Messiah In The Old Testament Episode 40
The Abrahamic Prophecies: Abram Leaves Ur For Canaan
Welcome to Messiah In The Old Testament. In our last three episodes, we revealed to you all the Messianic Prophecies that were found in the book of Job. Now in all, we found that there were 24 Job prophecies.
And these prophecies painted a picture that we found was the most vibrant, the most colorful, the clearest picture that we've had of Messiah so far. It was just a magnificent portrait of Messiah. Now those Job prophecies started out looking at the characteristics of Messiah's character, attributes of Messiah's character.
Specifically, we learned that Messiah will be blameless. Messiah will be upright. Messiah will fear God, shun evil. He will be a servant to others, and he will be a mediator. Then we went on to learn that Messiah was going to come as the suffering servant. We saw a collection of prophecies that painted a very gruesome and grotesque scene where Messiah was going to be brutalized and killed. Specifically, we saw that Messiah will be jeered by the mouths of men. Messiah will be struck on the cheek in scorn or in anger. Messiah will face crowds that are united against him. He will then be turned over to wicked men who will seize him and crush him or torture him. And then finally, they will pierce him in the side so that his gall spills out, obviously a terminal injury. So we saw Messiah, suffering servant, tortured and killed. And then finally, we saw in the book of Job a picture of Messiah as the conquering king.
We see that Messiah will be victorious over death and the grave. And he will return to the land of the living. And then he will be rewarded. These prophecies, if this is all we had to find Messiah, were these 24 prophecies, I don't think we'd have any trouble at all spotting Messiah. Now, today we're going to go back to Abram. Remember we left him in Ur. The family was traveling to Canaan, but they stopped in Haran. And we're going to pick up our story there. So far, we have
presented 68 Messianic prophecies. In our next collection of prophecies, all centered around Abram and Abraham, those prophecies are almost equal in number to the ones we have presented so far.
At current count, there are 67 Abraham or Abrahamic prophecies. And we're going to go through those Abraham prophecies one by one. Most of those have to do with blessing and have to do with the continuation of the Messianic line. A lot of words about prosperity and blessing. Now in order to introduce Abram, I would like to go back four episodes.
We're going to go back to the third part of a three-part series looking at Messianic prophecies from the post-flood era. And we were looking at the genealogy. We're looking at the Messianic line starting at Shem and going all the way down to Terah and then, of course, to Abram. I'm going to put up a chart.
And this is a chart that we looked at before. And it shows all of that Messianic line. It shows starting at Shem, ending at Abram. And I have the Hebrew name written in the Hebrew. I have the translation of that. And we look at the meanings.
The reason we did this was because the Tanakh said that Peleg, whose name means split, divide, make a channel or a canal between two land masses, that his name Peleg was given to him because during his lifetime the earth was divided. So we said, okay, what other names in the Messianic Line have world implications? So we discovered that Arphaxad, whose name meant boundary of the Chaldeans, that during his lifetime the Semitic boundaries were set. And then Shelah, who in the Hebrew, his name was Shelach. And, of course, we've dealt with that word several times. It means send away, divorce, set free, or release. And it was during his lifetime that the languages were confused, and the peoples were scattered all over the earth.
And then Eber or Eyver, his name means pass over, pass through, pass by or cross. It was during his lifetime that all the peoples were still crossing over and going into their final areas where their families would be established. And then we have four names that had Messianic implication. Reu, as the friend of God. Serug, the tender young shoot or younger branch like we saw also in Isaiah 53. Nahor, which means snorting vigorously. And then Terah, patiently breathe. Now we pointed out that the sages believed that Terah was the commander of Nimrod's armies. And the patiently breathe implies someone who is trained, someone who is able to control their breathing even in the face of a battle, for example. So, we now have arrived at the final person on that table.
And that is Abram or Avram. And his name means exalted father. And we're going to see over the next few episodes his fathering the next generation and all the generations following that we're all going to be blessed. I'm going to put up a picture for you. This is the Lifespans After Noah. And the reason I'm putting this up is you'll notice at the very bottom you've got Terah and Abram. And I've got Abram right at 70 years when Terah was 70 years old. So we know Terah was at least 70 when he had Abraham, Nahor, and Haran. We don't know how far after that 70.
