Welcome to EBible Fellowship’s Bible study in the Book of Genesis. This is study #29 of Genesis, chapter 6 and we are reading Genesis 6:21-22:

And take thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee; and it shall be for food for thee, and for them. Thus did Noah; according to all that God commanded him, so did he.

In our last study we saw how this food God commanded Noah to gather and store on the ark was to be food for Noah and his family and for all the animals. It pictured the spiritual nourishment that would identify with the period after the Tribulation in regard to “feeding” God’s sheep.

We saw that the point at which this food was to be eaten was not prior to the flood. As a matter of fact, what good would it do to eat the food before the door of the ark was shut and the flood waters came? It was not for that time, but the food that God commanded Noah to take aboard the ark was to be reserved and kept as provision for the duration of the flood, the time from the shutting of the door until they could come out of the ark (and maybe even longer than that because it would be a while before they could grow food).

So the storage of this food reminds us of another historical account in the Book of Genesis. It appears in Genesis, chapter 41 when Pharaoh had dreamed a dream and no one could interpret it until it was told him that there was a Hebrew man in the prison that had the ability to interpret dreams. So Joseph was called hastily out of the dungeon and brought before Pharaoh and he told Pharaoh that he could interpret his dream because God had given him that gift – the interpretation would come from God. Pharaoh’s dream had to do with seven fat cows, followed by seven skinny cows that devoured the fat cows. The dream also had to do with seven fat and good ears of corn and seven thin and awful ears of corn that devoured the fat ears of corn. By God’s grace, Joseph interpreted the dream for him. The seven fat cows and the seven full ears of corn represented “seven years of plenty” or seven years of “good” in regard to crops and harvest, a time when the earth would produce abundantly. It would be followed by seven years of famine. Then Joseph said this to Pharaoh, in Genesis 41:33-36:

Now therefore let Pharaoh look out a man discreet and wise, and set him over the land of Egypt. Let Pharaoh do this, and let him appoint officers over the land, and take up the fifth part of the land of Egypt in the seven plenteous years. And let them gather all the food of those good years that come, and lay up corn under the hand of Pharaoh, and let them keep food in the cities. And that food shall be for store to the land against the seven years of famine, which shall be in the land of Egypt; that the land perish not through the famine.

This was the wisdom from God that was given to Joseph as he relayed the interpretation of the dream to Pharaoh. Pharaoh and his servants thought the wisdom was good and there followed seven years of great plenty in the land of Egypt. Of that time, it says in Genesis 41:47-49:

And in the seven plenteous years the earth brought forth by handfuls. And he gathered up all the food of the seven years, which were in the land of Egypt, and laid up the food in the cities: the food of the field, which was round about every city, laid he up in the same. And Joseph gathered corn as the sand of the sea, very much, until he left numbering; for it was without number.

For seven years they laid up a fifth of the food in storehouses in certain cities throughout the land of Egypt and they did not touch that corn – it was kept in reserve. They had no need to touch it because there was such an abundance of food during this seven-year period. No one lacked food. No one was going hungry in Egypt. The land yielded tremendously, so Joseph (who was put in charge of the entire project) took a portion of the grain each year and he stored it until it was like the “sand of the sea.”

According to the dream and interpretation of it, which came from God, he knew that after the seven years of plenty there would come seven years of famine. In Acts, chapter 7 the Bible tells us something interesting about these seven years of famine, in Acts 7:11-13:

Now there came a dearth over all the land of Egypt and Chanaan, and great affliction: and our fathers found no sustenance. But when Jacob heard that there was corn in Egypt, he sent out our fathers first. And at the second time Joseph was made known to his brethren; and Joseph's kindred was made known unto Pharaoh.

In verse 11 it calls this dearth “great affliction” and these two words in the Greek are “megas-thlipsis,” and the word “thlipsis” is the word for “tribulation.” They are the same two Greek words that we find in Matthew 24 where it speaks of “great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be.” We have come to know as God has opened up the Scriptures to us that the Great Tribulation was a 23-year period that began May 21, 1988 and continued until May 21, 2011. That was the period of Great Tribulation and the “seven years of famine” is referred to as “great tribulation,” so we know that the seven years of famine had to do with the Great Tribulation that would come upon the churches of the world and the world itself at the end of time. It happened in our day and we have actually gone through that period.

