3 "The ox knows its owner and the donkey its master's crib; but Israel does not know, My people do not consider.
      4 "Alas, sinful nation, a people laden with iniquity, a brood of evildoers, children who are cor-rupters! They have forsaken the LORD, They have provoked to anger The Holy One of Israel, they have turned away backward.
      5 "Why should you be stricken again? You will revolt more and more. The whole head is sick, and the whole heart faints.
      6 "From the sole of the foot even to the head, there is no soundness in it, but wounds and bruises and putrefying sores; they have not been closed or bound up, or soothed with ointment," Isa 1:3-6.
      This is God's description of the rebellious, sin-sick state of Israel at the time of Isaiah prophecy some seven hundred plus years before the human birth of Christ. King Uzziah reigned over Judah more than 50 years, was zealous for the Lord and prospered greatly, but was not zealous for true holiness and a good conscience (1Ti 1:19) before the Lord among the people. As a result, this shameful and degenerate condition quoted above stealthily enslaved the people at large who were unaware of the exceedingly deceitful nature of sin at all times, especially in times of prosperity, Jer 17:9; Heb 3:12-13.
      As "a child left to himself will bring his mother (his parents) to shame," so a nation without a godly king or a godly leader is destined to the fiery judgment of God, Pro 29:15; Judges chapters 17 thru 21. How can we have a great and godly nation or church or family (a people with a good conscience) unless the Word of God is daily and fervently read, taught, and practiced by all? Uzziah and Jotham were to a great extent good and godly kings, but they miserably failed to establish a God-fearing conscience in the people of the nation.
      Hosea, Amos, and Micah were contemporary prophets with Isaiah and others before and after them, who pleaded with the kings and with the people for righteousness and reverence toward God and His Word, but the heart of man is deceitful and desperately wicked, Jer 17:9. So God permitted this fact to be demonstrated on a sweeping scale through both the Old and New Testaments. The whole is presented in the book of Isaiah, with a dramatic presentation of God's glorious plan of redemption through the suffering Servant as our Kinsman Redeemer, and crowned with the splendor and grandeur of the divine new birth of the faithful and overcoming remnant of the covenant people.

      1 "The word that Isaiah the son of Amoz saw concerning Judah and Jerusalem.       2 "Now it shall come to pass in the latter days that the mountain of the LORD's house shall be established on the top of the mountains, and shall be exalted above the hills; and all nations shall flow to it.
      3 "Many people shall come and say, ‘Come, and let us go up to the mountain of the LORD, to the house of the God of Jacob; He will teach us His ways, and we shall walk in His paths.' For out of Zion shall go forth the law, and the Word of the LORD from Jerusalem.
      4 "He shall judge between the nations, and rebuke many people; they shall beat their swords into plowshares, and their spears into pruning hooks; nation shall not lift up sword against nation, neither shall they learn war anymore,
      5 "O house of Jacob, come and let us walk in the light of the LORD." Isa 2:1-4.
      The mountain of the Lord's house will be established on the top of the mountains: this statement in verse 2 above refers to the nation of Israel (the deified saints) being exalted above all other nations and ruling over them in a glorious seventh day (millennium) of "rest." God had promised David that his Son would sit on his throne through that seventh day of glorious "rest."
      Isaiah has a lot to say about "that day," when the Word of the Lord will go forth from the highest hill to all the earth. All the "mountains" will beat their swords into plowshares and pruning hooks, and will not learn war any more.

      10 "Enter into the rock, and hide in the dust, from the terror of the LORD and the glory of His majesty.
      11 The lofty looks of man shall be humbled, the haughtiness of men shall be bowed down, and the LORD alone shall be exalted in that day." Isa 2:10-11.
      Read in verses 6 through 9 of the fallen condition of mankind, of Israel, and of us by nature. Read in verses 12 through 22 of the seventh day (millennium), which shall begin and end under the fierce wrath of God. But how much did the writer of the book of Hebrews know about "that day?" Heb 10:25; 4:1-11.

     7 "Again He (the Holy Spirit) designates a certain day, saying in David, ‘Today,' after such a long time, as it has been said: ‘Today, if you will hear His voice, Do not harden your hearts.'
       8 "For if Joshua had given them rest, then He would not afterward have spoken of another day," Heb 4:7-8.
      How much did king David know about "that day?" He wrote about it in Ps 95 and other psalms with an apparent high level of understanding. Of course, the apostle Peter wrote that the prophets often did not fully understand what they wrote, 1Pe 1:10-11. Then David also wrote:
      "As for me, I will see Your face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied when I awake in Your likeness," Ps 17:15.
       How much did David under-stand of what he wrote here? He should have understood much about it, since "that day" is by far the transcending significance of the seven day creation week, Gen 1 & 2; Heb 4:1-11.
      We have permitted ourselves to be deceived into sort of thinking that God forgot about that seventh day of "rest" for most of the Bible. However, the many seventh day sabbaths, seven day feasts, seven day cleansing ceremonies, seven times seven days (Pentecost), seven times seven years (year of jubilee) etc., were daily reminders of the creation week and its seventh day of "rest."
      The Holy Spirit, in Heb 3; 4; and 10:25 makes it clear that the projection of the seventh day (Millennium) "rest" was to be a daily "by faith" real life experience, Heb 4:10. This covers both Old and New Testament time periods in preparation for the new birth resurrection to begin the seventh day or seventh millennium of "rest."
      Joshua gave the covenant people "rest" by conquering and possessing the promised land, but that also was understood to be only a type of the true "rest." The Holy Spirit through David, in Ps 95, reveals that the testing (covenant training) is a continuing process toward the seventh day or seventh millennium.