I'm going to put up another one where we had the chronology of Adam's line. And that shows you Abram, you'll see at the bottom there, slid all the way over 130 years. So we know that it was probably somewhere between those two extremes. The sages would go more with the Lifespan After Noah, putting Abram alive during the lifespan of Noah, Shem, actually all of the ancestors from Abraham back to Noah. This is in alignment with what the sages believe because they believe that Noah and Shem spent time teaching Abraham. And all their knowledge was imparted to Abraham. In fact, we talked in a previous episode about how the priesthood was given to Shem and then from Shem it was transferred to Abraham. Now there's one more thing we know about Terah beside the sages believing he was commander of the army and that he was 70 before he had Abram, Nahor, and Haran. We also know that he was an avid
idol worshiper. That is backed up not only in the writings of the sages, but it's also backed up in the Old Testament. In Joshua 24:2, Joshua tells the people:
This is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says: ‘Long after your forefathers, including Terah the father of Abraham and Nahor, lived beyond the River and worshipped other gods.
In other words, Nahor was an idol worshipper. Terah was an idol worshipper. Serug was an idol worshipper. So let's start our story today. It's Genesis 11:27-30. This is the account of Terah:
Terah became the father of Abram, Nahor, and Haran. And Haran became the father of Lot. While his father Terah was still alive, Haran died in Ur of the Chaldeans in the land of his birth. Abram and Nahor both married. The name of Abram's wife was Sarai, and the name of Nahor's wife was Milcah; she was the daughter of Haran, the father of both Milcah and Iscah. Now Sarai was barren, she had no children.
So apart from Abram, very little is revealed about Abram's brothers Nahor and Haran. In fact, these three verses are the only place we learn about Haran. Nahor, we've got some more information given while we're talking about Rebekah and Isaac and how they get together. So here's what we know from this passage. Haran was the father of Lot, Milcah, and Iscah. He has no bearing on any Messianic Prophecy other than his daughter Milcah married her uncle Nahor and then they had offspring that then indirectly participated in the Messianic Line. And the same thing can be said for Nahor. Nahor doesn't have any direct play in the Messianic Line other than his wife Milcah.
He and his wife had eight sons, and one of those sons, his name was Bethuel. And Bethuel was the father of Rebekah and Laban. Rebekah, of course, married Abram's son Isaac. And then Laban was the father of Leah and Rachel. And, of course, Jacob was wed to both of those daughters. So, they were mothers in the Messianic Line, but Nahor
and Haran did not have any direct Messianic influence. So, that brings up our first Messianic prophecy of the day:
1) The Messianic Line will be reckoned through Abram, son of Terah, and not his brothers. Although Nahor's granddaughter and great-granddaughters will be mothers in the Messianic Line.
And then I guess you could say Haran's great-granddaughter and great-great-granddaughter were mothers in the Messianic line. But Messiah did not come through their seed. It came through Abram's seed. Now our story continues in Genesis 11:31&32:
Terah took his son Abram, his grandson Lot son of Haran, (and also Milcah's brother) and his daughter-in-law Sarai, the wife of his son Abram, and together they set out from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to Canaan. But when they came to Haran, they settled there. Terah lived 205 years, and he died in Haran.
So Terah's actions in moving his family from Ur to Haran has a Messianic significance. Abram, who here is a type of Messiah, his father picked him up as well as his family and moved them to another country. So it will be when Messiah comes, his father will pick him up and move him to another country. Now the Tanakh doesn't tell us why they moved to another country, but the sages obviously have an answer for everything. And they say it was because King Nimrod was going to kill Abram and Terah, and they fled out of fear of their lives from King Nimrod. But of course this is a very familiar mechanism of a story in the Hebrew literature. Somebody running away from a tyrant to escape persecution, that is a very common theme which we will see as we move through the Old Testament. Now I want to talk about Ur. Ur is a little bit controversial. In my mind not, but in other people's minds it is controversial. There are two proposed places for the city of Ur.
One has very strong archaeological and historic facts that support it as Ur, and others have very strong tradition, oral tradition, and local tradition, saying that that is the birthplace of Abraham. We will talk
about both places, but I want to start with Ur, which is located in Iraq. And we know the location of ancient Ur with great certainty because it has been excavated. The mound that was excavated that is Ur is located near the modern-day Iraqi city of Nasiriyah. It is located just south of Nasiriyah, and it is wedged between an air force base called the Imam Ali Air Force Base. And in fact if you stand on the tarmac, you can see the mound, and if you stand on top of the mound, you can see the tarmac.
