The ministry still maintains a good supply of our Question and Answer book containing about eighty-eight questions. The answers to these questions come from our previous television programs. That little book answers many questions on many topics in the Scriptures and has helped many people already. We sell it for about what they cost us, so just be aware that we do have this available, and like I say, we’ve never had anybody feel that it was $11.00 wasted.

All right, now we’re going to get right back in where we left off in our last several programs. That is on the covenants that God has made starting with the Garden of Eden and on up through the ‘fall’ when He made another covenant with Adam. Then on up to the flood where He made the covenant that He would never again destroy the earth with water. Then we came up to the Abrahamic Covenant, and I just sort of skipped the surface on it, because I wanted to reserve most of that until we’d finished the others. So, hopefully, our last two programs today are going to be devoted entirely to the Abrahamic Covenant.

Now, we’ve got the covenants up here on the board, and again I’m going to review them quickly, if I may. We started back here in Genesis with the covenant that God made in the Garden of Eden and the circumstances and what Adam and Eve were to do, and that’s called "The Edenic Covenant." Then, of course, when Adam sinned, we had another whole new relationship between God and the human race, and we call that the "Adamic Covenant." That was followed of course by the flood and the "Noahic Covenant" that God made with Noah, and these now carry all the way up even to our own time. The Adamic Covenant still holds. The Noahic Covenant still holds. Then, as we said, beginning with Abraham and Moses and the promise of the land and King David and the "New Covenant," which we’re going to talk about in our next half-hour, all are under the umbrella of the "Abrahamic Covenant."

The rest of the world is still under the Adamic and the Noahic covenants. But what we want to emphasize is that all these following covenants were based on the covenant that God made with Abraham, and consequently they are applicable primarily to the Nation of Israel. Israel, of course, is still the core of all of God’s dealing with the human race.

You take Israel out of the picture and this whole Book falls apart. Even though there are a lot of people who oppose that line of teaching, by claiming that Israel disappeared after 70 AD, I will never give in to that line of reasoning, because then three-fourths of this Book just falls through the cracks and becomes worthless. So, we’re going to be finishing in the first half-hour today what I did not finish in the previous half-hour on the Davidic Covenant.

Abraham was given the covenant that out of him would come the Nation of Israel, and of course, if you’re going to deal with a nation of people, you have to have certain requirements. We have to have a geographical area of land for their homeland. You can’t just pull people out and call them a nation if they’re scattered all over the world. So, we have the "Palestinian Covenant." And in order to control the religious system, we had the "Mosaic Covenant" of law, temple worship, and how to deal with your neighbor. We covered all that a few programs back. Then, of course, we come to the one that we are in now. The covenant that God made with David, the King of Israel, who brings Israel, you might say, out of the doldrums of antiquity and brings them to the glory of the Kingdom and followed by his son, Solomon.

The promises about the King and the Nation of Israel are under this "Davidic Covenant," and the reason being that Christ comes from the lineage of David. He’s constantly referred to in Scripture as the ‘Son of David.’ Oh, He’s also the Son of Abraham because David follows Abraham, but we have primarily throughout Scripture the reference to Jesus Christ, the Son of David. It’s the fulfillment of those promises made to David that will bring about the earthly Kingdom that all Scripture is looking forward to.

All right, so let’s go back and review the last part of our previous program, and we were in Psalms 89, and let’s drop in at verse 20, where the writer says, this isn’t written by David by the way, but the writer says:

"I have found David my servant; with my holy oil have I anointed him:" Now, who is really speaking through the writer? Well, God is. This is God speaking through the writer of this Psalm. He has found David, the King, his servant, and God is the one that anointed him as the King of Israel. All right, verse 21:

"With whom my hand shall be established: mine arm also shall strengthen him." In other words, God’s going to be in total control of this young man’s rule and reign over Israel.

"The enemy shall not exact upon him; nor the son of wickedness afflict him. 23. And I will beat down his foes before his face, and plague them that hate him." For sake of time, let’s jump up to verse 25.

"I will set his hand also in the sea, and his right hand in the rivers." Now remember, in my last program I said that we’ve got to be careful, could David do that? No. Now we’re leaping the centuries, the millennia in fact, to the Son of David, Jesus the Christ, the Messiah of Israel. So, you’ve got to watch the language. Could David put one foot in the Mediterranean and another one in the River Jordan or something like that? No. But symbolically Christ does, and so you go back and forth. Now verse 27, and this couldn’t be David, so it has to be the Son of David.

"Also I will make him my firstborn, higher than the kings of the earth." Well, there’s only one that’s higher than even David and Solomon, so who would it be? The Son of David, the Son of God, the Christ. All right, I think we made note of all that in our previous program. Now verse 28, now it is back to King David himself.

"My mercy will I keep for him for evermore, and my covenant (this Davidic Covenant) shall stand fast with him. (Now, here comes the offspring of David) 29. His seed also will I make to endure for ever, and his throne (the Throne of David in Jerusalem) as the days of heaven." Then He comes down and He gives the possibilities.

"If they break my statues, and keep not my commandments; 32. Then will I visit their transgression with the rod, (He will chastise, and chastisement usually came with invading armies.) and their iniquity with stripes." All right, verse 33 - but in spite of Israel’s failure, in spite of the nation’s unbelief, will God give up on Israel? Never! Never! Never will God pull away from His covenant people. All right, so He says:

"Nevertheless my loving-kindness will I not utterly take from him, nor suffer my faithfulness to fail. 34. (Now, this is God speaking again.) My covenant will I not break,…" Is that what a lot of these people are saying? No. They’re saying God broke it, that after 70 AD the Jews disappeared from the scene. The Jews that we call Jews today aren’t Jews at all, according to their line of thinking. They’re impostors. Well, then that throws this Book into nothing but a trash bin of lies, because God says He would not break it. And I prefer to believe the Word of God. Now verse 35:

"Once have I sworn by my holiness that I will not lie unto David. (God cannot lie. He cannot go back on His word.) 36. His seed (David’s seed, the Nation of Israel) shall endure (How long?) for ever, (That’s eternity.) and his throne as the sun before me. 37. It shall be established for ever as the moon, and as a faithful witness in heaven." Now, that’s just God reaffirming these promises made through what we call the Davidic Covenant.

All right, let’s move on, because I want to finish up on David in this half-hour, if at all possible, even though we can’t exhaust it. Come over with me for a moment to Isaiah chapter 9, where, again, we have David connected to the King who’ll be ruling during the millennium, that is God the Son, Jesus of Nazareth. Here we have it so explicitly expressed. Isaiah chapter 9, verses you’re all acquainted with; we use them quite often.

"For unto us a child is born, unto us (And again, I always emphasize, who are the ‘us’? Israel. We’re not talking to Gentiles back here. This is God dealing with Israel.) unto us a son is given: and the government (That is of this coming glorious earthly kingdom.) shall be upon his shoulder: (This One that is coming. This Son that was born in Israel.) and his name shall be called (here they come) Wonderful Counselor, The Mighty God, (the Creator of everything) The Everlasting Father,…" Now here, even though they are separate personalities, they act as one God.

All right, so here we even have God the Son referred to as the Father, like He did in John 14 to Philip, Jesus saith unto him, "Have I been so long time with you, and yet hast thou not known me, Philip? He that hath seen me hath seen (Who?) the Father;…" All right, here we’ve got them lumped together the same way. It’s God the Son and He’s the Counselor, but He’s also the Everlasting Father, the Prince of Peace. Now, here comes the part that connects us with King David.

"Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end,…" Now, even though the thousand years ends, remember it ends time as we know it, yet it slips right up into the eternal, as we saw, I think, in our last program, because in Revelation 21 what have we got? New heavens and a new earth.

So, the whole program just simply slips up out of the thousand years in time into eternity. I think we’re going to have that same separation between Israel and the Church for all eternity. I can see nothing else in Scripture. But here we’re dealing with the Jewish end of it. That earthly kingdom is going to slip right up into the New Earth of eternity, and it’s going to be:

"…upon the throne of David, (see, there in Mount Zion in Jerusalem) and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever." Not just for a thousand years but "forever." Now remember that I’m always reminding you that the word judge or judgment in this light always means a benevolent government, a good government.

All right, now let’s jump all the way up, if I may, to Matthew chapter 1. We’re also going to be looking at it in another program this afternoon when we deal with Abraham, but we want to see that, again, David is still kept in contact with this coming Messiah and His rule and reign over this earthly Kingdom. Here you can see immediately why I’m going to come back to this when we deal with Abraham.

"The book of the generation of Jesus the Christ, the son of (Whom?) David, the son of Abraham." But He’s also the Son of God. We can never take that away. But, all right, here is His connection, earthly kingdom-wise, with Abraham, the Father of the Jewish Nation, but also with King David, according to these covenants that He made with David. So, we have to understand that all of Scripture ties these concepts together.

Now for the few moments that we have left, time goes fast, let’s come all the way up to, well, I suppose I should stop at Luke chapter 1. Let’s stop there for a moment. I think we’ve got time for that. Luke chapter 1 and we’ve looked at these verses time and time again, where Zacharias, the father of John the Baptist, is in the priesthood laboring in the Temple in Jerusalem. He had been stricken dumb, or unable to speak, at the onset of Elizabeth’s pregnancy with John the Baptist. All right, but now little John is born, and the Jews are all shook up, because they can recognize the miraculousness of it all. So, when they asked Elizabeth what his name would be, and she said John, that just didn’t swallow very well. So, they went and found Zacharias at the Temple complex and asked him. And on a writing tablet he said, "his name shall be John." That’s all up there in verse 63. All right, he gets his voice back, and now let’s come down to verse 67.

"And his father (That is John the Baptist’s father.) was filled with the Holy Spirit, and prophesied, saying," Now, I’ve got to emphasize that verse, otherwise this just sounds like Jewish wishful thinking. That’s what people would put on it. But it isn’t. This is the Spirit of God speaking these truths through the lips of the priest Zacharias. All right, now look what he says, and watch it carefully.

"Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; (We’re not talking about the whole human race here. We’re talking about the covenant people, Israel.) for he hath visited and redeemed his people," Israel! We’re not talking about the rest of the world, yet.

"And hath raised up a horn of salvation for us (not for the whole world) in the house of his servant David;" Well, why is this all limited to David and Abraham? Because it’s the Covenant Promises! I’ve been stressing that in all the years I’ve been teaching. Why did Jesus not have anything to do with the Gentiles in His earthly ministry? They weren’t in the Covenants. Only the Covenant People were in a relationship with Jesus in His earthly ministry, with the two exceptions. So, this is what we have to understand – that He came in response to the Covenant Promises.

