Welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Genesis. Tonight is study #4 of Genesis, chapter 20. Again, I will read Genesis 20:2-7:

And Abraham said of Sarah his wife, She is my sister: and Abimelech king of Gerar sent, and took Sarah. But God came to Abimelech in a dream by night, and said to him, Behold, thou art but a dead man, for the woman which thou hast taken; for she is a man’s wife. But Abimelech had not come near her: and he said, Lord, wilt thou slay also a righteous nation? Said he not unto me, She is my sister? and she, even she herself said, He is my brother: in the integrity of my heart and innocency of my hands have I done this. And God said unto him in a dream, Yea, I know that thou didst this in the integrity of thy heart; for I also withheld thee from sinning against me: therefore suffered I thee not to touch her. Now therefore restore the man his wife; for he is a prophet, and he shall pray for thee, and thou shalt live: and if thou restore her not, know thou that thou shalt surely die, thou, and all that are thine.

I will stop reading there. This chapter of Genesis is not an easy chapter. We were moving along through chapters 18 and 19 where the Lord focused on the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah. It was very dramatic and it was very pertinent to our present day.

Then after that strange incident on the mountain between the daughters of Lot and their father, God moves on to the (seemingly) mundane account of Abraham taking his journey into the land of the Philistines with his wife Sarah. Then he says, again, that Sarah is his sister. Let us turn back to this account that took place after he had gone down into the land of Egypt. It says in Genesis 12:10-17:

And there was a famine in the land: and Abram went down into Egypt to sojourn there; for the famine was grievous in the land. And it came to pass, when he was come near to enter into Egypt, that he said unto Sarai his wife, Behold now, I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon: Therefore it shall come to pass, when the Egyptians shall see thee, that they shall say, This is his wife: and they will kill me, but they will save thee alive. Say, I pray thee, thou art my sister: that it may be well with me for thy sake; and my soul shall live because of thee. And it came to pass, that, when Abram was come into Egypt, the Egyptians beheld the woman that she was very fair. The princes also of Pharaoh saw her, and commended her before Pharaoh: and the woman was taken into Pharaoh’s house. And he entreated Abram well for her sake: and he had sheep, and oxen, and he asses, and menservants, and maidservants, and she asses, and camels. And JEHOVAH plagued Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai Abram’s wife.

We went through this passage earlier. We realized that Abram and his wife Sarai were a type and figure of Christ and His bride, the eternal church. When it comes to the spiritual relationship between Christ and His people, we are His bride and He is the bridegroom. We are married to Him through salvation. But the Bible also likens us to “brothers and sisters.” Let us look at a couple of verses to remind us. It says in Matthew 12:46-50:

While he yet talked to the people, behold, his mother and his brethren stood without, desiring to speak with him. Then one said unto him, Behold, thy mother and thy brethren stand without, desiring to speak with thee. But he answered and said unto him that told him, Who is my mother? and who are my brethren? And he stretched forth his hand toward his disciples, and said, Behold my mother and my brethren! For whosoever shall do the will of my Father which is in heaven, the same is my brother, and sister, and mother.

Christ has this personal relationship with His people and He is also the bridegroom and we are His bride. But as we do the will of God, we are also likened to His brother or sister or mother. So, when Pharaoh took Sarai, Pharaoh was a picture of Satan taking the believers into captivity. Then God plagued Pharaoh’s house until he finally released Sarai, and Abram’s wife was restored to him. It was an early mini-illustration of the Exodus that would come hundreds of years later when Israel went into Egypt and was taken captive by Pharaoh. But, spiritually, it has to do with Satan’s kingdom being a house of bondage. When God saves His people, He delivers them out of the house of bondage.

Now we have a very similar type of picture. We see another king, the King of Gerar in the land of the Philistines, and he took Sarah. The name “Abimelech” means “father of (the) king.” The land of the Philistines was not a land which identified with the kingdom of God. Typically, the Philistines were against the outward representation of God’s kingdom, the nation of Israel. The Philistines would identify with the kingdom of Satan, just as Egypt identified with the kingdom of Satan and Pharaoh identified as a type of Satan.

