“Now it came to pass after these things that God tested Abraham, and said to him, ‘Abraham!’ And he said, ‘Here I am.’ Then He said, ‘Take now your son, your only son Isaac, whom you love, and go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which I shall tell you.’ So Abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey, and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son; and he split the wood for the burnt offering, and arose and went to the place of which God had told him” (Genesis 22:1-3).
This is the part I call ‘God’s love story towards mankind.’ I describe this as the allegory of the sacrificial death of our Lord Jesus on the cross. God showed love upon us human beings when He sent His only begotten Son on the cross to die for the sins of mankind. This is in no way suggesting that we have to give back our all in terms of finances to God because what God did here was to test Abraham. However, let’s look at this with spiritual eyes now, Abraham is the picture of God and Isaac is the picture of our Lord Jesus.
I would like to leave it here for now as we continue; I will touch on it below. The bible says, “So Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac his son; and he took the fire in his hand, and a knife, and the two of them went together” (Genesis 22:6). Abraham took the wood and laid on his son, exactly the same as Jesus when He was going on Mount Calvary, He carried the cross of wood on His shoulder. The wood on Isaac’s back is the picture of the cross.
Now, for Jesus to die on the cross it was to demonstrate God’s love for humanity and how serious sin was before His sight. Our sins would not just escape without being punished, God had to find a righteous path and that was through the blood of His Son Jesus. After that, all our sins; past, present and future are forgiven. If God can punish you (a believer) for the same sins which He punished on His Son Jesus that would be double jeopardy. We thank God for His Son Jesus because, as our sins were purged on His Son, we have passed death and we will not come into judgement.
The world’s judgement is near, however, this message is not a warning trying to make people repent out of fear but it is for the church of Christ to be aware of the coming King. If you read this message and you accepted Jesus Christ as your Lord and Saviour, know that you are saved and heaven is your home. But those of the world, whom Jesus is an enemy to them, they are the ones whom the judgement will fall upon. They are going to suffer during the 7 years of tribulation and not you.
Jesus said, “And as it was in the days of Noah, so it will be also in the days of the Son of Man: They ate, they drank, they married wives, they were given in marriage, until the day that Noah entered the ark, and the flood came and destroyed them all. Like as it was also in the days of Lot: They ate, they drank, they bought, they sold, they planted, they built; but on the day that Lot went out of Sodom it rained fire and brimstone from heaven and destroyed them all. Even so will it be in the day when the Son of Man is revealed. In that day, he who is on the housetop, and his goods are in the house, let him not come down to take them away. And likewise the one who is in the field, let him not turn back” (Luke 17:26-31).
Let me clarify something here, the first coming of our Lord Jesus it is when He came and lived in Israel and the second coming which many pastors are preaching about is actually His revelation. He is rather talking about when the Son of Man is revealed, this means, He will appear in the sky in the clouds and we will meet Him. Then, the real second coming it is when He will come and sit on His throne as mentioned in Luke 1:32-33. It is the quite interesting that Jesus is mentioning the days of Noah and the overthrow of Sodom.
What happened? I will start with Noah. The bible says, “And God said to Noah, ‘The end of all flesh has come before Me, for the earth is filled with violence through them; and behold, I will destroy them with the earth. Make yourself an ark of the gopherwood; make rooms in the ark, and cover it inside and outside with pitch. And this is how you shall make it: The length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, its width fifty cubits, and its height thirty cubits. You shall make a window for the ark, and you shall finish it to a cubit from above; and set the door of the ark in its side. You shall make it with lower, second, and third decks” (Genesis 6:13-16).
So the Lord God here gave Noah the measurements of how big He wanted the ark to be and even how it would look like. He commanded that there would be a door on the side and the window above. The Lord didn’t want Noah to see the judgement and how fierce and harsh the judgement was. What the Lord wanted from Noah and his family was to look up and see heaven. This is what will happen even on the day of judgement; the Lord will not want us to see the fierceness of that day.
So you can see even here, the Lord had shut Noah in the ark first before the judgement could take place. The ark here is the picture of Jesus and I like how the Lord elaborated that. This is what He said, “...Come into the ark, you and all your household, because I have seen that you are righteous before Me in this generation” (Genesis 6:1). Just for you to have an idea the Lord said ‘come into’; He didn’t say ‘Go into.’ This is the reason why by the Spirit I say that the ark is the Lord Jesus.