What are the “seven years of plenty?” It would relate to the period when the Bible was being compiled and it is a picture of the Word of God. God gave His Word, starting with Moses in the wilderness, so it would have been about 1447BC until the end of the 1st century AD, a period of over fifteen hundred years in which God was compiling His Word. It was a bountiful time. Even after the Bible was completed, there was the opening of understanding to the New Testament churches, where they were granted greater spiritual insight than Old Testament Israel had. The “mystery of the Gentiles” had been revealed to them and many of Christ’s parables had opened understanding to a higher degree throughout the church age.

The church age was not a period that lacked blessing from the Word of God because they had the whole Bible and they were given much truth throughout the entire 1,955 years of the church age. They were blessed and they came to understand certain doctrines like election or the Trinity. They had understanding of the holiness of God and that truth is “the Bible alone.” This was rich spiritual food. They had no need for information about the end of the church age or information about the mapping out of God’s program of the Great Tribulation, the Latter Rain and Judgment Day because it was not for them – it was not time. They had “plenty,” as their focus was to be upon bringing the Word of God to the nations and spreading the Bible to the four corners of the earth to minister to the “144,000,” the firstfruits unto God that would come in through the churches and congregations. And all that was accomplished, so the church age was not a period of famine. There was a period of early rain and a period of the firstfruits, as the Word of God traveled across the earth in a great way. It was certainly a time of “plenty” from the time the Bible was completed until the end of the church age. It went from 33AD to 1988 on the day before Pentecost on May 21, 1988 when God brought an end to the church age and a grievous “famine” of 2,300 days occurred after the Holy Spirit came out of the midst of the churches; the Latter Rain had not yet started to evangelize the earth outside of the churches, so it was a period when almost no one was being saved and that agrees with the “seven years of famine.”

In Pharaoh’s dream the seven starving cows swallowed up the seven fat cows and the seven thin ears swallowed up the seven fat ears and, yet, they were no better and you could not know they had just swallowed up the fat cows or good ears of corn. The interpretation was that the years of plenty would be forgotten because of how grievous the famine would be. This is exactly what happened beginning with the judgment on the churches in 1988 at the beginning of the Great Tribulation. The time of “plenty” that had been in effect for almost two thousand years was quickly forgotten. The moment the Holy Spirit departed out of the midst of the churches and the “abomination of desolation” entered in, there was a terrible famine that caused us to forget any good that had taken place for centuries. That was the Great Tribulation as typified by the “seven-year famine.”

After the interpretation of Pharaoh’s dream, Joseph stored up corn and the corn is a figure of the Word of God, the Bible, but it was also a figure of Biblical truths that had not been previously understood. It was information that would be brought forth concerning doctrines like the doctrine of “hell” or the doctrine of Christ having paid for sins at the world’s foundation instead of in 33AD, and so forth. So the “corn” could typify the clarification of doctrines that had been incorrectly taught and, in some cases, they had been incorrectly taught for the entire church age. It also had to do with the bringing forth of doctrines like “the end of the church age” and its command to depart out of the churches and flee into the world. This was all part of the “corn.” It was like a “new covenant,” according to Hebrews, chapter 8 where God, finding fault with man’s inability to properly understand the Bible, brought a “new covenant,” as it were, which would be the “corn” of the Word of God that had been sealed up until the time of the end.

Do you see how Joseph, in effect, “sealed” the grain into the storehouses and no one could get to it until the time of the famine? It is like when God sealed His Word, according to the Book of Daniel, until the time of the end when knowledge would increase.

Again, we have already gone through that time and we have seen “mysteries” that have been unsealed and revealed to the people of God – glorious and tremendous things that have served to nourish and feed God’s people during the second part of the Great Tribulation and Latter Rain. It was a tremendous blessing that God had made provision for His people against the years of “famine” and against the years of “tribulation.” It was a time when the churches would remain in famine for the entire 23 years, but God, in His infinite wisdom, provided for His people outside the churches.

