Genesis chapter 3. I want to read one verse to you
here in the third chapter of Genesis, a very familiar verse.
Verse 15. Genesis 3.15. And then Revelations
chapter 12. This is after the fall of our
parents, and this is the promise that God sent him out of the
Garden of Eden with. I will put enmity between thee
and the woman. This is the speaking here of
the serpent. He's speaking of the serpent. I will put enmity
between thee and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed.
It shall bruise thy head, and thou shalt bruise his heel. The promise of the coming of
the Son of God, to be born of a virgin woman, and to bruise
Satan's head. Now look over in Revelation chapter
12. Here we have just a little more
light on this. In the first book, we have the
promise of Christ's coming. the seed of the woman, to bruise
the serpent's head. And now here we have some more
light on this in Revelations 12, and beginning in verse 1. There appeared a great wonder
in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun and the moon under her
feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars. And she, being
with child, cried, travailing in birth, and pained to be delivered. And there appeared another wonder
in heaven. And behold, a great red dragon,
having seven heads and ten horns, and seven crowns upon his head. And his tail drew the third part
of the stars of heaven, and did cast them to the earth. And the
dragon stood before the woman which was ready to be delivered,
for to devour her child as soon as it was born. And she brought
forth a man-child who was to rule all nations with a rod of
iron. And her child was caught up unto
God and to his throne. And the woman fled into the wilderness
where she had a place prepared of God. that they should feed
her there a thousand, two hundred, and threescore days. And there
was war in heaven. Michael and his angels fought
against the dragon, and the dragon fought with his angels. And prevailed
not, neither was there found any more place in heaven. And
the great dragon was cast out, that old serpent called the devil
and Satan, which deceiveth the whole world. He was cast out
in the earth, and His angels were cast out with Him. And I
heard a loud voice saying in heaven, Now is salvation and
strength, and the kingdom of our God, and the power of His
Christ. For the accuser of our brethren
is cast down, which accused them before our God day and night.
And they overcame Him by the blood of the Lamb, And by the
word of their testimony, they loved not their lives unto death.
Genesis now, chapter 11, and beginning here in verse 11. Genesis chapter 11, and beginning
here in verse 10. Let's begin in verse 10. These
are the generations of Shem. Shem wasn't a hundred years old.
and begat Arphaxad two years after the flood. And Shem lived
after he begat Arphaxad five hundred years and begat sons
and daughters. And Arphaxad lived five and thirty
years and begat Selah. And Arphaxad lived after he begat
Selah four hundred and three years and begat sons and daughters. And Salah lived thirty years
and begat Eber. And Selah lived after he begat
Eber four hundred and three years and begat sons and daughters.
And Eber lived four and thirty years and begat Pelag. And Eber
lived after he begat Pelag four hundred and thirty years and
begat sons and daughters. And Pelag lived thirty years
and begat Rul. And Pelag lived after he begat
Rul two hundred and nine years and begat sons and daughters.
And Reuel lived two and thirty years, and begat Serug. And Reuel
lived, after he begat Serug, two hundred and seven years,
and begat sons and daughters. And Serug lived thirty years,
and begat Nahar. And Serug lived, after he begat
Nahar, two hundred years, and begat sons and daughters. And
Nahar lived nine and twenty years, and begat Tira. And Nahar lived
after he begat Tira in 119 years and begat sons and daughters.
