of goat meat and sent Jacob to his father with the food. When Jacob entered his father's room he said." I am Esau your first-born; Get up, please, sit and eat of my game, that you may bless me" (Genesis. 27:19). Isaac was a little doubtful at first, but finally gave Jacob the blessing.
When Esau returned from the field, he also prepared a savory stew from the game he brought. He approached his father to receive the blessing. As Isaac learned of the deceit practiced upon him he fell into a violent fit of trembling, undoubtedly caused by his consciousness of the sovereign overriding of God. Isaac, aware of the divine prediction which he had sought to evade, gave Esau a lesser blessing.
Rebekah, fearing what Esau would do, convinced Isaac to send Jacob to Laban, her brother, to find a wife. Isaac sent Jacob off with his blessing.
Jacob, the Deceived
It was 600 miles from Jacob's home at Beersheba southwest of the Dead Sea, to Haran in Mesopotamia where Rebecca's family lived. Jacob spent his first night in lonely homesickness at a spot which he later named Bethel. There God appeared to Jacob in a dream of a ladder reaching up into heaven upon which angels ascended and descended. The ladder symbolized the continual communication open between him and God. This was followed by God's renewal of the promises which He made to Abraham, now extended and confirmed to Jacob. Thus God's first step in the process of sanctifying Jacob was not to scold him or punish him or rebuke him, but rather to reveal to him His love and faithful concern. Jacob was shown that the way was open between himself and God and was given a promise upon which his faith could rest and which he could pass on to this descendants.
Jacob had thought he was alone and uncared for, but he found that God was with him, loving him and seeking to help him. In response, Jacob erected a great stone, anointing it with oil, and named the place Bethel--the house of God. To this place Jacob returned again and again, gaining from each visit a renewed awareness of God's faithful love and sure promise. So the sanctifying process in each believer today will consist of ~ returning again and again to the faithful promises of God and the reminders of His love and care for us.
The rather lengthy account in chapters 29 through 31 of Jacob's life in Haran is the story of God's loving discipline of a favorite son. It is a record of God's careful mingling of blessing and chastisement so that Jacob's spiritual fiber is toughened and strengthened while his heart is kept from discouragement by the love of Rachel, one of his wives, the fertility of Leah, another wife, the birth of sons, and by his growing prosperity even under the exacting hand of his uncle Laban. The scene when Jacob arrived at Haran and met Rachel beside the well is reminiscent of the story of Rebecca and the servant of Abraham many years before. Jacob fell in love with Rachel at first sight and, having been welcomed initially into Laban's family, felt that all was working out well for him, for he was promised his beloved Rachel for his wife after seven years of service to his uncle.
But Jacob must learn the harvest of deceit, and at the end of seven years he found himself tricked into marrying Leah, Laban's older daughter, instead. When Jacob protested, Laban offered to let him have Rachel for yet another seven years' servitude. So great was Jacob's love he consented to this as well. Fortunately for him, Rachel was given to him immediately and he had her love and companionship throughout the second seven years of service.
During this time a total of 11 sons were born to Jacob's wives and their handmaids who became his concubines. This was in accordance with the customs of the day and before the written law made such practices clearly wrong. When Rachel gave birth to a son after many years of barrenness she named him Joseph At that point Jacob decided that the time had arrived when he should return to Canaan.
But God was not yet through with Jacob's training. He must again experience the deceitfulness of his uncle in the matter of obtaining flocks and herds to take on his journey. After 14 years of service Jacob had learned much of the need for straightforward honesty and integrity and so he offered to make a deal with his uncle. He would take only the speckled and spotted sheep and goats while Laban would retain all those who were totally white, which was certainly a predominance of the flock. To this Laban readily agreed but secretly separated the spotted and speckled sheep and goats and put them under his sons' care at a distance of three days' journey. Jacob was left with nothing but white sheep and goats. He resorted to what he felt would be a stratagem to overcome his uncle's deceit. He tried a method that we would consider an "old-wives-tale" to insure that he would have sheep and goats to take with him. What he did not know was that God, who understood the laws of genetics since He Himself had called them into being, was using the invisible, hereditary genes for color in the white sheep to produce offspring which were spotted and speckled. The result was a spectacular increase in Jacob's flocks.
At this point God appeared to Jacob again in a dream and commanded him to return to the land of promise. To escape from Laban's wiles Jacob left in the middle of the night with his wives, children and flocks, and though Laban pursued him and caught up with him, God intervened to keep him from harming Jacob any further. Instead Jacob and Laban made a covenant of peace with one another and Laban returned to his own home. Despite Jacob's suffering during all these 20 years there was no trace of bitterness in his attitude, but one of praise to God for His blessing. Jacob had grown spiritually in tremendous ways during the 20 years of his servitude, but he would reach his true potential only after he had wrestled with God and his human strength was broken completely.
Jacob, Man of God
As Jacob came to the ford of the river Jabbok he learned that his brother Esau was on his way to meet him with 400 armed men. Immediately his reaction was to resort again to wiles and stratagems of his own. He divided his household into two groups and planned to send them on before him to try to appease the wrath of Esau with gifts before he must encounter him personally. While he waited alone, an angel in the form of a man, met him and began to wrestle with him through the long night. As the day broke the angel sought to disengage himself but Jacob clung with stubborn persistence. The angel touched Jacob's thigh and threw it out of joint; but still Jacob clung in helplessness to the divine messenger, refusing to let go until he was blessed of God. Then the divine being changed the name of Jacob to Israel which means "he who prevails with God." As the sun rose, Jacob limped off to meet Esau with a totally different attitude in his heart. He no longer feared man but was confident that God would fight his battles for him. When Esau arrived his own heart had been strangely altered and instead of attacking he fell upon Jacob's neck and embraced him. Thus Jacob learned the great principle of sanctification: that God was his strength and his refuge and is fully capable of working out all the problems with which he may be confronted.
