Lesson 17 The Ark - A Figure of Him Who is to Come

 The Ark - A Figure of Him Who is to Come

                                   Genesis 6:11-17; Hebrews 11:7

“The earth also was corrupt before God, and the earth was filled with violence. And God looked upon the earth, and, behold, it was corrupt; for all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth” (Gen.6:11-12).

Man, who is a creation of the flesh of humanity, and who has gone his own way, lives in the flesh body as though it were his and as though his body is him (see 1 Cor.7:23; 1 Pet.1:18-20). He has his manner of life in the lusts of the flesh and of the mind (Eph.2:1-3). He will not concede that the body of human flesh is a mere creation of God for a temporary purpose. That it is mortal, he will admit, but he does not let his mind dwell on that fact. He will make the most of the time he has on earth in the here and now and hopes death is annihilation.

“The heart is deceitful above all things, and desperately wicked; who can know it?” (Jer.17:9). In the deceits of his own lusts, man will compromise if he believes that the end justifies the means. He will persuade himself that he believes the truth, while in the imagination of his heart he has changed the truth to fit his own desires. Man is deceived in his own imagination. His own heart - in the thoughts conceived in his own imagination - is what deceives him. He is drawn away and enticed by his own desires (Jas.1:14).

An unbelieving heart is an evil heart. An unbelieving heart corrupts. It will devise wicked ways. Why all the violence and corruption upon the earth? The corruption and violence show a society of restless, dissatisfied souls. Why all the unrest? There is no satisfying the desires of an unbelieving heart. There is no end to man’s desires of the flesh and of the mind. The desire is always for more or greater. Even in his degradation, the lust is for great satisfying of a desire which will not be satisfied. The deceitful heart says, “Why should one deprive oneself?”

“And God said unto Noah, ‘The end of all flesh is come before Me; for the earth is filled with violence through them; and, behold, I will destroy them with the earth’” (Gen.6:13).

Jehovah had given man 120 years to see the pride of his own self-will in going his own way, and thinking for himself as he pleased and fulfilling his own desires (Gen.6:3). Man had 120 years for changing his mind to agree with God. Jehovah had given man 120 years to prove his own heart to him. Though the thinking and the desires were seen to be corrupt and violent, man refused to admit that he is his own worst enemy. The reason being, man in the flesh is at enmity with God in his mind (see Rom.8:5-9).

Unregenerate, ungodly men, at enmity with God in their mind, are powerless to make themselves safe from being destroyed. Each one must have help. God knew this when He purposed and covenanted with Himself to have man in His image. Man’s salvation is covered in God’s Covenant with Himself. Man’s need is met and salvation made possible in the Anointed Son of God - the Son of the Covenant.

All is of God and by God and through God. The Anointed Son of the Covenant is “the power of God and the wisdom of God” (1 Cor.1:24b). In the wisdom of God the Anointed Son of the Covenant is made unto His mankind wisdom - both righteousness and sanctification, even redemption (1 Cor.1:30).

Redemption is more than the forgiveness of sins. The redemption of the body includes both Christ, who knew no sin, becoming sin for us, that we might become the righteousness of God in Him and our having been sanctified, set apart unto God in Him. There must be the ministration of death before there can be the ministering of righteousness and sanctification to the heart.

In grace God made a way for the sinner to be justified. The Covenant Son, with the power of eternal life, would become the Servant of Jehovah. He would take the likeness of man, born in a prepared body of human flesh. The Covenant Son, the Word who is God become flesh, would become God’s birthed Son of Man (Ps.139:13-14; Is.7:14; 49:5-8; Mt.1:18-25; Lk.1:26-35; Jn.1:1-14; Heb.10:5-23). The only perfectly obedient Son of His Father, the Anointed Son [Jesus] would be obedient unto death, even the death of the Cross (see Phil.2:5-8).

In that death the Covenant Son would become sin for His creation of mankind, that whosoever believes into Him should not perish but would become the righteousness of God in Him (2 Cor.5:21). In this way each one believing into Jesus and uniting with Him in His death and burial is justified.

Not only is one forgiven his sins but he is acquitted of all charges of sin and guilt (Is.53:4-6; Rom.4:25-5:11; Col.2:14-15). He is set apart unto God, sanctified together with the Son. All are out of the same Father through having been begotten out of the dead - alive forevermore. Whom He justified, God also glorified with a body born of eternal life (Rom.8:28-30).

God has the power to save man from perishing. The Covenant Son was willing to pour out His soul and to lay down the life of the prepared body, that He might take it up again a body of glory (Is.53:10-12). What is man’s to do? Will the sinner bow himself to the One who has the power to save? Will he come to Jesus Christ and take up His cross and follow Him through death to life eternal (Mt.16:24-27; Lk.9:23-26). There must be repentance toward God - a change of thinking. Will the sinner give up the enmity of his mind and reconcile with God?

There must be faith toward the Anointed Covenant Son. Repentance is the acknowledging of the wrong done by having gone one’s own way and by remaining at enmity with God in one’s mind. Also what must be acknowledged is the justice of the deserved death for the wrong done God (see Is.53:3-9).

Faith is the acceptance of the Gift of the Son with the righteousness of God and the sanctification in the redemption of the body and a thankfulness for the grace and mercy extended an ungodly sinner, helpless to help himself (Rom.5:8).

How does the sinner hear of the grace and mercy extended to him in the Covenant Son? Through the preaching of the gospel of the Anointed Son. The good news of the faith is set before one in the preaching of the righteousness of God through faith in His Anointed Son. Held out to us in the gospel is the display of God’s love for His creation of mankind. All the many facets of the person and work of the Covenant Son are set on the dark background of sin and death and hopelessness and helplessness and fear of death and of judgment to come. All displayed, that we might buy His salvation through repentance and faith in the Son.

It pleased God, by the foolishness of preaching, to save those who believe. The preaching of the cross is foolishness to those who are perishing, but unto those who are saved by it, it is the power of God (see Rom.1:16; 1 Cor.1:18-29).

“By faith, Noah, being warned of God of things not seen as yet, moved with fear, prepared an ark to the saving of his house, by which he condemned the world, and became heir of the righteousness which is by faith” (Heb.11:7).

Noah was a preacher of the righteousness through faith in the Anointed Covenant Son. God bears him witness in His word (see 2 Pet.2:5). As seen in Genesis 5, Noah came from a family of preachers of the righteousness of God through faith in God’s Covenant (see Jer.44:4; Lk.1:70). Noah took his text from the gospel of the Covenant Son declared in the heavens (see Gen.1:14-19; Job 9:6-9; 38:31-33;  Ps.19:1-6; 97:6; Is.45:11-12; 46:9-11; 48:16-18; Rom.10:5-18).

There against the black velvet of the night sky is seen the four faces of the One who was coming with life and light for ungodly sinners at enmity with God in their minds. There in the stellar heavens, like glistening diamonds, is seen the four faces of the Covenant Son - the Son of Man, the Servant of Jehovah, the Son of God and the King of the universe. The heavens declare the glory of the sovereign God who was willing to take the likeness of man in order to save God’s creation of mankind. There is seen how He carried out the salvation as a Servant of Jehovah. There is seen the virgin birthed Son of God and there is seen His death and His having been raised up out from the dead, the begotten Son of God who brings many sons of God to glory. There in the stellar heavens is the gospel of salvation which leads men to repentance and to put their faith in the Anointed Son of God, that they will be born again and not perish. There is seen the King of the universe He created, who will come again and set up His Kingdom, His Kingdom of righteousness and peace, filled with sons of God, that will continue on into eternity.

Noah, the preacher of righteousness, was a justified, glorified man through faith in the coming Son of God. Noah walked with God (Gen.6:8-9). Noah could be warned of the coming judgment as to details and he was given understanding of what was coming before it was seen (see Amos 3:7).

At the end of 120 years, with man still showing no repentance, judgment would come in the form of a flood of waters covering the earth. Therefore an ark must be prepared to make Noah’s household safe from the coming judgment of waters.

“God said unto Noah, ‘Make for yourself an ark of gopher wood; rooms shall you make in the ark, and shall pitch it within and without with pitch. And you shall make it this way: the length of the ark shall be three hundred cubits, the breadth of it fifty cubits, and the height of it thirty cubits. A window shall you make to the ark, and in a cubit shall you finish it above; and the door of the ark shall you set in the side thereof; with lower, second, and third stories shall you make it’” (Gen.6:14-16).

God is the Architect of the ark, but Noah is to be the builder of the ark. The reproaches of the One sending the Flood will fall on Noah. While Noah is building the ark, he will not only be a preacher of the righteousness of God through faith in the Covenant Son, he will be a preacher of judgment.

Though the necessity of preparing the ark was very real to Noah, to the unregenerate, unrepentant sinners of his day it would have seemed sheer folly and Noah a foolish old man with delusions. Many a jibe would be heard as they passed or stopped to watch the delusional old man. Noah would be the butt of many jokes.

Noah did according to all that God had commanded him (Gen.6:22). In Hebrews 11:7 the writer tells us that Noah was moved with “godly fear,” a rightly directed, godly reverence which dwells with faith. The secret of Noah’s obedience was faith - faith in the faithful Companion with whom he walked. The things had not been seen as yet, but Noah knew the One who had forewarned him. He knew the living and true God is faithful and true to His word. What He has spoken, He will make good (Num.24:19; Is.42:9; 45:21-24; 46:9-11; 55:11). In Noah’s faith and his godly reverence was his love for his God. In loving obedience he set to work cutting and planing timbers.

The future, unseen things of the Flood seen by faith were real to Noah. In the light of the scene around him, it was a just judgment. Man would not have God rule over them and, with the imagination of the hearts only continually evil, violence filled the earth.

God gave Noah the instructions to build the ark. All Noah need do was follow God’s lead to make an ark of gopher wood, literally “timbers of wood.” First trees must be cut down and dragged or taken to a specific place. The timbers must be planed and hammered together and then covered within and without with pitch to make the ark waterproof. The ark would be the only place of safety in the waters of death.

Considering the size according to the dimensions Noah was given, with three stories of rooms, to prepare the ark must have seemed a formidable task to Noah. But Noah had put his faith in the Covenant Son and he had come to the Covenant Son to be given the rest of salvation and to learn of Him and continually find rest for his soul. No matter the labor to be done, Noah had learned that, yoking up with the Anointed Son, made the yoke easy and the burden light (Mt.11:28-30).

Faith is the only condition necessary for entering into the rest of the Anointed Son of God. When one can truly say, “Your will be done,” and submit all to his Lord and Master and trust himself to his Savior-Redeemer, he will find true rest for his restless soul. Then God can work in that one to will and to do of His good pleasure.

