Speaker 1: How did Israel become a nation, why are they God's
Speaker 1: chosen nation, and why did God need a chosen nation
Speaker 1: at all. We will talk about that on this week's
Speaker 1: episode or the Faith by Reason podcast. Welcome to the podcast.
Speaker 1: The website behind it all is faith Byreason dot net.
Speaker 1: Please check it out. Tons of great information there, and
Speaker 1: please also subscribe to Faithbyreason dot net so you will
Speaker 1: get the new blogs and podcasts when they are published
Speaker 1: by just putting your email into that right navigation bar.
Speaker 1: So we are starting a new study on a new dispensation,
Speaker 1: the fourth dispensation, and this is called the dispensation of
Speaker 1: the Patriarchs. So as a bit of a history, the
Speaker 1: dispensations are God's contrastive way of showing that his plan
Speaker 1: for mankind is the only one that will work that
Speaker 1: on his own, man will never choose God's way on
Speaker 1: his own. And in order to prove that contrastively, God
Speaker 1: comes up with successive scenarios wherein man is given a
Speaker 1: choice to either choose God's way or his way, and
Speaker 1: if a man, if man chooses his way over God's way,
Speaker 1: then the dispensation fails and God has to move on
Speaker 1: until again he's exhausted every reasonable opportunity to give man
Speaker 1: a way to choose to be like God, to be
Speaker 1: always a completely right in jest, by again, by choosing
Speaker 1: to do it God's way, thereby earning his way into
Speaker 1: heaven and the meaning of life. And once God has
Speaker 1: exhausted all of those opportunities for man to do it
Speaker 1: on his own, then God can justly implement his plan
Speaker 1: for mankind, which of course is heaven. So in the
Speaker 1: first dispensation you will find it. Actually, the first threedispensations
Speaker 1: has something in common. They were all pretty open ended,
Speaker 1: and they all dealt with man we're fairly individually, especially
Speaker 1: the first two. In the first dispensation, the dispensation of innocence,
Speaker 1: man was given a simple choice as to whether he
Speaker 1: would believe in God or not, or choose God's way
Speaker 1: or not, by whether or not man and woman would
Speaker 1: choose to eat of the Tree of the knowledge of
Speaker 1: good and evil or not. And of course they failed
Speaker 1: that this sensation. They chose to eat the fruit and
Speaker 1: disobey God. And when God confronted them, they chose to
Speaker 1: justify themselves over God, and that dispensation failed. So in
Speaker 1: the second dispensation, God took an opposite approach. Instead of
Speaker 1: man being completely innocent with no knowledge of good and evil,
Speaker 1: God gave man hundreds of years of life in order
Speaker 1: to gain all the knowledge he could and to then
Speaker 1: see if gaining lots of knowledge would cause man to
Speaker 1: choose him, to choose God over himself. Of course, as always,
Speaker 1: man failed, and by gaining knowledge, it didn't bring him
Speaker 1: closer to God. It took him further away from God,
Speaker 1: to the point where all of his thoughts were continually evil.
Speaker 1: And then, of course we have the incident with the
Speaker 1: nepheline and the genetic corruption which we talked about ad
Speaker 1: nauseam earlier. Then in the third dispensation, God changed things again.
Speaker 1: Instead of giving man a long time to gain knowledge,
Speaker 1: God shortens man's life and controlled his life considerably and
Speaker 1: gave him a sense of urgency and a sense of
Speaker 1: community because because they have such a short time to
Speaker 1: accomplish whatever they needed to accomplish and have to do
Speaker 1: it fast and do it with intention. And this also
Speaker 1: did not lead man closer to God. In fact, it
Speaker 1: once again let man further away from God and to
Speaker 1: the point where Man and Babel under the leadership of
Speaker 1: Nimrod tried to erect a gateway Babel means gate to God,
Speaker 1: a gateway to God in order to invade Heaven. So
Speaker 1: it seemed that by giving man open ended opportunities to
Speaker 1: choose himself or God, man kept getting worse and worse.
Speaker 1: So then it would be unjust of God to continue
Speaker 1: to do that. God would need to put a fourth
Speaker 1: some actual guidance and some form of representation. Instead of
Speaker 1: just letting man go on his own and hope that
Speaker 1: man came to a sensus the right way and chose
Speaker 1: God on his own, it seems that it would only
Speaker 1: be fair and jest of God to give man some
Speaker 1: type of direction, some type of direct guidance. And that's
Speaker 1: and he begins to do that with the Age of
Speaker 1: the Patriarchs. And now as a result of Babel, man
Speaker 1: was divided into nations. Actually, according to the Bible, and
Speaker 1: I'll put the actual chapter in verse into the show notes,
Speaker 1: man was divided into seventy nations. And you will see
Speaker 1: in some translations where it says that when God divided
Speaker 1: men into nations, he had divided them according to the
Speaker 1: sons of Israel. Well, that's that's an incorrect interpretation. The
Speaker 1: correct interpretation if you look at the original Hebrew, who
Speaker 1: says that God divide the nations according to the number
Speaker 1: of the Banai hi Alohem, the sons of God, not
Speaker 1: the sons of Israel. Because if that were the case,
Speaker 1: the Hebrew would have said the Banai Israel. But it doesn't.
Speaker 1: It says the Bani high Alohem, the sons of God.
