Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #22 of Genesis, chapter 24, and we are going to read Genesis 24:22-28:

And it came to pass, as the camels had done drinking, that the man took a golden earring of half a shekel weight, and two bracelets for her hands of ten shekels weight of gold; And said, Whose daughter art thou? tell me, I pray thee: is there room in thy father's house for us to lodge in? And she said unto him, I am the daughter of Bethuel the son of Milcah, which she bare unto Nahor. She said moreover unto him, We have both straw and provender enough, and room to lodge in. And the man bowed down his head, and worshipped JEHOVAH. And he said, Blessed be JEHOVAH God of my master Abraham, who hath not left destitute my master of his mercy and his truth: I being in the way, JEHOVAH led me to the house of my master's brethren. And the damsel ran, and told them of her mother's house these things.

I will stop reading there.  In our last study, we were looking at verse 22 and the golden earring that was a half a shekel weight.  We saw the spiritual meaning of that and how placing it on her face (her nostril or nose) pictured the Word of God coming into the life of Rebekah who would become the bride of Christ.  It is picturing the Word of God as it reached out to find the elect to become the bride of the Lord Jesus Christ.  And the “half shekel” had to do with the atonement, so it was like putting the atonement upon her “nostrils,” and spiritual life being breathed into her.

Both the earring and the two bracelets were of gold, and gold identifies with God’s people, in verses such as Lamentations 4:1-2:

How is the gold become dim! how is the most fine gold changed! the stones of the sanctuary are poured out in the top of every street. The precious sons of Zion, comparable to fine gold, how are they esteemed as earthen pitchers, the work of the hands of the potter!

The precious sons of Zion would be a figure that identifies with the people of God, and it says, “comparable to fine gold.”  We also see other Scripture, such as Zechariah 13:8-9:

And it shall come to pass, that in all the land, saith JEHOVAH, two parts therein shall be cut off and die; but the third shall be left therein. And I will bring the third part through the fire, and will refine them as silver is refined, and will try them as gold is tried: they shall call on my name, and I will hear them: I will say, It is my people: and they shall say, JEHOVAH is my God.

Again, the “third part” are God’s people and we are refined as silver and tried as gold.  It is the same principle in the next book of the Bible in Malachi 3:3:

And he shall sit as a refiner and purifier of silver: and he shall purify the sons of Levi, and purge them as gold and silver, that they may offer unto JEHOVAH an offering in righteousness.

The “sons of Levi” are also a type of God’s people, purified as gold and silver.

We are also familiar with what we read in 1Corinthians 3:11-5:

For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ. Now if any man build upon this foundation gold, silver, precious stones, wood, hay, stubble; Every man's work shall be made manifest: for the day shall declare it, because it shall be revealed by fire; and the fire shall try every man's work of what sort it is. If any man's work abide which he hath built thereupon, he shall receive a reward. If any man's work shall be burned, he shall suffer loss: but he himself shall be saved; yet so as by fire.

The “gold, silver, precious stones” would endure and abide the fire.  The “wood, hay, stubble” would be burned up in the fire.  The “gold, silver, precious stones,” therefore, identify with God’s people. 

The servant put a golden earring upon Rebekah, the bride of Isaac.  The half shekel weight identifies with the “atonement” money that was placed upon her “nostril.”  Or, if it was placed upon her ear, it would paint the same spiritual picture with her having “ears to hear.”

It goes on to say in Genesis 24:22

…and two bracelets for her hands of ten shekels weight of gold;

The number “ten” would identify with completeness, and the “hand” in the Bible relates to one’s will.  His putting gold upon her hands is a picture of applying the atoning work of the Lord Jesus to her will.  The bracelets are also of gold, pointing to the fact that God has saved a people for himself out of the whole of mankind.

Now the Hebrew word used here for “bracelets” is #6781 in Strong’s Concordance, and it is found seven times in the Old Testament.  Six times it is translated as “bracelets,” and three of those six times are right here in Genesis 24, and we looked at one in Ezekiel 16, where it had to do with a woman that God found “in her blood.”  That was a picture of the corporate church.  It is found another time in Ezekiel 23 in a very similar context as Ezekiel 16, so that is five out of the six times.  The sixth time that word is used is in Numbers 31, after there had been a battle and God’s people had won the battle.  It is recounting the spoil, and it says in Numbers 31:48-50:

And the officers which were over thousands of the host, the captains of thousands, and captains of hundreds, came near unto Moses: And they said unto Moses, Thy servants have taken the sum of the men of war which are under our charge, and there lacketh not one man of us. We have therefore brought an oblation for JEHOVAH, what every man hath gotten, of jewels of gold, chains, and bracelets, rings, earrings, and tablets, to make an atonement for our souls before JEHOVAH.

