Audio Tapes # 45,    Oct 15, 2000       (Notes Updated Oct 16, 2000)

Don't miss the pictures of the zoo days. The Lord willing, Creation Creature Features soon.

Review: (Gen 1-14) See the previous sermon notes on the Web -

The Text: Genesis 15:1-21 (emphasis added in bold) (also Strong's numbers)

^{Gen 15:1}After these things the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, saying, "Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward." ²But Abram said, "Lord God, what will You give me, seeing I go childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?" ³Then Abram said, "Look, You have given me no offspring; indeed one born in my house is my heir!" ⁴And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, "This one shall not be your heir, but one who will come from your own body shall be your heir." ⁵Then He brought him outside and said, "Look now toward heaven, and count the stars if you are able to number them." And He said to him, "So shall your descendants be." ⁶And he believed in the Lord, and He accounted it to him for righteousness.

7Then He said to him, "I am the Lord, who brought you out of Ur of the Chaldeans, to give you this land to inherit it." ⁸And he said, "Lord God, how shall I know that I will inherit it?" ⁹So He said to him, "Bring Me a three-year-old heifer, a three-year-old female goat, a three-year-old ram, a turtledove, and a young pigeon." ¹⁰Then he brought all these to Him and cut them in two, down the middle, and placed each piece opposite the other; but he did not cut the birds in two. ¹¹And when the vultures came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away.

12Now when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and behold, horror and great darkness fell upon him. ¹³Then He said to Abram: "Know certainly that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, and will serve them, and they will afflict them four hundred years. ¹⁴"And also the nation whom they serve I will judge; afterward they shall come out with great possessions. ¹⁵"Now as for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried at a good old age. ¹⁶"But in the fourth generation they shall return here, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete."

17And it came to pass, when the sun went down and it was dark, that behold, there appeared a smoking oven and a burning torch that passed between those pieces. ¹⁸On the same day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying: "To your descendants I have given this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the River Euphrates— ¹⁹"the Kenites, the Kenezzites, the Kadmonites, ²⁰"the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, ²¹"the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites."

Brief Outline, Exposition, and Commentary - Genesis 15:1-21

The following chart by Dr. Paul Benware illustrates how a few of the various covenants in Scripture overlap and dovetail with the unconditional and eternal Abrahamic Covenant.  This is especially true of the Land Covenant:

Paul Benware, Th.D.   Understanding End Times Prophecy. [Benware is Prof.. of Bible and theology at Moody Bible Institute. This book is an excellent introduction to the various interpretations of biblical prophecy. Most conservative theologians agree on the literal, historical-grammatical method of interpretation, while also recognizing the occasional use of figures of speech, metaphors, hyperbole, etc. In this book, Dr. Benware very effectively demonstrates the fact that literal, national-ethnic Israel will play a central role in the culmination of God's revelation of His Glory. He compares both covenant theology and dispensational theology, with Scripture, so that you may draw your own conclusion.

    The following chart illustrates the important reality that Scripture presents numerous dimensions to the Abrahamic Covenant given by God.  Some of these dimensions (often described as sub-covenants) are conditional, yet the core of the original Abrahamic Covenant was unconditionally based upon the unilateral and sovereign work of God alone.

Remember, God said he would use prophecy to prove His authorship of His Word.  Gen. 3:16; Isaiah 41:22-23; 44:6-8, etc..  No other religious material on earth claims 100% accuracy in hundreds of predictions of the future to prove that its author is the God who transcends time and space.  Isaiah 44:6-7 " Thus says the LORD, the King of Israel, ... 'I am the First and I am the Last; ... And who can proclaim as I do? ... ... the things that are coming and shall come." ]

I am premill and pretrib in my eschatology.  To examine the alternative views, which I believe are incorrect (i.e., amill, and postmill), you might want to read Kenneth Gentry's, "He Shall Have Dominion", R.C. Sproul's The Last Days According To Jesus", Anthony Hoekema's The Bible & the Future". After comparing the writings of the best scholars from all camps, I believe you will see that only the premill position consistently interprets the Bible "normally" and is therefore able to harmonize all of the jigsaw puzzle pieces (Bible verses) together into a coherent picture of God's culmination of his-story. The other views are sincere and should be respected, but it is obvious that they must "spiritualize" and allegorize huge portions of Scripture in order to fit them into their preconceived theologies. Instead, we should simply take God at His Word, normally as it is stated, in the context of the entire Bible. Certainly on occasion, the Scripture uses symbol or allegory, but the majority of prophecies both those that have already been fulfilled as well as those yet to be realized, are given to us as literal, historical, people, times, places, and events.

