Let’s ponder what Scripture says about the ongoing war mentioned in our title. There are many conflicting views and opinions that offer a variety of explanations. Our generation has inherited many from previous eras and it continues to invent more of its own.
This confuses, discourages and greatly hampers sincere seekers of Ultimate Truth. Who can we trust? Who should we believe? Who is right? Who is wrong? And how can we know? Myriads of voices, causes and movements bombard us continually. They clamor for our allegiance and say things that appear to be true, but they say and do other things that conflict and those discrepancies undermine their credibility. So what are Truth Seekers to do? How can you sort what is right and good from what is false and evil? And what about those who have been called by God’s living Word to follow Him? Once you decide to follow and obey Him, do any other choices remain open to you?
“Then God said, ‘Let there be Light’; and there was Light. God saw that the Light was good; and God separated the Light from the Darkness.” (Genesis 1:3-4 Emphasis added.)
Obviously, sincere people that value and desire Truth and personal integrity will ultimately have to follow their consciences. But even then, more questions remain:
How was your conscience formed? What input went into its formation? What is your ultimate source of information and guidance? What is its origin? Which of the many gods have you chosen to serve, and why? From what source does your understanding of your personal god, or gods, originate? Is there, among the many possibilities, a God that is real and authentic; or are there several gods? And if there is only one…which one is it…and how can we know?
Only One Ultimate Source of Truth
These are questions with which all humans, even atheists, have to wrestle. The ultimate source of information, wisdom, truth and direction we choose for ourselves, will determine how we see ourselves and the world and life in general. It will determine our standards of right and wrong and whether or not we believe in objective truth or in relativism. Our ultimate source of truth determines whether or not we think we have an intelligent, meaningful identity, purpose and destiny given to us by some ‘higher power,’ or whether we’re just products of random, impersonal, meaningless phenomena that occur in the cosmos. The data to which we expose ourselves repeatedly will form our conscience and produce our results in this world, and in the one to come. If it is based on Real Truth…fine; but if it’s based on lies and deception –then what?
Committed disciples of Yeshua believe that He is God’s Eternal Word made flesh. They also believe that the Bible is God’s written Word and that it reveals the nature, significance and activity of God’s living Word. So for the Word’s committed disciples, the choices narrow down to only one. Among all available possibilities displayed in the enormous Religious and Philosophical Buffet, disciples exclusively submit to and embrace the God revealed in the Bible. To us, He is the only true God and so we love, honor and obey Him alone. For us, ‘The Big Religious Buffet’ is not an option.
Many reject the Bible and the God of Israel. So they ridicule and hold us in contempt. Many will hate and violently oppose us. But our God forbids us from allowing ourselves to be pulled into their destructive trap. Hatred, strife and violence are not signs that our Redeemer lives within us. They are symptoms of people that are decapitated…people who operate in the state of ‘living death’. Their ‘fruit’ reveals them to be the image and likeness of the Serpent!
But God’s Word commands His disciples to obey, serve and embody Him! And that is impossible to do unless – He is free to live and operate in and through us. Read Isaiah 55 with this in mind and you’ll see this dynamic revealed between the lines. When God’s Word actually lives and operates in and through us, His Life works in us and He obeys and fulfills God’s commands through us. That’s the only way God’s supernatural requirements can be met by human beings whose thoughts and ways differ so radically from His:
“For My thoughts are not your thoughts, nor are your ways My ways,” declares the Lord. For as the heavens are higher than the earth, so are My ways higher than your ways and My thoughts than your thoughts.” (Isaiah 55:8-9)
“Bless those who persecute you; bless and do not curse. Rejoice with those who rejoice, and weep with those who weep. Be of the same mind toward one another; do not be haughty in mind, but associate with the lowly. Do not be wise in your own estimation. Never pay back evil for evil to anyone. Respect what is right in the sight of all men. If possible, so far as it depends on you, be at peace with all men. Never take your own revenge, beloved, but leave room for the wrath of God, for it is written, ‘Vengeance is Mine, I will repay,’ says the Lord. ‘But if your enemy is hungry, feed him, and if he is thirsty, give him a drink; for in so doing you will heap burning coals on his head.’ Do not be overcome by evil, but overcome evil with good.” (Romans 12:14-21)
Our God says: ‘Vengeance is Mine! I am the Judge! I will deal with evildoers in My own way and time.’ And because our fallen, Sin-corrupted human flesh is not equipped and competent to know all there is to know and discern and judge between what is good and evil, we must all defer to the Authority of God’s living Word, Yeshua. Only He can reconcile the world to God, and God to the world. And so disciples must be trained to allow Him to love, obey and honor God through their spirits, souls and bodies.
So Word of the Lord must be free to deal with our personal enemies, through us! We are to allow Him to love them just as we want Him to love us! Only our Master, operating in and through us could fulfill such exalted levels of righteousness. For us, God’s commandments are always supernatural and beyond our reach.
So, if we learn to allow God’s living Word to obey and fulfill God’s written Word from within us, He enables us to be at peace with all men. His Holy Spirit is given to abide within us and makes it possible for God’s Word to fulfill the commandments through us. So for us, whether the rest of the world agrees or not, every word that comes from the mouth of our God is objective Truth to us. And what He requires of us is always the target with which our thoughts, choices, actions, reactions and interactions in daily life must always coincide. We must allow God’s living Word to fulfill the written Word from within our flesh and in our name. This level of Messiah-Life is the only option open to us once we decide to obey and abide with our Master as His disciples.