So being in the ark is the picture of the rapture; God is commanding Noah to get into the ark because he was righteous. It is the same as Lot, the bible says God rescued the righteous Lot from the temptations in Sodom. Noah was also rescued from temptations and called into the ark which I said it was the picture of our Lord Jesus because he was righteous. When the floods were finished, God said, “Go out of the ark, you and your wife, and your sons and your sons’ wives with you” (Genesis 8:16). Noah was brought to the land after the floods, so even us after the 7 years of tribulations we will return to this earth, but then it will be new.
In the days of Lot, this is what happened, “So it came to pass, when they had brought them outside, that he said, ‘Escape for your life! Do not look behind you nor stay anywhere in the plain. Escape to the mountains, lest you be destroyed” (Genesis 19:17). The angels’ command was for Lot and his family to go up to the mountains and as they go, they should not look behind. This is because the Lord did not want them to see judgement but focus on Him. The one who saw the overthrow never lived to tell the tale; that is Lot’s wife because she became a pillar of salt.
Only Abraham saw what happened because the bible says he woke up early and went to the place where he spoke with God and looked down and saw the overthrow. Lot was raptured and his wife was left behind because of curiosity. Some people have the propensity to question what comes from the authority, or even parents, Lot’s wife learnt the hard way. Whenever the Lord says something to us, we must know that He says it because He wants what is best for us, so as the parents to their children.
This is why Paul said, “Set your mind on things above, not on things on the earth. For you died, and your life is hidden with Christ in God” (Colossians 3:2-3). The Lord does not want us to focus on the things of the world and on our flesh. He wants us to focus on Him alone. On the day of judgement, we will be heaven, and as you can see, the Lord does not want us to see the judgement since we are redeemed and we are not part of it.
What will happen is this, let us read, “For the Lord Himself will descend from heaven with a shout, with the voice of an archangel, and with the trumpet of God. And the dead in Christ will rise first. Then we who are alive and remain shall be caught up together with them in the clouds to meet the Lord in the air. And thus we shall always be with the Lord. Therefore comfort one another with these words” (1 Thessalonians 4:16-18).
Paul says we must comfort one another with these words and not trying to scare one another. The preaching of the rapture or the coming of Jesus should not be used to cause panic among believers.
So as I said earlier, Abraham is on the Mount Moriah, sacrificing Isaac his only son in Genesis 22, and after this event, the bible says, “So Abraham returned to his young men, and they rose and went together to Beersheba; and Abraham dwelt at Beersheba” (Genesis 22:19).
The Holy Spirit only records Abraham and his young men without mentioning Isaac his son. Why? The reason is that, on Mount Moriah, according to the Lord, Isaac is dead. We know that the Lord showed Abraham the ram caught in thicket by its horns and Abraham took it and made it his burnt offering. Now, since I have just said that Isaac is as good as dead in the sight of God, in Genesis 23, his name doesn’t appear until in Genesis 24. I say there is a significant reason why this is happening.
Remember that I said Abraham was the picture of God and Isaac the picture of Jesus. Now, here in Genesis 24, we find Abraham sending out his servant on a request to find a wife for Isaac. If Isaac is the picture of Jesus, then the wife which is the bride is the picture of the church. Now, the church has to be mobilised and gathered by the Holy Spirit for the Lord’s Day. When the church is gathered, it will go and meet with the Lord Jesus who is the Groom. It is as Paul said in the above that we will meet the Lord in the air and we will always be with the Lord.
After we are raptured, there will be 7 years of tribulation before the return of Jesus. When He comes down to rule, the bible says “...And He Himself will rule them with a rod of iron...” (Revelation 19:15). Jesus will rule and rectify instantly all the wrongs and the world will be in full knowledge of Him. So what will happen during the 7 years of tribulations? First of all, we will not be here we who believe in the finished works of our Lord Jesus Christ. However, the Lord have commanded the angels to put on the seal and seal up 144 000 from the 12 tribes of Israel.