As the result of an incident involving Jacob's daughter Dinah, God appeared again to Jacob and sent him back to Bethel to dwell there with a tent and an altar, as his grandfather Abraham and his father Isaac had done before him. There God renewed His promises to Jacob and there Jacob's beloved wife, Rachel, gave birth to her second son Benjamin, and died in childbirth. Jacob traveled on to Mamre where he found his aged father on his deathbed and he and Esau joined together in burying Isaac with honor and reverence. The record then traces in one chapter (36) the extent of the sons of Esau and the nation of Edom which came from his loins. From here on, in Scripture, Jacob and Esau will forever stand for conflicting and opposite principles, the Spirit versus the flesh. The spotlight of Genesis now turns to Joseph and his sons.
MAN SEEKS JOY
With Joseph we come to the last of the four great patriarchs who symbolically present to us the great truths of redemption. To justification by faith, exemplified in Abraham; to sonship, shown in Isaac; and to sanctification, revealed in the life of Jacob; we now add the truth of glorification, set forth in the story of Joseph. He clearly appears as the forerunner, sent into Egypt to prepare the way for the coming of the 12 tribes into that land, and as such he pictures our great Forerunner who has gone on before us, even Jesus our Lord, to prepare the way for all His own to come into glory with Him and to share that glory together. In line with that emphasis, the character of Joseph is presented to us with almost unblemished consistency. He is often regarded as a type of Christ since he was beloved of his father but rejected by his brethren, sold into slavery for 20 pieces of silver, and, in the view of his father Jacob, died and eventually was brought to life again as a triumphant king instead of a suffering servant. Like our Lord he also forgave his brothers for their treatment of him and was used to save them from death and preserve the family line.
Beloved by His Father, Rejected by His Brothers
We have already learned that Joseph was born in Haran while Jacob was serving Laban, his uncle. In chapter 37 we discover him at the age of 17 working as a shepherd in his father's home in Hebron. Joseph was the obvious favorite of his father Jacob, who had bestowed on him a princely coat as a special mark of his favor. Therefore, he was the object of bitter hatred by his brothers. When, further, they learned that God had given Joseph two special dreams which predicted his elevation above his brothers, their hatred took a murderous form and they sought a way to kill him. Like his father Jacob, to whom God also spoke in dreams, Joseph seems to have had a special spiritual quality which God would greatly use in the years that lay ahead.
When Jacob's sons delayed returning from Shechem where they were feeding their flocks, Jacob sent Joseph the 50 miles from Hebron to Shechem to check on his brothers. Upon arriving at Shechem he found his brothers had departed for Dothan and he trudged on another 20 miles further north to find them there. Seeing him coming from afar, and recognizing the hated coat, his brothers plotted together to kill him, throw him into a pit, and tell his father that a wild beast had destroyed him. The oldest of the 12, Reuben, objected and persuaded them to leave him to die in a pit.
One can imagine the agony and fear of the 17-year-old boy who was thus roughly treated by his own brothers and tossed into a pit to die alone. While his brothers were in preparation for their journey home, they saw a caravan of Ishmaelites traveling by and hit upon a scheme to sell Joseph to them as a slave, but to tell their father that he had been killed.
Sold for 20 Pieces of Silver
Thus for 20 pieces of silver they sold Joseph to the Ishmaelites. Then they brought his coat, dipped in goat's blood back to their father with the report that Joseph had been killed by a wild beast. Once again, Jacob who had deceived his own father Isaac, is now most truly deceived by his sons. But God's strange purposes were at work to bring about a quite different turn of events.
Chapter 38 records an incident to show why God found it necessary to remove the chosen family into Egypt for a period of time. Judah the fourth son of Jacob married a Canaanite woman. Their marriage led to a series of events that indicates the degradation of Canaan. To prevent them from being absorbed by a heathen culture God was moving in ways that would eventually put the family out of Canaan.
Meanwhile, Joseph was sold to Potiphar, an officer in the army of Egypt. The excellence of Joseph's character soon elevated him to a place of trust and responsibility and he was put over all of Potiphar's household. Surely he must have felt that the prediction of his dream was soon to come to pass. But a loving heavenly Father saw his need for being made perfect through suffering (see Hebrews 2:10) and events quickly took another turn.
Because Joseph was handsome and good-looking, Potiphar's wife attempted to seduce him. Joseph resisted until one day she found him alone and lay hold of his garment, attempting to drag him into her bed. Crying out, "How then could I do this great evil, and sin against God?" (Genesis. 39:9), Joseph fled from her presence leaving his garment behind.
Potiphar's wife reported the incident to her husband as though Joseph had attempted to assault her. Potiphar cast Joseph into prison. In all this there is no hint of bitterness or resentment on Joseph's part, but a quiet trust that God was working His way. Joseph's kindliness and skill soon won him a position as trusty over the other prisoners, because "the Lord was with Joseph." Whatever he did the Lord made it to prosper.
Once again, dreams play a large part in Joseph's story. This time Pharaoh's butler and baker, who were cast into prison, were the dreamers, and Joseph was the interpreter. The dreams were fulfilled as Joseph said. The baker went to his death and the butler was restored to Pharaoh's household, but soon forgot his promise to remember Joseph when he was released. But another dream got Joseph out of prison two years later.
From Suffering Servant to Triumphant King
Pharaoh had a dream. He commanded his seers to interpret the dream for him. When they could not the chief butler remembered Joseph and told Pharaoh of his interpretative skill. Joseph was hastily hauled from the dungeon and brought before Pharaoh. There he interpreted Pharaoh's dream, predicting the seven years of good harvest followed by seven years of drought and famine. Pharaoh, impressed not only by Joseph's interpretative skills, but also by the wisdom with which he suggested ways to meet the coming crises, put his signet ring upon Joseph's hand, arrayed him in garments of fine linen, put a gold chain about his neck and made him at the age of 30 years the second ruler in all the kingdom. Thus the stage was set for the coming of Jacob and his sons down to the land of Egypt.
