9. A Bride for Isaac
9. A Bride for Isaac - for Notes
9. A Bride for Isaac - PP
Every marriage in the Old Testament is a picture of Jesus and the Church in full union together. And every child born of that union is a picture of the revelation of Jesus Christ through us, the life of God entering into creation.
Rebekah provides us with the simplest and most profound answer to the Lord Jesus Christ. Will you go with this man? – I will go.
Yet this man was not Isaac, but Abraham’s chief servant, representing the Holy Spirit who alone takes the bride into union with Christ.
Always Together. And the Spirit and the bride say, “Come!” (Revelation 22:17). The Spirit and the Bride are always together, you can’t have one without the other. The Bride is the full expression of the Spirit.
For just as the body is one, but has many members, yet all the members of the body, being many, are one body, so also is Christ. Indeed, we also inside of one Spirit were immersed into one body… and have all been made to drink one Spirit (1 Corinthians 12:12-13).
“Body,” “Bride,” and “Temple” are three ways to see the same relationship and speak of a very literal form.
A Many-Membered Bride. For the body is not one member, but many (verse 14).
Union with Christ must always be personal first and always to pure and perfect knowing. But union with Christ that does not find its fulfillment in a many-membered Bride of Christ, in the end, becomes no union at all.
Jesus does not marry a group of individuals, disconnected from one another. Jesus marries the Church universal but expressed as each local fellowship. For we are members of one another (Romans 12).
The Same Mission. We have turned around inside the Holiest and have embraced the revelation of Jesus Christ, that God might enter into His creation out from our own hearts. Thus, we also embrace this same mission with God’s Eliezer, to bring this Bride to the Lord Jesus, that He might win all His desire.
And thus these words – The Spirit and the bride say, “Come!” take on a meaning most do not consider.
This “bride” referenced here is speaking of you and me, fully grounded in our own union with Christ, yet now turning in the passion of Jesus to win the larger bride for Himself.
Desire for His Church. The Heart of God is the Lord Jesus Christ and the Heart of the Lord Jesus is His Desire for His Church. To share Hheart with God, then, is to share that same passion, whether we feel anything or not.
Love is not a feeling; love is a commitment.
When I committed myself to Jesus years ago, I committed myself to His Church without reservation, that she might come to Him and drink. That Jesus might have a body, a bride, a physical/spiritual form inside this heaven/earth, that He might reveal Himself to all, that Father might be known.
As Eliezer. It is into this mind, then, that we place Genesis 24, a Bride for Isaac. You and I are as/with Eliezer, Abraham’s servant.
It is the coming of this Bride to Jesus that gives my/our life meaning and gives importance to every moment. We approach her, as Eliezer/the Spirit do, as a servant.
Yet Eliezer does not represent Isaac first, but Abraham, and he comes with all the authority and provision of Abraham and with specific directions that he will follow in honor. Abraham, of course, represents to us the Father, sending the Holy Spirit to win a Bride for His Son. Eliezer’s instructions, then, give us a view into Father’s Heart.
Our Instructions. Let’s list the instructions that Eliezer followed.
Isaac must not marry a local Canaanite (out of Ham). Isaac must marry a daughter of Abraham’s family (out of Shem). Isaac must not return to the country out of which God had called Abraham – “You shall not take my son back there.” The bride for Isaac must be willing; if she is not, then Eliezer is released from his oath. The angel of the Lord will lead Eliezer in the way.
Eliezer then went with full provision from Abraham’s abundance.
Where We Bring the Bride. As I read through this chapter, what comes to me is, first, John 14:20, and then the entirety of Jesus’ words in the upper room, John 14-17.
Just as Isaac was to remain inside of Abraham, so to speak, so Jesus remains inside the Father. That’s where we have to go to be part of Him. That where I am, there you may be also.
Here, then, is my contention. Do you see how the word “heaven” eliminates the Person of the Father (Know that I am inside of the Father) and turns the completion of union with Christ into a geographical location.