Speaker 1: And as we found out several podcasts ago when we
Speaker 1: looked at the second dispensation, but ni hih Alohem, the
Speaker 1: sons of God are angelic beings. So God divided up
Speaker 1: the nation by a number of angelic beings, beings who
Speaker 1: he put over the nations. And that's one reason why
Speaker 1: we know that it's not the sons of Israel. And
Speaker 1: another reason why is because it wouldn't make any sense
Speaker 1: because the sons of Israel didn't exist at the time
Speaker 1: God divided the nations at the time of Babel. Israel
Speaker 1: didn't exist because Israel, the twelve tribes of Israel, are
Speaker 1: the sons of Jacob, and Jacob wouldn't even be born
Speaker 1: for another couple hundred years. So God cannot divide the
Speaker 1: nations by the numbers of the sons of Israel. They
Speaker 1: wouldn't even if they weren't even around. So why does
Speaker 1: the Bible say that? Why was the Bible translated that way? Unfortunately,
Speaker 1: it's because it's one of the same reasons that a
Speaker 1: lot of Bible scholars in the ancient Church bothers and
Speaker 1: all those folk called the sons of God the sons
Speaker 1: of Seth in Genesis chapter chapter six. We talked about
Speaker 1: that before. Because they were embarrassed by the supernatural world view.
Speaker 1: They didn't have the supernatural world view and about Genesis six.
Speaker 1: So instead of just taking it at face value that
Speaker 1: these sons of God, the Beniah Eloheim angels had intercourse
Speaker 1: with women and produce these odd creatures called nepheline, they
Speaker 1: didn't like it. They didn't have that worldview. They were
Speaker 1: embarrassed by it. So they inserted this false, ridiculous sons
Speaker 1: of Seth theory. And because they also don't in this case,
Speaker 1: they don't want to consider the idea of the supernatural
Speaker 1: idea that there are angelic beings that are over all
Speaker 1: the different nations in the world, they decided to come
Speaker 1: up with this idea of translating it as the sons
Speaker 1: of Israel. But that's completely false. But we will talk
Speaker 1: more about angelic beings being over the nations of a
Speaker 1: few podcasts from now, so i'll just let that go there.
Speaker 1: So the nations are all under angelic beings. But God
Speaker 1: wanted to have his own nation to be an example
Speaker 1: to the other nations, and so he wanted to In
Speaker 1: order to start that nation, he needed to pick someone
Speaker 1: to be the progeniture of it, and he picked a
Speaker 1: man named Abrahm, who would later be known as Abraham.
Speaker 1: I'm not going to talk a ton about Abraham and
Speaker 1: his history because I don't want to go too far
Speaker 1: over time in this episode. I went way over almost
Speaker 1: an hour in the last podcast, so sorry about that.
Speaker 1: I'm going to try to keep this brief. In the
Speaker 1: blog post that is attached to this podcast, I go
Speaker 1: into quite a bit more detail, and I have reference
Speaker 1: links to the entire story of Abraham, But just very briefly.
Speaker 1: God goes to Abraham and he gives them a rather
Speaker 1: spectacular promise, and i'll just quote it here a Genesis
Speaker 1: twelve one to three. Now, God said to Abrahm, who
Speaker 1: would become Abraham, get out of your country, from your
Speaker 1: family and from your father's house to a land that
Speaker 1: I will show you, and I will make you a
Speaker 1: great nation, and I will bless you and make your
Speaker 1: name great, and you shall be a blessing. And I
Speaker 1: will bless those who bless you, and I will curse
Speaker 1: those who curse you, and in you, all the families
Speaker 1: of the earth shall be blessed. So that is not
Speaker 1: only the promise to Abraham that is the parameter of
Speaker 1: this dispensation. This is the litmus test for whether or
Speaker 1: not the world, whether or not man will pass this dispensation,
Speaker 1: is based on how he treats the nation that comes
Speaker 1: from Abraham. So if these other nations in the world
Speaker 1: they curse Abraham's family, his descendants, this new nation, then
Speaker 1: God will curse them and they will this dispensation will
Speaker 1: be a failure. If they bless them, then God will
Speaker 1: bless those nations. And just you know, it's a little
Speaker 1: more than just the blessing. The blessing is is something
Speaker 1: that should actually lead these other nations to God. Because
Speaker 1: remember the point of the dismissation is not just to
Speaker 1: be blessed by God, is to choose God over yourself.
Speaker 1: So in order for these nations to choose correctly, they
Speaker 1: will have to number one bless God's new nation, and
Speaker 1: by receiving the blessings back from God, that should lead
Speaker 1: them to want to be a part of God's nation,
Speaker 1: to give up their own nationality and join this nation
Speaker 1: that God has brought about. So in order for this
Speaker 1: dismensation to be successful, the other nations of the world
Speaker 1: will have to bless God's nation and they will have
Speaker 1: to become a part of God's nation. Okay, got that great,
Speaker 1: Let's move on. So Abraham eventually moves to the land
Speaker 1: God tells me to go to, which is the land
Speaker 1: of Canaan. Again, there's a lot of story. It's an
Speaker 1: intrigue that go along with this, and you can read
Speaker 1: about it in the blog post. Abraham is very old.
Speaker 1: He's one hundred years old. His wife is Sarah is ninety,
Speaker 1: so they are both beyond childbearing years. Even though God
Speaker 1: promised him a son. Unfortunately, they got impatient and Sarah
Speaker 1: Sarah who became Sarah, Abraham's wife, decided to help God
Speaker 1: out because she says, Hey, I'm past child bearing years.
