Welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Genesis. Tonight, is study #21 of Genesis, chapter 15 and we are going to begin by reading Genesis 15:13-16:

And he said unto Abram, Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years; And also that nation, whom they shall serve, will I judge: and afterward shall they come out with great substance. And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be buried in a good old age. But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.

In previous studies, we have been looking at the historical aspect and the working out of these words that God spoke to Abram. They did have an historical fulfillment as Israel dwelt in the land of Egypt for 430 years, but we saw that they were afflicted for 400 years out of the 430 years, fulfilling the statement in verse 13: “and they shall afflict them four hundred years.” It also said in verse 14: “And also that nation, whom they shall serve, will I judge: and afterward shall they come out with great substance.” And both of those statement did come to pass, historically, as God judged the nation of Egypt and the Israelites spoiled the Egyptians. That is how the Lord worked things out in the literal fulfillment of His Word.

Then it said in Genesis 15:16:

But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again…

This happened in the fourth generation of certain Bible reference calendar patriarchs, which I mentioned earlier as being Levi, Kohath, Amram and Aaron. I think that was the order, but those were the four Bible calendar reference patriarchs and God attached the passage of time to their lifespans. When Aaron was 83, it was the 430^th year and the time for the deliverance of Israel and Aaron was that fourth generation. Again, it said, “But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again,” and that refers to the land of Canaan. Of course, the return did occur in the fourth generation in the sense that they were delivered out of the land of Egypt and they sojourned in the wilderness for 40 years, according to the judgment of God upon them and it was a time of testing. Then after that 40 years, they crossed Jordan and entered the land of Canaan. They had “come hither again.”

It also said at the end of the verse in Genesis 15:16:

… for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.

Here, the Amorites are being used as representatives of the inhabitants of the land of Canaan. For instance, it says in Deuteronomy 7:1:

When JEHOVAH thy God shall bring thee into the land whither thou goest to possess it, and hath cast out many nations before thee, the Hittites, and the Girgashites, and the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites, seven nations greater and mightier than thou;

The Amorites were one of the seven nations and, yet, God speaks only of the Amorites when He says, “for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full.” God is saying that the iniquity or the multiplication of sin of the people of the land of Canaan was an allotted degree of transgressions and rebellion that God would allow, but they had not yet reached that limit. It would be at the “fulness” of their iniquity that God would raise up the Israelites (through their deliverance and 40-year wilderness sojourn) and bring them across Jordan into the land of Canaan to conquer the land and defeat those seven nations, the inhabitants of the land of Canaan. Basically, this verse lets us know that the destruction of all the inhabitants of the land of Canaan came as a form of judgment upon them for their iniquity. God is very longsuffering and patient, but there comes a point when He will no longer endure the sinful nature of man and He will bring judgment. He used Joshua and the people of Israel as His instrument of destruction to destroy them and drive them out of the land. It was because at that point the iniquity of the Amorites was full, but in verse 16 it said that the iniquity of the Amorites was not yet full.

Let us look at one more verse that shows the Amorites are being used as a figurehead of all the nations of the land of Canaan. It says in Amos 2:9-10:

Yet destroyed I the Amorite before them, whose height was like the height of the cedars, and he was strong as the oaks; yet I destroyed his fruit from above, and his roots from beneath. Also I brought you up from the land of Egypt, and led you forty years through the wilderness, to possess the land of the Amorite.

Notice it did not say land of Canaan or the land of the Hittites or Perizzites or the other nations, but it refers to the land of the Amorites. Of course, Israel possessed more than just the land of the Amorites. They possessed the land of the other nations, too, but God is using the Amorites to typify all of them and the taking of the land of the Amorites pictures the taking of the land of Canaan in general.

We can look at it this way, since there are seven nations in the land of Canaan. There were also seven churches that God addressed in the book of Revelation. And what was true of one church (like Ephesus or Thyatira) was true of all. God wrote to the church of Thyatira that He gave them space to repent and they did not, so He came to visit and cast them into a bed of great tribulation. And this was true for the churches in general or the entire corporate body, so the reference to one of the seven (churches) had application to the entire corporate church.

We have seen how this passage in Genesis 15 fits very well with the historic fulfillment regarding Israel’s stay in Egypt and their deliverance from bondage and their later conquest of the land of Canaan.

