Messiah In The Old Testament Transcript of Episode 42 - The Abrahamic Prophecies The Power Of Elohim

Messiah In The Old Testament Episode 42

The Abrahamic Prophecies: The Power Of Elohim’s Name

Welcome to Messiah in the Old Testament. In today's episode, we're continuing our multi-part series looking at Messianic Prophecies that are associated with the life of Abram. Of course, his name is going to change to Abraham, and we call these the Abrahamic prophecies. Now so far, we have covered 14 of these prophecies, and there are many, many more to go. Now, in our last episode, we saw Abram, his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, pick up and move from Haran down to Shechem.

They went down to the land of Canaan, traveled through the land as far as Shechem, and they arrived at a place called the Great Tree of Moreh. And it was there that Abram had an amazing encounter, because Elohim physically showed up. He just appeared to him, and talked to him, and then disappeared. And this event was so amazing to Abram that he built an altar, and he said, hRarˆ…nAh hÎwhy (Adonai Hannir’eh), which means the LORD who appeared. And he built this altar in worship and honor to Elohim. Now that event had three Messianic prophecies. Now this was the first time that the Lord appeared to Abram, but it wouldn't be the last. There's going to be three episodes where Elohim shows up in person, physically appears to Abram. And this was the first altar recorded in the Tanakh that Abram built, but it wouldn't be the last. There are going to be five altars that he built. Now I think he built many more than that, but these are the five that are recorded in the Tanakh. Let's go through the Messianic prophecies associated with this event.

1) God appeared to Abram in person so that he could be seen. This points us to Messiah, the part of Elohim that appears to men in human form so that we will be able to see him.

2) The name Adonai Hannir’eh, the God who Appears, points us to Messiah who is the part of God that appears and can be seen by men.

3) God promised the Land of Canaan to Abram’s offspring. This was Messianic provision to ensure Messiah’s line would continue through Abram’s line.

Now, from Shechem they went further south. They moved to a place called Bethel, which was just north of Jerusalem. Actually it was between Bethel and Ai. And there he built an altar. And it says that Abram used that altar to call on the name of the LORD. And we looked in our last episode at that word call, and it means to cry out in a loud voice, to scream or yell. So, Abram was trying to get God's attention. He was crying out to the LORD, and this has Messianic significance.

4) Abram as a type of Messiah cried out to the LORD in a loud voice (yelled or screamed). So it will be with Messiah. He will cry out to the LORD in a loud voice. He will call on the name of the LORD.

Now this was the second altar that Abram built. Now, from Bethel they moved down to the Negev, ran into some problems because of a drought. So they decided they would go to the green river delta in the Nile. So they left to go to Egypt. While they were on their way, Abram said to his wife, please refer to me as your brother, and I will refer to you as my sister, because if they know that you're my wife, they'll kill me and they will take you. I think Abram kind of knew how those Egyptians operated. So they agreed, and when they arrived, of course, Pharaoh's officials, they saw this beautiful woman, and they talked her up to Pharaoh. So Pharaoh had her brought into his household and into his harem to become one of his wives. Abram knew what he was talking about.

So Abram was rewarded by Pharaoh. He lavishly rewarded him with men servants and maid servants and all kinds of animals, [he] bestowed wealth upon him. Now, there was precedent for this, we know from archaeological evidence, that the Egyptians were running a scheme where they would send to foreign dignitaries and ask for

them to send their daughters and wives, and in exchange they would give them money.

We found this out from the excavations at Tel Amarna, the so-called Amarna Letters which were correspondence between Pharaoh and these other kings. So they were running a scheme where they were doing human trafficking. Trafficking of young girls and the sisters of these officials so that Pharaoh could have a fresh supply of beautiful women. Now, Sarai would have just languished in his court. Now because she was so beautiful, maybe she would have had some advantage over all the other girls, but she was not going back with Abram. And they were not going to have their family. And Abram's myriad offspring were not going to come because Pharaoh now had Sarai in his custody.