So far in the happenings recorded in the book of Genesis, Moses has made no mention of building ships. Though the river going out of Eden was divided into four heads, there is no mention of a shipping trade or travel on the rivers for necessity or pleasure (see Gen.2:10-14).

But Noah was not building a boat or a ship. God’s blueprint was for a large box-like structure. The length was to be 300 cubits, the breadth 50 cubits and its height 30 cubits. A cubit can vary in size, anywhere from 18 inches to 22 ½ inches. If we take the general basis of the cubit as 18 inches, the length would be 450 feet and the breadth [width] 75 feet and the height 45 feet. This would make the ark considerably larger than a football field, which is 300 feet by 50 feet. The ark, being divided into three stories, would provide a total of 101,250 square feet of usable living space. The ark differs from a normal boat in that the ark was meant to float and not to navigate currents. The Hebrew word for “ark” simply means “a vessel.”

Once inside the ark Noah was totally at the mercy of the One in whom he had trusted, the One who loved him. Noah had trusted Jehovah God and His Anointed Son to receive the righteousness of God and the eternal life offered as a gift in the Anointed Son. Noah was a righteous man. He could trust his God for safekeeping through the waters of judgment. He and his family were entirely safe in the keeping care and grace and mercy of his God and His Covenant Son.

In our lesson “Saving a Household,” having seen Peter’s comparison of the preparing of the ark being a like figure to baptism (see 1 Pet.3:18-21), let us now look at the vessel of the ark being a like figure of the earthen vessel of the flesh prepared for a dwelling place for God’s Anointed Covenant Son, Jesus.

The “ark” was a vessel built upon the earth from timbers of a cut down tree, many trees. To prepare an earthen vessel for the Anointed Son, the Word who is God, to become flesh and dwell [tabernacle] on the earth, living tissue was taken from the womb of a virgin to prepare a body in the likeness of man.

In that earthen vessel dwelt the Word, who is God, and there all the fullness of the Godhead was pleased to dwell (Col.1:19; 2:9; Jn.10:36-38). There in that earthen vessel as the Son of Man dwelt the one Man who did not “walk in the counsel of the ungodly, nor did He stand in the way of sinners” (Ps.1:1a). He never turned to His own way, but He was perfectly obedient unto death, even the death of the cross (Jn.6:38; 8:28-29; Phil.2:5-8). “Nor did He sit in the seat of the scornful” (Ps.1:1b).

“His delight is in the Law of Jehovah, and in His Law He meditates day and night.” These first two verses in Psalm 1 are in the present tense. They are as true of the Covenant Son before He became flesh as afterward.

Verse 3 is in the future tense. When Israel sang this psalm of their coming Redeemer, He had not yet become flesh to dwell among them. “He shall be like a tree planted by the rivers of the water, that brings forth its fruit in its season; its leaf also shall not wither; and whatsoever He does, shall prosper.”

This is the Man, the one Mediator between God and man, who divides all mankind into the righteous, who are born of His seed, and the ungodly, who do not choose to receive the eternal life He has come to bring and who, therefore, remain dead in trespasses and sins (see 1 Tim.2:3-6; Ac.17:31).

“The ungodly are not so, but are like the chaff which the wind drives away. Therefore, the ungodly shall not stand in the judgment (of the righteous), nor sinners in the congregation of the righteous,” the Kingdom of the Son of God’s love. “For Jehovah knows the way of the righteous, but the way of the ungodly shall perish” (Ps.1:4-6).

Here is a Man who divides the ungodly sinners from the congregation of the righteous, those who will not stand the judgment of the Second Death (see Rev.20:6). Jehovah knows the way of the righteous. They are the fruit of the Man who is like a tree. They become the righteousness of God through faith in the Anointed Son, who became sin for them. They are His seed (see Is.53:10-12; Jn.12:23-32).

In Psalm 22, which is prophetic of our Lord, He prayed, “Deliver My soul from the sword” (Ps.22:20a). He could not ask for His body to be saved from the crucifixion of the body. But the body could be saved from the power of death (see Jn.10:17-18; 12:27; Ac.2:23-24; Phil.2:8). Isaiah 53:8 speaks of Him being cut off out of the land of the living.

Yet “a seed shall serve Him; it shall be accounted to the Lord for a generation” (Ps.22:30). The prophet Isaiah prophesies of the same figure: “Yet it pleased Jehovah to bruise Him; He has put Him to grief. When You shall make His soul an offering for sin, He shall see His seed, He shall prolong His days, and the pleasure of Jehovah shall prosper in His hand. He shall see the travail of His soul, and shall be satisfied. By His knowledge shall My righteous Servant justify many; for He shall bear their iniquities” (Is.53:10-11). His seed will be called “trees of righteousness, the planting of Jehovah, that He might be glorified” (Is.61:3b).

The vessel, the ark built by Noah, was a very large box, like a coffin floating in the waters of death. Buried in the ark were Noah and his family, who would come through the waters of judgment alive and safe. Here we have, in figure, mankind, through faith, being placed into the Anointed Covenant Son in His death.

“As many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ [the Anointed Son] were baptized into His death, and therefore we are buried with Him through baptism into death, that as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life. For since we have been planted [united] together in the likeness of His death, we shall be of His resurrection” (Rom.6:3-5).

As Noah’s household came through the waters of judgment of death safe in the ark with Noah, so the members of the household of the Anointed Covenant Son, His household of the righteous sons of God, have come through the judgment of the Second Death alive and safe, born into the Kingdom of God. In resurrection sons of God shall bear the image of the heavenly Lord from heaven (Phil.3:21; see Heb.3:1-6; Rev.20:6).

Noah was to make rooms in the ark. A “room” is a “dwelling place, an abiding place, or a resting place, a refuge.” So Christ, God’s Anointed Son, was to the sons of Israel a refuge and the Anointed Covenant Son was a refuge to Noah before them. And so He has been to all the righteous sons of God, beginning with Adam. And to us who are here after Israel has been set aside for a time, He is our dwelling place. Verse 1 of Psalm 90 claims Jehovah has been the dwelling place of the righteous through all generations.

Noah was to cover the ark with pitch, both within and without. The pitch would assure that the ark was waterproof. The waters of the judgment must not be allowed to enter the refuge of the household. The waters were a judgment of death. Man loses his life breath in water. Every square foot of the coffin-like vessel must be waterproofed with pitch. The Hebrew word for “pitch” in Genesis 6:14 is the Hebrew word translated 70 times in the Old Testament “to make atonement.” The Hebrew “atonement” has the meaning of “covered” or “covered over.”

In the Old Testament the death of the sacrificial animals figured the covering over sins of the one having believed into the coming Savior of mankind until the Anointed Son of the Covenant would come and ratify the Covenant in His own blood. The offering of the animal pictured the offering of the Covenant Son in the sacrifice of Himself (see Ex.12:1-28; Lev.1:1-7:38; 23:1-44; Heb.8:1-10:23; 13:20).

The offering of the animal in death was a picture of the Covenant Son coming to offer Himself in death as man’s Substitute. There was no redemption in the offering of the blood of an animal. The offerer was merely picturing his faith in the coming Son, whom God set forth as His Propitiation, that man might be freely justified in the redemption that is in God’s Anointed Son, Jesus (Heb.2:9-17; 1 Jn.2:1-2; 4:9-10). In this way, in any age, a person could declare his faith in the blood of the coming Son, whom God set forth as the One satisfying Him concerning the putting away of sin once for all and the sharing of eternal life with the power to raise up the body out from the dead.

For anyone believing in the righteousness of God through faith in the Anointed Son, in whom is the redemption, God could declare Himself righteous to pass over the sins covered in the blood of the Covenant Son, even though they were done before the Word, who is God, became flesh to be obedient unto the death of the Cross (Rom.3:22-26; Phil.2:5-8).

As the ark was covered with pitch to keep the household within safe from the judgment of the waters of death, even so was the earthen vessel of the Son of God covered within and without with the covering to make God’s household safe from the judgment of the Second Death. The begotten Son raised out from the dead is the Person who is eternal God in a tent of flesh and bone of eternal life. There is no death in eternal life.

Inside that earthen vessel built of human flesh was eternal life, the Word who is God, who is life eternal. And after the ratifying of the Eternal Covenant in His blood, the body would be raised up flesh and bone of eternal life. Here is seed of eternal life to raise up the body of the one who has believed into the begotten Son (see Rom.1:1-4; 8:9-11).

All who believe in the righteousness of God through faith in His Anointed Son are covered with eternal life. Each one has been born a son of God, born from above with eternal life. Each one in the resurrection is shared His likeness. Each one will be raised up a body of flesh and bone of eternal life - a deathless, glorified body (see Lk.20:36; 24:36-43; Jn.20:19-27; 1 Cor.15:44; Phil.3:21).

The blueprint for the ark Noah was to build was specific. The ark was to have a window above and a door on the side. The ark would have three decks or three stories (Gen.6:16). “A window” - one window finished a cubit above. Again, using the 18 inch basis, this would be an open space of 18 inches at the top of the sides all around the ark, length and breadth. This would furnish a circulating of air needed for oxygen for the mortal bodies in the ark. It would also furnish light while keeping the waters out.

For those having believed into the Anointed Son of God who have made their exodus out of the flesh and are therefore no longer in the flesh, but in the spirit, there is light and breath for the new born again son of God. The Spirit of God, the very Breath of God, bears witness with our spirit, in the very life of our soul, that we are born of God (Rom.8:9-17; 2 Cor.5:17; 1 Jn.3:23; 4:7-15). The Spirit of Christ dwelling in our tent with us is proof of our having become the righteousness of God in His Anointed Son.

“In Christ” is a key phrase for a member of the true Church, the Body, over which Christ is the Head. “In Adam” one is in the flesh. One lives minding the things of life as related to the body of mortal flesh. In Adam the mind is focused on the things done and said in the body of flesh. Life is all about self and about my will. That thinking is at enmity with God and His purpose to have sons of God - one with Him - thinking His thoughts, doing His will.

United to Jesus Christ in His death, burial and resurrection, one is no longer in the flesh, but in the very spirit of being. One has made his exodus out of the flesh creation of Adam. One is a new creation in Christ Jesus. One has died to the sin, to having his will over the will of his Creator-Redeemer. Having been set free from the selfishness of the flesh creation, one is free to live in the very spirit of his being, where the Spirit of God will enlighten the eyes of the understanding of the spirit to spiritual realities of the truth and wisdom of God.

We know that we have made our exodus out of Adam and the flesh creation and we have entered a new realm of spirit life if the Spirit of God has come to live in our tent of flesh with us and teach us the deep things of God and lead us into all truth as He glorifies Christ to us. We have the true light of the knowledge of the glory of God. We see it in the face of Jesus, the begotten Son of God. We no longer know the Lord according to the flesh. In the flesh we thought of Him as such a one as us. We related to Him according to our way of thinking. We either thought of Him too human or too holy.

