Good evening and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #2 of Genesis, chapter 23, and we are going to read Genesis 23:1-6:

And Sarah was an hundred and seven and twenty years old: these were the years of the life of Sarah. And Sarah died in Kirjatharba; the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan: and Abraham came to mourn for Sarah, and to weep for her. And Abraham stood up from before his dead, and spake unto the sons of Heth, saying, I am a stranger and a sojourner with you: give me a possession of a buryingplace with you, that I may bury my dead out of my sight. And the children of Heth answered Abraham, saying unto him, Hear us, my lord: thou art a mighty prince among us: in the choice of our sepulchres bury thy dead; none of us shall withhold from thee his sepulchre, but that thou mayest bury thy dead.

I will stop reading there.  As I mentioned in the last study, this is the only time in the whole Bible that God tells us the death age of a woman, so that lets us know this is very important.  It is extremely important that God has told us Sarah’s death age.

As we study the Bible, we compare spiritual with spiritual, and we do that by looking up the words, as each word is spiritual.  We check how that word is used elsewhere (in the Bible).  Every number in the Bible is a word.  We find a reference to Noah’s 600^th year or when God says, “And yet seven days,” and He would bring the flood.  Whatever number we find (and the Bible is full of numbers), in every case it is not the numeral that is in the original Hebrew or Greek, but it is a word.  For example, we can write the numeral “7” or we can write the word “seven,” so in the Bible every number is a word and every word is spiritual.  In order to understand spiritual things in a spiritual book, we have to compare spiritual things with spiritual.  We find the same word elsewhere (in the Bible) and we see how God uses that word.  Most often that helps us, but not always because we do not always know what God is saying.  And if we understand some things, it is only because God has opened our understanding to them.  But that is how we learn and that is how the Bible defines its own terms.  That is the way the Holy Ghost teaches, as it says in 1Corinthians 2:13: “…but which the Holy Ghost teacheth; comparing spiritual things with spiritual.”

So let us look up the word number here, where it says “an hundred and seven and twenty years old.”  This is where Strong’s Concordance comes in, and it is such an invaluable tool.  We find this word is found in only one other place, which is in the book of Esther.  It says in Esther 1:1-2:

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:) That in those days, when the king Ahasuerus sat on the throne of his kingdom, which was in Shushan the palace,

Here, historically, we see there is a king of the Medes and the Persians called Ahasuerus, and he reigned over 127 provinces, and he sat on the throne of his kingdom.  His kingdom are these provinces; that is, he rules over all 127 provinces.  The people in each of the provinces are his subjects.  Maybe I should add that when we go through the book of Esther, we will see that King Ahasuerus is a type and figure of God, and he will marry Esther, who is a figure of God’s elect, so their marriage is an historical parable representing the marriage of Christ and His bride, which is made up of everyone that is saved.  So as King Ahasuerus married Esther, it is a type of the Lord Jesus Christ marrying His “bride,” the elect.

So this is not a “stretch” and it is not something that people should “roll their eyes” at, as some individuals in the churches and congregations tend to do whenever they hear any spiritual teaching coming from the Bible.  We have spent a lot of time discussing how the deeper spiritual meaning in the Bible is the more important meaning, and certainly much more important than the surface meaning or the plain literal meaning.  We have shown that sometimes it is impossible to perform the surface meaning  of a verse.  I do not want to get into all that again, but people that have no understanding of how God wrote the Bible lack understanding of the mysteries of the Bible because it has not been given to them to discern or know the mysteries of the kingdom of heaven, as Jesus plainly said in a wonderful passage in Matthew 13, where He explained why He spoke in parables.  So, of course, these people are going to roll their eyes; they have a wrong understanding of practically everything when it comes to the Bible.

But it is not a “stretch” for us to understand how the 127 provinces (which would be like nations or geographical land masses) and the people upon the land could represent God’s elect.  It says in Isaiah 62:3-5:

Thou shalt also be a crown of glory in the hand of JEHOVAH, and a royal diadem in the hand of thy God. Thou shalt no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall thy land any more be termed Desolate: but thou shalt be called Hephzibah, and thy land Beulah: for JEHOVAH delighteth in thee, and thy land shall be married. For as a young man marrieth a virgin, so shall thy sons marry thee: and as the bridegroom rejoiceth over the bride, so shall thy God rejoice over thee.

You see, God is speaking here of that glorious, wonderful spiritual marriage between the Lord Jesus and the people He has saved.  He purchased them to be His bride.  In this context, we read “…thy land Beulah: for JEHOVAH delighteth in thee, and thy land shall be married.”  Now let us see how this could tie in and relate to Sarah by going to Galatians 4 where the Lord is describing the historical situation which we have already gone through in the book of Genesis regarding Abraham and his wife Sarah and the handmaid Hagar that had been given to him.  And God says that these things are an allegory.  The two women represent the two covenants.  Their sons represent the children of these covenants.  And speaking of Sarah, God says in Galatians 4:26:

But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all.

