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Sherlock

















Bible "MYSTERY"

The word "mystery" (Strong's #3466) occurs twenty-seven (27) times in the New Testament (Gr. 'musterion'), but not at all in the Old Testament.

Mark 4:11: "[Jesus] said unto them, "Unto you it is given to know the mystery of the kingdom of God: but unto them that are without, all these things are done in parables".

Ephesians 3:9: "And to make all men see what is the fellowship of the mystery, which from the beginning of the world hath been hid in God, who created all things by Jesus Christ".

Prov25:2 It is the glory of God to conceal a thing: but the honour of kings is to search out a matter.

Romans 16:25 Now to him that is of power to stablish you according to my gospel, and the preaching of Jesus Christ, according to the revelation of the mystery, which was kept secret since the world began..

Ephesians 5:32 "This is a great mystery: but I speak concerning Christ and the church".

Ephesians 6:18 "Praying always with all prayer and supplication in the Spirit, and watching thereunto with all perseverance and supplication for all saints; 6:19 And for me, that utterance may be given unto me, that I may open my mouth boldly, to make known the mystery of the gospel".

Colossians 4:3 "Praying also for us, that God would open unto us a door of utterance, to speak the mystery of Christ".




Christian ties to Groundhog Day...

Most Americans don't even know what day it happens on -- that day when the groundhog looks for his shadow to tell us whether we'll have another 6 weeks of winter.

The 2nd day of February is the 33rd day of the year, which was preceded by the last 7 days of December, beginning on the 25th (Christmas Day).

Forty (40) days total, and matching the time prescribed in Leviticus 12:4 for the purification of the woman after she birthed a boy. (Its twice this, for a girl.) Despite the change in calendars and dispute about the day Jesus was born, the seven (7) and the thirty-three (33) from Christmas to Groundhog Day line up with the Leviticus text in a poignant and mysterious way.

Lev12:2 Speak unto the children of Israel, saying, If a woman have conceived seed, and born a man child: then she shall be unclean seven days; according to the days of the separation for her infirmity shall she be unclean. 12:3 And in the eighth day the flesh of his foreskin shall be circumcised. [New Years Day by our calendar!]
12:4 And she shall then continue in the blood of her purifying three and thirty days; she shall touch no hallowed thing, nor come into the sanctuary, until the days of her purifying be fulfilled.

Are we looking forward to 'Getting Into the Sanctuary?'

The allegory here is saying that the boy that was birthed was Jesus, and the woman (Bride of Christ) is the Church that is going through this purification process before going to Heaven!



The number combination7+33 is also connected with King David. Four (4) times it's recorded how David reigned seven years in Hebron, and thirty-three in Jerusalem!


Mystery re The 3 choices given King David

King David was given his choice of three punishments for his sin of numbering Israel;
1 Chronicles 21:1-12. It should be remembered how David is number thirty-three in the generations, and how "the foolishness of God is greater than the wisdom of men", 1Cor1:25.

"Either three years famine;
or three months to be destroyed by thy foes; or else three days the sword of the Lord, even the pestilence..."


King David seemed to think it was a tough choice: he said "I am in a great strait", but he (wisely, don't you think?) chose the three days because he didn't want to fall into the hand of man. 1Chr21:13.

David was living ten centuries before Christ, in 1,000 BC, and maybe didn't know that a thousand years are as one day with the Lord (Ps90:4, 2Pet3:8), but he probably had heard about previous leaders who had 'numbered Israel', so it isn't clear (a mystery) why it was such a sin.

This story is presented differently in 2Sam24 -- instead of 3 years of famine,
it reads 7 years. "So Gad came to David and told him, and said unto him, Shall seven years of famine come unto thee in thy land? Or wilt thou flee three months before thine enemies while they pursue thee? Or that there be three days pestilence in thy land?"

The three (3) is replaced with a seven (7) in the 2Sam24 record. It reminds me of how Jesus spoke of being raised on the third day, and how WE are now the Body of Christ and when 1,000 yrs = 1 Day then we're already in the 3rd Day. However, the 3rd day becomes the 7th day when the count is begun with Adam.

Day 1 & 2 are the Genesis Period, and Day 3 & 4 are the Old Covenant Period, and Day 5 & 6 are the New Covenant Period. The millennium ahead of us becomes either the 3rd day or 7th day depending on where the count is begun. Note that only Bible readers recognize the 1000 yr. period which began with the year 2000.



















Mystery re The Two Cockcrows.

Hallelujah!

Three of the gospels; Matthew, Luke, and John, all record how Jesus told Simon Peter that he would deny Him three times before the cock crowed. It's the gospel of Mark, 14:30, which throws a monkey wrench into this account by having Jesus say "before the cock crows twice, thou shalt deny me thrice".

