Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #12 of Genesis, chapter 26, and we are reading Genesis 26:13-16:

And the man waxed great, and went forward, and grew until he became very great: For he had possession of flocks, and possession of herds, and great store of servants: and the Philistines envied him. For all the wells which his father's servants had digged in the days of Abraham his father, the Philistines had stopped them, and filled them with earth. And Abimelech said unto Isaac, Go from us; for thou art much mightier than we.

I will stop reading there.  We spent a little time on verse 12 where it literally says, “Then Isaac sowed in that land, and found in that year an hundred gates: and JEHOVAH blessed him.”  The idea of a “hundred gates,” as we saw when we looked up the word “gates” in the Old Testament and New Testament, has to do with the kingdom of God and the entry point, and those within the gates are in the kingdom of God, and those without the gates are outside the kingdom of God.

Of course, it can also identify with Israel of the Old Testament and the corporate church of the New Testament because they were outward representations of the kingdom of God on the earth.  The people of Israel or the professed Christians within the churches and congregations were within the kingdom, in a sense, but they were only within the outward representation.  When Satan was loosed and came against the camp of the saints, he besieged the “holy city” or the “beloved city,” as we read in Revelation, and it produced famine and death, but not for God’s elect.  Remember the elect are citizens of heavenly Jerusalem or within the eternal kingdom of God.  But those who were (spiritually) destroyed by this were not the elect.  God does liken being driven out of the churches as being “spiritually killed,” and that can refer to God’s elect as well.  But, of course, the elect were not truly killed spiritually because we have eternal life, but in that figure, it can spiritually point to being killed.  And any unsaved people that came under the power of authority of Satan at the time of the end are killed because they never had (spiritual) life. 

So “gates,” which identify with the kingdom of God, have everything to do with sowing in the land or in the earth.  The Word of God is what establishes the kingdom of God.  It was national Israel that had been entrusted with the Word of God.  They were the caretakers of the Oracles of God.  Likewise, the New Testament churches and congregations were caretakers of the completed Word of God, the whole Bible, throughout the New Testament church age.  So the “sowing” established “gates.”  It set up these kingdoms in the earth as the churches and congregations were identified with the kingdom of God. 

You see, I do not want to get pinned down on exactly what timeframe is in view, because I am still not sure.  And that is one of the keys to learning in the Bible when we can identify a passage as relating to the church age or to the Great Tribulation, and I have not been able to pinpoint that, so I am speaking in general terms.  So we also have to say that even after the end of the church age when the Word of God went forth to the nations to save a great multitude, the Word was sown and a “hundred gates” opened up, entry points into the kingdom of heaven – the eternal kingdom, not the corporate church – the glorious spiritual realm that only God’s elect may enter in.  When we are saved, we are said to seated in heavenly places in Christ Jesus.  So that may identify with that language, also.

So let us move on to Genesis 26:13-14:

And the man waxed great, and went forward, and grew until he became very great: For he had possession of flocks, and possession of herds, and great store of servants: and the Philistines envied him.

Verses 13 and 14 go together, as the man was Isaac, and we know that Isaac is a great type of the Lord Jesus.  Of course, Jesus has “waxed great.”  Where it says, “went forward,” it is the word “go.”  The man waxed great and went and grew until he became very great and, of course, that language identifies with the Lord Jesus Christ.  Isaac is a type of Christ.  We see similar language used of David, in 1Chronicles 11:7-9:

And David dwelt in the castle; therefore they called it the city of David. And he built the city round about, even from Millo round about: and Joab repaired the rest of the city. So David waxed greater and greater: for JEHOVAH of hosts was with him.

And David is also a great type of the Lord Jesus Christ. 

It says in 2Chronicles 17:12:

And Jehoshaphat waxed great exceedingly; and he built in Judah castles, and cities of store.

Then it continues to tell us about the wonderful things he was doing, and Jehoshaphat is a type of the Lord Jesus Christ.

Or, we can go to Esther 9:4:

For Mordecai was great in the king's house, and his fame went out throughout all the provinces: for this man Mordecai waxed greater and greater.

And, yes, you guessed it.  Mordecai is a type and figure of the Lord Jesus Christ.