Maybe this is as good a place as any. I was wondering where in the afternoon I could bring it in and I may again, but that’s as far as I need to go in these for now. I may come back to it later, but come all the way up with me to Romans chapter 15. This is a verse that I use over and over, because here it’s from the pen of the Apostle Paul. Romans chapter 15, and this just blows everything away that says that Jesus ministered to the whole world. No, He did not become an object of faith to the whole world until He finished the work of the cross. Up until that time, it’s fulfillment of the Covenants to the nation of Israel.

Here in Roman 15 verse 8, the Apostle Paul is writing merely to give us some understanding that most of Christendom doesn’t have yet! It’s unbelievable! And they refuse. They don’t want to see it. But look what it says in verse 8.

"Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the Circumcision (Israel) for the truth of God, (It had to happen. It was in God’s eternal blueprint. And Jesus Christ, what was the purpose?) to confirm (or fulfill, bring to fruition) the promises made unto the fathers:" Well, where were the promises? In the Covenants!

All these Covenants, after we get past the Abrahamic Covenant, they’re all God dealing with Israel on promises and prophecy. There’s no way anybody can take them away or mix them up with the Gentile world. It flies in the face of this Book. So, Christ came to fulfill all these Covenant promises. But, now we know that Israel rejected them when they rejected Him. But God didn’t break the covenants, He didn’t cast the covenants aside, but He merely postponed them.

I’m again going to refer to that in a later program this afternoon. All right, now we’ve only got five minutes left, already. Come back with me quickly to Acts chapter 2, where we have almost the last, not totally, because Paul refers to him once or twice, but the best reference we have to David, now, is in Acts chapter 2, when Peter is preaching on the day of Pentecost. Of course, Peter is going to refer to Christ as the Son of David, but he’s going to use the Psalms to prove that this wasn’t David himself who had been reincarnated or anything like that, but that the Psalms was speaking of Jesus of Nazareth. See that? All right, Acts chapter 2, come down to verse 25, and this is Peter, remember, preaching on the day of Pentecost to that huge crowd of Jews. And he says:

"For David speaketh concerning him, I foresaw the Lord always before my face, for he is on my right hand, that I should not be moved: 26. Therefore did my heart rejoice, and my tongue was glad; moreover also my flesh shall rest in hope: (Why? Because Christ would not end in the tomb, He’s going to be raised from that.) 27. Because thou wilt not leave my soul in hell, (Now, this is again Christ speaking through the prophet. He would not be left in hell, or Hades, or Sheol, which was, of course, the Paradise side, not the torment.) neither wilt thou suffer thine Holy One to see corruption." He never decayed and began to go back to the dust of the earth like a normal human would have, because He was Divine. All right, then I’m going to come down to verse 29.

"Men and brethren, let me freely speak unto you of the patriarch David, that he is both dead and buried, and his sepulcher is with us unto this day." In fact, just a few weeks ago, some of you were with us, we were up to what is called the Tomb of David. I’m sure it’s not in the exact place that the ancient tomb was, but nevertheless it makes a good tourist attraction, and we all go there.

"Therefore being a prophet, and knowing that God had sworn with an oath to him, that of the fruit of his loins, (Now, what are we talking about? The genealogy coming down through history that originated with Abraham first and then later with King David. That genealogy goes all the way up to the time of Christ Himself.) according to the flesh, he would raise up Christ to sit on his (David’s) throne;"

"He (David) seeing this before spake of the resurrection of Christ, (as a prophet) that his soul (That is Christ’s now, at His death, the three days and three nights he went down into Paradise, which was called Sheol or Hell or Hades, remember.) his soul was not left in hell, neither did his flesh see corruption." Why? Because He was of a Divine origin, even though born of the human mother.

"This Jesus hath God raised up, whereof we are all witnesses. 33. Therefore being by the right hand of God exalted, and having received of the Father the promise of the Holy Spirit, He hath shed forth this, which ye now see and hear. 34. For David…" (The King David of a thousand years ago.) …is not ascended into the heavens: (But who is?) But he saith himself, The LORD said unto my Lord, (The Lord Himself. Jesus the Christ. God the Father said, back in Psalms 110 verse 1) Come sit at my right hand until I make thy foes thy footstool."

Now, to make sure that you understand. Who is all this directed to? Look at verse 36, and why in the world can’t people read it?

"Therefore let (The whole race of Adam – is that what your Bible says? No, it doesn’t say that? What does it say?) all the house of Israel…." And not just two tribes, Judah and Benjamin, like some would try to tell you. But how many? All of them. All the tribes are under God’s dealing for end-time scenario. So Peter says, even on the day of Pentecost:

"Therefore, let all the house of Israel know assuredly, that God hath made that same Jesus, (Who came through the lineage of Abraham and David.) whom ye have crucified, both Lord and Christ."

All right, now let’s just recap in the seconds that are left. Through these Covenant Promises beginning with Abraham, God has been dealing with the Nation of Israel, bringing them all the way up to the appearance of their Messiah. They rejected Him. But God is still going to come back and fulfill all these covenant promises, as we’re going to see in our next program, when He brings about the next covenant on the board, the "New" covenant.

As we begin our study, we just pray now that you would use your Bible, as most of you write constantly that you take your notes as you study with us, and that you have learned how to study on your own. That’s all we ask. We don’t want people to say, "Well, this is what Les Feldick says," but study the Word so that you can say, "This is what the Book says," because that’s the only thing that counts.

Okay, we’re going to pick up where we left off in the last lesson. For this lesson we’re going to go back to the next covenant on the board, which is the New Covenant. Now, if you remember, those of you who were with me from the very beginning, seven is always the number of completion, and eight is the number of new beginnings. We see that over and over in Scripture, and now we’ve come through the seven covenants, and we’re going to look, this afternoon, at the eighth covenant, which will jump all the way into the Kingdom.

The New Covenant will not become a reality for Israel until they have the King and the Kingdom. Then we’re going to show what our relationship is with this New Covenant. Because I maintain that we, as members of the Body of Christ, are not covenant people. We are not under the covenant, per se. We merely are enjoying all the ramifications of what God did to fulfill the New Covenant.

All right, now turn with me, if you will, to Jeremiah chapter 31. We’re going to jump in at verse 31. Again, this is a series of verses that we use a lot, and again I beg people just read what it says. Not what someone has told you they think it says, but what does it really say?

"Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, (Now this is the word of God.) that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel,…" Can you make that any plainer? I don’t see how you can. It doesn’t say with the whole race. It doesn’t say the whole world. It doesn’t say with the Body of Christ. He’s making a new covenant with Israel. And Israel means Israel.

"…that I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel, and with the house of Judah: (That was at a time when the kingdom was split, remember.) 32. Not according to the covenant that I made with their fathers in the day that I took them by the hand to bring them out of the land of Egypt; which covenant they brake, although I was an husband unto them, saith the LORD." Now, what covenant did they break? Law. My, they broke it over and over and over and over. Yet, God never gave up on them.

So, the whole concept is now that under this new covenant; they won’t be breaking it. They won’t be tempted to rebel. They will not be disobedient, because they’re going to be in a heaven on earth environment. Satan is locked up, and there’ll be no temptations to disobey. But on top of that, the result of the New Covenant on the Jewish individual will be so domineering that they won’t have to worry about breaking anything. We’ll see that in just a minute.

"But this shall be the covenant that I will (That’s future. It hasn’t happened yet, but we think we’re getting close. That’s when Christ returns and sets up His Kingdom. Then this covenant will become an everyday reality.) make with the house of Israel; After those days, saith the LORD, I will put my law (Not on frontlets on their forehead - not on their doorposts, but where?) in their inward parts, and write it in their heart; (He will write it on their heart.) and will be their God, and they shall be my people." Now tonight, yes, Israel is still under God’s covenant promises.

He’s watching over them, but they’re not His people today. They’re anything but. They’re secular. They’re in unbelief for the most part, not all, but for the most part. And they are not His people. As He spoke to Moses, "they’re your people." You remember? And Moses said, "No, God, I don’t want them, they’re your people." Well you see, it was because of their rank disobedience, but that’s all going to end. All right, read on in verse 34.

"And they shall teach no more every man his neighbor,…" In other words, they’re not going to have to sit down and constantly be studying the Torah like Yeshiva students do today. They won’t have to study and try to figure out what is this verse? They’ll have full understanding, because it will be written in their hearts.

"…and every man his brother, saying, Know the LORD: (Why?) for they shall all know me,…" It isn’t like today where we have to be concerned about a lost loved one or a lost neighbor, and Israel is no different. My, the Jews for Jesus people are constantly handing out tracts and trying to win lost Jews. Well, that’ll no longer be necessary. Every Jew in the Kingdom will be a dyed-in-the-wool, heart-made believer. All right, verse 34 reading on:

"…for they shall all know me, from the least of them unto the greatest of them, saith the LORD: for I will forgive their iniquity, and I will remember their sin no more." They are going to be in total relationship with their Jehovah God, who will then, of course, be also their King and their Messiah and the Redeemer.

Now, we’ve used these last three or four verses so often, I’m not going to take time today, but these verses are another guarantee that nothing, nothing will ever remove Israel from the scene. They are here and will be forever. My, when we were there a few weeks ago and we saw all those four lane highways, it was amazing. I mean, just like any other great city and bustling. My, you can’t imagine the activity in Israel, and it’s just all because God’s promises are coming to the fore.

All right, now let’s jump over to chapter 32 for just a second, where the prophet repeats it basically, so we won’t spend a lot of time on these verses, but drop over to verse 37. In verse 37 is what we’ve seen happening now these last 50 years, right in front of our eyes, we’ve seen it happen.

"Behold, (God says) I will gather them out of all countries, whither I have driven them in mine anger,…" Now, who can refute that? My, they’ve been coming from all over the world into their ancient homeland. In other words, it was a chastising act of God that took them out of the land after the crucifixion and 70 AD and scattered them into every nation under heaven. Remember we looked at the promises and the prophecies a while back in Deuteronomy? Way back at the time of Moses he wrote that they would be scattered into every nation under heaven and God would bring them back. All right, here Jeremiah’s prophesying the same thing.

"…and in my fury, and in great wrath; and I will bring them again unto this place, and I will cause them to dwell safely:" Now, they’re not dwelling safely, yet, but a lot of them are already there. Now verse 38, this hasn’t happened yet, it’s all waiting for the return of Christ.

"And they shall be my people, and I will be their God: 39. And I will give them one heart, and one way, that they may fear (or respect or reverence) me for ever, for the good of them, and of their children after them: 40. And I will make (What?) an everlasting covenant with them,…" God will never let go of the Nation of Israel, and once this Kingdom economy comes in, it’s going to feed right up into eternity. They will forever be then, His covenant people.

