Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis. Tonight is study #21 of Genesis 29, and we are going to read Genesis 29:31-35:

And when JEHOVAH saw that Leah was hated, he opened her womb: but Rachel was barren. And Leah conceived, and bare a son, and she called his name Reuben: for she said, Surely JEHOVAH hath looked upon my affliction; now therefore my husband will love me. And she conceived again, and bare a son; and said, Because JEHOVAH hath heard that I was hated, he hath therefore given me this son also: and she called his name Simeon. And she conceived again, and bare a son; and said, Now this time will my husband be joined unto me, because I have born him three sons: therefore was his name called Levi. And she conceived again, and bare a son: and she said, Now will I praise JEHOVAH: therefore she called his name Judah; and left bearing.

We were continuing to look at the fact that Reuben was Jacob’s firstborn son, born of a woman who the Bible tells us was hated. He had two wives, but only one wife whom he loved, but as we saw in Deuteronomy 21:15-17, the firstborn son of the hated is to receive the right of the firstborn son. There was no provision made to give the right of the firstborn to the firstborn son of the loved one, even though he was her firstborn son that was born after the firstborn of the hated (wife). According to God’s Law, you must give the right of the firstborn to the son of the hated and, yet, Reuben (who was clearly Jacob’s firstborn son) did not receive the blessing of the firstborn. We saw it said of Reuben in Genesis 49:4:

Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel; because thou wentest up to thy father's bed; then defiledst thou it: he went up to my couch.

And we also read this in 1Chronicles 5:1:

Now the sons of Reuben the firstborn of Israel, (for he was the firstborn; but, forasmuch as he defiled his father's bed, his birthright was given unto the sons of Joseph the son of Israel: and the genealogy is not to be reckoned after the birthright.

Here, again, we read that Reuben was the firstborn. However, since he defiled his father’s bed, his birthright was given unto the sons of Joseph. We saw in both Genesis 49:4 and in 1Chronicles 5 that Rueben “defiled his father’s bed,” and this idea was picked up in 1Corinthians 5:1:

It is reported commonly that there is fornication among you, and such fornication as is not so much as named among the Gentiles, that one should have his father's wife.

Again, it was not his mother. Notice it does not say “his mother,” but “his father’s wife.” As we can see with Jacob, when a man marries more than one wife and there are also concubines, this kind of possibility is magnified, as when Rueben went in unto Bilhah, his father’s concubine. And here in 1Corinthians 5, a man went in unto one the concubines. She was no relationship to him. She was not his mother, but she happened to be one of his father’s wives. And, yet, it is a terrible sin, even in the eyes of the Gentiles, because the father’s wives represent the father’s bed or couch, and it defiles the father’s bed, in that sense.

So what does it mean for the father’s bed to be defiled? We saw here in 1Corinthians 5 that the man who committed this sin was (to be) turned over to Satan, as it says in 1Corinthians 5:5:

To deliver such an one unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh, that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.

Historically, this passage has been used to reference the idea of “excommunication,” where those in authority in the churches, like the pastors and elders and deacons, had the power to excommunicate an individual, and to hold back that person from the Lord’s Table, or even to cast them out of the church membership. They would do this citing 1Corinthians 5, with the hope that the spirit may still be saved.

But when we read this carefully, we see that this verse was not closely examined, because the whole point was to deliver such a one to Satan for the destruction of the flesh, and to destroy someone’s flesh is to kill that person, and then it says, “that the spirit may be saved in the day of the Lord Jesus.” And the phrase “day of the Lord” is a reference to Judgment Day. And when and where did judgment begin? It was at the “house of God,” according to 1Peter 4:17. Judgment must begin at the house of God. So God’s end time judgment program, the day of the Lord, began on the churches on May 21, 1988, and for 23 years God judged His house, the corporate church. That is what this historical parable refers to with this man going in unto his father’s wife. The judgment was to give such a one over to Satan. And, indeed, the corporate church was given over into the hands of Satan for its destruction. That is what Satan is an expert at doing. He was a destroying weapon in the hand of God, just as Nebuchadnezzar, king of Babylon, was a type and figure of Satan, and God raised up Nebuchadnezzar as His servant to destroy Judah as a historical prefiguring (proverb) of what would happen to the churches when they became unfaithful. And that time has now passed, and the churches have been judged. 