They are that close together. So we know the location of Ur. It is about 140 miles south of Babylon. So it was part of the Babylonian Empire. In fact, we are going to find out that even Haran, where they escaped to, was also part of the Babylonian Empire, although it was right on the fringes of the northern part of the empire. So, Ur was excavated by a chap named Sir Charles Leonard Woolley, and this happened from 1922 to 1934. He was the one that discovered the famous Ziggurat of Ur and it made the headlines.
But more importantly he excavated a royal cemetery, and that royal cemetery was full of fascinating items, a lot of them made of gold and alabaster. He found a treasure trove of artifacts. In fact, he was competing with another archaeologist by the name of Howard Carter, who had just discovered the tomb of King Tut. So you've got all the gold in King Tut's tomb, and all the gold that Sir Charles was pulling out, and it was kind of a competition between the two capturing the headlines. He not only excavated the tombs, the royal tombs, he also did excavations of residential centers and commercial centers in the city. He found a lot of streets lined with storefronts. He found a lot of residential houses, and one of the hallmarks of each of these residential houses was that they always contained either a niche or a room specifically dedicated to housing idols and the worship of those idols. Ur was a very pagan city. In fact they also excavated several temples.
The predominant Sumerian god that was worshipped was the god Shamash, who was the sun god, and also Sin, which was the moon god or goddess. So we know that Ur was a bustling commercial
center, but we also know that Ur was a center for pagan worship of these Babylonian or Sumerian gods. Now the interesting thing is that when they excavated Ur, they found that there was a harbor.
There was a basin of water where there was no buildings, and then there were harbor front structures. In fact there was a temple built right on the harbor. It's called the Harbor Temple. So this was right on the Gulf of Arabia. Now you might say, how can that be? The Gulf of Arabia is 150 miles away from Nasiriyah, and you are absolutely correct. But it turns out that during those millennia there was a rise in the sea level, and the experts theorize that it's from, of course, what we hear now is from global warming. There was a global warming event, and the sea level rose. One of the papers I read, and I'll put up the reference for you so you can see the reference.
This paper stated that climate changes caused the sea level to rise about 4,350 years before the present date. They stayed up for about a millennium, and then at about 3,300 years started falling until about 3,200 years before present the shoreline stabilized, and it's been at that same level up until the present time. Now, if we accept the common timeline where most people agree that Abram lived in Ur around 1900 BCE, I think most scholars will agree on that date. That is obviously 3,925 years before present, which puts it in that time period when the shoreline was further inland because of the sea rise. So the environmental evidence, looking at the geological evidence, we see that indeed Ur was a bustling seaport. Ur was a center of commerce. Ur would have been a center of great wealth. And it doesn't surprise you if you go with what the sages say, that if Abram was the son of Terah, who was the commander of Nimrod's armies, they would have lived in a very opulent city and a very opulent house.
So, our second location is located way, way up north. It's right on the Syrian border on the Turkish side. There is a town there, actually a big city, called Sanliurfa. And this city is an interesting city because it has within the city center, actually just south of the city center, there is a lake which is full of carp, and around that lake are mosques, and one of those houses the cave where it is said that Abraham was born.
So Abraham's birth cave is there, and all kinds of stories swirl around this town and around the culture. It's called the Jerusalem of Turkey, or of Anatolia, because all three religions hold it sacred, the Muslims' birthplace of Abram, some Jews, not all, but some Jews believe this is the birthplace of Abram. Also Christians, there were many crusader churches and Christian churches from the various empires. So all three hold this place sacred.
So, Sanliurfa, there is a lake, and the name of the lake is called Lake Balikligol, and it is full of carp which are considered to be sacred. In fact, you can go there and feed the carp, buy some food from the vendors, and you can feed the carp. It's a very clever way to defray the cost of maintaining those carp. Now, the story is that Abraham had been captured by King Nimrut, which of course is the Turkish version of King Nimrod.
And Abraham was railing against idol worship, and King Nimrut built a fire, built a pyre with multiple logs, and the fire was blazing, and they threw Abraham on the pyre into the flames, and as soon as Abram was engulfed in flames, the flames turned into water. And all the logs turned into the sacred carp, and the Lake Balikligol was formed. That's the story they tell, and if you go there, you can read it on the signs, you can hear it from your tour guide.
