Let me turn to Genesis chapter
17. While you're turning there, I
just want to maybe bring into remembrance some of the things
that we talked about last Sunday. We talked last Sunday about the
promises of God can't be disannulled. God cannot lie. God cannot go
back on His word. God does not break covenant.
God does not do something that He says He won't do. And He will
not not do something that He says He will do. God will keep
His word. And we've seen last week that
God does not go back on His promises. And we looked at some of the
promises that God had made as far as the everlasting covenant
or the eternal covenant, the spiritual covenant of God with
his spiritual people, and that though the law came in and we
transgressed the law in the outward man, that that does not disannul
the covenant that God has made to save and redeem his people.
And so we looked at that. Well, last week in passing, I
made comment to you that that the covenant that was made with
Abraham is a twofold covenant. There was a there was a physical
covenant that was made with Abraham. But there was also a spiritual
covenant that was made with Abraham. And we looked in Galatians last
week, and we've seen this spiritual covenant that God made with Abraham,
that God would make Abraham the father of many through the seed
which is singular as we've seen in Galatians 3 16 last week that
the seed was singular meaning Christ and that in Christ all
of his seed was blessed and all the promises were to come upon
his seed because Christ was blessed and so that promise to Abraham
in a spiritual way of him becoming the father of the faithful or
all of those who would have faith or be of faith because of the
Lord Jesus Christ was a spiritual covenant, was that everlasting
or eternal covenant, the new covenant, if you would. And that
was what we looked at last week. But I may mention that there
was a physical covenant with Abraham that was made. And a
lot of times there is there is misunderstanding and miscommunication
and especially much today more than there was hundreds of years
ago, thousands of years ago, if we go back. But there is so
much confusion today because there is a mixture of the physical
and the spiritual. Because of the physical, many
think that there is a spiritual fulfillment that is going to
come to the physical. And because of the spiritual,
there is a physical that is going to come upon the spiritual. And
that there is a physical promise that was made to the physical
people of Israel through Abraham, that is something
that's still to be, to happen today. And I would put forth
that there is no more promises to physical Israel in the days
to come, as far as the nation is concerned. And I think that
that's what we find whenever we come to look at the two different
covenants. One was a physical covenant,
and one was a spiritual. The physical, whenever we see
the types and the foreshadows in scripture, The types and the
foreshadows are always to, and are always going to be fulfilled
in a spiritual sense in a greater way. The type and the foreshadow
is always going to be left wanting, if you would, those words, whereas
the spiritual fulfillment of those are the spiritual application
of a lot of these things in the types and the foreshadows. will
always be of a greater value, of a greater significance, of
a greater thing than that which was typified. Now, when it comes to the covenant
with Abraham, especially the physical covenant with Abraham,
What we hear today is that, oh, we have to support Israel because
Israel is God's chosen people. And because they're God's chosen
people, we must help them. We must come to their aid. We
must give them all this money because if we don't, then God's
going to come against us and destroy us because we are not
helping them because that's God's people. And that that land that's
over there is their land and that God has given them that
land. And it's always supposed to be their land. Well, brethren,
I don't think the Bible supports that. And again, I could be wrong
in things and I'm always open for that correction. But I hope
to at least give the reason why I believe the
way that I do. And so today is going to be more
of a teaching, necessarily, than just a preaching on the gospel.
But hopefully we'll find the work of Christ in all of this.
We never want to go through anything without finding the work of Christ.
But if you would look in Genesis chapter 17 with me, this is where
we're going to see the covenant that God made with Abraham. But actually a couple of chapters
before that is when God began to speak to Abraham about some
covenant things. In Genesis chapter 15, in verse
1, It says, after these things,
the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, verse 1, 15,
1. The word of the Lord came unto Abram in a vision, saying,
Fear not, Abram. I am thy shield and thy exceeding
great reward. So up front, God tells Abraham
that I am your reward. I'm your inheritance. I'm what
is at the end for you. I'm your reward. So right up
front we see that it's not the land, it's not the city, it's
not the name or the status, it's the person, Christ Jesus. Jesus
is saying, I am your shield and I am your exceeding great reward. And Abram said, Lord God, what
wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of
my house is this Eliezer of Damascus? And Abram said, behold, to me
thou hast given no seed, and lo, one born in my house is mine
heir. And behold, the word of the Lord
came unto him, saying, This shall not be thy heir, but he that
cometh forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir. And
he brought him forth abroad and said, Look now toward heaven,
and tell the stars if thou be able to number them. And he said
unto him, So shall thy seed be. And he believed in the Lord,
and he counted it, and that it refers back to the seed, to him
for righteousness. Now the reason I say that is
because Jesus made mention that Abraham saw me Abraham in his
day saw me in my day and rejoiced and was exceedingly glad. Abraham
looked ahead. Whenever God preached to Abraham
the gospel, which we also learn in the New Testament that the
gospel was preached unto Abraham, when God preached this gospel
to Abraham that I will be your great reward, I will be your
shield, I will be your righteousness, Abraham believed God that his
righteousness was not in himself, But in this seed that was to
come, Abraham believed it and counted that seed, Christ, to
him for righteousness. And he said unto him, I am the
Lord that brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees to give thee
this land to inherit it. And he said, Lord God, whereby
shall I know that I shall inherit it? And he said unto him, take
me an heifer of three years and a she-goat of three years old,
and a ram of three years old, and a turtle dove, and a young
pigeon. And he took unto him all these, and divided them in
the midst, and laid each piece one against another, but the
birds divided he not. And when the fowls came down
upon the carcass, Abraham drove them away. And when the sun was
going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram, and lo and horror
of great darkness fell upon him. And he said to Abram, know of
a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that
is not theirs, and shall serve them and they shall afflict them
400 years." Now, this is a prophecy of Abram's descendants, physical
descendants, going into Egypt in the 400 years that they would
be. So God's telling them, hey, you're going to go off into Egypt
and you're going to be slaves in Egypt for 400 years. And also,
that nation whom they shall serve will I judge, and afterwards
shall they come out with great substance. And thou shalt go
to thy fathers in peace, be buried in a good old age. Now, turning
through it over to chapter 17, look at verse 1. It says, And when Abram was ninety
years old and nine, the Lord appeared to Abram and said unto
him, I am the Almighty God. Walk before me and be thou perfect
or be thou upright. And I will make My covenant between
Me and thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly.' And Abram
fell on his face, and God talked with him, saying, As for Me,
behold, My covenant is with thee, and thou shalt be a father of
many nations. Neither shall thy name any more
be called Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham. For a father
of many nations have I made thee." meant great father. The word
Abraham means father of nations. So he's going to change his name.