Speaker 1: I can have a baby. God says, you're going to
Speaker 1: have a son. Here's what I'll do. Since I'm beyond
Speaker 1: child bearing age. Why don't you go have a baby
Speaker 1: with my handmaid in Hagar and Abraham, being the good husband, says, hey, baby,
Speaker 1: you want me to have sex with another woman to
Speaker 1: have a baby for you, By golly, I'll do it
Speaker 1: because I love you so much. Of course, I'm being
Speaker 1: a little facetious here, but the bottom line is this
Speaker 1: was religion. Religion is when you tried to add to
Speaker 1: what God wants to do. Sarah was being religious by
Speaker 1: helping God. When you help God, that means that you
Speaker 1: must know better than God. And that's pride is contrastive thinking.
Speaker 1: I mean, it's comparative thinking, and it's wrong. And not
Speaker 1: only was it wrong, but it resulted in disaster in
Speaker 1: that Abraham and Hagar had a child named Ishmael, and
Speaker 1: Ishmael is the father of many of the Arab tribes
Speaker 1: that are Israel's enemies to this day, so for thousands,
Speaker 1: So Abraham, by obeying his wife Sarah and her religion,
Speaker 1: actually created enemies that Israel has had for millennia. Anyway,
Speaker 1: a little later, God performs a miracle, Sarah does get
Speaker 1: pregnant has a child named Isaac. We talked about Isaac
Speaker 1: before it in the faith chapters and the famous sacrifice
Speaker 1: of Isaac. I won't spend too much time on that,
Speaker 1: but when Isaac came of age, it was time for
Speaker 1: him to get married. And I will spend a little
Speaker 1: time on this, on the marriage of Isaac, because I
Speaker 1: think it's really cool and that it's a model for
Speaker 1: Christ and the cheer. Prophecy is not just pronouncements. It's
Speaker 1: not just God saying that X is going to happen
Speaker 1: in the future. It's also model and pattern. In fact,
Speaker 1: in the Jewish mind, prophecy is more pattern than it
Speaker 1: is pronouncement, and this is a great example of it.
Speaker 1: The story of how Isaac got his wife Rebecca is
Speaker 1: basically Abraham said us to side for my son to
Speaker 1: get married. So he sent his servant, who is unnamed,
Speaker 1: is an unnamed servant into another land to bring about
Speaker 1: to bring to find a bride for Isaac. Now, in
Speaker 1: this model, Abraham is a form or a model of God,
Speaker 1: the Father. Isaac is a model of Christ, the Son
Speaker 1: of God. And this unnamed servant is a model of
Speaker 1: the Holy Spirit. And for a couple of reasons. Number one,
Speaker 1: because he's unnamed and the Holy Spirit never testifies of himself.
Speaker 1: Jesus said that himself in the New Testament, the Holy
Speaker 1: Spirit will never testify of himself. He will only testify
Speaker 1: of the Son. So this unnamed servant is a model
Speaker 1: of the Holy Spirit for that reason, and also even
Speaker 1: though he's unnamed in the story which occurs in Genesis sid.
Speaker 1: Chapter twenty two, I'll put a link to there in
Speaker 1: the show notes, but we do find out what his
Speaker 1: name is earlier. The servant's name is actually Eliezer. Eliezer
Speaker 1: means comforter, and Comforter is the title that Jesus gives
Speaker 1: the Holy Spirit. So Aliazar is definitely a model of
Speaker 1: the Holy Spirit. So this unnamed servant, which is Eliezer,
Speaker 1: goes to a foreign land and finds a bride for
Speaker 1: the Sun, and this bride has the option she and
Speaker 1: she the LA's, are testifies of the Sun. He tells
Speaker 1: this lady, whose name is Rebecca, all about Isaac and
Speaker 1: ask her if she wants to join the family. Now
Speaker 1: she doesn't have to, but when she hears about Isaac,
Speaker 1: she decides that yes, she wants to join this family,
Speaker 1: and the model of the Holy Spirit, the unnamed servant
Speaker 1: gives her gifts and then brings her to the sun
Speaker 1: and then they consummate the marriage. So this is totally
Speaker 1: a a model of Christ in the church, whereas you know,
Speaker 1: we've never we in the church have never seen Christ.
Speaker 1: We've only heard of Him through the through the Holy Spirit,
Speaker 1: and we have the choice of whether or not we're
Speaker 1: going to accept that marriage invitation to become a part
Speaker 1: of God's family. So I think that's a pretty cool story. Anyway,
Speaker 1: Isaac and Rebecca get married. They have two children, twins,
Speaker 1: Jacob and Esau. And Jacob's name means usurper or he'll catcher,
Speaker 1: and he was named that because even though his brother
Speaker 1: Esau was born first, he was a first born. Jacobs,
Speaker 1: as an infant reached his hand out from the womb
Speaker 1: and grabbed the heel of Esau. So that's how he
Speaker 1: got his name, and he of course lives up to that.
Speaker 1: Jacob and Esau were very, very different. Esau was a
Speaker 1: very manly, masculine type. He was, you know, a hairy guy.
Speaker 1: He was a god man of the field, he was
Speaker 1: a hunter, and he was just a very manly man.
Speaker 1: And Isaac, you know, adored him. Jacob was the opposite.
Speaker 1: He was hairless, he was smooth, he was timid, and
Speaker 1: he was sort of he was a very upfront or
Speaker 1: manly who's sort of conniving and scheming, and he was
Speaker 1: a mama's boy. Rebecca loved Jacob, and Jacob ended up
Speaker 1: swindling his brother Esau out of his birthright, his blessing,
Speaker 1: and his inheritance, and you can read about that. It's
Speaker 1: a very famous story. You can read about how that happens.
