Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis. Tonight is study #3 of Genesis, chapter 28, and we going to be reading Genesis 28:5-9:
And Isaac sent away Jacob: and he went to Padanaram unto Laban, son of Bethuel the Syrian, the brother of Rebekah, Jacob's and Esau's mother. And Isaac sent away Jacob: and he went to Padanaram unto Laban, son of Bethuel the Syrian, the brother of Rebekah, Jacob's and Esau's mother. And when Esau saw that Isaac had blessed Jacob, and sent him away to Padanaram, to take him a wife from thence; and that as he blessed him he gave him a charge, saying, Thou shalt not take a wife of the daughters of Canaan; And that Jacob obeyed his father and his mother, and was gone to Padanaram; And Esau seeing that the daughters of Canaan pleased not Isaac his father; Then went Esau unto Ishmael, and took unto the wives which he had Mahalath the daughter of Ishmael Abraham's son, the sister of Nebajoth, to be his wife.
I will stop reading there. Again, it is a spiritual picture, the sending of Jacob, which is the second time a son in this family was looking for a wife, and the second time one had to leave Canaan and go to Haran looking for a wife.
I spent a great deal of time in our last study explaining how this pictures the second outpouring of the Holy Spirit (in 1994) and the gathering of the elect to form the bride. Then the bride was made ready.
One of the differences from Genesis 24 where Abraham sent a servant to find a bride for his son Isaac is that now Isaac is sending his son Jacob, and not a servant. Isaac had servants and he could have sent one of his servants, but he sent his son. We have seen that the problem was that Jacob could not stay behind due to the circumstances with the hostility of his brother Esau and his intention to kill him. So Jacob was driven out, and he must go. And his father, in looking out for his son’s best interest, made the decision and sent him. And this has everything to do with God’s command to the elect in Matthew 24: “When ye therefore shall see the abomination of desolation, …let them which be in Judaea flee into the mountains,” (Canaan represents the land of Judaea.) And Jacob fled to the land of Syria, and it says in Hosea 12:12 that he “served for a wife, and for a wife he kept sheep.” In the Bible, both figures of “sheep” and “wife” typify God’s relationship with His people; He is the bridegroom and we are the bride. He is the Shepherd and we are the sheep.
I mentioned this a couple of studies ago, but in Ezekiel 34 we see that God witnesses the terrible way the shepherds were treating the sheep. For example, it says in Ezekiel 34:2-6:
Son of man, prophesy against the shepherds of Israel, prophesy, and say unto them, Thus saith the Lord JEHOVAH unto the shepherds; Woe be to the shepherds of Israel that do feed themselves! should not the shepherds feed the flocks? Ye eat the fat, and ye clothe you with the wool, ye kill them that are fed: but ye feed not the flock. The diseased have ye not strengthened, neither have ye healed that which was sick, neither have ye bound up that which was broken, neither have ye brought again that which was driven away, neither have ye sought that which was lost; but with force and with cruelty have ye ruled them. And they were scattered, because there is no shepherd: and they became meat to all the beasts of the field, when they were scattered. My sheep wandered through all the mountains, and upon every high hill: yea, my flock was scattered upon all the face of the earth, and none did search or seek after them.
This is an awful condemnation of Israel of old, as it can apply to them, but, more specifically, it applies to the leaders, pastors, elders and deacons of the churches and congregations of the church age. Through their “high places” or false doctrines and false gospels, they failed to provide on a spiritual level the things the under shepherds ought to provide for their flock. In condemning these shepherds of Israel, God is condemning the churches and congregations and all in spiritual authority in the entire church world, and that is one of the reasons God ended the church age. It goes on to say in Ezekiel 34:9, and let us listen to the Word of God and listen carefully to what God is telling us. This is God speaking. It is not man. It is not me. God says in Ezekiel 34:9-10:
Therefore, O ye shepherds, hear the word of JEHOVAH; 10 Thus saith the Lord JEHOVAH; Behold, I am against the shepherds; and I will require my flock at their hand, and cause them to cease from feeding the flock; neither shall the shepherds feed themselves any more; for I will deliver my flock from their mouth, that they may not be meat for them.
When we look at the Bible, it is our job as Bible students…and we are all students of the Bible, and a student wishes to learn, and God is the teacher as the Holy Spirit. When we compare Scripture with Scripture, what does the Holy Spirit do? He teaches. God is the teacher and, therefore, something must be learned from this language in Ezekiel 34. First, God sees the spiritual crimes and atrocities that the shepherds are engaged in, and God gives judgment, and the judgment is, as God says, “I am against the shepherds…and cause them to cease from feeding the flock.” It is our duty and responsibility as readers of the Scriptures not to just read it like so many pastors and teachers and those in the churches are doing. They read it, and then they “check it off” their “Read Through the Bible in a Year” schedule. “I read Ezekiel 34.” Wonderful, but you read it without reading it. You heard it without hearing, and you saw it without seeing. Here, God is condemning the institution of the church. He is condemning its leaders, and He is ending their relationship with Him. They did have God-given authority and thy had been tasked with the job of spiritually feeding those in the churches, the sheep. They were under shepherds that were given the care of the sheep, the flock of God, but they abused that privilege. They abused the blessing of the task itself, to the point that God could take it no more.