Here is what happened, “Then I saw another angel ascending from the east, having the seal of the living God. And he cried with a loud voice to the four angels to whom it was granted to harm the earth and the sea, saying, ‘Do not harm the earth, the sea, or the trees till we have sealed the servants of our God on their foreheads.’ And I heard the number of those who were sealed. One hundred and forty-four thousand of all the tribes of the tribes of Israel were sealed” (Revelation 7:2-4).
These are the evangelists who will be raised for the purpose of preaching the gospel during the 7 years of tribulations. These servants will be on earth during these difficult days and they will be fortified and sealed with the seal of God lest they are harmed. Those days will be difficult because God will be revenging and at the same time will still be expecting people to repent from their wrongdoings. Now, these tribes are 11 children of Jacob and his grandson Manasseh.
Who is removed from the tribes and why? It is Dan and he was replaced Manasseh the younger son of Joseph. Dan fell out as it was foreseen by Jacob his father that Dan shall be serpent by the way. Let us learn something about the grace of God; Joseph had two sons namely Ephraim the older son and Manasseh the younger one. Joseph, the son of Jacob, asked his father to bless his two sons, guess what Jacob did. Joseph placed these sons in order in front of his father, Ephraim on right hand of Jacob and Manasseh on the left.
Jacob crossed his hands to bless the younger Manasseh with the blessing of the older son Ephraim. Joseph told his father that he is making a mistake, but Jacob told Joseph that he knew what he was doing and he blessed Manasseh to be a great nation. The hands of Jacob, as he crossed them to bless Joseph’s sons, they are the picture of the cross and through the cross; we receive what we don’t deserve. When Jesus died on the crossed, He unlocked the blessings which we didn’t deserve them to come on us. We are hopelessly and irreversibly saved through the cross by His grace.
Brethren, we are going up to be with our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ, and when we are raptured, we have to give thanks to Jesus and not ourselves, or any human being for that matter. Jesus is coming to His church and He will charge His angels to precipitate judgement on earth until they repent. The Lord Jesus said, “But he who endures to the end shall be saved. And this gospel of the kingdom will be preached in all the world as a witness to all the nations, and then the will come” (Matthew 24:13-14).
So those who will endure, and the word endure in the Greek is hypoménō which means to stay under (behind) or remain literally to be alive. This is to say that those who will be alive (hypoménō) will be saved. In other words, He was saying he who will stay behind shall be saved. The Lord is referring to those who won’t make it when He comes to rapture the church. According to the book of Revelation, these people who will be left behind will refuse to accept the Lord during the plagues which will be precipitated by the angels until towards the end of the 7 years of tribulations.
Amid these plagues, during the 7 years of tribulations there will be servants of the Lord, the 144 000 sealed from the 12 tribes of Israel. These 144 000 sealed will be preaching the gospel to the remnant of the population that they may repent. The bible records these people that they will harden their hearts and they will refuse to believe on the Lord instead they will blaspheme the Lord. The bible, “And the men were scorched with great heat, they blasphemed the name of God who has power over these plagues; and they did not repent and give Him glory” (Revelation 16:6).
My dear reader, you don’t have wait until the 7 years of tribulations to repent, you can accept Jesus now and be ready for the rapture. What I did not mention here is that, many people will die during this period of the 7 years of tribulations and the angels will be hurling plagues upon the earth. What if you die unrepentant? I want to lead you now in a prayer to accept Jesus in your life and be saved. Ready? Let’s go: “Father I thank You, for Your amazing and unending love, that You showed when You gave Your Son, to die my death, Father I am not perfect, and yet You love me, now I am fully Yours, through the blood of Your Son Jesus, I thank You Father, Jesus Christ is my Lord, my Redeemer and my Saviour, for eternity, thank You Father, for Your love and grace, amen.”
My friend, this prayer has qualified you to be a new creation in God the Father through Jesus Christ, now act like a new creation, the old man is dead and gone. Jesus Christ is your Lord, act forgiven, and act heavenly and believe that little by little, the Holy Spirit will work on your character. I like to say, ‘Do not put pressure on yourself because you will not reach that level whereby everyone sees a child of God in you.’
Stay in health through grace and favour
Comments
Post a Comment