So earrings and bracelets of gold were brought as part of the spoil, and it is tied into atonement.  Again, it be a similar idea as the earring of half a shekel weight, the “bekah.”  The seventh time that this Hebrew word, Strong’s #6781, appears is also in the book of Numbers, but it is not translated as “bracelet.”  It is translated in an unusual way in a very unusual verse, and I do not know if I fully understand the spiritual meaning of this verse, in Numbers 19:14-15:

This is the law, when a man dieth in a tent: all that come into the tent, and all that is in the tent, shall be unclean seven days. And every open vessel, which hath no covering bound upon it, is unclean.

You did not see the word “bracelet,” because it is not translated as “bracelet.”  In this verse, it is translated as “covering.”  So there is also a tent, and the word “tent” is the same word as “tabernacle.”  The Ark of the Covenant was in the tabernacle in the wilderness.  And, here, a man dies in the tent and if they were near that dead body, then things that were near to that body in the tent were made unclean; every open vessel that had no “bracelet” or no “covering” bound upon it was unclean.  The word “bound” is translated elsewhere as “lace” of blue in the book of Exodus.  It is a very unusual and awkward verse: “And every open vessel, which hath no covering (bracelet) bound upon it, is unclean.”  The implication is that if it had a bracelet bound upon it, it would not be unclean.  It was only if it was an open vessel that had no covering or no bracelet, and we can gather from this that having a bracelet relates to being made clean, and not having a bracelet relates to being unclean. 

Regarding a vessel, we do read in Acts 9 where the Lord is speaking to Ananias concerning Saul of Tarsus who would become the Apostle Paul.  God transformed him in this chapter.  It says in Acts 9:15:

But the Lord said unto him, Go thy way: for he is a chosen vessel unto me, to bear my name before the Gentiles, and kings, and the children of Israel:

So the words “vessel” and “chosen” appear together; that is, Paul was an elect.  He was one that God had predestinated to obtain salvation, so God refers to him as a “vessel.”  We find that kind of language in Romans 9 regarding the entire human race.  It says in Romans 9:21-23:

Hath not the potter power over the clay, of the same lump to make one vessel unto honour, and another unto dishonour? What if God, willing to shew his wrath, and to make his power known, endured with much longsuffering the vessels of wrath fitted to destruction: And that he might make known the riches of his glory on the vessels of mercy, which he had afore prepared unto glory,

There are two types of vessels – unto honour and unto dishonour.  It all depended what God, the Potter, intended to do with them.  It was predetermined before the foundation of the world, we are told in Ephesians, chapter 1.  If you are a vessel unto honour because God has chosen you, then you are clean.  But if you are a vessel unto dishonour because God has not chosen you, then your sins remain upon you.  You are in your iniquities and you are caught in your spiritual filthiness in your rebellion against God, and you are unclean.  That is the whole reason for the distinction between “clean” and “unclean” animals and all the ceremonial laws regarding what would make a person unclean, such as leprosy, and they typified sin. 

Going back to the verse in Numbers 19:15 regarding every open vessel which had no “covering,” the way to learn the meaning of this word, Strong’s #6781, is that you would place it over the word “covering,” and then draw a line and make a notation saying: “#6781 used seven times in the Bible: six times translated as bracelet.  Compare to Genesis 24:22.”  Then you have a notation because you are going to forget (just as I do) what we are going over right now.  We can be sure of that.  In our flesh, it is very difficult for us to retain spiritual information, and that is why we read statements in the Bible that say, “I will bring you into remembrance of these things.”  It is the Holy Spirit’s role to bring us into remembrance of the things Christ has spoken and reveal truth to us.  It is as though we are remembering.  Some people have better minds and younger minds than I do, and maybe they have an ability to remember things a little better.  But, for the most part, I think we are pretty much the same, and I do not know how people expect to retain the information we learn (without writing it down).  I lose a lot of things because I have been careless, and I have forgotten to jot down something I spent time looking up.  And when you make a notation, what will happen is that the next time you read Numbers 19 three months from now, you see that little note and it refreshes your mind.  Then you say, “Oh, yeah, I remember that.”  Or, more likely, you do not remember, and then you can go back to Genesis 24 and maybe some of it will come back to you.  Definitely, taking notes is extremely important.  If you do not want to write in your Bible (and I do not know why you would not), you can get a notebook and take notes regarding these things when you have proven them.  I am giving you the Strong’s numbers, so it is very easy to prove.  Look up all the places this word is found, and you will find this information is accurate.  Now if I am giving a spiritual meaning, you want to be even more careful, but this kind of information is basic and elementary, and it is something that will help you and save you time in the future.