Here in Genesis, we see God is doing the same thing, but it is not concerning the Great Tribulation. Again, it says in Genesis 6:21:

And take thou unto thee of all food that is eaten, and thou shalt gather it to thee; and it shall be for food for thee, and for them.

Noah was to store up the food and place it on the ark. This was done sometime within the 120-year period, probably starting a couple of years before they entered into the ark and God shut the door. That food could not be eaten until the proper time, just like the food reserved in storehouses in Joseph’s time could not be eaten. But this food on the ark was not being kept in store as a figure of the Great Tribulation, but it was kept in store against the Judgment Day of God – the day the door of the ark would be shut and the flood would begin. The waters would fall from heaven and come up from beneath and that awful deluge would take place. There had to be food for the eight souls on board and for all the animals. And so it was. In God’s design part of the information given to Noah was to make sure he stored up sufficient food for a flood that would last for one full year.

Again, that food typifies the Word of God, the Bible. But since it was food that was not previously to be eaten, it must also represent “progressive revelation.” God would continue what He began at the beginning of the Great Tribulation as He unsealed His Word and opened the understanding of His people over time regarding many major doctrines of the Bible.

Likewise, since the food could not be eaten before they were on the ark and the door was shut, it must be that God has stored up information against the Day of Judgment and the day of His wrath. That information would be brought forth to feed all on board the ark, which typifies Christ, so those that are fed would be all those that are “in Christ,” as the Bible says that we are dead and our lives are hid with Christ in God. All that are in the Lord Jesus Christ will be spiritually fed after the “seventeenth day of the second month” and throughout the duration of the flood, as the waters ascended and then, finally, descended and they could come off the ship.

That is exactly what has been happening. For example, we have learned since May 21, 2011 that God brought to pass a spiritual judgment. It was exactly like the judgment that had come against the churches. The “cup of God’s wrath” identifies with the spiritual outpouring of punishment upon the inhabitants of the earth. We did not know that previously; we had thought it would be a physical judgment for five months.

We have also learned many things concerning the role of the elect in Judgment Day. We were left on the earth; we were not raptured, but we remain on the earth to go through this time. While we are here, we are being severely tried and tested and we are also “appearing before the judgment seat of Christ,” and that is something that some theologians in the churches said, but their idea was that it took place before the great white throne in heaven. It was all misconstrued by them. But now we realize that it means that we are going through the judgment, along with the rest of the world, but we are “making manifest” that we were already judged “in Christ” from the foundation of the world. What will complete the manifestation of that judgment will be our endurance to the end, because only the ones that are truly saved will endure to the end because they have no sin upon them. So we have learned that God’s elect are filling up His suffering as we follow His example. Jesus went through the demonstration and His life was a tableau, culminating in the cross.

So, too, God’s people are following that example as we “appear before the judgment seat of Christ.” Just as Jesus had no sin upon Him as He made manifest what He had done from the world’s foundation, so, too, God’s elect bear no sin as we go through the judgment. Just as Jesus was lifted up after His resurrection, so, too, God’s people will be resurrected at the completion of this time. This is a major doctrine that we now understand, but we had not previously understood it. No one understood what 2Corinthians 5, verse 10 meant when it said, “For we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ.” No one had previously understood this because it was sealed up and it was provision or “food” reserved against the Day of Judgment. It was to be kept for those on board the ark while they went through the flood.

There is other information concerning the “baptism” which we are being baptized with and drinking of the cup that Christ drank of and other things we now properly understand. We also have learned that on May 21, 2011 Satan was deposed and the Lord Jesus Christ is ruling the nations with a rod of iron. People have incorrectly tried to tie Christ’s rule into some future thousand-year period, but it only fits this time period. As a matter of fact, in every case in the Book of Revelation where it says that Christ is ruling with a rod of iron, the Greek word translated as “rule” is the word “feed,” like one of the three times that Christ said, “Feed my sheep.” So the Lord Jesus Christ is “ruling” or “feeding” with a rod of iron; that is, He is the great Shepherd and we are His sheep and even though He uses His elect as instruments to feed His sheep, He gets the glory. He is ruling and He is doing so with a rod of iron; the Word of God is bringing forth the message of judgment, but it feeds the people of God because it is Christ that is ruling and it is the manner in which He feeds His sheep.