Good evening, and welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the book of Genesis.  Tonight is study #30 of Genesis 31, and we will read Genesis 31:52-55:

This heap be witness, and this pillar be witness, that I will not pass over this heap to thee, and that thou shalt not pass over this heap and this pillar unto me, for harm. The God of Abraham, and the God of Nahor, the God of their father, judge betwixt us. And Jacob sware by the fear of his father Isaac. Then Jacob offered sacrifice upon the mount, and called his brethren to eat bread: and they did eat bread, and tarried all night in the mount. And early in the morning Laban rose up, and kissed his sons and his daughters, and blessed them: and Laban departed, and returned unto his place.

I will mention this one more time concerning the spiritual picture in this covenant.  It completely identifies with Judgment Day.  We could say that it is the covenant of judgment between God and Satan and between the two kingdoms that is made when Judgment Day begins.  In an interesting way that is kind of unusual that the battle of Judgment Day…and the Bible does speak of the battle of Judgment Day in various places. 

We are not saying there is no battle between these two enemy kingdoms, the kingdom of God and the kingdom of Satan, but it is a different battle than the battle that was actively raging throughout the history of the world since the fall of mankind into sin.  And the Bible is clear that the battle was a very intense fight between the Lord Jesus and Satan and his forces as Christ went forth conquering and to conquer.  We see that picture in Revelation 6, as Christ is riding a white horse, while Satan on a red horse is seeking to take peace from the earth.  It was a battle between the Lord Jesus as He sowed the seed upon the hearts of men and Satan and his emissaries that came to snatch the seed that was sown away from the hearts.  That was the battleground – the hearts of men, or the souls of men.  And the weapon that God used was the Gospel, the Word of God.  The weapon that Satan used was also the Gospel as he attempted to twist it and turn it from grace to works, and to cast doubt upon the holy and true Word of God in whatever way he could. 

This was the battleground for thousands and thousands of years until we came to the date of May 21, 2011, the day that ended the Great Tribulation period and ended the Latter Rain and the outpouring of the Holy Spirit to perform the work of saving sinners by opening their ears that they might hear and become born again.  It was the day that the door of heaven – which had been open wide for the second part of the Great Tribulation during the Latter Rain – was now shut by God.  The day of the brilliant light of the Gospel was extinguished. 

And we could go on and on with various images and illustrations the Bible uses to say this same thing – God accomplished His salvation program.  He completed it, and He saved everyone whose name was written in the Lamb’s Book of Life.  He had found all the lost sheep of the house of Israel, and He brought them into the fold of the kingdom of heaven, just as Jacob gathered his flock and fled Haran.  He had his wives.  He had what he came for.  So too, the Lord Jesus entered into the world and sent the Spirit to find His bride, the whole company of the elect.  As each one became saved, they formed the “woman,” the bride of Christ.  Just as Eve was taken out of the side of Adam, we were taken out of the “side” of the Lord Jesus Christ, as the blood and water flowed forth into the world to recover the remnant of God’s people. 

And we have all been recovered.  We have been delivered.  We have been found.  All these things can be said to be finished by the end of the Great Tribulation, which ended after 23 exact years, or 8,400 days, on May 21, 2011.  Therefore the Husbandman, as James 5 tells us, “hath long patience for it, until he receive the early and latter rain.” The early rain fell over the course of the church age, and the Latter Rain fell (after the church age ended) during that little season of the last half of the Great Tribulation.  And the implication of the Scripture in James 5:7 is that the Husbandman will no longer be patient once He has received the rain and the fruits have come in.  That is, the people of God have all become saved, and they are the fruit, as the Bible uses language of sowing seed, sending rain, and gathering fruit.  It all has to do with God’s magnificent salvation program, and He has completed it.  It has been fulfilled to the utmost!  One cannot have any greater salvation than the salvation of everyone that God intended to save, the salvation of all predestined ones whose sins were laid upon Christ and paid for by Him.  They were all recovered.  They were found.  Now they are safe and secure within the kingdom of God.  They are in “Abraham’s bosom,” and we could just go on and on with the biblical language that declares that God has won.  He has been victorious.  He has defeated Satan because Satan was always in opposition to the workings of the Lord Jesus Christ to save His people.  Again, the Lord has won.  He was victorious.  He has triumphed.  He has done what He obligated Himself to do, and what He guaranteed He would do, and He has saved everyone that was to be saved.

That great work of Christ is done: “This is the work of God, that ye believe…”  As it says in John 9:3-5:

Jesus answered, Neither hath this man sinned, nor his parents: but that the works of God should be made manifest in him. I must work the works of him that sent me, while it is day: the night cometh, when no man can work.  As long as I am in the world, I am the light of the world.

