Welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Genesis. Tonight is study #5 of Genesis, chapter 20. Again, I will read Genesis 20:3-7:

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.

In our last study, we were beginning to understand that Abimelech, whose name means “father of (the) king,” is a figure of Satan. He was the king of Gerar in the land of the Philistines, so he was a king of the Philistines. The Philistines were a constant enemy to the people of Israel, which identified with the kingdom of God as His representative. It is not a good thing to be one that is constantly battling that which represents the kingdom of God. Who does that, but Satan and his forces? For example, in 1Samuel, chapter 6 there is a passage that shows how the Philistines picture the emissaries of Satan. In this chapter the Israelites had lost a battle to the Philistines, which was a terrible thing. They were soundly beaten, and the sons of Eli were killed in the battle after they had foolishly brought the Ark of the Covenant to the battle site; they were trying to use it as a sort of “good luck omen” to bring victory, so God permitted the Philistines to win the battle and to take the Ark of the Covenant. It is an incredibly shocking idea that the Holy Ark of God could be taken by the enemy. God had given so many statutes and laws regarding who could carry the Ark and who could enter into its presence, and so forth. It was now in the hands of the Philistines. It says in 1Samuel 6:1:

And the ark of JEHOVAH was in the country of the Philistines seven months.

The capture of the Ark is a picture of the judgment of God upon the churches and congregations. They were the outward representation of the kingdom of the God to the earth during the church age, but at the end of the church age God came to visit and saw their “high places” and He judged them by loosing Satan. Satan entered into the congregations and took his seat to rule as the man of sin. This is typified by the capturing of the Ark because the church is identified with the holy place, where the Bible was central and where God had dwelt in their midst. But when judgment began at the house of God, Satan and his emissaries ruled over the church world. God had given them up, just as He gave up the Ark in this historical picture. God could have struck the whole Philistine army dead for taking the Ark. Later, when the Ark was returned to Israel, the people of Israel dared to open the Ark and peek inside, so God struck tens of thousands of them dead. So, the only way the Philistines could capture the ark and have it in their possession was for God to have fought against His own people in allowing this to happen, just as God did at the end of the church age with the corporate church. We can see how the Philistines are used in this passage in 1Samuel as a figure of Satan’s assault against the churches and congregations.

Therefore, we can see how any ruler of the Philistines could typify Satan, like the King of Gerar in Genesis 20. After he took Sarah, God came to him. Again, let me remind you that we noticed that this was the second time this type of incident had taken place. God does not do these things casually in the Bible. It is all according to the divine will and eternal wisdom of God; He works out everything according to His precise plan. Therefore, he directed Abraham, allowing him to leave the area of Sodom and go to Gerar. God then allowed this duplicate situation to happen to Abraham and Sarah, except now they were both much older, were they not? That is a second difference. Earlier, when this happened to Abram and Sarai, they were younger. It is just like the first time God poured out the Holy Spirit, the world was younger (33 A.D.), after 11,000 years of history and after the Lord’s first coming. God caused Sarai to be released from her captivity and to be restored to her husband Abram. In other words, this was like saving the “firstfruits” out of the New Testament churches and congregations during the church age. But during the second outpouring that would come after 13,000 years and after the loosing of Satan, it would come at a time when the world was “old,” just as Abraham was an old man of almost 100 years old, almost to the point of “completeness.” His wife Sarah was almost 90. The taking of her as an older woman is rather curious. But, again, Abraham would live to be 175 and Sarah would live to be 127, so she would have lived about 37 more years. She could have had the appearance of a middle-aged woman of today, so she was still very attractive, according to this account.

And, yet, they were both “old” and this points to the second outpouring of the Holy Spirit when the earth would be “old” and near its end of days and the time when God would recover the remnant of His people by stretching forth His hand a second time. He would do so in a much grander way by saving the great multitude. Therefore, Abraham’s name had been changed at this point in his life to mean “father of many nations.” And Sarah’s name means “princess.” She was taken at this point and I think it is a figure of that great multitude in the world at the end of time that were in captivity to sin and Satan.

But this great multitude was “betrothed” to Christ. Christ had died for their sins at the foundation of the world, guaranteeing that eternal marriage (to Him) would occur and be consummated in the future. So, He certainly gave His pledge, although the Holy Spirit is that “earnest of the spirit.” The word “earnest” is related to the Old Testament word for “pledge.” Yes – it is true that it is not until the point of the application of the Word that someone can receive the “earnest of the spirit.” But, again, it was a guarantee (due to the atoning work of Christ performed at the foundation of the world) that we would receive the Holy Spirit, the down payment of God’s salvation program that will, ultimately, be completed on the last day.

However, again, Sarah was a “man’s wife.” It goes on to say in Genesis 20:4-6:

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.

I think this passage presents some problems. If Abimelech, the King of Gerar, is a type of Satan, why does he refer to himself and to his people as a righteous nation? Why does he say that he did this in the integrity of his heart and innocency of his hands? Those kinds of words do not apply to Satan, who is certainly not innocent and who does not possess integrity. But God is using an unsaved man, the King of Gerar. He was an unsaved man from everything we can know, because God threatened him with death if he did not release Sarah. The release of Sarah does not prove anything good about his character. The fact that God had to threaten him shows that he did not have a born-again heart. However, God withheld him from sinning, and this is one of the points made in these verses that we will look at, Lord willing. We will look at the idea of God the Holy Spirit restraining sin in the lives of the unsaved. This is a very important proof text to prove that God can hold back sin in the life of the unsaved.