The Follow Me Disciple Family believes, embraces and proclaims the God of the Bible.
We believe His revelation is what God commissions us to study, absorb and embody. That’s why our material is so specialized and limited in scope. We focus on our Master and ponder and meditate upon and train ourselves to absorb and embody Him. He is our indwelling Lord and Life. So we learn to rely on and draw from His perfect nature and Holy Spirit and Righteousness. He is the Power that works in and through us.
So our mission is not to focus on other people and their faults and errors. We are not here to argue or criticize those we consider to be wrong. Our job is to remain focused on our God and draw continually whatever Good is needed from Him and demonstrate the results to anyone that may be around us. We learn to allow our Lord to obey His Father’s commandments and live by His ways from within us, in our name. What is revealed in the Bible about Him must be clearly evident and manifested through the flesh of His obedient, crucified, Spirit-empowered disciples.
We admit that like all other humans, we are very limited in what we can see and perceive and grasp from how much there is to know in this vast universe. Most of what is out there is far beyond our awareness and intellectual grasp. There is too much for our minds to comprehend. But despite our limitations, we can still choose to love, serve, understand and obey our God as well as we can, no matter what the cost or consequences may be. People who disagree seek and follow other sources of information and direct their lives accordingly. But we believe and accept the revelation of the Bible. So this ministry serves and assists like-minded people by providing pertinent material and as much personal support as possible.
So ponder the Book of Exodus with all this in mind. And realize that the same issues we struggle with in the twenty first century are the issues that Genesis and Exodus deal with. We struggle with the very same things over which the generations of Moses and the pharaoh contested. The conflict between Light vs. Darkness is always the issue. Styles, venues, faces and ‘uniforms’ change; but beneath the externals the same war that God revealed in Genesis still rages today…the war between God’s Word and the Serpent that always tries to erase Him from our minds and hearts and usurp His place as supreme lord of Creation.
God and the Serpent are pure spirits. So in the dimension of time, space and physical creation, the Word of God and the word of the Serpent need physical bodies through which to reveal and fulfill their plans and purposes. And Scripture reveals that the Serpent has ‘hijacked’ God’s intended image and likeness, the human race, for his own purposes. He managed to destroy our true humanity and continually strives to ‘morph’ all men and women into his Sin-loving image and likeness. So realize that God’s living Word is speaking through Moses and Aaron; and the Serpent is manipulating, deceiving and speaking through…the pharaoh of Egypt. If you see their conflict in that light, you’ll see what Genesis and Exodus are really saying to the human race. Those books are packed with tremendous depths of understanding and insight into the agonizing realities of our human condition. They explain clearly and simply what is wrong with our world and its people and how we got that way and why we struggle so mightily to survive amid all the deficiencies, injustices, dysfunctions, pain, suffering, outrages and the inevitable death that none of us can escape.
Israel, Chosen by God
And as we ponder these monumental things, one unique revelation concerning God and His ways, progressively emerges. It is an inescapable reality that often sticks in the craw of this fallen world. It is the issue of Israel…the sovereign choice God made to set this people aside to serve His unique purpose on behalf of the rest of the world. This issue continually drives the rest of the world to fits of jealousy, resentment and bitter opposition. It escalates the war between God’s Word and the Serpent to a fever pitch. That’s why Israel always bears the brunt of the Serpent’s venomous, malicious animosity, more than any other group. The Serpent hates her because of the inescapable danger and ultimate doom she represents to him and all that serve his agendas. It is a war to the death.
We can see this as we follow the events that took place when Moses was sent to confront the pharaoh of Egypt on behalf of God’s Chosen People. And we see that it is still happening in our generation. We too will all be caught up in the shock waves of the combat that is revealed in the books of Genesis and Exodus. There’s no way any of us can escape involvement with this conflict. It is everywhere. So we have no choice but to cling to our living God with all our hearts and to respect, believe and follow His living Word and do as He commands, no matter what it costs.
We all need God’s wisdom, discernment and sustaining power to keep us securely within the boundaries of His Truth. And we always need God’s Holy Spirit to empower us to ‘love our neighbors as ourselves’, just as God commands. And if it’s true that we are entering the era the Bible calls the ‘birth pangs’ of the ‘Last Days,’ it’s time to become more diligent than ever in learning and abiding by God’s Truth concerning this inescapable issue over Israel that the Book of Exodus unpacks.
Israel is an offense and a stumbling block to anyone that rejects the God of the Bible. She is like a ‘red cape’ waving before angry bulls in an arena. Whenever Israel ‘waves’, murderous rage and violence surely follow. This anger and violence originated in the Garden of Eden where the war between God’s living Word and the Serpent is first revealed. It is a ‘War of the Words’…the Word of God vs. the word of the Serpent. Scripture calls God’s Living Word ‘The Light of the World,’ (John 8:12) and the Serpent is called, ‘The Father of Lies’ (John 8:44). The Serpent wars against God’s Word and His Kingdom of Light; and the Word wars against the Serpent’s works in the Kingdom of Darkness. The Serpent’s rebellion, animosity and jealously are perpetually attacking the Authority and glorious Preeminence of God’s living Word. Satan lusts after the Messiah’s Authority and Preeminence and seeks to commandeer them for his own self-adoring purposes.