All right, now I’m going to take you back to show you the difference between having these things written in their hearts and the way Moses left it in Deuteronomy chapter 6. Now, I just like to show the comparison that they, even as God’s covenant people in history, have never come close to the promises of the New Covenant. Deuteronomy chapter 6 and since we’re so close to it, I’m going to read verse 4. This is what the Jew even today, if he has any semblance of Biblical belief at all, will hang on this verse. And of course, this is where they have an argument with us about a Triune God. They said there’s only one God. Well, what they don’t comprehend is that it’s three persons in one, but they go back to this verse.

"Hear, O Israel: The LORD our God is one LORD: 5. And thou shalt love the LORD thy God with all thine heart, and with all thy soul, and with all thy might. (Now verse 6, and this was the every day condition of even the believing Jew in Moses’ day.) 6. And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: (Now watch it, this isn’t mentioned in the New covenant.) 7. And thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up. 8. And thou shalt bind them for a sign upon thine hand, and they shall be as frontlets between thine eyes. 9. And thou shalt write them upon the posts of thy house, and on thy gates." Why? To be constantly reminded of what the Word of God is saying. But see, when they come under the New Covenant that won’t be necessary. It’ll be on their hearts. They won’t have to read it and remind themselves and talk to their neighbor about it. It’s going to be as automatic as daylight following dark.

Now, that’s the vast difference then between the New covenant and the Mosaic or the ‘old’ covenant. All right, now let’s jump all the way up to the New Testament, because that’s what we like to do, not just stay in the Old, but compare it also with things in the New. Come up with me to Hebrews chapter 8. I’ll have to look a minute to see what verse I want, and that will be verse 6. I’m convinced that Paul is the writer of this letter to the Hebrews, but on the other hand always remember whom is he writing to? He’s writing to Jews.

"But now…" The but NOW’s in Scripture is what I’m hoping we’ll cover in our next few tapings, and here is one of them.

"But now (That is after this work of the cross has been accomplished.) hath he obtained a more excellent ministry, by how much also he is the mediator of a better covenant, which was established upon better promises. (Now, that’s one of Paul’s favorite words throughout the letter of Hebrews – better.) 7. For if that first covenant (the covenant of Law, the Ten Commandments, the Temple worship, and the priesthood) had been faultless, (or if it’d been perfect) then should no place have been sought for the second." Naturally. If something is okay you don’t fix it. What’s our little cliché? If it ain’t broke don’t fix it. Well, it’s the same context here. If the first covenant of Law had been perfect, there’d be no need for a new one. But it wasn’t. It was full of weaknesses, and we’ll see it in just a minute. All right, verse 8:

"For finding fault with them, (its imperfections) he saith, Behold the days come, saith the Lord, when I will make a new covenant with the house of Israel and with the house of Judah:" See, he’s quoting from Jeremiah 31, which we just read.

"For this is the covenant that I will make with the house of Israel (Now, it has nothing to say about the Gentile world. This is strictly God dealing with the house of David, the house of Israel.) after those days, saith the Lord; I will put my laws into their mind, and write them in their hearts: and I will be to them a God, and they shall be to me a people:" They won’t have to do like Moses said, "teach every man his neighbor" and so on and so forth. Now verse 13:

"In that he saith, A new covenant, he hath made the first (What?) old. (Worn out) Now that which decayeth and waxeth old is ready to vanish away." Why? Because it’s no longer of any use. It’s worn out.

All right, now let’s back up a little bit and pick up a couple of contexts. Galatians chapter 4, because I think a lot of people think that the Law was perfect. Well, that’s fine if you think so. The Ten Commandments certainly are perfect. There’s nothing amiss in any of those, but still the whole function of the Law did not change anybody’s heart. They could be a law-keeper and still be as lost as lost can be. All right, Galatians chapter 4 verse 9:

"But now, (See, there’s another one. My, I’ve got all kinds of them.) after that ye have known God, (In other words, come into a real salvation experience based now on Paul’s Gospel of the work of the cross.) or rather are known of God, how turn ye again to the weak and beggarly elements, whereunto ye desire again to be in bondage?" Well, now what’s Paul saying? When you’ve got something so perfect as faith in the Gospel that was according to the death, burial, and resurrection, which brings in new life, why do you want to go back to something that’s less than perfect, which was the sacrificial system of the Law?

All right, let’s back up a little further. II Corinthians chapter 3 and we’ll almost have to read verse 5 in order to understand verse 6.

"Not that we are sufficient of ourselves to think any thing as of ourselves; but our sufficiency is of God; (Without Him we’re nothing. All right, now the next verse, this same God, the same God who has saved us through our faith in the Gospel.) 6. Who also hath made us able ministers of the new testament; (or covenant) not of the letter, (which is Paul’s term for the Law) but of the spirit: (Because now the very core of our life, the very core of our salvation has been brought about by the third person of the Trinity, the Holy Spirit, and here’s the reason.) for the letter (The Law doesn’t give life, it what?) killeth,…" The Law could never give life to anybody. Never did. Doesn’t now and never will. All the Law could do was show a man his sin. And most of Christendom hasn’t got it yet today. That’s all the Law can do is show our sin. There’s no life in the Law. But, when we turn away from the Law after being convicted by it, what does give life? The Holy Spirit.

So now, in this Age of Grace, and Israel will experience it in the Kingdom, now when the Holy Spirit imparts eternal life, it’s not based on the Law, it’s based on the work of the cross, because the Law, now read the next verse, verse 7.

"But if the ministration of death,…" That’s the law, and oh, people don’t like that. That’s not what they’ve always heard. But that’s all the Law could do. The Law killed. Why? Because it condemned, and if a person was condemned what was the punishment? Eternal doom. It, consequently, became a ministration of death. Nobody could be saved by keeping the Law. Even in Israel’s history the Law didn’t save them. It was their faith in carrying out what God said to do as a law-breaker. But it never saved them. This is what we have to understand even today. You know, when they make all this commotion about the Ten Commandments, well and good, but the Ten Commandments never saved anybody. All they do is convict.

"But if the ministration of death, written and engraven in stones, was glorious, (Paul says. But now it’s been done away with because of the cross. So, even though it was glorious,) so that the children of Israel could not steadfastly behold the face of Moses for the glory of his countenance; (That is when he’d been in the presence of God and received the tables of stone.) which glory was to be done away:" Why? Because, like Hebrews said, when something grows old and it’s worn out what do you do with it? You cast it away.

Okay, so in the following six minutes, we have to clarify that if we’re not under the New Covenant, then what is the basis for our salvation today under Grace? Well, to put it in a nutshell, the New Covenant itself could never become a reality until God the Son went the way of the cross. It had to be, even for Israel. Now, that’s one thing I want to clarify. In order for the New Covenant to become a reality written on the heart of a Jew during the Kingdom, it had to be based on that eternal sacrifice, the shed blood that was accomplished there on the cross of Calvary. But through His power of resurrection and imparting new life, in order to fulfill the covenant promises made to Israel, He now, as I call it, caused a splash over. We’re not under the direct covenant promise. But we are enjoying everything that was done on Israel’s behalf; it now becomes applicable for us.

All right, now let’s just pick up a few verses that will, I think, bring this to the fore. Come back with me again to Romans chapter 3. Now, this is where we come to that work of the cross that was accomplished according to the eternal promises and covenants with Israel, but now God extends it to us as Gentiles who are not members of the Nation of Israel. We are not under Israel’s covenant promises, but we are under God’s Grace. We are now partaking of that which was given to the Nation of Israel. All right, Romans chapter 3 verse 23. This is that all-encompassing statement that covers every human being regardless of station in life.

"For all have sinned, and come short of the glory of God; (There’s not a one of us that can claim not to have sinned. We are all condemned by God’s perfect Law. All right, but God doesn’t leave it there.) 24. Being justified freely (Not by His covenant promises, but by what?) by his grace (And how does that Grace flow from God to us?) through the redemption that is (that was paid for) in Christ Jesus: 25. Whom God hath set forth to be a propitiation through faith in his blood, (That is His shed blood, which is the cleansing factor. It’s the redemption price.) to declare his righteousness for the remission of sins that are past, through the forbearance of God;" Now, verse 26 - my what a promise! Again, most people evidently don’t read this verse, or they don’t know it’s here, but it’s plain as day.

"To declare, (Paul says) I say, at this time his righteousness: (Not ours. We don’t attain to anything. We don’t deserve anything.) that he (Christ, or God) might be just, (He’s never going to cut corners with anybody, He’s going to be just.) and the justifier of him (Or of that person who what?) which believeth in Jesus." See? This is where so much of Christendom is ignoring the fact that according to the Apostle Paul salvation doesn’t come by walking an aisle. It doesn’t come by taking Jesus into your life and heart. It comes by believing!

I’m hoping that God is going to bend His thinking enough to save these people that think they’re being saved, but I’ll tell you what, it’s beginning to shake me up. If the Book says that we’re saved by faith, by believing, and they ignore that – I’ve got questions. I’m in no place to judge, naturally. But here is the whole emphasis in Paul’s epistles that salvation comes by believing.

Believe what? All right, I Corinthians 15. And then I sweat all night wondering how I’m going to fill thirty minutes, I never learn. I Corinthians 15 the first four verses, my, we should know them from memory now shouldn’t we?

"Moreover, brethren, I declare unto you the gospel…" Remember, there’s only one in this age of Grace. Verse 2:

"By which also ye are saved,…" It’s this Gospel that saves, nothing else. And here it is:

"For I delivered unto you first of all that which I also received, how that Christ died for our sins according to the scriptures; (It was foretold) 4. And that he was buried, and that he rose again the third day according to the Scriptures:"

That’s the Gospel. You don’t receive the Gospel of salvation by just simply saying, "I want Jesus in my heart." No, you believe THE GOSPEL with all your heart for your salvation!

Again, for those of you joining us on television, another welcome, and for any of you that may be catching us for the first time, we’re just an informal Bible study. We are not associated with any one group. We just try to teach it more or less like a Sunday School class. I’ve often wondered if we shouldn’t have called it a Sunday School of some sort. I don’t claim to be a theologian or anything like that, but we do like to open the Scriptures and help people to understand what it really says.

All right, now we’re on the Covenants, and we finished in our last program the New Covenant. It will become a reality after this Age of Grace has come to an end, and Christ has returned and set up His Kingdom. Then Israel will come under the promises of the New Covenant when all of the things of God will be written on their hearts. They won’t have to work at it. They won’t have to memorize and so forth, but it will be an automatic result of the covenant promises.