Speaker 1: He basically tricks his father Isaac into giving him the
Speaker 1: blessing of the first born by posing as Esau and
Speaker 1: whatever this blessing he is. Apparently it's non refundable and
Speaker 1: non transferable, because after Esau found that Jacob tricked him,
Speaker 1: he asked, is school kin to giving the blessing anyway?
Speaker 1: Isaac said, no, I can't. I've already given it to Jacobs,
Speaker 1: and it's it's done deal. You know, again, non transferable.
Speaker 1: So of course Esau's upset about this and he goes
Speaker 1: off to kill Jacob. Jacob runs away to his to
Speaker 1: his uncle and Laban in another land where his mother
Speaker 1: Rebecca came from, and in Laban, Jacob actually meets his match.
Speaker 1: Laban is is a better hustler and conniver than even
Speaker 1: Jacob is because Jacob falls in love with one of
Speaker 1: Laban's daughters, whose name is Rachel, who's apparently very beautiful,
Speaker 1: as the Bible says, she was beautiful and well formed,
Speaker 1: which means she not only had a beautiful face, but
Speaker 1: she had a rock and body. That's that's the gospel
Speaker 1: according to me. That's just how I interpreted, But that's
Speaker 1: that's basically what it means to me. She had a
Speaker 1: beautiful body and a beautiful face. Jacob fell in love
Speaker 1: with her, wanted to marry her, and he offered to
Speaker 1: work seven years for Laban to marry her. Laban agrees,
Speaker 1: but then he tricks him into actually marrying his older daughter,
Speaker 1: who's Leah, who's not anywhere near as attractive as Rachel,
Speaker 1: and then he makes Jacob work fourteen years to marry
Speaker 1: to get his eventual bride, Rachel, who he loved so much,
Speaker 1: so Jacob got hustled and had to work for Laban
Speaker 1: for fourteen years. He ends up having twelve sons various
Speaker 1: daughters as well, but the twelve sons through Leah and Rachel,
Speaker 1: as well as their handmaids. There was another issue where
Speaker 1: Apparently in that culture, the most womanly thing you could
Speaker 1: do was give your husband's sons. And when the wives
Speaker 1: were not able, the sister's wives were not able to
Speaker 1: give Jacob enough sons, they would give Jacob their handmaids.
Speaker 1: So just the same way as the same way as
Speaker 1: as Sarah did with Abraham. And of course, of course
Speaker 1: again it turned in disaster, because those those sons turned
Speaker 1: out to be some serious characters. But he had four
Speaker 1: sons through the handmaids, and he had the rest of
Speaker 1: the twelve sons through through his wives. The last two
Speaker 1: sons he had from his wife Rachel. The sons were
Speaker 1: Joseph and Benjamin, who Jacob loved the most because they were,
Speaker 1: you know, they were the sons of his most beloved wife.
Speaker 1: So again, as as you can read in the blog post,
Speaker 1: these these guys, these twelve sons of Israel. And by
Speaker 1: the way, Jacob's name was changed to Israel by God
Speaker 1: later on. And it's it's interesting, by the way, if
Speaker 1: you go through the Bible, whenever if Jacob is doing well,
Speaker 1: God calls him Israel. Whenever he is screwing up, he
Speaker 1: goes back to being Jacob. So most of the time
Speaker 1: when God changes someone's name, he only calls him by
Speaker 1: that new name. But apparently Jacob's naming was conditional for
Speaker 1: how he acts. In fact, the end times are called
Speaker 1: the Tribulation period. The period which we call the Tribulation
Speaker 1: is actually titled the Time of Jacob's Trouble. Is really
Speaker 1: the time where Israel's kind of taken to the mat
Speaker 1: and persecuted to the point where they finally recognize their Messiah.
Speaker 1: So because they rejected their Messiah, they have to go
Speaker 1: through this seven year period of harshness, and it is
Speaker 1: called the time of Jacob's Trouble. And again they're called Jacob,
Speaker 1: not Israel, because they were growing up they rejected their Messiah,
Speaker 1: and the tribulation is unfortunately a part of the penalty
Speaker 1: for rejecting their Messiah. But I'm getting way way ahead
Speaker 1: of myself anyway, These twelve Sons of Israel were again
Speaker 1: a pretty rough and tumble bunch of characters. They did
Speaker 1: a whole lot of really, really horrible things, and I
Speaker 1: talk about them in the in the blog post where
Speaker 1: they are murderers, they are genocidal, they commit incests, they
Speaker 1: do a lot of really bad things. But the shining
Speaker 1: star of those sons is Joseph, one of the eldest
Speaker 1: son of Rachel, who, even though he is the eleventh
Speaker 1: son that was born to Jacob, Jacob treats him as
Speaker 1: a first born, and of course this raises the ire
Speaker 1: of the other sons. They hate Joseph and Joseph among
Speaker 1: other things, he was a very good He was very intelligent.
Speaker 1: He was also very good looking. He was a great administrator,
Speaker 1: and he was able to interpret dreams. In fact, one
Speaker 1: of the dreams he had was that one day all
Speaker 1: of his brothers and his mother and father would bow
Speaker 1: down before him and Jacob, and he was Joseph, excuse me,
Speaker 1: when he was a kid, tells his brothers this dream,
Speaker 1: and that just made them hate him even more, Like
Speaker 1: he's bad enough that you're treated better than us, but
Speaker 1: you also have a dream that broke and all bow
Speaker 1: down to you. So they want to give of them.