Meanwhile, back at the ranch in Canaan, Jacob and his sons were experiencing terrible famine which settled upon the land. Jacob sent all his sons but the youngest, Benjamin, into Egypt to buy grain for their cattle. When the brothers came before Joseph he recognized them immediately, but did not reveal his knowledge. Instead he treated them roughly and accused them as spies come into the land. When they protested he ordered that they leave one of the brothers behind as a hostage and return to Canaan and bring back Benjamin, the youngest, as proof of their integrity. In discussing this among themselves, Reuben, the eldest, reminded them that this was a divine retribution for their treatment of Joseph many years earlier. Simeon, the second oldest, remained behind and the brothers returned to Canaan. Jacob at first was adamant that he would not let Benjamin leave. But the famine forced him to relent.
Upon reaching Egypt, Joseph entertained the brothers in his own home, much to their bafflement and uncertainty. When they left he commanded that the money they used to buy the grain be put back in their bags, and his own private cup be hidden in Benjamin's bag. A short way out from the city he sent his servants after them who accused them of stealing the cup. Protesting their innocence they vowed that the man in whose bag the cup should be found would immediately be put to death. But when the cup was found in Benjamin's bag they were overcome with sorrow and were brought back to Joseph's presence.
There, in a most moving plea, Judah privately recited the whole story in Joseph's ear and begged of him that Joseph would permit Judah to remain as hostage and let Benjamin go. Upon hearing this Joseph could not control himself any longer, and ordering all the Egyptians from the room, in a most moving scene he made himself known to his brothers. Upon Pharaoh's command the brothers returned to Canaan with the good news, and at last Jacob was persuaded to come with them into Egypt. Once again God appeared to Jacob in a vision of the night and reassured him that it was right for him to go into Egypt, for there He promised to make of his sons a great nation and to bring them again to the land of Canaan.
The remainder of the story is quickly told. The Israelites settled in the land of Goshen with Pharaoh's permission and became the herdsmen and keeper of Pharaoh's cattle. As the famine continued, the Egyptians sold first their cattle and then their land to Pharaoh, and at the end of the drought Joseph gave them seed to plant their land and retained the fifth part for Pharaoh's possession.
As the aged Jacob neared his death, Joseph brought his two sons Manasseh and Ephraim before him to be blessed of him. Joseph stood Manasseh, the older one, at Jacob's right hand and Ephraim, the younger, at Jacob's left hand, but when the old patriarch, sitting on the side of his bed, blessed them he crossed his hands so that the blessing of the firstborn fell upon Ephraim the younger and Manasseh, the elder, was given the secondary blessing. Once again the right of the firstborn was withheld from the one born first, and, by means of a cross, was transferred to the younger son. It was God's reminder that the right of the firstborn, which belonged to Adam, was now transferred to the last Adam (Jesus) that He might be "the firstborn of all creation."
In a great predictive chapter, Jacob called his sons before him and in poetic style foretold their destinies. When he had finished charging his sons "he drew up his feet into the bed, and breathed his last."
The final chapter recounts how Joseph brought the body of his father, in a great procession, up to the land of Canaan and buried him with Abraham in the cave of Machpelah. Joseph then returned to Egypt where he lived till the age of 110 and himself died, having made his brothers swear that they would bring his bones into Canaan when at last God brought the nation out of Egypt into the Promised Land (see Exodus. 13:19).
Thus Genesis, which began with the creation of the heavens
and the earth, ends in a coffin in Egypt. But behind the sad reality
there bums the bright promise of El Shaddai, the God who is sufficient
to bring about the fulfillment of all His promises by means of
the process of justification, adoption, sanctification, and ultimately,
glory.
Highlights of the Bible by Ray C. Stedman
As we have already abundantly seen, Genesis is the book that reveals the need of mankind. It is all about man--the creation of man, the sin of man, the world in which he is placed, and his slow journey through time groping after God. Its very last phrase, "a coffin in Egypt," is a revelation that the most you can say about man when you have said all there is to say is that he lives in the realm of death.
But Exodus is all about God. Exodus is God's answer to man's need. God's supply for man's sin. It commences immediately with God's activity in the preservation and call of Moses, and throughout the whole of the book we will see God mightily at work. The theme of the book is redemption, God's activity to restore man from his sin his degradation and misery. It contains many instructive lessons for us, especially what constitutes redemption in our own lives. We shall understand what God is doing with us when we see what He did with Israel in the book of Exodus.
The book centers around four great events which are easy to keep in mind for they focus on four experiences in the lives of the people of God in any age.
The first event is the Passover, chapters 1-14, which climaxes in that great event. The second significant event is the crossing of the Red Sea, described for us in chapter 14. The third great event is the giving of the Law at Sinai, chapters 19 and 20. The fourth event is the construction of the Tabernacle and its accompanying regulations for the camp of Israel.
The first two events relate closely to each other. The Passover and Red Sea are but two aspects of one great truth: the deliverance of God's people from the bondage of Egypt. They portray in Christian experience one great truth which we call conversion or regeneration--the deliverance of an individual from the bondage of the world. If you want to understand what God did with you when you became a Christian, study the Passover and the crossing of the Red Sea.
The other two events likewise tie together. The giving of the Law and the construction of the Tabernacle are absolutely inseparable. The pattern of the Tabernacle was given by God to Moses on the mountain at the same time that the Law was given, and we must understand from this book why these two are inextricably linked together. We shall do so as we move into this study. The Law requires the Tabernacle and the Tabernacle exists because of the Law.
OBSERVING THE PASSOVER
When man wants to change history he usually uses a battle or a ballot, but when God wants to change history He begins with sending a baby.
The opening chapter informs us that a new king had arisen over Egypt who did not know Joseph--Exodus opens some 300 years after the close of Genesis. The original 70 Israelites had multiplied to a great multitude of nearly two million. The new Pharaoh greatly feared the power of this developing nation in Egypt, and gave orders that all male Hebrew children should be cast into the river at birth. Against this dark background, Moses was born.
The story of his first 80 years is given to us in one brief chapter (chap. 2). In a delicate twist of irony that is wonderful to observe, God moved in such a way that despite the decree of Pharaoh to put all Hebrew male babies to death, Moses was not only saved but Pharaoh hired Moses' own mother to care for her baby. This is surely one of many delightful manifestations of the humor of God.