All right, like we said at the very beginning, we’re going to come back now for the next couple of programs and go into more detail with the most important of all the Covenants, which is the Abrahamic. For that we’ve got to go back to Genesis chapter 12, in fact we might even start in the last couple of verses in chapter 11. Now remember that this is, time-wise, about halfway between Adam and Christ’s first advent, about 2000 BC. Now I say about because I’m not going to get nitpicky on a few years one way or the other. But at about 2000 BC, God has been dealing with the whole human race as one race of people. There has been no division in how one group would approach God compared to the other. Everybody, whoever they were, whatever their lot in life, had to approach God on the same basis, and that was to recognize a need and to bring an animal sacrifice by faith, and God would accept them.

But, of course, that became as rare as a hound’s tooth, because the human race just simply walked underfoot everything concerning God. That precipitated, first, the flood. A couple of hundred years after the flood, they’d already gone so far down again that they met at the Tower of Babel under Nimrod and instituted all the false religions that have plagued the human race ever since.

So, 200 years after Babel – now again – I always have to stop and qualify. In the scope of 6000 years, I think we are all prone, I know I am, to think that 200 years was just such a little tidbit of time. Nothing could happen in 200 years. Like from the Tower of Babel to the call of Abraham. Listen, 200 years back then is just as long as 200 years has been since 1800 and look what has happened to the world since 1800! So, when I say there was only 200 years between the Tower of Babel and Abraham, don’t think that that was just a snap of the finger, so how could anything happen? That was a long time.

In that 200 years period of time, the whole human race now had succumbed. Of course, they’re all living in a relatively small area of the planet. We don’t take that away. But nevertheless, that was a long time. As the human race expanded, they were all under pagan worship and the mythological gods and goddesses, as well as paganism or nothing. Whatever you want to be. Out of that population of abject idolatry, God puts the finger on one man. Just one out of however many millions may now have come about.

All right, this is down in Ur of the Chaldees, which is at the lower end of the Euphrates River, the same Iraq that’s in the news everyday. And a few miles south of present day Baghdad was the ancient city of Babylon. It’s going to be interesting to see, because you know, I’ll have to admit, sometimes I have to change my thinking. I’ve always been of the mindset that ancient Babylon would never be rebuilt, but I’m beginning to restudy that, and I’m now kind of on the fence and maybe it will be. Maybe that’s why our President was so determined to go into Iraq, because it had to be stabilized. It had to be brought about that if indeed ancient Babylon is going to be the capital of the anti-Christ for the Tribulation, then the stage has to be set for the city to be totally rebuilt.

Now, I was reading an interesting book the other night. There’s been a new city built on the deserts out in the Arab emirates - a whole new modern city, with all of the infrastructure and everything, the hotels and you name it. They built it in less than two years time. So, this writer was making the same claim that when we talk about rebuilding Babylon that doesn’t mean that the Tribulation is 30-40 years into the future. They can build a new city today in less than probably a year. But whatever. That’s all going to take place in where we are presently involved – Iraq and ancient Babylon. Right down there on the Euphrates River.

All right, it’s from that same area then that everything began so far as the Nation of Israel is concerned – the call of Abram. All right, we pick it up in chapter 11 verse 31.

"And Terah took Abram his son and Lot the son of Haran his son’s son, and Sarai his daughter-in-law, his son Abram’s wife;…" Now, there’s the family, old Terah, the patriarch, and then his sons, including Abram and his wife, Sarai, who was a half-sister.

"…and they went forth with them from Ur of the Chaldees, (Now, Chaldea, of course, was ancient Babylon.) to go into the land of Canaan; (Which is up there on the shores of the Mediterranean.) and they came unto Haran, and dwelt there." Which was up at the upper reaches of the Euphrates River. Now, you’ve seen enough of Iraq lately, you know that the Euphrates River comes out of Eastern Turkey and makes a big swoop all the way down to the Persian Gulf. Just short of the Persian Gulf was the ancient city of Babel, or Babylon. All right, so they came all the way up the Euphrates Valley, up to about a little ways east of the Turkish border, and that’s where they stopped. That’s Haran, in Biblical history. On the Euphrates River straight north of Jerusalem but yet up in present day Syria.

"And the days of Terah (the father of Abram) were two hundred and five years: and Terah died in Haran." In other words, old Terah did not accompany Abram and his family down into Canaan. I’ve always taught it this way. Terah was an idolater. God could not deal, even with Abram, until he was totally bereft of that idolatrous influencing father. So, God waits until Terah dies, and then He moves them down into the Promised Land.

All right, now we pick up the Covenant in Genesis chapter 12. Again, I guess I should go to the board and remind all of you that after the Edenic Covenant came to an end with the Garden of Eden, and all of its innocence and beauty had gone, all of these covenants now, then, functioned right up until the demise of Israel, after they crucified the Christ. We are now in this age that has left Israel dispersed and so forth, and waiting for the stage to be set for the coming of the New Covenant. So, all of these covenants after this one with Abraham were between God and Israel, up until God put the finger on the Apostle Paul to go to the Gentile world.

Now, I know a lot of people can’t comprehend that, but from Abraham until Paul, God only dealt, with some exceptions, with the Nation of Israel. Never were the Jews told to go out and evangelize the Gentile. It was God dealing with His covenant people and no one else, with some exceptions. God is Sovereign. He can make exceptions. Rahab - on the walls of Jericho - she was a pagan Gentile, but she came in by faith to the promises of Israel. She ended up in the genealogy of Christ. Ruth, the Moabitess, was a Gentile. She was not of the stock of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob. But she too, by faith, came with her mother-in-law Naomi and became a citizen of Israel.

So, you have these exceptions. But other than that, God only dealt with his covenant people Israel. Now, I always have to use a verse from Paul’s letter to the Ephesians. Come back with me, keep your hand in Genesis, we’ll be right back, but I always have to qualify my statements with Scripture that God did not deal with the Gentile world, so far as salvation is concerned. Oh, He dealt with them in His wrath. They came under His discipline. If a nation stabbed Israel in the back, it wasn’t too long until God sent them into the dustbin of history. But, so far as offering salvation to a Gentile, no way, it was only to His covenant people Israel. Here are some verses that we use periodically to prove my point.

"Wherefore (Paul writes) remember, (bring it to mind) that ye (Now, Ephesians were Gentiles. They were living there on the western end of Turkey in the city of Ephesus.) being in time past Gentiles in the flesh, who are called Uncircumcision by that which is called the Circumcision in the flesh made by hands; (That is Israel.) 12. That at that time…" Well, now I have to always stop and ask –during what time? While God is dealing with the Covenant promises and Israel. All during the time from Abraham until we get to the Apostle Paul, God is only dealing with His Covenant people. And here it is.

"…that at that time ye (Gentiles) were without Christ, being aliens (Now, watch the language. Aliens – non-citizens) from the commonwealth of Israel, and strangers from the covenants of promise,…" Now, aren’t you glad you know what the covenants are? Gentiles had no part in the Abrahamic. They had no part in the Mosaic or the Palestinian or the Davidic, nor will they necessarily in the New. This is all God dealing with Israel.

"…Ye were strangers from the covenants of promise, having no hope, and (That left them where?) without God in the world." The Gentile had no hope of salvation. I always point that out. Don’t blame God. They had 2000 years at the beginning, and they walked it all underfoot. What was to make them any different having that chance during Christ’s earthly ministry? They would have walked it underfoot also. So, God wasn’t being unfair, but He’s going to set the stage for when He can send salvation to the Gentiles. That’s going to have to be through the Nation of Israel, through the call of Abraham and the Abrahamic Covenant, and the Apostle Paul.

All right, come back now to Genesis 12, and we’re going to take our time on this Abrahamic Covenant. I just decided in the last thirty-seconds that if I don’t finish it in these two programs, we’ll just put it into the next two. We’re going to exhaust this Abrahamic Covenant. Ray Brewer, that should be making you feel good, shouldn’t it? Ray’s been waiting for this for two or three years. Every once in a while he’ll come out and say, "When are you going to give us something on that Abrahamic Covenant? Nobody knows anything about it." Well, I’ll agree, but here it is now. We’re going to take our time.

"Now the LORD had said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, (from your family) and from thy father’s house, (Terah, get out from under Terah’s idolatrous influence.) unto a land that I will shew thee." Now, He doesn’t tell him what it is, but He just says He’ll get him there one way or another. Now, here come the covenant promises, seven of them. Count them if you want.

"And I will make of thee a great nation, (That’s number 1) and I will bless thee, (That’s number 2) and make thy name great;…" That’s 3, and that carries all the way up to our present time. I’ve even got a grandson that they called Abraham. You know a lot of people throughout your friendships who are called Abraham. It’s still a popular name.

"…and thou shalt be a blessing:" (Number 4) 3. And I will bless them that bless thee, (This is number 5, and God has never backed off of that one. You bless the Jew and God will bless you. It’s a promise. This has never been rescinded. Then verse 3, reading on, on the other hand.) and curse (or I’ll bring bad things to those who bring bad things to the Jew) him that curseth thee: (This is number 6. God says He will bring it about to those who are against the Jew or the Nation of Israel. Then here’s the seventh one. The all encompassing promise made to Abraham. This carries all the way up through you and I) and in thee (in Abram) shall all the families of the earth be blessed."

Now He’s going beyond the borders and the genealogy of Israel. It’s going to carry to the whole human race. Now, that’s the crowning part of the Abrahamic Covenant, and it’s that part of the covenant that brings us into the picture. That through this man Abraham will come the Nation that God will pull apart from all the rest of humanity. He’s going to deal with them on a Covenant basis, like we’ve been seeing now for the last several programs, with the idea that He’s going to prepare the Nation for the coming of a Redeemer and a Savior of all mankind. He’s going to have to come through the Nation of Israel. It could be no other way.

All right, now in order for Christ to come in His first advent, a lot of things had to happen. You had to have the Nation of Israel in the area of Jerusalem where He’s going to be crucified. That’s all in God’s blueprint. So, in order to have Israel in the area of Jerusalem, He has to bring them into a homeland that will include Jerusalem. He’s going to have to establish the Nation under some sort of a government that will hold them together until all this is fulfilled. That is all in His Divine purposes as Paul puts it.

All right, so now, that’s the Abrahamic Covenant, those seven statements. Whenever you refer to the Covenant, this is what you have to look at, and whenever we refer to Christ having come through the Nation of Israel, it began right back here in this Covenant promise.

All right, now to bring it further and further along, let’s just chase it down through the Old Testament. Turn over to chapter 13, starting at verse 14. Now, He has Abram down in the land of Canaan. The Canaanites are still occupying the land. Remember that Israel is marked with mountains. Those of you that were with us a few weeks ago, I think you were probably surprised how mountainous the country is. The city of Jerusalem is just simply built on the mountains. You go north from Jerusalem and it’s mountainous. We call them the mountains of Israel. All right, now I think in one of those high points on one of those mountains of Israel, verse 14 occurred.