Now in the spirit of our very being, with the eyes of our understanding enlightened, the Spirit of God makes Him known to us as He is. Now we see through the mirror of the word  in dimness (1 Cor.13:12), but it is the window of our ark of safety. With our heart unveiled of the flesh, we are free to look at the glory. And having beheld the glory in the mirror of the word, we are being changed into the same image from glory to glory (2 Cor.3:18). It is for freedom Christ has set us free. We are free to behold the glory.

There was only one door in the blueprint for the ark Noah was to build. A “door” is both an “exit and an entrance.” The Anointed Covenant Son, the begotten Son of God, is man’s exit out of the creation of the flesh in Adam, and He is the entrance into the presence of the living and true God (see Jn.10:7-9; 14:6).

We put off our body of flesh of humanity and, in union with the begotten birthed Son of God, we made our exodus out of Adam and the flesh creation. Together we went into death. Together we were buried. Together we are raised to walk in newness of life in the spirit. Jesus consecrated a new and living way into the holiest, where God dwells. The new and living Way is in a body of flesh and bone of eternal life raised up out from the dead. Jesus has gone back to heaven in His new living body. One day He will come with our new living bodies and clothe us and take us to the holiest to ever be with Him (Jn.14:1-3; 2 Thess.4:13-18).

There was one other detail in the blueprint God gave Noah. Leaving out the words of our text that are in italics we have, “lower, second, third shall you make it” (Gen.6:16b).

Chapter 1 of the book of Revelation speaks of Him “who is, and who was, and who is to come.” The reference is to both the Father, verse 4, and to the Son, verse 8. Father and Son are one God, but two personal beings.

Verse 5 is a reference to Jesus, the Anointed Son -

who is the faithful witness to the glory of God from the beginning when the heavens declared the glory,

who was begotten out from the dead,

who is to come - the Ruler of the kings of the earth.

God, having given Noah a blueprint for an ark, and for the work of building it, then gave Noah the purpose for the ark. The means of destruction was to be a flood of waters to take away the breath of the temporary life of the flesh.

“And, behold, I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth, to destroy all flesh, wherein is the breath of life, from under heaven; and everything that is in the earth shall die” (Gen.6:17).

“I, even I, do bring a flood of waters upon the earth.” The repetition of the personal pronoun is for emphasis and force. The Creator and Preserver of life is also the Judge of all the earth, who must do right.

The earth was corrupt before God. All flesh, each one of the creation in Adam, had corrupted his way upon the earth. In man going his own way, he had filled God’s earth with violence. The good environment God created for man to enjoy corrupted and filled with violence - destroyed by destroyers. Now the Creator has judged and He must become the Destroyer. He must bring a flood of waters to take away the breath of the godless sinners. A lifeless body of human flesh cannot corrupt the earth, nor can it do violence.

God has one righteous man - Noah. With Noah and his wife and his sons and their wives God can make a new beginning and carry through His Covenant purpose in the coming Anointed Son.

This concludes our lesson.

Lesson 16 The New Heavens and New Earth

                        The New Heavens and New Earth

                                    Revelation 21:1;  2 Peter 3

Revelation chapter 21 begins with John saying, “And I saw a new heaven and a new earth; for the first heaven and the first earth were passed away, and there was no more sea” (Rev.21:1).

The Holy Spirit began the Scriptures in Genesis, the book of beginnings, “In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth” (Gen.1:1). It is therefore fitting that He would choose to close the book of Revelation of Jesus Christ, the book of the consummation of all things having begun, with visions of the new regenerated heavens and earth.

The Revelation of Jesus Christ is divided into three parts. John was to write of the things which he “had seen, and the things which are, and the things which shall be hereafter” (Rev.1:19). The visions of John concerning the things which shall be hereafter took us to the time of the Great Tribulation, which ended with the War of the Great Day of God Almighty with the kingdom of this world becoming of our God and His Christ, His Anointed Son (Rev.11:15; 16:13-16).

Beginning in chapter 6 of the Revelation, John saw visions of all enemies having been destroyed and the cleansing of the heavens and the earth for the regeneration (Rev.6:12-17; 16:17-21; 19:17-21). The visions of Revelation 20 showed John God’s purposes and final dealing with His old adversary, the serpent, called the Devil and Satan, who became a great fiery Dragon (see Rev.12:3, 9). Then to the end of the 1,000 year Kingdom reign to the one final judgment of retributive justice of each man receiving the end of his own works and the sentencing of the dead to the Lake of Fire.

Not willing to leave the Revelation of Jesus Christ on such a dark note, the visions returned to the new heavens and the new earth of the regeneration. In the beginning in Genesis, all began in darkness and chaos. God brought light into darkness and He separated the light from the darkness. God then brought order out of chaos, and He saw all was very good (Gen.1:2-31).

In the regeneration of the new heavens and new earth God again will bring light into the darkness of this world and He will bring order out of chaos. The world system of the evil one will have been destroyed and all nations will be under the one jurisdiction of the Shepherd King, with His son David as His representative sitting on the throne in Jerusalem on earth (see Ezek.37:24-28).

Many of the Old Testament prophecies foretell of this yet future time. They cover both the judgment and the destruction of the Great Tribulation and follow with the glory of the Kingdom Age. We will look at just a few.

In Psalm 102 the psalmist tells us: “Of old You laid the foundation of the earth, and the heavens are the work of Your hands. They shall perish, but You shall endure. Yea, all of them shall become old like a garment. Like a vesture You shall change them, and they shall be changed, but You are the same, and Your years have no end” (vv25-27).

The prophecy of Isaiah 13 takes us far beyond the destruction of Babylon by the Medes in Daniel’s day to the destruction of the future Babylon described in the Revelation of Jesus Christ (see also Dan.5:17-31). Speaking of this future time Isaiah says, “Behold, the Day of the Lord comes, cruel both with wrath and fierce anger, to lay the land desolate, and He shall destroy the sinners out of it. For the stars of heaven and the constellations thereof shall not give their light. The sun shall be darkened in its going forth, and the moon shall not cause its light to shine. And I will punish the world for its evil, and the wicked for their iniquity, and I will cause the arrogance of the proud to cease, and will lay low the haughtiness of the terrible” ... “Therefore I will shake the heavens, and the earth shall remove out of its place, in the wrath of the Lord of Hosts, and in the day of His fierce anger” (Is.13:9-11, 13).  Isaiah 14 follows with Israel restored to her land and the total defeat and destruction of both Lucifer [Satan] and the enemy nations of God’s people Israel.

Isaiah 24 has been called “The Little Apocalypse” as it is a picture of the future distress of the Great Tribulation, and not just on the inhabitants, but on the earth itself because of the defilement of the earth-dwellers, “because they have transgressed God’s laws, changed His ordinance and broken the Everlasting Covenant” (v5).  Isaiah prophesied, In that day when the Lord punishes the kings of the earth, the windows from on high shall be opened and the foundations of the earth shaken. “The earth is utterly broken down, the earth is thoroughly dissolved, the earth is moved exceedingly. The earth shall reel to and fro like a drunkard, and shall be removed like a booth, and the transgression shall be heavy upon it, and it shall fail, and not rise again” ... “Then the moon shall be confounded, and the sun ashamed, when the Lord of Hosts shall reign in Mount Zion, and in Jerusalem, and before His ancients gloriously” (vv18-20, 23).) This is followed in chapter 25 by the triumph of the Kingdom Age.

Another prophecy from Isaiah 26: “For, behold, the Lord comes out of His place to punish the inhabitants of the earth for their iniquity; the earth also shall disclose her blood, and shall no more cover her slain” (Is.26:21; see Rev.6:9-11; 17:6; 18:24; 19:2). Here also is the prophecy of the destruction, which is followed by a prophecy of a restored Israel (Is.27).

In chapter 34 Isaiah declares,  “For the indignation of the Lord is upon all nations, and fury upon all their armies. He has utterly destroyed them. He has delivered them to the slaughter. Their slain also shall be cast out, and their stench shall come up out of their carcasses, and the mountains shall be melted with their blood. And all the host of heaven shall be dissolved, and the heavens shall be rolled together like a scroll. And all their host shall fall down, as the leaf falls off from the vine, and like a falling fig from the fig tree” (Is.34:2-4; see rest of chapter; Rev.19:17-19). Isaiah 35 follows with the prophecy of the Kingdom blessing.

In chapter 51 Isaiah begins with exhorting the future remnant of the Great Tribulation. “Hearken unto Me, My people, and give ear unto Me, O My nation. For a Law shall proceed from Me, and I will make My justice to rest for a light of the peoples. My righteousness is near. My salvation is gone forth, and My arms shall judge the peoples. The isles shall wait upon Me, and on My arm shall they trust. Lift up your eyes to the heavens, and look upon the earth beneath, for the heavens shall vanish away like smoke, and the earth shall grow old like a garment, and they that dwell therein shall die in like manner, but My salvation shall be forever, and My righteousness shall not be abolished” (Is.51:4-6). In chapter 52 is the vision of the glorious Kingdom Age which follows the great time of trouble (see Jer.30:2-9).

And Joel’s prophecy of the future Day of the Lord is very clear. “And I will show wonders in the heavens and in the earth: blood, and fire, and pillars of smoke. The sun shall be turned into darkness, and the moon into blood, before the great and terrible [awesome] Day of the Lord comes” (Joel 2:30-31). The day of the display of His power - when Jesus comes in power and great glory, when there will be great deliverance for His nation and the remnant brought back to Jerusalem for the 1,000 year reign of the Kingdom Age, with Israel as the head nation (Joel 2:32-3:1; see Deut.7:6; 26:18-19; 28:1, 13; Zeph.3:15-20).

Joel then goes on to prophesy of the War of the Great day of God Almighty with the armies gathered in the Valley of Jehoshaphat [“Jehovah judges”] (Joel 3:2-17). “Multitudes, multitudes in the valley of decision, for the Day of the Lord is near in the valley of decision. The sun and the moon shall be darkened, and the stars shall withdraw their shining. The Lord also shall roar out of Zion, and utter His voice from Jerusalem, and the heavens and the earth shall shake, but the Lord will be the hope of His people, and the strength of the sons of Israel. So shall you know that I am the Lord, your God, dwelling in Zion, My holy mountain. Then shall Jerusalem be holy, and there no strangers shall pass through her anymore” (vv14-17). Joel also ends with the full Kingdom blessing of Messiah’s reign.