The Serpent’s vendetta against God’s Beloved
Imagine then…the Serpent’s rage and animosity against any human who dares to side with God’s living and written Word and opposes his dark agendas and initiatives. If you never thought about this before…do it now. Imagine what the Serpent must have thought when God chose to bring Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and their entire family of physical and spiritual descendants into the Eternal Blood Covenant that He made with His own living Word…even before Creation took place…even before the Serpent was created! How must it feel to the one that slaves to find ways to take God’s place, when he sees God elevate humans above him and blesses them with a rank and status that go far beyond anything he could ever manage to usurp for himself? How does he feel each time the Messiah of Israel cuts through his coils and frees people he has worked so hard to captivate and enslave?
The Serpent knows that if Israel survives and succeeds in her God-given task, her Messiah will hasten his eternal undoing! Abraham’s Family was the ‘womb’ the spiritual, physical, mental and emotional matrix from which the perfect Humanity of God’s living Word emerged! And the Word promised that He would appear as ‘The Seed of the Woman’…to crush the Serpent’s head!
God commissioned His Word to serve as His Captain, ‘The Captain of the Lord’s Hosts.’ God sent Israel’s Messiah to hunt down the Serpent and destroy every trace and vestige of his domain. And since the Word has become one with Israel, and Israel is one with Him, the Serpent hates and fears them both with a passion.
“Little children, make sure no one deceives you; the one who practices righteousness is righteous, just as He is righteous; the one who practices sin is of the devil; for the devil has sinned from the beginning. The Son of God appeared for this purpose, to destroy the works of the devil. No one who is born of God practices sin, because His seed abides in him; and he cannot sin, because he is born of God.” (1 John 3:7-9 Emphasis added.)
Can you imagine the Serpent’s terror and rage when God began to progressively reveal these things to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph and Moses? Imagine his frenzied efforts to destroy the Word’s Body on Earth! Imagine his furious jealous rage when God freely gives to Israel a share in the Preeminence, Authority and Inheritance of His living Word…which is the Preeminence he has been striving to usurp for himself since his rebellion first began! He strives to usurp it…but God freely gives it to these humans and places them far above him!
The Preeminence, Authority and Honor that God bestowed on His living Word is the ‘Wedding Garment’ by which He also covers His Son’s Bride…the True Israel. And the thought of that continually causes the Serpent to writhe and contort with frustration, jealousy and murderous rage:
“Now then, if you will indeed obey My voice and keep My covenant, then you shall be My own possession among all the peoples, for all the earth is Mine; and you shall be to Me a kingdom of priests and a holy nation.’ These are the words that you shall speak to the sons of Israel. So Moses came and called the elders of the people, and set before them all these words which the Lord had commanded him. “All the people answered together and said, ‘All that the Lord has spoken we will do!”. (Exodus 19:5-8)
God gave the above proposal to Moses to convey to the nation of Israel before He delivered her from the Serpent’s clutches in Egypt. In effect, God’s living Word was saying to Israel: “Marry Me!” Everyone that God brings into His personal service is intended to become one with His Eternal Light – the Word. That’s why God continually calls Israel His ‘Bride.’ And this is what the Book of Revelation alludes to with the terms, ‘Marriage of the Lamb’ (19:7) and, ‘the Bride of the Lamb’ (21:9). In Exodus, God proposed Blood Covenant Marriage to Israel! He offered the same living relationship He entered into with Abraham, to all of Abraham’s descendants! So when Israel’s elders accepted His proposal, God’s Word and God’s Chosen People were ‘engaged’ or ‘betrothed.’ (We elaborate on this in two other articles listed on this website entitled ‘God’s Disciple Training’ 1 & 2). And after that, there was no way the Serpent was able to keep his hold on them.
The Bridegroom’s Proposal
So what was God’s Word proposing when He selected Israel to be His ‘priestly nation?’ In our opinion, we can gain insight into His “Marry Me” proposal by realizing that God’s Word says essentially the same thing when He says to us, “Follow Me!” He calls His disciples to become part of His True Israel! Originally, He called Israel to be His disciple nation. And this call was not just for one ethnic group of people, it was a call to each individual Jewish and non-Jewish person God ever created. All of mankind is to become one with God’s True Israel…and partake of the same Blood Covenant ‘oneness’ He entered into with Abraham. It means that all Jewish and non-Jewish disciples are to transform into the image and likeness of God’s living Word and to embody Him, as He lives His Life through them and perfectly satisfies God’s commands, in their name. In this way, all mankind can become His true ‘image and likeness.’ God’s True Israel is first; she gets grafted into God’s Eternal Covenant Root, the Word…and then the rest of the world is to be ‘grafted’ into God’s True Israel.
This is the interactive disciple-life relationship God’s people are commissioned and expected to have with God’s living Word. In this way, the Word that comes from the mouth of God can set the entire human race free from the coils of the Serpent. The Serpent knows this full well! So he takes a maniacally hostile view of God’s Word…and His Bride Israel…and any human who dares to begin to follow Him on the Exodus path that leads them away from the clutches of his demonic coils.
