Given the response to last night's post, here's the conclusion to yesterday's study on leviathan:
Psalm 104: [26] There go the ships: there is that leviathan, whom thou hast made to play therein.
He's talking about the ships going out here in the Mediterranean and that's where the idea of Leviathan being a whale comes from. If there's going to be an animal to liken him to that way, a whale would be okay, says Richard Jordan.
In Jonah 2, Jonah is swallowed by "a great fish," but Jesus says it's a whale in Matthew 12: [40] For as Jonas was three days and three nights in the whale's belly; so shall the Son of man be three days and three nights in the heart of the earth.
Well, that's a picture of Satan.
Psalm 74, referencing leviathan, is a teaching of Asaph, a prophet in Israel's history. When he writes such psalms they are basically prophetic. Psalm 78 is another example: [1] Give ear, O my people, to my law: incline your ears to the words of my mouth.
[2] I will open my mouth in a parable: I will utter dark sayings of old:In this chapter he gives you a picture of some things in Israel's history and says those things are a parable, a picture of what's going to come in the future.
[18] And they tempted God in their heart by asking meat for their lust.
[19] Yea, they spake against God; they said, Can God furnish a table in the wilderness?
[20] Behold, he smote the rock, that the waters gushed out, and the streams overflowed; can he give bread also? can he provide flesh for his people?
[21] Therefore the LORD heard this, and was wroth: so a fire was kindled against Jacob, and anger also came up against Israel;
[22] Because they believed not in God, and trusted not in his salvation:
[23] Though he had commanded the clouds from above, and opened the doors of heaven,
[24] And had rained down manna upon them to eat, and had given them of the corn of heaven.
[25] Man did eat angels' food: he sent them meat to the full.
So God literally fed them. What he's saying there is, "You see what God did back there? He's going to do that again." In Revelation 12 He feeds them in the wilderness.
Here's another prophecy of Asaph in Psalm 74: [1] O God, why hast thou cast us off for ever? why doth thine anger smoke against the sheep of thy pasture?
[2] Remember thy congregation, which thou hast purchased of old; the rod of thine inheritance, which thou hast redeemed; this mount Zion, wherein thou hast dwelt.That's Isaiah 26: "Here's the little flock; here's His congregation. Here's the righteous nation. Remember them."
In connection with that, go to verse 9: [9] We see not our signs: there is no more any prophet: neither is there among us any that knoweth how long.
Who do the sign gifts belong to in the Bible? The nation Israel. "There's no more any prophet." During that fifth course of judgment God's withdrawn from them.
[10] O God, how long shall the adversary reproach? shall the enemy blaspheme thy name for ever?
[11] Why withdrawest thou thy hand, even thy right hand? pluck it out of thy bosom.
[12] For God is my King of old, working salvation in the midst of the earth.
[13] Thou didst divide the sea by thy strength: thou brakest the heads of the dragons in the waters.
[14] Thou brakest the heads of leviathan in pieces, and gavest him to be meat to the people inhabiting the wilderness.
There's the dragon and there's leviathan. It says, "and gavest him to be meat to the people inhabiting the wilderness."
My point is that's going to happen again in Revelation 12. You remember when Satan came to tempt Christ? Have you ever wondered why he'd ask Him, "Turn that stone into bread"?
The three temptations that he asked Christ to do were things that Jesus Christ is going to do in the future at His Second Coming.
Satan wanted Him to do it then. Jesus could do it, but He didn't come to do that then. If you don't rightly divide the Word of truth, you can't understand even the temptations of Christ, because the temptation was to do something God said He was going to do that He will do but not at that time. It wasn't the right time in the program. But my point is He's going to feed them in that day.
And in the passage, He's going to use the breaking of leviathan to do it. The destruction of leviathan, the destruction of the Antichrist, the destruction of the dragon, the destruction of the satanic policy of evil . . . In that destruction He's going to deliver his people.
I want you to see in Isaiah 27 again: [1] In that day the LORD with his sore and great and strong sword shall punish leviathan the piercing serpent, even leviathan that crooked serpent; and he shall slay the dragon that is in the sea.
He punishes the satanic policy of evil with that Book. The sword, it's effective. It works. It's incisive; it's sharp. Back in Deuteronomy 32, the first time we read about it, it's His glittering sword:
[41] If I whet my glittering sword, and mine hand take hold on judgment; I will render vengeance to mine enemies, and will reward them that hate me.[42] I will make mine arrows drunk with blood, and my sword shall devour flesh; and that with the blood of the slain and of the captives, from the beginning of revenges upon the enemy.
When it says "whet," it means He sharpened it and it's glistening because He's got it sharp and polished. It's a sharp, two-edged sword. It gets the work done. It overcomes ANY opposition.