While that is true of a man, how can this description of this king apply to Satan? The significant part of this statement is made in verses 4 which says that Abimelech had not come near her; then verse 6 says, “I also withheld thee from sinning against me: therefore suffered I thee not to touch her.” He did not come near her and he did not touch her. She was taken into his house, but she was protected by God. And this is also the case with God’s elect during the day of salvation when we were still out in the world as unsaved people. The blood of Christ had not yet been applied to us, although the atonement took place on our behalf before the world began. It was as if the blood of Christ fell into a basin and then it must be applied to us, individually, in each succeeding generation through the Word of God. The Bible speaks of dipping hyssop into the blood of the sacrificial lamb during the Passover and applying it to the doorpost. They would literally take a hyssop and dip it into the basin of blood and apply it to the doorpost. The night the Israelites fled from Egypt, when the Destroyer came He would see the blood and “pass by” that house. That is the reason it was called the Passover. It was a picture of what God would do through the application of the Word of God, because the Bible says, “Faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.”

In every generation there were people that Christ had died for by spilling his blood and giving His life (the life is in the blood) for their sins. Then as the Gospel went forth, God made sure that these elect people heard the Word at some point in their lives. It may have been just a little bit of the Word – it could have been a verse or even one word of one verse. We cannot underestimate the power of the Word of God. It may have been delivered through a tract, a billboard or someone speaking to a stranger or through the preaching of a preacher. But, however it happened, God applied the “blood” through the Word of God. The Word of God itself was the “hyssop.” The Word of God fell upon the heart of an individual and God blessed that Word to those people that were predestinated to receive it. Then the blood of Christ was applied, and they were delivered out of the kingdom of Satan and out of the house of bondage. In our historical parable, an elect was delivered out of the house of a king of the Philistines in Gerar and she was restored to her husband Abraham (father of many nations) and he received his wife. That is the picture.

The fact that Abimelech did not come near her and did not touch her signifies the spiritual situation. When an elect person was still unsaved before the application of the Word of God to that person, that person was a part of Satan’s kingdom, but Satan could not “touch” him. He could not harm the elect in any eternal way, although they could have suffered all kinds of indignities and miseries, as sin tends to bring. But, ultimately, Satan could not hurt them because God had His hand upon them and He protected them, even in their unsaved condition. They were under the care and protection of God. They could not die physically before God saved them.

For example, God could have protected someone that went to war if they were God’s elect and, yet, that person had not yet heard the Gospel. A bomb could drop, and nine out of 10 people could have been killed, but he lived. Or, a plane could have been shot down and all 20 men in the plane died, except for him. Or, even if it was not a war, a plane could crash and everyone in the plane could die except for one little baby that was one of God’s elect. However God did it, He had His hand of protection over His people – they could not die or be eternally harmed by Satan while they were in his house under his rule. That is one thing we can see here clearly.

God had said to Abimelech, “Therefore suffered I thee not to touch her.” Let us turn to 1John 5:18:

We know that whosoever is born of God sinneth not; but he that is begotten of God keepeth himself, and that wicked one toucheth him not.

The wicked one, who is Satan, cannot “touch” whosoever is born of God. He can certainly come against a child of God and assail him from every direction and in every imaginable way. He could trouble him through people at work, through neighbors or through family. He could trouble him through an evil government, and so forth. But Satan cannot “touch” him in the sense that he could damage or destroy his eternal soul and eternal condition. That is what Satan wanted to do. He wanted to destroy mankind and, in doing so, to destroy the elect that were predestinated to salvation.

Of course, this is one of the big reasons for abortion; and before abortion, there was birth control. If God wanted to bring an elect through a specific family, then Satan’s approach was to convince the people of the world that it was a wise thing to exercise “planned parenthood” and control the number of children. Then, perhaps, that elect person would not be born. That was the hope of the evil one that was operating behind these things. Satan took that evil further with children that were conceived and developing in the womb: “What if this child was one of the elect? How about putting in the minds of those I control, and we can start by having people push the idea that abortion is a wonderful thing. I will put in people’s minds doubt about whether the fetus is even a child.” Creating doubt is what Satan specializes in, is it not? He brings doubt: “I do not know if it is a baby, or not.” It is conceived of two human parents and you do not know if it is a baby, or not? Come on! That is just an indicator of how blind mankind can be in his sins and how desperately wicked we are in our sinful condition. God permitted this kind of thinking as we neared the end stage of earth’s history, as these ideas were growing in preparation for the end.

God had his hand of protection over His people and it was as if he was saying to Satan, “Go and try to destroy the elect, if you can. You will not be able to do so.” Well, I must correct that because Satan could have caused an elect child to be killed in the act of abortion, but God would have saved that baby before the abortion took place. In that way, God protected its eternal soul. If that child was born again, Satan could not touch the born-again soul. He could destroy the body, but not the soul.

Lord willing, in our next Bible study we are going to continue looking at this king of the Philistines who is a type and figure of Satan.