So we can see a pattern here.  In Luke 2 when Jesus was born of the Virgin Mary, it says in Luke 2:40:

And the child grew, and waxed strong in spirit, filled with wisdom: and the grace of God was upon him.

It is not exactly the same language, but it is similar, and later on it says in Luke 2:52:

And Jesus increased in wisdom and stature, and in favour with God and man.

You know, some people do not understand that Jesus is the essence of wisdom.  He was God incarnate or God in the flesh, and He knew everything from the very beginning of taking on an earthly form.  Remember that at 12 years of age, He was not a normal 12-year-old.  He knew far more than the leaders of Israel that He spoke to, and so, too, He would have known all the information that God knew, even as a toddler, and so forth.  But, you see, He “increased in wisdom and stature,” in the sense that He had humbled Himself.  When He was a baby, He would not have spoken as He spoke later.  When Christ was a baby in the crib, He was not speaking parables – He chose or opted not to speak, but to grow as a baby would grow into a toddler.  And then He began to speak, and it would have been very obvious early on that He was not a typical child, but that He was, indeed, Holy God.

You know, a person can have wisdom, as Jesus did, and yet not display it, so it can give the appearance of increasing in wisdom and in stature.  Of course, He was physically growing.  But as the wisdom came out of Him, everyone would have seen an increase in wisdom. 

It is a similar idea to the desperately wicked heart that is within men, and we read of men that waxed more evil, as it says in 2Timothy 3.  It is the same idea, but wicked men increased in evil.  If you have a desperately wicked heart that is deceitful above all things to begin with (and that is where every human being starts), and you cannot bring a clean thing out of an unclean thing.  Our parents were desperately wicked human beings, and they gave birth to desperately wicked human beings, unless God had mercy and saved us in the womb, like John the Baptist.  But that is common.  Normally, we are born speaking lies because we have desperately wicked hearts, and we are 100% wicked in the heart.  But we were cute little babies, people would tickle us under our chins, and we would coo.  We laugh a lot when we are young, and everything is new and exciting!  “Oh, what a wonderful child this is!”  Then fast forward to the teen years, and out comes some venom and filth and filthy words and deeds.  Then fast forward another ten or fifteen years, and all kinds of evil transpires, but this person was this cute little baby that was beautiful and was so fun to play with, and now he is murdering people and doing all kinds of terrible things.  And people are saying, “What an evil man!”  Had he become more evil?  No – he is simply showing what has always been the condition of his heart, but there had been an increase (of wickedness) that people can see, and, finally, they begin to recognize the great and tremendous degree of evil.

And, likewise, Christ was the fulness of wisdom right from the beginning (of His earthly life), but as He went about growing and then, especially at the point of His ministry, He began to speak the things that had always been within, and then people stood in awe and wondered at the great wisdom that was in the Lord Jesus.

So we can see this language in Genesis 26 that says, “And the man waxed great, and went forward, and grew until he became very great.”  Also, we are told of his possessions of flocks, herds, and great store of servants.  There are three things listed, and it probably could have been much longer, but the Lord narrowed it down to show that the purpose of God is in view concerning his greatness, his wealth and his strength, as he had a great store of servants.  As we know with Abraham, he armed his trained servants, and he had a little army that went to battle to rescue his nephew Lot.  So this indicates someone that is truly great.  And people at that time who were rich and powerful and had a small army of servants were a threat to developing nations or city-states, such as Abimelech, king of the Philistines, had in that land of Gerar.  Then we read at the end of the verse in Genesis 26:14:

… and the Philistines envied him.

They envied him.  Now this is actually common for the people of the world.  The Philistines under Abimelech are a picture of the people of the world, and Abimelech is a picture of Satan and he is ruling over the Philistines and they area under his control and power.  So the people of the world can look with envy at God’s people…well, actually, it was Isaac.  It does not say that they envied “them,” but they envied him, and they can have envy toward the Lord Jesus Christ.  And, yes, the Bible does point that out by using historical figures in a parabolic way, like in Genesis 37, in speaking of Joseph, in Genesis 37:11:

And his brethren envied him; but his father observed the saying.

