Philippians 2:5-8 "Let this mind be in you, which was also in Christ Jesus: 6. Who, (Christ Jesus) being in the form of God, (absolutely, He never stopped being God) thought it not robbery to be equal with God: 7. But (as God, He) made himself of no reputation, and took upon Him the form of a servant, and was made in the likeness of men: 8. And being found in fashion as a man, He humbled Himself, (as a result of that determining council back in Acts chapter 2) and became obedient unto death, (not just an ordinary death) even the death of the cross." When we willingly set ourselves to gain the knowledge of spiritual things and we seek God by searching His Word to learn of Him of whom it was written. We begin to delineate the word of God rightly, we find that His Grace is the very essence of the Spirit of Christ at work within us, again. As we learn more of Him our minds imagination and way of seeing things changes as we take on the mind of Christ, in the spirit of our mind or we pay more attention to spiritual realities, than earthy ones. Our peace with God overwhelms us and we loose the fear of death as we've become united with Him as in the beginning and we progressively take on the mind of Christ, and come into the Rest of God through the Peace with God, which His Spirit imparts.
Remember, it had to be a death that could be likened to the serpent in the wilderness, that as it was lifted up, so also must the Son of Man be lifted up.
Hebrews 2:15-16 "And deliver them who through fear of death were all their lifetime subject to bondage (mainly Israel). 16. For verily He took not on Him (that is, Himself) the nature of angels; but He took on Him the seed of Abraham." Now, stop and think for a moment, how easy it would have been for Christ to become the man, the Son of God in the form of an angel, because after all, there are myriads of angels. There are many references to the angel of the Lord (as an angelic being) in the Old Testament having appeared not to a few but many. In fact He appeared as an angel of the Lord to Moses in the burning bush that was not consumed. Angels power, at least in total, is stupendous. But God didn’t draw on the power of angels. He did nothing with regard to angels but instead, set up the man Abraham. He gave him the covenant that, out of him would come a nation of people and through that nation of people would come this Redeemer, this God Man. Of whom the prophets spoke.
The Abrahamic Covenant is so basic to our understanding of Who Jesus of Nazareth really is, and Who the Christ of the Epistle of Hebrews really is. When we realize that, then we can understand that He did not come through the powers of the angels but through the seed of Abraham and the seed of woman (Genesis 3:15). So let’s go back to Genesis and come forward to see how all of this unfolded to bring about this One Who would become man in the flesh. The One Who was the Creator of everything and the One Who is the God of Glory. The One Whom we are looking to return in the divine flesh, bodily, and will yet establish His kingdom on earth. Though He's building His Kingdom or Church even now within the hearts of receptive man.
It all really began, so far as Abraham is concerned, in Genesis chapter 12. Genesis 12 verses 1, 2 and 3. The Abrahamic Covenant.
Genesis 12: 1 "Now the LORD (remember the word Lord in the Old Testament is actually EYHEY or in English Yehweh (Yehovah) and Christ are One and the same. Yehweh is his Old Testament term but it is still God the Son. It’s the One we know as the Lord Jesus Christ.) had said to Abram, Get out of your country, and from your kindred, and from your father’s house, to a land that I will show to you:" Note: the book is still open on the actual spelling of God's name, what is known is that He was called Elohim, El, El Shadiah and others, the Rah, Jah, Yah, are all linked to false pagan gods of the Sun, or other forms going back to the tower of Babel and Nimrod. Because there's no known history prior to this.
It always helps to understand background. We want to remember that from Adam to the flood was 1,600 years in round terms and the whole human race has rebelled against their Creator, with the exception of Noah and his family for a total of eight souls. Out of those eight souls coming out of the Ark after the flood, the population once again began to explode and we came to the Tower of Babel about two hundred years after the flood.
Now the problem with people who think in Biblical time, they think two hundred years as we think of as twenty. But listen, two hundred years is a long time, we don’t care when it was! Because all we have to do is think back. How far have we come in America in two hundred years? It’s unbelievable, we know that!! Two hundred years ago we were just an empty wasteland and look at us today. So don’t just think that two hundred years from the Tower of Babel to the call of Abraham was just a flip of a coin. No, it was still two hundred years and a lot of people came on the scene in that period of time and they are all steeped in idolatry, in false religion, for the most part. There were those in Noah's history who walked with God and there were those who were righteous in the line of Shem the son of Noah. Form who Abram comes.
God now is going to do something totally different. And, he goes down to Ur of the Chaldees and we think God went down in human form. We think he confronted Abram eyeball to eyeball because that’s what the term in Acts chapter seven implies. That He "appeared" to our father Abram. The word appeared is optomai from which we get optometry, which has to do with eyes! So, we feel that the Lord went eyeball to eyeball with this man Abram and said, "I want you to get out of town! I want you to get away from your relatives and get away from all this idolatry, and go to a land that I will show you." And Abraham believed God!! (he obeyed God and it was counted for righteousness by God, he was spiritual)
Now, that is the background for the call of Abram to separate himself from the idolatry that was all around him. Out of the mainstream of humanity coming from Adam and now we are going to see a totally different group of people. Alright, verse 2. Here comes the Covenant, this is the promise from God to Abram.
Genesis 12:2a "And I will make of you a great nation,..." Now we want to remember back in antiquity, a great nation didn’t have to be 275 million people. But, by the time Israel came out of Egypt with her five to seven million, they were indeed the greatest nation at that time. In numbers and in power and everything else. So the promise was that out of this man Abram would come a nation of people, totally different from all the rest. (Moses believed God and God called him His friend or brother. Exodus 33:11)
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