This is going to talk about some physical things. He's going to
make Abram a father of many nations. And many nations did come out
of Abraham. He said that I will make thee exceeding fruitful
and I will make nations of thee and kings shall come out of thee.
And I will establish my covenant between me and thee and thy seed
after thee in their generations for an everlasting covenant to
be a God unto thee and to thy seed after thee." Okay, so I
want you to notice something here in verse 7 because this
is usually what we hear whenever we begin to talk about the physical
covenant that God had with Abraham and as it pertains to Israel
now and what people think is still their land that belongs
to them and that God is going to restore them back to that
land one of these days and set them up as a nation again and
all these things. They think that the covenant
that God made here is an everlasting or eternal covenant that can
never be rescinded. But that it's an unconditional
covenant. But brethren, if you'll look
closely here, you'll find that this is a conditional covenant
that He made with physical Israel. He made a conditional covenant
not an unconditional covenant, even though the word everlasting
is used there. It says, I will give unto thee
and to thy seed after thee the land wherein thou art a stranger. And so it's talking about all
the generations after him, right? So now we're talking about the
plural. First, we're talking about the singular in Genesis
15. We're talking about the singular,
which was in Galatians. Last week, we seen that it was
talking about the seed, which is singular, meaning Christ.
So we were talking about a covenant that was made in Christ Jesus
to the spiritual people of God. But now we're looking at a covenant
that God is making with Abraham, with the physical people that
God had chosen through Abraham, chosen out of all the rest of
the people to make a nation of, to be an example, to bring forth
all the things of God in the covenant, to show forth the gospel,
to show forth Christ, to bring forth all these things that was
to typify and to foreshadow all of what was going to be done
of the new covenant. So we see here that he says,
In verse 7 he says, I will establish my covenant between me and thee
and thy seed after thee in their generations for an everlasting
covenant to be a God unto thee and to thy seed after thee. And
I will give unto thee and to thy seed after thee the land
wherein thou art a stranger, all the land of Canaan for an
everlasting possession. See, here's the terms of the
covenant. I will give thee and thy seed after thee all the land
for an everlasting possession, and here's the terms on their
end, and I will be their God. So the terms of the covenant
is, I will give you land, but you will be my people and I will
be your God. So as long as they have Him as
their God, as long as He is their God, then that is the term of the
covenant and it will be an everlasting covenant under that condition.
Verse 9, And God said unto Abraham, Thou shalt keep my covenant. So there again, that's a conditional
thing. Thou shalt keep my covenant,
therefore, thou and thy seed after thee in their generations.
So the physical covenant was a conditional covenant. It wasn't an unconditional covenant
like the New Covenant is. The New Covenant is an unconditional
covenant because it wasn't made with man. It was made by God
Himself saying, this is what I am going to do. Here, He is
giving a condition, just like whenever He gives on the mountain,
He gives the commandments to the people and told them to keep
it. Well, there isn't no way that they're going to keep it.
There was no way that Abraham and these people were going to
be able to keep this covenant because it never was intended
for them to keep this covenant. And I think we'll see that here
in just a few minutes. But he said, this is my covenant
which ye shall keep between me and you and thy seed after thee. And then he gave them the sign
of the covenant. So he made the covenant that
he would give them the land and they would be His people, and
they would look to Him as their God, and this is the sign of
that covenant, that they were His covenant people, then He
gave them the sign of circumcision, and that they were to keep that
sign of circumcision as a sign that they were His people and
that they were keeping His law. Now remember, this is before
the Law of Moses, okay? The Law of Moses had came. Matter
of fact, God just had given them the prophecy that there would
be a time when Moses would come, but that has not happened yet. So here is the law that God had
given to these brethren, keep this covenant, and here's the
sign of this covenant. And so he gave them the covenant
and they kept that covenant. Now, if you'll turn with me over
to Joshua, of course we know between here and Joshua, that
Moses did come. The children of Israel did come. We know the promise of God was
true that Abraham and Sarah did have a child, right? And in that
child, we see that many other children came and that there
was a time that Joshua had went into slavery. And his brothers
had sold him into slavery after kicking him down into a pit and
tearing his clothes, lying to Jacob about his demise. And Joseph was then sold into
slavery and served under the pharaoh of Egypt for several
years and eventually was able to be brought by the pharaoh
up into high esteem as the second in command over all of Egypt.