The Bible reveals that the pharaoh of Egypt and Moses, were participants on opposite sides of the war that rages between God’s Light and the Serpent’s Darkness. God sent Moses to the Pharaoh who, in his unwitting service to the Serpent, was assisting his demonic master by holding the Chosen People captive. If he managed to keep them as his perpetual slaves, forced to make bricks and gather straw for his purposes, they would have no time or energy left to obey God and fulfill the commission He had given them for the salvation of the world. So Pharaoh was not really serving himself and fulfilling his own agendas. He was being manipulated by the Serpent and his powers of Darkness to put up as much resistance to God’s Word and His chosen people and the Salvation that would come from them, as possible.
Israel is one with God’s Word. She is His Bride! She is to live as one with God’s Light to the Gentiles. He is the Light that invades the realm of the Prince of Darkness. From conception, the children of the First Adam have the wrong head on their shoulders – the Serpent. And in relation to the incredibly beautiful universe that God has created, the Serpent is the epitome of Destruction. He initiated that destruction…but…in his insane quest to destroy the work of God’s hands…he destroyed himself and destroys every other creature around which he manages to keep his coils.
So Israel is God’s instrument of revelation, reconciliation, redemption, regeneration and Full Restoration. Her success will mean death to the human state of Death that comes from Sin. So Death and Darkness which constitute the realm in which the Serpent lurks and over which he dominates…are marshaled to resist and oppose the invasion of God’s Word…and His Bride.
When God’s Word is free to live as one with God-chosen Israel, He becomes Israel’s Head as well as her Eternal Life and Inheritance and Wisdom, Redemption and Righteousness! Then He is free to obey His Father in her name and manifest His Perfection in her daily life! His Light fills her and radiates out of her. And He can invade, expose and dispel the Darkness. He chases Darkness out of human minds and replaces it with His Light. And through His beloved Israel and her faithful obedient testimony…He can reach the many still-fallen victims of the Serpent.
Disciple Job Description
This is the job description of an ‘image and likeness’ of God which is another way of saying, ‘disciple of God’s Word’…which is another way of saying…‘Israel.’ The True Israel is God’s prophet-nation, commissioned to live, embody and proclaim the Truth which is the living and written Word of God. Her task is essential for humanity’s salvation. That’s why the office of a prophet of Israel is such a serious matter. We can gain insight into how important it is when we consider the following text in which God’s Word commissions Ezekiel to warn Israel that she is failing once again to fulfill her purpose as God’s prophet to the nations (Gentiles) of the world. He warns Ezekiel that if he fails to warn Israel of her dereliction of that duty, God will hold him responsible for the punishment she will receive.
In the same way, Israel is called to be God’s prophet nation to the other nations. If she fails to do her duty, the blood of the world will be on her hands. Thus we can see the importance of the prophetic ‘job description.’ And that reveals how important the salvation of the world is to God:
“At the end of seven days the word of the Lord came to me, saying, ‘Son of man, I have appointed you a watchman to the house of Israel; whenever you hear a word from My mouth, warn them from Me. When I say to the wicked, ‘You will surely die,’ and you do not warn him or speak out to warn the wicked from his wicked way that he may live, that wicked man shall die in his iniquity, but his blood I will require at your hand. Yet if you have warned the wicked and he does not turn from his wickedness or from his wicked way, he shall die in his iniquity; but you have delivered yourself. Again, when a righteous man turns away from his righteousness and commits iniquity, and I place an obstacle before him, he will die; since you have not warned him, he shall die in his sin, and his righteous deeds which he has done shall not be remembered; but his blood I will require at your hand. However, if you have warned the righteous man that the righteous should not sin and he does not sin, he shall surely live because he took warning; and you have delivered yourself.” (Ezekiel 3:16-21 Emphasis added.)
As God’s prophet to the nations, Israel must always choose between the fear of Almighty God, who sends her to warn the decapitated world of the Judgment to come…and the fear of the decapitated world that is being manipulated by the Serpent to seek her destruction in order to extinguish the Light of the World forever. And this is the same issue all disciples of God’s living and written Word that are grafted into her must face. If they do not do their God-given jobs, the world will perish; but the blood of the world will be on their hands. So whenever God appoints someone to be His emissary and spokesperson on behalf of someone else, eternal salvation is at stake and nothing is more important to God than that!
God’s Fullness, including His Light, is contained within His living Word. When you deal with the Word, you’re dealing with God, who sent His Word to you. The Word comes to abide in and live through His disciples. And through them, He can reach out to the decapitated world that is deceived and dominated by the Serpent and does not yet know Him. Through disciples, the Word is revealed. He radiates out from His disciples and ‘lights’ the way for the rest of mankind. He destroys the Darkness that acts as humanity’s ‘death shroud.’ This is how God has chosen to reach out to every fallen child of Adam. They are all created to be His Word’s image and likeness, to become just like the disciples that He sends into their midst. So God’s Jewish and non-Jewish Chosen People are the faithful Remnant of the human race that serves God in each generation. They are His True Israel. And the Serpent despises and fears and never stops trying to destroy them. What he tries to do to the Head…He also tries to do to His Body.