Moses was reared in the court of Pharaoh and had access to all the learning of the Egyptians. As Stephen will tell us many centuries later (see Acts 7:17-22), Moses was trained in the best university of the biggest empire of the world in that day. He was the foster son of the Pharaoh and every privilege and every advantage were his.
But when Moses came of age, he realized, evidently from his mother's instruction, that he was destined to be the one who would deliver Israel from the bondage of the Egyptians. He attempted this in his own wisdom and tended up murdering a man and having to flee into the wilderness to escape the justice of Pharaoh. There in the wilderness of Midian he spent the next 40 years herding sheep for his father-in-law, Jethro. What a sense of failure and humiliation Moses must have had! All his dreams of glory fading away, he saw nothing in the future but the life of a sheepherder in a barren desert. But all this was necessary in God's disciplinary training of his faithful servant. What Moses could not learn in Egypt, he must learn in the quietude of the desert. In Egypt he had learned the wisdom of man; in the desert he was to learn the wisdom of God.
It was here that God appeared to Moses in the remarkable confrontation of the burning bush. That bush was to become a symbol of Moses' own life. As the bush burned with great brilliance and power yet was not consumed, so Moses would become a man of tremendous power so that when he died at the age of 130 years "his eye was not dim nor his vigor abated" (Deuteronomy. 34:7). The power was not from Moses but from God.
Moses' response to God's call was to doubt himself. "Who am I?" he cried out (Exodus. 3: 11).
To this God replied, "I will be with you."
Again Moses doubted, based on his awareness of his ignorance of God. "What do I know about you?" is the essence of his query.
The answer was the reminder of the meaning of the divine name, "I AM WHO I AM." In its full intent, this is the name, the Lord "who is and who was and who is to come, the Almighty," as found in Revelation 1:8.
Yet again Moses doubted, and this time his doubt is based upon the people of Israel. "What if they will not believe me, or listen to what I say? For they may say, 'The Lord has not appeared to you'" (Exodus. 4:1). God understood this fear and granted him three signs: the rod which could become a serpent; the hand which could become leprous and cleansed; water which could become blood on the land.
All Moses' fear had been met by the revelation of the grace and power of God, but still Moses doubted and retreated to his first argument, asking that someone else be sent in his place. At this the Lord became angry, for Moses in effect was saying, "I can't do this and I don't think you can do it either." God answered Moses' faltering faith by giving him Aaron as a mouthpiece. Here, as in many other instances in the Bible, God accommodated Himself to man's unbelief and yet at a cost of sorrow to that man's own heart, for Aaron proved to be an unreliable companion in times of crisis.
A further flaw in Moses' obedience is dealt with when at a lodging place in route to Midian the Lord met Moses and sought to kill him. For some unrecorded reason (probably due to the opposition of his Gentile wife) Moses had failed to carry out the divine instructions concerning circumcision. The circumcision rite being taken care of, Moses and Aaron met the people of Israel, performed the signs God had given them, and were encouraged by the reception and obedience of the people.
In chapters 5-11 is found the record of Moses and Aaron's confrontation with a repeatedly obdurate and stubborn Pharaoh, and God's breaking of his power by the presentation of nine miraculous plagues. This is a most dramatic encounter, and the drama is clearly designed to reveal the redemptive power of God against the satanic power personified in Pharaoh.
Moses and Aaron appeared before Pharaoh and demanded in the name of the God of Israel that Pharaoh let God's people go. As predicted, Pharaoh defiantly refused, and actually increased the burden of the people by requiring that bricks be made of straw which the people must themselves supply. Jehovah encouraged Moses by reminding him of His promises of judgment until the Egyptians should know that He is the Lord. Subsequently, in the king's presence, the sign of the rod was employed; but when Aaron's rod became a serpent and swallowed up the rods of the Egyptian magicians who performed the same feat, Pharaoh's heart was still unmoved. These miracles by Egyptian magicians were undoubtedly manifestations of evil powers such as those manifest today in occultism.
Then began the series of nine plagues, to be culminated in a tenth, the death of the firstborn of the land and the celebration of the first Passover. The plagues came in series of three and were all directed against the gods of the Egyptians. The first plague was that of fuming the water of the Nile River into blood so that the fish died and the Egyptians found little water to drink. Before the second plague Pharaoh was given opportunity to repent, but hardened his heart instead, and the land was filled with the frogs of the second plague. The Egyptian magicians had imitated both the first and second plagues, but when the third plague struck, with gnats covering the land on both man and beast, the magicians confessed their inability to imitate and declared it to be the finger of God.
Again Pharaoh hardened his heart, and so the judgment of God continued and we have the first of the second cycle of plagues. Swarms of flies filled all the houses excepting in the land of Goshen where the people of Israel dwelt. Thus Pharaoh was to be impressed by the immunity of Israel, that they are truly the people of God.
Pharaoh attempted to compromise by suggesting the people sacrifice in the land of Egypt, but Moses would have none of this. Pharaoh then seemed to give way, declaring his willingness to let them go, but not far away. At this sign of fuming on Pharaoh's part, divine mercy fumed toward him and the flies were removed from the land. But Pharaoh broke faith and again God warned him, and the next day sent the second plague of the second cycle. All the cattle of the Egyptians died, but none of the cattle of the people of Israel died. Still Pharaoh was unrelenting; so without warning, the sixth plague struck. Ashes which Moses and Aaron tossed into the air became boils on the Egyptians, both man and beast throughout the kingdom.
The third cycle of three plagues began with hail. In the midst of a terrible thunder and lightning storm, heavy globes of hail struck down everything in the land of Egypt, sparing the land of Goshen. When Pharaoh seemed to repent the hail ceased, but again we are told Pharaoh callused his own heart and God responded by hardening His own. Pharaoh attempted another compromise but Moses rejected it and called for the plague of locusts to cover the land. Pharaoh was now beyond reason and God did not reason with him. Instead He sent a ninth plague, a terrible darkness to be felt throughout the land of Egypt for three days. In the midst of the darkness Pharaoh made his fourth and last attempt at compromise by suggesting the cattle be left behind. When Moses refused, Pharaoh said he did not want to see his face again.
