Welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Genesis. Tonight is study #15 of Genesis, chapter 20. I am going to read Genesis 20:16-18:

And unto Sarah he said, Behold, I have given thy brother a thousand pieces of silver: behold, he is to thee a covering of the eyes, unto all that are with thee, and with all other: thus she was reproved. So Abraham prayed unto God: and God healed Abimelech, and his wife, and his maidservants; and they bare children. For JEHOVAH had fast closed up all the wombs of the house of Abimelech, because of Sarah Abraham’s wife.

We are going to start at the end of verse 16, because we have gone through all these statements. I mentioned at the close of the last study that I had a difficult time regarding the word “reproved.” Let me read it again, in Genesis 20:16:

… behold, he is to thee a covering of the eyes, unto all that are with thee, and with all other:…

We understood that Abraham is a type of Christ and Christ is a covering for sin to God’s eyes, not Sarah’s eyes. The statement, “all that are with thee, and with all other,” is referring to the whole company of the elect, as it indicates in John 17 where Christ referred to those that He prays for, the elect. Then it said at the end of Genesis 20:16:

… thus she was reproved.

I now think I understand this statement. It was a similar mistake I was making with the statement, “he is to thee a covering of the eyes,” as I mistakenly thought it was Sarah’s eyes. Here, I was having difficulty because I thought it was Abimelech that was reproving Sarah, but, spiritually, I do not think it refers to Abimelech’s reproof. Historically, although Abimelech referred to Abraham as “thy brother” instead of “thy husband,” but, other than that, it is hard to see a reproof in this. Again, it does not say, “Thus Abimelech reproved her,” but it simply says, “thus she was reproved.”

This Hebrew word for “reproved” is Strong’s #3198. It is also translated as “reproved” in Genesis 21:25:

And Abraham reproved Abimelech because of a well of water, which Abimelech’s servants had violently taken away.

Here, it is very specific, having to do with Abraham rebuking Abimelech over a well of water. It is the same Abimelech and his servants that violently took away the well, and he is being reproved.

It also says in Job 5:17:

Behold, happy is the man whom God correcteth: therefore despise not thou the chastening of the Almighty:

Here, the word “corrected” is from the same word translated as “reproved.”

It is also the same word in Proverbs 3:12:

For whom JEHOVAH loveth he correcteth; even as a father the son in whom he delighteth.

This word is the same word that is sometimes translated as “chastened.” God corrects those whom He loves, His elect people. When the Gospel of salvation went out in the world to save the people of God, it served to correct them. It served to chasten them to make them sons of God. Right now in the Day of Judgment, God is using this same application, as He severely tries and proves His people as we go through the spiritual fire.

In our verse, Sarah was chastened or corrected by God, not by Abimelech, just as every child of God is chastened by Him.

Let us go on to Genesis 20:17:

So Abraham prayed unto God: and God healed Abimelech, and his wife, and his maidservants; and they bare children.

Now we have a big problem, spiritually. Historically, there is no problem understanding this, and that is why it is so much easier to study the Bible by looking at plain, literal statements. It is easy, but it is boring. Historically, we know the situation, as it had said in Genesis 20:7:

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.

This is exactly what God had said. So, Abraham prayed unto God and He healed Abimelech, his wife and his maidservants and they had children. We are being told something we had not been told at any prior point. We had been told that God told him he would be a dead man if he did not restore the man his wife. We know that he gave Abraham sheep, oxen, menservants, womenservants and a thousand pieces of silver. We know all this, but we did not know God had shut the wombs of Abimelech’s wife and maidservants that they did not bear children. So, this was in addition to the threat of death. When God says something, it is not like the threat of men, but it would be a certainty if he did not obey.

But now we find that Abraham prayed, and that curse was removed. It is a curse when you do not bear children, because children are a blessing of the Lord. But this specific curse was lifted. God healed Abimelech and the women, and they could bear. We are told in Genesis 20:18:

For JEHOVAH had fast closed up all the wombs of the house of Abimelech, because of Sarah Abraham’s wife.

We do not know how long Sarah was there. We do not know how long the wombs of these women were closed, so they could not have children. It could have been weeks or months. Nonetheless, this is the point God makes.

But, again, it is so “wooden” when you just look at the historical narrative or the moral lesson you can learn to apply to modern-day living. (Perhaps, “wooden” is a better word than “boring.”) It is “wooden” or “lifeless” because it is the shell of the Bible, but not the substance of the Bible which is found in the deeper spiritual level. We want to learn on that level. To do that, we must ask questions and we must compare Scripture with Scripture to make sure our conclusions harmonize. And, of course, we need the wisdom of God’s Spirit to guide us into truth through that methodology.

We had understood Abraham was a type of Christ and continues to be a type of Christ. So, Christ healed Abimelech, a type of Satan. God healed Satan and his wife and maidservants and they bore children. Do you see the problem? Why would God heal Satan? That idea just seems unheard of and we would not want God to heal Satan, so he could have more children. What kind of idea is that?

You see, this is the reason this chapter has been one of the most difficult studies I have personally done. It has been difficult all the way through. However, it has been one of the more satisfying chapters because the Lord has been gracious to me and to us as He has opened our understanding on point, after point. He has done that with this verse, I think, because we asked the question about what the Bible presented to us about this: Has God ever healed Satan in the Bible? The answer is, “Yes, He has,” and it was done in a very significant place that ties in with the Great Tribulation. And this is the spiritual emphasis we have been seeing throughout this entire chapter of Genesis 20. It was the second time Sarah was recovered and it was the second outpouring of the Holy Spirit during the Great Tribulation.

First, just to remind us, we saw earlier 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.

Also, again, it had said in Genesis 20:7:

… and if thou restore her not, know thou that thou shalt surely die, thou, and all that are thine.