“A disciple is not above his teacher, nor a slave above his master. It is enough for the disciple that he become like his teacher and the slave like his master. If they have called the head of the house Beelzebul, how much more will they malign the members of his household! Therefore do not fear them, for there is nothing concealed that will not be revealed, or hidden that will not be known. What I tell you in the darkness, speak in the light; and what you hear whispered in your ear, proclaim upon the housetops. Do not fear those who kill the body but are unable to kill the soul; but rather fear Him who is able to destroy both soul and body in hell…
…He who receives you receives Me; and he who receives Me receives Him who sent Me. He who receives a prophet in the name of a prophet shall receive a prophet’s reward; and he who receives a righteous man in the name of a righteous man shall receive a righteous man’s reward.” (Matthew 10:24-28; 40-41)
“Jesus said to her (a Samaritan woman), ‘Woman, believe Me, an hour is coming when neither in this mountain nor in Jerusalem will you worship the Father. You worship what you do not know; we worship what we know, for salvation is from the Jews. But an hour is coming, and now is, when the true worshipers will worship the Father in spirit and truth; for such people the Father seeks to be His worshipers. God is spirit, and those who worship Him must worship in spirit and truth.” (John 4:21-24 Amplification and emphasis added.)
Those who are blessed and honored to live as disciples in Israel’s New Covenant era know that to worship the Father in Spirit and Truth means that true Israelite disciples of God’s living Word no longer live or think or act, react and interact in a ‘decapitated’ state, nor do they think or perceive from their former decapitated, radically independent perspectives. God’s living Word is their True Head and Life. He is their King, and they serve as His Kingdom on Earth. He is here to fulfill God’s perfectly Perfect Standards of Righteousness, perfectly, in their name. He is their True Eternal Life and they are His True Embodiment on Earth. They do everything together, as one.
The time of the Word’s marital Fulfillment and Consummation with Israel His Bride will come as soon as all the Gentiles that are going to allow God to save them, have heard and obeyed His summons to Salvation. Then, all of Israel, Jewish and non-Jewish alike, will receive her full salvation. All Israel will be saved and established in her place of honor. And the full Consummation of her union with God’s living Word will take place. It will be like the dry bones of the dead suddenly reassembling and rising into Eternal Life:
So I prophesied as I was commanded; and as I prophesied, there was a noise, and behold, a rattling; and the bones came together, bone to its bone. And I looked, and behold, sinews were on them, and flesh grew and skin covered them; but there was no breath in them. Then He said to me, ‘Prophesy to the breath (in Hebrew, ‘Ruach’ or ‘Spirit’) prophesy, Son of Man, and say to the Breath, ‘Thus says the Lord God, “Come from the four winds, O Breath, and breathe on these slain, that they come to Life.”’
“So I prophesied as He commanded me, and the Breath came into them, and they came to Life and stood on their feet, an exceedingly great Army. Then He said to me, ‘Son of Man, these bones are the whole house of Israel; behold, they say, ‘Our bones are dried up and our hope has perished. We are completely cut off.’ Therefore prophesy and say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God, “Behold, I will open your graves and cause you to come up out of your graves, My people; and I will bring you into the land of Israel. Then you will know that I am the Lord, when I have opened your graves and caused you to come up out of your graves, My People. I will put My Spirit within you and you will come to Life, and I will place you on your own Land. Then you will know that I, the Lord, have spoken and done it,” declares the Lord.’” (Ezekiel 37:7-14)
“For if their rejection is the reconciliation of the world, what will their acceptance be but life from the dead?” (Romans 11:15)
So as you follow the story of Moses and see what is at stake in the story of the downtrodden Israelite slaves God’s Word led out of Egypt, you can’t help but marvel and shudder at the impossibility of the task and destiny God had set before them. How could such Sin-corrupted, weak, disenfranchised people, living in such a hostile, unfavorable world, possibly fulfill such a commission? How can any child of Adam that is caught in the living death brought about by Sin accomplish anything that such a Perfect, Holy God would require? The answer is: they can’t!
The Dry Bones Live… in Him!
So we must realize that God is not giving all those commands and responsibilities to a pile of dead, dry bones. He’s giving it to the Head of those bones…His living Word…the Son of Man. He is the True Israel…Messiah and Covenant Representative and Eternal High Priest that stands for all the rest! He must be the Life that surges throughout those dead bones. Only He has the Authority and Holy Spirit creative Power to transform the dead into His living, revivified members. If His Resurrection Life cannot freely be transmitted into them by God’s Holy Spirit, they will remain dead bones and the Head will not have them as living members of His Body. And that state of decapitation is what the Serpent strives to perpetuate in as many people as possible.
So when Father addresses the Israelite slaves, He is really addressing and commanding His living Word, their intended Head. Only the Word can obey and fulfill His Father’s commands through the obedient faith of His members. He must do everything on their behalf, and in their name. And because His living Word and Israel are betrothed and have become one in His Eternal Covenant, the Head will be forever faithful to her and no matter how many times she may fail and how hopeless things between them may seem…He will be with her always, to do the impossible on her behalf until the fullness of God’s timing! And so Israel must learn to rest and abide in His Perfection…and receive everything from Him continually…and see herself as completely one with Him at all times. (You can see God’s Perfect Faithfulness to His very imperfect Israel revealed in the book of Hosea. What happened for Gomer through Hosea…is what has to happen for Israel through Yeshua, her Messiah.)