Even the Gentile Job, who is thought to be a contemporary of Abraham, spoke of the heavens being no more and of that taking place at the time of the resurrection of the righteous when the bodies of the righteous awake from their sleep of death to be raised up (Job 14:12; see Job 19:25-26).

The shaking of the heavens are a constant accompaniment of the Lord’s awakening His people to the judgment and its purpose. The terrible agitation of the heavens and the earth in the Day of the Lord [Jehovah] are to be identified with the invisible winds - the powers of heaven directing the judgment. Out of the burning cleansing fire comes a new heaven and a new earth with all things made new. The former heavens and earth are passed away. The cleansing fire is what causes the former things to pass away.

In the New Testament the apostle Peter wrote of the new heavens and the new earth in his second epistle. Peter’s first epistle was written to the sojourners who were scattered throughout Gentile nations in the dispersion of the early church through persecution. In Acts 8 we read of the first scattering abroad of the church in Jerusalem through the regions of Judea and Samaria (Ac.8:1).

Peter addresses his second epistle to those who have attained like precious faith with the apostles through the righteousness of God and our Savior, Jesus Christ (2 Pet.1:1). The righteousness of God is through faith in Jesus Christ (Rom.1:16-17).

In chapter 3 of this second letter  Peter gives the purpose of his writing to those having attained like precious faith. Having obtained the righteousness of God through faith in Jesus Christ, each one is looking forward to the coming of Jesus to take them home. This world is not their home. They are simply passing the time of their sojourn here, occupying for Christ until He comes.

“This second epistle, beloved, I now write unto you, in which I stir up your pure minds by way of remembrance, that you may be mindful of the words which were spoken by the holy prophets, and the command of the Lord and Savior by us apostles” (2 Pet.3:1-2).

Peter is writing to stir them up, to cause them to remember to keep in mind the words that were before spoken by the holy prophets, the holy men of old, men of God who spoke as they were moved [inspired] by the Holy Spirit (2 Pet.1:19-21). As the prophets of old spoke for Jehovah, the apostles spoke for Jesus. The Holy Spirit would also use Peter’s epistle to stir up all who have obtained like precious faith down through the Church Age to remember to keep in mind the words spoken by the holy prophets.

The holy men of old were searching diligently what manner of time the Spirit of Christ, who was in them was signifying, and they were enquiring into the grace that would come to those living and having believed into Christ, the Anointed Son of God, after Jesus had been birthed and suffered and been glorified in being raised out from the dead. The holy men understood that the happenings of the things being revealed to them through the Holy Spirit would be significant to those living in the last days (see 1 Pet.1:10-12).

The holy men of old were men of God who were serving God, not for themselves. They served God, that we might have the fruit of their labor and understand beforehand how the Eternal Covenant of God would be consummated. They themselves would be dead and buried and in Sheol [Hades] awaiting the resurrection, when they would be raised out from the dead to inherit the earthly Kingdom of Messiah (see Rev.20:4-6; Gen.15:8-18; Job 19:25-26; Dan.12:13; Heb.11:39-40).

Those in the last days would have the sure Word of God, the Son Himself, of whom the prophets were foretelling (Heb.1:1). We, living in the end times, must keep fully awake to the prophecies of the holy men of old, that we have a pure mind, that we have understanding to see things intelligibly and clearly, that we not mistake what God is doing. Through the Spirit of God in us, we too have the discernment of clear judgment with the facts of the prophecies foretold for us (see Jn.14:16-26; 15:26-27; 16:7-15; Rom.8:9-11; 1 Cor.2:9-13). Peter would wake us up and cause us to keep in mind and not forget the Old Testament prophecies concerning God’s Anointed Son Jesus, and of the command the Lord and Savior shared with us by the apostles.

The ones who share the faith of the righteousness of God through Jesus Christ heard of Jesus’ command from the apostles. We have Jesus’ command in Matthew 24, Mark 13, and Luke 21, the parallel Gospels. Matthew wrote, “You shall hear of wars, and rumors of wars. See that you be not troubled. For all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet” (Mt.24:6).

“There shall be great tribulation, such as was not since the beginning of the world to this time, no, nor ever shall be” ... “Immediately after the tribulation of those days shall the sun be darkened, and the moon shall not give its light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of heaven shall be shaken. And then  shall appear the Son of Man in heaven” (Mt.24:21, 29-30a; see Mk.13:24-26; Lk.21:25-28).

“Watch, therefore” - stay awake - “for you do not know what hour your Lord comes. But know this, that if the householder had known in what watch the thief would come, he would have watched, and would not have allowed his house to be broken into. Therefore you also be ready, for in such an hour as you think not, the Son of Man comes” (Mt.24:42-44; see also Mk.13:32-37;  Lk.21:34-36).  Jesus was referring to His coming out of heaven as King of kings and Lord of lords.

Peter exhorts his readers to stay awake to the clear understanding of these facts discerned for them by the holy prophets and by Jesus Himself, as witnessed through His apostles. Peter introduced his subject of the Second Coming of the Lord and the new heavens and the new earth with exhorting his readers to remember the prophesies spoken by the holy prophets and by the Lord Jesus Himself and as witnessed then by His apostles and the Gospel records.

Then, before he goes into his subject, Peter wrote, “Knowing this first, that there shall come in the last days scoffers, walking after their own lusts,” that is, after the way they desire things to be, and asking, “‘Where is the promise of His coming? For since the fathers fell asleep, all things continue as they were from the beginning of the creation.’ For this they willingly are ignorant of, that by the word of God the heavens were of old, and the earth standing out of the water and in the water, by which the world that then was, being overflowed with water, perished” (2 Pet.3:3-6).

As Peter also is writing for those living in that future day as well as his own time, he warns of the scoffers walking after their own lusts [strong desires]. We live in the last days and we see the scoffers walking, conducting themselves according to what they desire life on earth to be, and doing what they think to be right in their own eyes. They have no desire for Christ Jesus to return to earth and interfere in the affairs of men.

Since the prophets have all died and their prophecies have not come to pass, the scoffers mock the fulfillment of the Second Coming of the Lord Jesus Christ. The scoffers are blinded by their own lusts of the flesh and of the mind. Therefore the truth is hidden from them. In the Greek verse 5 of 2 Peter 3 reads, “For this is hidden from them by their willing it so.”

It is hidden from the scoffers that the heavens were of old and the earth, by water and through water, were being held together by the word of God, through which the world which then was being flooded by water perished.

The truth as prophesied by holy men of old is hidden from the scoffers. They willfully choose to not believe the word of God to see in their understanding what God is making known through His prophets. All things have not continued as they were. Moses, the prophet that there was none like in all Israel, wrote of the great Flood which was foretold and which did come to pass (see Gen.6:1-9:11; Deut.34:10). The earth which was of old, the earth which in the beginning was standing in the waters, and without form and uninhabited, was brought out of the waters and formed and brought forth vegetation for food, became inhabited by mankind (Gen.1:9-13).

When mankind had corrupted his way upon earth and filled the earth with violence, the Lord God interfered in the affairs of man and opened the windows of heaven and the fountains of the deep waters below the earth, and again overflowed the earth with water and washed the corruption off the face of His earth, and that world perished (Gen.7:11-24). The scoffers are ignorant of this because they willfully choose to not believe Moses’ record.

The heavens and earth which are now are the same heavens and earth after the waters had receded from off the face of the earth after the Flood for a new beginning. “The heavens and the earth which are now,” which we inhabit are, “by the same word,” the word of God which pronounced the judgment of the Flood, “are storing up the judgment” of the wrath of God “and destruction of ungodly men” (2 Pet.3:7). The earth is again being corrupted and violence is again filling the earth.

The heavens and the earth which are now, are reserved for the judgment of fire. The holy prophets and Jesus Himself have made this clear and His apostles are witnesses of the words of Jesus. The Day of judgment by fire and the destruction of ungodly men has been foretold. It will come to pass.

“But let not this one thing be hidden from you, beloved, that one day is with the Lord as a thousand years, and a thousand years as one day” (2 Pet.3:8; see Ps.90:4). Beloved, do not be ignorant of this one thing. Do not let it be hidden from you because you willfully desire it to not be so. God’s Day is coming. God’s Kingdom will come. His will will be done on earth as it is in heaven.

To the Hebrew mind, Jehovah God ordered His creation in six days and rested on the seventh day. He would also accomplish His work of redemption in six days and the seventh day would be the Kingdom Rest. The days of the redemption work would be days of 1,000 years and the last 1,000 years the Day of righteousness and peace under the rule of the King of kings and Lord of lords, so the rabbis teach. They understand this from the Law as given by Moses concerning the sabbath rest (see Ex.16:23-26; 20:8-11; 31:12-17; see also Ezek.43:25-27).

We can see the picture of the Jews’ teaching of the six days of man’s redemption. The six days of 1,000 years each are linked in pairs:

2,000 years from Adam to Abraham

2,000 years from Abraham to Christ Jesus

2,000 years of Christ’s Day

1,000 years, God’s Day, Kingdom Rest

From Adam to Abraham, the Lord God made Himself known to individuals of mankind, born of the seed of man, of the flesh, earthy, bearing the image of the earthy.

The old serpent, called the Devil and Satan, has been permitted to enter into contest with the Covenant Son to have the kingdom of this world for himself. To do this he created his own world system of politics, economics and religion. The Devil’s world system is a deception, built on lies. But the world system of politics, economics and religion furnishes man an alternative choice to the truth. Through the truth the living and true God makes Himself known in His Covenant plan of hope of life everlasting (see 2 Tim.1:9-10; Tit.1:2).

Satan is allowed his will to think that he can be like the Most High God (see Is.14:12-17). Man has freedom of choice to believe the lies of this world, and think that he too can be like God and rule over his own life and know good and evil for himself and chart his own destiny.

The issue is obedience to the truth to be born of the incorruptible Seed, the Word of God, and be raised up out from the dead to live forever in the Kingdom of God as a son of God. It is a matter of life everlasting or death, which will leave one without a body and unclothed forever. Each man in any age makes his own choice. He buys the truth of the righteousness of God through faith in God’s Anointed Son Jesus, born of a virgin, or the lie, you can be like God.

The battle is for the mind (see Prov.4:23). Whatsoever a man thinks in his heart, so is he (Prov.23:7). No one is coerced. Each one makes his own choice. And the old serpent was forewarned of the final destiny of the Lake of Fire. This issue will continue on down through the six days of redemption and into the Kingdom Rest.

In the next pair of days, from Abraham to Christ, on the third day, God began a new thing. He called out one man, Abram, and began to build a nation as a people for His Covenant Son. The Lord began the work of His nation through one man and his family. He began by giving Abram a son through his barren wife, Sarah. The son was promised a long time before he was given through a supernatural conception (see Gen.12:4; 17:15-18:14; 21:1-7; Rom.4:13-24; Heb.11:8-12). God Himself named him Isaac, “he shall laugh” (Gen.17:19).