"And the LORD said unto Abram, after that Lot was separated from him, Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art northward, (up toward Lebanon) and southward, (down toward the Red Sea) and eastward, (out over the Jordan Valley and out into what is present day Jordan) and westward:" Which, of course, would end at the Mediterranean Sea. Look all four directions.

"For all the land which thou seest,…" Hey listen, the Middle East is still relatively compact. You can easily look from a high point in Israel clear across half of Jordan. And you can look half-way down to the Red Sea. You can look clear up past Mount Hermon. So, Abraham took in a lot of square miles in just one view. Now look what it says:

"For all the land which thee seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever." Of course, remember, when it says forever, it’s going to take you right on into the new heavens and the new earth of eternity.

"And I will make thy seed (or your offspring, the generations to come) as the dust of the earth:…" Now, I don’t think it’s so much numbering the grains of dust as it is the symbolic picture that Abraham is going to be associated with an earthly people. Now, you remember that as long as I’ve been teaching this on television, I’m always designating Israel as God’s earthly people. All of their promises were earthly. Never did God make spiritual, heavenly promises to Israel. It’s all earthly. That’s why, even in their Old Testament economy, if they were obedient, hey, they got wealthy. They were blessed. If they were disobedient, they may lose it.

Now see, we don’t have promises like that today. God doesn’t tell you that if you’re an obedient Christian He will bless you with wealth. That does not happen. I don’t care what anybody says. If you’re wealthy today, it’s by His grace, not by promise. So, when we get into Paul’s epistles, now it’s not the earthly people we’re associated with but what? The heavenly. All our promises, as a believer today, are heavenly. We’re just strangers here on this planet. We’re citizens of heaven because we have heavenly connected promises. Israel’s are earthly.

All right, now then, let’s skip over to chapter 15, I think I want to go, and now we’ve got another direction that Abraham is looking. God is still dealing with him on those mountains of Israel.

"And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and (count or) tell (Not the dust of the earth, but what?) the stars,…" Now, are you seeing the picture? He looked at the dust, that’s earthly. But he looked at the stars, and that’s what? Heavenly! So, Abraham has a connection not only to the earthly people of Israel, but also to you and I of the Church Age. And that’s where some people have totally twisted the concept into telling you that when you become a believer you become a Jew. No! That’s not what the Scripture teaches. The Scripture merely teaches that we have become recipients of this glorious Gospel of salvation because of the Covenant God made with Abraham.

Now, here’s the main point. When God made that Covenant with Abraham, was it after circumcision, or before? Well, before. Was it after the Law, or before? Before! So, what did Abraham have going for him other than to just simply believe what God said? Nothing. So, now what can we put on that? How was Abraham saved? Faith plus nothing!

Now, that should ring a bell! That’s where we are! With the exception of the thief on the cross, and that’s all that was, an exception, I know of no other individual from Abraham until we get to the Apostle Paul where anyone was saved by faith plus nothing. So, when I use the board, I don’t want to take off what’s up there, otherwise I would; you can just simply make your own diagram. Here’s the cross in the center of my time line and back here 2000 years is Abraham. Over here where we are today, 2000 years on this side of the cross, we are still connected with Abraham with an overview, that’s how I usually draw it on the board. Not that we become Jews. Not that we become recipients of any of the covenant promises, but we step into a relationship with the God of Abraham, how? By faith plus nothing!

Oh, not in what he told Abraham – get out and go to Canaan. But now our faith is in the finished work of the cross and His glorious resurrection. I can’t emphasize it enough. I just told a lady yesterday, "Look, God told the human race, through the Apostle Paul, that when He died the death of the cross, when His blood was shed according to the Old Testament prophecies, when He was buried three days and three nights and arose in power over sin and death and all His enemies, it’s done. He proclaimed that everything that needs to be done for man’s salvation is done. He said believe it, and I’ll give you eternal life."

Now then, I use this illustration. How would you feel if all of a sudden you just had an impulse of love for your son or daughter, who is now old enough to drive, and out of the blue you say, "You know, Son, I love you so much that tomorrow we’re going to go down and I’m going to buy you a brand new car." And the son says, "Dad, I don’t believe it." How would you feel? You mean my own son doesn’t believe that I will do what I say I’m going to do? You’d be real put out, wouldn’t you? Now, that’s just a simple illustration. God has said, "I’m going to give you eternal life if you’ll just believe that what I’ve done is all you need." But what does everybody do?

Well yeah, I believe that Christ died. I hear it all the time. I believe that Christ died. I believe that He rose from the dead, but I’ve got to ‘do’ this and I’ve got to ‘do’ that. But God says you don’t have to. Then what are you making God? You’re making Him a liar. My, how mankind has fowled up that glorious Gospel of salvation by adding everything to it that you can imagine, and it’s getting worse everyday, but always remember God will have no part of it!!

But all right, now back to….only got 45 seconds left! All right, so now just a recap. Abraham has been promised to be the progenitor of the dust of the earth, the earthly promises given to Israel. Now, he’s taken out and he’s shown the stars. He’s also going to be involved in God pulling out a people for His name, who are heavenly-connected. But it’s all based on this covenant promise that He made with this man Abraham 2000 years before Christ, "that in you shall all the families of the earth be blessed."

Okay, once again we’re going right back where we left off, so those of you in the studio can go with me back to Genesis chapter 15. For those of you joining us on television, we again want to thank you so much for all your prayers, your letters, your financial help, and your encouragement. My goodness, mail time is a pleasant time, really.

Again, we like to always let new listeners know that we’re just an independent Bible study. I’m not out to build an empire, or build colleges and what have you. We’re just simply teaching the Word much like, as I said a taping or two ago, much like a Sunday School class. And we appreciate people. They say, "I just feel like I’m sitting back there on the back row. It’s just like an old college class." Well, that’s exactly what we want to come across. Again, all we can say is thank you. We know the Lord is using it.

All right, now let’s go right back to where we left off in Genesis chapter 15. We’re covering now, for the next few programs at least, the Abrahamic Covenant. Now, everything that pertains to us today had its beginnings, yes in Adam, I know that, but predominately, in the realm of the spiritual, it’s all resting on this Abrahamic Covenant. The Nation of Israel appeared by the sovereignty of God. Then their promised Messiah came, was rejected, was crucified, buried, and risen from the dead and then proclaimed as the Savior of the world, and we call this the total purposes of God when He brought about this glorious plan of salvation.

But, let’s go back now to the early promises in this Abrahamic Covenant that are making everything possible that you and I enjoy today. Let’s go back to chapter 15 where we left off in the last lesson and where he looked at the stars.

"And he (God) brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell (count) the stars, if thou be able to number (or count) them: and he said unto him (Abram), So shall thy seed be." Which I feel, and said in the last lesson, is the spiritual seed which would involve, I think, you and I as the members of the Body of Christ who are heavenly connected.

All right, now then you come on down into the next few verses and we see the humanness of this great patriarch Abram, or Abraham as he becomes known later. How he was just as human as we are. Now, after God had made all these promises, in a later verse what does Abraham say? Well, prove it. Show me. But first, verse 6:

"And he believed in the LORD: and he counted it to him for righteousness." That’s all. He doesn’t do anything else. He doesn’t practice circumcision yet. He has no law to keep. He doesn’t offer sacrifices. He just simply believed what God said.

Now, let’s show you how Paul puts that. Maybe I should back everything up with Scripture. Jump all the way up to Romans chapter 4, and we’ll start at verse 1, because when I keep mentioning that Abraham has a connection with us who are saved by faith plus nothing, I’ve got to let the Scripture speak for Itself. Remember, Paul writes to us Gentiles in the Body of Christ.

"What shall we say then that Abraham our father, (Now remember, Paul was a Jew.) as pertaining to the flesh, (in other words, in his genetic background) hath (Abraham) found? 2. For if Abraham were justified (or saved) by works, he hath whereof to glory; (Or brag, by saying look what I’ve done to obtain salvation.) but not before God. 3. For what saith the Scripture? Abraham believed God, (That’s all! He believed what He said and what did God do? Called him righteous.) and it was accounted unto him for righteousness." Now, that’s simple isn’t it? That’s too simple for mankind to comprehend. But that’s the truth of the Word. All right, so now come back to where this was first referred to in Genesis 15.

"And he (Abraham) believed in the LORD; and he counted it to him for righteousness." Not because he was sinless, he’s going to fail. He’s going to trip up now and then. But God imputed righteousness to him in spite of it. All right, now then, verse 7:

"And he (God) said unto him, I am the LORD that brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it." That is the land of Canaan, where he’s standing, like I like to think, on one of the mountains of Israel. Now, here’s Abraham’s humanity.

"And he said, Lord GOD, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?" Where’s the proof? And what does God do? Okay, Abraham, we’ll go through the secular system of transferring real estate. We’ll just do like your neighbors do. You remember that all of paganism rested on animal sacrifices. That’s where they adulterated the right thing, remember? So, they open up these animals and lay the carcasses with a space down between them. All right, now you pick it up in verse 10.

"And he took unto him all these, and divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one against another: but the birds divided he not." He just laid the sacrificed birds there with that walkway down between them and now then verse 12.

"And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram;…" In other words, I always call this the first instance of real anesthesia. God put him under where he couldn’t say a word or know anything, and He says to him:

"…Know of a surety that thy seed (your offspring) shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs,…" Now, this is prophecy. I usually refer to this verse as the first true prophecy in Scripture. It’s a future event that God promises to the Nation of Israel. That’s prophecy. Even today, prophecy only really involves the Nation of Israel. As we see the world getting ready for the end time, all that’s taking place, whether it’s Iran or whether it’s North Korea and all that, it’s still all circling about the Nation of Israel. They are at the core of everything. So all of prophecy, even as we see it today, is based on what God has promised His covenant people, Israel. Here is the first one in Scripture that’s a true prophecy.

"…that they seed (Offspring - these children that will be coming down the pike.) shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; (Well that, of course, is the Egyptian bondage, which wouldn’t take place for two – three hundred years, but God prophesied it.) and they shall afflict them four hundred years; 14. And also that nation, (Egypt) whom they shall serve, will I judge: (He will punish.) and afterward (That is after the plagues of Egypt.) they (the children of Abraham) shall come out with great substance. (And we know they did. They spoiled the Egyptians. Then verse 15, the promise is:) 15. And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; (He’s going to die in a great old age.) thou shalt be buried in a good old age."