We know that God is longsuffering and patient. Of course, we know He was longsuffering in salvation. He had a certain people or certain individuals that were “firstfruits.” They were the ones that had to be saved through the churches and congregations, and God waited until the very last of the firstfruits became saved. Then He ended the church age and His Spirit departed out of the midst, and He began the process of the separation of the wheat and the tares.
Anyway, He waited patiently, and He gave space in that time of longsuffering and patience wherein the churches, from their perspective, could have repented. They did not repent, and then He came in the proper time when the “seasons” changed. The early rain stopped falling, and it was no longer time for firstfruits, and then judgment came on the churches. There is famine, as He removed the authority. He removed the blessing He had given to the churches in the glorious task of studying His Word to find truth and sharing that truth with the congregations. He had given that glorious task to these men within the churches, And, again, they did not treat it with the proper respect and integrity and honor that was due it, and they ended up treading it under foot, and bringing the churches into the condition of famine. And God said, “You are no longer qualified. I remove my Spirit. I remove my command that you are to take care of the sheep within the churches. In fact, I will call my sheep out of the churches. I will remove them from you, and you will no longer feed my sheep. I am causing you to stop.”
Of course, we see churches continue to function in our day, even after the end of the church age, and even after God has made it known that the church age is over. He had turned it over to Satan, and He called His people out. There are only tares remaining. But that just goes to show that the churches are continuing in their blatant disregard for the Bible. It is the reason God ended the church age, so we should not expect that they would suddenly find the proper respect for the Word of God, humbling themselves and falling down in submission to the Word of God. No – they are continuing on in their errors and apostacy. But as far as God is concerned, it does not matter. He had called His people out of that place, so the churches are not feeding sheep. Who are they feeding? I do not want to use the figure of “goats” because the figure for the churches was “wheat” and “tares,” so now it is really tares instructing tares. It is the unsaved opening up the Bible, of which they have no understanding of because it is a spiritual book, but they have no spiritual life and no Spirit to guide them into truth. Therefore, we see natural-minded teachers, preachers, pastors and elders instructing natural-minded people sitting in Sunday schools, in the pews and within the churches overall. It is no more the feeding of God’s sheep than it is feeding God’s sheep in mosques, Jewish synagogues or even in any secular institution. There is no spiritual activity taking place, except that of judgment and condemnation with every word they read because God is finished with them. They are no longer His people.
But God had a people that are still on the earth during the time of the end of the church age, that period where He called His people out during the second part of the Great Tribulation, and He has a people still on the earth during this period of Judgment Day. We read in Ezekiel 34:11-16:
For thus saith the Lord JEHOVAH; Behold, I, even I, will both search my sheep, and seek them out. As a shepherd seeketh out his flock in the day that he is among his sheep that are scattered; so will I seek out my sheep, and will deliver them out of all places where they have been scattered in the cloudy and dark day. And I will bring them out from the people, and gather them from the countries, and will bring them to their own land, and feed them upon the mountains of Israel by the rivers, and in all the inhabited places of the country. I will feed them in a good pasture, and upon the high mountains of Israel shall their fold be: there shall they lie in a good fold, and in a fat pasture shall they feed upon the mountains of Israel. I will feed my flock, and I will cause them to lie down, saith the Lord JEHOVAH. I will seek that which was lost, and bring again that which was driven away, and will bind up that which was broken, and will strengthen that which was sick: but I will destroy the fat and the strong; I will feed them with judgment.
This was God’s plan that He has carried out, for the most part, as it relates to why Isaac sent Jacob personally to get his bride during the second outpouring of the Holy Spirit. This was the second time there was a sending forth to obtain a bride for the son – the first time it was a servant, and the second time it was the son himself. He will find his bride, and when Jacob went to the land of Syria, he was the one that kept sheep and served for a wife. So we see how it fits in with the language of the time of 1994 and the beginning of the Latter Rain period, and the time of the end of the church age, wherein God commanded His people to go out from the midst of the congregations where those shepherds had been feeding His people with falsehood. “Go out into the world,” as God said in this language, “and I will feed you.” He will do the gathering. He will do the feeding. He will do the protecting. He will perform all the service in the role of Shepherd. He is the good Shepherd.