You see, Hagar was connected to mount Sinai in Arabia, where the Law was given, so her child Ishmael was likened to the children in a works covenant relationship with God.  Sarah’s child Isaac was the child of promise, and God relates Sarah to Jerusalem which is above, and Hagar is related to the “Jerusalem which now is, and is in bondage with her children.”  Sarah was tied to the heavenly Jerusalem, and notice that after telling us, “But Jerusalem which is above is free, which is the mother of us all,” it says in Galatians 4:27:

For it is written, Rejoice, thou barren that bearest not; break forth and cry, thou that travailest not: for the desolate hath many more children than she which hath an husband.

If you remember, that is what God said in Isaiah 62:4:

Thou shalt no more be termed Forsaken; neither shall thy land any more be termed Desolate…

The land will not be desolate, but the land will be “married.”  It is just as the language regarding Sarah and her representing Jerusalem, which is a city, and the city is laid out over land.  Except in her case, it is the heavenly Jerusalem.  Now this is really amazing, and I am not exactly sure how we can understand this fully, but God describes the new Jerusalem in Revelation 21.  Let me read Revelation 21:1-2:

And I saw a new heaven and a new earth: for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away; and there was no more sea. And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem…

First, we see an association or relationship between a new heaven and a new earth and “new Jerusalem.”  He saw a new heaven and a new earth, and he saw “new Jerusalem,” and I do not think he was seeing something different, but the same thing.  Again, it says in Revelation 21:2:

And I John saw the holy city, new Jerusalem, coming down from God out of heaven, prepared as a bride adorned for her husband.

The whole city is prepared as a bride.  So, again, we can see how God is relating people that have become saved (the elect of God) and, perhaps numbering as many as 200 million, as a city “adorned for her husband.”  And keep in mind Isaiah 62:4-5 where it says that the land shall be married.

It goes on to say in Revelation 21:3-4:

And I heard a great voice out of heaven saying, Behold, the tabernacle of God is with men, and he will dwell with them, and they shall be his people, and God himself shall be with them, and be their God. And God shall wipe away all tears from their eyes; and there shall be no more death, neither sorrow, nor crying, neither shall there be any more pain: for the former things are passed away.

Then the chapter goes on to describe the city, its gates, its wall, and, of course, more “numbers” that are words, featuring the number “12.”  It is 144 or “12 x 12,” indicating the fulness of the city or the fulness of the elect children of God that make up that heavenly city, Jerusalem above.  And Sarah is likened to it as “the mother of us all.”  It would also relate to the Word of God, but that is getting into another area we are not going to get into right now.

Going back to Genesis 23, we read that Sarah was “an hundred and seven and twenty years old,” and the only other place that number is given is in Esther 1:1 in relationship to King Ahasuerus ruling as he sits upon the throne of his kingdom.  He is ruling over 127 provinces and over the vast land that consists of all his subjects and all in submission to him as the King.  This is where Sarah, typifying Jerusalem above, made up of all of God’s kingdom and the tremendous multitude of subjects in submission to Him as Lord and God – King of kings and Lord of lords.  He rules over us all.  I am sure that this is the meaning that God is assigning to Sarah at the time she dies.  She is likened to the body of the believers.

Then we are told in Genesis 23:2:

And Sarah died in Kirjatharba; the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan…

If you look up Kirjatharba, it is rather complicated in the Bible.  You can find the word “Kirjath” and you can find the word “Arba.”  It has several listings, and I found it kind of complicated.  It just was not direct, but let us look at a couple of places we find this word or variations of this word, beginning in Joshua 14:13-15:

And Joshua blessed him, and gave unto Caleb the son of Jephunneh Hebron for an inheritance. Hebron therefore became the inheritance of Caleb the son of Jephunneh the Kenezite unto this day, because that he wholly followed JEHOVAH God of Israel. And the name of Hebron before was Kirjatharba; which Arba was a great man among the Anakims. And the land had rest from war.

Here, Joshua is giving Caleb a piece of lot of land for his inheritance in the land of Canaan, and he is giving him this land that was called Hebron, but before that it was called Kirjatharba.  Why is Caleb receiving this particular piece of land?  There was a lot of land in the land of Canaan.  Why was he given this land?  He was one of the 12 spies, along with Joshua, that went to spy out the land, and only Caleb and Joshua came back with a good report.  The other ten spies had an evil report.  What was the main cause of their evil report?  Let us go to Numbers 13:26-33:

And they went and came to Moses, and to Aaron, and to all the congregation of the children of Israel, unto the wilderness of Paran, to Kadesh; and brought back word unto them, and unto all the congregation, and shewed them the fruit of the land. And they told him, and said, We came unto the land whither thou sentest us, and surely it floweth with milk and honey; and this is the fruit of it. Nevertheless the people be strong that dwell in the land, and the cities are walled, and very great: and moreover we saw the children of Anak there. The Amalekites dwell in the land of the south: and the Hittites, and the Jebusites, and the Amorites, dwell in the mountains: and the Canaanites dwell by the sea, and by the coast of Jordan. And Caleb stilled the people before Moses, and said, Let us go up at once, and possess it; for we are well able to overcome it. But the men that went up with him said, We be not able to go up against the people; for they are stronger than we. And they brought up an evil report of the land which they had searched unto the children of Israel, saying, The land, through which we have gone to search it, is a land that eateth up the inhabitants thereof; and all the people that we saw in it are men of a great stature. And there we saw the giants, the sons of Anak, which come of the giants: and we were in our own sight as grasshoppers, and so we were in their sight.

Just so we understand what happened because of their evil report, let us read on in Genesis 14:1-7:

And all the congregation lifted up their voice, and cried; and the people wept that night. And all the children of Israel murmured against Moses and against Aaron: and the whole congregation said unto them, Would God that we had died in the land of Egypt! or would God we had died in this wilderness! And wherefore hath JEHOVAH brought us unto this land, to fall by the sword, that our wives and our children should be a prey? were it not better for us to return into Egypt? And they said one to another, Let us make a captain, and let us return into Egypt. Then Moses and Aaron fell on their faces before all the assembly of the congregation of the children of Israel. And Joshua the son of Nun, and Caleb the son of Jephunneh, which were of them that searched the land, rent their clothes: And they spake unto all the company of the children of Israel, saying, The land, which we passed through to search it, is an exceeding good land.

Then they continued, trying to convince the people: “We can do this.  God is with us.  After all, did we not just see God destroy the mighty Egyptians?  Are the people of this land any greater?”  This was basically the point they were making.  But, of course, we know the tendency of the natural mind.  Even those of us that are saved used to live in agreement with our minds and bodies in our previous unsaved state (unless we were saved as babies).  We know how it is to think as a natural man because we were natural-minded for a time, and we know the doubting and the diminishing of God and His Word, His might and His power, and the tendency for the natural mind of man to exalt, uplift and magnify the dangers from other men, the dangers of the things of this world and of Satan and his forces: “Oh, Satan is so powerful, and we fear before him.”  That is the tendency of the natural mind, whereas it is almost like they do not even think of God.  How foolish!  How ignorant!  Were they not there when He parted the Red Sea?  Yes – they were there.  Were they not there when He brought the plagues upon Egypt?  Yes – they were there.  Were they not there when God drowned the Egyptians, including Pharaoh, in the Red Sea?  Yes – they were witnesses.  But, again, the natural mind plays down the things that glorify and give honor to God and the things that recognize (rightly) His might and power. 

It is the same today.  Professed true believers have diminished and “played down” the might that God has displayed.  And, of course, God is not breaking the barrier of the supernatural since the Bible was completed.  So it was not the might of a parting of seas that we saw.  It was not the might of literal plagues upon a land.  But we saw God do something incredible when He took the message of impending judgment from His Word, the Bible, and He caused it to be broadcast across the face of all the earth, so that it was put in the forefront of the eyes of the whole world for a prolonged period of time.  “Oh, that is nothing,” say the critics and the natural-minded individuals of the world.  “You make too much of that!”  Oh, really?  Go out and take a message from the Bible that has to do with judgment and bring it to the forefront of the eyes of everyone in your little town.  Go, try to do that, and see how far you get.  Go, try to extend that to a major city near you or to a whole state, and see if you can bring the message from the Bible with a thousand or ten thousand helpers, and bring it before everyone in a state like Pennsylvania, California or New York.  We will even give you a big budget to try to do it, and we will see how far you get.

And, yet, God took that message from the Bible and He placed it not only before the eyes of everyone in a town or a city or a state or a single country, but He placed it before the eyes of the whole world for a prolonged period of time: “May 21, 2011, Judgment Day!”  And now it is as nothing.  The critics count on the poor memories of their fellow man.  (And it is one of the reasons why God tells us something repeatedly in the Bible.)  But the critics count on people to forget all about the billboards, all the new casts, all the tract trips, all the caravans and Project Jonah.  Forget about all the discussions and intensity of that message.  Forget about the tremendous anxiety the world was showing as the day approached or the enormous celebrations they had when it did not happen in a literal, physical way.  We see this tendency of man.

And, yet, here we are, and we should keep that in the forefront of our memories, and we should acknowledge that God did a mighty thing.  We should also thank God for the great deliverance of saving all the elect out of the kingdom of Satan, as they have all been delivered.  But, again, it is the tendency of man to downplay the might of God and to lift up the enemies of God.  So that is what the spies did, and that is what the people of Israel accepted.  They believed that message and they rejected the good report from Joshua and Caleb.

Lord willing, we will see how this all fits together in the next couple of studies.