And because of that, The people of Abraham, the Hebrews, the
Israelites, was able to come into Egypt during the famine
and was able to be taken care of and then for 400 years they
lived within the land of Egypt and they began to multiply. And
they began to multiply a lot. They became millions to the point
where Pharaoh, the Pharaoh that was alive when Moses came along,
began to say, hey, these people have become so great in the land
that they are more than us, that they can overtake us. We need
to do something about that. And so the Pharaoh began to put
a lot of hardships upon the children of Israel. Of course, we all
know what happened. Moses came along. The plagues
came along. God delivered his people out
of Egypt after showing his power and his might over Pharaoh and
hardening his heart, all the exercise of sovereignty that
God showed. and they were brought out of
Egypt and after they came out of Egypt and they wandered in
the desert and everything, but all the promises that God had
given to Abraham that these people would go into this promised land
of Canaan was still ahead of them. They were still looking
forward to that. That promise had not yet been fulfilled. But
then they came to the edge and Moses was not allowed to go over,
but Joshua And the rest of Israel that was still alive after they
wandered in the wilderness was able to go in and possess the
land. Now, some say that Israel has never fully possessed the
land, that God still has this promise to fulfill to Israel. But we find here in Joshua that
God did keep His promise. God did fulfill everything that
He promised to Abraham and to the children of Israel. In Joshua
chapter 21, if you'll look there with me, Moses has since died. Joshua
and them have come into the land. They've taken possession of the
land. God has went before them, destroyed
all their enemies, and they've come into the land. And in Joshua
21, if you'll look with me at verse 43, this is Joshua here speaking.
It says, And the Lord gave unto Israel all the land which He
swore to give unto their fathers, and they possessed it and dwelt
therein. So here the Scripture clearly
says that they possessed the land which God had promised to
Israel. So God kept His promise. He took
them out, He brought them in, He destroyed all their enemies,
and He gave them the land that He promised to give them. It
says, and the Lord gave them rest round about according to
all that He sware unto their fathers. So He didn't go back
on His promise. He didn't leave His promise. It said, and there stood not
a man of all their enemies before them. The Lord delivered all
their enemies into their hand. There fell not out of any good
thing which the Lord had spoken unto the house of Israel. all
came to pass. So everything that God promised
to physical Israel, to Abraham, came to pass. So it was fulfilled
right here. It was promised, and God kept
His promise. Now, they didn't keep their promise,
as we'll see, but God kept His promise. He gave them the land,
destroyed their enemies, and He made them a people within
this land who were not a people. They took over things that were
not theirs. And they came into this land and they physically
took over and they physically owned it, they physically possessed
it, and all the physical promises God set here came to pass. Now, look with me, if you would,
over to chapter 23 in Joshua. Joshua reiterates this right
before his death. Joshua 23. I'm going to start
reading in verse 21, and bear with me because I'm going to
read down through the whole chapter here. But there's some things that
I'd like to point out here as far as it pertains to this physical
covenant, this conditional covenant God made with Abraham. The reason
I say it's conditional is not only because of what we've seen
in Genesis, but also what Joshua says. Because I think this also
confirms that that physical covenant with Israel was a conditional
covenant. Chapter 23, verse 1 says, And
it came to pass, a long time after that the Lord had given
rest unto Israel from all their enemies round about, that Joshua
waxed old and stricken in age. And Joshua called for all Israel,
and for their elders, and for their heads, and for their judges,
and for their officers, and said unto them, I am old and stricken
in age. And ye have seen all that the
Lord your God hath done unto all these nations because of
you. For the Lord your God is He that
hath fought for you. Behold, I have divided unto you
by lot these nations that remain, to be an inheritance for your
tribes from Jordan, with all the nations that I have cut off,
even unto the great sea westward. And the Lord your God, He shall
expel them from before you and drive them from out of your sight. And ye shall possess their land
as the Lord your God hath promised unto you. Be ye therefore very
courageous to keep and do." Now here's where this covenant, conditional
covenant comes in. Be ye therefore very courageous
to keep and to do all that is written in the book of the law
of Moses that ye turn not aside therefrom to the right or to
the left. that ye come not among these
nations, these that remain among you, neither make mention of
their name or their gods, nor cause to swear by them, neither
serve them, nor bow yourselves unto them. But cleave unto the
Lord your God, as ye have done unto this day. For the Lord hath
driven out from before you great nations and strong, But as for
you, no man hath been able to stand before you unto this day.
And it wasn't because Israel was a mighty nation in and of
themselves. They weren't. It was because
God fought for them. Verse 10. One man of you shall
chase a thousand for the Lord your God. He it is that fighteth
for you as He hath promised you. Take good heed therefore unto
yourselves that ye love the Lord your God. So here's the conditional
part again. Take heed that you love the Lord
your God. He told Abraham, I will do all
this stuff for you. I will give you the land. I will
give you all this that I've promised. And you will be my people. I
will be your God. Okay. And you will keep this
covenant. You will do this covenant. Verse
12. Else, if ye do in any wise, go
back and cleave unto the remnant of these nations, even these
that remain among you, and shall make marriages with them, and
go in unto them, and they to you. Verse 13, listen. Know for a certainty that the
Lord your God will no more drive out any of these nations from
before you, but they shall be snares and traps unto you. and
scourges in your sides, and thorns in your eyes, until ye perish
from off this good land which the Lord your God hath given
you. And behold, this day I am going the way of all the earth."
Joshua is basically saying, I'm about to die. And ye know in
all your hearts and in all your souls, here it is again, not
one thing hath failed of all the good things which the Lord
your God spake concerning you. all are come to pass unto you,
and not one thing hath failed thereof." So he's reiterating
the fact that God has kept His promise. He's done everything
He said He would. And they have received the promise that God
made to Abraham. They have inherited the land.
They've taken over the land. God has destroyed their enemies
before them. And as long as they keep the covenant, that will
continue on everlasting. Verse 15, "...therefore it shall
come to pass that as all good things are come upon you which
the Lord your God promised you, so shall the Lord bring upon
you all evil things until He hath destroyed you from off this
good land which the Lord your God hath given you." So here
again is a condition. God's saying, therefore it shall
come to pass that as all good things are come upon you which
the Lord God promised you, so shall the Lord bring upon you
all evil things until He has destroyed you from all the good
land which He has given you, if you don't keep the covenant. Now here, brethren, is one of
the things that really solidified in my mind about this being a
conditional thing and being a purpose thing that God never intended
for it to be everlasting in the physical nature of it. It's because
God had predestinated before the foundation of the world that
this people would rebel against him, would go away whoring after
other gods, would not keep him as their god, would not be their
god because it represents our old man who never does bow in
submission to God. And so it never will enter in.