The cock crowed TWICE!

My wife told me she was going to scream if she heard any more about that rooster crowing. I went round and round with all four gospels before concluding that Peter had to have denied Jesus three times before the first cockcrow and three more times before the second cockcrow. Six times in all; detailed rather extensively in the four accounts.

The Great Author is thus perceived to have engineered this mystery of the gospels for the edification of believers. It's part of the banquet table (his Word) He's prepared for us in the midst of our enemies!





Sherlock























MYSTERY OF THE NAME

"Wherefore God also hath highly exalted [Jesus], and given him a name which is above every name". Phil 2:9

    What's so special about that name, or for that matter ANY name?? Even if you take the name Gates or Madonna, you don't have access to their bank acounts, do you?

Keeping the name from being eliminated was the apparent reason for a strange law in the Old Testament.

"If brethren dwell together, and one of them die, and have no child, the wife of the dead shall not marry without unto a stranger: her husband's brother shall go in unto her, and take her to him to wife, and perform the duty of an husband's brother unto her
And it shall be, that the firstborn which she beareth shall succeed in the name of his brother which is dead, that his name be not put out of Israel". Deut25:5,6.

The 'case study' for this law is found in Genesis 38 where Tamar was married in turn to two of Judah's sons; Er, and then his brother Onan, who both died childless. Judah promised his third son, Shelah to the widow Tamar, and his seeming procrastination was why she "played the harlot" with Judah himself. When his own culpability was discovered, he allowed as how Tamar had been more righteous than himself.

We may have wondered how Noah knew to differentiate between the clean and unclean animals, because the Bible doesn't spell that out until Leviticus 11, and somehow Judah knew in advance about this law of the brother's wife and naming that offspring accordingly,.because he did exactly that. Seems the widow (the brother, too) had no choice in the matter but had to accept the marriage even if they didn't cotton to one another..

The Sadducee's posed a hypothetical question to Jesus based on this account; wondering whose wife she would be in heaven, Mt22:28, and he told them they didn't know what they were talking about.

Ruth was a widow after her husband Mahlon died, Ru4:10, and knew about raising up the name, but after marrying Boaz they named their firstborn 'Obed' instead of the name of Ruth's dead husband. Did they deliberately violate the law by giving baby Obed a new name? (One that had never been used before.)

CONSIDER how "God is a husband", Isa54:5 and Jer3:14, married to the Hebrews (the chosen people, like Rachel was to Jacob) and how the death on the Cross has freed that 'wife' to enter into the New Covenant with the Resurrected Jesus.

CONSIDER how the Law was UNSUCCESSFUL (not being mixed with faith, Heb4:2), but now with the New Name of Jesus, the Gentiles are being 'fruitful' (as Leah was -- she was the wife who had six sons and one daughter.)

The OT mentions surnames in Isa45:4, and several persons in the NT are given surnames, but the modern practice of the wife taking the surname of the husband is not found in scripture, so the reality of how it's the SONS (not the daughters) who carry on the Family-Name, may escape our notice.

The New-name theme is found in both Old and New Testaments: Abram became Abraham, Sarai became Sarah (adding the 'h', maybe like in Jesus h. Christ), Jacob became Israel, Simon became Peter, Saul became Paul, etc.

So, what's in a name? Are they important, or are they only valid for identification purposes?











Mystery re The Confusion over the Genealogy of Jesus



The genealogy of Jesus Christ is recorded in Matthew Chapter One and refers to Jesus as "the son of Abraham, the son of David".

The reader of the Old Testament knows about Ishmael and Isaac being the first two sons of Abraham, and how King David had many sons, and reasons that Jesus was only a "son" in the sense of being a great, great, great, great, etc. GRANDSON. That is, descended from that bloodline via his mother, the virgin Mary. His father, of course, was the Heavenly Father.

Surnames aren't used in the Old Testament, although Isaiah speaks of them. Instead, it's the name of their father which identifies them, and especially when two or more share the same name. It may be worth remembering how the Book of Jude departs from this custom when it identifies Enoch as the seventh from Adam, rather than 'son of Jared'. Instead of imagining a discrepancy, we should consider how the anomaly may be a clue to better understanding.



A puzzling chapter indeed, is Matthew chapter one. All the generations from Abraham to David are fourteen (father to son, and father to son, etc.), and the generations from David to the carrying away to Babylon are fourteen, and from the carrying away until Jesus are fourteen. Three periods of fourteen according to Matt1:17, but the astute reader soon discovers five Old Testament names are unexpectedly missing from the second column, and the third column appears to be short one generation.