Chapter 11 describes the conversation between Jehovah and Moses in which the final plague, the death of the firstborn throughout Egypt, is predicted and Israel is commanded to ask of the Egyptians gold and silver and jewels that they might leave with abundance when the hour strikes. This brings us to the central act in the redemptive program of Gad, the feast of the Passover. Jehovah now made this the beginning of the year and gave detailed instructions how the Passover lamb should be taken and killed and the blood placed on the doorposts of the houses, followed by the eating of the unleavened bread.
At midnight, in a most solemn account, the Lord smote the firstborn in the land of Egypt, from Pharaoh on his throne to the captive in his dungeon, as well as the firstborn of all the cattle. In that very night the Egyptians urged the Israelites to leave, thrusting their gold and silver upon them, six hundred thousand men...aside from children. And a mixed multitude also went up with them" (Exodus. 12:37,38) of those who had married Egyptians. Every Israelite was commanded to teach the meaning of this Passover to his children.
Centuries later when John the Baptist would meet Jesus of Nazareth at the River Jordan, his announcement, "Behold, the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world!" (John 1:29), would be understood by every Hebrew present. The Passover feast is clearly the anticipation of the cross of Christ where the judgment of God was vented against all that is of the flesh within man and only those are saved who rest under the protecting blood of the Lamb.
Following the Passover is the feast of unleavened bread described in chapter 13. This was to be a perpetual memorial to the necessity to abstain from anything and everything which causes defilement in the individual life.
As the Israelites began their journey God went before them in a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night, to guard them on the way.
CROSSING THE RED SEA
Immediately after the Passover and the feast of unleavened bread, the people of Israel left the safety of their homes in Egypt and went out into the wilderness, coming at last to the shores of the Red Sea. Looking back they saw 600 Egyptian chariots hot upon their trail; looking ahead they saw only the waters of the Red Sea. The case looked hopeless to them, and they began to cry out to Moses and ask him why he had brought them here to die in the wilderness.
Moses' answer is wonderful. He said, "Do not fear! Stand by and see the salvation of the Lord" (Exodus. 14:13). It was a great cry of faith, and God's word came immediately, saying, "Lift up your staff and stretch out your hand over the sea and divide it, and the sons of Israel shall go through the midst of the sea on dry land" (14:16). The pillar of cloud moved between Israel and the Egyptians and throughout the night a great east wind drove back the waters of the sea. The next day the people marched through the sea safely, the waters standing as a wall on either side. When the Egyptians attempted to do the same, the waters of the sea resumed upon them and they all perished. "Thus the Lord saved Israel that day from the hand of the Egyptians" (Exodus. 14:30).
In I Corinthians 10:2 we are told that all the people "were baptized into Moses in the cloud and in the sea." The meaning of that is they were made one, they became a nation when they passed through the Red Sea. When Moses went down to Egypt the people of Israel were not a nation. They were a disorganized mob. But when they came out of the sea they were a unit. This is a beautiful reflection of the truth that every Christian must discover.
Before he became a Christian he was simply an individual struggling to make his way through life. But when he has gone through the experience of the Passover, when he has seen the blood of the Lamb nailed to the cross for him and has rested in the security of that fact, and when he has passed through the Red Sea experience, moving forward into an openly Christian stand, he will understand fully that he has now become part of a Body, the Body of Christ, and is joined together in a living unit with all other Christians.
The Red Sea typifies a break with the world. Egypt is now on the other side. Once Israel passed through the Red Sea they were then in the wilderness, but they were out of Egypt. The river of death now rolled between them and the place of bondage; and exactly that same river of death rolls between the Christian and the world when he claims Jesus Christ as Lord. Here is perhaps the reason why many professions of Christian faith never seem to go anywhere. There are people who are willing to sit under the Passover blood, willing to receive Jesus Christ as Savior, but they are not willing to walk through the waters of the Red Sea. They never take that step which brings them to the other side and cuts them off from the world. In their mind and thinking they are still back in Egypt. They will not move forward through the waters of death, and until that happens they are still under the bondage and control of the world.
The first thing Israel did as they walked through to the other side of the sea was to break into song. There had been no song in Egypt. That was a place of unrelenting bondage and heartache, misery, toil and danger. But when they came onto the far shore of the Red Sea they began to sing. Real deliverance always brings a song, reflecting joy in the greatness of God. The song they sang acknowledged the sense of dread that falls on the men of other nations who hear the story of the triumphal crossing.
Annie Johnson Flint has written a beautiful poem reflecting the truth of the Christian crossing of the Red Sea.
Have you come to the Red Sea place in your life,
Where, in spite of all you can do,
There is no way out, there is no way back,
There is no other way but--through?Then wait on the Lord with a trust serene,
Till the night of your fear is gone,
He will send the wind, He will heap the floods,
When He says to your soul, "Go on."And His hand will lead you through-- clear through--
Ere the watery walls roll down,
No foe can reach you, no wave can touch,
No mightiest sea can drown;The tossing billows may rear their crests,
Their foam at your feet may break,
But over their bed you shall walk dry shod
In the path that your Lord will make.In the morning watch, 'neath the lifted cloud,
You shall see but the Lord alone,
When He leads you on from the place by the sea
To the land that you have not known;And your fears shall pass as your foes have passed,
You shall be no more afraid;
You shall sing His praise in a better place,
A place that His hand has made.
We have also in chapter 15 the story of the waters of Marah, the place of bitterness In order to cure these bitter waters, Moses cut down a tree which the Lord showed him and threw it into the water and the water became sweet. This is a clear symbol to us that the cross, that great tree on which the Lord Jesus hung, is God's answer to the bitterness of life. When we have experienced the security of the Passover and passed through the Red Sea, cutting ourselves off from the world, we discover that the cross is forever the answer to the bitterness that sin may have brought into our lives, both past and present. To accept that cross as the will of God is to find the waters of life sweetened.
In the record of chapters 16-18 we have the account of Israel's first experiences in the wilderness. They provide a continuing contrast between the murmuring, unbelieving people and the patient mercy of God. It becomes increasingly clear that Jehovah was attempting to wean them from their craving for the material and the immediate, to a realization of the value of the spiritual.
