Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #31 of Genesis, chapter 22, and we are going to be reading Genesis 22:17-19:

That in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the sea shore; and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies; And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice. So Abraham returned unto his young men, and they rose up and went together to Beersheba; and Abraham dwelt at Beersheba.

We were looking at verse 17 and we discussed the part where God said, “I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the sea shore.”   The final part of this verse says, in Genesis 22:17:

… and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies;

Because we have seen the word “seed” appearing so many times in theses last few chapters of Genesis, we are conditioned when seeing that word to think of Galatians, chapter 3.  I will read it again because God keeps bringing it up, so it must be important.  If the Lord thinks we need constant reminding of this, then we must need constant reminding of this.  It says in Galatians 3:16:

Now to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. He saith not, And to seeds, as of many; but as of one, And to thy seed, which is Christ

The seed is singular, because it is pointing to one.  Jesus Christ is the seed.

We are also helped in Galatians 3 in the last verse of the chapter, as it says in Galatians 3:29:

And if ye be Christ's, then are ye Abraham's seed, and heirs according to the promise.

Here, the word “seed” is singular, but there is a filling out of our understanding, because it says that all those that be in Christ are the seed (plural).  So, the seed is singular, pointing to Jesus, but in Jesus are His people or all those He has saved.

So when we read, “and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies,” we see right away why the masculine pronoun “his” is used, because it is referring to the enemies of the Lord Jesus Christ, and He will possess the gate of them, His enemies.  We can understand this perfectly.  We are not coming up with our own ideas and our own understanding of what the “seed” is, but some theologians were blinded with the idea that it was physical, national Israel that was the seed, but half of these verses would make no sense if you try to apply it to national Israel.  But, here, we understand it is referring to Christ.

It also refers to the seed in Genesis, chapter 24.  Lord willing, we will be going through this chapter soon, but it says in Genesis 24:60:

And they blessed Rebekah, and said unto her, Thou art our sister, be thou the mother of thousands of millions, and let thy seed possess the gate of those which hate them.

This is very similar and, of course, Rebecca would be involved in the “seed.”  She would enter into that line that eventually produced the Lord Jesus Christ, so this statement made to her is important.  We can see that it speaks of “thousand of millions” when it refers to the seed, and it also says, “and let thy seed possess the gate of those which hate them.”  It says “them,” not “him,” as it says in Genesis 22:17.  So, here, it is plural, and this goes with Genesis 22:17.  (And, again, this is why God keeps repeating things.  I know I have a bad memory.) 

And we can understand this along the same lines as another Bible declaration.  Remember that there is one verse found in Isaiah and one verse is found in Romans and in one place, it says, “How beautiful…are the feet of him that bringeth good tidings,” and in the other place it is almost word-for-word, but it says, “How beautiful are the feet of them that bring glad tidings.” 

Christ is the seed, but all those counted in Him are counted for the seed – all the elect.  Christ sent forth the Gospel.  The elect are the messengers of Christ or the body of Christ that carry it out.  So there is the “singular” and the “plural.”  It is interesting that God does this fairly frequently.  He can have Christ in view, or the body of Christ in view, or both in view.  We can go to Psalm 127:3-5:

Lo, children are an heritage of JEHOVAH: and the fruit of the womb is his reward.  As arrows are in the hand of a mighty man; so are children of the youth. Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.

In verse 5, the “man” that is happy refers to Christ or God Himself: “Happy is the man that hath his quiver full of them: they shall not be ashamed, but they shall speak with the enemies in the gate.”

The word “they” refer to the elect children of God.  God is the one who has begotten us through His Spirit.  We are born of God.  God is our Father and, therefore, we are His children, and we will speak with the enemies in the gate.  This is the “gate” that God possesses and the “gate” we will also possess, the gate of our enemies.  A gate is an entry way, and it can be understood in a similar way to a door.  Christ is the door.  Christ is the gate, and in this world of darkness, there had always been that portal or entryway, the gate to heaven.  Jacob, one of the patriarchs, slept in a certain location one night, and remember he called it “the gate of heaven,” in Genesis 28:16-19:

And Jacob awaked out of his sleep, and he said, Surely JEHOVAH is in this place; and I knew it not. And he was afraid, and said, How dreadful is this place! this is none other but the house of God, and this is the gate of heaven. And Jacob rose up early in the morning, and took the stone that he had put for his pillows, and set it up for a pillar, and poured oil upon the top of it. And he called the name of that place Bethel: but the name of that city was called Luz at the first.