Now, Elohim had a different plan. Elohim threw some stuff at Pharaoh. He sent serious diseases, which we learned in our last episode meant plagues. So he sent plagues on Pharaoh and his household. They were selective plagues. They didn't affect anybody else. So Pharaoh was being oppressed by Elohim to push him into action. And Pharaoh jumped and he brought Abram in and said, Why did you do this to me? And eventually he relented and let Abram, Sarai, Lot, and all their stuff go. So when Abram left Egypt, he plundered Egypt, and this was the first time that Abram and his offsprings would plunder Egypt. We know that they will do that in the coming exodus, and this was also the first time that plagues were sent against Pharaoh and his household, but it wouldn't be the last. There would be more plagues to come administered by Elohim at the hand of Moses and his brother Aaron. So that brings us to today's episode. There's one prophecy associated with that, but I'm going to hold off on that whole prophecy until we present one more story in today's episode. Our episode begins in Genesis 13:1-2, and it says:

So Abram went up from Egypt to the Negev, with his wife and everything he had, and Lot went with him. Abram had become very wealthy in livestock and in silver and gold.

Now this is what I like to refer to as the rest of the story. Abram, we know, left with all these menservants, maidservants and animals. But there was more to it than that, because Abram had become very wealthy in livestock, silver, and gold. Now the term very wealthy, I want to look at that in the Hebrew.

The Hebrew phrase is dOaVm dEbD;k (kaveyd me’od). dEbD;k (kaveyd) is from the root db;k (kaveyd), and the root means heavy, weighty, burdensome, honored, so weighed down. The adjective form, which is what we're using here, it means massive, abundant, numerous, and it's a connotation of massive prosperity or wealth.

dOaVm (me’od) is just an amplifier, it means very, so he was very massively, massively weighed down with wealth. So, Abram returned from Egypt, specifically weighed down with h‰nVqI;m (miqneh), which is the cattle, PRsR;k (kesef), which is the silver, and bDhÎz (zahav), which is the gold.

This is a picture of Abram and his entourage rolling out of Egypt heavily laden, burdened down. Probably had to have huge carts and wagons to haul his gold reserves and silver reserves, and all these animals back to the Negev, where he was heading. And eventually we know he's going to head back north. Now, the story continues in Genesis 13:3-4:

From the Negev he went from place to place until he came to Bethel,

Now, the Negev was probably still recovering from the famine, so there probably was very little the Negev offered him. So he went back to Bethel’

to the place between Bethel and Ai where his tent had been earlier where he had first built an altar. There Abram called on the name of the LORD.

Now, we ask the question, of course, this is the third altar that Abram built, but we ask the question, “Why is Abram building all these altars?” It seems everywhere he goes; he puts up a new altar. And I think this harkens back to our story of Job and Noah and Adam and his two sons. There was a habit, there was a, I wouldn't say ritual, but I think there's some ritual to it. Their habit was to build altars to honor Elohim.

And I think the whole concept is best explained by the word altar, which in the Hebrew is AjE;bzI;m (mizbeach), and it comes from the root jAbÎz (zavach), and zavach means to butcher, slaughter, sacrifice. So Abram was using these altars, yes, to honor Elohim after he appeared to him, yes, to call on his name, but I think he was using these altars as a means to connect or communicate with God. He was sacrificing animals. He was butchering them, slaughtering them. He was offering them on his altar in an effort to get close to God. Now, this was his regular practice. We see it everywhere he went. He did it, he used it to worship, but in this specific case in Bethel, he was using that altar, the sacrificing of those animals, the blood of those animals, to approach Elohim. And this has Messianic Implication.

As we discussed in our episodes looking at the sacrificial systems, we know that they all pointed to the ultimate sacrificial system, which was the Levitical system. In that episode, we looked at all the steps along the way. Abram was one of those steps with his five altars. But they all pointed towards the final thing, which is Messiah, who will be the ultimate final sacrifice once and for all, and will eliminate the whole animal sacrificial system and gain us direct access to Elohim so we don't have to sacrifice a bunch of animals to get God's attention and to approach Him. So this is the prophecy associated with that:

1) Abram sacrificed animals on his altar as a means to approach Elohim and call upon his name. Messiah will eliminate this need and allow us direct access to Elohim through his blood (instead of the animal's blood.)

Now at this altar, Abram called out to Elohim. And we know the call was screaming, yelling, calling out a loud voice.

The Hebrew phrase is hDwhy MEvV;b MrVbAa MDv arVqˆ¥yÅw (vayyiqra’ sham Avram beshaym Adonai). And the arVqˆy (yiqra’) part is the crying. Literally, this means and he cried there Abram in name Adonai. He called out on the name of the Lord.

Now, what does it mean to call on the name of the Lord? If I invoke somebody's name, what does that mean? I think the best way to explain it is to use a real-world example. So I'm going to use my own example, my own surgical practice. We're filming this now in the basement of my office building. I am a pediatric surgeon, and I operate on pediatric patients from birth up to 18.

And I have two partners now with me. I've been in the business for 27 years in this town operating as a pediatric surgeon. I have a junior partner who came six years ago and joined me and then I have another partner who joined just over a year ago. Now we have differences in experience and expertise. I have 27 years of experience in this town. I have a reputation that's been built up because I've operated on 30,000 different children and that represents almost the same number of families and that in a town of 350,000 represents a significant percentage. So within family groups, friend groups, everybody knows who Dr. Smith is. I go to a restaurant and then say, Hey Dr. Smith, remember me? You operated on blah, blah, blah. So I have a huge reputation built up. Now my next partner down has six years of experience. He's operated on over 4,000 children so he has a significant reputation built up. But obviously it's a little bit smaller than mine. And then the next partner down has been here a year and has only operated on several hundred children.

So we have a joint day where everybody comes in for consultation, for surgeries, for hernias, etc., you know, lumps and bumps. And all three of us are there seeing these patients and then the patients, if they need surgery, get scheduled. And our system is that we operate in three different hospitals and have pretty much almost every day OR

time available. So the patients decide what day is going to be best and they do have some option to pick a certain day which has a certain surgeon attached to it. And by and large, everybody is wanting to see Dr. Smith. They want Dr. Smith. They say, I want Dr. Smith to do my surgery. So my OR schedules are always full and that's because of my reputation. And this is exactly what we're talking about. Those patient families are calling on my name, we want Dr. Smith, we call on Dr. Smith to do our surgery.

They are hearkening to my reputation as a good surgeon because of all these other families that have had good service by Dr. Smith because they know I've been there a long time. And they want Dr. Smith because they think they're going to get the best possible surgery with Dr. Smith as opposed to the other partners. That is what Abram was doing.

He was calling on the reputation or the name of Elohim. He could have picked any other god to call on. He could have built an altar, and he could have worshipped and honored, for example, Shamash, the sun god. Or he could have worshipped the moon goddess, Sin. Or he could have picked the ever-popular Ishtar, the goddess of prosperity and war. But he didn't pick any of those Babylonian gods. His father worshipped those gods, he wanted nothing to do with those gods because he knew Elohim, he knew his reputation. He knew that if he invoked the name of Elohim, he was going to get much more than those stone and wooden idols would provide. Now, let's look at the Hebrew where it says he called on the name of the Lord.

It's the Hebrew phrase, hDwhy MEvV;b (beshaym Adonai). MEvV;b (beshaym) is a compound word, it's got a prefixed preposition, the b (beit). The beit means in, at, on, upon. It is a preposition of proximity. So, I'm walking down a path in the woods, and I come upon a deer, and the deer runs away. I'm driving to the hospital, I get to the doors of the hospital, so I come at or to the hospital, so I'm now arriving at the hospital. That's beit, its proximity. MEv (shaym), of course, means

name, your reputation, your brand. And then hDwhy (Adonai) is the private name of God.

It's the Tetragrammaton, hDwhy (Yad He Vav He), translated in the NIV as capital L, capital O, capital R, capital D. In the Hebrew, scholars and the rabbis and the experts, a lot of them call this Shem HaMephorash, which is the explicit name of God. There are some very devout Jews that will not say his name, they will simply call him HaShem, or the name. I like to say Adonai, which is what we do in the prayers, when we say Baruch Atah Adonai, that is the four-letter name of God, but we're saying Adonai as a means to honor him and to make his name more sacred. Now, the Christians, they tend to use the Masoretic pointing, and they'll say Ya-Ho-Vah, or Jehovah, and there are some that will even go further back, hearken to the original language, where the Vav, they pronounce it as a Wow, and so they use Y-H-W-H, and put some vowels in there, and they say Yahweh. Now, I don't care how you say his name, we're all referring to the same entity, we're all referring to Elohim, to God, the Almighty, the Provider of Everything, the King of the Universe, we're all worshiping the same God. I don't care what you call him, but I do respect those who go a little extra and protect his name by saying Adonai, or by saying HaShem, I think that is awesome, because I think the name of God is worthy of any respect that we might give it.

Now, I went through the Tanakh, and I found that there were at least 122 different names given to Elohim, and I cataloged all these names, there's actually many more, because some of these names, I kind of lump things together. You could spend your lifetime, I think, researching the name of God, and all the meanings of the name of God. But I put together the list, and I posted it on our website, so if you're interested in looking at the list, you can go to FindingMessiah.org, go to the home page, and at the top there's a link that says Names of God, just click on that, you get to the document, you can read it, you can even download it.

Now, those names are arranged, of course, 1, 2, 3, all the way down to 122. So, I've picked three of them as an example for today's episode.

Number 86, so if you download my list, you can look, number 86, this name comes from Deuteronomy 33:29. It's where Moses was blessing the Israelites before he died. He tells the nation, “Who is like you? A people saved by the LORD.” And then he tells them, NEgDm hÎwhy (Adonai magayn). This means, The Lord is your shield, your buckler, or your armed defender. So, protection is included in the Name of God. That's part of his brand, reputation, his name, protection is in there.

Number 2, we're looking at number 98 on our list. It comes from Exodus 15:26. It's where Elohim states, KRaVpOr hDwhy yInSa (ani Adonai Ropheka), and it means, I am the God that heals you, restores you, cures you. So healing is included in the Name of God.

And then finally, number 3. It's 100 on our list. It comes from Judges 6:24, where Gideon built an altar, and he called it MwølDv hDwhy (Adonai Shalom). And Shalom, of course, means peace, completeness, nothing missing, nothing broken. So, peace is included in the Name of God. So when Abram called on the Name of the Lord, he was invoking all of these things.

He was invoking protection. He was invoking peace. He was invoking healing and all the other 122 or more things; he was invoking all of this. That is why the Name of Elohim was so much more powerful than the name of Ishtar, or the name of Marduk, or any of the names, and later on, Ashtoreh and Baal. His name was so much more powerful. It's like, how on earth would the Israelites move away from Elohim and go to these stupid other gods? So, this is our next Messianic Prophecy:

2) Abram as a type of Messiah called on the name of the LORD thereby invoking all the power contained in his Name including protection, healing, peace, etc. (all the other 122 things). Messiah will do the same.

He's going to invoke all the power contained in the name. And I want you to remember that concept. The Name of Elohim has so much power in it. It's powerful enough to create a universe. It's powerful enough to raise the dead. It's powerful enough to heal the sick. It is a very, very powerful name.

Now, Abram is sitting at Bethel. He's got all of his household goods, all of these animals. He's got menservants and maidservants. He's got soldiers protecting everybody. It's such a huge, huge entourage. It would be very hard to find a place that is green enough, has enough pastureland to support all this. And it's going to reach the breaking point. And it actually does reach the breaking point in Genesis 13:5-9:

Now Lot, who was moving about with Abram, also had flocks and herds and tents. But the land could not support them while they stayed together, for their possessions were so great that they were not able to stay together. And quarreling arose between Abram’s herdsmen and the herdsmen of Lot. The Canaanites and Perizzites were also living in the land at that time.

So Abram said to Lot, “(I have a solution!) Let’s not have any quarreling between you and me, or between your herdsmen and mine, for we are brothers. Is not the whole land before you? Let’s part company. If you go to the left, I’ll go to the right; if you go to the right, I’ll go to the left.”

Now, Lot was a man of great means, obviously. [Lot] Leaving would allow Abram to be able to stay in the same place and be supported. And Lot had a sufficient number of animals that tipped the balance. So, I don't know where Lot got all this stuff. Did he earn it on his own? Was he very industrious and he was able to breed the cattle? Did he work for it, or did he just get it as a free gift from Abram? I suspect it was more of the last, than the former, based on his behavior. Now, Lot's response to Abram comes in Genesis 13:10-11:

Lot looked up and saw that the whole plain of the Jordan was well watered, like the garden of the LORD (which would be Eden), like the land of Egypt, toward Zoar (which would be the Nile River Delta). This was before the LORD destroyed Sodom and Gomorrah.

Now, why did they have to, why did Moses have to say that in Genesis that this was before [the destruction of Sodom]. Why was there such a distinction before and after? And we're going to talk about that.

So Lot chose for himself the whole plain of the Jordan and set out toward the east. The two men parted company:

Now, Lot chose the best land and left Abram quarreling with the Canaanites and the Perizzites and trying to make do with the resources they had. He headed off to the green land, which was like the garden of Eden or the Nile River Delta. Now, the plain of Jordan obviously was to the east, because Abram parted ways with Lot and Lot headed east. The Jordan plain, it's the word rA;kI;k (kikkar). It’s translated as plain. It means oval or round. It can be applied to like a piece of bread, a piece of land, or even a talent weight. There's no mention of valley, although some will call kI;k (kikkar) as valley, translated as valley. There's no real sense of valley in there. It's a flat piece of land. It's not a valley. So if he went over there, I think it was a flat plain. I think it was very green and well-watered, moist. The Jordan came down from the Hermon range and headed on down to the Gulf of Eilat or Aqaba, depending on which side of the Gulf you're standing on. And I think because of that, the whole thing, just like the Nile River, the whole thing was very well-watered. So Lot headed on over.

Now some scientists totally refute this whole idea because they think that the Dead Sea, the huge river valley, and if you know anything about the topography of Israel, even the Sea of Galilee is below sea level. That whole valley is below sea level from basically the end of the Hula plain where it comes over the waterfall and heads on down.

So, I think when Sodom and Gomorrah were punished, I think that whole thing collapsed and that whole valley formed. I think there were massive earthquakes associated with this fire coming down from God. And I think the whole valley just fell and achieved the topography that it is today. Now scientists disagree.

They say that, oh, it's pretty obvious, it's a tectonic plate thing. It's the Arabian plate, African plate, moving apart, creating a deep rift. Duh. They can't even agree on how many millions of years. They say it's millions of years. Some say, oh, it's two and a half, three million. Some say, no, no, it's 20 to 30 million. And they can't even agree amongst themselves. But the tectonic plate theory, as we talked about before, is very popular.

Some cite the Sedom Lagoon Theory. Sedom, of course, is the name for Sodom.

And they use the current topography of the Jezreel plain connecting to the Jordan, or the Jezreel Valley, I should say, connecting with the Jordan River Valley. And they overlay water on that. And that was the Sedom Lagoon. They say that there was a connection with the Mediterranean up just north of Haifa. And so there was Mediterranean Sea, so it was an inland lagoon. And then the Carmel Range got pushed up to what it is today. And that lagoon got cut off. So then it became an inland sea. And then it evaporated and eventually went to the current state, where the water comes down from the Hermon Heights, down the Hulu Plain, down the Sea of Galilee, down the Jordan Valley, all the way down to the Dead Sea, which is way below sea level. I'm going to put up a picture that demonstrates it.

This comes from an article. It's in the Quaternary Research. It's an article talking about cosmogenic burial ages. But, it does have a beautiful picture of this Sedom Lagoon. It's a satellite image, and they've overlaid the water. So I'm going to put it up so you can see that. You can see the Jezreel Valley connecting with the Jordan River Valley. And you can push that all the way up to the Sea of Galilee, up to the Hulu Plain, all the way down to the, I think, probably all the way down to the Gulf of Aqaba. You can see it's outlined in the blue

there. So that's the Sedom Lagoon. It evaporated and went down to the current Sea of Galilee, or Dead Sea. So, if the current topography is the same, obviously it would have been this identical topography for millennia past. Certainly in the age of Abraham, it would have been like that. So where in that entire area would you find a nice flat plain that was well watered? If you went straight east from Bethel, it would take you just north of Jericho.

Yeah, it is green down at the bottom, I agree. And when it rains appropriately, there's some grass on the hills. But I'm thinking for you to take all of your herds and all your stuff and parking it down in that valley, I don't think that would be the Garden of Eden or the Nile River Delta. So I think I'm going to believe what the Tanakh says, which is he moved to the Jordan Plain, which is a flat piece of land, and it was just like the Garden of Eden or the Nile River Delta, and he lived there in the plain. Now, our story continues in Genesis 13:12-13:

Abram lived in the land of Canaan, while Lot lived among the cities of the plain and pitched his tents near Sodom. Now the men of Sodom were wicked and were sinning greatly against the LORD.

So, Abram stayed put. Obviously the land would now support him. And he stayed there with his altar calling on the name of the LORD. And his greedy grabber nephew went over to this well-watered plain, and he parked his caravan right next to the city of Sodom.

Bad choice, because the city of Sodom was full of men that are described as MyIaDÚfAjw MyIor (ra‘im vechatta’im). And this phrase translated wicked sinners, the ra'im is plural, vechatta’im is also plural. This is referring to all the men of Sodom.

MyIor (ra‘im) comes from the root oor (ra‘a‘), which we know from our episode with Job, that this means badness, evil, wicked. Job turned away from this, but it seems that Lot is turning towards this because he parked his family and everything up next to Sodom. I think he moved there because it was probably the best pasture lands.

MyIaDÚfAjw (vechatta’im) comes from the root afj (chata‘), which means miss, go wrong, sin, forfeit, incur guilt, condemnation, or punishment. So, this is the word sin, sinners. Sin has the meaning of punishment, ones deserving of punishment. So, Sodom was ripe for punishment from Elohim. They were very wicked, and they were deserving of punishment. Now, after Lot left Abram, the LORD came to Abram, and he spoke to him. And he had a very important message. I mean it was a huge message. He was going to give him a massive gift. This is found in Genesis 12:14-18:

The LORD said to Abram after Lot had parted from him, “Lift up your eyes from where you are and look north and south, east and west. All the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever. I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted. Go, walk through the length and breadth of the land, for I am giving it to you.”

So Abram moved his tents and went to live near the great trees of Mamre at Hebron, where he built an altar to the LORD.

Okay, here it is, altar number four. He moved down to Amorite territory, probably better pasture lands. He made friends with three guys, Mamre, Eshcol and Aner.

And that's going to be his new base of operations. Now, did the Lord appear to Abram again and talk to him? Or did he just speak to him from the clouds? Or did Abram have a dream and dreamed all this? It does not say in the Tanakh what happened. You can imagine any of those could be possible. But what we do know is that the Lord talked to Abram and gave him this promise. Now, I think the best way to imagine this is to assume that Dr. Smith has the deed to a very large piece of land. Let's pick an obvious piece of land, Yellowstone National Park.

Let's say I own Yellowstone National Park, and I'm going to give it to you. Just like God's giving Abram a huge piece of land. So, I'm going

to put you in the middle of the park. I'm going to put you down in the caldera region where all those geysers and those hot pools and all those boiling pits are.

And I'm going to put you right in front of Old Faithful. And I'm going to say, look to the north, and you look to the hills up there, and turn around, look to the south, and then look to the east, look to the west. Everything you see is yours. You own it.

Now I want you to go to the northern boundary of Yellowstone National Park and I want you to walk all the way down to the southern boundary. Then I want you to go over to the east boundary and I want you to walk all the way over to the west boundary. Every place your foot sets, that belongs to you. Now, Yellowstone is 2.2 million acres. It's actually 2,221,766 acres, which is less than half of what Abram was getting. Abram was getting somewhere around 5.4 or even more, depending on how far you put the territory out. 5.4 million acres. How on earth was he going to walk that? How on earth was he going to take possession of that? Well, the obvious answer is he himself wasn't going to take possession of it. His offspring, his myriad dust-of-the-earth offspring were going to take it. So the promise given to Abram was extended all the way down through his line to all of his offspring.

Abram really showed no concern over Lot's choice to go over to the best land. He knew that his covenant with Abram was so strong, so secure, that no matter where he went, he was going to end up on top.

Now, I want to read a paragraph from my original Messiah in the Old Testament. It says:

God was revealing piece by piece the extent of his blessing to Abram. He made Abram wealthy in gold, silver, livestock, maidservants and menservants, herdsmen and soldiers. He gave Abram the deed to a vast expanse of land. In essence, God made Abram a king over all the land that would become the future

nation of Israel. He promised him innumerable offspring to fill the promised land. This all has Messianic significance.

So here they are all the rest of the Messianic Prophecies for this episode:

3) Abram’s inheritance of Canaan ensured that the Messianic line would prosper and continue beyond Abram.

4) The expansive proliferation of Abram’s offspring ensured that the Messianic Line would continue through Abram and his offspring.

5) Abram as a type of Messiah acted as a king over the land that was to become Israel. Messiah will be ruler over all he can see.

6) Abram as a type of Messiah will have offspring as numerous as dust. Messiah will also have offspring (followers) as numerous as dust.

So Hebron became Abram's new base of operation. I'm sure his massive amount of wealth and his stunningly beautiful wife helped his cause and allowed him to become friends with the men of the land. And I think that they all in this new place lived in comfort and safety. Abram had his own personal army and I'm sure that personal army also helped protect Mamre and his two brothers and his family.

So I think this was a very, very happy relationship. Now that ends today's episode. And next time we're going to continue with an episode that's full of exciting things. There's going to be battles. There's going to be kidnappings. There's going to be warfare. There's going to be chases. There's going to be all kinds of wild things. And then it's going to end up with Messiah being demonstrated through a man named Melchizedek. So join me next time.

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.