So the “flesh” represents the tares. There was the division of the wheat and the tares. The “tares” are those that never became saved, and the Bible has other language that describes those (in the churches) that never became saved, such as “carnal” and “fleshly.” And that is exactly what happened when God turned the churches over to the hand of Satan. It does destroy the “flesh,” or all those who never truly became saved.

It also served to deliver the spirit, because the command went out to depart out of the churches. And although there were some of the “flesh” did come out, all those left behind were tares, and all the elect in the churches did come out prior to May 21, 2011. Along with them, some others that were not truly saved came out, too, but it did serve the purpose of delivering or saving the “spirit” in the day of the Lord Jesus. That was the important time when it was necessary to come out of the churches in order to receive the Latter Rain, and to be in a place where God was still blessing His Word to the hearts (of His elect), and when there could still be salvation.

That is the way we should understand that passage. It should not be understood in the traditional manner, where it is just speaking of an “individual case,” and having to do with church authority and the power to excommunicate. That does not even fit once we look more closely at the language.

And God is citing this man that went into his father’s wife as a reason that spiritually identifies with ending the church age and bringing the “house of God,” (the sanctuary or tabernacle) into judgment, because the man defiled his father’s bed or his father’s couch. That was the argument against Rueben receiving the right of the firstborn. We looked at this in the setting of Jacob and Esau and Isaac giving the blessing of the firstborn son to Jacob, rather than to Esau. Esau, like Reuben, was actually the firstborn son. We saw that it had to do with the division that comes at the end of time, with the separation of the wheat and the tares. This fits in with that because in not giving the blessing to Esau, but giving it to Jacob, it was the elect (the spirit) that received the blessing and not the non-elect (the flesh). So, too, we see this with not giving the blessing to Reuben, but giving it to Joseph. It is a similar picture.

Now we are told it has to do with defiling his father’s bed or couch. The word translated as “couch” and “bed” in Genesis 49:4 and in 1Chronicles 5:1 is also found in Psalm 132:1-4:

A Song of degrees. JEHOVAH, remember David, and all his afflictions: How he sware unto JEHOVAH, and vowed unto the mighty God of Jacob; Surely I will not come into the tabernacle of my house, nor go up into my bed; I will not give sleep to mine eyes, or slumber to mine eyelids,

We are not so much interested in what this Psalm is getting into regarding its topic, but we are interested in verse 3. This is David, a type of Christ, and he said, “Surely I will not come into the tabernacle of my house…” So when we see David in view and he is a type of Christ, we know that his “house” or “tabernacle” is synonymous, and it identifies with the church. It can refer to the eternal church and, therefore, the spiritual house, as we are told in Hebrews 3:6: “But Christ as a son over his own house; whose house are we…” And 1Peter tells us that we are built up a spiritual house. Or, it can refer to the outward representation of the kingdom of God or that “house” that is earthly Jerusalem, the corporate church. They are the houses of worship, the churches on the local street corners. So, again, He says, “Surely I will not come into the tabernacle of my house, nor go up into my bed.” You see, there is a Hebrew parallelism in this verse. The first part of the verse is really saying the same thing as the second part of the verse, but is being said in a different way. The idea of going up into my bed is joined to the idea of coming into the tabernacle of His house. Now we can see it, as we wonder what the reference to his father’s bed means spiritually. Everything in the Bible is spiritual. The Law is spiritual, so what is the spiritual meaning of “bed” or “couch,” and what does it mean that Reuben defiled his father’s bed? 

We can substitute the word “bed” that is used in Genesis 49:4 or 1Chronicles 5:1 for the word “tabernacle” or “house.” Then we think about the meaning of that, if it said, “He defiled his father’s tabernacle. He defiled his father’s house.” Then we immediately see that Rueben is a type and picture of the corporate body or those in the flesh, but they have an outward representation with God and His kingdom. And that is why he lost the right of the firstborn because he had defiled the house, or defiled the tabernacle, or defiled the church. That is what those that profess to be Christians have done with their misdeeds and wrongdoings. 