Bethel means “house of God.”  This is the gate, and it is the only gate in this world.  The people of the world try to establish gates or doorways (portals or entrances) into heaven through their own minds, and they come up with various religions.  They pervert and abuse the Word of God, the Bible, to come up with various false gospels and they claim that their way will gain you access to heaven and you will go to be with God when you die.  But it is all false.  God is the owner of the only true gate for this whole world.  Though the world lay in darkness throughout history, there had always been a gate, and God possessed it.  And God is the One who determines the status of the gate, whether it be open or shut.  It is all according to His perfect will as time unfolded through various “times and seasons,” until we reached the time of the very end of the world.  And, of course, this would agree with Scripture such as John 14:6:

Jesus saith unto him, I am the way, the truth, and the life: no man cometh unto the Father, but by me.

Jesus was indicating ownership possession of the “way” to heaven.  It is the narrow way as laid out in the Bible.  It is not the broad way.  You can forget about the broad way – it is not to be taken seriously.  The broad way only leads to destruction.  The narrow way that leads to heaven is Christ, and it is found in His Word, the Bible, but Christ has shut the door to that way at this time, since we are in the Day of Judgment.  But He was always the gate, and He possesses the gates of His enemy because every unsaved person born into the world was born an enemy of God and, yet, God granted grace to certain select individuals, the elect, that were chosen by Him before the foundation of the world.  Yet they were once enemies, the children of wrath even as others, and God was the one that possessed the gate that they would have to come through, and He did bestow grace on these few.  They did come to Him in heaven through that gate or door, who is Christ. 

This is what is in view, especially the statement in Psalm 127:5 that says the children of that blessed “man” (who has his quiver full of them) will speak with their enemies in the gate.  Why does it say “speak”?  It is because speech or words point to the Word of God, as God’s people ministered the Word of God in the day of salvation.  As we ministered, it was as though a doorway opened up into heaven and then, according to God’s perfect will and good pleasure, the Word would “take hold” of an individual and draw that person through that doorway.   The Word of God, the Bible, opened the entrance to the eternal kingdom of God and that person would enter in.  It was through speaking with their enemies in the gate that this could take place.

That is what is in view in the last part of the verse in Genesis 22:17 where it said, “…and thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies;

Then it goes on to say, in Genesis 22:18:

And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice.

Again, the seed (singular) would be Jesus Christ.

You know, if you take notes (and I do take notes because I have a bad memory), you could write “Christ” over the words “thy seed,” and you could read it that way: “And in Christ shall all the nations of the earth be blessed; because thou hast obeyed my voice.”

Then we see that there might be a problem with verse 18, because we could ask, “Is it true that all the nations of the earth are blessed in Christ?”  Well, that was the Great Commission, as it was stated in Matthew 28, where the Lord Jesus declared, in Matthew 28:19:

Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost: Teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you: and, lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. Amen.

He said to go and teach all nations, so here is another reference to all the nations of the earth that would be blessed.  We have discussed this at other times, but were all nations taught as commanded by the Great Commission?  Were all nations baptized, if we understand it literally to mean all nations and all people of those nations?  No – not even close at any point during the New Testament era and right up to today.  Again, if you take the Bible literally, as most theologians have done, then we would have to admit that the Great Commission was a great failure because all nations were not taught, and all nations were not baptized and, therefore, all nations were not blessed.

But, again, we do not take the Bible literally because the deeper spiritual meaning is always the more important level of meaning that is far more important than the surface meaning, the plain literal meaning.  Remember, the plain literal meaning is often impossible to fulfill, such as the declaration that the land of Canaan would be given for an everlasting habitation.  Or, we could look at Genesis 18:22 where God said that all the nations of the earth would be blessed because Abraham had obeyed His voice.  But that is just not true on a literal level, because Abraham obeyed God’s command to take his son Isaac and offer him up for a burnt offering.  No – it is not true on the literal, physical level, but only on the spiritual level.  Abraham was a type of God the Father and Isaac was a type of Christ the Son, and through the Father’s offering of the Son were all the nations of the earth blessed.  It was very true on the spiritual level, but not true on the literal level.  We spent a good deal of time talking about that a few studies ago.

