Under His Wings Pt.2
EZEKIEL 16:1-10
1 ¶ Again the word of the LORD came unto me, saying,
2 Son of man, cause Jerusalem to know her abominations,
Ezekiel chapter 16 begins with a very graphic allegory of an unwanted and abandoned newborn baby girl that in parable form represents Jerusalem. And because of the abandoned condition of her birth, she should have died, but God commands her to live, and so she ends up growing into a mature and beautiful young woman.)
3 And say, Thus saith the Lord GOD unto Jerusalem; Thy birth and thy nativity is of the land of Canaan; thy father was an Amorite, and thy mother an Hittite. (There were 7 gentile nations that descended from the line of Canaan that are listed in Deuteronomy 7:1 - the Hittites, Girgashites, Amorites, Canaanites, Perizzites, Hivites, and Jebusites. And so even though this woman represents Israel in type, she is also represented here as a gentile woman like what we saw in the relationship between Ruth and Boaz, because a city represents a woman, and we know that the New Jerusalem represents the gentile bride of Christ.)
4 And as for thy nativity (circumstances of her birth), in the day thou wast born thy navel was not cut, neither wast thou washed in water to supple thee (supple = to clean); thou wast not salted at all, nor swaddled at all. (Their custom was to rub salted water onto a newborn baby’s skin as it was believed to promote health by being a natural antiseptic as well as to strengthen the newborn’s sensitive flesh)
5 None eye pitied thee, to do any of these unto thee, to have compassion upon thee; but thou wast cast out in the open field, to the lothing of thy person, in the day that thou wast born. (This unfortunately was a custom used with unwanted babies – they would be left out in a field to die of exposure – and there were varying reasons for this – the baby may have been illegitimate or physically defected in some way, or even the fact that it was a girl was in some cases enough reason)
6 ¶ And when I passed by thee, and saw thee polluted in thine own blood, I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood, Live; yea, I said unto thee when thou wast in thy blood, Live. (The shedding of the woman’s blood is connected with death (we saw that in Eden with Eve), but by the shedding of the blood of God comes the commandment of life)
7 I have caused thee to multiply as the bud of the field, and thou hast increased and waxen great, and thou art come to excellent ornaments: thy breasts are fashioned, and thine hair is grown (She is coming into mature womanhood), whereas thou wast naked and bare.
8 Now when I passed by thee, and looked upon thee, behold, thy time was the time of love; and I spread my skirt over thee, and covered thy nakedness: yea, I sware unto thee, and entered into a covenant with thee, saith the Lord GOD, and thou becamest mine. (We know that he is speaking about Israel, but this is also speaking in parallel of a covering of His garment and a marriage union with a gentile woman, just as Ruth was also a gentile woman who was covered by Boaz and then married to him. And so this portion of Ezekiel chapter 16 is the same story of Ruth told in another way, the difference being that Ruth had been bereft of her old husband (her provider and protector), and so she was naked in that sense and needed to be covered again by a marriage covenant – under Boaz’s wings of protection)
9 Then washed I thee with water; yea, I throughly washed away thy blood from thee, and I anointed thee with oil.
10 I clothed thee also with broidered work (Embroidery – it is to do with wealthy and high-quality clothing – luxury, royalty. And she is even crowned in verse 12, showing that she is like a queen, and she goes on to become very beautiful), and shod thee with badgers' skin, and I girded thee about with fine linen, and I covered thee with silk.
II PETER 1:10a
10 Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure:
Under His Wings Pt.2
Ezekiel chapter 16 is spoken of as being the longest single parable of the entire bible.
There are 63 verses in Ezekiel 16 that are made up of 4 parts, and the first part begins by presenting this very graphical allegory of this unwanted baby girl that was left totally abandoned in a field in order that she would die of exposure, and the Lord commanded her to live.
*And then when she is grown and becomes of age, then she comes into a marriage covenant with God himself and is dressed by Him with the finest of all clothing.
*So from the lowest condition of an unwanted and dying infant, to a fully dressed and beautiful woman that becomes like a royal bride.
*And so this story is actually showing us something of the story of God’s amazing grace upon each of our lives.
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47 And he said, in the Bible, "He found her in the field, as a little girl sitting in her own blood, and He washed her and cleaned her up, and what He done. But after God showed all these mercies to her, and she got rich," she got amnesia, amnesia, "and she forgot all about where these things come from."
This is the direction of where the rest of the chapter goes – of how we forget about the blessings of God and become proud in our own ideas and in what we think in our own security of our own making. But the bible tells us that “without Him ye can do nothing”.
***We know that this allegory is spoken of concerning Jerusalem (Israel), but then we also know that it is symbolic of this last age of where were have entered into an invisible union of a marriage covenant with Christ, and we have also been clothed with the garments of the finest revelation of the word that has ever been made available in any other age – because your religion is like your covering.