** Remember, even huge jigsaw puzzles are not really complicated, but simply require patience, diligence, and time to put them together. And when you finally put this one together, it's awesome and will draw you to your knees in humble worship - singing Thou art worthy!  You'll see God's sovereign hand orchestrating and fulfilling His previously dictated agenda for His-Story.

Gen 15:1-6            God Promises To Give Abram Physical, Genetic Descendants as a National Group:

*    This chapter contains many first uses of very significant theological terms, such as word, reward, and believe. This is the first reference in the Bible to "the Word of the LORD" coming to an individual.  Note the context of it also being to a man whose heart was in a state of submissive faith.
*    Verse 6, "believed" (Heb. = amen).  This verse is quoted 3xs in the NT highlighting its theological and practical importance for the life of every believer (Rom 4:3; Gal 3:6; Jam 2:23).  It is the heart and core of the gospel.  The way of salvation for sinners has always been the same from the OT to the NT.  Salvation is by grace alone, through faith alone, in the person and work of God's promised Messiah, the Seed of a women, Jesus.
*  God's promise of an ethnic nation (Gen 12) was "forever", without condition.
(Deut 7; 2 Ch 6:6; 7:16; 33:7; Psa 48:1, 2, 8; Jer 3:17; 14:19; 30:1-11; 31:36; 33:19-21; 46:28)

Gen 15:7-11          God Promises To Give Them a Physical Land in which to Plant this Nation:

*    God uses a common covenant picture, in order to lovingly accommodate to Abram's human need for assurance, just as we eagerly do for our little children when they need reassurance.
*    It was common in Abram's day for two persons to cut a covenant as a visual, tangible assurance of their mutual promise and obligation to one another.  So God uses this very practical and personal method to affirm and strengthen Abram's faith.

Gen 15:12-16        God Prophetically Proclaims How He Will Prepare the Nation's Foundation:

*    Abram is but into a deep sleep similar to Adam when God made Eve.  "Terror" and darkness come over Abram as he receives a prophetic message about the coming persecution his descendants will endure for roughly 400 years (430 exactly) as slaves in Egypt.
*    But God promises that they will be delivered from slavery and will in fact come out of Egypt with massive amounts of gold, silver, etc..  Thus they will be prepared to establish the new nation with a strong foundation.
*    A "generation" back then was about 100 years, since folks regularly lived 150+ years.  Today, in later years as the lifespan decreased, a generation was typically seen to be 40 years.
*    The "iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete" referred to the visible escalation of sin in the culture of the people of the promised land had not yet peaked.  God historically holds back His judgment until the sin of a man, a nation, or the world (before the flood for example) has demonstrated publicly that it deserves righteous punishment.  Luke 21:24 refers to the "times of the Gentiles" which similarly indicates a time when God lets the non-Israelite nations rule over the world and dominate even Israel, while proving by a global escalation of sin and debauchery that the final judgment on the world will be justified.