Again, it said in Numbers 19:15 that every open vessel that had no “bracelet” found upon it was unclean.  If you had the bracelet, it is implied that you would not be unclean.  You would be clean, and being clean relates to being cleansed of your sins, and to be unclean is to be in your sins.

Let us go back to Genesis 24:23-24:

And said, Whose daughter art thou? tell me, I pray thee: is there room in thy father's house for us to lodge in? And she said unto him, I am the daughter of Bethuel the son of Milcah, which she bare unto Nahor.

We have seen this information before, back in Genesis 24:15:

And it came to pass, before he had done speaking, that, behold, Rebekah came out, who was born to Bethuel, son of Milcah, the wife of Nahor, Abraham’s brother, with her pitcher upon her shoulder.

So God had already told us this, but now He is repeating it.  The servant is learning these things, as he did not know it from verse 15 because God was telling us, the reader, in that verse.  He is hearing it for the first time that Rebekah is “the daughter of Bethuel the son of Milcah.”  We had come across “Bethuel” in Genesis 22:20:

And it came to pass after these things, that it was told Abraham, saying, Behold, Milcah, she hath also born children unto thy brother Nahor;

Now the name “Nahor” is #5152 in Strong’s Concordance.  Apparently, it is derived from #5170, which is a word translated twice, once as “nostril” and once as “snorting,” and both have to do with horses, so I have no idea what that means, except we know that a horse, spiritually, is tied to “strength.” 

The word “Milcah” is #4435 in Strong’s Concordance, and it comes from the word #4436, which is translated as “queen,” so we can see more of a spiritual picture that Rebekah was born of the “queen.”  A queen is wife to the king, and we know that God is the King and Rebekah is the “daughter of the king” because she pictured God’s elect.  In all probability, she was actually one of the elect or one of those that Jesus died for, paying for all her sins.

So, again, it says in Genesis 22:20:

… Behold, Milcah, she hath also born children unto thy brother Nahor;

Then the children are listed, in Genesis 22:21-23:

Huz his firstborn, and Buz his brother, and Kemuel the father of Aram, And Chesed, and Hazo, and Pildash, and Jidlaph, and Bethuel. And Bethuel begat Rebekah: these eight Milcah did bear to Nahor, Abraham's brother.

Bethuel was the eighth son listed, and then it said in verse 23 that “Bethuel begat Rebekah: these eight Milcah did bear to Nahor, Abraham's brother.”  The word “Bethuel” is a very difficult word for me to understand.  It is Strong’s #1328 and with names, we must look up each name to see if it leads anywhere, and sometimes it does not lead us anywhere.  But, according to Strong’s Concordance (and I am not sure if this is absolutely correct), #1328 is related to #1326.  Strong’s #1328 is a compound word, “beth-oo-ale,” and we know that “ale” is “God,” which is #410 in the Concordance, but “beth-oo” is #1328, which we are told is related to #1326.  And #1326 is a word that is translated as “waste.”   There is another word in between those two, #1327, that is translated as “desolate.”  These two words are used only one other time, but we are going to look only at where it is translated as “waste,” in Isaiah 5.  (You should read the earlier verses because it speaks of the vineyard the Lord established.)  The vineyard is the house of Israel, and it says in Isaiah 5:5-6:

And now go to; I will tell you what I will do to my vineyard: I will take away the hedge thereof, and it shall be eaten up; and break down the wall thereof, and it shall be trodden down: And I will lay it waste: it shall not be pruned, nor digged; but there shall come up briers and thorns: I will also command the clouds that they rain no rain upon it.

Of course, this vineyard is the corporate church that God would “lay waste” and “destroy.”  Just look at the language here!  How could anyone think that God would still save individuals within the churches after He has executed His wrath upon it?  He will “break down the wall thereof.”  What is the “wall,” spiritually?  What does it identify with?  Salvation.  And the wall is broken down, so there is no salvation.  He will lay it waste.

So, regarding this word “Bethuel,” I thought it would relate to the “house of God,” like the word “Bethel,” but it is pronounced differently, with this extra vowel, so Strong’s Concordance believes it is related to this other word translated as “waste,” and it does appear to be related in spelling.  So it would mean “wasted of God” or “destroyed of God,” or something like that.  Since it is only used in Isaiah 5 in speaking of the vineyard, and it does identify with the “house of God,” it does come back to a similar understanding as the word “Bethel,” the house of God.  And remember that I mentioned that the servant went to this place that identified with the people of God, and that it did relate to the churches.  We discussed that in an earlier study.

We are going to stop here because we have run out of time.  Lord willing, we will continue looking at this in our next Bible study.