A lot of scholars believe that these local legends are where the story that we're going to tell you from the Sefer HaYashar, where they came from. Remember the Sefer HaYashar was a collection of stories, Midrashim from the medieval times, and they believe that these stories came from places like Sanliurfa. Now, let's get back to our story. We know that they've left Ur. They've gone to Canaan, but they stopped at Haran on the way. We know that Abram's brother was born in Ur. Many people believe that Abram was also born in Ur, just like Haran. In fact, Pope John Paul II believed that. He was going to make a tour to Iraq, and that prompted Saddam Hussein to have a lot of the buildings in Ur renovated, so when the Pope came, he could see the Ziggurat of Ur, he could see all these houses and storefronts rebuilt. And we know that many of the Muslim scholars believe that Abram's
birthplace was in Sanliurfa. So we presume he was born there, but we just don't know for sure. What we do know is that Ur was a pagan city, whether you believe it was up in Turkey or down in Iraq. Ur was a pagan city, and we know that because Joshua told us that Terah was a pagan and worshipped pagan gods. So I'm going to read you, or just tell you and read some of it, the story of Abram's life, because we don't have a lot of details in the Tanakh about Abram's early childhood. We basically are told, okay, he's born, he married Sarai, and off they went to Haran and then to Canaan. But the Sefer HaYashar gives us a very colorful, very vibrant story about Abram as a baby and his childhood, and how it was that he went from being born to heading off to Haran.
One night, all the scholars and astrologers of Babylon, all the wise men, were gathered together at the house of Terah. Terah, as you know, was the army commander of King Nimrod's army, and they were celebrating the birth of his son. So, after the festivities wound down, the astrologers and wise men were on their way home, and as they were traveling, they saw this portent in the sky. They saw a star streaking from the eastern horizon across the sky, and as it traveled, it consumed four stars, which represented the four directions, and they saw that this had a very important prophetic message. The message was for King Nimrod. So, they hustled off to King Nimrod, and they told him of what they saw in the heavens. Well, Nimrod understood what they were trying to tell him. It was that the child that was born on that night, that would be Abram, was going to usurp the king's throne, and that the king had to do away with the child. Now they told the king that this child is a child of great worth, and they would have to pay Terah in exchange for him giving over his child. So the king sent to Terah and asked him to bring his child with him.
So, Terah comes to the king with a baby, but it's not Abram. It turns out there was another baby born in the household that night to one of the servants. So he took that baby, brought it to King Nimrod, and handed it over to Nimrod. Nimrod then took the baby, dashed the baby to pieces, because he didn't want it to usurp his throne. And Terah was sent on his way.
Now, Terah wanted to protect his son and protect his secrets, so he took his wife and one of his wife's servants, and they took Abram and hid him in a cave. That cave then protected him and protected his identity. For ten years they kept him in seclusion. After ten years he came out, and then he went up to his ancestors, and he went to the house of Noah and Shem. Now you remember from a previous episode we said that Noah and Shem ran kind of a school for prophets. They had a house of righteousness. And when Abram went there, he sat under their teaching, and Abram learned the ways of the Lord, and he became aware of Elohim, and learned from Noah all the dealings from Adam all the way down to the flood and beyond. So then, Abram was well-versed in the history of the Semitic peoples and of the ways of the Lord. So after 50 years, he finally leaves the school of prophets. And Abram goes back to Ur, to his father Terah, and he goes to live in his house once again. Now we don't have any idea where Sarah fits into this. It's not really part of the story when he marries Sarah. But we know that he goes back to his father's household.
And while he's there, he sees all the idols, realizes that his father is addicted to idol worship and a chief proponent of idol worship. So Abram goes along with offering the idols some meat. The idols do nothing. There's no meat that's consumed by any of the idols. So then the next day he brings three times the portion and still nothing from the idols. So he takes an axe, and he smashes every one of his father's idols, destroys them, and then takes the axe and puts it in the hands of the largest idol which he preserved. And so now that idol is holding the axe. Abram heads out, but his dad sees him leaving the hall of the idols, and his dad goes in and finds out what he had done and finds all of his smashed idols. Then his father flew into a rage. And so he confronted Abraham, and this is what he said. This is quoting from the Sefer HaYashar:
“What is it thou hast done unto all my gods?” And Abram replied unto Terah: Not so my Lord, but I have brought a savory meat offering before them. And while I came before them with
the meats, each of the gods put forth his hand to eat, before the largest god could take some for himself. And when the large god saw their ill-manners then his anger rose, and he seized the axe which was in the house and went and broke them all to pieces. And you can see the axe in his hands even now.