And Tira lived 70 years and begat Abram, Nahar, and Haran. These are the generations of
Tira. Tira begat Abram, Nahar, and Haran. And Haran begat Lot. And Haran died before his father
Tira in the land of his nativity, in Ere of the Chaldees. And Abram
and Nahar took their wives, the name of Abram's wife was Sarai,
and the name of Nahar's wife, Malchah, and the daughter of
Haran, the father of Malchah, the father of Ishkah. But Sarai
was barren, she bore no children, she had no children. And Terah
took Abram, his son, and Maut, the son of Haran, his son's son,
and Sarai, his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife. And they
went forth with them from Ere of the Chaldees to go into the
land of Canaan. And they came into Haran and
dwelt there. And the days of Tira were two
hundred and five years. And Tira died in Haran." Now
that's a lengthy reading and I appreciate your patience. But
I want to look and compare these scriptures that I read to you
this morning. And we come here to The last portion, the last
half of this chapter, this eleventh chapter of Genesis, and we see
a change. Things begin to change. And the
change is in these genealogies that we read here. In the tenth
chapter, you remember we looked last week at the descendants
of these three men. the three sons of Noah, Japheth
and Ham and Shem. And we look there in that 10th
chapter of their genealogies and what regions of the world
at that time these three sons settled their families in. But
now we come here to the 11th chapter and beginning there at
verse 10, And the Lord sets aside the descendants of Ham. He sets
aside the descendants of Japheth. And He doesn't record their genealogy. He sets those families aside
and we hear nothing else of them. It seems like the Lord is saying,
I have purpose to leave you. I don't intend to write your
genealogies. I don't intend to mention your
families. If you want to keep your descendants,
if you want to record your posterity, you must do it yourself. If you
want to keep track of who your grandfathers were and who your
great-grandchildren are, then you must write it down in a book
yourself. And for the first time we see here that the Lord in
a most peculiar way, and in a particular way, He records the lineage of
Shem. And it's because through this
man is to come the seed of the woman. Leaving there with Adam
through Seth and that lineage, What you and I would call the
golden thread, the royal seed out of which the Son of God would
come, was to come through this lineage of Shem. And as we read
the names here of Shem's descendants, one generation after another,
we see one son after another set aside, and his name is never
recorded again. One family after another is set
aside, and we never hear of them again. In the 11th chapter, in
verse 10 and 11, I read to you as an example here, that we're
told that Shem had five sons, but four of them were set aside.
We never hear of them again. We don't know what happened to
them, what happened to the descendants of Shem from those four sons. But our faxing is chosen. And then we're told there in
verse 11 that Selah had sons, but only one was chosen, and
the rest was passed by. God only records the lineage
of Shem, and He only records the sons of Shem and his descendants. He only keeps track of those.
from whom the seed of the woman is to come. And this takes us back to Genesis
chapter 3 and verse 15. I will put enmity between thee
and the woman, and between thy seed and her seed. And when he
comes, he shall bruise the serpent's head. And it also takes us here
to Revelations chapter 12. Where this great dragon, he waits. He waits and he stands before
this golden thread. And every generation, he watches
and he listens for this man child to be born. To do his best to
devour him. How frustrating it must be. Because Satan, this big dragon,
this red dragon, he's not all-knowing. He has to look at the Scriptures.
He has to wait for it to be revealed. He knows the seed of the woman
will be born to bruise his head, but what nation will he come
out of? What tribe will he come out of?
What family will he descend from? whose son's daughter will bear
the seed of this woman. Satan and his fallen stars, they
anxiously wait until God reveals His purpose. And then they wait
and they watch to do what they can to hinder the seed that's
coming from this golden thread. And when it was revealed here,
in chapter 11 and chapter 12, that this golden thread was to
run through Sarah and Abraham, and this seed was to come from
Abraham's loins and from Sarah's womb. Don't you imagine that
day after day, Satan waited and he watched. He watched Sarah
And he listened to do what he could to stop the birth of Isaac. He heard the Lord saying unto
Abraham, Sarah thy wife shall indeed bear thee a son, and you
shall call his name Isaac, and my covenant shall stand fast
with him, and in his seed all the nations will be blessed.