"But in the fourth generation, they (his offspring) shall come hither (here to the mountains of Israel) again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full." After a sojourn in Egypt, they’re going to come back to the land of Canaan, but it has to wait 400 years, because the iniquity of the Amorites, the Canaanites, was not yet full. God could not punish them with taking them out of their land that they had now worked for and had made prosperous and productive until their behavior demanded it. And if you want to know what their behavior was, you read Leviticus 18. It was horrible! All the immorality that mankind can think of, the Canaanites practiced. Promiscuously. Consequently, God was able to take their land away from them and give it over to the Promised Covenant People. All right, now verse 18:

"In the same day the LORD (Jehovah, God the Son in His Old Testament personality) made a covenant with Abram, saying, (On top of the one that He made in Genesis 12, now we come to an additional part, or addendum we may call it, with Abram. He says unto him:) Unto thy seed (unto your coming generations) have I (past tense) given this land, (It’s a done deal, Abraham, but I’ll just go a little bit further and secure it in your own mind.) from the river of Egypt (Whether it was the Nile, or whether it was another river that has since disappeared, it doesn’t make that much difference.) unto the great river, the river Euphrates:" And all those tribes that follow in verses 19-21 that were involved in that geographical area would have their land taken from them and given over to God’s covenant people, Israel.

All right, now we’re going to jump all the way up to chapter 26 verse 1. Genesis 26 verse 1. Now, we’re already up to Isaac. We’re going to pass this covenant promise that was given to Abram on to Isaac. From Isaac it’s going to pass on to Jacob. All right, verse 1:

"And there was a famine in the land, beside the first famine that was in the days of Abraham. And Isaac went unto Abimelech king of the Philistines unto the Gerar. 2. And the LORD (Again, that’s the same God the Son, the coming Messiah of Israel.) appeared unto him,…" Now, that word appeared in the Greek is what we use for the verb, I’ve got to think for a moment, ‘optomei,’ I think it is, and it means a visual eye to eye contact. Not just envisioned, but He evidently appeared eyeball to eyeball with Isaac.

"…and said, (face to face) Go not down into Egypt;…" Now you have to remember, and I’m always stressing history in my teaching, that back in antiquity, Egypt was to the then known world what America is today. And what are we? We’re the consumer nation. We’re only six percent of the world’s population, but we consume ninety-some percent of the world’s goods and raw materials. Of course, that’s why the world hates us. But that was Egypt in antiquity.

All of the caravan routes from the Far East and the Middle East and from the civilized areas of Europe wound their way down to Egypt, because Egypt was the kingpin of the civilizations at this time. So, the temptation was that if you didn’t have much going for you in the mountains of Canaan, go down to Egypt. But God warns Isaac – don’t you go down to Egypt. Now again, symbolically, Egypt in Scripture is a picture of ‘the world.’ So, this is where we get the whole idea that we are not to be enticed by the world. Well, there stood Egypt with all of its glitter and all of its pleasure and all of its abundance of goods and services, but God tells his pastoral people living there in the mountains of Israel, don’t go down to Egypt.

"Sojourn (or spend your time) in this land, (the land of Canaan) and I will be with thee, and I will bless thee; (Ringing a bell?) for unto thee, and unto thy seed, I (God says) will give these countries, (They haven’t got it yet, but they’re going to get them in time.) and I will perform the oath (or the covenant) which I sware unto Abraham thy father;" See how plain all this is? Now verse 4, right along with what He told Abraham, He repeats to Isaac.

"And I will make thy seed to multiply as the stars of heaven, and will give unto thy seed all these countries, and in thy seed (Here comes the promise, again, of an over-all Redeemer for the whole human race.) and in thy seed (the Nation of Israel, Israel’s Messiah, Israel’s Son, Jesus of Nazareth) shall all the nations of the earth be blessed." See how plain that is? But until He can bless the nations of the world, He’s going to deal with His covenant people Israel. That’s how it’s all going to come about. All right, verse 5:

"Because that Abraham obeyed my voice, and kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws." All right, so now then, we come all the way up through these Old Testament Scriptures, and it’s a constant referral to the promises that He made to Abraham. In fact, in the few moments that we have left, I think I’ll go ahead and just jump ahead to the New Testament promises that are resting on the Abrahamic Covenant. Then we’ll go back in our next program and pick up some more of those promises back in the Old Testament. But come up with me, for now, to Luke chapter 1. I was going to stop at Matthew for a minute, but I don’t think I’ll take time today. Let’s go right on into Luke chapter 1, which we’ve referred to many times. But repetition is the mother of learning, remember. I never apologize for repeating some of these things that are so basic to our understanding.

We looked at this in one of the previous programs this afternoon on the New Covenant, how it referred to – no, it was in the Davidic Covenant - referred to David in this one. But here, I want you to see how all that Zacharias is foretelling is resting on the promises that God made with their father Abraham. Okay, verse 67, the father of John the Baptist, here in Luke chapter 1, who has just now received back his ability to speak, is going to make some fantastic statements concerning God’s covenant people, Israel.

"And his father Zacharias was filled with the Holy Spirit, and prophesied, (he spoke forth) saying, 68. Blessed be the Lord God of Israel; (Now, that’s because they are a covenant people! And God cannot deal outside of His covenant promises.) for he hath visited and redeemed his people," Now, there’s only one Redeemer, and that will be God the Son, Jesus of Nazareth. And that’s what John the Baptist is being prepared to announce. Everything is falling in place.

"And hath raised up an horn of salvation…" Now, you remember, I’ve taught over and over through the years, that all through the Old Testament we have two lines of thought. Just like parallel railroad tracks. Remember seeing it on the board? I always put on the top line, the promise of a coming King and a Kingdom. The second parallel line is the promise of a suffering Savior.

Now, they had to have both. You could not have the ruling and reigning King without first having the suffering Savior. Because the New Covenant, as we saw earlier this afternoon, the New Covenant could not become a reality until the sacrifice for sin had been made, which was the person of God the Son who had to die the death of the cross. All right, so redemption now is going to be totally resting on the suffering Savior. But after He’s accomplished the suffering, then He could come and be the ruling King. But nowhere in the Old Testament do you have an indication that there will be a 2000-year hiatus. That’s why some of these Bible teachers scorn at the fact – show me where there’s a parenthetical period of time in the promises.

Well, while I was getting ready for this, I came across one that’s as plain as the nose on our face. I don’t know how they miss it, but they do. I don’t think I’ve got time to show it to us today, but I will in our next taping. I’ll let you look for it yourself. Where it’s just as plain as day that there’s going to be a period of time between the tabernacle of David falling down, which of course is when the Temple was destroyed and Israel was taken out of the land in 70 AD, until the tabernacle of David will rebuilt and restored. And in that interval, God is going to be calling out a group of Gentiles for His name. Now, I’ll let you find where it is in Scripture. But there it is.

That after the tabernacle is fallen down, He will call out a people for His name and then the tabernacle of David shall be restored. It is a parenthetical period of time. Now, it doesn’t designate how long. But there it is. And there are a couple of others, and I don’t remember just right now where they were. I’ve just seen them in the last few days, and then the scoffers scorn and they ridicule, "How can you even imagine that there was ever anything mentioned about a parenthetical period of time between the rejection of Christ and His Second Coming." Well, I’ll let you look for them as well. Prove these people wrong. That’s what makes Bible study interesting. All right, reading on in Luke 1, repeating verse 69.

"And hath raised up an horn of salvation for us in the house of his servant David;" Not in the Gentile world, only in the house of David, which is that lineage of the twelve tribes of Israel.

"As he spake by the mouth of his holy prophets, (All the way back, you might say, to Genesis.) which have been since the world began: (Now, here’s the promise.) 71. That we (the Nation of Israel) should be saved from our enemies,…" Now stop and think all the way up through Israel’s history, how many enemies have they had? Few or many? Many! Their whole world around them has hated them from day one. Not because they’re deserving of hate because of what they say and do, it’s because they’re God’s chosen people, and Satan knows it.

I’ve stressed that on this program over and over. The reason the Jew has suffered inexorably since the very beginning is because Satan knows that if he can destroy the Nation of Israel, he destroys every promise in this Book. If he can keep the Nation of Israel from being a real entity in the Middle East today, then prophecy can’t be fulfilled. It just cannot happen, and Satan knows that. So, he’s been making life miserable for them. He’s tried over and over to obliterate them from the human experience, beginning with the Book of Esther and then again in the Roman invasion in 70 AD. The Romans would have loved to just literally annihilate every Jew. Now we’re seeing it today. The Arab world will not rest until every Jew is gone. But it’s not going to happen, because God has promised it. But this is why. Don’t blame the Arabs. Don’t blame the Muslims. Blame the source - The Devil. He knows that if he can destroy Israel, he can destroy the promises of this Book.

"That we should be saved from our enemies, and from the hand of all that hate us; (All their Arab neighbors are one day going to be dealt with, and what’s the end result?) 72. To perform the mercy promised to our fathers,..." Now, you remember all the promises that we’ve been looking at today, and no matter how much Israel sins God will never withdraw His covenant promises. No matter how many times they break His covenants, He will not break it with them, because His mercy is from everlasting to everlasting. Here it is again, Zacharias, through the unction of the Holy Spirit, repeats it - that we’re going to have the mercy promised to our fathers. Now here’s the part I came in for.

"…and to remember his holy covenant; (What covenant?) 73. The oath (or the covenant) which he sware to our father Abraham," See how plain all this is? God is never going to give up on His covenant promises. All right, now reading on in verse 74, based on those covenant promises, God can tell the Nation of Israel through the priest Zacharias.

"That he would grant unto us, that we being delivered out of the hand of our enemies might serve him without fear," That’s Israel’s future when their Messiah will yet be their King, and they’re going to have the New Covenant become a reality. They won’t have to work at living a spiritual life. It’s going to be automatic. They won’t have to sit down and study the Old Testament or anything else; it’s going to be automatic. God will just simply control their lives and their existence, and it will be joy like no one can understand.

"In holiness and righteousness before him, all the days of our life." It’s going to be without end. Now those are promises, you see, that the Nation of Israel can rest on. But if Israel can rest on them, then we know that God will be just as sure in His promises to us.

Now, I only have a minute left. I hardly know where to go to spend that minute, but let’s just go briefly to Romans chapter 11 and verse 11. This will be something that we can be thinking about for the next month until we come back for our next taping. Now, this is the Apostle Paul explaining how salvation came to us as Gentiles, without the covenants. This is by the Grace of God.

"I say then, (Paul says) Have they (the Nation of Israel) stumbled that they should fall? (And be gone and off the scene like the scoffers try to tell us?) God forbid: but rather through their fall salvation has come unto the Gentiles,…" Well, what’s Paul talking about? When did Israel fall? When they rejected the Messiah. When they cried out for His crucifixion. When they screamed, we’ll not have this Jesus of Nazareth to rule over us. That’s when they fell. But, what did they bring about? The work of the cross. Our glorious salvation!