      19 "For the earnest expectation of the creation eagerly waits for the revealing of the sons of God.
      20 "For the creation was subjected to futility, not willingly, but because of Him who subjected it in hope;
      21 "Because the creation itself also will be delivered from the bondage of corruption into the glorious liberty of the children of God.
      22 "For we know that the whole creation groans and labors with birth pangs together until now, Rom 8:19-22; Mt 19:28.
      In Heb 4:3-4 the Holy Spirit clearly reveals that the seventh day "rest" is the seventh millennium when when "the Sun of righteousness will arise with healing in His wings," Mal 4:1-3. This seventh day of "rest" is when the heavens will be rolled back (Rev 6:12-17), when the throne of God is set up in midheaven (Dan 7:9-10), when the son of Man will be ushered in before the Father and given the throne of David (Dan 7;13-14; Isa 2:1-4; 9:6-7; 11:1-9; et al), and when the whole creation will experience a new birth, Rom 8:19-22.

      25 "For I know that my Redeemer lives, And He shall stand at last on the earth;
      26 "And after my skin is destroyed, this I know, That in my flesh I shall see God,
      27 "Whom I shall see for myself, And my eyes shall behold, and not another. How my heart yearns within me!" Job 19:25-27.
      What did Job know about his Redeemer? He spoke, as indicated above, with a solid confidence, revealing that he was thoroughly knowledgeable of the necessity of a Kinsman Redeemer, as well as the divinely required relationship and functions of a Kinsman Redeemer, as later revealed and required in the Scriptures.
      These verses (with Job 1:5 and 42:8) reveal that Job had a good understanding of the meaning 1) of the sacrifices which he offered continually, 2) of the kinship of the Messiah as our Kinsman Redeemer, 3) of the functions of the Messiah as our Kinsman Redeemer, 4) and the new birth resurrection in the last day. Consider briefly:

      15 "And I will put enmity between you and the woman, and between your seed and her Seed; He shall bruise your head, and you shall bruise His heel," Gen 3:15.
      Job's age requires that he lived before Abraham, though perhaps contemporary with Abraham in the last years of Job's life. It is obvious that Job did not live to read the Law of Moses; yet, from the above passage (Job 19:25-27), Job understood that the Messiah would be both God and the Seed of the Woman.

      Job lived before the Law Covenant, but God promised a Kinsman Redeemer immediately after the sin of Adam and Eve, as later recorded by Moses in Gen 3:15. This promise in the Garden of Eden was immediately augmented by God killing clean animals and clothing Adam and Eve with their skins, Gen 3:21. God could have clothed Adam and Eve by means of other materials as we have now, but shedding the blood of the animals, taking their lives, and clothing Adam and Eve with the animal skins strikingly makes the following associations:
            a. The whole Bible reveals that the slaying of these animals and the clothing of Adam and Eve with their skins signified a "redeeming" remedy for the sin (and sins) of Adam and Eve and their descendants. The Seed of the woman would be the Redeemer.
            b. The Seed of the woman must be a miracle virgin birth because all the descendants of Adam and Eve would be born with the sin nature. Adam was the head of the human race, and we all sinned in Adam, Rom 5:12. Eve was in the transgression (1Ti 2:13-14), but nothing happened to her or anything else until Adam ate of the forbidden fruit, Gen 3:1-7. Obviously the sin nature is passed through the father, since the Redeemer must be without the sin nature to be the Redeemer, and Christ was born without the sin nature.
            c. The animals that God killed in the Garden of Eden were clearly "clean" and "spotless" animals, as established throughout the Scriptures, to represent the sinless and divinely righteous Redeemer (Gen 6:19-20; 7:2-3; 8:20; Ex 12:5; 1Pe 1:18-20).
            d. God used the skins of the animals to clothe Adam and Eve and hide their nakedness. We will in a later article discuss extensively the symbolic washing of garments and the clothing of the bride of Christ. For now we emphasize that this whole process associates the bodies of the sacrificed animals with the bodies of Adam and Eve. We will often demonstrate how the bodies of the animal sacrifices ceremonially and metaphorically represent the ch (or faithful covenant people throughout the Scriptures) as one and the same human (now deified) body of Christ. The final result will be that the bodies of the saints will be conformed to the precise image of Christ's divine body.
            e. The blood of the animals was shed – their lives were thereby taken, signifying that "death" was necessary in the process of redemption. As the sacrificial animals died, the Redeemer's body must also die. The functions of the Kinsman Redeemer must include a unique oneness of life, death, burial, and resurrection birth into a divine state of being.
      God's explicit and personally demonstrated Redeemer instructions to Adam and Eve received further witness by Abel's offering "the first-lings of his flock," Gen 4:4.
      Noah, Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob offered the same sacrifices, which reveals that this was the common practice until all was incorporated into the Law Covenant. The family priests learned these things from their fathers and no doubt by direct revelation from the Lord.