Speaker 1: They decided first they wanted to kill him, but they
Speaker 1: decided against that and says, instead of just killing him,
Speaker 1: let's make some money off of him, we'll sell him
Speaker 1: into slavery. So they sell Joseph into slavery. Joseph ends
Speaker 1: up as a slave in the house of an Egyptian.
Speaker 1: He goes down to Egypt and ends up in the
Speaker 1: house of an Egyptian man named Potiphar, who's a pretty
Speaker 1: important guy in the in the pharaoh's court, the pharaoh
Speaker 1: of Egypt, the king of Egypt is called a pharaoh.
Speaker 1: But because God was with Joseph, and God blessed Joseph
Speaker 1: and gave him favor, and because of Joseph's intelligence and
Speaker 1: administrative skills, Potiphar put Joseph over his entire household. He
Speaker 1: trusted Joseph to run his entire house. Unfortunately, unfortunately, unfortunately,
Speaker 1: excuse me for him. Potterphar's wife was kind of scummy,
Speaker 1: and she kept trying to seduce Joseph, and Joseph, being
Speaker 1: a man of integrity, kept refusing her her advances, and
Speaker 1: she got frustrated and eventually lied and told Potiphar that
Speaker 1: Joseph raped her, and so Potter had Joseph thrown into jail. Now,
Speaker 1: by the way, as an aside, I don't think that
Speaker 1: Potiphar really believed that Joseph raped his wife, because if
Speaker 1: he truly believed that, he would have had Joseph killed.
Speaker 1: Joseph was just a slave. There would have been no
Speaker 1: problem in Egyptian law for him having a slave killed
Speaker 1: if that slave actually assaulted his wife in that way.
Speaker 1: I think that Potiphar knew Joseph was a man of integrity,
Speaker 1: and I think he knew that his wife was sluty,
Speaker 1: and he would have just liked to have let it go,
Speaker 1: but he couldn't because he had to save face. He
Speaker 1: couldn't have his wife running around saying that a slave
Speaker 1: raped her and that her husband did nothing about it.
Speaker 1: So Potiphar had n't put in jail and Joseph while
Speaker 1: he was in jail again, the jailer saw that he
Speaker 1: was an excellent person, a man of integrity, a great administrator,
Speaker 1: and the jailer put him in charge of the entire prison.
Speaker 1: He trusted Joseph enough to make him run the entire prison. Now,
Speaker 1: some folks might wonder why, if Joseph was so blessed
Speaker 1: by God, why did he keep going through all these
Speaker 1: harsh times, being sold into slavery, being falsely accused, being
Speaker 1: thrown in jail. Well, what God was doing was preparing
Speaker 1: Joseph by giving Joseph more and more responsibility and teaching
Speaker 1: him how to be a greater and greater administrator, because,
Speaker 1: as we'll find out in a few minutes, he would
Speaker 1: actually need all those skills when God finally elevated him.
Speaker 1: And it's something for us to keep in mind. When
Speaker 1: God gives us a vision of something great that we're
Speaker 1: going to do, and then we wonder why we're toiling
Speaker 1: in obscurity, Why hasn't this vision that God gave us
Speaker 1: come about? Yet, keep in mind that God sometimes keeps
Speaker 1: us in that obscurity because he's training us the same
Speaker 1: way he traded Joseph, and Joseph would use everything he
Speaker 1: learned during these harsh periods of his life to actually
Speaker 1: become one of the greatest men of his age. So
Speaker 1: Joseph in jail for twelve years. During that time, the Pharaoh,
Speaker 1: the king of Egypt, has this dream that disturbs him,
Speaker 1: and none of the mystics in his court. And of course,
Speaker 1: as I said a few podcasts ago, mystics are always
Speaker 1: hanging around the the corridors of power, pretending that they
Speaker 1: know more than they do, and in some cases they
Speaker 1: do have certain power. We'll talk about that in the
Speaker 1: next podcast. But none of the mystics in Pharaoh's court
Speaker 1: could decide for the dream. Well, there was one person
Speaker 1: who really who remembered that Joseph had this ability. He said, yeah,
Speaker 1: there's this guy in jail, this Hebrew, that's what they
Speaker 1: call the Israelites. This Hebrew has the ability to interpret dreams.
Speaker 1: Maybe he can help you out. So Pharaoh, Joseph brought
Speaker 1: up and Pharaoh tells him as the dream and the
Speaker 1: dream is this, And between Pharaoh saw fourteen cows. Seven
Speaker 1: of the cows were very healthy, very vibrant, beautiful cows,
Speaker 1: lovely cattle. Then there were another seven cows that were
Speaker 1: ugly and emaciated, just skinny, sickly cows. And then as
Speaker 1: Pharaoh watched, these ugly, emaciated, sickly cows devoured the healthy cows,
Speaker 1: and he didn't know what they made districting greatly. Well,
Speaker 1: Joseph prayed, and God gave him the interpretation of the dream.
