Welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Genesis. Tonight, is study #5 of Genesis, chapter 15 and we are continuing to read Genesis 15:1-3:

After these things the word of JEHOVAH came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward. And Abram said, Lord JEHOVAH, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus? And Abram said, Behold, to me thou hast given no seed: and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir.

We have been taking some time to look at the statement God made to Abram in verse 1, telling him, “Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield.”

In our last study, we saw that God truly is our shield or our protection and the defense of His people. It is an impenetrable shield. There is no danger or harm that can get through to seriously injure the child of God, when we look at things correctly and we look at the overall situation. Can someone do damage to our physical bodies? Yes, but if we are hurt physically or even if we are killed physically, does that really do damage to the person God has saved? The answer is, “Not really, because the soul of the one God has saved will live on.”

As we discussed last time, there is no weapon or earthly piece of equipment that could harm or kill the soul of a child of God. It truly is indestructible. It cannot be damaged. It cannot be injured. It is an everlasting soul. We possess everlasting life right now because we have an eternal soul that will live on forever and ever, so that is good news, item #1 and there is good news, item #2. Yes, we are in a weak and corruptible body as we live out our days in this world and our bodies can feel pain and sustain injury and it can even be killed. We could think of the worse situation we could imagine that could happen to our body, like being blown up or ripped to pieces. In times past, some Christians were thrown to the lions and the lions would have ripped their bodies to shreds. Or, during the time of the Reformation many that tried to bring the Bible to the common man were burned at the stake. They were burned beyond recognition or, perhaps, even burned to ashes. It was good news for the person because in the moment death came he would have gone to be with the Lord in his soul existence and the body could have been just tossed out, with no proper burial. Then that (living) soul could begin to look forward with expectation to another promise of God.

God refers to the souls of those that are in heaven in Revelation 6:10:

“How long, O Lord, holy and true, dost thou not judge and avenge our blood on them that dwell on the earth?”

They are living in their soul existence, but they are looking forward to receiving a body, once again, but not a corrupt body and not the ashes of their old body or a body of flesh. A new resurrected spiritual body awaits each one of these souls. It will be a body that is much improved and greater in every way, an eternal spiritual body that will be indestructible, like their souls. The saints that died in this world and their spirits are with the Lord in Heaven are fully aware that their souls are indestructible. The fires of being burned at the stake did not harm their souls. The lions could not devour their souls, because the soul is spirit. So, physical danger cannot do any damage to the spirit. The spirit of the child of God exists in another realm, the spiritual realm, and only God has the power to destroy soul and body. He does destroy the souls of the wicked upon their death and they will be gone forever. God has that power because He is Spirit and He can operate in any realm because He is the Creator of all things, visible and invisible, and He controls all things.

However, the threat that comes from man against the child of God is only a threat to the physical body and we do not receive a physical body in the second resurrection. It will not be a body that can still experience sickness, suffering, pain and weakness and eventually die. That is not the promise. The promise is of an incredibly improved resurrected body that will be joined with our soul and, likewise, will be eternal and incorruptible. There will never be any harm, damage or death against the child of God. This is why God said to Abram (and to all His people), “Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield.” What tremendous protection we have! What tremendous security we have! We do not have to worry and fear like the people of the world. They live in dread that someone may come along and hurt them or kill them and that would be it for them. Their lives would be over and all they possessed is gone. No wonder they are terrified of death.

But the child of God need not fear. That should not be our concern. We have nothing to fear and the Lord told Abram exactly this: “Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward.” God Himself is the “exceeding great reward.” The word “reward” in the Hebrew and the Greek can be translated as “hire” or “wage,” as well as “reward.” It is like a payment.