Their first supernatural provision was the gift of manna, the bread from heaven. They were given clear instructions to gather each day for five days and on the sixth enough for that day and the following Sabbath. The people had difficulty in obeying, even as today. We also find it difficult to trust God for His deliverance in the midst of impossible situations. Again their faith was tried when they came to a barren desert, wherein there was no water at all; but again Jehovah patiently met their murmuring unbelief by providing water out of the rock for them.
They encountered a third trial when they suddenly found themselves under attack from Amalek. This was their first experience with war after leaving Egypt. The principles of divine conflict were revealed in that Joshua led the men in actual fighting while Moses, assisted by Aaron and Hur, prayed on the mountainside. The Israelites, through this experience, taught that faith requires obedient action, combined with dependence on God. Here again the eternal conflict between Jacob and Esau reappears. Amalek was a tribe that descended from Esau and represents always the flesh in eternal battle against the spirit. Here a great victory was gained, which Moses commemorated by raising an altar which he named The Lord is My Banner. It was to be a continuing encouragement to any who would have to battle Amalek, with whom Jehovah declared Himself to be at war from generation unto generation.
In chapter 18 an interesting interlude occurred when Jethro, Moses' father-in-law, brought Moses' wife and his two sons from their home in Midian. Even though Jethro was a priest of Midian, upon hearing Moses' recital of God's activity in delivering Israel from Egypt, Jethro acknowledged Jehovah as supreme and offered to Him a sacrifice. Purely as a matter of common sense, he offered advice to Moses on the delegation of authority within the camp of Israel. The fact that Moses acted on this advice is clear evidence that he recognized God speaking through Jethro. The advice probably saved Moses from an early death from sheer exhaustion, and is excellent counsel for those who have not learned to share their work load with others.
From chapter 19 through the remainder of the book, the record concerns itself with the last two great events of the book of Exodus.
GIVING OF THE LAW
The 10 words of God are introduced to us in a scene of fearful solemnity and majesty. God called Moses and announced to him the purpose for Israel: They shall be to Him. "a kingdom of priests and a holy nation." When Moses repeated these words to the people their easy and superficial response was, "All that the Lord has spoken we will do" (Exodus. 19:8). It is clear that the people have no true consciousness of what these words mean. Jehovah, therefore, directed Moses to separate the people from the mountain and to consecrate them for three days that they might be able to endure the sights they were soon to see.
On the third day there were thunderings and lightnings and a thick cloud upon the mountain and a piercing trumpet blast which made the whole camp of Israel tremble. As the trumpet blew louder and louder and the mountain shook continually, Moses and Aaron were summoned to the mountain and Moses alone was called into the very presence of God. There the voice of God delivered to him the words which we call the Ten Commandments.
The first five of the commandments deal with the relationship between God and man and especially guard against the violation of God's Person. The first warns against polytheism. The second against idolatry. The third proclaims the righteousness of God and warns against profanity. The fourth guards the worship of God against secularism, and the fifth requires the honoring of father and mother as representatives of God, guarding against irreverence to authority.
The second five concern the relationships between persons, guarding the sanctity of life, the sanctity of marriage, the sanctity of property, the sanctity of character and sanctity of the inner thought-life.
Immediately instructions were also given as to the nature of worship, and it is significant that the only altar which God will honor was to be made of simple, unadorned stones devoid of any human workmanship in which the heart of man might boast. Thus the people were instructed in two essential matters: the law which describes the character and holiness of God and the system of sacrifice by which a sinful and lawbreaking people may yet draw near to a holy and righteous God, and find Him merciful and gracious toward them.
As yet the words of the Law were not written upon the stones, but Moses had simply repeated them before the people. He proceeded to give them certain ordinances which apply the principles of the ten words to life. The first section deals with the rights of persons, regulating slavery, wrong done to one's fellow man, and injuries brought about through neglect or carelessness. The second section deals with the rights of property covering theft and dishonesty. The third section (22:1-19) touches upon matters which directly affect worship, including seduction, sorcery, bestiality and idolatry.
Great concern is shown for the rights of strangers, indicating that God hears the cry and avenges the sorrows of many who are oppressed. Warnings are given against reviling God and cursing rulers, and the rights of God concerning the firstborn are reiterated.
Finally, matters of justice are detailed, and the three great feasts which Israel was to keep each year are described. These are the feast of unleavened bread, associated with the Passover; the feast of firstfruits, later associated with Pentecost; the feast of harvest at the end of the year.
These divine admonitions conveyed by Moses to the people conclude with God's great promise to send His angel before them to guard them and to bring them to the place that God had prepared. This angel of the Presence is surely to be identified with Him who eventually became flesh and dwelt among us. He would insure God's blessing to the people and drive out all their enemies.
Following these ordinances, Moses and Aaron and 70 of the elders of Israel were called upon and Moses in their presence repeated all the words of the Lord, reading them as they were written in the Book of the Covenant. Taking blood from-the altar he sprinkled the people as they responded, "All that the Lord has spoken we will do, and we will be obedient."
At this solemn point, the elders of Israel were invited to ascend the mountain funkier where they saw the glory of God described in words which recall the vision of the apostle John, recorded in the fourth and fifth chapters of the Revelation. Here they entered into some mystic communion in which "they beheld God, and they ate and drank" (Exodus. 24:11).
Following this, Moses alone was called to the top of the mountain where he waited for six days, and on the seventh he disappeared into the cloud of glory which, in sight of the people of Israel, was like a devouring fire on the top of the mountain. There he remained for 40 days and 40 nights.
CONSTRUCTING THE TABERNACLE
From chapter 25 through chapter 31 we have the account of the explicit directions given to Moses for the construction of the Tabernacle, the dwelling place of God among the people. It begins not with the building itself, but with the three articles of furniture which were to be at the heart of the worship of Israel. The first was the Ark of the Covenant with its covering cherubim over the mercy seat, symbolizing the place of the dwelling of God. The next instructions describe the table for the bread of the Presence. In Eastern imagery the table is the symbol of fellowship, and thus the people were reminded of their constant need for communion with God and with one another. The golden lampstand follows, symbolizing the revelation these people were to receive and the testimony they were subsequently to give-to the outside world.