It’s so good to see everybody this afternoon, especially those of you from out of state. We have Indiana and Illinois and Texas and various other places outside of Tulsa. We just want to make you feel welcome and at home in our group, because, after all, people across the land get used to seeing these same faces all the time, and they feel like they know you as well as they do me. And of course that’s only by TV association. But, anyway, we’re glad to have you all.

For those of you joining us out there in television, we thank you for tuning in. We thank you for your loyalty, because the first thing everybody that writes to us or speaks to us at seminars says is, "I watch you every day." So, we appreciate your loyalty, your prayers, your letters, and your financial help. On the ordinary, we appreciate short notes. That way we can keep in contact with all of you out there.

All right, this is a Bible study - for someone that might be catching us for the first time. We’re an informal Bible study, as you can tell. We simply go by what the Book says, but for the doctrine and instructions we live by during this Age of Grace, we go by what was written by the Apostle Paul, as he is the Apostle to the Gentiles, as we see in Romans 11:13. We don’t try to decipher the Greek and try to figure out how the Greek could have been mistranslated and all of this other stuff we’re hearing today. That’s the bad part of the computers now. You know the computers are throwing out so much information that now they think that they know it all. You know the old cliché as well as I do, "A little knowledge is frightening." So, you have to take all that into consideration.

All right, now let’s go right back in a continuation of where we left off in our last program. I didn’t feel that I had sufficiently finished the Abrahamic Covenant, and we touched on Romans chapter 11, but I want to come back to it for this first half-hour and more or less complete it. All right, we’re dealing with the covenant that was made with Abraham way back in 2000 BC in Genesis chapter 12. That covenant said, in so many words, that God was going to make of that one man, Abram, a new nation, a group of people. God would bless the man himself, and the crowning act of the whole thing was that through Abram, or later on Abraham, "the whole human race would be blessed."

That, of course, came about when the Messiah of Israel, who came as a result of the Covenant promises, went the way of the cross, purchased salvation for the whole human race. Not just for Israel, but for all. It all rested, of course, on that Abrahamic Covenant. That’s why I don’t think you can exhaust studying it.

All right, so now we come to Paul’s reference to the Abrahamic Covenant, which is of course primarily to the Nation of Israel. We’ll start with verse one, and what a statement we find in light of so much of the stuff that we’re being bombarded with today.

"I say then, Hath God cast away his people? (Has He given up on the Nation of Israel? Have they disappeared like they’re trying to tell us? Well, the Scripture answers the question.) God forbid." A better translation there, I think, is – "Don’t even think such a thing!"

God could not cast away His people because of all the promises that we’ve been seeing coming up through the covenants in the last several programs. How could He cast away everything that He ever said? But you see, we’ve got this one huge group that is making such tremendous inroads today, and they call themselves Preterits. For years I called them Amillennialists, and they believe that in 70 AD the Nation of Israel disappeared.

The other day I received a huge, brown envelope that contained thick, typewriter-size pages. I didn’t even bother to look at who wrote it or where it came from, but I opened it. I have what some people call a bad habit. I think it’s the best one I’ve ever had, and that is everything I get, a book or an editorial or a news magazine, I go to the back page first. Can’t help it! Iris will bring a library book, and I go to the back page first. But anyway, that’s my habit. The editors know that I’m not alone. What’s usually on the back page now of your news magazine? The editorial! In the Daily Oklahoman, the editorial page isn’t in the front or the middle; it’s almost the back page.

So anyway, I open this great big manuscript, or whatever you want to call it. So, I go to the back page. What do you suppose his last paragraph says? Boy, what a time saver! "So, all this is to prove that the Jews that claim to be Jews today are not Jews at all." Well, handily the round file was right there, and so I pitched it. So, if the guy’s listening, I hope he knows better than to spend three dollars in postage next time. Save your money, because I won’t read that garbage.

But see, this is what they’re bombarding even the Christian world with - that God did away with the Jews after the Titus invasion of Jerusalem in 70 AD, and that the Jews of today have no relationship whatsoever with the Jews of Scripture. Well, if that’s the case, then three-fourths of this Book can just as well be torn out and thrown away, because it all promises that God will never give up on the Nation of Israel. And Paul confirms it right here in chapter 11.

"God hath not cast away his people which he foreknew." Have they disappeared? Don’t even think such a thing. Because God’s Word is true. As we’ve been showing over the last several programs, especially in the covenant promises, God has promised that the sun will fall out of its position before Israel will disappear as a nation. Yet these people just totally ignore all that. Then here’s the crowning one in the New Testament.

"I say then, Hath God cast away his people? God forbid. (He can’t or His Word would become of no use. All right and Paul is living proof. He goes on now.) For I also am an Israelite, of the seed of Abraham, of the tribe of Benjamin. 2. God hath not cast away his people, which he foreknew." Now, we’re going to see in our following programs how that everything since the dawn of human history with Adam and Eve has been by God’s design. He’s in control of everything for 6000 years. This is what Paul is reminding us. God will never let the Nation of Israel disappear, because in His foreknowledge He has them ready for the end-time return of Christ to set up His Kingdom. They have to be here! All right, now I’m going to take a few of these verses and just sort of skim over them. He says in verse 3:

"Lord, they have killed thy prophets, (And we know the Old Testament Jews did that over and over.) and digged down thine altars; (And Elijah said,) and I am left alone, and they seek my life. 4. But what saith the answer of God unto him? I have reserved to myself seven thousand men, who have not bowed the knee to the image of Baal." There’s that remnant - seven thousand out of Israel’s population of usually seven to ten million. So, you math people, what’s the percentage? One tenth of one percent.

All right, now we’ll read on, and when we get to the word remnant I’m going to go back and show you what it really means. All right, so that remnant of one tenth of one percent didn’t bow their knees to Baal. They remained true to Jehovah. Now, Paul brings them up to his present day, and he says:

"Even so then at this present time also there is a remnant according to the election (now) of grace." All right, now let’s go back to Isaiah chapter 1 to show that this is not a new phenomenon. I was reading a book last night by a British prophecy expert, and he was pointing up how close we are to the end. And of course being a Brit he was more acquainted with what’s going on in England and Europe. It’s frightening - frightening of what is really taking place in western civilization. He quoted what some of the Bishops of the Church of England had been telling young people, and it’s just unbelievable. So, he made the same point – the believing element in the world today is just a small remnant.

Well, that’s nothing new. Don’t be shocked, because here in Isaiah 1:9 we are 700 years before Christ, and among the Nation of Israel, the chosen race:

"Except the LORD of hosts had left unto us (that is the Nation of Israel) a very small remnant, we (the nation) should have been like unto Sodom and Gomorrah." Had it not been for the little one tenth of one percent, what would God have done? Destroyed the Nation. And it’s ever been that way.

Now, we’ll probably see this in the next program. We’re going to go back to Noah, and I’ve always maintained there must have been around four or five billion people at the time of Noah’s flood. How many were saved? How many were believers? Eight! Not eight million, not eight thousand, not eight hundred. Eight. Out of four billion, five billion people, what was that? A little tiny remnant. And so it’s always been. Even today amongst Christendom. My, they like to tell us there are 50-60 million Christians in America. I wish that were true. But I’m afraid it’s a stretch, because the vast majority of even our well-churched people don’t have a clue about salvation through faith in the death, burial, and resurrection of our Lord Jesus Christ and that alone in this Age of Grace. And it’s so sad.

Well, anyway, here we have this whole concept that it’s only the small percentage. All right, now come down to verse 7, still in Romans 11.

"What then? Israel hath not obtained that which he seeketh for; but the election (or those who truly believed) hath obtained it, and the rest were blinded." Now, we’ve got to stop. What was the Nation of Israel constantly looking and hoping for? The Messiah who would bring in the heaven-on-earth Kingdom environment. But when the Messiah came, in unbelief they rejected Him. Except for the few. That little, small flock of believers who Paul refers to here as "the remnant." But what happened to the vast majority of Israel? Blinded! Blinded! And to this day, it’s almost impossible to speak to a Jew about Jesus Christ.

Now, I’ve been getting the little mission magazine Israel, My Glory for years and years. One of my favorite articles is, again, on the last page, written by a converted Jew, a survivor of the Holocaust. He’s always sharing his experiences of trying to testify or witness the Lord Jesus Christ to fellow Jews there in Jerusalem. You’d be amazed at how they hate him for it. But that’s the typical response of the Jew. They’re blinded - Providentially - until the day when God’s going to open their eyes. They’re suddenly going to again become the favored Nation, and they’ll recognize their Messiah when He comes the second time.

All right, but that’s not where I wanted to spend my time. I wanted to come on down now to some of the aspects that show the Abrahamic Covenant can never be abrogated. All right, let’s come all the way down then to verse 11 of Romans chapter 11. Here again, for these Preterits, what do they do with verses like this? As a rule, I don’t fault people who disagree with me, but this is becoming so obnoxious, and the material that’s coming in my mail, they’re just bombarding me with it. So, I can hardly hold my patience much longer. But see, what do they do with this verse?

"I say then, Have they (the Nation of Israel) stumbled that they should fall?" Well, of course they stumbled, but did they fall out of all of God’s dealing for the end-time? Never! Of course they stumbled, in unbelief. And of course God uprooted them and dispersed them into the nations of the world. But, did He obliterate them as a nation of people? No way!

Everything that’s happening in the world today is a fulfilling of those promises that after they’d been dispersed into every nation in the world, that God would bring them back. And He’s been doing it. And He’s still doing it. And people are blind to that. I don’t see how anybody can miss it, that those Jews are there in that bustling, beautiful city of Jerusalem - unbelievable wasn’t it, you guys? I know you were shocked when we were there just a few weeks ago. It’s shocking how huge and how busy that city of Jerusalem has become. And the Arab world thinks they’re still going to run them into the sea? You know, as we were driving through the streets with all that traffic, I almost had to laugh within myself. Who do they think they’re kidding? Who brought them in there and gave them all this? The God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob! There isn’t enough force in this whole world to oppose the God of Abraham. So, they’re there. This is what Paul is talking about. Yes, they stumbled when they rejected the Messiah, but they didn’t fall out of God’s program for the future.

"…God forbid: but rather through their fall (Through their unbelief, rejecting the Messiah, crucifying Him, and bringing about the resurrection and all that pertains to our Gospel - it was all because of Israel’s unbelief. So…) salvation is come to the Gentiles, for to provoke them (the Nation of Israel) to jealousy." To think, that the God of Abraham is now turning to the Gentile world. All right, now verse 12, and just keep reminding yourself of what I’m saying. How can this be true if the Jew disappeared 1900 years ago? Then we might as well throw the Book away and go home.