We should look at this and be sure to understand properly before we look at the idea of God’s people receiving a “reward.” We should understand that we receive the reward because of what God has done for us and it has nothing to do with our own works or our own efforts. If we were to work to obtain salvation and to get right with God, the Bible says that no man is justified by the works of the law. All our righteousness is as filthy rags, so they would not qualify any way. It is all through Christ’s work that God can impute to us His righteousness; He saved us through the faith and the work of the Lord Jesus Christ. He gives us a new resurrected spirit and His Spirit indwells us. After salvation, He has ordained that we will walk in good works which He has prepared, so the elect children of God do perform good works. When God looks down upon us, He only sees good deeds and any sins we may be doing are not “seen” by God – He only sees the good. God gets the glory because we must remember that He who has begun a good work in us will finish it in the day of Christ and because of this, we will receive the reward and the reward is God Himself.

If we include the words “I am” from the previous statement, God is saying, “I am thy exceeding great reward.” It is not just any kind of reward, but a great reward and not only a great reward, but an exceeding great reward, as God tries to convey the enormity of something unspeakable to those that are limited and finite. It cannot be done, but this is the language that God uses as He condescends to us and speaks on our level. So, we understand that an “exceeding great reward” must be super-great and super-wonderful and, of course, it is.

This language also reminds us of something we read in Luke, chapter 6 in the “Beatitudes” spoken by the Lord Jesus Christ. It says in Luke 6:20-26:

And he lifted up his eyes on his disciples, and said, Blessed be ye poor: for yours is the kingdom of God. Blessed are ye that hunger now: for ye shall be filled. Blessed are ye that weep now: for ye shall laugh. Blessed are ye, when men shall hate you, and when they shall separate you from their company, and shall reproach you, and cast out your name as evil, for the Son of man’s sake. Rejoice ye in that day, and leap for joy: for, behold, your reward is great in heaven: for in the like manner did their fathers unto the prophets. But woe unto you that are rich! for ye have received your consolation. Woe unto you that are full! for ye shall hunger. Woe unto you that laugh now! for ye shall mourn and weep. Woe unto you, when all men shall speak well of you! for so did their fathers to the false prophets.

God’s elect people will receive a great reward in heaven, an exceeding great reward, according to Genesis 15 and it is our expectation. It is our hope, based upon what the Word of God, the Bible, declares. The Bible also says that our expectation shall not be cut off, but it will be fulfilled. There are other Scriptures where God reveals to us that He has vowed or sworn that the things He said to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and all the people of God will come to pass; we will receive the Promised Land of the new heaven and new earth. We will inherit that Promised land as an everlasting possession. We will receive this “great reward,” a reward that goes beyond time and a reward that transcends this world. It transcends the blessings of this world because all blessings in this world are temporal because it is a fact that God will one day destroy this world. Also, the fact is that every person living in the world will one day die, even if they lived their entire life without the world having been destroyed, but they will personally die. Let us say there is a person that is the richest person in the world and today that would be a multi-billionaire and he has yachts and mansions all over the place. He is respected by everyone and everyone speaks well of him. He has a beautiful family and he has everything you can imagine in this world. He possesses it all, but then he died. Maybe he died in a plane crash or maybe there was an unexpected heart attack that he did not survive, even though he had doctors “at the ready” 24 hours a day. You know, when a person’s time comes and God has determined to take his life, nothing can stop it. Remember the parable in the Gospel of Luke where a rich man was going to build greater barns to store his wealth, but God came that very night and said, “Thou fool,” and He took his life. It says in Luke 12:16-21:

And he spake a parable unto them, saying, The ground of a certain rich man brought forth plentifully: And he thought within himself, saying, What shall I do, because I have no room where to bestow my fruits? And he said, This will I do: I will pull down my barns, and build greater; and there will I bestow all my fruits and my goods. And I will say to my soul, Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years; take thine ease, eat, drink, and be merry. But God said unto him, Thou fool, this night thy soul shall be required of thee: then whose shall those things be, which thou hast provided? So is he that layeth up treasure for himself, and is not rich toward God.