**Because when Adam and Eve left the word, that was when they became naked, and they needed natural clothing to cover themselves with, because the supernatural garment that they had been clothed with before had left them because of their sin, and so they tried to make for themselves man-made coverings of clothing made out of fig leaves (botany life) which represented man-made religion, like how Cain thought that his parents sin was eating apples, and so he presented natural fruit to God for an offering, but it wasn’t a fruit sin, it was a blood sin, because the shedding of blood was involved with Eve’s sexual sin, because that was the first blood that was shed upon the earth, it was Eve’s blood, and so that is why it had to be a blood sacrifice and not a botany fruit life sacrifice.
**And so God himself provided a covering for them made out of bloodied lamb skins from a slain lamb showing in type the future death of Christ at Calvary.
GENESIS 3:21
21 ¶ Unto Adam also and to his wife did the LORD God make coats of skins, and clothed them.
The bible doesn’t specifically say what kind of animal skins that God used to cover them with, but it is generally accepted by most bible scholars and theologians to be a lamb or sheep, and the prophet of God to this generation has confirmed that to us also.
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E-38
…God went out and got some skins and made aprons. Is that right? Now, if He got skin, something died to get skin. See, it had to be substitutionary. Something had to substitute the guilty man's place. And that was that lamb that He killed out there was Christ Jesus, speaking in a figure. And there He brought the lamb skins, throwed them back into the bushes, and Adam and Eve put them on.
**And so it is obvious to us that the lamb had to become naked so that Adam and Eve could be clothed. And this is why we find that Christ was naked when he died on the cross.
He had to died naked because He represented that lamb in Eden that died naked, and of which that lamb’s garment was then used by God to cover his children with.
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E-38 But notice, they had sinned now, and I can hear God say, "Because you came out of the dust of the earth, dust thou shalt return." And poor little Eve throwed her head over on Adam's shoulders and begin to weeping because she knowed what she'd done. Adam put his arm around Eve, and there they go walking out of Eden condemned. I can just hear that old bloody sheepskin around the beautiful figure of those two people, slapping against their legs as they were going, walking out of Eden. God looking at them...?...
All that great space come down to one four letter word, l-o-v-e. He's loved them so well He couldn't see them go. So He called her, said, "I'll put enmity between your seed and the serpent's seed," promising a Saviour.
And that same Saviour, with His own Blood around His garments flapping against His legs, walked up Golgotha's hill and was crucified to redeem the man.
REVELATION 19:13-14
13 And he was clothed with a vesture dipped in blood: and his name is called The Word of God.
14 And the armies which were in heaven followed him upon white horses, clothed in fine linen, white and clean.
We can see how this scripture here also connects with Ezekiel 16:10
Ezekiel 16:10
I clothed thee also with broidered work, and shod thee with badgers' skin, and I girded thee about with fine linen, and I covered thee with silk.
**We remember how that Joseph’s coat of many colours was taken from him and dipped in blood just as Jesus bloodied garment was taken from him by the Roman solders.
**And so this woman here in Ezekiel 16 was naked and bloodied just like we see the condition that Eve was in Eden after that she had sinned, and so Christ had to also become naked and bloodied in order to redeem back Adam’s fallen human race.
From nakedness to being clothed.
From Being uncovered to being covered.
**And then we see that this same plan of redemption is also being described from another angle in this story of Ruth and Boaz of where he covers her with his garment (the wings of his garment), and makes a covenant of marriage with her.
RUTH 3:8-9
8 And it came to pass at midnight, that the man was afraid, and turned himself: and, behold, a woman lay at his feet.
9 And he said, Who art thou? And she answered, I am Ruth thine handmaid: spread therefore thy skirt over thine handmaid; for thou art a near kinsman – in other words “cover me with thy garment - I want to be under your wings, I want to be under your protection by becoming your lawfully wedded wife”. And so notice where this event was taking place – at the midnight hour, and in a secret place.
**They were in a secret place that no one else knew about where they were – and in this hour, that place is the third pull ministry of the opening of the word that was not to be a public show.
PSALM 91:1-4
1 ¶ He that dwelleth in the secret place of the most High shall abide under the shadow of the Almighty. (This secret place carries the idea of a place of intimacy of fellowship just like what we see here taking place in this event here of Ruth and Boaz at the secret place of the midnight hour of when Boaz opened up and made known his seventh sealed plan of redemption to Ruth, and so it was in this secret place that Ruth becomes certain of God and certain of her election and calling.)
2 I will say of the LORD, He is my refuge and my fortress (protection from all harm): my God; in him will I trust.
3 Surely he shall deliver thee from the snare of the fowler, and from the noisome pestilence.
4 He shall cover thee with his feathers, and under his wings shalt thou trust: his truth shall be thy shield and buckler.
**We need to become certain of God in this hour of great uncertainty, and we need to become certain of our election in relationship to God regardless of how much we as human beings go through all of our emotional ups and downs.
*God has literally made a way for us to come into that secret place in this hour of where we can be certain of who we are. And that secret place is found in the revelation of the word for this hour – in the secret place of the little room as the Holy Spirit told brother Branham.
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6-3 …I seen that Light leave me, and go to that building, and go in that building; and a Voice said to me, "I'll meet you in there; that'll be the third pull." I said, "Why?" He said, "Well, it won't be a public show like the other."
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E-24 …He said, "I'll meet you in there and this time it won't be a public show."