Before the birth of Isaac, God came to Abram in a vision as El Shaddai, the Almighty God, and assured Abram that between Himself and Abram, He would bring forth His Covenant as declared in the heavens. He changed Abram’s name from Abram, “father is exalted,” to Abraham, “father of a multitude” (see Gen.17:1-22).

Through the next 2,000 years the Lord continued to multiply the natural seed of Abraham and build His nation of a Covenant people for His anointed Son, who would be coming through the line of King David, a man after God’s own heart (see 2 Sam.7:12-16; Lk.1:26-33; Ac.13:22-23).

During that 2,000 years Satan continued to build Gentile kingdoms and world empires to take over the world before the coming Son could be born of the nation of Israel. Satan had his world rulers of darkness through whom he worked.

Mankind continued making a choice individually between the darkness of this world and the light of the truth of the knowledge of the glory of God as declared by the heavens and by the prophets, the holy men of old, and by the Law of the Offerings, all of which are figures of the true Anointed Son of God, who is God become flesh (see Jn.1:1-14; 5:39; Heb.8:1-10:1). God’s nation Israel was shut up under the Law to preserve the truth (Rom.9:4-5; Gal.3:23-24).

In the fullness of time God did send His Son, become of a woman (Gal.4:4). Jesus came into being of His own nation (Jn.1:11; Mt.1:18-23). He was born of a virgin of the seed of Abraham and the seed of David (Lk.1:26-35). The world rulers of darkness delivered Him up to be crucified, not realizing that Jesus’ death would be the victory over the sin and death of man. On the third day, as prophesied, God raised Jesus up out from the dead (see Lk.24:13-21; Ac.2:22-36; Rom.1:2-4; 1 Cor.15:3-4).

Here was another new beginning of a Body with many members, a Body of sons of God, born of God, born from above through having become the righteousness of God through faith in God’s Anointed Son, Jesus. The members of the Body of Christ began to be called Christians, “Christ-ones,” “little anointed ones” first in Antioch (Ac.11:26).

Satan was  allowed to continue building his world city into a global community. Mankind  would , each one, continue to choose the way he would go. For her great sin of rejecting her Savior and King, the Covenant people of Israel must be set aside (Rom.11:25). Her capital city, Jerusalem, must be looted and burned and destroyed (see Mt.23:37-24:2). Her people must be scattered until the Times of the Gentiles shall be fulfilled (see Lk.21:20-24). At the end of the two days she would be forgiven and regathered to her land.

Hosea prophesied, “Come, and let us return to the Lord, for He has torn, and He will heal us. He has smitten, and He will bind us up. After two days He will revive us [bring us back to life]. In the third day He will raise us up, and we shall live in His sight” (Hos.6:1-2; see Ezek.34:11-13, 23-31; Jn.10:11-18).

The last two days of 1,000 years each is Christ’s Day. He is building a Kingdom of priests to be seated with Him in the heavenlies. Each one has been loosed from sin in the blood of Christ and is born from above with hope of life everlasting (Rev.1:5-6). The gospel of the finished work of Christ has gone out to the ends of the earth. Jew and Gentile are invited to believe into Jesus and unite themselves together with Him, that they might share His life of resurrection (see Rom.6:3-10; Eph.2:4-22). We live at the end of these days.

Satan is still permitted to build his global empire through world rulers of darkness. Man is yet permitted to go the way he so chooses.

Christ’s Day will end in the victory of the fiery cleansing of the heavens and the earth, a regeneration of the heavens and earth initiated and created by the One who made them. All will be made ready for the inheritance of the Anointed Son. All clean and new for another new beginning of the last 1,000 year Kingdom Rest of righteousness and peace. Peter wants us to keep these things in mind, that they not be hidden for us. They were written for admonition - for our learning. Through God showing us His ways, we know Him as He is.

The timing is set. Peter says, “The Lord is not slack as some count slackness, but He is long-suffering toward us [His creation], not purposing that any should perish, but that all should come to repentance” (2 Pet.3:9; see also Ezek.18:23; 33:11; Ac.10:34-43).

Though the scoffers do not desire it to be so, “the Day of the Lord will come as a thief in the night, in which the heavens shall pass away with a great noise, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat, the earth also, and its works burned up. Seeing then, that all these things shall be dissolved, what manner of persons ought you to be in all holy living and godliness, looking for and hasting unto the coming of the Day of God, in which the heavens, being on fire, shall be dissolved, and the elements shall melt with fervent heat? Nevertheless, we, according to His promise, look for new heavens and a new earth, in which dwells righteousness” (2 Pet.3:10-13).

The apostle Peter, who was personally taught by his Master, the Lord Jesus, connects the new heavens and the new earth with the passing away of the former to the “Day of the Lord [Jehovah],” and to Jesus as coming as “a thief in the night.” This Peter learned from Jesus the evening they were on the Mount of Olives and the disciples asked Jesus when would be the end of the age and what would be the sign of His return (see Mt.24:1-42).

The apostle Paul, who was also personally taught by the glorified Lord Jesus for three years in Arabia, wrote to the assembly in Thessalonica, “But of the times and seasons, brethren, you have no need that I write unto you. For yourselves know perfectly that the Day of the Lord so comes as a thief in the night. For when they shall say, Peace and safety, then sudden destruction comes upon them, as travail upon a woman with child, and they shall not escape. But you, brethren, are not in darkness, that that day should overtake you as a thief. You are all sons of the light, and sons of the day. We are not of the night, nor darkness. Therefore, let us not sleep as others, but let us watch and be sober-minded. For they that sleep sleep in the night, and they that are drunk are drunk in the night. But let us who are of the day, be sober, putting on the breastplate of faith and love, and, for a helmet, the hope of salvation. For God has not appointed us to wrath but to obtain salvation by our Lord Jesus Christ, who died for us that, whether we wake or sleep, we should live together with Him” (1 Thess.5:1-10).

In our study in Revelation, we have seen Jesus as coming as a thief in the night is connected with the War of the Great Day of God Almighty and the battle of Armageddon (Rev.16:15-16). Also, when John recorded the opening of the sixth seal of the scroll, he prophesied of the heavens departing as a scroll when it is rolled together (Rev.6:12-14).

God created the elements of the heavens. He stretched them around the earth and He fastened them together as a firmament to divide the waters above from the waters below (Gen.1:6-8; Jer.10:12-13; 51:15-16). All cohere and are held together by the Creator (see Col.1:15-17; Heb.1:1-3). In the cleansing fire they will be loosed, but not forever. Just through the cleansing.

The Greek word for “dissolved” in 2 Peter 3:11 has the meaning “to loose something fastened.” The “elements,” the basic parts or components of the heavens, verse 10, is in the plural. Having been put on fire, they will melt, but all is under the control of the Almighty God who created them and who will oversee the baptism of fire for the cleansing of the heavens from the works of man and for the regeneration of the heavens for a new beginning in the Kingdom of the Anointed Son and Heir to all things, which He will have subdued unto Himself (see 1 Cor.15:28; Phil.3:21).

Peter spoke also of the burning of the earth. The earth too will burn and the works in it - man’s works. We read of this in Revelation 18 with the destruction of the great city of Babylon. Babylon the Great, the virtual world city of politics, economic and religion will all burn up, destroyed from off God’s earth in preparation for the new regenerate earth for the Kingdom Age. Having been cleansed and made new, the earth will have been prepared, that the Lord might multiply His sons of men and fill His earth with sons of God to inherit and reign with their King-Priest.

In speaking of the time of His return, Jesus said, “The sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give its light, and the stars shall fall from heaven, and the powers of the heavens shall be shaken. Then shall appear the sign of the Son of Man in heaven” (Mt.24:29-30a).

The heavens rolled up like a scroll, the shaking of the heavens, causing showers of falling stars, and the great cloud caused by nuclear power will obscure the sun to the earth-dwellers. This will also have its effect on the moon. Jesus did not say the sun would pass away. He spoke of the sun being darkened and the moon not giving light. As we have already seen, in speaking of the Day of the Lord, both Isaiah and Joel had prophesied of the sun being darkened and the moon not causing its light to shine (Is.13:10; Joel 2:10; 3:15).

We live in a day of nuclear power. We can easily see in these prophecies a description of nuclear warfare. The great noise as a mighty rushing wind of bombs and missiles in the storm of the War of the Great Day of God Almighty as seen in the metaphor described in Revelation 16 as the seventh bowl of the anger of God is poured out (see Rev.16:17-21).

In His great indignation with the wicked, Almighty God will permit man to have the consequences of his own doing. Man has built his nuclear weapons as a way of holding power. Man, with his nuclear weapons, will set the heavens on fire and will burn up all the junk he has put in God’s heavens since he invaded God’s space. Also, man will be the cause of the burning of the earth and of his works which are in it. The burning and destruction of all man’s works will be man’s own doing. Burning is the most purifying cleansing. The judgment will be a retributive justice of a holy righteous God, who gives to man the fruit of his own doing (see Is.59:18; Mic.7:13; Gal.6:7-8; Rev.18:5-6).

Jeremiah writes, “Thus says the Lord, who gives the sun for a light by day, the ordinances of the moon and of the stars for a light by night, who divides the sea when its waves roar; The Lord of Hosts is His name: If those ordinances depart from before Me, says the Lord, then the seed of Israel also shall cease from being a nation before Me forever” (Jer.31:35-36). Then Jeremiah goes on to speak of rebuilding Jerusalem (see vv37-40).

At Mount Sinai with the giving of the Law, “Mount Sinai was altogether in 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” (Ex.19:18).

“The earth shook, the heaven also dropped at the presence of God, even Sinai itself was moved at the presence of God, the God of Israel” (Ps.68:8).

The One whose voice shook the earth has promised, saying, “Yet once more I shake not the earth only, but also heaven. And this word, Yet once more, signifies the removing of those things that are shaken, as of things that are made, that those things which cannot be shaken may remain. Wherefore, receiving a Kingdom which cannot be moved, let us have grace, by which we may serve God acceptably with reverence and godly fear. For our God is a consuming fire” (Heb.12:26-29).

The one last shaking is so that all that is not of God will be done away. All that is of God will remain forever. This shaking and the setting on fire will end the Great Tribulation and then shall appear the Son of Man riding down out of the opened heaven on His angelic chariot, coming in power and great glory. His coming is the sign of the end of the age of Gentile dominion (see Mt.24:29-31; Mk.13:24-27; Lk.21:25-27). In the Revelation the apostle John saw the Mighty Conqueror with His angelic host riding out of the opened heaven and coming to rule over the earth (Rev.19:11-16).