These three pieces of furniture were to be the center of all national life and worship: (1) The meeting place with God on the basis of propitiation; (2) the table for fellowship between God and His people; (3) the lampstand of testimony, symbolizing the work to which they were called.
Following this, the divine details of the curtains and coverings in the Tabernacle are specified. The 10 curtains of fine-twined linen contain white (the color of purity), blue (the color of heaven), purple (the color of royalty) and scarlet (the color of blood), as foregleams of the Person and work of Him who would fulfill the symbolism of the entire building. This is also true of the Tabernacle coverings, the boards, the veil and the door screen, which are next described. The veil which separates the holy place from the holy of holies is interpreted in Hebrews10:20 as the flesh of our Lord. When Jesus died the curtain of the Temple was torn in two and a new and living way was opened up into the presence of God, by Jesus' death.
Exodus 27 brings before us the court surrounding the Tabernacle, and once again the description begins from the inside. We are given first the brass altar on which the animal sacrifices were to be burned. It was to be set within the outer court of the Tabernacle in front of the entrance to the holy place. The outer court was to be enclosed with curtains of finely twined linen, set in sockets of brass and capped by crowns of silver, suggesting purity resting upon the strength of government and crowned with the symbol of redemption.
The screen before the entrance to the court was similar to that before the holy place, and in turn was somewhat like the veil before the holy of holiest As we have seen, intertwined colors picture the person of Christ. Thus no man might pass within the court save through the symbol of mediation. Likewise there could be no entrance into the holy place of fellowship and testimony but through the same gateway. And none might reach the inner chamber of the presence of God without participating in the very body and blood of the mediator.
Oil was also commanded to be brought for the continuing light of the lampstand. This clearly symbolized the Holy Spirit who gives the light of revelation in the midst of the darkness of human knowledge.
Following the revelation to Moses of the precise pattern of the Tabernacle, he was then shown the divine mind concerning the priesthood; The priesthood in Israel was to be vested in Aaron and the sons of the tribe of Levi. Aaron as the high priest foreshadowed the work of Christ as confirmed by the book of Hebrews The garments of the high priest were to represent the glory and beauty of Christ as our High Priest. The vestments of the high priest with their colors of gold, purple, scarlet and white, spoke eloquently of the Person and work of Jesus. The shoulder pieces, each adorned with two onyx stones, engraved with the names of the 12 tribes, symbolized the office of burden-bearing. On the head was the glorious breastplate embellished with precious stones containing also the names of the 12 tribes. At the center of this were the strange Urim and Thummim (Lights and Perfections) which indicated in some mystic manner the work of the priest in discovering the divine mind and will.
The robe of the ephod was entirely blue, suggesting the heavenly matters with which the high priest was to be engaged. The alternating bells and pomegranates on the skins of the robe spoke of testimony and fruitfulness necessary to priestly intercession. Attached to the golden mitre on the head was a plate bearing the words "Holy to the Lord," indicating the exquisitely balanced perfection of the priestly office.
The consecration of the priests to their office is described in chapter 29, consisting of a threefold function: washing, dressing and anointing. The washing symbolizes the forgiveness of sin; the dressing symbolizes imputation of righteousness; the anointing speaks of the enduing of the Holy Spirit. The offerings which follow are repeated in more detail in the book of Leviticus. They emphasize anew the truth that Jehovah wants always to be before His people, that God could meet with them only through sacrifice and the cleansing of sin. The priests alone are to feed upon the meat of the offerings as a symbol of the necessity of understanding all that is involved in the work of redemption, that by these means and these alone would a living God be able to dwell among a sinful people.
At this point the altar of incense which is supremely the altar of priesthood is introduced. It completes the furniture of the holy place and speaks of the offering of praise and adoration unto God. The bronze laver is then described, which stood before the entrance of the holy place within the outer court.
Finally, we have instructions concerning the use of anointing oil and incense. The whole is symbolic of the fact that only those who had given the half-shekel of redemption, had been cleansed at the bronze laver, and anointed by the fragrant oil could truly offer the worship of prayer and thanksgiving typified by the incense. The Lord who gave these complicated instructions was able also to call and equip certain workmen to construct the Tabernacle and all its furnishings. Two men, Bezalel of Judah and Oholiab of Dan, were filled with the Spirit of God in order to provide the skilled labor necessary to this work.
Then the Sabbath was brought in as essential to all, typifying that the energy by which they labored was to be that of those who have entered into God's rest and have ceased from their own labors. As we have seen before, the Sabbath is forever the symbol of restful activity, dependent upon the Spirit of God.
While these careful instructions were being given to Moses on the mountain top, the people at the bottom of the mountain were already falling into grievous sin. The people who had so wondrously been redeemed from Egypt and led through the waters of the Red Sea and fed miraculously by manna from heaven and refreshed by water from the rock, now manifest a great wickedness in making and worshipping a golden calf. In a scene reminiscent of Abraham pleading with God for the salvation of Sodom and Gomorrah, we see Moses pleading before God on behalf of this people. As with Abraham, it was God Himself who was using Moses to call upon His mercy and allay His wrath. Moses pleaded not so much for the people but for God Himself. He reminded Him that His honor is at stake and pleaded the covenant made with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. He thus became the instrument to turn aside the divine wrath.
On coming down from the mountain with the tables of stone, and surveying the scene of idolatry and debauchery, Moses angrily threw the plates to the ground, breaking them at the foot of the mountain. He ground the golden calf to powder and compelled the people to drink of the water into which it was thrown. He called, "Who is for the Lord?" In response, the Levites gathered to him and he sent them throughout the camp with a sword in every hand and 3,000 of the worst offenders were slain. The next day he returned to the presence of God and there confessed the sin of the people and pled that they might be spared even if he himself must be blotted out of God's book. God responded by sending him back again to lead the people and promising the angel of the Presence to go with him. Though the angel of the Presence will go before the people to Canaan, nevertheless Jehovah indicated that He would not dwell among them in their sinful state. This remoteness is indicated by the tent of meeting (the predecessor of the Tabernacle) being placed outside the camp where God would commune with Moses.