Moses never entered into the promised land because he represented
the law. He represented us who cannot
keep the law and we will not enter in. The inward man, he's
the one that entered in. the inward man is the one who
keeps the law of God, but the outward man doesn't. The outward
man of Israel cannot keep that which is the Israel of the flesh,
cannot keep the things of God, is not the children of promise,
is not the one who has been given the covenant of eternal things. But the children of promise,
the children of faith, the children of the spiritual seed is the
ones who have been given the everlasting, eternal, non- conditional
promise. But if you look here, the word
in verse 16 that causes me to see this, or to say this, is
God doesn't say if ye transgress the covenant of the Lord your
God, He says when. He says, so shall the Lord bring
upon you all evil things until He hath destroyed you from off
the good land when the Lord your God hath given you which the
Lord your God hath given you, when ye have transgressed the
covenant of the Lord your God, which He commanded you, and have
gone and served other gods, and have bowed yourself to them,
then shall the anger of the Lord be kindled against you, and ye
shall perish quickly from off the good land which He hath given
unto you." God's telling them what is going to happen, not
what might happen. because he gave them the condition,
a condition that never was meant to be kept. Just like whenever
God gives us the law, it was never given to make us righteous,
it was given to us to show our sinfulness. And he gave Israel,
in the flesh and physicality, a covenant that they could never
keep. And since they cannot keep the covenant, they will not inherit
the promises or be able to keep the promises. God will keep his
promise, and he did keep his promise. But someone will say,
well, wait a minute. God still has that promise out
there. Well, he said here he's going to destroy them off this
land if they don't keep this covenant. And we learn that they
don't keep that covenant. In fact, if we continue to follow
the nation of Israel, we find out that the nation of Israel
began to break up into two sections, Israel later broke up and there
was ten tribes to the north and there was two tribes to the south.
The ten tribes to the north was called Israel and the two tribes
to the south was called Judah and Benjamin. The ten tribes
that went to the north, they completely went headlong after
idols. And God judged them, took them
into captivity. God spared Benjamin and Judah
for a time, but then they also began to follow after other gods
with the king Jeroboam. Now, or excuse me, Jeroboam was
the king of the northern tribes, and he went after all the other
gods, and all the other kings of all the other tribes, they
also followed after Jeroboam and went after other gods. Okay? And so, God led them into Egyptian captivity. He led them into Babylonian captivity.
But whenever God brought them into those captivities, whenever
the tribes of the north and the tribes of the south began to
go against God and look after other gods, within Judah, within
Benjamin, within those tribes, even whenever they came back
out, there were some that stayed in. Not everybody came back. Some stayed in and stayed worshiping
other gods. And then those that came out,
among those who came out, eventually they turned back against God
as we've seen in the days of Jesus. Those two southern tribes,
Judah and Benjamin, those are the ones that eventually became
known as the Jews in what we see in the New Testament. Now,
whenever those tribes were taken into captivity, into Babylonian
captivity and Egyptian captivity, and God began to punish them
for what He had done, He gave them a promise under Ezra and
Nehemiah that He would restore them. So yes, they transgressed
God, they went after other gods, and God took them into captivity,
but God came and said, I will restore you and He restored them. He brought them back and He restored
them. So He promised that He would
restore them. They would go away into idolatry. They would go away into captivity.
God would send them into captivity. Then He would come and He would
bring judgment upon those who took them into captivity. They
would be released from captivity and He would restore them. So
there was a promise made to restore them to the land. And God did.
He restored them back to the land under Ezra and Nehemiah,
when Cyrus, the king of Persia, let them go out, rebuilt everything,
and restored them. There was first a rebuilding
of the wall, there was a rebuilding of the temple, but then there
was an allowing of all of them to go back and to begin to worship
again. So God restored them back, so
He did exactly what He promised. That brings us up to the time
of Jesus. Now, there's a couple of places where we can go and
we can see this captivity and how God had promised to destroy
the people that was in there, just as He had promised all along
to destroy their enemies. And He promised to restore them
back to the land, and He did. But then we come to the time
of Jesus. And whenever Jesus came, He began
to talk about these idolaters He began to talk about this nation
of Israel in a completely different way. Matter of fact, he began
to call them a den of vipers. Remember that? Called them the
children of the devil. That's pretty harsh. He called them whitewashed sepulchers.
He called them a synagogue of Satan. That's what God said about
the physical nation of Israel. And so, what they had become
was not a people who was, that was their God and they was his
people. They had gone after their idols, they had clung to their
idols, and the Pharisees, the Sadducees, and all these religious
leaders and the scribes, All of them were holding on to the
traditions of men. They were holding on to a lot
of the Talmud, and they were holding on to a lot of the Kabbalah,
and a lot of the things that they gathered in Babylon. And
a lot of these things were prevalent in the way that they conducted
themselves and how they led. Even Jesus, whenever He'd come,
He said, O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, thou who persecuted... As a matter of fact, let's go
ahead and turn there. That's in Matthew 23. Matthew 23. Now remember, I mentioned a while
ago, God said, when ye, when ye go out after these idols and
you forsake Me, and you bow down and you serve them, then I will
destroy you off this land. There was a time, there was a
purpose, there was a time that God was going to come and destroy
them and not to bring them back in to that land. And if you look
in Matthew 23, and let's start reading in, well, what I was just saying
here, This whole entire passage here
is where he calls them vipers and whitewashed sepulchers. Let's look at verse 29. Why won't
you, you scribes and Pharisees, hypocrites, because you build
the tombs of the prophets and garnish the sepulchers of the
righteous, and say, if we had been in the days of our Father,
we would not have been partakers with them in the blood of the
prophets. Wherefore ye be witnesses unto
yourself that ye are the children of them that killed the prophets."