But their hopes were renewed as they watched Sarah, because
they remembered that she was an old woman and that she was
barren. And they no doubt did what they
could to discourage her and weaken her faith, because Sarah counted
God faithful who had promised, and through faith she received
strength to conceive seed. But one day, this dragon, and
his fallen stars were passing by the tent of this old barren
woman, and they heard her laughing. And this is what she said, I
have born Abraham a son in my old age. A dark day, no doubt,
for the devil and his fallen angels. But when Isaac was born,
they watched him. They couldn't destroy him, but
they could tempt him. They could harass him, and they
could send Ishmael to mock him. And finally, in the process of
time, Isaac met Rebekah, and they had twin sons, Esau and
Jacob. Satan knew that Jacob, the youngest,
was the royal seed. He listened. He listened as the
Lord spoke to Rebekah and said, The elder shall serve the younger. Jacob have I loved, and Esau
have I hated. Oh, the devil knew then that
Jacob was the royal seed. And he listened and he looked
every way he could. to destroy this Jacob. He begins
to tempt. He begins to seek to devour. He puts hate in Esau's heart
to kill him, to kill his brother. If he can just kill Jacob, the
cord will be broken and my head will be spared. But the Lord
frustrated Jacob's devices and brought his counsel to naught. And Jacob flees to Iraq. And
there he marries Leah and he marries Rachel. And I can almost
feel the frustration in the devil's mind as Jacob has one son after
another until finally twelve sons are born. And the Lord says,
out of those twelve tribes shall come a number that no man can
number. How frustrated the devil must
have been. How can I possibly keep track
of these trials? How can I know what man and what
woman this seed that's to bruise my head is to come out of? But does he give up? No, no. He doesn't give up. He listens
and he watches to see what's revealed. And then it's revealed
to this woman, to this man, poor Jacob, upon his deathbed. He's
laying there dying and he calls his sons. His twelve sons. And the devil is there. The devil
is always where the Lord's people are. He listens and he watches. And Jacob leans upon his cane
and this is what he says to his son Judah. The scepter shall
not depart from you, my son. nor a lawgiver from between thy
feet until Shiloh come, until the tranquil one come, until
the peacemaker come, for that's what Shiloh means. He's the peacemaker. The seed of the woman is coming
to make peace by the blood of His cross. And He says, Judah,
the scepter shall not depart from you until He comes. And
unto him shall the gathering of the people be. And he shall
wash his garments in wine, and his clothes in the blood of grapes."
Oh, and the devil heard that. Satan heard that. He heard it. But he must have been so frustrated.
This seed is coming through Jacob's loins, through Judah's loins. He's coming through Judah. Why
did that frustrate Him? That He was coming through Judah
just a few years before this. The Lord had killed two of Judah's
sons. And Judah's daughter-in-law disguised
herself as a harlot and sat on the side of the road. And the
devil tempted Judah. to lay with him, thinking, I'll
cast a snare into this man. I'll tempt God to destroy this
man. But out of that relationship
ran this fine golden thread from which the seed of the woman should
come. And again, the devil's devices is frustrated. And God
proves that not only the foolishness of the Lord is wiser than men,
but it's even wiser than devils. When Satan heard this promise
that Jacob prophesied to his son Judah, no doubt he was hopeful
and fearful. He was hopeful because now he
could watch, he could concentrate on one tribe. That was the tribe
of Judah. He can more or less set the other
tribes aside and he could concentrate on this one tribe, the tribe
of Judah. But he was fearful because this
promise seemed so sure. The scepter shall not depart
from Judah until Shiloh come. It shall not blend. And the devil
knows the meaning of words. He looks at these definitions.
He knows what shall means. He knows it means unavoidable
and inescapable. And he heard Jacob saying to
his son Judah, he shall come, he shall come, the peacemaker.
And unto him shall the gathering of the people be. People shall
be gathered to him. So he begins to watch and concentrate
on the tribe of Judah. He stands before each man as
they marry a woman, as a great dragon waiting to devour. And we put this golden thread
between our fingers and we follow it down into Egypt. And there
we find this royal seed, this lineage of shem. that we find
them in great affliction and danger. And order comes down
from Pharaoh the king of Egypt to these Hebrew midwives.