It is not literal as far as Jesus’ physical presence being the light of the world.  He was “the light of the world” for the entire church age, was He not?  He was also “the light of the world” that shined so brightly during the Latter Rain during the Great Tribulation.  He was “the light of the world” during the day of salvation, but then comes the night.  The day of salvation ended.  And it is not a disappointing finish.  It is not a failure.  It is not as though God wanted to save more people, but He was unable to save more.  “Oh, if only He had longer time!”  No – it has nothing to do with that.  God set the boundaries.  He is the one who determines times and seasons in which to accomplish His will, and He set the time constraints in place.  “I will save during the period of the church age, as I send the early rain and gather the firstfruits.  Then I will stop the rain, and there will be a grievous famine of 2,300 evening mornings from May 21, 1988 to September 7, 1994, during which time virtually no one will be saved.  Then on September 7, 1994, a Jubilee year, I will send my Spirit once more and stretch forth my hand the second time to recover the remnant of my people, and I will save a great multitude out of Great Tribulation.  And that will complete the salvation of God.” 

And that is exactly what God did.  Even though it was a “little season” of about 17 years, from September 7, 1994 until May 21, 2011, God saved scores of millions more people than He had saved over the 1,955 years of the church age.  That was almost two millennium, but God saved more (people) in 17 years than He had saved in nearly 2,000 years.  So, obviously, it is not a question of God needing or requiring more time in order to save more people.  No – it has nothing to do with that.  By the way, in Revelation 7, where the great multitude comes into view and the question was asked, we read in Revelation 7:13-14:

And one of the elders answered, saying unto me, What are these which are arrayed in white robes? and whence came they? And I said unto him, Sir, thou knowest. And he said to me, These are they which came out of great tribulation, and have washed their robes, and made them white in the blood of the Lamb.

Notice the question: “Whence came they?” From where did they come?  And the answer is given: “These are they which came out of great tribulation.”  That is recognized because there are only certain time periods in God’s plan for sending rain for saving, and for not sending rain for saving: “a time to be born, and a time to die.”  And the “time to be born” is the day of salvation, and the “time to die” is the Day of Judgment.  “To every thing there is a season, and a time to every purpose under the heaven.”  God is very precise and, of course, He is brilliant, and He does everything by design and purpose, according to His plan.  It all works out in the way He intends for it to happen.  So He saved the firstfruits over the course of the church age, and the question could be asked, “Where did these 144,000 (12,000 from each of the 12 tribes of Israel) come from?”  And the answer the Bible gives is that they are “the firstfruits unto God.”  So we know from whence they came.  They came out of the church age, which produced that harvest of the firstfruits.  With that understanding, we can turn to Luke 13, which tells us about the day God shut the door, Judgment Day.  It says in Luke 13:24-25:

Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able. When once the master of the house is risen up, and hath shut to the door, and ye begin to stand without, and to knock at the door, saying, Lord, Lord, open unto us; and he shall answer and say unto you, I know you not whence ye are:

You see, that is the response of the Lord Jesus Christ in the Day of Judgment, our time period in these days after the Tribulation.  We are in a prolonged judgment season that will go from May 21, 2011 to a yet unknown date in the year 2033, according to biblical evidence.  This is the time that the door is shut, and the Lord is no longer actively saving because He has already saved everyone He intended to save.  And yet, people come.  We read it here and we read it in Matthew 7.  They knock and they say, “Lord, Lord, open the door.”  But in these passages, the Lord never opens the door.   He does not open the door, and the door is completely under His control, by the way.  It is not the responsibility of the elect child of God to lock the door or to open the door.  We are totally unable to do anything of that nature.  We are just little beings that God graciously had mercy upon and saved us, but we do not shut doors or open doors.  We are only doorkeepers.  God commands the status of the door and we receive the information through the written Word of God, the Bible, in the proper time and season, and we declare it.

During the second part of the Great Tribulation we let everyone know that God was saving a great multitude, and we said, “Go to God and beseech Him, and you may be one that He will save!”  The door was flung wide open.  But in the Day of Judgment, according to the Bible, God “shut him in,” as we read of Noah and all the inhabitants within the ark.  God shut him in.  Noah did not shut the door.  God shut the door.  So too, God shut the door of heaven on May 21, 2011, but people do not listen to the Bible, and that is nothing new.  There are always those natural-minded, unsaved people that are contrary to spiritual things and the things of God.  And if God says one thing, man will constantly do the opposite.  If God says the door is open like it was during the last part of the Great Tribulation, and He commands us to come to Him and beseech Him for mercy, and to read the Bible and come under the hearing of the Word outside of the churches, then man says, “No! No! No!  I do not believe any of this.”  And man was contrary.