Peter tells us that to be forewarned is to be forearmed. Keeping these things in remembrance generation after generation will produce a steadfast faith. Knowing the truth will help one to detect the lies of the evil one and his false prophets (2 Pet.1:18-2:22).

Peter puts a question to those who understand these things will be. “What manner of persons ought you to be in all holy living and godliness?” (2 Pet.3:11). Are we set apart to God in our living - holy? Are we godly? Do we have rightly directed reverence for our God? Do we look for God to have His day of cleansing of the heavens and earth for the Kingdom reign? Are we hastening the Day of God in our holy living and godliness?

Peter ends his brief epistle with this comprehensive doxology. “Grow in grace, and the knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. To Him be glory both now and forever. Amen” (2 Pet.3:18).

This is our holy living and our godliness. Grace is the great favor God has done us in Jesus, His Anointed Son and second man, who became sin for us that we might become the righteousness of God in Him (2 Cor.5:21; 1 Cor.15:45-58). Sent from heaven, He brought us eternal life for our dead body, that we might be raised up out from the dead in an immortal, imperishable body to live with Him forever in eternity future. He brought us the light of the knowledge of the glory of God for understanding the deep things of God, shared with us by the Holy Spirit.

We stand in that grace, rooted and grounded in the word of God, the very soil for growth, continual growth in the grace and knowledge of our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, that we might abide steadfast in the faith. Glory to our Lord and Savior in the present heavens and to His God and our God and Father. Glory to our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ, and to our God and Father in the future heavens and earth, which He will claim, and throughout all eternity - glory.

This ends our lesson.

Lesson 15 Saving a Household update 10-14-13

                                     Saving a Household

                                 Genesis 6:8-13; 1 Peter 3:18-20

As we have seen in our continuing narrative written by Moses, the time was drawing near when Jehovah Elohim must bring judgment on the man He created. “God saw the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually” (Gen.6:5).

Why was man living in the imagination of his heart? Every man was turned to his own way. As Moses has recorded for us, Jehovah Elohim made a creation for one purpose - that He might have man in His image, after His likeness (Gen.1:26).

God covenanted with Himself that man be given the hope of eternal life (2 Tim.1:9-10; Tit.1:2; Heb.13:20). God did not create man with eternal life. Man would begin life in a temporary body in the image of the earthy body created by Jehovah Elohim from the dust of the ground for His first man (Gen.2:7; see 1 Cor.15:35-58).

Man is given hope of living forever but he must desire it, and choose it, and receive it God’s Way. God’s Way is His own Covenant plan and purpose. The Word, who is God and in whom is eternal life and who is light, would be sent from heaven with eternal life and light to be shared with whosoever would believe (Jn.1:1-14; 3:16).

The Word who is God would become flesh. He would take the likeness of His creation of man that He might share with each one of His creation eternal life for the mortal body of the dust of ground. Having received eternal life in the Son through faith, one would be raised up out from the dead a new deathless glorified body.

The inner man, the soul of spirit being, would be given light for understanding the Covenant plan of the Way of God. Man must be freed from the sin of having his own will and desires over God’s will for him. The Covenant Son would become sin for man. As man’s Substitute, the Covenant Son would take the sins of the whole world of mankind of all ages on His body of human flesh to put sin away once for all. It would only take one death to put sin away (Rom.4:25-5:11; 6:10; Heb.1:1-3; 7:27; 9:22-28; 1 Pet.3:18).

Through faith in the Anointed Son becoming sin and taking care of both sin and death, one might become the righteousness of God through uniting in the death that put away sin once for all (2 Cor.5:21). This is God’s Way of a man making his exodus out of a corrupt creation of mankind in human flesh and becoming the righteousness of God, be born again in a body of eternal life, and of man saving his soul from destruction (Mt.16:24-27; Mk.8:34-38).The righteousness of God through faith in the Anointed Covenant Son of God is man’s only hope of being clothed with a new body born of God.

Righteousness and eternal life are a gift from God. They are sent to mankind in His Anointed Son. “For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believes in Him should not perish, but have eternal life” (Jn.3:16). The Gift is freely given and it must be freely received. No one is coerced

into being born again. God purposely gave man freedom of choice. He may have his own way or go God’s Way (see Prov.14:12; 16:25; Jn.14:6).

The creation of mankind was proved together in their progenitor Adam. The apostle Paul, taking his text from the psalmist, said, “As it is written, There is none righteous, no, not one. There is none that understands, there is none that seeks after God; they are all gone out of the way, they are together become unprofitable. There is none that does good, no, not one” (Rom.3:10-12). This is Paul’s picture of man born of the seed of Adam - bearing the image of the earthy - man in the flesh.

Paul took his text from Psalm 14: “Jehovah Elohim looked down from heaven upon the children of men, to see if there were any that did understand, and seek God. They are all gone aside, they are all together become filthy; there is none that does good, no, not one” (vv2-3).

This was taking place in Noah’s day and in the nation of Israel and in the Gentile nations and in Paul’s day and in our day. But there is no excuse for not understanding the Way of God and for not coming to Him. It is understandable that men born turned to their own way would not seek after God. But God is not willing that any should perish. God seeks after each man (2 Pet.3:9; Ezek.18:19-23; see Jn.1:9; Ac.10:34-43; Col.1:23b; 1 Tim.2:3-6; Tit.2:11).

Together in their progenitor, man could be proved as to the way which they would choose to go. Man in his heart is self-serving and self-loving. In the thoughts of his heart, in the inner man in his tent of mere flesh, man is deceived concerning that which is his own doing (see Jer.17:9-10). In his own heart each one is deceived in his imagination. He is deceived through the thoughts conceived in his imagination and he is drawn away and enticed through his own desires (Gen.6:5; Jas.1:13-14).

Man believes that he is basically good and that he can rule over his own being and govern his own person to do that which is right. Man believes in power that he only sees in his own imagination. In truth, man is powerless to save himself from destruction. Only the thoughts of Almighty God are true and only He has the power to bring to pass His plan and purpose for His mankind to become born sons of God (Jn.1:12-13; 5:26).

In the one proving of all mankind, each one was proved to turn to his own way and to have his own will over the will of His Creator for him. That is sin. Through one man the sin came into the world and death through the sin. So death - absence of eternal life for the raising up the body born again - passed through to all mankind, for all sinned (Rom.5:12). All bodies of human flesh were consigned to return to the dust of the ground from which they came, through the seed of Adam (Gen.3:19; Rom.5:14).

Of man born in the flesh, each one has proved the reality of going his own way. Each one  born of the flesh has sinned and is coming short of the glory of a new body - until he repents and has a change of thinking to return to God and go God’s way to be born again of the incorruptible Seed, the Word of God, who lives and abides forever (Rom.3:23; 1 Pet.1:17-25).

In the one proving of the heart of a creation of man in human flesh, the lawlessness of the heart was seen. Together man could be proved to see that which is true of each person of the same creation of human flesh. The  crucial test is that of a new birth of a new creation of sons of God. That proving is individual (see Tit.3:4-7).

In going his own way, man walks in darkness concerning the deep things of God’s thoughts and purposes. The light of the knowledge of the glory must be shined into the darkness of each heart. In the light of the knowledge of the glorification, God has prepared for His creation of man is seen His purpose for man to become a son of God.

In the light of the knowledge of the glory is seen the Covenant Son, sent as God’s Gift to bring man eternal life for his dead body and light for his soul to show man the true self who lives in darkness, deceived by the imagination of his own heart. The light, if received, makes clear that one must be born from above. One must receive the Gift of righteousness and eternal life in the Son of God. There is no other way of saving one’s soul from destruction.

A creation of man in the flesh, which does not fulfill the purpose of God and become a born again son of God is of no profit to his Creator. He is corrupt and will corrupt that which he touches in his doing. He must be destroyed.

As Moses recorded, there came a time in the days of Noah when all flesh had corrupted his way upon the earth and filled the earth with violence. They must be destroyed (Gen.6:11-13). God had foreseen the necessity of the judgment which must come and 120 years before the judgment God forewarned man of His timing of the coming judgment, giving man more than enough time to repent (Gen.6:3).

The Holy Spirit, through the preaching of the righteousness of God through faith in the Covenant Son, was shining the light of the knowledge of the glory of God into the hearts of each one of His mankind. God had His faithful preachers, who had repented and gone God’s Way to be born again a son of God. Each one having become the righteousness of God through faith in the Covenant Son shared the light of the knowledge of the glory of God to make clear the absolute imperative: You must be born again to enter the Kingdom of God as a true birthed son and be made safe from perishing (see Jn.3:3-21). We have record of three, Methuselah, Lamech and Noah, who were preaching this message during these 120 years (Gen.5:25-29; see Amos 3:7; Lk.1:70; Heb.11:7, 39-40; 1 Pet.1:10-12; 2 Pet.1:20-21; 3:2).

Jehovah has His witnesses, His preachers of the righteousness of God through faith in the coming Anointed Covenant Son of God. The Spirit of God was testifying to the truth of the witness, to the hearts of those hearing the witness, that the righteousness of God through faith in His Son might sit in judgment on the unbelieving heart with conviction to show the person not receiving the righteousness of God to be guilty of sin (Gen.6:3).

If anyone born of the seed of man was willing to judge himself, he would see himself guilty of not having received the Gift of the Son, who is made unto us righteousness for power over the sin, who shares His eternal life for the body to be raised up out from the dead, a son of God to live in the Kingdom of His Son forever. The judgment was for conviction and called for repentance, a change of mind to agree with Jehovah Elohim.

The gospel of the Anointed Son is a call to lay down one’s own thinking of the imagination of one’s heart and receive the gift of righteousness and eternal life to save one’s own soul. There is no other way of salvation from the perishing of the unworthy vessel of human flesh.

It is in the thoughts of the imagination of his heart that man is at enmity with God. The enmity is in man’s own thinking. It is in believing that he has a right to his own way of thinking that man is antagonistic to God. It is man’s thinking that must be laid down to take in God’s thinking and have a change of mind and be transformed through the renewing of his thinking.

In that day Jehovah had one man who had found grace in His eyes (Gen.6:8). Noah came from the line of the preachers of righteousness. In the light of the knowledge of the glory of God, Noah heard the voice of the Spirit of God. He saw the great value of this great favor Jehovah Elohim had done man - to send His Son that man might become a born son of God and bear His image.

Noah was God’s man. Noah carried the seed for the coming Covenant Son. Noah had three sons and the seed for the Covenant Son would be passed to one of them (Gen.6:10; 9:26). Through Noah Jehovah Elohim would continue His purpose to have a Kingdom of sons of God.