Some names are spelled differently, probably because of the change in language from Hebrew to Greek. Hezekiah for instance (a famous king) is spelled Ezekias, and Jechonias was better known in the Old Testament as Coniah or Jehoiachin.

In Gen6:9 we are told how Noah was "perfect" in his generation. It's a clue to the Old Testament generation count to David, because the next ten generations lead to Abram#20 and the third and last group of ten is found at the conclusion of the Book of Ruth which takes us from Pharez to David. You might think David would be generation #30, but you'd be wrong because of 3 'skipped' names: Isaac, Jacob, and Judah. So David is generation #33 and Jesus is #66.


Sherlock

















The Generation Chart

All the generations from Adam to David are thirty-three (33), and all the generations from David to Jesus are 33. [Compare the analogous logic with Matthew 1:17].

Genesis 5 and 11, 1Chr1-3:17 .................> Three Periods of 14 Generations

1. Adam 20. Abraham 34. Solomon 53. Salathiel
2. Seth 21. Isaac 35. Rehoboam 54. Zerubbabel
3. Enos 22. Jacob I 36. Abijam 55. Abiud
4. Cainan 23. Judah 37. Asa 56. Eliakim
5. Mahalaleel 24. Pharez 38. Jehoshaphat 57. Azor
6. Jared 25. Esrom 39. Jehoram 58. Sadoc
7. Enoch II 26. Aram 40. * Ahaziah 59. Achim
8. Methuselah 27. Aminidab 41. * Joash 60. Eliud
9. Lamech II 28. Naason 42. * Amaziah 61. Eleazar
10. NOAH 29. Salmon(Rahab) 43. Uzziah 62. Matthan
11. Shem 30. Boaz (Ruth) 44. Jotham 63. Jacob II
12. Arphaxad 31. Obed 45. Ahaz 64. Joseph
13. Salah/Shelah 32. Jesse 46. Hezekiah 65. Mary
14. Eber 33. DAVID 47. Manasses 66. JESUS
15. Peleg   48. Amon  
16. Reu   49. Josiah  
17. Serug   50. * Jehoiakim  
18. Nahor   51. Jechonias  
19. Terah   52. * Assir  



Notice first that there are thirty-three (33) generations leading to David, and then thirty-three (33) leading to Jesus. Then note that all of the sixty-six names (except for Jacob) are unique and different. The name Jacob means "supplanter", to take the place of...Gen27:36. The generations marked with (*) are recorded in the Old Testament, but aren't found in Matthew: a fact which to this very day continues to baffle many scholars.

The cryptogram seen here is the 7th generation (the second Enoch) and the 9th generation (the second Lamech) which lead to the 63rd generation (second Jacob).

Jesus knew Mary as his mother, and both his father and grandfather were named Joseph!
Gives new meaning to the modern term of 'grandfathered', maybe?

  The only Joseph in the lineage of Jesus was Mary's father. The Joseph in Egypt wasn't in His pedigree and neither was Mary's husband. I like to think that we are 'wise virgins' (like Mary), and that we have a heavenly father and heavenly husband (Isa54:5) with the SAME NAME!! Christ in us; the hope of glory!

The 66 Generations are a parallel to the 66 Books of the Bible; authenticating for us how Jesus is really 'The WORD', and how there are no missing books or none to be excluded. The 39+27 are COMPLETE!



Follow the Four!

The 66 chapters of Isaiah BEGINS with 4-Generations (father to son) -- Uzziah, Jotham, Ahaz, Hezekiah. We note that Hezekiah wasn't the last King of Judah, altho it was during his reign that the Northern Kingdom of Israel was carried away, and 4 chapters in Isaiah, 36-39, furnish us further details about Hezekiah. For one, he mandated a tremendous Passover, although in the second month instead of the first, and 2K18:5 declares him to be a remarkable king unlike any other..

When we continue the father-to-son trail, it continues: Hezekiah, Manasseh, Amon, Josiah, and this Josiah ALSO celebrates a notable Passover, 2K23:22, and is ALSO described as a 'special' king, 2K23:25. He leads the way to the 'Carrying away to Babylon, and the end of the dynasty of David and Kings of Judah: Josiah, Jehoiakim, Jeconiah, Assir. Yes, we know about Zedekiah being set as the last king, but he wasn't in the father-to-son line, even though of the House of Judah.

Gen15:16 "But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full". The sons of Jacob included Levi (3rd son of Leah), so the 4-Generations would be Levi, Kohath, Amram, Moses.









Compare the logic to the three periods of fourteen generations.







Check out Leviticus 12:4,5 and Genesis 46:15,26 to see the two places in the Bible where the numbers 33 and 66 are used TOGETHER.









Bob is duxrowQ@Qcswnet.com
(omit the Q's) Use 'website' in subject..


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