Moses again interceded before Jehovah saying, "If Thy presence does not go with us, do not lead us up from here" (Exodus. 33:15). With this God acquiesced and Moses asked for funkier display of the glory of God. Hidden in the cleft of the rock he saw the back parts of God but not His face. While man is yet on earth, God may be seen only by the results of His passing by; the vision of the face of God is reserved only for heaven.
Strengthened by this vision, Moses was called again to ascend the mount and to receive two other tablets inscribed by the hand of God. There on the mountain top the Law and the covenants were renewed and the necessity to keep the feasts and the Sabbath was again decreed. After another 40-day stay with the divine presence, Moses came down the mountain with a shining countenance to greet the people. When he learned of his shining face, he put a veil upon his face that he might speak to the people unhindered. Later we learn from the apostle Paul that he kept the veil there that the people might not see the fading glory. This is to contrast the glory of the law with the superior glory of the face of Jesus Christ.
Chapters 35 to 39 contain the account of the actual building of the Tabernacle. Once again the Sabbath law is restated as emphasizing the need for all activity to be performed in the consciousness of the divine activity superseding the human. The offerings commanded in chapter 25 were brought by the people for the construction of the Tabernacle. The offerings were wholly voluntary, and the labor on the Tabernacle was to be done only by those who came with a willing heart. So abundant was the offering that Moses had to command the people to cease their giving.
First the curtains for the Tabernacle proper were set up and then the beams for the building itself. These were overlaid with cloths of blue, purple and scarlet stuff, with fine-twined linen and cherubim skillfully worked in. The furniture of the Tabernacle was then constructed, beginning with the Ark of the Covenant with its cherubim overshadowing the mercy seat. This was followed by the table of showbread, the golden lampstand and the altar of incense. For the outer court the altar of burnt offering was made, with its horns and grating. Then the great laver of bronze was cast. Finally the curtains of the outer court were hung on each side and the screen for the gate of the court was embroidered in blue and purple and scarlet stuff with fine twined linen. Then the accounting was given of the work of the materials of which the Tabernacle was made.
Full details are given concerning the holy garments of the priest which were made strictly according to the pattern shown to Moses. At last the statement is made, "Thus all the work of the tabernacle of the tent of meeting was completed; and the sons of Israel did according to all that the Lord had commanded Moses; so they did" (Exodus. 39:32)
Moses blessed the people for their obedient labors and, according to the instruction of God, set up the furniture of the Tabernacle all in its proper place. When the work was finished and the Tabernacle stood exactly according to the pattern which God had shown Moses on the mountain, then the cloud covered the tent and the glory of the Lord came down and filled the whole of the Tabernacle. So splendid was this glory that Moses was not able to enter the Tabernacle. Moreover the cloud of glory remained over the Tabernacle as a permanent guide. Throughout the years of their wanderings it was to be a symbol to the people of the presence of God and the sign of the divine intent to move or to settle.
What shall we make of this amazing building and its precise God-given design? We have already seen that its intimate detail is a foreview of both the Person and the work of Christ, but in the Epistle to the Hebrewswe are given a funkier hint as to its significance. There in chapter 3 verse 5 we are told, "Moses was faithful in all His house as a servant, for a testimony of those things which were to be spoken later; but Christ was faithful as a Son over His house, whose house we are, if we hold fast our confidence and the boast of our hope firm until the end." There the full meaning of the Tabernacle is stated plainly for us. It was the symbol of man himself. It was a symbol of Christ because Christ was the perfect man, but it was also the symbol of every believer in Christ who with his Lord shares the glory of the Son of Man.
As the Tabernacle in the wilderness was built in three parts--an outer court, the holy place, the holy of holies-- so man is a threefold construction consisting of body, soul and spirit. The human spirit is intended to be the dwelling place of the Holy Spirit, and this is symbolized by the Ark of the Covenant with its mercy seat by which the living God can dwell within His people. The apostle Paul confirms this when he says, "You are a temple of God" (I Corinthians. 3:16). The soul of man corresponds to the holy place, and the furniture within, that of the table of the bread of the Presence, the golden lampstand and the altar of incense, reflect the qualities of emotion (essential to fellowship), mind (encompassing knowledge which gives light), and will (making obedient choices which redound to the praise and glory of God).
The outer court symbolized the body of man with its exposure to the outside world. As Paul tells us in Romans 6, the body is the seat of sin and therefore the site of the altar of sacrifice. It is also the place of defilement and requires the cleansing work of the laver. But above all else, man is to be the dwelling place of God and the anointing of the Holy Spirit is to suffuse his being with the presence and power of God.
It has always troubled me to hear Sunday School teachers and others teach children that a building is the house of God. It is true that the Tabernacle of the Old Testament is called the house of God, but it was a mere shadow. The Temple in Jerusalem took its place, and it too was a shadow. When we come to the New Testament we never find a building designated as the house of God. The house of God in the New Testament is a human body. The apostle Paul declares in I Corinthians 3:16 "Do you not know that you are a temple of God, and that the Spirit of God dwells in you?" When we teach that a building is the house of God, we make it very difficult for people to grasp the idea that their bodies are the temples of God. Nothing is more important than to realize that Jesus Christ Himself is dwelling in your body, which is His temple. Deep at the center of your life is the holy of holies, your human spirit, and in that place the Spirit of God dwells.
Sometimes we hear that the weakness of the Old Testament was that they were under the Law and did not know the grace of God. Nothing could be further from the truth. It is true, they were under the Law, but the Law was not given to them to be their Savior. It was given to reveal their sin and to make them aware of how hopeless was their condition apart from God's redemptive grace. Their problem was not the Law, but the Tabernacle and its system of sacrifices. It was not sufficiently complete; it was not real enough. It consisted only of shadows, just kindergarten pictures, and could never really accomplish anything. Thus when we come to the book of Hebrewswe learn that the shadows are done away because they are fulfilled in the great anti-type, the Lord Jesus Christ. We read: "We have confidence to enter the holy place" (Hebrews 10: 19). We need no longer fear to enter; for in t