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18-6 …the Angel's voice, He said, "I'll meet you in there, and this is the third pull, but nobody will know nothing about it."
And I said, "Well, I don't understand why in there. Why there?"
He said, "It will not be a public show this time."
*Why won’t it be a public show this time? Because it is the story of Ruth and Boaz at the midnight hour and of that secret place being interpreted in this day.
*Brother Branham goes on to tell us that what took place in that little room was far beyond and greater that anything of what had taken place under the first and second pull of what had first attracted the attention of the public of the healing ministry with the sign in the hand and the revealing of the secrets of the hearts of the people.
**The third pull was the opening of the mysteries of the word that would bring back into reality form everything that Adam and Eve had lost in Eden.
And they lost three things - Eternal life, Fellowship with God, and dominion over the earth.
II PETER 1:10a Opening scripture
10 Wherefore the rather, brethren, give diligence to make your calling and election sure:
This is why that when we come to the end of this age of where we are now – the big question among the bride is, “Am I truly a part of the gentile bride that is going in the rapture? Is my name written in that Lamb’s section part of the book of life?”
*We know that Brother Branham knew he was going in, but do we know why he knew? And it wasn’t just because he had visited beyond the curtain of time and so he knew by that experience, but it was because he knew that he was Malachi 4:5, and Revelation 10:7, and Luke 17:30.
He knew that all of those scriptures spoke of a messenger to come, and that he was the one of which those scriptures spoke of, and that is why he preached, “This day is this scripture fulfilled”.
**And so the question is, which is your scripture that you have fulfilled in this day, and which is my scripture that I have fulfilled? Because if we don’t have a scripture, then we won’t be able to see our names written in the book.
**The bible is the title deed book of redemption, inside it is written the names of all the heirs of the inheritance and of what belongs to each one of them, because the bible tells us that all the names of the elect, and it has to do that, because you can’t make any claim if you don’t have any identification in the book.
**And so we have to look to see how people that lived before us found their names in the book, because we know that John the Baptist found his name in the book. And this is where we are picking up from last week.
*We know that when they asked John the Baptist, “Who art thou? Art thou the Christ? Art thou that prophet? Who art thou John?
John didn’t say, “Well, you remember there was the old priest Zacharias, and the old woman Elisabeth, and they had a baby in their old age, and now I am that baby grown up today, because they were my father and my mother.”
No – he didn’t speak about his natural birth and his natural lineage. He said, “I am the voice of one crying in the wilderness” – in other words, he pointed to his name written in the book in prophecy form. He looked back into the eternal realm of the eternal word of God to see who he really was.
*Jesus said, “What went you out to see, a reed shaken with the wind? A man with fine raiment? No. A prophet, and more than a prophet. Behold, I send My messenger before My face.” Matthew 11, and Luke 7.
***So Jesus placed John in the bible, and John placed himself in the bible, and Jesus placed Himself in the bible, and Brother Branham placed himself in the bible, and as the gentile bride of this hour, we must also must place ourselves in the bible to reveal who we are in this day.
**But you can’t place yourself in the bible unless the bible is first opened up to you in order to reveal your name written under the scriptures of prophecy that pertain to this hour.
And this is what the secret place of that third pull little room does for you and I - it is Boaz covering Ruth under his wings – his garment, or what we would say in this hour, the garment of the revelation of the original word. It is the marriage covenant promise.
**And so if we are to see our names written in the bible, then we can only do that by seeing our life matching certain portions of the prophecy of scripture that are promised to be fulfilled in the time that we are living in now - because the word interpreted is the manifestation of the name.
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214 And the Name is in the Word because He is the Word. Amen! What is He then? The Word interpreted is the manifestation of the Name of God.
**Malachi 4:5 was the word being interpreted and manifested in the life of Brother Branham - because the scriptures written in the bible that pertained to his life was really just the record of his life in prophecy form.
**And this is why that no one can truly manifest a scripture unless they are the one of whom that scripture is speaking of – because your life is attached to a prophecy of scripture, and therefore you will not be able to stop yourself from fulfilling that portion of the word no more than Brother Branham could stop himself from becoming the seventh angel.
*And so it was the evidence of the Holy Ghost in the life of Brother Branham that had caused him to be able to see that he was Revelation 10:7 and Malachi 4:5. And that he is Eliezer getting a bride for Isaac, and that he is John the baptise introducing Christ, and that he is Moses standing in the gap and all the other places in the bible that we have spoken about in previous services.
**It was the Holy Ghost in him that caused him to see the revelation of himself sealed up in the bible.
*He was able to see that He was the servant at supper time calling the halt the lame, and the blind – a healing revival ministry.
*That he was the chief reaper in the book of Ruth who introduces Ruth to Boaz.
It was the opening of the word that unlocked these truths to him.
*And so that same Holy Spirit that opened the seven seals and revealed his part in the bible to him, is the same Holy Spirit that does the same for us and leads us into the truth of where our parts of scripture were sealed up in the bible.
**And this is why that it took the opening of the seven seals to open up the bible in such a way in order to reveal to us this truth of the word that light has never shone on before.