No Thought. AND – the false definition of “heaven” is not heaven, but the primacy of death. So when the entire conception of “death to heaven” is vanished from our minds, all that is left for us is a Personal God, All-Here-Now.
And so we come to the Church with no thought of “to heaven,” but with all thought of Father Personal and Now. We come with that now-ness and here-ness, all-ness and personal-ness.
When we look at the Church, we think only in terms of all fulfillment now, with no conception of “someday.”
In the Highest Regard. Then we see that the larger part of Genesis 24 shows us just how seriously Eliezer took his commission.
Eliezer expects God’s leading immediately. He refuses to accept hospitality until he has stated Abraham’s instructions to him. And he is ready to return immediately upon hearing Rebekah’s willingness to go.
A servant acts in this way when he holds his master in the highest regard. And it is this regard that Rebekah’s family saw and thus knew that it was Abraham himself come to them through this servant.
The Spirit Through Us. We are thinking in terms of Eliezer as the Spirit through us.
When the Helper comes, whom I will send you in the presence of the Father, the Spirit of truth, who goes forth and is spread abroad in the presence of the Father, He will bear witness concerning Me (John 15:26-27).
When He, however, has come, the Spirit of truth, He will guide you inside of all truth; indeed, He will not speak from Himself, but whatever He may hear, He will speak, and the things coming [from God] He will make known to you. All things the Father possesses are Mine; …He will take out of that which is Mine and will make it known to you (John 16:13-15).
For the Bride. And so we see that all the wealth that Eliezer took with him, though it came from Abraham, in reality, it all belonged to Isaac as Abraham’s heir.
Yet Paul said that we are that same (singular) heir.
Now, there is no question that the story of Rebekah in Genesis 24, and Jesus’ words concerning the coming of the Holy Spirit to us, are utterly for each one of us personally. And we can see Hebrews 10:19-22 in Jesus’ words, our seizing hold of everything given to us inside of God. But the hour is late, and our hearts are now turned to the entire Bride – for Father’s sake.
Out from Our Hearts. Here is what I’m driving towards. God is all-powerful and God is all-love. But God cannot just do in human affairs because He has no authority to do. In the moment God said “Subdue,” He gave all authority over all creation, heaven and earth, into the hands of man.
I do not believe in fate or fatalism – “God’s will.” I do not believe in “Well, God will do it when it’s His time.” I believe in symmorphy-synergeia, that God does all that He does entirely together with us, as Wwe share all form and all desire and all doing together.
God comes to His Church out from our hearts.
Authority to Love. Here is another of the ruling verses of the Bible growing in its size and importance. How can we place ourselves as the love of Jesus towards His Church?
By this we know love, because He set forth His soul for us, and we also are committed to setting forth our souls for the sake of our brothers and sisters.
God gave us all authority to be as Jesus to His Bride, not to take His place, but to show her His love, Jesus Himself through us. And God Himself is that Love.
More – No Thought. And thus we see the IMMENSE importance of Genesis 22 being fulfilled in our lives.
Notice what Jesus said – He will bear witness concerning Me – He will not speak from Himself, but whatever He hears, He will speak – He will take what is Mine and make it known to you.
As we have offered our hearts to the Father for His dwelling place, that He might be Mercy through us, so we come to Jesus’ Bride with no thought of ourselves, but only of that which concerns Him. We come to our fellow believers to connect them ONLY with Jesus, with no thought of ourselves.
Do NOT! Yet God has given us/the Holy Spirit two vital “Do Not’s.” DO NOT find a bride from among the Canaanites. DO NOT take my son back there again. We must let these two “Do Not’s” fill our hearts.
The Canaanites were the most wicked people on earth, having received the worship of Satan from before the flood through Ham. These same practices fill our world today – read www.vigilantcitizen.com to see what that means.
The first “Do not” means find those who are pure of heart. Those who are pure of heart give freely with joy, as Rebekah did.
One Sacrifice. And the second “Do not” is found here – one sacrifice for sins forever – one unlimited sacrifice for sins.