Scripture is always highlighting the Head…not the dead bones. Without Him, the potential members of His Body can do nothing. Everything is about Him. But He must actually be free to connect the bones to Himself. Only the Head can share His Life with the Body. Those who are not part of His True Body remain decapitated and spiritually dead. The Head has come to recover His human image and likeness. And He was sent to Israel first. The Word’s salvation campaign starts with them. That is why the Serpent incessantly tries to find ways to keep them decapitated and dead. If he can do that, he can keep his coils firmly positioned around the whole world!
Genesis begins to reveal the story that will reach its climax and fulfillment at the end of human history. The Book of Revelation focuses on that climactic, final showdown era between Light and Darkness. But in Genesis (3:15) God reveals the beginning, the Seed of that Fulfillment. The Seed is His Eternal Word that He commissioned to be the Eternal Covenant Representative for the whole human race. And in Genesis, God’s Word brings Abraham and his Family into that Eternal Covenant and God’s living Word ‘marries them.’ Then in Exodus, He comes to rescue their enslaved descendants invites them to renew and confirm the Covenant of Abraham with Him so that the work of World Salvation can continue into every future generation. God commissions Abraham’s physical and spiritual descendants to be a national prophetic revelation of His Truth among all other nations and generations. And this is why the revelation of God’s living Word…through His Chosen People Israel…is the Eternal Issue with which the whole world must contend. And as long as the Serpent remains ‘the god of this world,’ the issue of Israel will continually stick in the craw of the decapitated people he dominates. And God will continue to force the issue by sending His True Israel and the Light He commissioned her to reflect…to invade the Serpent’s realms of Darkness.
“…I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great; and so you shall be a blessing; and I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.” (Genesis 12:2-3)
“Behold, I send you out as sheep in the midst of wolves; so be shrewd as serpents and innocent as doves. But beware of men, for they will hand you over to the courts and scourge you in their synagogues; and you will even be brought before governors and kings for My sake, as a testimony to them and to the Gentiles. But when they hand you over, do not worry about how or what you are to say; for it will be given you in that hour what you are to say. For it is not you who speak, but it is the Spirit of your Father who speaks in you.” (Matthew 10:16-20)
Can you see how serious and far-reaching this is? And can you see how responsible the Gentile world will be to God for the way they respond to His Chosen People and the Messiah that emerged from her womb? Whatever happens in and to individual Israelites in eternity…will depend on how they have received and responded to God’s living Word while they lived in time and space. But that’s between God and His Chosen People. Apart from those individual personal considerations that exist between God and His Bride, Israel the nation is commissioned to serve as God’s instrument for the revelation of His Word…and to be a positive or negative revelation and warning to all the other nations of the world. The world must learn about the true, living God of Abraham and His ways and requirements through His prophet nation, Israel. By seeing what happens to her as she interacts with her God (obediently or disobediently), the world can know what to expect when the Day of Judgment arrives. If they receive Israel and learn from her, men can know Israel’s God and His ways and what their true state before Him really is. God will reveal Himself to them through Israel, and warn and show them what has to happen before He will be able to save them.
“He who is not with Me is against Me; and he who does not gather with Me, scatters.” (Luke 11:23)
This isn’t a matter of ethnicity or natural family ties. Nor is it essentially about the secular, worldly political state of Israel. This is about how fallen, Sin-corrupted Jewish and non-Jewish flesh responds to God’s living and written Word. True Israel is truly one with God’s living Word. Together, the Word and His Bride obey Father’s commandments and carry out His orders on Earth:
“While He was still speaking to the crowds, behold, His mother and brothers were standing outside, seeking to speak to Him. Someone said to Him, ‘Behold, Your (natural Jewish) mother and Your (natural Jewish) brothers are standing outside seeking to speak to You.’ But Jesus (God’s living Word made flesh) answered the one who was telling Him and said, ‘Who is My mother and who are My brothers?’ And stretching out His hand toward His disciples, He said, ‘Behold My mother and My brothers! For whoever does the will of My Father who is in heaven, he is My brother and sister and mother!” (Matthew 12:46-50 Amplification and emphasis added.)
“So husbands ought also to love their own wives as their own bodies. He who loves his own wife loves himself; for no one ever hated his own flesh, but nourishes and cherishes it, just as Christ also does the Church (God’s Blood Covenant Family), because we are members of His Body. For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother and shall be joined to his wife, and the two shall become one flesh. This mystery is great; but I am speaking with reference to Christ and the Church.” (Ephesians 5:28-32 Emphasis added.)
The Prophetic Significance of Israel
Because Israel is God’s special prophetic instrument of revelation, reconciliation and salvation, she is God’s ‘ambassador,’ His ‘emissary nation,’ to the world. It is clearly understood among nations that when an emperor or king sends his personal emissary to another ruler and his nation, that ambassador is to be regarded and treated as if he or she were actually the ruler that they represent. The response and treatment given to ambassadors is considered to be done personally to the kings or emperors and commonwealths that sent them. This is a great example of the blood covenant mentality and viewpoint. Whatever happens to the covenant representative, happens to everyone he represents. And whatever happens to those who are represented happens to their representative. So remember that God’s living Word is sending His betrothed Bride to speak in His Name! The Covenant principle is always in force: ‘Whatever you do to my Bride, you do to Me!’ This is the Blood Covenant mentality and spirit about which God’s living Word warns the Gentile nations concerning His Chosen People. Never forget these vitally important points:
- God’s Eternal Living Word made flesh (Yeshua the Messiah) shares Israel’s blood and DNA!