And Terah grew furiously angry at his son, and he screamed out bitterly: What is it that thou art saying? Darest thou to come with such falsehood before thy father? Wilt thou try to make me believe such things, as if I did not know that these gods have no soul, and no spirit, and no strength within them? For are these gods anything but pieces of wood and stone which I myself have shaped into images? And now darest thou to tell me the falsehood, that the greatest god among them hath broken all the other ones to pieces, while it is thou that hath done all that mischief, putting finally the axe into the hands of the greatest of the gods, to deceive me. And Abram replied unto his father, saying: Now if thou knowest all that, how canst thou worship these idols which have neither strength nor power to do the least thing? Can those idols, in whom thou trusted, save thee in the hour of danger, can they hear thy prayers when thou callest upon them, or can they deliver thee from the hands of thy enemies, and fight thy battles for thee, that thou art worshiping those idols of wood and stone, which can neither hear nor speak.
Now this, of course, did not calm Terah down one bit. He became even more enraged. So he went to King Nimrod, and he told Nimrod about Abram's blasphemy. And Nimrod ordered that Abram be brought to him. He had a trial, evidence was given, and he was found guilty and put in prison. He was in prison for a total of ten days. And at the end of that ten days, Nimrod held court with all of his officials, and they all decided that Abram must die in a spectacular fashion to dissuade anybody else from doubting the idols.
So the king had his furnace kindled, and it burned for three days and three nights, got to its hottest temperature, and then they threw Abram in. In fact, some of the servants that threw him in were burned in the
process and died. Abram's hand and feet were tied, and when they threw him in the fire, the ropes burned, but Abram did not burn. So Abram was now free and walking around in the furnace. The astrologers were looking in, and they saw Abram walking around, and they realized that this was the baby from 50 years ago that they had seen the star going across the sky. So they told King Nimrod, this is Abram, this is the baby that we prophesied to you about. And so King Nimrod called in Terah to interrogate him. And Terah threw his son Haran under the bus, and he said it was Haran's fault. Haran, you duped me, and he gave me the wrong baby, and so then I presented to you the wrong baby. So the king then took Haran, arrested him, and then threw him into the fiery furnace, and he died immediately. Well, for three days and three nights, Abram walked around in that furnace free. So finally the king says, okay, get him out, but it was just too hot, nobody could get him out. So, finally the king himself goes and yells into the furnace, Abram, come on out. So Abram came out, and this is what he said to Nimrod when he came out of the furnace:
“The God of heaven and earth in whom I trust, and who is all powerful, he hath saved me from the fire whereinto I was cast at thy command.” Nimrod bowed down to him and gave him great wealth including large quantities of gold, silver and jewels.
So, Abram walked in the ways of the Lord, and he turned the hearts of all his people to serve the Lord and to worship him all the days of their lives. So Abraham walked in the ways of the Lord, he taught people about the Lord, and many people turned to Elohim because of Abram's witness. The sages say that 300 men pledged themselves to Abraham and became his servants and his guard. So everything was all going along just fine for Abram. And he was making great progress and doing good work. But then the king had a dream.
And the king's dream was that Abram was coming out of the fiery furnace with an axe in his hand, coming to kill King Nimrod. So he declared that Abram should be arrested. Abram found out about it, and he went to his place of safety, up to the house of Noah and Shem once again, and he stayed there for two years. His father met him
there, and they decided that they would leave to avoid the death sentence from King Nimrod. So they go back to Ur, and Abram, his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, and his dad then head off. They're going to go to Canaan, but they stopped at Haran on the way.
So let's talk about Haran real quick. The ancient city of Haran, the location is known just like the city of Ur. Excavations have been done there. The British archaeologist David Storm Rice excavated the site in the 1950s. He had several seasons of excavation. The excavations came to an end at his death, and then the whole expedition was closed down. But while he was excavating, he noted that there were some stele. Now a stele is either a cylinder or a tablet that's erected with a message on it. Sometimes it's carved and it has a pictorial message. Sometimes it's written. These were written in Akkadian. And it turns out the stelae were erected by King Nabonidus, who was the Babylonian king from 556 to 539 BCE, and they tell of the rebuilding of the Temple of Sin in Haran. So, we actually have the name Haran written on the stelae, which were found on site.