Speaker 1: And the dream was this, that there was going to
Speaker 1: be a fourteen year period coming up, and the first
Speaker 1: seven years there's going to be great abundance, a tremendous abundance,
Speaker 1: represented by the big, healthy cows. But after those seven
Speaker 1: years there's going to be a severe famine in the
Speaker 1: entire region. It's going to be so severe that it's
Speaker 1: going to basically devour all of the abundance that people
Speaker 1: gained in the previous seven years. And Pharaoh was impressed
Speaker 1: so much, so wad he said, Hey, you know what
Speaker 1: should I do? And Joseph, again, being an administrator, having
Speaker 1: spent all his time learning through the trials that God
Speaker 1: put him through how to be an administrator, he told Pharaoh, Hey,
Speaker 1: here's what you do. During the seven years of abundance,
Speaker 1: store up everything extra, keep all the extra and put
Speaker 1: it into a storehouse, so that there'll be more than
Speaker 1: enough of food and grain when we have the seven
Speaker 1: years of famine. And Pharaoh says, hey, I believe you,
Speaker 1: and he tells all the people of Egypt, whatever Joseph
Speaker 1: tells you to do, do it. And it came to
Speaker 1: pass that because of this, Pharaoh basically gave he did
Speaker 1: the same thing that the jailer did and that the
Speaker 1: Potiphar did, and that he put Joseph over everything. He
Speaker 1: gave Joseph all of his authority. So Joseph basically he
Speaker 1: ran Egypt. He was second only to the Pharaoh. Joseph
Speaker 1: was essentially the prime minister of Egypt, so he in
Speaker 1: one day, Joseph goes from being a prisoner to being
Speaker 1: the second most powerful man in the powerful Egyptian Empire,
Speaker 1: And sure enough, the seven years of abundant comes around. Joseph.
Speaker 1: People of Egypt do what Joseph says said, and they
Speaker 1: accumulated all of the excess grain and they put it
Speaker 1: in the storehouse. And then, as as predicted, seven years
Speaker 1: of severe famine came about, and the people of Egypt
Speaker 1: went through all of their food and they had no
Speaker 1: more food. And they came to Pharaoh saying, hey, we
Speaker 1: don't have any food. Pharaoh, what are you gonna do?
Speaker 1: You're our leader? What do we do? And Pharaoh said, hey,
Speaker 1: do whatever Joseph tells you. And Joseph said, if you
Speaker 1: want food from us, you'll have to buy it from us.
Speaker 1: They said, okay, we'll buy it. We need food, we'll
Speaker 1: buy it. So they bought the food and made Pharaoh
Speaker 1: extremely rich, more richer than he was before. Not only that,
Speaker 1: but people all over the region because it wasn't just
Speaker 1: a local famine, it was regional. It affected the entire
Speaker 1: Middle East, and so people came from other nations all
Speaker 1: over the world to pay for food from Egypt. Because
Speaker 1: Egypt had food and the rest of them didn't. But
Speaker 1: it turned out that people ran out of money and
Speaker 1: they still needed more food. The famine was so severe
Speaker 1: that people gave all of their money and they still
Speaker 1: needed more food. And people said, hey, Pharaoh, we don't
Speaker 1: have any more money, but we still need food. What
Speaker 1: do we do And Pharaoh said, do whatever Joseph tells you.
Speaker 1: And Joseph said, hey, you don't have any food, but
Speaker 1: you have land, so give me your land and I'll
Speaker 1: give you food. And people said, well, that's fine, no
Speaker 1: point having land if we're starving to death. So all
Speaker 1: the people of Egypt gave up their land to Pharaoh.
Speaker 1: So suddenly Pharaoh, through Joseph, owned all of the Egyptian land.
Speaker 1: Not only that, but all the other nations surrounding them
Speaker 1: did the same thing. They sold their land to the
Speaker 1: Pharaoh to get food. So now Egypt went from being
Speaker 1: a nation to being an empire. The Pharaoh and Egypt
Speaker 1: now owned the entire region. So thanks to Joseph and
Speaker 1: the blessing that Pharaoh got through Joseph, the Egypt became
Speaker 1: an empire. So, as the narrative goes along, it turns
Speaker 1: out that the sons of Israel. You know, Jacob and
Speaker 1: his sons, they experienced a famine as well, and they
Speaker 1: heard that there was food in Egypt. So Joseph sends
Speaker 1: his sons down to buy some food, just like all
Speaker 1: the other nations were doing. And when they get there,
Speaker 1: they run into Joseph. They don't recognize Joseph, but Joseph
Speaker 1: recognizes them, and you know, they It's actually very interesting
Speaker 1: and colorful story how they know they come together, but
Speaker 1: I'll spare you that because we're running out of time.
Speaker 1: Joseph brings the entire family down to Egypt to Pharaoh
Speaker 1: and he presents this this new his family, which is,
Speaker 1: you know, a bunch of them now, all of his
Speaker 1: twelve the twelve sons, all of their wives, all of
Speaker 1: Joseph Jacob's daughters, and all of their families. So it's
Speaker 1: like a pretty big group of people. And Joseph comes
Speaker 1: and presents them before Pharaoh. So now you have this
Speaker 1: fledgling nation of Israel standing before all the nations of
Speaker 1: the world. Because at this point, Pharaoh is essentially the
Speaker 1: king of the entire known world. So what's gonna happen
Speaker 1: now here? Is that conjunctive issue where you have the
Speaker 1: choice to make, will Pharaoh bless God's nation of Israel
Speaker 1: or will he curse them? Well, it turns out that
Speaker 1: Pharaoh blessed him. He gave he welcomed them into Egypt.
Speaker 1: He gave them land, not just some land in Egypt.
Speaker 1: He gave him the best land, an area called Goshen,
Speaker 1: which was right at the Nile delta, which was very
Speaker 1: fertile land. It's the best land in Egypt. And when
Speaker 1: Jacob died, he instituted a empire wide period of mourning
Speaker 1: for him and gave him a royal It offered him
Speaker 1: a royal burial. So it seemed that the Pharaoh did right,
Speaker 1: he blessed the nation. So does that mean the dispensation
Speaker 1: was a success. Well no, because remember it's not just
Speaker 1: about blessing Israel. It's about blessing them and becoming a
Speaker 1: part of God's nation, which Pharaoh didn't do. And I
Speaker 1: don't know if that's because he didn't want to give
Speaker 1: up his gods, or maybe Pharaoh just you know, died
Speaker 1: before he had a chance to do that. Nevertheless, God
Speaker 1: did not judge them yet because it was still open ended.