In man refusing to go God’s Way and receive the eternal life in the Son to fulfill the purpose of God to have man in His image - sons of God - man must be destroyed. Man had corrupted his way upon earth and the earth was filled with violence. The breath of the mortal bodies must be taken away and the bodies become lifeless.

A lifeless body of human flesh cannot corrupt or do violence. The persons, the souls of spirit life, do not die. Spirit being is neither born, nor can it die. Once a soul comes into being - a person - the person will always be. Knowing this, God made provision for a place for those spirit beings who have departed the mortal body to go and be. In the Old Testament, the place is called Sheol. In the New Testament, it is called Hades.

Sheol/Hades is a temporary holding place. From Jesus’ description of it in Luke 16, we know that it is divided into compartments, with a great gulf separating them (see Lk.16:19-31). On one side the spirit beings who chose to receive eternal life and be born a son of God wait for The Resurrection of Life (Dan.12:2; Jn.5:21-29; Rev.20:4-6). Together they fellowship in wisdom and the ways of God. They share the same thinking, the wisdom taught them, and the understanding of the deep things of God and of the inheritance awaiting them. God, being omnipresent, is with them.

For the spirit beings who remained at enmity with God in their thinking and would not choose eternal life and be born a son of God, Hades is a place of torment, a place where each one is left with the imagination of the thoughts of their own heart, and with the unfulfilled desires, and with the emotions of having been denied continuing to go one’s own way. Each one tormented day and night as a consequence of his own decision. And at the end of time each one will be given a fair trial, proving the justice of the retribution (see Rev.20:11-15).

Each one had been forewarned in the gospel of the righteousness of God through faith in God’s Covenant Son. Each one had life and death set before them. After having been warned that the only way to live forever in the body of human flesh given to them was to receive the Son with eternal life and be born again a son of God, each will be forever left with the choice they made.

In his two epistles Peter, the apostle of Jesus, wrote of the spirits of those destroyed in the Flood and imprisoned in Hades. In his second epistle, he wrote concerning the judgment of God, who “did not spare the old world, but saved Noah, the eighth person, a preacher of righteousness, bringing in the Flood upon the world of the ungodly” (2 Pet.2:5; see also Heb.11:1-7).

In his first epistle Peter makes clear that the spirit beings imprisoned in the place of departed spirits had the preaching of the righteousness of God through faith in His Covenant Son, that each one could have chosen to believe that God is and diligently seek after Him to be rewarded with eternal life and become a son of God.

Peter writes, “For Christ also has once suffered for sin, the just for the unjust, that He might bring us to God, being put to death in the flesh but made alive by the Spirit, by whom also He went and preached unto the spirits in prison, who at one time were disobedient, when once the long-suffering of God waited in the days of Noah, while the ark was preparing, in which few, that is, eight souls, were saved by water, the like figure unto which baptism does also now save us” (1 Pet.3:18-21a).

Christ suffered once, once in the sense that it is not to occur again. Christ suffered once for all mankind (Rom.5:6; 1 Jn.2:2). The righteous One suffered for the ungodly sinners of Adam’s seed. Jesus was innocent of sin Himself. In Him is no sin. He knew no sin. He did no sin (2 Cor.5:14-21; 1 Jn.3:5; 1 Pet.2:22).

That He might bring us, mankind, to God, Christ, the Anointed Covenant Son, was put to death in the body of human flesh but made alive by the Spirit. Through the power of eternal life, the Spirit of God raised the body of Jesus up out from the dead mortal body - a body of eternal life (Ac.2:22-28; Rom.8:11).

“By one man the sin came into the world, and death through the sin, and death passed through to all men, for all have sinned” (Rom.5:12). All are born dead in trespasses and sins (see Eph.2:1-3). All, each one, born without eternal life to raise the body up out from the dead.

Death has a claim on all mortal bodies of human flesh in the image of the earthy. And mankind is impotent, powerless to overcome death. Death is absence of eternal life. Man must be given the eternal life with the power to raise up a body out from the dead and overcome death (see Jn.12:23-33). Man must freely receive the eternal life shared with him in God’s Anointed Son.

Also man must be set free from choosing to have his own will over the will of His Creator-Redeemer. That is sin. Man is helpless to help himself. The sin so easily besets and masters him to choose his own will and go his own way. Man must become the righteousness of God through the Son, who became sin for us (2 Cor.5:21).

Man must be delivered from death and ransomed. For this, the Anointed Covenant Son must be baptized into death. He must go into death and rescue His creation of man. He must drink the cup and become sin for man, that man might become the righteousness of God in Him.

Christ, the Anointed Covenant Son of God, went and preached to these spirits who are imprisoned in Hades. How did He do that?

By the Spirit who raised up His mortal body again alive.

When did Christ preach to these imprisoned spirits?

When they were disobedient to the word preached.

When was that?

In the days of Noah when the long-suffering of God waited to bring judgment while Noah was preparing the ark to save his household.

In what way did Christ preach by the Spirit to these spirits who were disobedient while Noah was preparing the ark and the long-suffering of God waited to bring judgment?

We have Moses’ record in Genesis 6.

Methuselah, Lamech and Noah were preachers of the righteousness of God through faith in the coming Covenant Son. The Spirit of God was bearing witness to the testimony of the preachers of righteousness concerning the Covenant Son of God, who was coming to die for man’s iniquity and sins that man be made fit for the presence of God and to share His righteousness and eternal life. The Spirit of God was bearing witness to the hearts while the spirits were yet in their mortal body, that He might bring conviction of guilt and repentance with a change of mind to receive the Propitiation set before them, that they might be born again and save their soul (see Jn.5:24; Rom.3:22-26; 1 Jn.2:2; 4:10). Sharing His righteousness with His creation of mankind would give man power over sin, the lawlessness within, that one might walk worthy of his calling.

Those imprisoned had, in the days of Noah, refused to change their mind. They remained disobedient to the truth of the word of God being preached. They hardened their heart against the voice of the Spirit. They refused to judge themselves guilty of wickedness. They refused to judge themselves in need of righteousness and eternal life for the new birth of the body. In man refusing to change his mind and lay down his own thinking to take up God’s thinking, the earth was being corrupted and violence filled the earth (Gen.6:11-12).

The judgment of the Flood of waters must be sent to wash away the filth caused by men as mere flesh, dead in trespasses and sins. The consequence of the judgment brought death to the bodies of the disobedient and the soul of spirit life must then be imprisoned in Sheol/Hades.

In the ark which Noah had prepared, a few souls were saved. Eight in number. Namely, Noah’s household. His wife and his three sons and their wives equal seven, and Noah was the eighth. The Covenant would be established in Noah in the new beginning after the Flood (Gen.9:8-17).

Peter says the preparing of the ark and the saving of the eight souls is “a like figure unto baptism which does also now save us (not the putting away of the filth of the flesh, but the answer of a good conscience toward God), by the resurrection of Jesus Christ, who is gone into heaven, and is on the right hand of God, angels and authorities being made subject unto Him” (1 Pet.3:21-22).

The preparing of the ark to save the eight souls of Noah’s household was for God to wash His earth clean of the filthiness of the works of the flesh. Baptism, which now saves us, is for the answer of a good conscience toward God. Having gone into death with Jesus Christ and having been buried with Him, one has been planted together in the likeness of His death, and shall also be of His resurrection (see Rom.6).

The Greek word for “figure” comes from two Greek words. One anti, meaning “instead of” or “corresponding to,” and the other, tupo, “ a type,” “a model,” or “a figure.” Peter refers to the baptism of Jesus as like or corresponding to the preparing of the ark and the saving of the eight souls for a new beginning.

The eight souls in the ark were saved through the waters of judgment. They came out of the judgment alive. All other beings in mortal flesh bodies, who were not in the ark of safety, lost the breath of their mortal bodies. Their souls of spirit life were sent to the place of spirit beings who have departed the lifeless body of human flesh and blood. The life of the spirit is everlasting. The soul of spirit life does not die.

From what were those in the ark saved? From being imprisoned in the place prepared for spirit beings who have departed their lifeless mortal body. Seven of the souls on the ark were unregenerate (see Gen.7:1). They had not received the eternal life sent to them in the Son. Had they died in the waters, they too would have been imprisoned in the place of departed spirits until the end of time, when they would have faced the Son as the Judge at the Great White Throne Judgment. Not having been born again, their name would not be written in the Lamb’s Book of Life. Their end would be the lake of fire, where they will be imprisoned forever (see Rev.20:11-15).

Noah, preparing an ark to the saving of his household and making them safe from losing their soul, Peter said is a like figure of the body prepared for God’s Anointed Son Jesus, that He might save His household of sons of God. The sons of God who, all down through the ages, believed in the righteousness of God and received the righteousness and eternal life in the One who is the salvation of Jehovah Elohim.

How is it Christ’s being put to death in the flesh but made alive in the Spirit saves His household of sons of God? We find our answer in the Gospel records.

In Matthew chapter 1 we have the birth of Jesus. In chapter 2 we have the plot to kill Jesus when He was a toddler and God warning Joseph to flee to Egypt and remain until He sent Joseph word to return. When Herod died, Joseph, with Mary and Jesus, returned to Nazareth in Galilee (Mt.2:19-23; see Lk.1:26; 2:39).

“In those days John the Baptist came, preaching in the wilderness of Judea, and saying, ‘Repent; for the kingdom of heaven is at hand.’ For this is he that was spoken of by the prophet, Isaiah, saying, The voice of one crying in the wilderness, Prepare the way of the Lord, make His paths straight” (Mt.3:1-3).

“Then went out to him Jerusalem, and all Judea, and all the region round about the Jordan, and were baptized by him in the Jordan, confessing their sins. But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees come to his baptism, he said unto them, ‘O generation of vipers, who has warned you to flee from the wrath to come? Bring forth, therefore, fruits befitting repentance. And think not to say within yourselves, We have Abraham as our father; for I say unto you that God is able of these stones to raise up children unto Abraham. And now also the axe is laid at the root of the trees; therefore, every tree which does not bring forth good fruit is hewn down, and cast into the fire. I, indeed, baptize you with water unto repentance, but He who comes after me is mightier than I, whose shoes I am not worthy to bear; He shall baptize you with the Holy Spirit, and with fire” (Mt.3:5-11).

Jesus is the Anointed Son of God, the Word, who is God, become flesh. John was a man sent from God to prepare the way for the sons of Israel to come to Jesus and become the righteousness of God in Him (Jn.1:6-8). John’s baptism was a baptism of repentance.