The clearest outward display of “taking Jesus back again” is the crucifix, the ever-dying “Christ.” But the practice of “the crucifix” in the church is that of forcing the cross as a present “dying” onto God’s people, an unfinished and limited exercise, a “penance,” a weeping and wailing over something God does not know.
Pure of heart (to the pure all things are pure) and no consciousness of sins. – This is God’s STRICT injunction to us, not for us but for others.
Nothing without Her. I want to look specifically, now, at this Bride, this Rebekah, this “I will go,” which I have termed as one hundred million believers in Jesus all across this earth. The number is not definitive, just large and extensive.
There is NO proving of Jesus faithful and true without her. There is NO fulfillment of God’s intentions inside creation without her. There is NO life for us without her. There is NO Salvation-Revealed without her.
Let our own hearts be broken by this one who says, “I will go.”
False versus True. Let me show you the difference between the false prophet and the true witnesses of Christ.
The false prophet looks at Christians all across this earth and sees a prostitute covered with the garments of sin. The true witnesses of Christ look at the same Christians and SEE a woman clothed with the Lord Jesus Christ, carrying His life in her belly.
All authority has been given to Me in heaven-earth. Having gone through [yourselves, then turn] and immerse all into … (Matthew 28). I will give to my “true” witnesses, and they will call Me forth – inside My Church.
Their Eyes Are Evil. I needed to remember how to spell Dennis Cline’s name correctly, but in my search, I found him listed on a “Christian” website exposed as one of the leading false prophets taking God’s people into end-times deception. Say what?
This is the same Dennis Cline who led the little church in my mother’s living room, a gentle and good man who loves Jesus and who pours out his life for God’s people.
They look at Jesus and see a prostitute because their eyes are evil. And their eyes are evil because their hearts are not pure. They insist on weeping and wailing over sin.
Seeing the Bride. When God took me to that Thanksgiving retreat at Christian Renewal Center in 1994, He showed me this very woman, His intended Bride for Jesus.
I was looking at around 110 people from many varying Christian groups, but with no thought of any difference. They were gathered together in one Spirit, in love with one Jesus, and desiring to know the Lord in the Spirit of truth.
And I look across the non-Pentecostal Spirit-filled fellowships of my knowledge, including Lakewood Church, and I see the same people, the same Rebekah, saying to the same Holy Spirit, “I will go with you; take me to Jesus.”
Into Sarah’s Tent. Yet we do not exclude any, but welcome with wide-open arms and hearts all who come to drink.
And here is the final point. – Then Isaac brought her into his mother Sarah’s tent; and he took Rebekah and she became his wife, and he loved her. Paul said that Sarah represents the Jerusalem of God, the mother of us all, that is, the Church universal.
And the Spirit and the bride say, “Come!” And the one hearing, let him say, “Come!” And the one thirsting, let him come; the one desiring, let him receive the water of life freely (Revelation 22:17).
Come and See – Where I Am. And John and Andrew said to Jesus, “Where do You dwell?” and Jesus said to them, “Come and see” (John 1).
Just as Eliezer brought Rebekah straight to Isaac, that Isaac might embrace her WHERE HE DWELLS, so the Holy Spirit through us draws this Bride for Jesus into that place where He dwells, that “Come and see.” We are speaking of Christ Community, the revelation of Jesus through every local assembly, loving one another with pure hearts fervently.
I am inside of the Father – where two or three of you are gathered together in my name, there I am – same thing.
Reading for Next Time. I have written this lesson, not to impart understanding to your mind, but to imprint your heart with the same passion that fills the heart of Jesus right now over these “100 million believers” across the earth. This one time I want to alter the chronological flow and bring forward the story of Gideon in order to shape our prayers together for God’s people as well as to shape our thinking as we continue with Jacob, Joseph, and Moses.
For the next session read Judges 6 & 7, the story of Gideon and his three hundred. Then read Luke 12:35-49, Matthew 2:16-18, and all of Psalm 144 and Psalm 18.
He teaches my hands to make war.