But how does it fit spiritually? Back in Genesis 15, verse 13 it said, “Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs,” and the seed would also represent the spiritual seed of Abram or those that are in Christ. Christ is the “seed,” singular, and all the elect of God are counted for the “seed” in Him and we are all “strangers in a strange land.” We are spiritual Israel. Also, we are strangers in a land not ours because we dwell or sojourn in this world and Egypt is a type and picture of the world. Just as Israel dwelt in Egypt, God’s elect dwell in the world. Egypt could also be a type and figure of the corporate church as it was overcome by Satan and, therefore, part of his kingdom like the rest of the world. So, the seed was a stranger in a land not theirs and they served them. Remember, in the book of Jeremiah God told His people to go to Babylon and to go into captivity and do service there, so as we operate in this world the elect people of God, in a sense, perform service of some sort as we live in the world. Then our passage said, “and they shall afflict them four hundred years,” and as God’s elect people live in this world, we are afflicted for the Word’s sake. Remember the parable of sowing the seed. There is always tribulation that comes as a result. I will read the explanation of a portion of that parable in Matthew 13:20-21:

But he that received the seed into stony places, the same is he that heareth the word, and anon with joy receiveth it; Yet hath he not root in himself, but dureth for a while: for when tribulation or persecution ariseth because of the word, by and by he is offended.

It is the nature of the Word of God that the people of the world and the spiritual forces under the control of Satan come against the Word and it brings affliction and persecution for the Word’s sake or for Christ’s sake, so God’s elect are afflicted in the world for “400 years,” figuratively. We can look at that number “400” as “40 x 10,” and we can see it points to the complete testing of God’s elect as we live in the world. That is one way we can look at the spiritual application, but there is also another way we can look at it and that would be as a timeline. We will look at that shortly, but the elect of God are afflicted “400 years” by those that are set against the kingdom of God and His Word.

Then it says in Genesis 15:14:

And also that nation, whom they shall serve, will I judge: and afterward shall they come out with great substance.

Again, with the reference to 400 years, there is a timeline involved. It is as though God’s elect will experience the completeness of testing regarding their ministry of the Word of God for this period of time that is likened to a 400-year time path. When the 400 years are complete, then God will judge that “nation,” which is spiritually represented by Egypt, and represents the kingdom of Satan in the world (which now includes the churches).

Then it says, “and afterward shall they come out with great substance,” and this would represent the elect people being delivered out of this world. What is our great substance? It is all the rich spiritual blessings that salvation brings. And, yet, we know that just as Israel was delivered out of Egypt, they did not immediately enter into the Promised Land. Likewise, as we look at a deeper spiritual level of the 400 years being a timeline of some kind, we need to make an allowance for some time after the 400 years when there would be a road or pathway to the kingdom of heaven and in the fourth generation we “shall come hither again.” There is a sojourning period or a period of wandering in the wilderness, which is also typified as “40,” which could represent testing or it could represent “10 x 4” or the furthest completeness of what is in view. God’s people must also travel that span of time before we can “come hither again” or come into the land of the kingdom of God as typified by the land of Canaan.

Where it said, “for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full,” it is as if the iniquity of the world is not yet full or throughout whatever that period of 400 years represented or even the additional forty years of severe testing as Israel was on the way to the Promised Land and God brought them in a round-about way to try them, and so forth. By the time Israel finally crossed Jordan and entered into the land of Canaan, the iniquity of the Amorites was full. By the time God’s elect at the end of the world reach the last day and enter into the new heaven and new earth, the iniquity of the unsaved inhabitants of the earth will be full and God will cause His elect to inhabit their land: “The meek shall inherit the earth.”

So, that is a basic summary of the spiritual teaching that is in view in this picture. Now let us look at some possibilities for the “400 years,” and from what I can see, there are two possibilities. We know that it is speaking of the seed. As we read the book of Genesis, there are several references to the seed and God re-establishes the covenant and the promises He made to Abram with Isaac and with Jacob. So, as we are looking for a timeline represented by the 400 years, we would be looking at a time path that would stretch out to encompass the number of years that have passed since the day of Abram, so we would have to look at a possible “4,000 years.”