But when God shut the door, we find more and more people coming to the door now and wanting to come in.  Now they have an interest in entering into the kingdom of God.  That is why it says in Luke 13:24:

Strive to enter in at the strait gate: for many, I say unto you, will seek to enter in, and shall not be able.

So we can have that expectation that there will be many that will seek to enter in, and they will be unable.  They are going to hear the news that the door is shut.  Again, the thing that stands out is Christ’s response to their demand, “Lord, Lord, open unto us,” and He responds, “I know you not whence ye are.”  It is as if He is saying, “I have all my children with me in bed.  I have my firstfruits.  I have my final harvest saved out of Great Tribulation.  They are all with me in my kingdom.  And I know from whence they are, but I do not know whence ye are.”  I do not identify you with any particular season of rain that fell to produce the fruit that you are claiming to be.  In fact, there are no more seasons of rain, and I have no more plans for fruit.  As the Husbandman, I have received the early and latter rain, and my fruit has come in, and my harvest is complete.  And the only thing that remains is to equip all of my elect with new resurrected bodies.  But as far as additional resurrection of the soul, that is over and done with. 

It is accomplished, and it has been a tremendous success.  It is 100% done, and it was a  great and wonderful and glorious fulfilment of the Word of God.  And none were lost.  None were missed.  None failed to become saved and, therefore, need some kind of extension of an open door and further rain.  It is all finished, and the final crop has been harvested.  There is no more to do.

This is what the pillar and the heap of stones is signifying in this covenant because as far as this battle has been concerned, the Lord Jesus had been on the offense, and he had entered into the house of Satan (the nations of the world) to deliver the captives and to set the captives free.  And He spoiled Satan’s house.  So that is why Laban is agreeing: “OK, OK, I cannot really say or do anything concerning the ones you already have.”  But remember, we saw that he pointed out in Genesis 31:50: “If thou shalt take other wives beside my daughters, no man is with us; see, God is witness betwixt me and thee.”   In other words, he is saying, “No more wives!  No more taking of captives.  I will agree with this for that reason.”

And Jacob, a type of Christ, can also be in agreement because there is no more to take.  He is satisfied.   He has his wives, his sheep, and his cattle, and he wants nothing more from Laban’s house. 

The battle over souls (the first resurrection) has been completed.  It is finished.  There is a cease fire.  There is rest, and this is what we see when we go to Isaiah 14:2-4:

And the people shall take them, and bring them to their place: and the house of Israel shall possess them in the land of JEHOVAH for servants and handmaids: and they shall take them captives, whose captives they were; and they shall rule over their oppressors. And it shall come to pass in the day that JEHOVAH shall give thee rest from thy sorrow, and from thy fear, and from the hard bondage wherein thou wast made to serve, That thou shalt take up this proverb against the king of Babylon, and say, How hath the oppressor ceased! the golden city ceased!

That is, Satan, who is typified by the king of Babylon, has ceased oppressing the people of God, the elect.  Babylon itself, which typifies the nations of the world, has also ceased from oppressing the elect people of God because we are no longer in bondage to sin and to Satan.  Then it goes on to say in Isaiah 14:5-7:

JEHOVAH hath broken the staff of the wicked, and the sceptre of the rulers. He who smote the people in wrath with a continual stroke, he that ruled the nations in anger, is persecuted, and none hindereth. The whole earth is at rest, and is quiet: they break forth into singing.

The whole earth is at rest, and is quiet, and they break forth into singing.  Now we find all three of these words in 2Chronicles 20.  The word “sing” is in verse 22: “And when they began to sing and to praise, JEHOVAH set ambushments…”  And then we know the enemy armies destroyed one another, and they were all dead bodies in the wilderness.  It is a historical parable picturing Judgment Day.  And then it says in 2Chronicles 20:29-30:

And the fear of God was on all the kingdoms of those countries, when they had heard that JEHOVAH fought against the enemies of Israel. So the realm of Jehoshaphat was quiet: for his God gave him rest round about.

So we see the same words we just read in Isaiah 14 concerning the king of Babylon, the oppressor, having ceased.  When did he cease?  After 70 years, which typified the Great Tribulation.  Babylon has ceased.  When did Babylon fall?  After 70 years, the Medes and the Persians took the kingdom, just as Christ came as a thief in the night on May 21, 2011, and Babylon fell and, therefore, ceased their oppression.  And the king of Babylon, Satan, also ceased his oppression.  And now Christ reigns the earth with a rod of iron, and there is “quiet,” and God gave Him “rest” round about – there is no more battle over the souls of men.

Now there is another battle.  It is the battle of Judgment Day, but we will have to talk about that another time.