He was a “fool” because when God comes for a man’s soul (and only God can kill a soul), there is no one that can resist. God will get what He came for and that man will die and in the grave he will know nothing any longer. He will have no conscious existence. He will have no memory and he cannot dwell on the glories of his life. He cannot relish the wealth he had amassed. He cannot sit back and think about the wonderful life he lived – it is all gone. The things that he stockpiled and built up are given to others. The point is made in Ecclesiastes that you do not know if the one who receives your goods will be wise or a fool and, therefore, the life of the unsaved person is vanity: “Vanity of vanities, all is vanity.” And vanity is emptiness at the end. That is what the unsaved person is left with – nothing. This point is made again, and again, throughout the Bible. It says in Job 20:4-10:

Knowest thou not this of old, since man was placed upon earth, That the triumphing of the wicked is short, and the joy of the hypocrite but for a moment? Though his excellency mount up to the heavens, and his head reach unto the clouds; Yet he shall perish for ever like his own dung: they which have seen him shall say, Where is he? He shall fly away as a dream, and shall not be found: yea, he shall be chased away as a vision of the night. The eye also which saw him shall see him no more; neither shall his place any more behold him. His children shall seek to please the poor, and his hands shall restore their goods.

The parable goes on, but the point is that this is the end of man, his life flies away like a dream. Have you ever woken up in the middle of the night and you have had a dream that is on edge of your mind, but you cannot grab hold of it and it is just gone from you? You cannot remember it and it is gone forever. And that is the end of mankind. Man’s consolation or “reward” is what he has now in this world and he has his temporal inheritance. Certainly, he can try all he can to enjoy it. Let him enjoy it. How can a child of God be envious? “Let not thine heart envy sinners: but be thou in the fear of JEHOVAH all the day long. For surely there is an end; and thine expectation shall not be cut off.” This is the Word of God in Proverbs, telling the people of God not to envy sinners because they will come to their end and their lives will end and their riches will dissipate. They will vanish away and be no more, as it says in Psalm 37. This is a great Psalm where God contrasts the life of the child of God with the life of a wicked person. It says in Psalm 37:34:

Wait on JEHOVAH, and keep his way, and he shall exalt thee to inherit the land: when the wicked are cut off, thou shalt see it.

We are seeing that today as God has shut the door of heaven. Then it says in Psalm 37:35:

I have seen the wicked in great power, and spreading himself like a green bay tree.

We have also seen this as the wealth of the wicked today is just incredible as compared to what mankind has had in past generations. Then it says in Psalm 37:36:

Yet he passed away, and, lo, he was not: yea, I sought him, but he could not be found.

That is it. All is over and done with and they are annihilated for evermore. The judgment of God will have been accomplished and justice will have been served. The sinners of this world are destroyed, along with the corrupt creation itself and they vanish away. They cease to exist.

It is at that point when it is over and done with for billions of people that all the elect will receive the reward. We will receive our exceeding great reward, which is God Himself. In Isaiah, chapter 40 the reward of God is tied to His coming. It says in Isaiah 40:10:

Behold, the Lord JEHOVAH will come with strong hand, and his arm shall rule for him…

Compare this to Revelation 19:15, where it says that Christ will rule with a rod of iron in the Day of Judgment. Then it says in Isaiah 40:10:

…behold, his reward is with him, and his work before him.

We do not have time in this study, but we will look at this language and see what it means. We have an idea. His reward is with Him and His work is before Him. Then it says in Isaiah 40:11:

He shall feed his flock like a shepherd: he shall gather the lambs with his arm, and carry them in his bosom, and shall gently lead those that are with young.

These two verses are just amazing in how well they fit with our present situation. The word “rule” in Revelation 19 is a word translated as “feed.” It is the same word that was used to describe the feeding of sheep. We know that in the Day of Judgment God has given the commandment to feed His sheep, as it says three times in John, chapter 21. And in this verse, He comes and His reward is with Him and His work before Him and this has to do with the judgment determination that will be issued by the Judge of all the earth, as to whether we have done “good” or “bad.” The work has to do with people and at the same time He is feeding His flock. We can see how well that fits with the information we have learned.

It also says Isaiah 62:11:

Behold, JEHOVAH hath proclaimed unto the end of the world, Say ye to the daughter of Zion, Behold, thy salvation cometh; behold, his reward is with him, and his work before him.

Once again, we read His work is before Him - we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ.