Welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Genesis. This is study #22 of Genesis, chapter 6 and we are continuing to look at Genesis 6:16:

A window shalt thou make to the ark, and in a cubit shalt thou finish it above; and the door of the ark shalt thou set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories shalt thou make it.

We were looking at the second part of the verse in regard to the door of the ark. Again, this is God’s Word and in the Bible the Lord Jesus taught us that we have to look for the parabolic meaning, the deeper spiritual meaning. Christ is the “Word” and “without a parable he did not speak,” teaching us how we must understand the Word of God, the Bible. We are to look for the Gospel or spiritual meaning. We do not just look at a word and assign our own spiritual definition to it – we do not pick an idea out of “thin air” to assign a meaning. That would be “private interpretation” and that would be interpretation out of our own mind and our own understanding. We must follow the Bible’s guidelines and that means that we allow God to provide His definition for the spiritual meaning of words.

In regard to the word “door,” it is very clear because God made a direct statement regarding the “door” in John 10:7-9:

Then said Jesus unto them again, Verily, verily, I say unto you, I am the door of the sheep. All that ever came before me are thieves and robbers: but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door: by me if any man enter in, he shall be saved, and shall go in and out, and find pasture.

Here is the definition. Two times Jesus said, “I am the door,” and we see that entry through the door (Christ) relates to salvation: “If any man enter in, he shall be saved.” Therefore, salvation through Christ is the “door.” Where does that salvation lead? It leads to the kingdom of God and to the heavenly city of Jerusalem to be seated at the right hand of God, the Lord Jesus Christ. The “door” is Christ Himself.

The Bible speaks at times of an open door: “For a great door and effectual is opened unto me,” as God directed the Apostle Paul to say. When the door is open people may enter in and this is another way of saying that they may become saved, but their salvation is through Jesus. It is always through Jesus because He is the only “door.” That is why God only made one door into the ark; there was only one way to enter into that ark and you could not enter another way – you had to use the door. And Christ is that door, spiritually, and if the door is open people can go in. Of course, not just anyone can enter in, but those elect that were chosen by God to salvation before the foundation of the world. The elect have a path way, as Jesus also said, “I am the way, the truth, and the life.” It is through Him that we can travel from an unsaved condition to a saved condition and we can leave this world and enter into the next. It is through Him that we that are dead in sin can obtain eternal life. He is “the door,” and the definite article “the” is in view because He is not just “a door,” but the only door by which people can enter into heaven.

In Acts, chapter 14 we can see the spiritual tie-in with the Gospel that brings the message of the Lord Jesus Christ. It says in Acts 14:27:

And when they were come, and had gathered the church together, they rehearsed all that God had done with them, and how he had opened the door of faith unto the Gentiles.

God opened the door and this displays a Biblical principal. If a door is opened, it must be God that opens it. There is no one else that can open the door to heaven. It is God’s kingdom. It is His domain and He has complete rule and authority over the kingdom of heaven and, therefore, it is absolutely necessary that God open the door if anyone was to be translated from this world (of darkness) into the kingdom of God’s dear Son, the Lord Jesus Christ. God must personally open the door. We will not get into this at this time, but the Bible speaks of the true believers as doorkeepers in Psalm 84 and that is our task as messengers and servants of God. God opened the door in particular “times and seasons” of His salvation program. The door could have been slightly opened, with relatively few being saved like during the time of the Old Testament; or the door could have been widely opened like during the church age; or it could be tremendously wide open like it was during the second part of the Great Tribulation period when God sent forth the Latter Rain to save the great multitude. It was like the Apostle Paul was led to say in 1Corinthians 16:9: “For a great door and effectual is opened unto me.” That would refer to something like God’s outpouring of the Holy Spirit for that short little season of about 17 years in which He saved tens of millions of people.

Each one that God saved entered through the “door” or through Christ, as it said, again, in Acts 14:27: “they rehearsed all that God had done with them, and how he had opened the door of faith unto the Gentiles.” The Bible teaches us that Christ is faith. God is faith, so the “door of faith” tells us it is the “door of Christ.” They are synonymous. Jesus is the door. Jesus is the faith, so it is the door of faith. It is not that man would “exercise” faith to believe on Jesus and thereby enter in. That is not possible because no man is justified by the works of the Law and faith is a work because the Bible calls “belief” a commandment as it commands us to believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and any attempted obedience to any commandment of God is a “work.” That is the definition of a “work” and we are not justified by works and it is impossible for anyone to have entered into the kingdom of heaven by exercising their own faith – it is not our faith, but the faith of Christ. It says in Galatians 2:16: “Knowing that a man is not justified by the works of the law, but by the faith of Jesus Christ,” so it is Christ’s faith. It is Christ’s door and He drew people through that door, as it says in John 6:44: “No man can come to me, except the Father which hath sent me draw him.”

God would begin the drawing process with an unsaved individual in the day of salvation and He would bring them through the door of salvation and into that blessed condition of eternal life. He would give the person a new heart and a new spirit, just like what was demonstrated when Christ spoke and raised Lazarus from the dead. Christ did all the work in giving him life and giving him ears to hear the command, “Lazarus, come forth!” Christ gave him life and the ability to respond to the command and he did come forth. That is a picture of God’s salvation program.

Again, it says in Acts 14:27 that the Lord opened the door of faith. We have to keep in mind what it says in Romans 10:17:

So then faith cometh by hearing, and hearing by the word of God.

This means that the “door of faith,” who is Christ, is ministered through the Word of God, the Bible, as the message of the Scriptures was carried forth to people. That is why Christ commanded, “Go ye therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost.” That was a command to find the lost sheep of the house of Israel, the nation of them that are saved, but in order to find them it was necessary to go into all the world, carrying the good news of salvation. As believers carried forth the Word of God through preaching, teaching, sharing pamphlets and tracts or broadcasting over the radio and internet, there was a ministering of the “door,” the Word of God. The Word of God was the “door of faith” and by sharing the Bible the believers were conducting themselves as doorkeepers during the time when God was actively saving. This happened for the 1,955 years of the church age and during the second part of the “little season” of the Great Tribulation when the Latter Rain was being poured out. God’s people were lowly doorkeepers: “Here is what the Bible says.” It was very encouraging and it was a blessed thing to participate in God’s ministry of the “door of faith” and bringing the Word of God. We were hopeful and greatly encouraged because we knew that God was saving a great multitude: “Maybe God will save you. Why not cry out to Him for mercy?” This was the presentation of the “door of faith.”

But God also indicates that He opens the door of faith and He shuts the door of faith. What He opens, none can shut. No one could prevent or hold back the ministry of the Word of God. The churches desired to do so and fought against it. People of the world are constantly fighting against the Gospel in various ways, but despite all that God made a point to get His Word out in an unparalleled manner that the world had never seen before. The Word of God covered the earth as the waters cover the sea and there was a total saturation of the message of the final proclamation of salvation. It was declared, “You have up until this point, May 21, 2011, to seek the Lord while He may be found. Cry out and beseech Him for all you are worth! That will be the day.” It was foretold because the Bible locked in that day as the day the door would shut. It was said over and over for a period of years. What “door” was to shut? It was the “door of faith.” It was the door that is Christ. It was the door of salvation and the door that led to eternal life. If the door shut and you had not been drawn in, then you would not live forever because you did not become saved and when you die you will be annihilated and cease to exist forever. This was declared and proclaimed to the world by the “doorkeepers.” As God made these things known to His people, the watchmen saw the sword coming and God moved them to will and to do of His good pleasure. God stirred them up to perform the good works of getting this message out to the world as never before seen in history. The Lord’s people delighted in it because it meant the salvation of God’s elect. It was finally the completion of God’s magnificent salvation program and we were privileged to play a part in it. It was a tremendous thing. It was a wonderful and beautiful thing to have been a doorkeeper at that time because the door was wide open.

Then came that day. Time passed. Time always passes and the day came that God said would come and He shut that door – He shut the door to heaven and He ended His salvation program. He ended the gift of faith that could save people. There would no longer be that “door of faith” ministered to unsaved individuals, as God ended His evangelization of the earth. That is what the Bible taught for years in advance of that date. And as we have gone back to the Bible and restudied it, we found that this is what the Bible insists occurred at that time.

As we look in hindsight from our vantage point of living on the earth in these days after the Tribulation, we are finding further evidence that it is what happened.

God was using small ministries in a mighty way to get His Word out, but then it suddenly ceased and the “great and effectual door” and platform of the radio and electronic medium was cut back. The worldwide ministry of Family Radio no longer had Radio Taiwan and all the overseas facilities they had leased, and so forth. Their international department was scaled back to where Family Radio only has an international ministry through the internet and they have lost the shortwave department. Or, we could say that God took it away because He utilized it while it was necessary during the proper season, but once the door closed and God ended His salvation program there was no reason for these things. They had already accomplished the purpose that God had established for them. Also, the worldwide tract effort suddenly came to a close and the printing of millions of tracts ceased.

God’s people had loved sharing the Gospel and being doorkeepers and lowly servants in God’s kingdom in whatever capacity they were needed. We recognized our place and we realized we were “nobodies,” but we were saved by the grace of God even though we did not deserve it in any way. Therefore, we were like servants carrying around “buckets of water,” asking people, “Would you like a drink?”

That is what we did as we brought the Word of God to the masses and, yet, suddenly God’s elect realized they did not feel that urgent desire within them to get the Gospel out. All of a sudden the Holy Spirit stopped moving in the people of God in the area of evangelization and they were no longer prompted or moved in that way because God had accomplished His purpose; God saved all those He had intended to save, the entire company of the elect whose names were recorded in the Lamb’s Book of Life. Therefore, the Spirit of God that had not let His elect rest for a moment t now no longer convicted in them their spirits and they were not grieved at the prospect of ceasing to bring the Gospel of salvation to the people of the world. It was not according to the will of God that the Spirit of God would trouble them in their minds and direct them in that way. There is no such troubling. There is no such conviction or leading by God’s Spirit in His people to get the Gospel out that people might become saved because the Bible teaches that the door is shut. Salvation is ended. There is no more keeping the door open for people.

We are still doorkeepers, but now our task it to tell people that God shut the door. You know, we are not the ones that opened the door to begin with, because we are just doorkeepers. The opening and closing of the door is determined from above by the mighty power of God. If He opens, no man can shut and if He shuts, no man can open. We are standing down below and standing by the “door” (the Word of God, the Bible), but now the Bible is declaring that the door is shut. It is not ministering faith unto salvation any longer. We just tell people what the directive is and what we are told through the Word of God. Of course, this is not the happy and wonderful task we had before. This is a grievous thing and this is something we take no pleasure in because God takes no pleasure in the death of the wicked and, yet, it is something that we must be faithful to as doorkeepers. We just tell people the condition of the door – the door is shut.