Now look at verse 32. Jesus says, Fill ye up then the measure of
your fathers. Now what does that mean? Is that
just something that Jesus threw in there in the midst of his
woes against all these Pharisees? No, there was a purpose for which
these Pharisees had come. There was a purpose in which
these religious leaders had been raised up to their idolatrous
religious leadership. There was a reason why all of
this had taken place is because God, before the foundation of
the world and the eternal counsel of God, and by His determinate
counsel, had determined that these religious leaders would,
by their wicked hands, crucify the Lord Jesus Christ. So if
there was to be religious leaders who would lift up their hand
against the Son of Man and to crucify Him, if there were to
be religious leaders among Israel who were to go against God and
to cease being His people and to cease from looking to Him
as their God, then God had to have predetermined that before
the foundation of the world. Otherwise, He would not have
said, go after other gods and bow down
and serve them, then I will do this." He would not have said
that. He would not have said that by
the determinate counsel of God, you by wicked hand. He would
not have said that if that had not been the determination. So
these wicked men, these Pharisees and these religious leaders,
as we see here in verse 32, have a measure to fill up. All the
times throughout the prophets, we see there was these religious
leaders, there was these religious people, excuse me, the religious
people who raised up and killed the prophets. And these religious
Pharisees was just more of that line of people. And they killed
the prophets. They didn't want God as their
God. They continued in their mixture of God's stuff and Babylonian
stuff, if you would. But look what he says there.
Fill ye up the measure of your fathers. So it tells me that
there was a allotted amount of iniquity that these men were
to bring on before God was going to bring judgment upon them.
God had said He was going to bring judgment upon Israel back
in the Old Testament, in many places actually, but God was
going to bring judgment upon Israel. But there was an allotted
amount of iniquity that they were to fill up before He brought
that iniquity. The same with some of the other
nations. Some of the other nations, the Gentile nations, had not
filled up the iniquity that God had intended to be filled up
before He brought destruction upon them. There was an allotted
amount of iniquity that God had determined would take place,
meaning that there was a lot of things that was going to go
on that they were going to do that was against God, that God
was going to permit because He had determined it before the
foundation of the world. He was permitting it to happen
for His purpose. But when all of that has transpired,
then He would bring judgment upon them. And He had placed
within the physical nation of Israel people that would be idolaters
to fill up iniquity, to fill up the measure of their fathers
and bring about what God had purposed, which was the crucifixion
of His Son for the salvation in the new covenant of His spiritual
Israel. He brought through the physical
people these men who would fill up the measure, and when that
measure had been filled up, then the judgment would come as God
had promised, because God doesn't lie. Verse 33. He says, Ye serpents,
ye generation of vipers, how can ye escape the damnation of
hell? They can't. They can't escape the damnation
of hell. Why? Because God has created
them as vessels of dishonor. Romans 9 tells us that He has
created some for vessels of dishonor. Just like with Pharaoh, God raised
Pharaoh up for the purpose of showing his might and his power
at Pharaoh. So that God would be known throughout all the world.
And his name would be proclaimed in all the world. And his sovereignty
would be heralded and praised throughout all the world. He
raised Pharaoh up for that purpose. Raised him up, hardened his heart,
brought him into all the iniquity that Pharaoh was to bring forth,
and then killed him and judged him. Same thing with all the
lands that they conquered. Same with all the stuff that
was cut whenever they'd come against Israel. God did all these
things. They would fill up the iniquity
to the point and then God would judge them. And here we see it's
no different with the nation or the physical nation of Israel
who had turned against their God. Now, brother, I'm not talking
about the remnant. I'm not talking about the spiritual ones of Israel
who are true spiritual Israelites. I'm not talking about them. I'm
talking about those physical children of Israel who have,
as Jesus said here, is doing all these things. They're killing
the prophets. They have turned away from God. They have ceased
believing in God. Whenever Jesus came, there were
some that believed and was looking forward to the promise of the
Messiah. And then there was some that weren't. They were following
after the traditions of the Pharisees. He says, verse 34, Wherefore,
behold, I send unto you prophets and wise men and scribes and
some of them ye shall kill and crucify, and some of them shall
ye scourge in your synagogues and persecute them from city
to city. That upon you may come all the righteous blood shed
upon the earth from the blood of righteous Abel unto the blood
of Zacharias son of Baracchus whom ye slew between the temple
and the altar. So he said, this reaches all
the way back to Abel. It's talking about a people,
and that was back before Abram was called. He's talking about
this is a generation of people who this is not their God. And
he said, this judgment is coming and you have been guilty of everything
that has been from the very time you have been against righteousness. You have been against God's gospel,
the gospel of the Messiah who would come. the gospel of the
salvation of Jehovah. You have been for your own righteousness. You have gone after your own
gods who in that idolatry you perform, they reward based on
your performance. You have gone against everything
that we have preached from righteous Abel all the way down to this
Zacharias, son of Barakias. And he said, you and all your
children are guilty of this blood. He says, Verily I say unto you,
all these things shall come upon this generation. I believe He
was talking to them. All these things, all the judgment
that is to come is going to come upon that generation because
they were the ones who, as He said in verse 32, were going
to be the ones to fill up the measure of their fathers. They're
the ones that are going to seal it all up, to finish it all up.
In verse 37, O Jerusalem, Jerusalem, Thou that killest the prophets
and stonest them which are sent unto thee, how often would I
have gathered thy children together, even as a hen gathers her chicken
under her wings, and you would not. Behold," here it is, Jesus
is saying, behold, your house is left unto you desolate. So Jesus is saying here that
the house of Israel is to be left desolate. that these men
would be the ones who would fill up the measure of the iniquity
that was predetermined upon them, decreed upon them, predestinated
upon them, the purpose for which they were brought forth, that
they were to be the ones that would fill up the measure. And
once that measure is filled up and they have been completed
in everything that God had predetermined for them to do, then God will
bring His judgment upon them just as he had promised. He says,
For I say unto you, ye shall not see me henceforth, till ye
shall say, Blessed is he that cometh in the name of the Lord.