There was the threat of death. God stated it outright in Genesis 20:3: “Behold, thou art but a dead man.” And this is how the Bible pictures Satan. When the Lord Jesus Christ went to the cross, Satan was bound. Christ spoke of this in the parable where you first bind the “strong man” and then spoil his house. And we have seen in Genesis 20 that Abimelech’s house was spoiled. “Here, take sheep, oxen, menservants and womenservants. Here are a thousand pieces of silver. And, here, take Sarah your wife back.” It was a spoiling of the house of Satan, but to do this, Satan had to be bound, as we read in the Gospel accounts. That “binding” also related to Satan having been “cast down to hell.” He entered into the condition of “hell” or “death” at the cross and he was there during the entire New Testament era. It says in Revelation 20:1-3:

And I saw an angel come down from heaven, having the key of the bottomless pit and a great chain in his hand. And he laid hold on the dragon, that old serpent, which is the Devil, and Satan, and bound him a thousand years, And cast him into the bottomless pit, and shut him up, and set a seal upon him, that he should deceive the nations no more, till the thousand years should be fulfilled: and after that he must be loosed a little season.

Satan was bound at the cross for a figurative “thousand years,” which was 1,955 years in actual years. He was loosed in 1988, the 13,000th year of earth’s history and the beginning of the Great Tribulation. We read here that Satan was loosed, and he went out to deceive the nations. God speaks of the loosing of Satan from having been bound, but He speaks of it from a different angle in Revelation 13:1-3:

And I stood upon the sand of the sea, and saw a beast rise up out of the sea, having seven heads and ten horns, and upon his horns ten crowns, and upon his heads the name of blasphemy. And the beast which I saw was like unto a leopard, and his feet were as the feet of a bear, and his mouth as the mouth of a lion: and the dragon gave him his power, and his seat, and great authority. And I saw one of his heads as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed: and all the world wondered after the beast.

Satan was bound at the cross and cast into the bottomless pit for “a thousand years.” This is the figure the Bible uses, but he was not in a literal place called hell, but he was in the condition of “hell,” which relates to death. Therefore, the Bible refers to him having received a “deadly wound” by the Lord Jesus Christ at Calvary. Then it says, “his deadly wound was healed,” because he was loosed out of the condition of hell or loosed from death, “and all the world wondered after the beast.” We can see their “wonder” over the last few decades, because prior to that the world was being restrained by the Spirit of God. There is just no resemblance to the way the peoples of the world conducted themselves in the 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s 60s and 70s compared to the peoples of the world today. It is incredibly different. It is almost unbelievable. The language, the music and everything else has been changed because Satan was loosed. They marveled at him, as his deadly wound was healed, and Satan became their champion, as it were. He became the “Goliath” of the unsaved people of the world that champion their cause before God, as the Philistines championed Goliath before David. They have ventured more and more into sin as God removed His hand of restraint. Their evil hearts of unbelief had been more subdued before by God’s activity within their beings, but now they have become “self-realized” as they embrace their evil nature.

But the significant statement is, “one of his head as it were wounded to death; and his deadly wound was healed.” His binding at the cross was in effect until 1988, but then “his deadly wound was healed,” which identifies with his rule over the nations and the churches during the 23-year Great Tribulation period.

So, in our verse we see that Abraham prayed unto God on behalf of Abimelech and God healed Abimelech, his wife and his maidservants, and they bear children. You see, we must look at the release of Sarah, the menservants and maidservants and the giving of sheep and oxen and silver as the time when Satan turned over the elect at the demand of God during the second part of the Great Tribulation. But it was also the time when “his deadly wound was healed.” It was simultaneous with this other activity on a spiritual level. God healed Satan, just as Abraham prayed that Abimelech be healed.

It was God’s doing to bind Satan. And it was God’s doing, as the Keeper of the keys to hell and death, to open the pit where Satan was bound and to free him. It was all done by the determinate counsel and will of God that the world would be in the dire straits and condition it is today, as God lifted His hand of restraint. He let Satan loose to destroy the churches, but at the same time God was preparing the world for the final judgment as the world goes after their lustful desires. We see the results of this all around us.

This is the spiritual undercurrent of what is in view when Abraham prayed to God and God healed Abimelech, his wife and maidservants and they bear children. But what does it mean that Satan was healed to bear children? We are helped in John 8 where the Lord Jesus Christ is speaking, in John 8:44:

Ye are of your father the devil, and the lusts of your father ye will do. He was a murderer from the beginning, and abode not in the truth, because there is no truth in him. When he speaketh a lie, he speaketh of his own: for he is a liar, and the father of it.

Christ referred to, “your father the devil.” Satan speaks of his own, which is a lie. At the time of the Great Tribulation, the Lord turned over the corporate church to Satan. The entire Christendom in the world was turned into the hands of Satan when he was loosed. The churches and congregations immediately became apostate and, yet, they have continued to send forth their false gospels to draw people into their congregations and to produce spiritual children. They are children conceived through lies, whose father is the Devil or Satan, not God. They have repopulated the churches and filled their pews with those begotten of false gospels.

If we had continued to read chapter 13, an image was made to the Beast. It was an image that could “speak” and it was an image that everyone (in the churches) would bow before; if they did not have the image of the Beast, they could not buy or sell. The entire corporate body is that image that has the ability to speak and which has life physically. Those in the churches are made up of people that are physically alive and that is the “image of the beast” that is full of lies. Again, the churches in the world number about two billion people, so that is a great number of offspring that belong to Satan, their spiritual father and the father of lies.

We will look more at this in a short study and then we will get into verse 18. Thank you for joining us tonight and, Lord willing, we will finish this chapter in our next Bible study.