The sons of Israel were being taught the righteousness of God through the works of the Law and through birth as a son of Abraham, and in this way, being a covenant people is identified through circumcision. The apostle Paul speaks of true circumcision, made without hands being in the putting off the body of the flesh by the circumcision of Jesus having put off His body of flesh. That is, one puts off the body of human flesh through being baptized into Jesus, the Anointed Son of God. “Buried with Him in baptism, in which also you are risen with Him through the faith of the operation of God, who has raised Him out from the dead” (Col.2:12; see vv11-14). In Colossians Paul is speaking collectively of the members of the Body of Christ, which came out of His death (see also Col.1:12-22; Eph.1:3-3:21; 5:23-27).

John was baptizing unto repentance. Those coming to him to be baptized were confessing themselves to be sinners and in need of a change of thinking. In this way hearts were being prepared to come to Jesus to hear the truth and become His disciples, “learners” of Him.

One day, at the time Jesus was preparing to begin His public ministry, Jesus came to John to be baptized. John would have hindered Him. Here is the One who will be baptizing with the Holy Spirit and with a fiery judgment in the end of Gentile dominion for the preparation of the setting up of His Kingdom of sons of God. Here is the One of whom John is preaching. “And Jesus answering John said unto him, ‘Permit it to be so now; for thus it becomes us to fulfill all righteousness.’ Then he consented to Him” (Mt.3:15).

Jesus going into death and cutting off the body of flesh will fulfill righteousness for all. Jesus, in His baptism of death, will become sin for His creation of mankind, that anyone believing into Him and uniting in His death, can become the righteousness of God in Him (2 Cor.5:21).

Through the veil of His flesh of humanity, Jesus made an exodus out of the creation of man in human flesh, and Jesus opened a new and living way into the presence of God (Heb.10:10-23). In having become sin for His mankind, anyone born in the flesh can, through faith in Christ, become the righteousness of God in the Anointed Son and be born again a son of God (Gal.3:26). The believing one has taken his exodus out of the creation of man in human flesh.

“And Jesus, when He was baptized, went up straightway out of the water; and lo, the heavens were opened unto Him, and he saw the Spirit of God descending like a dove, and lighting upon Him. And, lo, a voice from heaven saying, ‘This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased’” (Mt.3:16-17; see Mk.1:9-11; Lk.3:21-22; Jn.1:31-34).

Here is the Son of God’s love, born of a virgin (Is.7:14; Mt.1:18-25; Lk.1:26-35). Here is the Word, who is God, become flesh - the Seed of the woman (Jn.1:1-14; Gen.3:15). The seed for His body of human flesh taken from the living flesh of the virgin womb. The body prepared for Jesus as a seed coat for His person of eternal life, with power for the Spirit of God to raise it up out from the dead a body of spirit being - of His own eternal life (Jn.5:26; 10:17-18; 12:23-27; 1 Cor.15:44). In the body of the begotten Son, the body raised up out from the dead, is the seed of eternal flesh and bone to bring forth many sons of glory - the household of God, sons of God.

In the Gospel of John we read of John the Baptist introducing Jesus as “the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world,” which is a reference to Jesus taking the sins of the whole world on His body of flesh, that He might put away sin - once - for all (Jn.1:29).

John the Baptist was born into the priesthood (Lk.1:5-17). Here we have a figure of the Law as practiced in Jesus’ day. At Passover the lamb to be slain for the household must be approved as without spot or blemish by a priest (see Ex.12:3-27). God brought His Lamb to the priest in the wilderness, John the Baptist. God Himself pronounced Jesus as approved, the One in whom He, God, is well pleased (see Ac.2:22-24).

But that was not the baptism of putting off the flesh. That was symbolic of the only way to put off the body of flesh is in death. Jesus spoke to His disciples concerning the baptism of putting off the human flesh of His mortal body with the life in the blood.

Jesus and His disciples were going up to Jerusalem for His last celebration of Feast of Unleavened Bread. The Spring Festival began with Passover. That spring Jesus, the true Passover Lamb, would be slain. Along the way Jesus took His disciples aside to speak to them of what would take place in Jerusalem (Mt.20:17-19).

The mother of James and John was traveling up to Jerusalem with them. In Matthew’s record we read, “Then the mother of the sons of Zebedee came to Him, along with her sons, worshiping and desiring a certain thing of Him. And He said unto her, ‘What do you desire?’ She said to Him, ‘Grant that these, my two sons, may sit, the one on Your right hand, and the other on the left, in Your Kingdom” (Mt.20:20-21).

Mark’s account records, “And coming up to Him, James and John, the sons of Zebedee, said, ‘Master, we would that You should do for us whatever we shall desire.’ And He said to them, ‘What do you want Me to do for you?’ They said to Him, ‘Grant unto us that we may sit, one on Your right hand and the other on Your left hand in Your glory.’ But Jesus said to them, ‘You do not know what your ask. Are you able to drink of the cup that I drink of; and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with?’ And they said to Him, ‘We are able.’ And Jesus said to them, ‘You shall indeed drink of the cup that I drink of; and with the baptism that I am baptized you shall be baptized. But to sit on My right hand and on My left hand is not Mine to give, but it shall be given to those for whom it is prepared’” (Mk.10:35-40).

Truly James and John did not know what they were asking. At an earlier time, when Peter had asked Jesus what the disciples’ reward would be for forsaking all to follow Him, Jesus answered, “Truly I say unto you, that you who have followed Me, in the regeneration, when the Son of Man shall sit on the throne of His glory, you also shall sit upon twelve thrones, judging the twelve tribes of Israel. And everyone who has forsaken houses, or brethren, or sisters, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, or lands, for My name’s sake, shall receive a hundredfold, and shall inherit eternal life” (Mt.19:28-29).

James and John were thinking Kingdom and position in the Kingdom. Jesus had been speaking of what He must suffer at the hands of the chief priests and scribes, of being condemned and put to death, and on the third day being raised.

With His question to James and John, Jesus changes the metaphor to “drinking a cup of judgment” and of “being baptized with a baptism.” These disciples have left all to follow Him, but can they drink the cup and be baptized with His baptism of death and resurrection?

The death is a judgment on the flesh of humanity and on the willfulness of man to use his mind and his body to fulfill his own desires rather than the will of God for His creation of mankind. That is sin. Sin is lawlessness (1 Jn.3:4).

Not having true understanding of the question Jesus asked, James and John claim they are able. Then Jesus said to them, “Indeed you shall drink of My cup, and be baptized with the baptism that I am baptized with” (see Mt.20:22-23).

Each one who, through faith, believes into Jesus, the Anointed Son, is baptized into Jesus. “As many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death. Therefore, we are buried with Him by baptism into death, that as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we should walk in newness of life. For if we have been planted together in the likeness of His death, we shall be also of resurrection” (Rom.6:3-5).

As many as have been baptized into Jesus’ baptism are made safe from being sent to the place in Hades of the departed spirits of the unrighteous souls of spirit being. Each one baptized into Jesus’ baptism of death and resurrection has been born again, born from above, and has entered into the Kingdom of the Son of God’s love. The son abides in the house forever. He is a born son of the household of God.

As many as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into His death. Therefore we are buried with Him through baptism into death, that as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, we should walk in newness of life. In Christ, God’s Anointed Son, each one was baptized into His death - together with Him.

Not one was able to drink the cup of judgment on his own sins, but the sins were laid on the mortal body of Jesus and consumed in the acceptance of His offering of Himself in sacrifice, that man might have an exodus out of the mere creation of human flesh in a temporary body not completed with eternal life.

And baptized into Jesus’ death, man is set free from the sin of having his will over the will of His Creator for him. United together with Jesus in His putting away the sins of the whole world by His sacrificial death, we have died to the sin with Him in His death. For freedom from having our will over our Lord’s will for us, Jesus died to set us free. Jesus drank the cup of judgment to set us free. And He swallowed up death in eternal life (1 Cor.15:54-57). Let us drink the cup of our freedom to not have our will but to choose to have the eyes of our understanding enlightened to know His will and do it.

As the one righteous man, Noah, prepared an ark to the saving of his household, so the one righteous Son of Man, Jesus the Anointed Son of the Covenant, was prepared a body that He might be baptized into death and be brought again from the dead to save the household of His sons born of His Seed, flesh of his flesh, bone of His bone - a body of eternal life (see Lk.24:36-43; Jn.20:19-27; 1 Cor.15:44; Phil.3:21; see also Lk.21:16-18).

In Noah’s day seven souls of Noah’s house were made safe from being sent to the place of departed spirits. Only a few souls, seven in number, saved. Anyone who had been willing to go into the ark would have been made safe and the soul been saved from, in the end, the final place of everlasting torment - the Lake of Fire.

Having come through the judgment of the waters of the Flood alive, the old world was condemned to Noah’s family. Each one was given a new opportunity to repent and believe into the coming Son to be forever safe, as a born son of God. The world in which Noah’s sons had been born was condemned to them. They had been saved to a new beginning.

In Noah’s day the souls who refused the preaching of the truth of the righteousness of God when they heard the preachers preaching of the righteousness of God through faith in the Anointed Son, when they refused their only hope of eternal life, each one must suffer the judgment and go to the place prepared for unrepentant souls who would not receive the Gift of God’s Son, that they be born again and freed from the sin. Each one stopped breathing in the waters of judgment and became lifeless in the body (see Gen.7:17-23). But the soul is a life of spirit being. The souls went to the place in Sheol prepared for the unrighteous spirit beings. For them, there was no second opportunity to repent. They had rejected Him who is the only hope of eternal life for the body.

The Lamb was slain before the foundation of the world (Rev.13:8). Jesus suffered being put to death in the flesh and made alive through the Spirit, that mankind might believe into Him and anyone believing and receiving the eternal life offered in Him be made safe from losing his soul in a prison made for departed spirits. And then be brought to the Great White Throne Judgment and cast into the lake of fire and be tormented day and night forever, a just retribution. Each one receives what he chose.

The invitation of Jesus Christ is, “If any will come after Me, let him deny [disown] himself, and take up his cross, and follow Me. For whosoever will save his life shall lose it, and whosoever will lose his life for My sake, shall find it. For what is a man profited if he shall gain the whole world, and lose his own soul? Or what shall a man give in exchange for his soul?” (Mt.16:24-26).

Untold millions down through the ages have chosen to believe into the Anointed Covenant Son of God to save his soul life. Each one has saved his soul of spirit being through obedience to the truth to be born of the incorruptible Word of God, born from above a son of God, and translated into the Kingdom of the Son of God’s love. Each one will have a forever living body raised up out of the dead body.

Each one who disowned himself to confess he is not his own but a creation of God, and who took up his cross to be baptized into Jesus and united in the baptism of Jesus’ death has been made safe from the prison of departed souls of spirit being. One day there will be a resurrection of the body and a reuniting of soul and body.

This concludes our lesson.