So God was through with them. He said that their house would
be left desolate, just like the ten tribes to the north. If you
look at Matthew 27, we'll see where this was consummated. The people filled up the measure
just as God had said. Matthew 27 and verse 25. Matthew 27. Actually, I'm going to start
reading verse 22. Pilate saith unto them,
What shall I do then with Jesus which is called Christ? They
all said unto him, Let him be crucified. And the governor said,
Why, what evil hath he done? But they cried out the more,
saying, Let him be crucified. When Pilate saw that he could
prevail nothing, but that rather a tumult was made, he took water
and washed his hands before the multitude, saying, I am innocent
of the blood of this just person. See ye to it. Then answered all
the people and said, His blood be on us and on our children. So here, Israel, apostate Israel,
has said, let His blood be upon us and all of our children. Just
as God said, all the blood of all of the righteous prophets,
all of the righteous scribes, and here upon the Messiah Himself
was going to be upon them, that physical nation of Israel. He
said, let His blood be upon us, and not only us, but look, upon
our children. Look also in the parallel of
this, in John chapter 19, they even said it worse, I believe,
in John chapter 19, they declared their loyalty, they declared
their rejection of God as their God, John chapter 19 and verse 15. I'll start reading that verse
12. And from this force, pilots sought
to release Jesus. But the Jews cried out saying
if that let this man go, thou art not Caesar's friend. They're like siding with Caesar
before they're siding with Jesus, their Messiah. They're saying,
if thou let this man go, they were being crafty, by the way,
the Jews were being crafty, because they knew Pilate was head under
Caesar, but over them is Roman. And so they were putting Pilate
in a predicament. Hey, if you choose this man, you're not a
friend of Caesar. So they're conniving here to
get Pilate to do what they wanted. They wanted Jesus dead. They
didn't want Him as their King. They didn't want Him as their
Messiah. They didn't want God as their God. Jesus had foretold
that in the time. He said, if Abraham was your
father, you would believe on Me. If God was your father, you
would come to Me. But He's not. You don't come
to Me. The reason you don't hear My
words is because you're not of the Father. You're of your father,
the devil. See, Jesus was pronouncing all
the statement of fact that these people were exactly who God had
determined that the physical nation of Israel would be. The
physical nation of Israel was never intended to be the people
of God and His kingdom. It was always the spiritual people
of God in a spiritual kingdom, not of the old covenant, but
of the new covenant. It's always been that. From before
the foundation of the world until after the end of this world and
the beginning of the new. It's always been God, Christ
and His people, and His people being blessed in Him. And that
kingdom is a spiritual kingdom. They are ruled by their King
within. It has always been that way. And Jesus is saying this time
is about to come to an end. Now they were looking for a physical
king. They were looking for a physical ruler. They were looking for
a physical kingdom. And that's not what Jesus came
for. He didn't come to set up a physical kingdom and a physical
people. He came to set up His, or to
bring forth and manifest His spiritual kingdom in His spiritual
people, His children, His servants, which are the ones who serve
Him in the Spirit, in the new man. And so look what we see
here though. He says, if thou let this man
go, thou art not Caesar's friend, whosoever maketh himself a king
speaketh against Caesar. So he's saying this man says
that he's a king, and so he's setting himself up against Caesar.
We're not going for that. We're putting our allegiance
to Caesar. He says, when Paul therefore
heard that saying, he brought Jesus forth and sat down in the
judgment seat in a place that is called the pavement, but in
the Hebrew, Gabbatha, And it was the preparation of the Passover,
and about the sixth hour, and he said unto the Jews, Behold
your king. But they cried, Away with him,
away with him, crucify him. Pilate said unto him, Shall I
crucify your king? The chief priests answered, and
listen to what they said, We have no king but Caesar. Brethren, I believe that right
there was the ultimate filling up, the measure of their iniquity,
and it beginning right there, with their allegiance to Caesar.
And if you remember, the Roman Caesars was considered to be
gods. They considered themselves to
be gods and were, they didn't care if you worshiped other gods,
but they themselves would be the prominent god. To them and
them alone was to be complete and total servitude. And here, the, what was thought to be the
people of God, here the Israel, the physical Israel, said we
have no king. These are the people who years
ago, years ago, said we don't want this king to rule over us. Give us a king like all the kings
of the nations. See, even back then their heart
was, this is not our king. We don't want to have a king
that rules over us in this faith realm, in this invisible realm,
in this unseen realm. We want signs and wonders. Well,
God even gave them signs and wonders and they still didn't
believe. Just in the New Testament, God gave signs and wonders and
they still didn't believe. The signs and wonders were there
to prove that they were not true Israel. That's why God gave the
gifts of the Spirit, the speaking in tongues, the healing, the
prophesying. These things were given as spiritual
gifts or supernatural gifts to not believers, but to unbelievers.
He was given that to the unbelievers to show forth that even though
you see signs and wonders that you're seeking after, you still
don't believe because you're not of Abraham. Spiritual Abraham. Just like in the old days, they
were given signs and wonders. God took care of them, gave them
manna from on high, split the Red Sea, did the deliverance
out of Egypt, wiped out all their enemies before them, walked in
the fiery furnaces with them, saved them from the lion's den.