Therefore, due to the similarity of these accounts, we suspect that Abimelech is also a type of Satan. He is “father of (the) king.” Remember, the book of Revelation often refers to the unsaved as the kings of the earth. It can also apply to true believers, but it can identify with the unsaved. For example, it says in Revelation 6:14-17:

And the heaven departed as a scroll when it is rolled together; and every mountain and island were moved out of their places. And the kings of the earth, and the great men, and the rich men, and the chief captains, and the mighty men, and every bondman, and every free man, hid themselves in the dens and in the rocks of the mountains; And said to the mountains and rocks, Fall on us, and hide us from the face of him that sitteth on the throne, and from the wrath of the Lamb: For the great day of his wrath is come; and who shall be able to stand?

It refers to “the kings of the earth” as being with the great men and the rich men that are trying to hide themselves from God in the day of wrath. They would not be true believers. They must be the unsaved. True believers can be represented as “prophets, priests and kings,” but there are about two billion professed Christians in the world that are making that claim: “I am a king, too.” But they are not true spiritual kings – they are not of the royal family of God. They take the name of the King, but they are not a spiritual king. So, I think God uses that figure here as “kings of the earth,” which can point to the professed believers or it can point to mankind in general. At the point of creation, we know that man was given dominion over the creation and he was to rule. In that sense, he was the king of earth and, yet, he fell when he rebelled against God by obeying Satan and believing the lie over the truth. Therefore, he became a subject of Satan and Satan began to rule over him.

Abimelech’s name means the “father of kings,” just like Satan is the “father of lies.” When mankind sinned, they became subject to Satan, the father of lies. I think this is probably why God has given this king the name of Abimelech and he took Sarah. First, she was taken by Pharaoh of Egypt and now she has been taken by another king of an enemy nation. Sarah was a type of the true believers. Remember, God gave her death age of 127; it is the only instance in the Bible where God gave the death age of a woman. The number “127” is only found in one other place in the Bible, which is in the book of Esther. It says in Esther 1:1:

Now it came to pass in the days of Ahasuerus, (this is Ahasuerus which reigned, from India even unto Ethiopia, over an hundred and seven and twenty provinces:)

King Ahasuerus reigned over 127 provinces. This king is also a type and figure. When we read the Bible, we are constantly seeing types and figures or spiritual representations, because that is how God wrote the Bible. King Ahasuerus is a type of God ruling over the kingdom of God, which consists of 127 provinces. Sarah’s age identifies with the whole company of the body of believers, the elect.

There is a third incident of this unusual situation involving King Abimelech. It is likely the same king, but it involves two different women. It did not involve Abraham and Sarah, but it involved Isaac and Rebecca. Isaac had done the same thing by saying his wife was his sister. This was more a lie than when Abraham said it, because in Abraham’s case, they had the same father, so Sarah was his half-sister. That was not the case with Isaac and Rebecca. They did not have the same father or the same mother and, yet, Isaac said of her, “She is my sister.” The only way this is true would be in the spiritual realm. But God wanted to paint that picture, again, so Isaac did say the same thing.

Insofar as Abraham and Sarah are concerned, this was the second time Sarah was taken. In the verses we read, God tells Abimelech to release her, which he eventually did, and she was restored to Abraham. And, once again, Abraham will receive riches upon her release. I think the reason God did this twice is very likely tied to the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, because there were two outpourings of the Holy Spirit. There was the outpouring of the Holy Spirit in 33 A.D. that started the church age. Over the 1,955 years of the church age, the “firstfruits unto God” that had been held captive by Satan were released – they became saved. Then they were all gathered by the end of the church age.

Then God had a second outpouring of the Holy Spirit after He ended the church age. He had another plan to evangelize the world and pour out His Spirit the second time to recover the remnant of His people. Notice there is language of “recovering” the remnant because all the elect out in the world during the period of the Latter Rain were captive to sin and Satan until God gathered them in salvation.