- He was conceived and born a Jew and lived as a Jew amid His people. His Sin-less human flesh was circumcised into God’s Everlasting Covenant with Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and Israel!
- So God’s living Word and the nation of Israel are considered by God to be one! And if she is one with His Word that He sent to her, then, through the Word, she is one with God Himself!
- Therefore: the way the world responds to Israel, the ‘Bride’…is the way it responds to her ‘Husband,’ the Word. And the way they respond to the Word, is the way they respond to the Father who sent the Word to become one with her:
““But when the Son of Man comes in His glory, and all the angels with Him, then He will sit on His glorious throne. All the (non-Jewish) nations will be gathered before Him; and He will separate them from one another, as the shepherd separates the sheep from the goats; and He will put the sheep on His right, and the goats on the left.
Then the King will say to those (Gentile nations) on His right, ‘Come, you who are blessed of My Father, inherit the Kingdom prepared for you from the foundation of the world. For I was hungry, and you gave Me something to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me something to drink; I was a stranger, and you invited Me in; naked, and you clothed Me; I was sick, and you visited Me; I was in prison, and you came to Me.’ Then the righteous will answer Him, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, and feed You, or thirsty, and give You something to drink? And when did we see You a stranger, and invite You in, or naked, and clothe You? When did we see You sick, or in prison, and come to You?’ The King will answer and say to them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did it to one of these (Covenant) brothers of Mine, even the least of them, you did it to Me.’
“Then He will also say to those on His left, ‘Depart from Me, accursed ones, into the eternal fire which has been prepared for the devil and his angels; for I was hungry, and you gave Me nothing to eat; I was thirsty, and you gave Me nothing to drink; I was a stranger, and you did not invite Me in; naked, and you did not clothe Me; sick, and in prison, and you did not visit Me.’ Then they themselves also will answer, ‘Lord, when did we see You hungry, or thirsty, or a stranger, or naked, or sick, or in prison, and did not take care of You?’ Then He will answer them, ‘Truly I say to you, to the extent that you did not do it to one of the least of these, you did not do it to Me.’ These will go away into eternal punishment, but the righteous into eternal life.”” (Matthew 25:31-46)
Imagine God’s living Word saying the above words to the peoples that lived around Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph and their households and you will see the significance of this awesome principle as God began to reveal it in Genesis. And this principle will continue to play out as He says these words to the people around Moses and His Israelite brethren throughout the book of Exodus and the rest of the Bible and throughout all of human history:
The Lord said to Moses, ‘When you go back to Egypt see that you perform before Pharaoh all the wonders which I have put in your power; but I will harden his heart so that he will not let the people go. Then you shall say to Pharaoh, ‘Thus says the Lord, “Israel is My son, My firstborn. So I said to you, ‘Let My son go that he may serve Me’; but you have refused to let him (My firstborn) go. Behold, I will kill your son, your firstborn.”’” (Exodus 4:21-23)
God’s living and written Word gives the world this tremendously heavy and dire warning. Implied in the above words is this: whoever refuses to hear and obey God’s voice in this regard, and continually disregards, rejects and ignores what God inspired Moses and the other sacred writers to write by way of warning…will be utterly shocked and devastated to learn that on their Day of Judgment, they will be judged according to their attitude toward and treatment of, the children of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob…and the Messiah, their Covenant Spouse (Head), whose living members God’s True Israelites are commissioned to be.
On that day, no one will be able to accuse our God of wrong-doing. They will not be able to say He didn’t warn them. The warning is clearly given in Genesis, Exodus and the rest of the Bible. It is repeated many times. God chose the family of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob to be His prophetic nation to all the other nations. So be forewarned. There is a Covenant principle underlying all of this:
Whatever you do to God’s Blood Covenant Family…you do to God Himself!
If individual Israelites do wrong, God Himself will judge them and deal with them. But as far as the rest of mankind is concerned, because Salvation can only come to them through corporate Israel…the rest of the world must always respect and regard the children of Israel as God’s special instrument of Salvation and honor and revere her accordingly. No one can take Israel’s place, for God is eternally faithful and true to His Covenant and His promises. So if you want to love and serve God, love and serve whoever is one with Him in His Covenant. And whatever you think of or do to Israel, remember that you are doing it also to God’s living Word who is one with Israel. And if you do it to God’s Word, you are doing it to the living God whose image and likeness the Word is. And God will deal with you accordingly. If you’re one with God in His Covenant…you too are Israel!
The nations of the world must heed this warning if they care about being well prepared to face God’s final Judgment prior to their entry into eternity. In God’s Kingdom, His living Word is Preeminent over all Creation. God has spoken and decreed this to be so.