All these wonderful works that God did before their eyes and
miracles and signs that God did, and yet still these people said,
we don't want this king of the invisible, unseeable, untangible
world. We want something physical. We want something physical. And
here, they filled up the measure, or at least began filling up
the measure here, by saying, we have no king. I mean, they
didn't say, Yeah, we have a king to come, which is Messiah. It wasn't that they were saying,
we have a Messiah coming. We just don't think this is the
guy. No, they said we have no king but Caesar. Then delivered
he him therefore unto them to be crucified. And they took Jesus
and led him away. And then we learn in Acts, that's 20. That's quoting a while ago. Remember, I can't remember. The one I'm
thinking of is where he said that by the term of the Council
of God, these wicked men would would do these things, and they
did. They crucified Christ Jesus. They were deceptive after His
death and His resurrection. We're going to hide this. Don't
tell anybody about this. You tell everybody that His disciples
stole Him away, even paid off the guards, told them not to
say anything to anybody. This wicked and untoward generation
of Israelites ceased to see God as their God. and they to be
His people. And God did exactly what He promised
to do. He destroyed them off that land
in AD 70. God sent in, just as Daniel 9 promises, He sent in
armies and they destroyed them and wiped them off of the land.
Here's the difference between Israel during Jesus' time and
Israel in Nehemiah and Ezra's time. God promised to them after
their captivity to restore them. And He did. And brought about all the promises
that He had promised. But God never promised after
these men to restore them. Once He destroyed
them in AD 70 and wiped them off the land, and promised to
restore them again. He did restore them as He promised
under Ezra and Nehemiah like He promised He would do. But
there never was ever again told that He would restore them if
they went away again. And for however many hundreds
of years it was, from the rebuilding of the temple, it was like 400
and something years, to Christ's coming, there was no more promise
of a restoration. And here the Jews came and did
exactly what God had promised. When thou goest after other idols,
and you cease to serve Me, and you begin to serve them, and
bow yourselves before them, then I will destroy you off this land.
I will wipe you off. And that's exactly what God has
done, but yet He hasn't given them a promise to restore them
after that. And the reason why is because
the need for physical Israel, just like the need for the signs
and wonders that God gives, just like the need for all the types
and foreshadows of the Old Testament, the need for all of the Old Covenant
and the Old Covenant people and the Old Covenant ordinances was
to look forward to Christ Jesus. They're no longer needed now
because now it has been made manifest and brought forth the
mystery that was from all ages, that God had a true Israel, and
Christ was that King, and Christ has a kingdom that is a spiritual
kingdom, and that these people are made up of every tribe, language,
nation, and tongue, Jew and Gentile. And so God made that manifest,
and that everlasting covenant, or eternal covenant, that is
the new covenant, is not made with the promises of the old
covenant, which were promises that were based upon conditions
that would never be able to be kept, but the New Covenant was
based upon, as Hebrew says, upon better promises. This was a promise
that God will do this and left no conditions for us. The spiritual
salvation, the spiritual kingdom, the spiritual people of God would
be saved in a spiritual way and it would be kept and held and
performed by God Himself. He would be the keeper of the
covenant. It wasn't a conditional one. Abraham, Adam, Jonah, all
these men, Noah, these conditional covenants was given, and every
time the conditional covenant is ever given to the natural
man, the natural man cannot keep it. Natural Israel could not
keep the covenant, nor will it ever be able to keep that covenant. Because the covenant that God
has put up as one that will not fail, and that has no conditions,
is one that is a spiritual covenant. It's a new covenant. And so what's
going on over in Israel, and the fighting over land, and the
saying that these are God's people and we've got to... No, God has
ceased with them. Whenever Christ was crucified,
that rail was rent in two, and He caused the end of oblations. And the abomination of desolation
took place, and it destroyed all of the city and all of the
people, and they were done away with. That was the end. I'm sorry. Acts 2.23. Not Acts 20. Acts
2.23 is what I flipped over. Verse 22, it says, you men of
Israel, hear these words of Jesus of Nazareth, the man of proof,
of God among you, by miracles and wonders and signs. So see,
Christ gave them miracles, wonders, and signs, which God did by him
in your midst, as ye yourselves also know, him being delivered
by the determinate counsel and foreknowledge of God, ye have
taken him by wicked hands, have crucified and slain. whom God
hath raised up, having loosed the pains of death, because it
was not possible that he should be holding to it." And so we
see that it was determined by God that these men be there for
that purpose, that this nation be there for this purpose. And
that nation also shows forth the nature of every child of
grace who on the outward man is just like physical Israel.
We're idolatrous. all the time. And we can't cease
from being idolaters. We will always run away back
to our idols, which, number one, is ourself and our own righteousness.
But yet the inward Israel who is in us, that seed that is within
us, that man never goes away. It cannot sin. It will not go
after other idols. It will always be after God. And it's a remnant that is preserved
in Christ Jesus. It is a remnant that is preserved
by God. And so we see the duality of
the Shulamite as we sing about. There is an army, two armies
within us. The outward army will perish.