Remember, this is the Bible and in the Bible God can speak of 40 days, but He represents each day for a year. Or, He can speak of periods of time like He did with the prophet Ezekiel, where He spoke of 390 days, but He had in view 3,900 years. God is able to establish these things and by adding a “0” to the number “400,” we get “4,000,” but it does not change the meaning of the overall number because with “400,” it is “10 x 40,” and with the number “4,000,” you have “100 x 40,” but you retain the number “40” and the number “10,” but it is now “10 x 10” and it gives a little more emphasis upon the spiritual meaning of “completeness,” but it retains the same spiritual meaning.

To prove that, let us look at the way God uses the number “10,” the number “100,” the number “1,000” or even the number “10,000” in the Bible. With the “10 virgins” or the “100 coins,” a “1,000 generations,” or “10,000 saints,” you will see that in every case it points to the completeness of whatever is in view. The addition of “zeros” simply adds greater emphasis, but still points to the completeness of what is in view.

Likewise, “400” years can very well point to “4,000” years. Again, in order to encompass the full amount of time that has passed since the days of Abram, we would have to look at 4,000 years. When we look at Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, the individual that fits best among those patriarchs would be Jacob. It says in Genesis 28:1-4:

And Isaac called Jacob, and blessed him, and charged him, and said unto him, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan. Arise, go to Padanaram, to the house of Bethuel thy mother’s father; and take thee a wife from thence of the daughters of Laban thy mother’s brother. And God Almighty bless thee, and make thee fruitful, and multiply thee, that thou mayest be a multitude of people; And give thee the blessing of Abraham, to thee, and to thy seed with thee; that thou mayest inherit the land wherein thou art a stranger, which God gave unto Abraham.

We see that God has re-established the covenant with Jacob with very similar language regarding the “seed” and inheriting the land wherein he was a stranger, and so forth. Therefore, Jacob qualifies as a patriarch that God could have in view with the language we find here in Genesis 15:13: “Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs.” As a matter of fact, it would be Jacob that would live at the time when Israel entered into Egypt in 1877BC. Remember what Jacob said to Pharaoh when Joseph brought his father before the ruler of Egypt, in Genesis 47:8-9:

And Pharaoh said unto Jacob, How old art thou? And Jacob said unto Pharaoh, The days of the years of my pilgrimage are an hundred and thirty years: few and evil have the days of the years of my life been, and have not attained unto the days of the years of the life of my fathers in the days of their pilgrimage.

He was 130 years old and all the years of his life had been “few and evil.” Why? It was because of affliction. It is not easy being a child of God in a strange world. It is hard. It is full of trials and affliction. We are looking for someone that would qualify as a starting point for affliction for “400” years or even “4,000” years. Jacob is a type of God’s elect and we can know that because God said, “Jacob I have loved, but Esau I have hated.” When did God make choice? It was before either of them were born. As a type of God’s elect, upon his entry into Egypt in 1877BC, Jacob’s age was 130 and that relates to “13,000” years of earth’s history and with the spiritual fulfillment of what was depicted in his day, he is a perfect candidate to be a representative of God’s elect when the time of their affliction begins. Again, Jacob’s “130” years would picture the lifespan of all God’s elect from the very beginning with Abel to the time of the end.

And, yet, God is only focused on a 4,000-year portion of time where we can find two dates that qualify for possibilities in the life of Jacob. One date would be the year 1967BC. Jacob was born in 2007BC and in 1967BC he was 40 years old (as well as his brother Esau) and it was at that time that Esau (whose name identifies with Adam) failed a test and married heathen wives, which grieved his mother. More importantly, it would have grieved God. From that date (when Jacob did not marry a heathen wife and, therefore would have passed the test) in 1967BC to 2033AD is 4,000 calendar years. On one hand, this qualifies because it is a 4,000-year period, but we are looking for a date where there would be a follow-up period of time in which the people of God would be severely tried, like Israel being delivered and then going through 40 years of testing. We do not see that with the year 2033AD. We do see evidence for that being the end of time, but there is no time afterwards which the Biblical evidence points to, so that date seems unlikely.

The second possibility is the year 2007BC, the birth year of Jacob and Esau. Jacob said he was 130 years and “few and evil have the days of the years of my life been,” and this included all the years of his life from the time of his birth, so we can say that God’s elect from the very beginning, as typified by Jacob’s birth, have been afflicted while in this world. From the birth of Jacob in 2007BC to the year 1994AD is exactly 4,000 years.