      The Redeemer who would crush the head of the serpent (Satan), would be the Seed of the Woman, and therefore would be a human. We perhaps read this statement in Gen 3:15 with less of the profound meaning it should have. However, it is a uniquely and divinely planted guiding light, a resourceful storehouse of knowledge, and an often referenced pillar in the doctrine of Christ, 2Jn 9. It has been reasona-bly well understood, believed, and faithfully preached down through the ages. We hold the same Kinsman Redeemer doctrine of the Messiah, and its (His) efficacious influence (2Co 2:14-16) will be the praise of the saints for ever.

      The functions of the Kinsman Redeemer are that God 1) would become the Seed of the woman (a virgin birth to be without sin, Gen 3:15), 2) and as a human He would live a perfect life (portrayed by the clean and spotless animal sacrifices), 3) would die for our sins (the clean and spotless animal died for man's sins), 4) would suffer God's wrath in our stead (seen in the burning of the animal sacrifices), 5) would rise again from the dead into a divine body, triumphant over all laws of the universe, and thereby crush the head of the serpent (of Satan, Gen 3;15; Dan 7:13-14; Col 2:14-21; Mal 4:1-3), 6) would come again to raise the faithful dead into divine bodies (witnessed to by the burial of the dead, Gen 50:24-26; Ex 13:19; Dan 12:3; 7:18,22,26-27), and 7) would come with myriads of His saints to execute judgment and establish God's kingdom, as prophesied by Enoch, Daniel, and many others, Jude 14-15; Dan 7:13-27; Zec 14:4-5; et al.

      26 "And after my skin is destroyed, this I know, that in my flesh I shall see God," Job 19:26.
      This sounds much like the words of David a thousand years later:
      15 "As for me, I will see Your face in righteousness; I shall be satisfied when I awake in Your likeness," Ps 17:15.
      Assuredly, Job and many others like him had a good understanding of person and functions of our Kinsman Redeemer. In the midst of adversity greater than we can understand, Job's comments (Job 19:25-27) express the confidence and hope of glorious victory in the resurrection. At that last day, he will see God, his Kinsman Redeemer, with his own eyes.

      25 "And behold, there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon, and this man was just and devout, waiting for the Consolation of Israel, and the Holy Spirit was upon him.
      26 "And it had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ.
      27 "So he came by the Spirit into the temple. And when the parents brought in the Child Jesus, to do for Him according to the custom of the Law,
      28 "He took Him up in his arms and blessed God and said:
      29 "Lord, now You are letting Your servant depart in peace, ac-cording to Your word;
      30 "For my eyes have seen Your salvation
      31 "Which You have prepared before the face of all peoples,
      32 "A light to bring revelation to the Gentiles, and the glory of Your people Israel."
      33 "And Joseph and His mother marveled at those things which were spoken of Him.
      34 "Then Simeon blessed them, and said to Mary His mother, "Behold, this Child is destined for the fall and rising of many in Israel, and for a sign which will be spoken against.
      35 "(Yes, a sword will pierce through your own soul also), that the thoughts of many hearts may be revealed," Lk 2:25-35.
       book could be written on what Simeon expressly understood and said here. Simeon was just another God-fearing Israelite like Zacharias and Elizabeth, Joseph and Mary, and many other meek and Bible loving Israelites in His day. Nicodemus could and should have understood as much. The words of Jesus in Jn 3:10 and of Simeon in Lk 2:25-35 should encourage our pursuit of the understanding made available to us.
      The scrutiny and understanding of the sacrifices Job offered and the information passed down from his elders was more abundantly available to who later had the Old Testament Scriptures. Simeon made use of the Scriptures and has blessed many with the simplicity and richness of his brief testimony.
      There is not space in this issue of The Midnight Cry to fully address the rich testimony of Simeon, so only a sketch is given here.

      See verse 25. This state of mind and being is more precious and more to be desired than all the riches, pleasures, and earthy happiness this world can produce. Simeon stood ready to inherit the unsearchable riches of Christ eternally.