“For the one who has entered His Rest has himself also rested from his works, as God did from His. Therefore let us be diligent to enter that Rest, so that no one will fall, through following the same example of disobedience. For the Word of God is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword, and piercing as far as the division of soul and spirit, of both joints and marrow, and able to judge the thoughts and intentions of the heart. And there is no creature hidden from His sight, but all things are open and laid bare to the eyes of Him with whom we have to do.” (Hebrews 4:10-13)
Anyone that dares to harm Israel is being deceived and manipulated by the Serpent and striving against Almighty God Himself! And God will deal with the Serpent and anyone who serves his vendetta against Israel:
“…I will bless those who bless you, and the one who curses you I will curse.” (Genesis 12:3a)
“It is the Lord your God who will cross ahead of you; He will destroy these nations (pagan Gentiles that oppose you) before you, and you shall dispossess them. Joshua is the one who will cross ahead of you, just as the Lord has spoken. The Lord will do to them just as He did to Sihon and Og, the kings of the Amorites, and to their land, when He destroyed them. The Lord will deliver them up before you, and you shall do to them according to all the commandments which I have commanded you. Be strong and courageous, do not be afraid or tremble at them, for the Lord your God is the one who goes with you. He will not fail you or forsake you.” (Deuteronomy 31:3-6)
God reveals this in and through His living and written Word. So those who ignore and reject God’s Word, ignore and reject the Father who sent Him. The Book of Exodus amplifies this Genesis revelation. And this is what our Master was reiterating to His True New Covenant Israelite disciples and apostles:
“You are the Light of the World. A city set on a hill cannot be hidden; nor does anyone light a lamp and put it under a basket, but on the lampstand (menorah), and it gives light to all who are in the house. Let your Light shine before men in such a way that they may see your good works (of obedience to God), and glorify your Father who is in Heaven.
“Do not think that I came to abolish the (revelation and instruction contained in the) Law (Torah) or the Prophets (the Tanach); I did not come to abolish but to fulfill. For truly I say to you, until Heaven and Earth pass away, not the smallest letter or stroke shall pass from the Law until all is accomplished.
“Whoever then annuls one of the least of these commandments, and teaches others to do the same, shall be called least in the Kingdom of Heaven; but whoever keeps and teaches them, he shall be called great in the Kingdom of Heaven. For I say to you that unless your righteousness surpasses that of the scribes and Pharisees, you will not enter the Kingdom of Heaven.” (Matthew 5:14-20 Emphasis added.)
Yeshua did not come to start anything new. He came to restore and explain and completely fulfill what He originally shared with and entrusted to Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, Joseph and Moses. The Nation of Israel was created by God to live as one with God’s living Word and to teach and impart His ways to the entire world. The Word is God’s Light. And when the Light is able to abide in and shine through his disciples, they transform and radiate Him and together, they serve as, ‘The Light of the World.’
On the other hand, the Bible warns that those who disbelieve, reject, disobey and try to replace God’s Word with other false gods…follow and serve the Serpent by default. So from this revelation, we can realize that the Serpent is hiding behind the external appearance and behavior of the pharaoh. The Serpent manipulates people like him in every generation:
“And afterward Moses and Aaron came and said to Pharaoh, “Thus says the Lord, the God of Israel, ‘Let My people go that they may celebrate a feast to Me in the wilderness.’” But Pharaoh said, ‘Who is the Lord that I should obey His voice to let Israel go? I do not know the Lord, and besides, I will not let Israel go.’
“Then they said, ‘The God of the Hebrews has met with us. Please, let us go a three days’ journey into the wilderness that we may sacrifice to the Lord our God, otherwise He will fall upon us with pestilence or with the sword.’ But the king of Egypt said to them, ‘Moses and Aaron, why do you draw the people away from their work? Get back to your labors!’ Again Pharaoh said, ‘Look, the people of the land are now many, and you would have them cease from their labors!’ So the same day Pharaoh commanded the taskmasters over the people and their foremen, saying, ‘You are no longer to give the people straw to make brick as previously; let them go and gather straw for themselves. But the quota of bricks which they were making previously, you shall impose on them; you are not to reduce any of it. Because they are lazy, therefore they cry out, ‘Let us go and sacrifice to our God.’ Let the labor be heavier on the men, and let them work at it so that they will pay no attention to false words.’” (Exodus 5:1-9 Emphasis added.)
As God told us through the writer of the Book of Ecclesiastes:
“That which has been is that which will be, and that which has been done is that which will be done. So there is nothing new under the sun. Is there anything of which one might say, ‘See this, it is new’? Already it has existed for ages which were before us. There is no remembrance of earlier things; and also of the later things which will occur, there will be for them no remembrance among those who will come later still.” (Ecclesiastes 1:9-11 Emphasis added.)
God still sends His beloved Son, to reveal Himself to each generation of fallen men and women. He speaks to them positively or negatively, as the true attitudes and conditions of their hearts require. And He presents His emissary…the living Lesson and Example of Israel. So regardless of whether Israel personally disobeys or obeys God…we must learn from her example. And, if in our ignorance and mistaken assumptions we’ve been living and acting on the wrong side of this principle, now is the time to correct our mistakes, change our attitudes, and repent of any stubborn resistance and arrogance against God’s Word that we may have been guilty of in the past. Positively or negatively, Israel is our appointed teacher. Let us learn well the lessons she has been commissioned to impart to us:
“See to it that you do not refuse Him who is speaking. For if those did not escape when they refused him who warned them on earth, much less will we escape who turn away from Him who warns from heaven. And His voice shook the earth then, but now He has promised, saying, ‘Yet once more I will shake not only the earth, but also the heaven.’ This expression, ‘Yet once more,’ denotes the removing of those things which can be shaken, as of created things, so that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. Therefore, since we receive a Kingdom which cannot be shaken, let us show gratitude, by which we may offer to God an acceptable service with reverence and awe; for our God is a consuming Fire.” (Hebrews 12:25-29 Emphasis added.)