But, here, where it says, “And in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed,” we need to go to Revelation, chapter 21 where God is speaking of the glorious new heaven and new earth, and it says in Revelation 21:23-25:

And the city had no need of the sun, neither of the moon, to shine in it: for the glory of God did lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof. And the nations of them which are saved shall walk in the light of it: and the kings of the earth do bring their glory and honour into it. And the gates of it shall not be shut at all by day: for there shall be no night there.

The “nations of them which are saved” are the ones that have entered in, and those gates are always open to them.  They entered through the gate while living their lives in this world, as God ministered an entrance into that glorious kingdom unto them through His Word, the Bible.  God made sure they were drawn through the gate and made “born again,” and, therefore, transported into heavenly places to be seated in Christ Jesus.  Those are the “nations” that are in view, but not every individual in every nation of the world, but only “the nations of them which are saved.”  Those are the ones that were all taught (100%).  Those are the ones that were baptized in the Holy Spirit (100%).  Those are the ones that have been blessed through the promise of the seed of Abraham in Christ (100%).  There were none of these that were not blessed.  It is speaking of the eternal church, the body of Christ, or the seed.  It is the seed (singular) and the seed (plural).  The Gentiles or the elect that were chosen out of the world become known as “the nations of them which are saved,” and that received the blessing.  This is what God is referring to, in verse 18.

We will look at Genesis 22:19, so we do not have to come back to this in the next study, and then we will try to finish the study of chapter 22 in the next study.  It says in Genesis 22:19:

So Abraham returned unto his young men, and they rose up and went together to Beersheba; and Abraham dwelt at Beersheba.

Remember that “Beersheba” is a compound word that literally means “well of the oath” or “well of swearing.”  We have looked at “wells” in the Bible, which identify with salvation, and God has sworn and taken an oath.  He has promised Abraham, Isaac and Jacob and all His people that He will fulfill His promise concerning the seed, the Promised Land that the seed will receive for an eternal inheritance.  It is God’s salvation program, and He has promised and sworn with an oath.   The Bible has God’s seal set upon it, that He has so decreed and made this oath, and He will bring it to pass.  That is where Abraham went with his young men.  Remember that the young men were the two lads we read about in Genesis 22:3-5.  It said in Genesis 22:5:

And Abraham said unto his young men, Abide ye here with the ass; and I and the lad will go yonder and worship, and come again to you

And that is exactly what happened in verse 19.  Abraham was certain and positive (even though God had commanded him to slay his only son Isaac) that God would raise him up.  That is what we are told in Hebrews 11, saying that Abraham received him (Isaac) in a figure.  He knew that God would fulfill His promises to him which had to come through Isaac.  Abraham thought, “God wants me to kill him and offer him for a burnt offering, but then God will raise him up again,” so Abraham did not lie to the two lads when he said, “I and the lad will go yonder and worship, and come again to you.”  He had both of them in view.

What is interesting is that after Abraham returned to the two men, it says they rose up and went together to Beersheba, but Isaac is not mentioned.

Talk about a different style of writing!  You know, if a man was the author of the Bible, as some charge, this would be a telling point.  If men wrote this, they would have taken extra care to make sure that the two lads saw both Abraham and Isaac; that is, they would mention Isaac.  They would probably focus on Isaac as he returned with Abraham.  After all, that would be the more dramatic way of presenting it, but God does not care for drama.  He is just giving us the Word of God, the Bible, to teach and to illustrate points He wants His people to know.

We wonder what point He could be illustrating by not mentioning Isaac in verse 19.  We know that Isaac was with Abraham.  Certainly, after that great deliverance by God in showing the ram caught in the thicket which he offered in the place of Isaac, Abraham would have had his arms around his son, and even hugging him every step of the way.  He would not have left him behind.  That would be foolish to think, and Isaac would definitely have been with him.  But why not mention Isaac?  It is because the whole illustration was of Christ dying and resurrecting.  After Christ resurrected, it is true that He showed Himself for 40 days, but that is too nuance to illustrate in a historical parable like this, but what is being illustrated is that God the Father (the fulness of the Godhead) returned to the two lads that would point to God’s people, the caretakers of the Word of God.  Then it would be like the New Testament church age or Pentecost and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit, which was the promise of the Father that was sent upon them, according to Acts 2.  So the Father returned to the elect children of God, and they rose up and went together to the well of the oath; that is, they went to minister the Word of God in the gate and to share the Word of God with the nations of the world.