So, God had two plans to recover the captives. There was one program that was carried out throughout the church age and a second program was carried out over the (almost) 17 years of the second part of the Great Tribulation period. Again, that is probably why God paints this picture. Remember, twice in the Gospel accounts Jesus commanded the Apostles to cast their nets to catch fish. The first time, they caught many fish, but the net broke. The waters they were fishing in is a type and figure of the people of the world being in a condition of hell in their unsaved state; in coming up out of the water, they were being rescued from their bondage to sin and Satan. However, during the fishing expedition of the church age, the net broke, just as the ship was shipwrecked in Acts 27. In both cases, you cannot use the net or the ship again.

But there was a second fishing expedition, as it were, which we read about in John 21, and it ties into the Great Tribulation period. It was at night, which identifies with judgment. Christ commanded them to let down their net and they had a great catch of fish, 153 in total. That time the net did not break, and they dragged the fish to land. It was a picture of those saved outside the churches during the Latter Rain, which relates to the second outpouring of the Holy Spirit.

Here, too, it was the second time that God intervened with this situation regarding Abraham and Sarah. Abraham’s name was different and Sarah’s name was different. When God changed his name to Abraham, God said in Genesis 17:15:

Neither shall thy name any more be called Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham; for a father of many nations have I made thee.

The first time God restored Sarai to Abram was a picture of the church age. What have we learned about the church age? There were not as many people saved as we would have thought. We do not know the number, but they are typified by the 144,000. There were relatively few saved, given the number of churches and the number of nations the Gospel had reached, as it says in Isaiah 9:3: “Thou hast multiplied the nation, and not increased the joy.” They were not that great multitude. God saved the best until last and He had determined to save a great multitude during the second outpouring of the Holy Spirit during the second “fishing expedition,” like the second time Sarah was restored to Abraham, the father of many nations. That is language relating to the great multitude, so God caused Abram’s name to be changed so it would signify that it was pointing to the Latter Rain, just like the net not breaking the second time was pointing to the Latter Rain. There was a difference from this case and the first instance when Sarai was taken by Pharaoh.

Let us go on in Genesis 20. After Abraham said that Sarah was his sister. Abimelech sent and took Sarah and she was taken to the house of Abimelech. He said he did not know that Sarah was married to Abraham. Abraham did not reveal it and Sarah did not reveal it. We can see how this also fits the spiritual picture because Satan is an evil ruler over all the unsaved people of the world. But among them are God’s elect. In the day of salvation, God’s elect were in the world and, yet, Christ had died for them at the foundation of the world and paid for their sins; He had obligated Himself to apply His atoning work to them at some point in their lives. God’s elect were scattered among the masses of unsaved people that Christ did not die for and that are all under the rule and power of Satan. In Abimelech’s house, he had his wives or concubines, but now Sarah was included among that number. But there was a very big difference because Sarah was a “man’s wife.” Sarah belongs to a man, as it says in Genesis 20:3:

But God came to Abimelech in a dream by night, and said to him, Behold, thou art but a dead man, for the woman which thou hast taken; for she is a man’s wife.

Spiritually, the “man” is easy to identify. It is Christ. Satan has taken a “woman” or an elect child of God into his house, the kingdom of darkness. As was the case with Mary and Joseph, before they came together as man and wife, Mary was “betrothed” to him. It was as good as being married. For all intents and purposes, since Christ took our sins upon Himself and died for them at the foundation of the world, He has guaranteed that we will be His eternal bride forever. He will never leave us nor forsake us. This was all promised and it has been an obligation of the Lord since the foundation of the world. Since He has paid for all our sins, how can God separate from us? So, in a real way, the elect are as if we were betrothed to Christ at the foundation of the world. Then it is a matter of each of us being born in this world and we may live our lives for a time in complete ignorance of being married to Christ, which was a different situation from Sarah, who was aware she was married to Abraham. (Not every detail carries over from a historical parable.) For the children of God, we were children of wrath even as others. We acted like the world and we thought we were of the world; we were occupied with the things of the world like everyone else. However, we also were “a man’s wife.”

So, this is what God impressed upon King Abimelech: “Behold, thou art but a dead man, for the woman which thou hast taken; for she is a man’s wife.” God applied pressure to this king of the Philistines to release her, just as God did with Satan regarding His elect.

Lord willing, when we get together in our next Bible study, we will continue this discussion.