Joseph had just revealed some of his dreams, like the sun, moon and stars making obeisance to him, which was offensive to his brethren and, yet, his father observed the saying.   They knew Joseph was the favorite (son) of Jacob, and in this case Joseph would also be a type of Christ or a type of God who begat the children of Israel, pointing to the elect or to those that have identification with the elect, like Israel was in the Old Testament or the churches of the New Testament, and they responded with envy toward Joseph.  They were envious of his position and the fact that his dreams were listened to, and that he was the one that was being lifted up or exalted in the dream – the sun, moon and stars were making obeisance to him.  And, yet, he was not being rebuked by his father Jacob, but Jacob observed the saying, and that led to this envy.

Also, it says in Psalm 106:16:

They envied Moses also in the camp, and Aaron the saint of JEHOVAH.

Again, this is speaking of the children of Israel who envied the deliverer Moses, the man with whom God spake face to face.  And we can see the envy in some of the rebellion that took place with Korah, Dathan and Abiram and some of the other princes of the congregation (250 princes).  And what was their problem?  They gathered against Moses.  Actually, let us turn to Numbers 16:3:

And they gathered themselves together against Moses and against Aaron, and said unto them, Ye take too much upon you, seeing all the congregation are holy, every one of them, and JEHOVAH is among them: wherefore then lift ye up yourselves above the congregation of JEHOVAH?

You see, God was using Moses and revealing tremendous amounts of truth to Moses, giving him not only the Ten Commandments, but all the revelation that would come to be the first five books of the Bible.  And He communed personally with Moses, giving Him the Ten Commandments.  And Moses’ face shone as the sun. 

But these men started thinking, “Well, I am a Jew.  I am a son of Abraham, and I am just as equal as Moses before God.”  And, of course, these were men of renown.  They were the princes.  They were the ones accustomed to the people looking to them: “What should we do?  How should we act?  Which way should we go?”  The people had been looking to these princes and, instead, they were looking to Moses and Aaron, so these men envied, and God brought judgment.  He brought judgment because if God chooses to bring His revelation in a certain way, as He would use an individual here or there, and He would reveal large amounts of information and truth, then no one should envy.  That is under the control of God.  That is God’s purpose and His business who He deals with, and what He does with each individual.  He has plans for all His elect, and each one has a different role to play in the task that God reveals to His people. 

There is no room for jealousy and envy among sinners that have been saved by the grace of God.  Where can envy fit into the true Gospel of the Bible?  The true Gospel of the Bible says that we are all sinners.  We have all come short of the glory of God.  We were all originally rebels, possessing desperately deceitful hearts that are in the condition of “stone,” and dead in trespasses and sins.  We were all filthy in body and soul, and then God acted to apply the blood of Christ that had been shed on behalf of an individual’s sin, and it covered his sins and washed them away.  He makes him clean from his filthy deeds, and then God moves in this person to will and to do of His good pleasure.  Step by step, He moves him into performing good works that God had foreordained that he should walk in them, and so he does.  And big deal!  Big deal!  Who can say this of himself: “I am great.  I am the big one.  Look what I have done.  Look at what I am doing and the things I know.”  No – that is just pride, and it is sinful pride that is typical of man, and very typical of unsaved man.  Even though it is possible for a saved man to have pride along those lines, the Lord will respond with chastisement when He sees it, and He will severely chasten that individual so he knows the truth about himself – that he is nothing of himself, and nothing at all apart from the grace of God and the working of His Spirit.  And everything he has done in his life that is any good at all in relationship to God and obedience to His commandments, ultimately, was the result of God moving within him to enable the doing of it.  Therefore, God gets the glory.  God gets the glory, and there is not to be in envy of any kind toward someone else because God is working in someone else. 

It is good, I suppose, on one level that we would desire for God to work in us in a mighty way, and that is what our prayer should be: “O, Lord, use me.  Use me, and may I walk faithfully and obediently?  May you move within me to will and to do of your good pleasure?  And may everything I have become as a living sacrifice in service to you?”  You see, it is all individual between God and that person, and God will use that person according to His perfect will – whatever His will is, and His will is most certainly not the same with one person than another person, or His purpose is not the same for this woman as it is for this other woman.  We are all part of the body (of Christ) and we all have different functions to perform, and one part of the body is not greater than another, but all work together in unison as Christ, the head, directs us: “Do this.  Go there.”  And by God’s grace, may it be that we have a heart that responds, “Yes, Lord, as you command, and as you will for me to do.”