Q. Why does God say “Remember the Sabbath” in Exo 20, and when the Ten Commandments are repeated in Deut 5 he says “Observe the Sabbath?”
A. The Sabbath is the only “ritual” mentioned in the Ten Commandments. It is described as a day of “rest” but what does that mean. Since God rested after he created the universe, it means to not interfere with nature and the creation, or having mastery over it. Work is an act that shows man’s mastery over nature and the creation. When you read the command about the Sabbath in Exodus, it says that we are not do any manner of work on the Sabbath because God rested from all his work after the creation. So, we are to remember that God is the creator on the Sabbath. It is showing our belief that he is the creator when we rest on the Sabbath. When the Lord repeats the commandments in Deut 5, he says to “observe” the Sabbath and then goes on to say it is because he took Israel out of Egypt with a mighty hand and an outstretched arm. He does this because we are to know that his creation has a purpose. The Exodus is a unique historical event because he delivered an entire people out of slavery. No other nation saw and heard the Lord (Deut 4.32-33). Any other religion usually starts out with a single individual who claims to hear from God or has some sort of “truth.” This person gradually spreads his teachings to others and the movement grows into a new religion. But in the Exodus, God spoke to an entire people at the same time. They saw with their own eyes and heard with their own ears what God did and said. He fed them, clothed them, gave them water and delivered them from their enemies for 40 years. God did not create the universe, then stand aloof from his creation. He showed that he is involved in the affairs of man. So, when we keep the Sabbath, we are telling everyone we believe that the God of Abraham, Isaac and Jacob created the universe and he is involved in the affairs of man, and that is why he says he is the creator in Exo 20, and why he mentions the Exodus in Deut 5.
Q. Are the “sons of God” in Genesis 6.2 fallen angels?
A. There is a lot of false teaching out there today about this, and it comes up every so often. The “sons of God” are not fallen angels who produced some sort of half-man, half angel type of human being. Let’s start in Gen 6.1 and work through a few things to verse 4. Chapter 6 is telling us about how Satan tries to corrupt mankind through false teaching. There are many attempts at this in the Scripture. Balaam tried to corrupt Israel and caused Israel to sin, killing 24,000 people. In Genesis, man procreated and daughters were born. As time went by, some followed God and the teachings brought down from Adam and others did not, corrupting the truth. The term “sons of God” is merely and expression for the believing line, also called the sons of Seth (Gen 4.26). The term “sons of God” has four meanings in the Bible. It is a term for angels, believers, Adam himself and the Kings of Israel. In Gen 6.2, the sons of Seth began to choose for themselves wives from the daughters of men (unbelievers), whomever they chose, out of the unbelievers, thus becoming “unequally yoked.” Abraham had a fear of this when he wanted to choose a wife for Isaac (Gen 24.3). Jacob was told the same thing (Gen 28.1), but Esau saw that the daughters of Canaan displeased his father Isaac, and he married one (Gen 28.9). The Lord saw that this intermarrying was not good in Gen 6. They were living long lives at the time and this was not producing repentance (2 Pet 3.9) and he set limits in Gen 6.3. The Nephilim in Gen 6.4 were the children produced from these “intermarriages.” Nephilim in Hebrew means “fallen ones” which implies they had “fallen” from the truth with ferocity and impiety. This word is used again in Num 13.33, with allusions to the “giants” in Deut 1.18, 2 Sam 21.18-22 and 1 Chr 20.4-8. Without a doubt, these certainly were not children born from fallen angels, but simply people with a “giant” reputation for being ferocious and impious and di not follow the ways of the Lord. These people became famous for their valor, power and rule. The battle between Goliath and David was a prime example of this struggle between those of the truth and those who had fallen away (“nephilim”) that had been going on since Gen 6. There are several reasons why these “sons of God” were not fallen angels. First, angels cannot marry or are they given in marriage. Second, angels cannot produce children from humans because they don’t have human DNA. Genesis 1 tells us that God created his creatures to reproduce “after their own kind” and to believe that angles could do this without human DNA totally disregards what the Lord said about how he accomplished his own creation. There are some who teach that these “angels” manipulated the DNA so they could produce such children, but that is a fairy tale. You can’t kiss a frog and turn into a prince, either. That is just a myth that should be disregarded. Genesis 6 simply tells the story of how the truth of God began to be corrupted when believers, or those who knew the truth, began to intermarry with those who mixed truth with error. The word “Babylon” means “a mixture.” In time, man became so corrupt that God brought the flood and preserved the truth through the righteous line of Noah. Later, through the line of Shem (where the word “semite” comes from), the Messiah would be born who would destroy Satan and his works as promised in Gen 3.15.