Speaker 1: They were they had the Pharaoh had blessed Israel, Egypt
Speaker 1: blessed them, and they were doing well. So God was
Speaker 1: giving them time to decide if they were going to
Speaker 1: join up with his nation, and in God's mercy, was
Speaker 1: giving them time. Unfortunately, something happened that changed things. A
Speaker 1: new pharaoh came around, a new pharaoh that the Bible
Speaker 1: says didn't know Joseph. This was, you know, a couple
Speaker 1: hundred years later Joseph. Excuse me, Joseph had already died
Speaker 1: by this time, and this pharaoh didn't know Joseph. Now
Speaker 1: that excuse me, excuse me. That doesn't mean that the
Speaker 1: pharaoh didn't know Joseph existed. Of course he did. He
Speaker 1: was legendary. But remember in the knowing means intimacy. It
Speaker 1: means that this pharaoh was not intimate with the story
Speaker 1: of Joseph, the legend of Joseph. This means that this
Speaker 1: pharaoh did not take the story of Joseph to heart.
Speaker 1: In fact, it is strongly implied and many Bible scholars
Speaker 1: take the tect that this pharaoh was not even Egyptian,
Speaker 1: that he was possibly an Assyrian. Now, why would there
Speaker 1: be an Assyrian on this throne of Egypt? Probably because of
Speaker 1: a royal marriage. This is something that had happened that
Speaker 1: happens to this day, but it was very common back
Speaker 1: then and then throughout most of time that whenever you
Speaker 1: had when you want to join two powerful families together,
Speaker 1: you would do it by marrying one of you know,
Speaker 1: the son of one family to the daughter of another family.
Speaker 1: That way they're they're joined together. And it's quite possible
Speaker 1: that the Assyrians were kind of maybe bucking the trend
Speaker 1: a little bit, causing some trouble, and there was a
Speaker 1: possibility that they would be a rival to Egypt. So
Speaker 1: in order to call the rivalry, they married a daughter
Speaker 1: of Egypt to a son of Assyria, and that Assyrian
Speaker 1: became the new pharaoh. So this pharaoh didn't know Joseph,
Speaker 1: and he didn't regard Israel very well. In fact, when
Speaker 1: he saw that the Israelites had the best land and
Speaker 1: that they were multiplying, they were apparently giving birth, you know,
Speaker 1: just pretty rapidly, and they were growing strong and numerically,
Speaker 1: he became afraid of them. And he said, well, you know,
Speaker 1: they're going to outnumber us, and they might side with
Speaker 1: an enemy or try to take over Egypt. So he
Speaker 1: decided to put them into bondage and to just work
Speaker 1: them hard to build cities in Egypt. So he basically
Speaker 1: made the Israelites slaves. Now, at this point God could
Speaker 1: have probably judged them. However, the Israelites being slaves was
Speaker 1: part of God's plan. In fact, God told Abraham in
Speaker 1: a prophecy that the Israelites would serve another nation to
Speaker 1: turn off Egypt, obviously for four hundred years, but then
Speaker 1: God would bring them out of Egypt as a powerful
Speaker 1: nation and a rich nation, into the back to to
Speaker 1: the promised land of Canaan. So it's interesting, isn't it
Speaker 1: that God instituted a worldwide femine just to bring one
Speaker 1: family down to Egypt so that he could so this
Speaker 1: prophecy could be fulfilled. Interesting. So anyway, this pharaoh put
Speaker 1: them in bondage, and of course that happened again four
Speaker 1: hundred years. Finally, after four hundred years, it was time
Speaker 1: that people prayed to God, and God said, okay, it's
Speaker 1: time for my nation to come out. And God does
Speaker 1: this all through Moses, a very familiar story. We hear
Speaker 1: it every well. I'm probably aging myself. I don't think
Speaker 1: they do it anymore. But when I was a kid,
Speaker 1: every Resurrection holiday during the time which we incorrectly called
Speaker 1: Easter or Holy Week, they would show the old movie
Speaker 1: The Ten Commandments was Charlton, Heston and Moses, and it
Speaker 1: was actually even though it's an older movie, it holds
Speaker 1: up pretty well. But we all know the familiar story
Speaker 1: of how Moses was born during a time when that
Speaker 1: the pharaoh of that age, you know, a few hundred
Speaker 1: years after the Pharaoh who initially enslaved Egypt. That Pharaoh
Speaker 1: wanted to all or ordered rather than all the first
Speaker 1: born sons of the of the Israelites be killed because
Speaker 1: he was trying to keep their population down. Moses escapes
Speaker 1: down the river through his mother's help. He is adopted
Speaker 1: by the pharaoh's daughter, who gets some other river and
Speaker 1: raises him as her own. He has a falling out
Speaker 1: with the Egyptian court. He is driven off into the
Speaker 1: land of Midian, where he encounters God and burning bush,
Speaker 1: and God commissions him to go to Pharaoh and tell
Speaker 1: them to let his people go. Now, keep in mind
Speaker 1: exactly what God said. God didn't tell Moses to go
Speaker 1: and tell Pharaoh to release them from their bondage. God
Speaker 1: actually said to let them go a three day journey
Speaker 1: into the wilderness just so that they could worship him.