The army will cease to exist and will be no more. But the
inward army will continue on. Though the outward man perish,
the inward man is renewed day by day. Though the outward Israel
perish, The inward Israel continued on. All them that are of Israel
are not Israel. All them that are of Israel are
not all Israel. It is not the children of the
flesh who are the children of the promise, but those who are
the children of the promise are accounted for the seed. See, there's the outward and
there's the inward. There's the physical, there's the spiritual,
there's the fleshly, and there's the heavenly. And we bear forth
the heavenly. We preach the heavenly. We look
forward to the heavenly. We're not looking to reestablish
some sort of a physical thing or a physical type or a physical
shadow. We're looking to rejoice in the spiritual. We're to rejoice
in the conquering of Christ, of all of His foes, physical
and spiritual. Where the enemies of God are
not only laid bare, whether it be the wicked, whether it be
Satan, whether it be sin, and death, all these have been conquered
of God on our behalf. He is the king overall, whether
it be physical or whether it be spiritual. But that kingdom
that we are going to be a part of, that's part of the new covenant,
is not a physical kingdom that will be set up with physical
Israel to rule and reign in. But it will be a spiritual kingdom
that all of the true Israelites will be a part of and will rule
and reign with Him as we already are in Christ Jesus now as we
are seated with Him in heaven. So we look towards that as a
spiritual... I bring this up because I've
seen a lot of stuff on TV with what's going on over in Israel
and the fight about the land. I see a lot of professing Christians
who are waving their Zionist flags that we have to keep up
this hope with Israel because if not, then we're not going
to be blessed. Because we have to support these
people because they're the people of God. And that God loves them
and that's their people. Brethren, listen to me. Those
people that are over in Israel, I can tell you right now, I know
two or three men who went over and preached over in Israel and
they've just about been killed for preaching the gospel. because
they hate. They were spit on. They came
and tore up all their tracts that they give and everything
like this. They were spit upon. They were dragged off into the
street and beat. All their stuff was ransacked
and everything. They were run out of town. Listen,
these people hate Christ and they hate Jehovah. How can you
say that the people that hate Christ are God's people? How can you say those who love
idolatry are God's people? They're not. And listen, they
are the source and the generation of many, of many, of many wicked
devices. You'll just do some research
on that and you'll see that these Zionist Jews are a synagogue
of Satan, just as Jesus had said. They are not the people of God.
Now, don't misunderstand what I'm saying, brethren. I know
the brethren here know what I mean. I'm talking about anybody listening
or watching. I'm not saying everybody who is of an ethnic Israel heritage
are these people. I'm talking about the religiousness
or the religious religion of the Jews is not the religion.
There is not a Judaic Christian thing. Judaism and Christianity
is not the same thing and neither are they married together. We
are not Judeo-Christians. We are New Covenant Christians,
not Old Covenant Christians. Judaism is a mockery of the Old
Covenant system. Those Zionist Jews that are doing
their rituals and everything that they do now, that is not
after the covenant that God had given them, after the law of
Moses even. They are not keeping the law
of Moses in what they do. All of them. And yet they feel
that their salvation is in their heritage and their salvation
is in their keeping to their laws and their traditions. Just like in Jesus' days. These
people are still the people that Jesus spoke to. They are vipers.
They are a synagogue of Satan. They're not the people of God. The people of God are those who
believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and are looking to Christ Jesus
as their only righteousness. As their only King. And they're
not looking for a city here. They're looking for a city that
is beyond here. Beyond the physical. They're
looking to that city that is built up of every lively stone
that God has brought forth to be forth His building and where
His presence dwells and where He is their God and they are
His people just as in the old covenant He said, I will be their
God and they will be My people. But that never happened. Why?
Because of the failure of the people. But in that kingdom,
that spiritual kingdom, that spiritual Jerusalem, He is our
God and we are His people and it can never change that way.
because He will never go against that people of God because they
are His and love from everlasting. And we will never go against
Him because we have the seed remaining in Him. And we cannot
sin, meaning we cannot go off into idolatry. We can never go
away from Him. We will be preserved because
we are in Christ Jesus. See, the New Covenant is always
better than the Old Covenant. The fulfillment is always better
than the type in the shadow brethren. And why so many people want to
harbor on an attack in shadow and make something of it and
want to go back and build some tabernacle and start performing
sacrifices again, I don't have any clue on why you would do
that because that to me is a spit in the face of the Lord Jesus
Christ. He came and fulfilled it all. And He's brought you
into it. You don't have to work to get
into it. As we talked about last week, there isn't nothing to
be fulfilled on your part that everything is fulfilled on His
part, and those promises can't be disannulled because of who
we are in the outward man. That Shulamite on the outside,
the Shulamite on the inside, He keeps the law of God. And
He is being ruled and reigned by Jesus Christ now. And so,
brethren, we rejoice in the fact that we are not of this world.
We're just pilgrims passing through. Is that something in the thing
book? Did you have a song? 170. 170.
170. 170 in the old school. Go ahead, brother. I would see Jesus when the flowers
of joy adorn my way. When sunshine and my hopes surround
my path from day to day. When friends I cherish most are
near and hearts encircle mine. that Father would I turn from
all and lean alone on Thine. To those who know, the Lord I
speak is my beloved near. The bridegroom of my soul I seek,
O when will he appear? The one, some man of grief and
shame, Yet now He fills the throne and bears the greatest, sweetest
name that earth or heaven has known. Grace lies before a lovatent,
it says where'er He goes. Though none can see Him but His
friends, and they were once His foes. He speaks obedient to His
call, our warm affections blue. Did He but shine a light on all,
then all alike would love. Then love in every heart would
reign, and war would cease to roar. And cruel I let a thirsty
man, who thirsts for blood no more. Such Jesus is, and such
is great, so may he shine on you. And tell him when you see
his face, I long to see. Alright, anybody got any comments
or questions or anything? Correction or abuse? Anybody
got anything that you just want to share? Alright, that's good. Father, again we come thanking
you so much for the many lessons that we have in Christ Jesus
and for your word. Thank you for the day that we
have before us today. Thank you for the fellowship
of the brethren. Thank you for all the love and grace and mercy
and compassion that we have through the Lord Jesus Christ given to
us. So thank you, Lord, that your promises are true. We thank
you, Lord, that you are a God that cannot bind, cannot go back
upon your word. Lord, we are so grateful that
there is a better covenant that is given to your people, one
that does not require our performance, because we all know, Lord, that
in and of ourselves, we're no good. that we are wretched, that
we are vile, and we cannot keep your commands and keep your law.
But we look towards the one who can and who did on our behalf,
the Lord Jesus Christ. It's in him who our hope is found.
And so, Lord, we just look forward to the day that you come and
bring us to yourself, Lord, that we might, as we just sang now,
see you face to face. And, Lord, we just thank you
again for all that you've done for us and for all that you are
for this time together. And it's in your precious name
that we pray. Amen.