We also find this word that is translated as “defiled” in Genesis 49:4 and in 1Chronicles 5:1 in Psalm 74. Just to give a little context of what is being discussed, let us read Psalm 74:3-4:

Lift up thy feet unto the perpetual desolations; even all that the enemy hath done wickedly in the sanctuary. Thine enemies roar in the midst of thy congregations; they set up their ensigns for signs.

So when we see words like “sanctuary” or “congregations,” we think of the churches, because in Old Testament Israel the sanctuary or the house was a type and figure of the New Testament corporate church.

Then it says in Psalm 74:7:

They have cast fire into thy sanctuary, they have defiledby casting downthe dwelling place of thy name to the ground.

Fire was cast into the sanctuary and they defiled the dwelling place of God’s name. And that “defilement” has to do with wrong doctrines, false gospels, and the perversion of God’s true Gospel of pure grace by adding works, or the worship of high places, idols, and false gods. Ultimately, they are worshipping Satan in the place of God because Satan is the father of lies. When doctrinal lies and false gospels are believed and served more fervently than the truths of the Lord Jesus Christ, then they have defiled the sanctuary of God – they have defiled His bed. And God brings judgment. This terrible sin of going into thy father’s bed or couch and defiling it is the sin of defiling the house of God or the sanctuary of God.

We also read in Daniel 11:31:

And arms shall stand on his part, and they shall pollute the sanctuary of strength, and shall take away the daily sacrifice, and they shall place the abomination that maketh desolate.

The word “pollute” is the same word is “defile,” so they polluted or defiled the sanctuary. And we recognize and understand this transaction of the “daily” being taken away as the time when the Holy Spirit came out of the midst and Satan being loosed out of the bottomless pit and entering into the churches and congregations of the world, ruling in the churches and showing himself that he is God.

Well, that helps us to understand the situation with Reuben and Esau. You know, when God sets up these figures of one receiving the blessing who is not the firstborn, it helps us to understand why. It is all laying out God’s Gospel program and His end-time judgment program, and so forth.

Just one other thing before we close our study in Genesis 29, and that is concerning this Hebrew word translated as “defiled.” It is Strong’s #2490, and it was translated as “pollute” in Daniel 11:31, and it is also translated as “pollute” in some other Scriptures. But this word is used in an interesting way in the future tense in the Hebrew as the word “begin,” and it is the word we find in Jeremiah 25:29:

For, lo, I begin to bring evil on the city which is called by my name, and should ye be utterly unpunished?

So the Lord is speaking to the nations: “I started the judging process, and I began on the church called by my name.” And God is speaking to the nations: “And will you be utterly unpunished? No – you will not be utterly unpunished.” And that is our present situation. God has done what He said He would do. He began with the churches, and then on May 21, 2011, He transitioned from judging the churches exclusively to expanding it to include all unsaved inhabitants of the earth, the entire world. Interestingly, this word “begin” is the same Hebrew word. 

Also, we see this word in Ezekiel 9 where the Lord is giving direction concerning the city of Jerusalem, and that all without a mark are to be destroyed. It says in Ezekiel 9:5-6:

And to the others he said in mine hearing, Go ye after him through the city, and smite: let not your eye spare, neither have ye pity: Slay utterly old and young, both maids, and little children, and women: but come not near any man upon whom is the mark; and begin at my sanctuary. Then they began at the ancient men which were before the house.

The word “begin” is the word translated as “defile” and “pollute.” So we got a sense of that as a starting point with the verse in Daniel 11:31 about the “daily” being taken away and the sanctuary being polluted. And then God gives the point in time of the daily being taken away and the abomination of desolation being set up, which was the very beginning of the judgment on the house of God. That is when that transaction took place in the spiritual realm. So, again, in an interesting way, God is tying together a word (defile) that directs our attention to the commencement of His wrath upon the corporate church to the “defiling of His bed,” and it relates back to Rueben defiling his father’s couch. It also related to what we read in 1Corinthians 5 of the man who had gone into his father’s wife, something that was not so much as heard among the Gentiles, and how he will be delivered unto Satan for the destruction of the flesh that the spirit should be saved in the day of the Lord. To make sure I quoted that last part accurately, it said in 1Corinthians 5:5: “…in the day of the Lord Jesus.” This is what God has done, and this is what we have learned.

Lord willing, when we get together again, we will move on in our studies to Genesis 30.