Now the site is called Tel Haran, where he did his excavations, and Tel Haran is located in the middle of the plain of Haran. So historically, everybody knew that this was the location of Haran. Now, did the entourage travel from Sanliurfa to Haran, or did they travel from just outside of Nasiriyah over to Haran? If they came from Sanliurfa, they only traveled about 25 miles and then stopped in Ur. If they came from the other place, it was 750 miles away. Now, I think that the Ur we're talking about in the Bible is more likely the city in Iraq. It has much more historical, archaeologic, the evidence is overwhelming that that was the ancient city of Ur. However, the Sanli Urfa is steeped in such deep tradition and lore and oral tradition that many, many from all three religions believe that that was the city Ur. So, if they came from Iraq, they would have had to travel 750 miles.
They would have traveled by caravan, and they would have followed the major caravan route, which if you look at the ancient caravan route, it went from Babylon over to Haran. Now, you could take a direct route to Canaan from Babylon, but that would take you right
through a desert, and it would have been a more difficult trip. And if you're traveling with a large entourage, you would not want to go across the desert. You would head over what we call the green route, follow that trade route over to Haran, and then from Haran, you can head on down to Damascus and beyond into Israel, into Canaan. So, to me it doesn't bother me that they went from Iraq over to Haran. Some would argue that they just went the 25 miles and stopped from Ur. Whichever it is, it really makes no difference to what we're talking about to our story.
What's important to our story is we now have that family living in Haran, and we know that Brother Nahor is going to join Abram there with his eight sons and, of course, Milcah. And one of those sons was going to be Bethuel, who would become the father of Rebekah and Laban. And we'll see them appear later in our story of Abram when we get to Isaac. When it's time for Isaac to find a wife, they reappear. Now, let's shift gears a little bit. When Abram was living in Haran with his family, and I believe it was with the greater family group, he would have become very comfortable living there with family. I think he was quite prosperous. We're going to find later in the discussion that Abram was not a poor man, and Abram had servants, and he had soldiers protecting him. He traveled with an entourage. So, we know that he did not leave Ur a poor man, and we know that he was not a poor man in Haran. So when the Lord came to him and gave him a specific instruction to leave Haran to go to Canaan, it would have been a very difficult decision. It would have been, you know, once you get settled, it's hard to just pick up and leave. But we're going to tell you the story. It's found in Genesis 12:1-3. And I want you to pay attention as we read it, because there are several words that keep coming up over and over. Pay attention and see if you can hear them.
The Lord had said to Abram, Leave your country, your people, and your father's household, and go to the land I will show you.
So leave all of that comfortable stuff behind and head on down to Canaan.
I will make you into a great nation, and I will bless you. I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse, and all the peoples on earth will be blessed through you.
So you'll notice the word, it's bless or blessing. The word is used five times as Elohim is calling Abram out of Haran. It's very clear that Elohim wanted to impart His blessings into Abraham, into the nation he would become, and then that would allow Messiah to come through his family line. Two other places, if you recall, in previous episodes, the Lord imparted His blessing into the earth. The first one was given to Adam and Eve in Genesis 1:28.
God blessed them and said to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number; fill the earth and subdue it. Rule over the fish of the sea and the birds of the air and over every living creature that moves on the ground.”
He then reiterated that blessing to Noah and his sons, and this is found in Genesis 9:1.
Then God blessed Noah and his sons, saying to them, “Be fruitful and increase in number and fill the earth.
And now it's being given in Genesis 12:1-3. So, the blessing given to Adam, to Noah, and now iterated again to Abram. These are blessings that kept propagating the Messianic line. The thread of the Messianic lineage has passed now Adam to Noah, Noah down through Shem to Abram. So now we are 19 generations removed from Adam. God has now called Abram to do a mighty act of faith. Now Noah, we thought his act of faith was monumental because he had to build an oceangoing vessel to save humanity. But now God is asking Abram, I want you to leave your family, I want you to leave everything you know, I want you to leave your comfort zone, and I want you to go from Haran down to Canaan. And by faith, Abram obeyed God, and he left to go to Canaan. That act of faith is described in many places as one of the greatest acts of faith ever recorded. Abram, because he believed
God and he obeyed God, it was credited to him as righteousness. It was credited to him as blessing. It was credited to him as everything good and proper. And Abram, because of that act, started now a chain of events that was going to lead to the nation of Israel and beyond to where we could have the coming of Messiah.
God’s prophetic word spoken over Abram introduces us to the coming Jewish Nation. We are going to learn that this blessing applies not only to Abram but also to all his offspring and even to us today. He has made all of Abram’s seed, both Jewish and Muslim, into great nations. (And they are great nations even to this very day) He has blessed them and made their name great. He blesses those who bless them and curses those who curse them. The whole world is blessed through them. Abram was a type of Messiah just like Job and Noah and Enoch. Abram’s blessings point us to Messiah. They will apply to him when he comes:
And I want to go back and read Genesis 12:1-3 one more time. And each one of these things has Messianic implications. Abram is being a type of Messiah, so when Elohim says to Abram, I'm going to bless you, that then applies to Messiah. So let's read it.
The LORD had said to Abram, “Leave your country, your people and your father’s household and go to the land I will show you. I will make you into a great nation and I will bless you; I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse; and all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”
So now, seven things that Elohim said to Abram. These are the things I'm going to do for you. So now, let's look at the Messianic implication. And this is starting with prophecy number three. Remember, we'd already done two prophecies previously. So this is the third one.
3) Messiah’s children (followers) will be made into a great nation
4) Messiah himself will be blessed
5) Messiah's name will be made great
6) Messiah will be a blessing to others
7) Elohim will bless those that bless Messiah.
8) Elohim will curse those that curse Messiah
9) All peoples on the earth will be blessed through Messiah.
So now, let's take a deep breath. That's a lot of prophecies, nine of them, and just these first few verses. So we've successfully now have Abram from Ur to Haran. Haran now heading down into Canaan. And we're going to find a large number of adventures that Abram will get himself into. And each one of those adventures has Messianic implication. And like we said, we're going to come up with at least sixty-seven. And who knows, we may discover more along the way, all the Abrahamic prophecies. So join me next time as we're going to pick up the story with Abram heading down to Canaan.
Thank you for watching our show today. We hope that you enjoyed watching it as much as we enjoyed bringing it to you. Now, after watching this episode you might be saying to yourself, “Who is this Messiah that Dr. Smith is talking about?
Is he talking about the Christian Messiah? Is he talking about Jesus Christ, the Son of God, who was born of the Virgin Mary. And then lived a blameless and holy life on the earth And then was tortured and crucified. And after he died he then was resurrected from the dead after three days. Then after people witnessed this, he was then taken up bodily by Elohim into heaven from the Mount of Olives.
Or is Dr. Smith talking about the Muslim prophet Isa. Isa Ibn Maryam, the messenger, who was sent by Allah to bring a message to the people. The Quran says he that lived a holy and blameless life, was born of the virgin Mary. He fulfilled all the Jewish prophecies in exact accordance. But one difference, instead of being crucified, he then was taken up by Allah into heaven before the Romans laid hands on him. And he awaits there now in the fourth heaven where at the end of days at the day of judgment he will be revealed to all.
Or is Dr. Smith talking about the Jewish Messiah? The Messiah who has not yet been revealed that the entire Jewish world is waiting for his revelation. Now, the beautiful thing is that you can hold to any of these beliefs. And we can all still learn together about Messiah. We can learn about our Christian Messiah. We can learn about our Jewish Messiah. We can learn about our Muslim prophet Isa who will be revealed. It doesn’t matter what you believe. You can even be an atheist or agnostic and still learn from this program about Messiah. Now, I have to admit I am a Christian so I approach things, obviously, from a Christian point of view. And I promise you, as we reveal these prophecies, which I believe have all been fulfilled through Jesus Christ. Or will be fulfilled when he comes back, returning in the clouds in the same way he was taken up. I believe that all of this is true, but I promise you I will do my very best to present these prophecies from a neutral point of view. And try to keep my Christian bias to a minimum. Obviously, it will pop up from time to time but I will try to stay only in the Tanakh and try not to get into the New Testament very often. Now, if you want more information about Messiah, we have resources for you.
We have a website which is findingmessiah.org. Now, on that website you are going to find several resources. You will find links to all the videos, all the episodes that we have created so far. You will find links to download the transcripts of any of these episodes. And then you will find a section where you can get more information about Messiah through frequently asked questions. And then there is a section for donation. If you want to come alongside our ministry at Finding Messiah.
Now, there’s going to come a time in this series where you are going to be confronted with the question: What are you going to do with Messiah? Who do you believe Messiah is? Which of these Messiahs do you believe Dr. Smith is talking about? And Messiah will become real to you if you look at all the information presented and come to your conclusions. So, join us as we continue our journey through the
Old Testament Scriptures looking for all the Messianic Prophecies. And join us next time as we reveal those to you.