Speaker 1: God basically asked Pharaoh, hey, how about give my people
Speaker 1: a weekend pass so that they could they could worship me.
Speaker 1: God didn't say I'm going to strip you all your slaves.
Speaker 1: I said, just give him a holiday. Now, what did
Speaker 1: Pharaoh do? Here is Pharaoh's chance to definitively decide if
Speaker 1: he's going to bless or curse the people of God.
Speaker 1: So Pharah could have said, okay, fine, you guys can
Speaker 1: go there and worship your God. But Pharaoh didn't. Pharaoh
Speaker 1: did two things. First of all, he said no, they
Speaker 1: can't go. And then Pharaoh made their burden even more
Speaker 1: difficult by telling him he wasn't going to give them
Speaker 1: straw to make brick. You can't make brick without in
Speaker 1: that time without straw. So Pharaoh not only refused to
Speaker 1: obey God, he cursed is well. By making their job
Speaker 1: not just difficult, but virtually impossible. Pharaoh definitively chose himself
Speaker 1: over God, and by doing so, he failed that dispensation
Speaker 1: he could have blessed him. He decided not to be
Speaker 1: decided to curse them. It was bad enough that they
Speaker 1: were already enslaved, but now he made their work virtually impossible.
Speaker 1: It was impossible for them to stay on schedule without
Speaker 1: the straw that they needed in order to make the brick.
Speaker 1: So Pharaoh told him to do the impossible. No one
Speaker 1: can do the impossible. That's a contradiction. So Pharaoh was definitive,
Speaker 1: and that he was going that he cursed God's nation.
Speaker 1: So the dispensation failed, and God could now end the
Speaker 1: dispensation start a new one, and of course judge Pharaoh,
Speaker 1: which he did through the famous ten plagues we all
Speaker 1: know about them. That's turning the Nile to blood and
Speaker 1: bringing out frogs and flies and lights and boils and
Speaker 1: killing the cattle, and darkness and hail and eventually sorry
Speaker 1: and locus and eventually the death of all the first born,
Speaker 1: at which time Pharaoh finally let the people go, and
Speaker 1: not really did they go, They also took the riches
Speaker 1: of Egypt with him with them, and that was what
Speaker 1: they were used to build the nation of Israel. And
Speaker 1: so that ends that dispensation, And of course it's time
Speaker 1: for the next dispensation. But before we do that, as always,
Speaker 1: we're going to take a deeper dive into some of
Speaker 1: the intricacies and very interesting and relevant parts of what
Speaker 1: went on in this dispensation, and we're going to start
Speaker 1: doing that next week, and the next week's podcast, we're
Speaker 1: going to cover a couple of pretty significant and interesting things.
Speaker 1: The first is the hardening of Pharaoh's heart. If you
Speaker 1: look at the narrative of the ten plagues, you will
Speaker 1: find that after some of them, God, well, first of all,
Speaker 1: God says in the beginning to Moses, said, when you
Speaker 1: go down there, Pharaoh's not going to obey you, and
Speaker 1: I'm going to harden his heart so that he doesn't
Speaker 1: obey you, so that I can send these plugs on him.
Speaker 1: And then after some of the plagues, Pharaoh first says
Speaker 1: he's going to let the Israelites go. Then later his
Speaker 1: heart is hardened. And sometimes it says that God hardened
Speaker 1: his heart so that he would renig on his offer
Speaker 1: and double down on his disobedience, which would allow God
Speaker 1: to send yet another plague. But if you look at this,
Speaker 1: it kind of seems unfair when you think about it.
Speaker 1: God intentionally hardens this man's heart. It's almost like he
Speaker 1: takes away his free will and does not allow him
Speaker 1: to do what he wants to do, which is let
Speaker 1: the Israelites go. No, God hardens his heart, takes a
Speaker 1: seemingly taking away his free will so that he doesn't
Speaker 1: let the people go, so that God can punish him more.
Speaker 1: And again you take a step back in and you
Speaker 1: look at that. It doesn't seem right, It doesn't seem fair.
Speaker 1: But we know that God is right and just always completely.
Speaker 1: So there must be a just and righteous explanation for
Speaker 1: God hardening Pharaoh's heart. There is, We will talk about
Speaker 1: it in the next podcast. Also, the plagues themselves, those
Speaker 1: ten plagues, Why did God choose those specific plagues? They
Speaker 1: kind of seem random, but they are not. God is
Speaker 1: not random. He did not just pull these things out
Speaker 1: of his hat and say, hey, I think I'll do
Speaker 1: these things that'll take off the Egyptians and torture them,
Speaker 1: you know, and judge them. No, God had a very
Speaker 1: intentional reason for choosing those specific ten things, and the
Speaker 1: reason behind them you can only understand if you have
Speaker 1: the supernatural world view, which we talked about several podcasts ago.
Speaker 1: Those ten plagues have every these specific plagues and specific
Speaker 1: meetings behind them. I have everything to do with a
Speaker 1: supernatural worldview, and I will tell you how in the
Speaker 1: next podcast. So thank you for listening. I appreciate it.
Speaker 1: Please subscribe to Faithbyreason dot net just by putting your
Speaker 1: email into the right navigation bar, and they'll feel free
Speaker 1: to send me your comments. I'd love to hear them
Speaker 1: either on this on the website, which I prefer, or
Speaker 1: on Facebook if you like, and I will talk to
Speaker 1: you next week.