Q. In Revelation 16.3 it says three frogs come out of the mouth of the dragon, the mouth of the beast and the mouth of the false prophet. What does this mean?
A. To fully understand this we will start in Rev 16.13 and go to verse 16. The Scriptures teach that good and evil will exist together in the Kingdom of God. God uses the demonic realm to achieve his purposes to test the earth, his people and so on. He will use lying spirits if he wants (2 Chr 18.19-21). In the verse mentioned above, a similar thing is going on and it is completely under the control of the Lord. Satan (the dragon), the false messiah (the beast) and the false prophet are not running around out of control during the Birthpains (Tribulation). It is all going to “play out” according to the will of God. Rev 16.13 describes the power behind these characters in apocalyptic terms and symbolism. Frogs are used in this scenario because a frog captures its victim with its tongue, and so do false teachers and prophets. These three will deceive many with their tongues. The next verse tells you it is the power of demons and their job is to gather the world together for a war. This war has been going on since Eden, and notice it does not say “battle.” It is an ongoing war (see our articles on Spiritual Warfare) and during the Birthpains it is going to be far worse than today. There is no “Battle of Armageddon” here, as taught in many prophetic scenarios. These lying spirits will try and convince the world to go against the Torah and God’s ways, and embrace replacement theology Christianity that is seen all around us. The key verse in understanding their purpose is seen in verse 16. John says they will try and gather them (the people) to a place called in the Hebrew tongue “Har Magedon” meaning “mount of assembly.” Why did he say it should be understood in Hebrew and not in Greek? It is because there is something to be understood about this in Hebraic thought and it can only be understood if you have been taught from the Torah and the Prophets. The Greeks did not have these concepts (John 4.22). The term “har moghed” has been used before in Scripture. It can be found in Isa 14.13 and it refers to Satan’s desire to sit on the “mount of assembly (the Temple Mount) and be worshipped. The word “har” means “mount” and “moghed” is the term “moed” (spelled with a mem, vav, ayin, dalet in Hebrew) and can be pronounced “moghed” (with a soft “g” sound as seen in Amos 1.6 where the “ayin” has a soft “g” sound in “Gaza”) which means “the appointed times” or “assembly.” Remember, the festivals could only be kept in Jerusalem and the Temple. It refers to the people coming up to Jerusalem, to the Temple on Mount Moriah, at the appointed times of the festivals and Sabbath to “meet with God.” So this term is used again in Rev 16.16 to describe why these lying spirits go out to deceive the world. This term does not mean “Mount Megiddo” because Megiddo is spelled with a “mem, gimel, dalet, vav.” This war is over whose holy days are the people going to keep, who are the people going to worship. 2 Thes 2.4 says that the false messiah will sit in the Temple of God (on Mount Moriah) and want to be worshipped as God. He wants to be worshipped on “Har Moghed” or the “mount of assembly.” Dan 7.25 says that the false messiah and the false prophet will replace the biblical holy days with other ones (replacement theology) because he wants to be worshipped. These lying spirits like frogs will try to accomplish this through their lies. They will tell the people that the Torah has been done away with, Sunday is the Lord’s Day and their pagan holidays are what should be kept. This is a war over truth. Satan doesn’t care what you follow, as long as it isn’t biblical. He has deceived the world into following many different religions. If what the people are following is not from God, then by implication you are really following Satan, and he is now on the Mount of Assembly (har moghed) and that is what he wants (Isa 14.13). This spiritual war has always been over who the people will obey. These frogs signify demonic spirits and teachings, who go forth into the world to capture their victims with their tongues. This will really be seen during the Birthpains through Satan, the false messiah and the false prophet. The “mount of assembly” is another way of saying “true worship” as described in the Torah. There is no last “battle of Armageddon” in prophecy. There will be many battles, but not a last, great battle. That is part of the deception. People are looking for a physical battle, when the real war is spiritual and it is over who the people will obey. Remember, this is described as a “war” (Rev 16.14) and not a “battle.” The world is being prepared right now to embrace these three frogs and the theology is already in place.
Leave a Reply