One of the most famous Bible stories about King David concerns the time he committed adultery with Bathsheba. When Bathsheba got pregnant David tried to cover up his sin, but his attempts failed. David ultimately decided to hide what he had done by having Bathsheba’s husband (Uriah the Hittite) killed. Instead of personally killing him, though, David devised a plan to place Uriah in danger and then withdraw so that enemy forces could kill him:

2 Samuel 11:14: “And it came to pass in the morning, that David wrote a letter to Joab, and sent it by the hand of Uriah.
15 And he wrote in the letter, saying, Set ye Uriah in the forefront of the hottest battle, and retire ye from him, that he may be smitten, and die.”

It must have taken quite a lot of nerve for David to have Uriah carry his own death sentence to Joab, but that’s not what I want to focus on today. What often gets overlooked in this story is that Uriah was not just some nobody, nor was he a random soldier in David’s army. Uriah was actually an important man, and David probably knew him well.

The reason we know this is because 1 Chronicles 11 lists the mighty men of David. These were David’s special forces; they were the heroes of his army. These were great men who did great deeds. David’s mighty men were divided into two groups: there were the three superheroes, and then there was a larger group of heroes. If you read the list of heroes you will discover a very familiar name:

I Chronicles 11:41: “Uriah the Hittite, Zabad the son of Ahlai,”

There is a similar list in 2 Samuel 23, and Uriah is mentioned in 2 Samuel 23:39. Uriah, then, was not just a common soldier; he was one of David’s greatest warriors – a man of tremendous integrity, honor, and loyalty. He was one of David’s greatest servants, and David had him murdered so he could steal his wife. David wasn’t murdering some random guy; he was killing someone he knew quite well.

In the end David got what he wanted. Bathsheba became his wife, and their son Solomon sat on the throne and became the king of Israel – and part of the Messianic line. Uriah was murdered (by the very king he had spent his life serving and protecting) and lost both his wife and his life. David did get something else, though: God cursed him for the rest of his days (2 Samuel 12:10). David’s life was never the same after that. I do believe that David sincerely repented of his sin, but there was no way to undo what he had done.

There is one other component of this tragic story that I’d like to mention. Some time after David committed this sin his son Absalom launched a rebellion against him. Ahithophel, David’s trusted adviser and counselor, helped Absalom in his rebellion. It turns out that Ahithophel actually had a personal connection to what David had done. You see, Bathsheba’s father was a man named Eliam:

2 Samuel 11:3: “And David sent and enquired after the woman. And one said, Is not this Bathsheba, the daughter of Eliam, the wife of Uriah the Hittite?”

Who was Eliam’s father? Why, it was Ahithophel:

2 Samuel 23:34: “Eliphelet the son of Ahasbai, the son of the Maachathite, Eliam the son of Ahithophel the Gilonite,”

When David committed adultery with Bathsheba he was actually doing it with the granddaughter of his most trusted adviser. When he had Uriah killed he was actually murdering the husband of Ahithophel’s granddaughter. I strongly suspect that Ahithophel became very upset over what David had done, and he jumped at the chance to get his revenge. David did more than just murder one of his loyal friends; he also turned his counselor into his enemy.

Revelation 6:2: “And I saw, and behold a white horse: and he that sat on him had a bow; and a crown was given unto him: and he went forth conquering, and to conquer.”

This rider has a stephanos crown, which is a crown of victory, not a crown of authority. He has that crown because he has waged war and been victorious. This person is believed to be the antichrist, and here – after the Rapture – he makes his appearance on the world stage.

As you can see, this man is going forth to conquer the nations, and he will be victorious. So, then, the Tribulation starts with the Antichrist waging war against the nations and overcoming them.

Revelation 6:1: “And I saw when the Lamb opened one of the seals, and I heard, as it were the noise of thunder, one of the four beasts saying, Come and see.”

One of the key things that I would like to emphasize is that Revelation 6 actually parallels what Christ taught in Matthew 24 (the Olivet Discourse). Most people who read Matthew 24 interpret it to be talking about the days leading up to the Rapture, but they are mistaken. Matthew 24 is actually talking about the Tribulation period and the days leading up to the Second Coming.

The Second Coming and the Rapture are not the same thing. The Rapture happens before the Tribulation; the Second Coming happens after the Tribulation. The first time Christ returns He comes to get His Bride; the second time Christ returns He comes to rescue Israel and put an end to the antichrist. They are two separate events and they should not be confused.

If you read Matthew 24 and you then start reading through Revelation beginning in this chapter, you will see a lot of parallels. Matthew 24 gives a high-level overview of the entire Tribulation; the book of Revelation goes into a lot more detail.

Over the years I’ve heard a lot of talk about the unforgivable sin. There are all sorts of different opinions concerning what it is and what it isn’t. Since there’s a lot of confusion surrounding this topic, I thought it would be a good idea to sort things out in a clear and concise way.

The unforgivable sin is mentioned several times in the Bible:

Matthew 12:31: “Wherefore I say unto you, All manner of sin and blasphemy shall be forgiven unto men: but the blasphemy against the Holy Ghost shall not be forgiven unto men.
32 And whosoever speaketh a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but whosoever speaketh against the Holy Ghost, it shall not be forgiven him, neither in this world, neither in the world to come.”

Mark 3:28: “Verily I say unto you, All sins shall be forgiven unto the sons of men, and blasphemies wherewith soever they shall blaspheme:
29 But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation.”

Luke 12:10: “And whosoever shall speak a word against the Son of man, it shall be forgiven him: but unto him that blasphemeth against the Holy Ghost it shall not be forgiven.”

As you can see, all of these passages talk about something known as blaspheming the Holy Spirit. Matthew tells us that if you speak a word against the Son of Man then that can be forgiven, but if you speak against the Holy Spirit then that is unforgivable. But what does that mean? Is this something that we need to be worried about? Are we in danger of committing this sin?

This is a situation where context is absolutely critical. There are many people who focus solely on Matthew 12:31-32 and who completely miss the surrounding context. In this case, the context makes all the difference.

When Jesus said those words, He was engaged in a discussion with Israel’s religious leaders. By this point in Christ’s ministry He had done many incredible miracles. He had healed people, He had cast out demons, and He had done many wonders. He had the attention of the people and multitudes followed Him.

Then Jesus did something that truly astounded the nation: He cast a demon out of someone who could not speak. This immediately made the nation think that Jesus must be the Messiah, the son of David:

Matthew 12:22: “Then was brought unto him one possessed with a devil, blind, and dumb: and he healed him, insomuch that the blind and dumb both spake and saw.
23 And all the people were amazed, and said, Is not this the son of David?”

To understand why this miracle had such a large impact, you have to understand how Jewish exorcisms worked. In order to cast out a demon you first had to discover its name. Once you knew its name you could then order it (by name) to come out of the person. This worked fine if the person could talk, but it did not work at all on people who were mute. Jewish tradition taught that only the Messiah could cast a demon out of a mute man; no one else was capable of doing it. Therefore, when Jesus did it He was establishing His claim to be the Messiah – and the people recognized that.

Israel’s religious leaders, however, had another explanation. They said that Jesus was doing His miracles through the power of Satan:

Matthew 12:24: “But when the Pharisees heard it, they said, This fellow doth not cast out devils, but by Beelzebub the prince of the devils.”

When the Pharisees said this, Jesus immediately rebuked them – and in every single case, that rebuke included a mention of the unforgivable sin. In fact, the book of Mark actually makes it crystal clear that the unforgivable sin was a reference to what the Pharisees had just said:

Mark 3:29: “But he that shall blaspheme against the Holy Ghost hath never forgiveness, but is in danger of eternal damnation.
30 Because they said, He hath an unclean spirit.”

In other words, the reason Jesus warned them against the unforgivable sin was because they had just accused Jesus of doing miracles by the power of the devil. That was the unforgivable sin. The religious leaders of Israel’s day saw Jesus Christ, in person, doing miracles that only the Messiah could do – and they accused Him of doing them by the power of Satan. That was the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, and that was unforgivable. They were looking at what was unquestionably the work of the Holy Spirit and saying it was a work of the devil.

It is no longer possible to commit the unforgivable sin because Jesus Christ is no longer here. We believe in Jesus by faith; we trust Someone whom we have never seen. Israel was in a very different situation: they refused to trust in someone who was standing right there in front of them. None of us have ever had the chance to reject a Jesus who was standing in front of us, in person, doing mind-boggling miracles while we watched. None of us have ever been in a position to watch Jesus do the unfathomable (a Jesus who was physically present with us, who we could see and touch and have dinner with) and then dismiss it all as a work of the devil. That particular sin is no longer possible. There are a lot of very serious sins that are a real danger to you, but this is not one of them.

Yes, it is a sin to not trust in Jesus. But refusing to trust in a Jesus who you have never seen is not quite the same as refusing to trust in a Jesus who you have seen. Refusing to believe in miracles that you have never seen is not the same thing as rejecting miracles that you personally saw Jesus perform. They are both sins, but they are very different sins.

There is one other unforgivable sin. Like the blasphemy of the Holy Spirit, this sin is also impossible in this Age. We find this sin discussed in the book of Revelation. Simply put, anyone who takes the Mark of the Beast is lost forever and will be damned:

Revelation 14:9: “And the third angel followed them, saying with a loud voice, If any man worship the beast and his image, and receive his mark in his forehead, or in his hand,
10 The same shall drink of the wine of the wrath of God, which is poured out without mixture into the cup of his indignation; and he shall be tormented with fire and brimstone in the presence of the holy angels, and in the presence of the Lamb:
11 And the smoke of their torment ascendeth up for ever and ever: and they have no rest day nor night, who worship the beast and his image, and whosoever receiveth the mark of his name.”

Everyone who takes the Mark will be lost. That act cannot be undone and it cannot be forgiven. It is permanent and it is fatal. If you receive the Mark, you will face the wrath of God and you will be tormented with fire and brimstone forever. It is a one-way, irrevocable ticket to the Lake of Fire.

However, the Church will never be tempted to take the Mark. The Mark of the Beast does not appear until midway through the Tribulation – and the Rapture will remove the Church from the Earth before the Tribulation ever begins. By the time the Mark appears the Church will be long gone. The only ones who will be tempted by it are those who are still on Earth at that time (in other words, those who have been left behind).

The unforgivable sin is a very real thing, with very real consequences – but it does not apply to the Church. We are uniquely spared of that temptation.

Today’s oddity is definitely one of the stranger ones. In Daniel chapter 2 King Nebuchadnezzar had a dream that deeply disturbed him:

Daniel 2:31: “Thou, O king, sawest, and behold a great image. This great image, whose brightness was excellent, stood before thee; and the form thereof was terrible.
32 This image’s head was of fine gold, his breast and his arms of silver, his belly and his thighs of brass,
33 His legs of iron, his feet part of iron and part of clay.
34 Thou sawest till that a stone was cut out without hands, which smote the image upon his feet that were of iron and clay, and brake them to pieces.”

After telling the king what he had dreamed, Daniel then provided the interpretation. Daniel explained that God was showing him what the future held. Toward the end of his explanation Daniel said this:

Daniel 2:43: “And whereas thou sawest iron mixed with miry clay, they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men: but they shall not cleave one to another, even as iron is not mixed with clay.”

Notice the highlighted part: Daniel said that “they” would “mingle themselves with the seed of men”. That’s a rather odd phrase, isn’t it? Who is “They”? What is this verse talking about?

If you look up this verse in other translations you will get mixed results. Some translations preserve this odd phrase (which is apparently a direct translation of the original Aramaic), while others butcher it beyond recognition. The Geneva Bible preserves it, as does the ASV and the NAS. The ESV and the NIV butcher it, though: instead of translating it they offer their interpretation (although the ESV at least adds a footnote that points out what the original Aramaic actually says). Incidentally, that is one of many reasons why I dislike the NIV. I don’t want their interpretation of the passage; what I want is to know what the passage actually said.

The original Aramaic really does say “they shall mingle themselves with the seed of men”. This implies that something very strange is going on. As I have pointed out, modern Bible translations have tried to paper over this and obscure the issue, and commentators tend to do the same. But I think there is something special about this verse; I think it means precisely what it says.

If “they” are going to try to mingle with the “seed of men”, then it seems rather obvious that “they” are not part of mankind. Daniel explains that this mingling doesn’t work out very well: the iron and the clay just don’t mix. We humans are the clay; we were made from dust and we return back to dust. These others, though – the “they” – are depicted as being iron. They are trying to mix with the clay, but what results is a very brittle mixture.

Are there any other times in the Bible where some foreign element tried to mix itself with mankind? I believe the answer is yes. Genesis 6:1-4 speaks of a time when the “sons of God” married human women and produced the Nephilim – a race of powerful beings. For reasons I have discussed here, I believe the “sons of God” are actually fallen angels. Before the Flood, demons took women as wives and produced offspring that were partly human and partly demon. In other words, “they” mingled themselves with the “seed of men”.

One of the things that Christ said about the days just before His return was that things would be like they were in the days of Noah:

Matthew 24:37: “But as the days of Noah were, so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.
38 For as in the days that were before the flood they were eating and drinking, marrying and giving in marriage, until the day that Noe entered into the ark,
39 And knew not until the flood came, and took them all away; so shall also the coming of the Son of man be.”

Here Christ said that just as people were going about their lives right up until the Flood killed them all, so people would be going about their lives right up until Jesus returned. But there are other parallels as well. Just as the Flood was God’s judgment upon a wicked world, so the Tribulation will be God’s judgment on a wicked world. Just as Enoch was taken from Earth and spared having to live through the Flood, so the Church will be taken from the Earth and be spared having to live through the Tribulation. Finally, before the Flood happened demons intermingled themselves with the seed of men – and in the last days, we are told that “they” will also intermingle themselves with the seed of men.

I suspect that we may once again see some sort of Nephilim arise. Satan has tried that trick twice: the Nephilim appeared before the Flood in the days of Noah, and the Nephilim were in the land of Canaan when Israel conquered the Promised Land. Satan has used them in the past to try to thwart God’s plan, and I think he may try it again.

This is just pure speculation on my part, but I wonder if this might tie into the Mark of the Beast. One of the puzzling things about the Mark is that whoever takes it cannot be saved; they are lost forever and there is no way to repent of it. How is something like that possible? How could taking a Mark possibly have that kind of permanence?

Here is something to think about: the reason the death of Jesus can save us is because Jesus was a man. Jesus had to be a man in order to die in our place; the sacrifice only worked because He was fully man and fully God. His sacrifice, however, is only good for us. His death cannot provide atonement for fallen angels; it only works for men. I strongly suspect that it would not work for Nephilim either, since they are not men – they are a hybrid.

Some people have speculated that the Mark may be more than a simple tattoo. What if taking the Mark merges you with the demonic and turns you into some kind of transhuman Nephilim? If that is the case (and no one knows if it is), then that would certainly explain why the Mark is so permanent. Since you are no longer human, Christ’s sacrifice cannot save you – and since there is no way to reverse the process, you cannot undo what you have done. Once you have crossed that line you are permanently lost.

Is that the right interpretation of that verse? I don’t really know; it’s just a guess. But it’s certainly something worth pondering.

Revelation 5:11: “And I beheld, and I heard the voice of many angels round about the throne and the beasts and the elders: and the number of them was ten thousand times ten thousand, and thousands of thousands;
12 Saying with a loud voice, Worthy is the Lamb that was slain to receive power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honour, and glory, and blessing.”

Notice that the angels say these things; they don’t sing them. (I realize that some other translations use the word “sing” here, but they are incorrect.) There are actually no cases anywhere in the Bible where angels sing anything. If the angels do have the ability to sing the Bible never mentions it.

Another thing to notice is the tremendous number of angels that exist. John speaks of 10,000 times 10,000, with thousands of thousands more. This implies that there are many millions, perhaps even billions of angels. It is a very large number. There aren’t just five or six angels.

We should also notice what the angels are not saying. The elders said that Jesus redeemed them by His blood, but the angels don’t say that. The elders said that Jesus made them kings and priests and they would reign on the Earth, but the angels don’t say that. What the angels do say is that Jesus (the Lamb that was slain) was worthy to receive “power, and riches, and wisdom, and strength, and honor, and glory, and blessing”. They are praising God, but they are doing it in a different way than the elders are. God’s relationship with the Church is different from His relationship with the angels.

The same can be said for the creatures, which are mentioned in the next verse. Notice what they have to say:

Revelation 5:13: “And every creature which is in heaven, and on the earth, and under the earth, and such as are in the sea, and all that are in them, heard I saying, Blessing, and honour, and glory, and power, be unto him that sitteth upon the throne, and unto the Lamb for ever and ever.

While they praise God, they don’t say anything about being redeemed. The only group that is praising Jesus for redeeming them are the elders – and that is because the elders (which represents the Church) is the only group that Jesus has redeemed. He died for us; He did not die for anyone else.

Revelation 5:10: “And hast made us unto our God kings and priests: and we shall reign on the earth.”

Now there is an encouraging statement! God has made us kings and priests, and we will reign on the earth. Notice that the verse uses the future tense: it says that we “shall” reign on the earth, not that we “have” reigned. It is speaking of our future destiny – of an event that has not yet taken place.

At this point in Revelation’s chronology the Church Age has ended, the Rapture has occurred, the Church is in Heaven, and the Tribulation is just beginning. The reigning that the verse speaks of takes place in the Millennial Kingdom, which does not begin until after the Tribulation is over. Therefore the reigning is indeed still in the future – but by this point it is in the near future. (The Tribulation is only seven years long.)

There are many people who don’t believe in the Millennium Kingdom. In fact, I would say that most Christians today reject the idea as utter nonsense. The Kingdom doesn’t get discussed a lot these days, and that is a real shame. It is one of the major themes of the Bible, especially in the Old Testament. Many of the prophets (both major and minor) discuss it. If you read through the book of Isaiah you will find many references to it.

People who are amillennial teach that we are reigning over the Earth now, but that is simply not true. Christians aren’t reigning over anything; instead we are persecuted, murdered, and hated. We are not kings; we are outcasts. But one day we will reign over the Earth. That day is still some distance off, but it is approaching and it cannot be stopped.

This is something that every Christian needs to remember: we have been made kings and priests, and we will reign on the earth. That is our destiny – not because we have earned it, but because Christ has redeemed us by His blood and has given this to us. This is His doing.

It is common knowledge that the Lord made a number of appearances in the Old Testament. For example, God spoke to Moses in the burning bush:

Exodus 3:3: “And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt.
4 And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.”

God spoke to Israel from Mount Sinai:

Exodus 19:18: “And mount Sinai was altogether on a smoke, because the Lord descended upon it in fire: and the smoke thereof ascended as the smoke of a furnace, and the whole mount quaked greatly.
19 And when the voice of the trumpet sounded long, and waxed louder and louder, Moses spake, and God answered him by a voice.”

God spoke to Elijah in a still small voice:

I Kings 19:12: “And after the earthquake a fire; but the Lord was not in the fire: and after the fire a still small voice.
13 And it was so, when Elijah heard it, that he wrapped his face in his mantle, and went out, and stood in the entering in of the cave. And, behold, there came a voice unto him, and said, What doest thou here, Elijah?”

God spoke to Job out of a whirlwind:

Job 38:1: “Then the Lord answered Job out of the whirlwind, and said,
2 Who is this that darkeneth counsel by words without knowledge?”

There are more examples that I could give, but you get the point. Today I would like to talk about theophanies – visible manifestations of God in the Old Testament. While a lot of these appearances are quite well-known, I believe there are other appearances that are commonly overlooked. Sometimes the Bible is very obvious about an appearance of God and sometimes it’s not. For example:
 

God Visits Abraham

About a year before Isaac was born, three men came and visited Abraham. The patriarch invited them in and fed them:

Genesis 18:2: “And he lift up his eyes and looked, and, lo, three men stood by him: and when he saw them, he ran to meet them from the tent door, and bowed himself toward the ground,
3 And said, My Lord, if now I have found favour in thy sight, pass not away, I pray thee, from thy servant:
4 Let a little water, I pray you, be fetched, and wash your feet, and rest yourselves under the tree:
5 And I will fetch a morsel of bread, and comfort ye your hearts; after that ye shall pass on: for therefore are ye come to your servant. And they said, So do, as thou hast said.”

Despite the fact that this is a very well-known story, I think there’s something going on here that is almost universally overlooked. Verse two tells us that “three men stood by him”. But who are these three men? Verse 1 gives us the answer:

Genesis 18:1: “And the Lord appeared unto him in the plains of Mamre: and he sat in the tent door in the heat of the day;”

Who appeared to Abraham? The Lord. The three men were not ordinary men, and they were not angels either; God Himself came and paid Abraham a visit. The rest of the passage confirms this. Whenever Abraham talks to the men, we are told that the Lord responds to him. For example:

Genesis 18:9: “And they said unto him, Where is Sarah thy wife? And he said, Behold, in the tent.
10 And he said, I will certainly return unto thee according to the time of life; and, lo, Sarah thy wife shall have a son. And Sarah heard it in the tent door, which was behind him.
11 Now Abraham and Sarah were old and well stricken in age; and it ceased to be with Sarah after the manner of women.
12 Therefore Sarah laughed within herself, saying, After I am waxed old shall I have pleasure, my lord being old also?
13 And the Lord said unto Abraham, Wherefore did Sarah laugh, saying, Shall I of a surety bear a child, which am old?”

The passage is very clear, but we completely miss it. Verse 1 tells us that the Lord appeared to Abraham; the Lord then speaks to Abraham throughout the whole chapter, and then leaves in verse 33. God Himself paid Abraham a visit that day.

I believe that this is a theophany – a preincarnate appearance of Jesus Christ. However, I don’t think this is the only time that He appeared…
 

The Angel of the Lord

If you read through the Old Testament you will occasionally come across references to a being known as the Angel of the Lord. This being has some rather unusual characteristics. For example, the Angel of the Lord accepts worship:

Joshua 5:13: “And it came to pass, when Joshua was by Jericho, that he lifted up his eyes and looked, and, behold, there stood a man over against him with his sword drawn in his hand: and Joshua went unto him, and said unto him, Art thou for us, or for our adversaries?
14 And he said, Nay; but as captain of the host of the Lord am I now come. And Joshua fell on his face to the earth, and did worship, and said unto him, What saith my Lord unto his servant?
15 And the captain of the Lord’s host said unto Joshua, Loose thy shoe from off thy foot; for the place whereon thou standest is holy. And Joshua did so.”

One thing we know about angels is that they never accept worship. When the apostle John tried to worship an angel, the angel immediately rebuked him:

Revelation 19:10: “And I fell at his feet to worship him. And he said unto me, See thou do it not: I am thy fellowservant, and of thy brethren that have the testimony of Jesus: worship God: for the testimony of Jesus is the spirit of prophecy.”

The apostle John did the exact same thing that Joshua did – but in Revelation the angel rebuked him for it. That tells me that the Angel of the Lord is not an angelic being, but is God Himself. One thing we need to keep in mind is that the word “angel” just means messenger. Jesus spent a great deal of time relaying God’s messages. In fact, He said this:

John 12:49: “For I have not spoken of myself; but the Father which sent me, he gave me a commandment, what I should say, and what I should speak.
50 And I know that his commandment is life everlasting: whatsoever I speak therefore, even as the Father said unto me, so I speak.”

Jesus, then, did not speak for Himself; instead He relayed the messages that His Father had given him. If the phrase “Angel of the Lord” bothers you, then think of it as “Messenger of the Lord”. Jesus was certainly a messenger of the Lord.

Now, I’m not trying to claim that all angels that appear in the Old Testament are really appearances of Christ. The Bible sometimes says that “an angel of the Lord” appeared, or “angels of the Lord” appeared. There really is a separate race of angelic beings, and they really do appear in the Old Testament. What I am saying is that when the Bible speaks of “the angel of the Lord”, it is probably referring to Jesus Christ. As I have pointed out, “the” Angel of the Lord appears to be something altogether different.

The Angel of the Lord makes quite a few appearances in the Old Testament. He was there when Hagar fled from Sarah:

Genesis 16:7: “And the angel of the Lord found her by a fountain of water in the wilderness, by the fountain in the way to Shur.
8 And he said, Hagar, Sarai’s maid, whence camest thou? and whither wilt thou go? And she said, I flee from the face of my mistress Sarai.
9 And the angel of the Lord said unto her, Return to thy mistress, and submit thyself under her hands.
10 And the angel of the Lord said unto her, I will multiply thy seed exceedingly, that it shall not be numbered for multitude.
11 And the angel of the Lord said unto her, Behold, thou art with child and shalt bear a son, and shalt call his name Ishmael; because the Lord hath heard thy affliction.
12 And he will be a wild man; his hand will be against every man, and every man’s hand against him; and he shall dwell in the presence of all his brethren.”

Notice that the Angel of the Lord says that he will “multiply thy seed exceedingly”. He doesn’t say that God will do it; he says that he will do it himself! That’s rather startling, isn’t it? But if the Angel of the Lord is actually Jesus then it makes perfect sense.

The Angel of the Lord later reminded Hagar of this promise:

Genesis 21:17: “And God heard the voice of the lad; and the angel of God called to Hagar out of heaven, and said unto her, What aileth thee, Hagar? fear not; for God hath heard the voice of the lad where he is.
18 Arise, lift up the lad, and hold him in thine hand; for I will make him a great nation.”

The Angel of God didn’t say that God would make Ishmael “a great nation”; he said that he would do it. That is a detail that we should not miss. It’s more evidence that the Angel of the Lord is not simply an angel.

The Angel of the Lord also appears when Abraham is about to sacrifice Isaac. In fact, the Angel of the Lord actually stopped Abraham from sacrificing his son:

Genesis 22:11: “And the angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham: and he said, Here am I.
12 And he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou any thing unto him: for now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me.”

Take a close look at verse 12. The Angel of the Lord said that Abraham had not withheld his son from him. It doesn’t say “from God”, which is what the angel should have said if it was just an angel! The Angel of the Lord is acting like he is God. That’s rather remarkable, isn’t it?

The Angel of the Lord was at the burning bush with Moses:

Exodus 3:2: “And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him in a flame of fire out of the midst of a bush: and he looked, and, behold, the bush burned with fire, and the bush was not consumed.
3 And Moses said, I will now turn aside, and see this great sight, why the bush is not burnt.
4 And when the Lord saw that he turned aside to see, God called unto him out of the midst of the bush, and said, Moses, Moses. And he said, Here am I.
5 And he said, Draw not nigh hither: put off thy shoes from off thy feet, for the place whereon thou standest is holy ground.”

Just as the Angel of the Lord told Joshua that he was standing on holy ground, so we see the same thing happening to Moses. On top of that, verse 2 says that the Angel of the Lord was in the bush, and then verse 4 says that God called to him out of the bush. The Angel of the Lord is actually referred to as God.

The Angel of the Lord also rebuked Israel in the days of the judges. Pay close attention to the pronouns that are used:

Judges 2:1: “And an angel of the Lord came up from Gilgal to Bochim, and said, I made you to go up out of Egypt, and have brought you unto the land which I sware unto your fathers; and I said, I will never break my covenant with you.
2 And ye shall make no league with the inhabitants of this land; ye shall throw down their altars: but ye have not obeyed my voice: why have ye done this?
3 Wherefore I also said, I will not drive them out from before you; but they shall be as thorns in your sides, and their gods shall be a snare unto you.
4 And it came to pass, when the angel of the Lord spake these words unto all the children of Israel, that the people lifted up their voice, and wept.”

Verse 1 does say “an angel”, but verse 4 clarifies that the words were said by the Angel of the Lord. Notice, also, what the angel actually said. The Angel said that he made them go out of Egypt and he made the covenant with their fathers. The Angel is talking as if he was God.

The Angel of the Lord also appeared to Gideon, and did some very odd things:

Judges 6:11: “And there came an angel of the Lord, and sat under an oak which was in Ophrah, that pertained unto Joash the Abiezrite: and his son Gideon threshed wheat by the winepress, to hide it from the Midianites.
12 And the angel of the Lord appeared unto him, and said unto him, The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valour.
13 And Gideon said unto him, Oh my Lord, if the Lord be with us, why then is all this befallen us? and where be all his miracles which our fathers told us of, saying, Did not the Lord bring us up from Egypt? but now the Lord hath forsaken us, and delivered us into the hands of the Midianites.
14 And the Lord looked upon him, and said, Go in this thy might, and thou shalt save Israel from the hand of the Midianites: have not I sent thee?”

Verse 11 just mentions “an angel”, but verse 12 clarifies that this is the Angel of the Lord. When Gideon talks to him, verse 14 tells us that the Lord looked upon him and answered him. As if that were not enough, the Angel then accepted Gideon’s offering and consumed the sacrifice:

Judges 6:20: “And the angel of God said unto him, Take the flesh and the unleavened cakes, and lay them upon this rock, and pour out the broth. And he did so.
21 Then the angel of the Lord put forth the end of the staff that was in his hand, and touched the flesh and the unleavened cakes; and there rose up fire out of the rock, and consumed the flesh and the unleavened cakes. Then the angel of the Lord departed out of his sight.”

No angel would ever accept a sacrifice – but this Angel did. Once again, this Angel is acting a lot like God. The Angel of the Lord later accepted another offering, this time from Samson’s parents. You see, he was the one who told Samson’s mother that she would have a son:

Judges 13:3: “And the angel of the Lord appeared unto the woman, and said unto her, Behold now, thou art barren, and bearest not: but thou shalt conceive, and bear a son.
4 Now therefore beware, I pray thee, and drink not wine nor strong drink, and eat not any unclean thing:
5 For, lo, thou shalt conceive, and bear a son; and no razor shall come on his head: for the child shall be a Nazarite unto God from the womb: and he shall begin to deliver Israel out of the hand of the Philistines.”

When the couple offered a sacrifice, the Angel of the Lord accepted it:

Judges 13:17: “And Manoah said unto the angel of the Lord, What is thy name, that when thy sayings come to pass we may do thee honour?
18 And the angel of the Lord said unto him, Why askest thou thus after my name, seeing it is secret?
19 So Manoah took a kid with a meat offering, and offered it upon a rock unto the Lord: and the angel did wonderously; and Manoah and his wife looked on.
20 For it came to pass, when the flame went up toward heaven from off the altar, that the angel of the Lord ascended in the flame of the altar. And Manoah and his wife looked on it, and fell on their faces to the ground.”

Notice, also, that the Angel of the Lord refused to disclose his name. This is a bit odd, as other angels were quite willing to disclose their names:

Luke 1:19: “And the angel answering said unto him, I am Gabriel, that stand in the presence of God; and am sent to speak unto thee, and to shew thee these glad tidings.”

This was not the last time that the Angel appeared. King David once took a census of Israel, and the Lord punished him for it. During that punishment the Angel of the Lord came to destroy Jerusalem:

2 Samuel 24:15: “So the Lord sent a pestilence upon Israel from the morning even to the time appointed: and there died of the people from Dan even to Beersheba seventy thousand men.
16 And when the angel stretched out his hand upon Jerusalem to destroy it, the Lord repented him of the evil, and said to the angel that destroyed the people, It is enough: stay now thine hand. And the angel of the Lord was by the threshingplace of Araunah the Jebusite.
17 And David spake unto the Lord when he saw the angel that smote the people, and said, Lo, I have sinned, and I have done wickedly: but these sheep, what have they done? let thine hand, I pray thee, be against me, and against my father’s house.”

As you can see, David actually saw the Angel. If the Angel was really Jesus, then there is an impressive list of Old Testament people who glimpsed Him: Hagar, Abraham, Moses, Joshua, David, and Samson’s parents all saw Him. That gives Jesus’ conversation with the Jews a new meaning:

John 8:56: “Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day: and he saw it, and was glad.
57 Then said the Jews unto him, Thou art not yet fifty years old, and hast thou seen Abraham?
58 Jesus said unto them, Verily, verily, I say unto you, Before Abraham was, I am.
59 Then took they up stones to cast at him: but Jesus hid himself, and went out of the temple, going through the midst of them, and so passed by.”

Not only had Jesus seen Abraham, but all those many centuries ago, Abraham had seen Jesus. (In fact, Abraham actually had a meal with Him.) It’s something to think about.

Now, that is not the last time that the Angel of the Lord appears in the Old Testament, but I’ll let you discover the rest. There are more theophanies in the Bible than you would think; if you read the Old Testament carefully you may discover all sorts of unexpected and amazing things.

I have finally completed my summary of the events of the Old Testament. In order to create this I analyzed every book of the Old Testament and put the events in chronological order. The result is a 25-page document that provides a good high-level overview of the entire Old Testament. Under normal circumstances it takes a great deal of time to read through the Old Testament, but this document allows you to go over everything that happens in a matter of hours.

If you have never had a chance to read through the entire Old Testament, this is a good place to start. The document contains more than 1600 footnotes that give the verse references of every event that the summary mentions. This makes it easy to look up passages that you want to learn more about.

The summary can be downloaded right here, free of charge:

The Old Testament (PDF file; 25 pages)

I hope you find this useful!

Updated: For those of you who prefer printed copies, I have turned this into a book and published it on Lulu. You can find it for sale here for $4.99.

One of the odd things about King David is that he was the youngest of Jesse’s sons. David had other brothers, but God was not impressed with them:

I Samuel 16:5: “And he said, Peaceably: I am come to sacrifice unto the Lord: sanctify yourselves, and come with me to the sacrifice. And he sanctified Jesse and his sons, and called them to the sacrifice.
6 And it came to pass, when they were come, that he looked on Eliab, and said, Surely the Lord’s anointed is before him.
7 But the Lord said unto Samuel, Look not on his countenance, or on the height of his stature; because I have refused him: for the Lord seeth not as man seeth; for man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.
8 Then Jesse called Abinadab, and made him pass before Samuel. And he said, Neither hath the Lord chosen this.
9 Then Jesse made Shammah to pass by. And he said, Neither hath the Lord chosen this.
10 Again, Jesse made seven of his sons to pass before Samuel. And Samuel said unto Jesse, The Lord hath not chosen these.
11 And Samuel said unto Jesse, Are here all thy children? And he said, There remaineth yet the youngest, and, behold, he keepeth the sheep. And Samuel said unto Jesse, Send and fetch him: for we will not sit down till he come hither.”

David was held in such low esteem that when Jesse brought his sons to Samuel, he didn’t even think about including David. David was an outcast in his own family. When his father sent him to bring food to his brothers (who were fighting on the front line), his brothers showed exactly why God had rejected them:

I Samuel 17:28: “And Eliab his eldest brother heard when he spake unto the men; and Eliab’s anger was kindled against David, and he said, Why camest thou down hither? and with whom hast thou left those few sheep in the wilderness? I know thy pride, and the naughtiness of thine heart; for thou art come down that thou mightest see the battle.
29 And David said, What have I now done? Is there not a cause?”

David went to the front line because his father told him to bring his brothers food. Eliab was completely out of line – but his attack on David was so routine that David’s response was “What have I done this time?” David was used to unjust attacks; that’s just how his life was.

David’s family was not a fan of David. But one thing we do know is that when David killed Goliath, someone paid attention. Later in the Bible we find out that one of David’s nephews followed in David’s footsteps and killed a giant:

I Chronicles 20:6: “And yet again there was war at Gath, where was a man of great stature, whose fingers and toes were four and twenty, six on each hand, and six on each foot and he also was the son of the giant.
7 But when he defied Israel, Jonathan the son of Shimea David’s brother slew him.”

David may have been rejected by his brothers, but Jonathan decided to follow in his uncle’s footsteps. The family outcast had become the family role model.

Revelation 5:9: “And they sung a new song, saying, Thou art worthy to take the book, and to open the seals thereof: for thou wast slain, and hast redeemed us to God by thy blood out of every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation;”

Why was Jesus worthy? Because He was the sinless One who was crucified for our sins and then rose again. No one else did that, so no one else was worthy. It’s worth nothing that only Jesus was worthy; no other candidates were found, even though both Heaven and Earth were searched. There is simply no one else like Jesus.

Notice, also, that the elders say that Jesus “hast redeemed us to God by thy blood”. The blood of Jesus redeemed the elders. Some people have claimed that the word “us” should really be “them”, but that isn’t born out by the manuscript evidence. It really is “us”. This is more evidence that the 24 elders really do represent the Church, since the Church has been redeemed by the blood of Jesus and is composed of people from every kindred, and tongue, and people, and nation. Since the 24 elders are symbolic of the whole church, that means that the whole church must be in Heaven when these events take place. Therefore, when Jesus begins opening the book, the Rapture must have already occurred. This supports a pre-Tribulation Rapture.

Revelation 5:8: “And when he had taken the book, the four beasts and four and twenty elders fell down before the Lamb, having every one of them harps, and golden vials full of odours, which are the prayers of saints.”

One of the important keys of interpretation is that the Bible defines the symbols that it uses. As we can see here, incense is symbolic of prayer. Therefore, when you are reading the Bible and come across a passage that uses incense in a symbolic way, you can know that it stands for prayer. That is how symbol interpretation works.

Did you notice that the verse mentions harps? I was a bit surprised to see that. As it turns out, though, the book of Revelation mentions harps a number of times:

Revelation 14:2: “And I heard a voice from heaven, as the voice of many waters, and as the voice of a great thunder: and I heard the voice of harpers harping with their harps:”

Revelation 15:2: “And I saw as it were a sea of glass mingled with fire: and them that had gotten the victory over the beast, and over his image, and over his mark, and over the number of his name, stand on the sea of glass, having the harps of God.”

I always thought it was a bit silly to imagine that people in Heaven had harps, but I see I was mistaken. The people who have the harps are the 24 elders, and the elders are symbolic of the Church – so in Heaven it does look like we will have harps. (I’ve actually never played a harp before, but it seems that harp playing may be in my future.) Since the verse explains the symbolism of the incense but does not say anything about the harps, that probably means that the harps aren’t symbolic and are actually real.

Now, I still think that the common picture of Heaven is wrong. We are not going to spend eternity sitting on a cloud, holding a harp and wishing we had something to do. The book of Revelation makes it quite clear that no one who is standing in the presence of God is bored. In fact, the response to being in God’s presence seems to be awe, worship, and praise. Greatness invites praise, and being around the greatness of God creates an urge to praise Him that simply cannot – and should not – be suppressed.

Most of the essays that I’ve written discuss what the Bible has to say about different topics. In my previous essays I’ve spent a lot of time studying passages and then drawing conclusions. The process is pretty straightforward and the results have been encouraging.

This time, however, I’d like to do something a little different. I want to spend some time speculating about what life will be like in the Eternal State – the endless period that begins after the devil has been defeated once and for all, and after the Great White Throne Judgment has put an end to all evil. (You can read about this period in Revelation 21 and 22.) In this astonishing era, all sin, death, and pain have been done away with, and we will live with God in the New Heaven and Earth. It will a glorious time of joy and peace – an endless time, in fact.

Now, to be sure, other people have spent a lot of time discussing what the Bible has to say about this, but I want to go a bit further. I would like to explore the implications of living in the world that the Bible describes. What will it be like to live through the endless ages of eternity? Based on the information that we’ve been given, are there any conclusions that we can draw?

One might ask, why bother speculating? After all, the Eternal State doesn’t begin until after the Millennium is over, so it’s at least a thousand years away. Why not just wait until we get there and then see what happens? Does it really matter?

I think it does, and I think it’s worth pondering. Look at it this way: when people have a vacation planned they tend to spend a lot of time thinking about it, even if it’s still months (or even years) away. They think about it, long for it, hope for it, and dream of the day when it will finally begin. The Eternal State is much more than a mere vacation; it is our eternal destiny. As exciting as the Millennium will be, it only lasts 1000 years and it still takes place in a world that has pain, sin, and death. The Eternal State is much better and it lasts forever. Given the truly unimaginable amount of time we will spend there, I think it’s certainly worth pondering.
 

Science

Science is not an evil thing. There is no reason to believe that scientific advancement will confined to this Age, or that it will suddenly stop when Jesus returns and establishes His Millennial Kingdom. Likewise, there’s no reason to believe that science will cease to progress when the Eternal State begins. Despite what some people think, we will not automatically know everything there is to know the moment we are resurrected; our knowledge will always be finite and we will always have questions. (Only an infinite being can have infinite knowledge, and we are not and will never be infinite beings. God is the only God; there will never be any others.) Since this is the case, it’s quite likely that people in the Millennium and the Eternal State will ask questions about the universe and design experiments to answer those questions.

That being said, I do not believe that scientific advancement can continue forever. The laws of the universe are finite, and that means that if scientific progress continues long enough, people will eventually arrive at a perfect understanding of all physical laws. Of course, people will still have to learn the full implications of those laws (along with how the laws interact with each other), and that will take some additional time. Knowing the laws of physics will help people understand how the Earth works, but the Earth contains a lot of very complicated systems, and the laws interact in very complicated ways.

However, we should also keep in mind that the rate at which scientific knowledge is accumulating is continuing to grow. In a perfect world with perfect immortals, it is not unreasonable to speculate that this trend will continue. If science is the study of a finite universe with finite laws, then an ever-accelerating learning process will eventually complete its study of that universe. In other words, scientific research cannot last forever; one day it will come to an end.

Here’s another way to look at it: it is possible to express physical laws as mathematical formulas. The universe is essentially a giant math problem. It’s a very complicated math problem, but it’s not an infinite one, and eventually it will be solved. If people continue to care about science and continue to pursue it throughout eternity, then that math problem will be solved. It is only a matter of time.

I believe there will come a time when scientific research will, for all practical purposes, be completed. All physical laws will be known and all of their implications will be understood. We will know what can be achieved and what cannot be achieved, and we will know the best way to achieve any physical goal that is actually possible. Now, it may take a long time to reach that point, but given that we have all of eternity to work with I think that it is inevitable. I also suspect that diminishing returns will play a factor. We may still be learning new scientific facts 10,000 years from now, but I suspect that if you compared our scientific knowledge in 1 million AD and 10 million AD, the differences would be relatively small.

What I am suggesting is that scientific advancement and discovery is a characteristic of a young civilization. Mature civilizations will master science to the point where it is a known quantity. Any civilization (alien or human) that is capable of scientific advancement will eventually reach a point where science is “done”. Therefore, we will not spend all the ages of eternity pursuing science; I suspect that is something we will only do in our youth.

Now, there are some caveats to this. If God creates new life forms then those life forms will have to be studied, and that will provide something new to learn. However, since these life forms operate under known laws, the amount of time it will take to fully understand these new creatures will drop as we march through eternity. Likewise, if God creates an entirely new parallel universe that has entirely different laws, then that will present a new challenge. Neither of those situations alter the core premise, though: this universe has a finite set of unchanging laws, and it is likely that those laws will be known and mastered long before we get very far into eternity. Science has an end.
 

Economics

Will the Eternal State have an economic system? Before we can answer that, we need to understand what economic systems are for and why they exist. If we understand that then the answer will become clear.

The purpose of economic systems is to efficiently allocate scarce resources. Any time there is a system that has scarce (or limited) resources, the laws of economics will come into play. This brings up a question: will the Eternal State have resources that are not infinite and that have a cost?

Let us suppose that when science is mastered, it will be possible to obtain a limitless supply of energy at a negligible cost. (If energy never becomes free then that means it has a cost, and that means it is a scarce resource – but for the purpose of this argument let’s assume a best-case scenario.) Let us also suppose that Star Trek-style replicators become common, and anyone can create anything that they want at any time, at no cost. If you want something – be it a meal, or a car, or a house, or a book to read – you can press a button and materialize it at no charge to you.

Even if that level of technology is reached, I believe there are some resources that will always be scarce. For example, time is a scarce resource. Even though we will live forever, we will always live one moment at a time, and in each moment we must make a choice about what to do. We may spend a given hour writing a book, or eating a meal, or talking to a friend, or walking on the beach – but we must make a choice. Barring some limited multi-tasking, if we are doing one thing then we are not doing something else.

This means that our potential creative output is time limited. Take Bach as an example. Bach is a composer of music. If he is building a bookshelf then he is not composing music. New music from Bach is a unique thing; it is a scarce resource, and one that no one else can provide. If civilization wants more music from Bach then it will need to find some way to persuade Bach to spend his time writing music instead of walking in the park. Bach’s time is a scarce resource.

Since there are scarce resources, and since there are competing uses of those resources, and since civilization will desire some things more than others, that leads to the conclusion that there will be some sort of economic system in the Eternal State. Now, it’s unlikely that the medium of exchange will be currency or precious metals; after all, if you can materialize anything you want then precious metals will cease to be valuable. The medium of exchange must be something that is scarce; otherwise it cannot be traded for a scarce resource. I do not know what that resource might be, but it seems highly likely that it will exist.

This brings up another point. Since different people have different talents, and since some talents are more in demand than others, that means that some people’s time will be more in demand than other people’s – which means that their time will cost more. Also, since some people will benefit civilization more than others, that implies that some people will become wealthier than others. How that will work out and what that wealth will look like is unknown, but it seems a likely outcome.

Now, I am not saying that the Eternal State will have people who are poor or destitute. The Eternal State is a world without pain, suffering, death, or disease; no one will go hungry and no one will suffer. Poverty is a relative term here. If one person has $10 million and someone else has $10 billion, then the millionaire will seem poor by comparison – but he’s certainly not poor in an absolute sense. What I am saying is that since people are different, some people will be wealthier than others. (In Christ’s parable of the talents, some servants ended up with more and some ended up with less. There are economic reasons for this, and I do not think that will ever change.)

At the same time, I would like to point out that everyone is going to have an infinite amount of time to enrich themselves. Right now, in this world, people have limited lives and limited opportunities. In eternity, however, people will have endless ages in which they can pursue opportunities. I’m not sure what kind of goods people will be accumulating, or how wealth will be measured, but in an infinite amount of time people can accumulate an infinite amount of things. (It’s really staggering if you stop and think about it.)
 

Population

One of the known characteristics of God’s kingdom is that it will continue to increase and grow forever, throughout all of the ages to come. This implies that there will be some type of growth in the Eternal State. Since Jesus said there is no marriage in Heaven and since Revelation states that we will reign throughout the Eternal State, that implies that God will create new creatures throughout the ages of Eternity. It is possible that He will create new beings or races that we will reign over – and that those creatures may reproduce in large numbers.

One thing we do know is that the universe contains a lot of unused space. Scientists estimate that there are roughly 350 billion large galaxies and 7 trillion dwarf galaxies – for a total of 30 billion trillion stars. That is a great deal of space, and could accommodate a staggering amount of growth! I admit that a lot of that space is uninhabitable by Earth standards, but I’m not sure that matters. God is certainly capable of creating life forms that don’t need Earth-type conditions to survive.

The size of the universe does present a challenge, however. Even if you discount the dwarf galaxies and just focus on the 350 billion large galaxies, we still have something of a problem. To see why, imagine that when the Eternal State begins there are 100 billion Christians. (I admit that number seems extremely high, but for the purpose of this example let’s assume a best-case scenario.) Once the Universe is fully populated, that would mean that 100 billion Christians would be ruling over 350 billion galaxies – so each person would be responsible for 3.5 galaxies, each of which contains billions upon billions upon billions of stars. That would be a truly staggering task. On top of that, the growth will continue for all of eternity, so at some point the Universe will be full and additional universes will be needed. The amount that each person will need to govern will seemingly grow to staggering proportions.

This brings up a question: will people be asked to govern an ever-growing portion of the universe, or at some point will God change the rules so that mankind can have children again? I admit this is unlikely, but it should be noted that God has changed the rules in the past when one dispensation ended and another began. For example, before the Flood no one was allowed to eat meat, but after the Flood it was permitted. Before the Flood people were allowed to marry their siblings, but after the time of Moses that was no longer permitted. Some things have changed throughout time. At this point in history the people in Heaven (and in the Resurrection) do not marry. It may be that it will stay that way forever, but it’s also possible that it will not. It’s at least a possibility to consider.
 

God

One of the complaints I’ve heard about living forever is that eventually you would run out of things to do and life would become incredibly boring. Sure, there’s a lot to do out there, but after a million years or so everything would be old and life would become a terrible pain. People don’t want to die, but at the same time they think that eternity basically means you get to eat the same thing for breakfast for billions and billions of years, until you are sick of life and wish you had never been born.

Interestingly, God does not have this problem. God is eternal; He has always existed and will always exist. God is also complete: He never changes. God is not growing because God is perfect. He is not learning because He knows everything (past, present, and future). Yet, God is not bored. He is not craving something new and He is not bemoaning the fact that He will live forever. In fact, Jesus often advertised eternal life as a good thing, not a bad thing; He seemed to think that it was an incredible prize that was worth giving up everything for.

So what will make eternal life worth living? God. You see, God is infinite; there is no end to Him. We are in a relationship with God; in fact, Jesus called His Church “the Bride”. We can spend a billion years growing in our relationship with God, and still have an infinite amount of things left that we do not know – and an infinite amount of time in which to learn them. We will never exhaust God and we will never learn everything there is to know about Him. Nor will we ever possess all of His wisdom or knowledge. It is staggering to think that, no matter how much time we spend, there will always be more about God that we do not know than we do know. There will always be more.

God is the real prize in Eternity. He is the source of all wisdom, the creator of beauty, the One who is infinitely good and infinitely holy; nothing else we ever encounter will even come close to comparing with Him. He is the Source – and one we will never tire of exploring, and one we will never exhaust. God has told us that He intends to spend the endless ages to come showing us the exceeding riches of His grace, and that is a stirring thought.

The Westminster Catechism says that the chief end (or purpose) of man is to glorify God and enjoy Him forever. It’s a good thing that we have all of eternity to fulfill that goal, because we’re going to need it. That is one task that will never end – and one that we will never get tired of doing.

In Exodus chapters 3 and 4 God told Moses to go to Egypt and demand that Pharaoh release the Israelites. After some initial objections, Moses agreed to go:

Exodus 4:19: “And the Lord said unto Moses in Midian, Go, return into Egypt: for all the men are dead which sought thy life.
20 And Moses took his wife and his sons, and set them upon an ass, and he returned to the land of Egypt: and Moses took the rod of God in his hand.”

At this point something truly unexpected happened. As Moses went on his way to Egypt, God met him in an inn and tried to kill him:

Exodus 4:24: “And it came to pass by the way in the inn, that the Lord met him, and sought to kill him.
25 Then Zipporah took a sharp stone, and cut off the foreskin of her son, and cast it at his feet, and said, Surely a bloody husband art thou to me.
26 So he let him go: then she said, A bloody husband thou art, because of the circumcision.”

This passage is extremely odd. God had just finished talking to Moses, and everything was fine; Moses was on his way to Egypt, doing exactly what God had commanded. So why did God suddenly try to kill him? This is an extremely unexpected turn of events (and it is pretty much always left out whenever the story of Moses is told). The resolution is equally strange: how did Zipporah (the wife of Moses) know what to do? For that matter, why did Zipporah do anything? Why wasn’t Moses the one to act?

In order to understand this passage, there are a few things that we need to keep in mind. First of all, the word “met” in verse 24 (“the Lord met him”) is the same Hebrew word that we find in verse 27, where it says that Aaron “met [Moses] in the mount of God”. It means that God actually met Moses in person. This is a theophany – a preincarnate appearance of Christ. Jesus came to Moses in person so He could kill him. This is not the first time that He had done something like this; in Genesis 32:24-30 the Lord spent the night wresting with Jacob (although His intent there was obviously not to kill him).

So why was God so upset with Moses? It was because Moses had broken His covenant. When God made His covenant with Abraham He instituted circumcision. The consequences of not being circumcised were pretty dire:

Exodus 4:14: “And the uncircumcised man child whose flesh of his foreskin is not circumcised, that soul shall be cut off from his people; he hath broken my covenant.”

[Note the pun in the verse: if the foreskin was not cut off, the person would be cut off. That’s what it says.]

Moses – the man who God had chosen to lead the Israelites to the promised land – had failed to circumcise his own son. How could Moses possibly lead Israel when he had broken the covenant and failed to faithfully lead his own house? God simply could not allow that, so He went and grabbed Moses.

Yes, he grabbed Moses. Notice how the passage says that after Zipporah circumcised Moses’ son, God “let him go”. That Hebrew word “let go” literally means “relax”. Think of it as relaxing your grip on someone. That is probably why Moses didn’t circumcise his own son; since God had grabbed him, Zipporah had to do it.

That brings up another question: why did Moses fail to circumcise his son? The most likely answer is Zipporah. Notice how angry she was over the whole situation, and how much she absolutely hated circumcision. It’s very likely that Moses didn’t circumcise his son because his wife was passionately against it. If that’s the case, then it’s interesting that Zipporah – the one who had opposed her son’s circumcision – had to be the one to circumcise him.

Here is something else to think about. Zipporah took the foreskin and “cast it at his feet”. Who is the word “his” referring to? One would assume that it was referring to Moses, but it doesn’t make sense that she would cast it at his feet; after all, he wasn’t the one who was demanding it. Since Jesus was actually standing there demanding that this be done, isn’t it more likely that in her anger she cast it at His feet? She does call him a “bloody husband”, but that’s not unusual; in the Old Testament God often referred to Himself as Israel’s husband (see Isaiah 54:5 and Jeremiah 31:32, for example).

After this event, it seems that Moses sent Zipporah back home. She was apparently not with Moses when he lead the Israelites out of Egypt, because when Jethro (Moses’ father-in-law) came to visit them when Israel was in the wilderness, he brought along Zipporah and her children:

Exodus 18:1: “When Jethro, the priest of Midian, Moses’ father in law, heard of all that God had done for Moses, and for Israel his people, and that the Lord had brought Israel out of Egypt;
2 Then Jethro, Moses’ father in law, took Zipporah, Moses’ wife, after he had sent her back,
3 And her two sons; of which the name of the one was Gershom; for he said, I have been an alien in a strange land:
4 And the name of the other was Eliezer; for the God of my father, said he, was mine help, and delivered me from the sword of Pharaoh:
5 And Jethro, Moses’ father in law, came with his sons and his wife unto Moses into the wilderness, where he encamped at the mount of God:
6 And he said unto Moses, I thy father in law Jethro am come unto thee, and thy wife, and her two sons with her.”

It seems that Moses initially started out for Egypt with his family, but after the encounter in the inn Moses sent Zipporah and his two sons back, and they only rejoined him later. Given that Zipporah is never mentioned again and that Moses later married someone else (Numbers 12:1), it’s possible that they separated after this.

It’s certainly something to think about, isn’t it?

Revelation 5:1: “And I saw in the right hand of him that sat on the throne a book written within and on the backside, sealed with seven seals.”

Once again, I think that the One who is sitting on the throne is God the Father. The reason I think this is because in a few verses the Lamb will appear and take the book, and it seems unlikely that Jesus is both in front of the throne and on the throne at the same time.

Revelation 5:2: “And I saw a strong angel proclaiming with a loud voice, Who is worthy to open the book, and to loose the seals thereof?
3 And no man in heaven, nor in earth, neither under the earth, was able to open the book, neither to look thereon.”

In a few verses we will see that Jesus was worthy to open the book. What’s interesting about this is that this is a book of judgments and woes that will come upon the Earth. Only Jesus had the authority to unleash these judgments. No one else was able to do it.

People often say that the God of the Old Testament was an angry God who spent His time judging the world and killing people, but the God of the New Testament is a peaceful and loving God. This is a very superficial analysis. People overlook the incredible mercy that God showed in the Old Testament. Before sending judgments He warned people repeatedly and urged them to change their ways. He showed tremendous love and compassion.

People also overlook the fact that the awful, horrific judgments of Revelation were unleashed by Jesus Himself. God destroyed the old world with the Flood – and Jesus will destroy the modern world with fire. Both testaments demonstrate the love of God, and both testaments demonstrate the wrath of God. God never changes.