Chasing down the changes

In Genesis 17, God does something extremely important with Abraham and Sarah. He talks to Abram, saying, “As for me, behold, my covenant is with thee, and thou shalt be a father of many nations.
[5] Neither shall thy name any more be called Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham; for a father of many nations have I made thee.
[6] And I will make thee exceeding fruitful, and I will make nations of thee, and kings shall come out of thee.”

In verse 15, God continues with the further proclamation, “As for Sarai thy wife, thou shalt not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall her name be.
[16] And I will bless her, and give thee a son also of her: yea, I will bless her, and she shall be a mother of nations; kings of people shall be of her.”

Jordan explains, “Notice in verse 5, God changes Abram’s name and what He does is He takes the 5^th letter of the Hebrew alphabet and inserts it into Abraham’s name.

“Again, in verse 15, He takes that 5^th letter of the Hebrew alphabet (and that letter that represents death to the old life and grace for the new life) and inserts grace into Sarai’s name. This is where, in verse 17, He formalizes His covenant with the nation Israel.

“Verse 10 says, ‘This is my covenant, which ye shall keep, between me and you and thy seed after thee; Every man child among you shall be circumcised.
[11] And ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin; and it shall be a token of the covenant betwixt me and you.

“It’s the sign and the seal, Romans 4 says, of that covenant that God made. He cut the covenant in Genesis 15, promised it in Genesis 12. He laid out the details in Genesis 13 and then seals it with the sign of circumcision.

“Here’s God’s new seed line in the earth right here. Now when you have a name change in the Bible, there’s something prophetic about it. In Isaiah 62:1 you see the name change is associated with Israel’s kingdom: ‘For Zion's sake will I not hold my peace, and for Jerusalem's sake I will not rest, until the righteousness thereof go forth as brightness, and the salvation thereof as a lamp that burneth.’

“Zion appears only one time in your Bible in the possessive. Every other time it’s just Zion. It occurs 152 times in the singular and one time in the possessive plural. That equals 153.

 

“You understand you can’t do this with anything but a KJB. God is called the God of Israel 203 times in the KJB. You ought to divide that by 17 and see what you come up with.

“Psalm 69:35 says, ‘For God will save Zion, and will build the cities of Judah: that they may dwell there, and have it in possession.’

“God’s intention is to take Zion, that’s that part of the city of Jerusalem where the temple was, and make it the city of the great king.

“When God ratified the covenant with Abraham in Gen. 15, do you remember He put Abraham asleep and they cut the sacrifices up? And the Lord went down between that in the garden, you remember what that was like?

“Gen 15:12 says, ‘And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and, lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him.’

“The smoking furnace in Deuteronomy 4 is described as the captivity. The burning lamp . . . all through the horror of great darkness they have a guide that takes them to the glory on the other end in the promise of God’s word to them.

“So when you come back to Isaiah 62, the salvation of Israel is going to be ‘as a lamp that burneth.’ That’s talking about the Abrahamic covenant and God’s salvation to Israel through His promise to Abraham.

“Isaiah 62:2 says, ‘And the Gentiles shall see thy righteousness, and all kings thy glory: and thou shalt be called by a new name, which the mouth of the LORD shall name.’

“That’s exactly what He does with the Abrahamic covenant. He gives Abraham a new name. This new name is associated with the nation Israel during the tribulation period.

“Revelation 2:17 says, ‘He that hath an ear, let him hear what the Spirit saith unto the churches; To him that overcometh will I give to eat of the hidden manna, and will give him a white stone, and in the stone a new name written, which no man knoweth saving he that receiveth it.’

“One of the rewards the overcoming remnant’s going to get is that new name. What verse is that in? Verse 17. Just coincidence, I understand, it’s just fascinating that it’s the right verse.

“If you’re looking for another one, go to Acts 2. When the Holy Spirit comes on the apostles here, verse 5 says they were ‘dwelling at Jerusalem Jews, devout men, out of every nation under heaven’ . . . they all heard them speak in their own language and then He lists them in verse 8-12. You know there are 17 different groups listed there?

“Look at verse 17: ‘And it shall come to pass in the last days, saith God, I will pour out of my Spirit upon all flesh: and your sons and your daughters shall prophesy, and your young men shall see visions, and your old men shall dream dreams.’

“What was it we discovered back in Genesis 8? There’s the dove associated with Israel and Israel’s salvation taking them into the kingdom when they have this spiritual status restored through the new covenant and putting His spirit into them.

“You can just keep going with this. Seventeen in the Scripture is a number associated with transition from old to new; with change from the old to the new. 153 numerology wise, these are the numbers—7, 8, 9 and 17-- associated with it.

“With the 9 and the 17, you’ve got that transformation of Israel into that fruit-bearing nation God intended. By the way, 9 is the number of fruit-bearing. In Ephesians 5, Paul says ‘the fruit of the Spirit is . . .’ and lists how many fruit? Nine.

“In Ephesians 5:9 it talks again about the fruit of the Spirit. In I Corinthians 3:6, Paul says, ‘I have planted, Apollos watered; but God gave the increase.’ That term ‘planted’ is used nine times in your Bible.

“Psalm 9:17. The term hell is used 54 times in the Bible. That’s 9 times 6. The fruit of the spirit is 9. The fruit of sin is still 9. Nine is fruit-bearing.

“Did you know Titus is the 17^th book in the New Testament? Titus 2:13 and I Corinthians 15:51. You know what three times 17 is? 51. You know what I Thessalonians 4:17 says? When you’re caught up together with Him that change has taken place and the reality of that blessed hope is there, not just a prospect.

“When you begin to chase numbers down through the Bible, you begin to find out there’s things written in the text of your Bible that lay themselves out in a way that make you believe it’s okay to get out on that limb.”