"Now if the fall of them (Israel’s rejecting their Messiah.) be the riches of the world, (the whole world) and the diminishing of them (Their being taken out of their homeland and dispersed among the nations.) the riches of the Gentiles;…" Which is what happened because of the Gospel of Grace. It went out to the whole human race. Rich and full and free! Whereas, they’ve been diminished and have been blinded and are out in dispersion, up until now in our lifetime. Then look at the last question. If all of this is accomplished, what we’ve seen it accomplish, then:

"…how much more their (What?) fullness?" What’s that? When they will finally, in opened eyes of belief, see the return of their Messiah, the establishing of that earthly kingdom. That’s their fullness. It’s still in their future. Okay, now verse 13, Paul reminds us that he’s merely giving us all these facts concerning the Nation of Israel.

"For I speak to you Gentiles, inasmuch as I am the apostle of the Gentiles," And oh, people don’t want to swallow that. It just rankles them. Paul? I had someone tell me again the other day that they were trying to talk to one of their pastors, and the guy says, "Paul, we don’t even look at Paul. We don’t have a thing to do with him." Well, that’s running rampant through Christendom. But Paul is the Apostle of the Gentiles, he’s God’s spokesman for us who are not Jews.

"…I magnify mine office. (Then the reason for his apostleship) 14. If by any means I may provoke to emulation them which are my flesh, and might save some of them." All right, now here we come back to Israel again. We’ve got to move quickly.

"For if the casting away of them (Sending them out into the dispersion) be the reconciling of the world, (That is, the rest of the world. In other words, by Israel’s rejecting and bringing about the death, burial, and resurrection of the Messiah, that opened up the whole plan of salvation for the rest of the world. Well, if that act of unbelief has brought about such a response of salvation for so many Gentiles…) what shall the receiving of them be (back into the promises - What is it, but like what?) but life from the dead?" Well, isn’t that exactly what’s pictured back there in Ezekiel 37, the dry bones? The valleys are white with dry bones. Those are symbolic pictures of Jews out in the dispersion for these hundreds and hundreds of years. But what did Ezekiel see? The bones coming back to life. They hooked up together. They formed skeletons. Flesh came upon them. It was all a symbolic picture of the Jew coming back to his homeland and becoming once again a nation among the nations. And we’ve all seen it happen. And what is it? Like a miracle of resurrection itself, life from the dead. All right, now I’m going to come down to verse 17.

"And if some of the branches be broken off, (Which of course is what God did with the Jew when He sent them into dispersion.) and thou, being a wild olive tree, wert graffed in among them,…" Remember, he’s talking to us Gentiles being grafted in.

"…and with them partakest of the root and fatness of the olive tree;" Well, what’s he talking about? This whole Book, from cover to cover, was written by what people? Jews! That’s why I maintain Luke couldn’t have been a Gentile. This Book was written by Jews. You and I are feasting on what God accomplished through the Jewish people.

On top of that, Jesus came to earth as a Jew. He went through His earthly ministry as a Jew under the Law. Anything He accomplished that had to be reported to the priest, what’d He tell them? Go show yourself to the priest, according to the Law. So, everything that you and I enjoy under this Age of Grace is because of Israel. You can’t take them out of the picture. I don’t care how hard they try. So, here we are. We’re boasting in the "root and the fatness of Abraham."

Now then, verse 18, you and I as Gentile believers cannot get proud and puffed up and look down on the Jew and say, "Look what we’ve accomplished that you could have had and didn’t get." No! We dare not do that.

"Boast not against the branches. But if thou boast, thou bearest not the root, but the root (is bearing) thee." Do you see what he’s saying? He’s telling you and I, as believers, don’t get proud and puffed up and act as though we’re the ones that have brought about Israel’s possibility for salvation someday. No. Israel’s still going to rest on those same roots and the tree that began with the Abrahamic Covenant. And one day it’s going to come back into full force, and the Nation of Israel will be blessed like they’ve never been blessed before. All right, now we’ll come down to verse 19. Again, Paul is talking to you and I as Gentiles. He says:

"Thou (as a Gentile) wilt say then, The branches were broken off, (That is, the Nation of Israel was taken out of the place of blessing.) that I might be graffed in." Now, what’s the danger? That we’d get proud and puffed up and say, "See, you Jews were nothing." There are a lot of people that try to say that. How does the average Muslim refer to a Jew? "He’s a pig. He’s less than human." And a lot of Gentiles are just as bad. A lot in Christendom are just about as bad. But we dare not take that attitude. It’s got to be the other way around. We’ve been blessed to partake of these covenant promises, even though they’ve been set aside because of their unbelief.

"Well; because of unbelief they were broken off, and thou standest by faith. Be not highminded, but fear:" They were sent into dispersion. They were given that spirit of blindness. And God turned to the Gentile world through the Apostle Paul. All right, so now he’s reminding us. Don’t be high-minded, don’t get proud and puffed up, but you’d better have some reverential fear. In other words, we’d better understand how blessed we are because of Israel’s unbelief back there at the time of Christ’s earthly ministry.

"For if God spared not the natural branches,…" If He judged Israel because of their unbelief, do you think He’s going to shrink from judging the Gentile world because of their unbelief? Not for a minute! The world is getting closer every day.

You know, I was reminded the other day, by some company we had from a distant state, of how many multiple murders were taking place in their particular area of the country. But lo and behold the Daily Oklahoman had headline front-page news of four people murdered over here in southeast Oklahoma City. Now we’re finding out it’s almost epidemic across the country. Not single murders. Multiple! Multiple! All right, so he says here, be careful that we will not bring in His wrath and His judgment because of unbelief just like He did with Israel.

"Behold therefore the goodness and severity of God: on them which fell, severity;…" Here we come back to Israel again because of their unbelief. It was severe. Their city was destroyed. Their Temple was destroyed. Almost a million Jews lost their life in that Roman invasion. The rest were scattered into the nations of the world because of God’s wrath against them and their unbelief. But hey, is the Gentile world going to miss it? Not for a minute. Their judgment is coming, and it’s coming faster and faster every day. All right, so he says, don’t be like they were. Don’t stay in unbelief, but continue in his goodness, otherwise you too will be cut off. Now verse 23:

"And they also, (that is Israel) if they abide not still in unbelief, shall be graffed in: for God is able to graff them in (And what’s the word?) again." Now goodness, you know plain English. If they’ve been taken away from the root and the fatness and they’re going to be grafted in again, what does that tell you? They’re going to come back into the place of blessing. How can they if they’ve disappeared from the scene? You see what a big lie the whole thing turns out to be? But they will be grafted in again. They will enjoy their Messiah at His Second Coming.

All right, now I’m going to, for sake of time, come all the way down to verse 25. What’s going to be the indication of all this?

"For I would not, brethren, (That is to you and I.) that ye should be ignorant of this mystery (secret), lest ye should be wise in your own conceits: that blindness in part (That is, for a period of time. It’s now been 1900 and some years.) is happened to Israel, until (And they still are, but it’s going to end one day. And when will that be?) the fullness of the Gentiles be come (is brought) in." And what’s the fullness of the Gentiles? When the Body of Christ is complete and removed in the Rapture.

Okay, good to see everybody back from their coffee break. We’re going to be ready to start in a different series with this lesson. Several programs back I mentioned that I was contemplating doing some of the "Buts" in Scripture, so the day has arrived. We’re going to start with that series in just a moment.

For those of you out in television, we want to remind you again how much we appreciate your financial help, your letters, your phone calls, and everything that’s an encouragement to us. We just thank you for it from the depths of our heart. And the other thing that always amazes me, I think 99 out of 100 of our letters start out, "Dear Les and Iris." Now, you know as well as I do that Iris is never visible. She never says anything. How everybody knows she’s part and parcel of this I really don’t know, but they do. And we appreciate it, because she is a big part, even though she may not be that visible.

We’re going to start this series so turn with me to Genesis chapter 6. We’re going to start with one of the very first ones in Scripture. Be aware that whenever we use these little prepositional phrases, because after all the word "but" is a proposition in our English language, it always involves the Sovereignty of God. Had God not intervened, then things would have never gone as they have.

Now, I’ve mentioned on this program down through the years, that one of the most amazing things is that when God set everything in motion back there with the Creation and Adam and Eve in the Garden, He did not make the human race puppets on a string. The human race has been left with a free will, and yet, by His Sovereign design, everything has fallen into place exactly as God blueprinted it. Here we are 6000 years later and God is not a day behind or a day ahead. It’s amazing, how that the human race is left with a free will, and as I’ve said over and over – nations can form armies and navies, they can declare war, they can sign peace treaties, and yet everything is in accord with His purpose and design.

All right, now let’s start here at Genesis chapter 6. It’s the chapter that brings in Noah’s Flood. The first one we want to look at now is verse 8.

"But Noah found grace in the eyes of the LORD." Now, what were all of the previous events that brought in this Sovereign act of God? Well, let’s just rehearse for a minute. I don’t have to show you from Scripture, most of you know. As soon as Adam and Eve fall, Satan becomes the god of this world. The human race becomes sin-natured. From the very day that they come out of the Garden, even though there was an element that remained faithful to God and so forth, yet within 1600 years, which of course is a long time, the whole human race had degenerated to a corrupt condition. And that’s the word in Genesis chapter 6. All right, let’s go back to verse 5, and we’ll build up to verse 8.

"And God saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every imagination of the thoughts of his heart (That is, of every individual human being.) was only evil continually." Now, can you put that in context? In other words, the human race, however many there were, I think in the area of four to five billion people by now. If you don’t believe me, jump on your computer you math people, and you start out with two people having children. Who knows how many, because they lived 900 years? You put that over a period of 1500-1600 years and you have no trouble whatsoever getting four billion people. Yet every one of them was consumed with wickedness and evil, and the primary one was murder. They were killing each other like we kill flies and thought nothing of it. So, this is when God had to come in and begin to look at the whole situation.

"And it repented the LORD (Now, that’s far different from what we mean repent in our New Testament. This merely means that He was sorry.) that he had made man on the earth, and it grieved him at his heart." Because man’s made such a mess of it. But why did man make a mess of it? Because God left him with a free will. Had God made him a robot, it would have never happened, but we’re not robots. Nobody is. We all have that free will. So it was that their hearts were bent on wickedness, and God was sorry, and it grieved him at his heart that he had made the human race.

Well, I imagine all of us think of that at one time or another, don’t we? What must God have thought, even as He looks at the world today? I’m going to make the point here in just a minute that we are right back to where they were then. We’re not very far removed. All right, now look at verse 7.

"And the LORD said, I will destroy man whom I have created from the face of the earth; both man, and beast, and the creeping thing, and the fowls of the air; for it repenteth me (I am sorry) that I have made them." In other words, He’s just going to destroy it all so to speak and seemingly start over. Now verse 8, here’s where we have to stop and think.

"But Noah…" Here God is ready to