Gen 15:17-21        God Proves His Promise  to Abram Is Unconditional

*  God alone, moves through the animal pieces, showing that the fulfillment of this covenant depends only upon God's sovereign hand of unconditional grace through submissive faith, not man's works.  Normally both parties in a covenant would walk through the pieces, but here only God unilaterally passes through.  The election and history of Israel especially the security of its national salvation (Rom 11) is a picture of the personal election and security of each believer.  Israel is described in the OT as God the Father's child, and God does not abort His children even though they fail.  He will discipline them, giving and withholding conditional rewards, but the ultimate reward of fellowship with Him forever in His house (1 Cor 3) is unconditional.
*  Israel (The people & the land) were sovereignly, unilaterally, and unconditionally chosen by God to be the primary physical witness to the world for all eternity.  They were chosen and called to take the promised land by force, and establish a theocracy in the name of YAHWEH God.  Israel has a history distinct from the Church, and a future that is distinct from the Church.
*  The central stage of Israel is the city of peace, Jerusalem, the heart of which is the throne of Messiah, the seed of Abram, the seed of a virgin woman - God's Son, Jesus.
*  The Church is NOT Israel.  These two groups of people are distinct in God's prophetic plan of history.  Failure to understand this crucial biblical distinction leads people to interfere with God's plans for both.  
*  Israel is the only ethnic, national government elected by God to rule over this Gentile world.  And one day it will rule with a rod of iron, in the hand of the King of kings, Messiah Jesus, after His second coming.  
*  The Church, in contrast, is the Body of Christ, sovereignly called to humbly submit to Gentile governments, until the time of the Gentiles is complete.  Those modern theologies, which confuse these two different roles, encourage Christians to unbiblically rebel against government authorities (Rom 13; Titus 2; 1 Pet 2), and even to try to force them to bow to the LORD.  That is not the Church's job.  Yes Christians are to vote, but never to show disrespect or rebellion to government authorities.  Only if the rulers command us to violate Scripture, China's laws against witnessing, are we to respectfully disobey.  
*  To best glorify the LORD, Christians must comprehensively understand and cooperate with His different agendas regarding the Church and Israel.
*  The Roman Catholic institution developed an extra-biblical, "replacement" theology claiming that the Church permanently replaced Israel, because Israel rejected Jesus as Messiah.  Many of the protestant reformers (Calvin, Luther, etc..) failed to fully reform their post-Roman Catholic beliefs.  They carried over this false conceptualization of the Church.  Yes, the reformers were powerfully used of God to preach and teach much truth.  In fact, modern Christianity needs to return to many of these truths taught by the reformers.  Unfortunately, many modern theologians who are seeking to do just that, are also indiscriminately integrating all that Calvin or Luther taught without sufficient biblical justification.  Paul warned in Corinthians of this natural tendency to follow men and not the Word of God ("I am of Apollos").  This is especially true regarding Israel, the Church, and end times prophecy.
*  Interpreting Scripture "normally", like any other writing, means that it is to be taken literally when the simple context indicates a literal meaning.  When the context clearly implies a non-literal, analogical meaning like Jesus' statement that He was the door, then it is normal to interpret a passage as non-literal.  All of the prophecies that have so far been fulfilled, were fulfilled literally according to a normal interpretation.  Therefore, it is logical to expect that those prophecies which are not yet fulfilled, will also be fulfilled literally just as a normal interpretation would indicate.

*  The following are three biblical categories of evidence proving that the Church is NOT Israel.

1.  Different Beginnings:  The Church is a "mystery", not revealed in the OT, and it had a unique beginning as an entity distinct from Israel:

- Israel began with the call of Abram in Gen 12, when God promised to make a great nation from his genes.  The rest of the OT records the historical development of that physically ethnic, geographic nation.
- The Church is never mentioned in the OT, because the NT says it was a "mystery" (Eph 3:3-6; Col 1:26), which God did not reveal until its distinct beginning at Pentecost (Acts 2).  It is a new spiritual entity, composed of regenerated, believing Jews and Gentiles (John 7:37-39; Acts 11).
-  Jesus in Mat 16:18 used the future tense when He said, "I will build My church.".
(see also Acts 1:5) 
- Jesus is the head of the church and did not assume that role until He ascended into heaven (Eph 1:20-23; Col 1:18).
-  The Church did not begin until the baptizing work of the Holy Spirit (John 7:37-39; 1 Cor 12:13).  Members of the Church are baptized into the Body of Christ.
- Many specific prophecies in the OT regarding the physical nation and land of Israel have yet to be completely fulfilled, such as Ezek 36-40 (especially 39:29-40:1ff).

2.  Contrasted Consistently:  The Church in the NT is consistently contrasted as distinct from Israel, and the two names are never used interchangeably:

- 1 Cor 10:32 lists three distinct groups:  Jews, Greeks, and the Church of God.  Even after the Church is in existence, ethnic Israelites are still seen as distinct from Gentiles, and the Church.  The Church is a unique mystery composed of both Jews and Gentiles.  (These same three groups are delineated in Eph 2:11-16.
- Throughout Acts (Israel 20xs and Ekklesia 19xs), the two terms are always used in contrast to one another and never interchangeably.  
- In the entire NT, "Israel" is used 73xs, and it always refers to ethnic, national Israel.
Only three of the 73 are claimed by replacement theologians as representing the "church" (Rom 9:6; 11:26; Gal 6:16).  And two of these three (Rom 9:6; 11:26) are even seen by many replacement theologians as referring to ethnic Israel.  
- Only Gal 6:16 is used by all replacement theologians as their proof text to say that the Church is now Israel.  Gal 6:^{16 "}And as many as walk according to this rule, peace and mercy be upon them, and upon the Israel of God."  The key to interpreting Gal 6:16 is the meaning and use of the Greek term for "and" in this verse, "them, and the Israel of God".  Replacement theologians set aside the primary meaning of "and" and substitute the word "even".  The verse then reads, "even the Israel of God".  Everyone agrees that the term "them" refers to members of the Church, but the simple, normal use of "and", as well as the context of Galatians, indicates a contrast between "them" and a different group called "the Israel of God".  Yet replacement theologians must assume an abnormal use of "and" in this verse in order to make "them" and "Israel of God" become synonyms for the same group, the Church.
- "Israel of God" in Gal 6:16, according to a normal interpretation, simply refers to the believing Jews.  1 Cor 10:18 in contrast refers to unbelieving Jews ("Israel after the flesh").
- Another verse important to the discussion is Gal 3:2^{29,  "}And if you are Christ’s, then you are Abraham’s seed, and heirs according to the promise.".  What does "Abraham's seed" mean?  Note that the specific term Israel is not used here.  The phrase "Abraham's seed" is used in Scripture for a number of meanings:  physical descendants, believing Jews, believing Gentiles.  Yet the Church is never called "Israel", nor is it even said to fulfill the land promises of the covenant.  The land covenant will only be filled in the millennial kingdom, after the fullness of the Gentiles (Luk 21:24).

(Rom 11:25-27)  ²⁵For I do not desire, brethren, that you should be ignorant of this mystery, lest you should be wise in your own opinion, that blindness in part has happened to Israel until the fullness of the Gentiles has come in. ²⁶And so all Israel will be saved, as it is written:

"The Deliverer will come out of Zion,
And He will turn away ungodliness from Jacob;
²⁷ For this is My covenant with them,
When I take away their sins."

3.  Purposeful Tribulation:  The stated purpose of the tribulation is for national, ethnic Israel, not the NT Church:

- Jer 30:⁷ "Alas! For that day is great, to that none is like it; And it is the time of Jacob’s trouble, But he shall be saved out of it."
(Deu 4:30; Jer 31:31-34; Ezek 20:37; 36:25-36; 37-40; Dan 9:24-27; 12:1; Zech 13:8-9; Mal 4:4-6; Mat 24:15-20; Rom 11:25-28; Rev 7:4-14)
- The tribulation (Seven years of judgment comprising the 70th week of Daniel's prophecy in Dan 9) is sovereignly designed for the purpose of bringing Jacob's descendants, Israel as a corporate nation, to repentance and faith in the Messiah whom they pierced, Jesus:

Zech 12:1-3  ^1"The burden of the word of the Lord against Israel. Thus says the Lord, who stretches out the heavens, lays the foundation of the earth, and forms the spirit of man within him: ²"Behold, I will make Jerusalem a cup of drunkenness to all the surrounding peoples, when they lay siege against Judah and Jerusalem. ³"And it shall happen in that day that I will make Jerusalem a very heavy stone for all peoples; all who would heave it away will surely be cut in pieces, though all nations of the earth are gathered against it."

Zech 12:¹⁰  "And I will pour on the house of David and on the inhabitants of Jerusalem the Spirit of grace and supplication; then they will look on Me whom they pierced. Yes, they will mourn for Him as one mourns for his only son, and grieve for Him as one grieves for a firstborn."  

- Mat 24:21-22 Jesus says the tribulation of Jacob will be a time worse than any other time, both past and present.  This could not refer to the 70 AD destruction of Jerusalem and the Temple, since the Jews experienced even worse persecution by Hitler and Stalin.
- The Church is not mentioned in the Revelation after chapter 3.  From then on in the Revelation the focus is solely on national Israel.

Are you and your family responding to the world authorities as the Church (Rom 13; Titus 2; 1 Pet 2), or as if you were a soldier of Israel?  As you work on the practical projects and questions at the link below, try to work on how you can change to better reflect the role of the Church in the World, rather than a soldier or an army of Israel.