Well, does that mean there are not to be teachers anymore? No – because God will not break the barrier of the supernatural until this world is through on the very last day, and then it is the end of the world. But, until then, He is bound by His own Law. He has given us His Word, the Bible, and it cannot be added to, and, therefore, God continues to work through people. It is necessary that He does it that way. He must. But at the time of the end when He led His people out, it was a result of us comparing Scripture with Scripture. He had sealed up His Word in the form of parables or hidden truth, and He gave His people the proper methodology of comparing Scripture with Scripture and making sure our conclusions harmonize with the Bible as a whole. And through that procedure, the Holy Ghost teaches.
We can use Mr. Camping as an example, but I think the teachers at EBible Fellowship follow the same example, but he did this in a way the churches were never able to do, because at the time of the end God emphasized this Biblical hermeneutic above all. That is, He highlighted that this is the way to truth, and no more relying on longstanding church positions or confessions or creeds, or on statements made by renown theologians, even faithful Reformers. You see, it had been very difficult, even for a faithful man and a true, elect child of God during the church age to teach the Bible there in a true and faithful manner, because, inevitably, there would come a point when there was conflict with the stance of the denomination. “Hey, we have been a denomination for 400 years and we have had this same statement (of faith) for a long time. Do you think we are going to change it because you come along and you want to teach something different? You are not thinking straight. We have 400 years of tradition, and, obviously, you are in error.” Did they go to the Bible to come to that conclusion? No – they just dared not disturb their “high place,” and their “high places” were the real authority, and not the things the Bible said. And this would always have been a problem for anyone within the churches and congregations.
But now at the time of the end, it is only the Bible. It is only the Scriptures, and God’s elect that have come out of the churches are free. We are free, and we do not have to check to make sure our conclusions harmonize with our church’s particular position on this doctrine and that doctrine. We do not have to check and harmonize our conclusion with our church’s Belgic Confession or Westminster Confession, or whatever confession. We do not have to make sure our conclusion harmonizes with well-respected Reformers and their commentaries. Actually, we could not care less. We pay them no attention whatsoever. As we search the Bible and the Bible presents a particular doctrine or teaching, no one at EBible Fellowship worries or frets because the conclusion happens to contradict something that Calvin or Luther said, or something that the Presbyterian churches said. To tell you the truth (and I am sure you are aware of it), we have “zero” concern in those areas.
All we are concerned about is letting God “speak.” Let the Holy Ghost teach. We are concerned about getting out of the way of the Spirit of God, and the way that is done is by following what the Bible says, comparing Scripture with Scripture. We check out a word, and we keep checking it out, and we wait on the Lord. You know, it is amazing that this is the way that God has determined we are to come to truth. It is really an awesome method of arriving at truth. It is an awesome way that God can “speak.” Remember Mark 13:11: “…take no thought beforehand what ye shall speak, neither do ye premeditate: but whatsoever shall be given you in that hour, that speak ye: for it is not ye that speak, but the Holy Ghost.” It is through this methodology given in 1Corinthians 2:12-14. We compare spiritual with spiritual, and the Holy Ghost teaches. It is incredible that God has not spoken by breaking the barrier of the supernatural since the close of the 1st Century A. D. and, yet, nearly two thousand years later He is able to speak because of His brilliance.
What human could have designed such a hermeneutic for arriving at truth? We see the so-called brilliant minds of men when they get involved with religious things and they interject their wisdom into the wisdom of God, and they develop doctrines and hermeneutics like this: “Well, you just read the Bible and take the plain, literal sense.” How brilliant is that? A second grader could come up with that kind of idea. “Whatever it says, it says.” That is basically what they are saying. But God’s mind is infinite. He is an eternal God that literally dwells in eternity. He dwells in the whole spectrum of existence all the way backwards into eternity past and all the way forward into eternity future, and He moved men over many centuries to compile one book, and in that one book there is perfect harmony and unity. It is so far above us and so great, and there is such depth of knowledge in the Word of God that we could study a verse in Ezekiel or Genesis or 1Corinthians, and as we look at the words, it will lead us on a trail through the Scriptures and, finally, lead us to a wonderful and glorious truth that fits with the whole of the Bible, and is, in fact, the Word of God. This is the doctrine of Christ, and not the doctrine of men. This is the doctrine that comes down from above. It is divine revelation, as God reveals truth to His people.
Maybe someday we will get into the whole idea of how God develops doctrine through parables. That is a Biblical truth. It is a Biblical principle, and we can show that. He hides doctrine, and when we are able to open up the hidden meaning of a parabolic statement, through His grace, we typically will also come to know “doctrine.” Doctrine is revealed. And, of course, there are many that dismiss that idea: “Oh, no, no.” They are the surface readers of the Bible, and everything is on the surface with them, and everything has to be plain and apparent. Then you have to wonder, if everything is so plain and obvious, why did Jesus say, “He that hath ears to hear, let him hear”? Why does the Bible repeatedly stress that God’s judgment is that “having ears, they hear not, and having eyes, they see not”? No – it is not on the surface. We have to go into the depths (of His Word) to find the truth, the teaching of Christ.