Let us glean a few truths from our father in the faith, the man called “father Abraham.” Remember when Melchizedek, the King of Righteousness greeted Abraham with bread and wine? This bread and wine foreshadowed Christ’s body (bread) and blood (wine). This speaks of the Word/Promises of God (bread) and the Spirit (blood) to carry out the Word/Promises. The blood speaks of the power, desire, will to carry out the Word. When we eat food, after it is broken down, it is the blood which carries it to various parts of the body so that it can produce work. “Life is in the blood.” So likewise, when the Word is broken open (in the digestive system of our spiritual body), it is then carried by the blood/Spirit to perform the work the body is called to perform. When we are truly “in” Christ, we flow in His blood which is His life. We are then carried by His power to the work He planned from the foundation of the world. Flowing in His work in not grievous. It does not produce “sweat” the symbol of the curse. His work consists of “yes” and “Amen.” It is not a mixture of blessings and cursings. It is rich and abundant, pressed down and overflowing. Oh, His work is joyous!
The New Covenant is a covenant between God the Father and His Son in which mankind is a recipient. Man in his fallen nature is incapable of making a covenant with God and keeping it. A covenant is an agreement in which the two parties have the ability to keep their part. This Word and Work must be perfectly fulfilled, a work reserved only for the Son of God and all that are in Him.
In this beautiful covenantal meal, we find Melchizedek, King of Righteousness (the Father), coming from the City of Peace (Jerusalem), and providing the Bread and the Wine with which to consummate the covenant. The bread and wine, of course, foreshadows the true Bread and Wine which is, of course, the body and blood of the Father’s Son, Jesus Christ. Remember? “Truly, truly, I say to you unless you eat the flesh of the Son of Man and drink His blood, you have no life in you” (John 6:53).
It is absolutely vital to understand that Abraham brought nothing of his own into this covenant. The spoils of war he offered to Melchizedek were not his own; they came from the kings he had recently conquered. One might say, he gave them on behalf of all of these pagan kings, but he did not give anything which belonged to himself. I cannot overstress the importance of this. The very foundation of true Christianity rests upon this most important truth. Abraham NEVER gave God anything which God didn’t provide Himself, nothing! This speaks of salvation by grace through faith, a gift from God not of works lest anyone should boast (Eph. 2:8).
We find this pictured quite perfectly in the life of Abraham. The story has been twisted much out of its original shape and thus, we have lost its true message. The story of Abraham is the story of faith. Many Christians do not understand this key foundation of Christianity. They look at Abraham’s faith when he offered up Isaac as a sacrifice to God and see great faith. Then they try the best way they can to muster up some semblance of that kind of faith through their own strength. There are umpteen thousand books, pamphlets, and sermons all promising to increase one’s “faith.”
On the other side of this key principle of Christianity is another mountain-high pile of literature which simply tells us to believe the simple message, “Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ and you will be saved. It’s as simple as that.” And so, many sincere people find themselves reading little tracts, or hearing these words declared by some television or radio preacher, perhaps at a crusade, and they repeat these words and so now believe by faith because the Bible says so, that they are saved. Salvation to those who preach this message usually means being delivered from the fate of everlasting torture either bodily or spiritually, or annihilation, sometimes called “eternal death.” People who have been “saved” by this kind of message usually will attend a nice comfortable church environment which doesn’t demand too much. The “maturing” in Christ usually consists of a program of basic moral principles derived from the Bible mixed with general principles from many other sources on how to get along with each other.
I personally believe that modern Christianity has removed itself so far from the foundational truths of the Bible, that it has become almost worthless. As a matter of fact, it may be one of the leading stumbling blocks to people truly “getting saved.”
The general understanding which an unbeliever receives from modern Christianity regarding salvation is that accepting the tenents of Christianity (and they vary greatly from one denomination to another) will allow one to escape the wrath of God. Somehow, through either the first man’s disobedience to God’s commandment not to eat of the tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, all of mankind is born into this world deserving punishment of the worst kind. The punishment, they say must be of eternal consequence. Most of the modern church has opted for everlasting torture to all those who do not accept the gift of life through faith in Jesus Christ, while some sects teach one will be annihilated should they refuse the offer made through the sacrifice of Jesus Christ on the Cross.
Obviously, we do not find such an offer made by God in the first three quarters of the Bible. What we find is a number of different types of sacrifices which the sacrificer felt would give him some benefit. I want the reader to please pay careful attention here and press past your preconditioned ideas and come to a place where you can reason this out. What we are about to look into may totally change your life.
Whenever we study the types and shadows contained in the Bible, when properly interpreted, they always point to Jesus Christ, Savior of the world. The reality of all the symbols, rituals, covenants, prophets…everything is summed up in the Living God Who broke His body for you. He has reserved a portion for you. In Him is Life abundant. Taste and see that the Lord is good. It is not the bread of the Pharisee mixed with malice and wickedness, (the bread of hypocrisy). It is the unleavened bread of sincerity and truth. It is not puffed up with pride. This bread is flat, which speaks of humility. When unleavened bread is made, they cut lines into it and pierce it to help prevent it from rising. Recall that Jesus was “bruised” and “pierced” for our transgressions.
Unleavened bread was called “sweet” bread while leavened bread was called “sour” bread since the yeast added a sour taste to the bread. This “sour” bread has dead organisms in it, a symbol of impurity. A pure life is one that feeds on unleavened bread. The High Priest after the order of Melchizedek is still offering the bread and wine to the sons and daughters of faith, the children of Abraham. (Hopefully, we will discuss the mysteries of this covenantal meal between Abraham and Melchizedek in upcoming issues of Breaking Bread when we look into the Blood/Wine and the subject of sacrifice itself. I just want to bring out one important point before we go on.)
The key issue in the whole fall of the Adamic race is the subject of sufficiency. God is self-sufficient. He is neither created nor requires an outside force, energy, food, nor provision of any kind in order to keep functioning. Adam was not made like that. The very fact that he “was made” reveals the fact that his very existence depended upon the Creator. God made it plain to Adam that he was dependent upon Him for his very life. Yahweh told Adam that if he ate of the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil, he would die. Satan told Eve this wasn’t so. Satan told them they would not die, that is, they could still live even while disobeying God’s Word. While most Christians will not acknowledge it, they are saying the same thing.
They say that a person can live forever separated from the Word of God. They say the rebellious will live forever in a state of torment eternally separated from the Word of God. Man can “live” independent from God, but He will torture them because of their desire to be independent. While this may “sound” reasonable, it is as false as Satan’s words to Eve. Death is not being burned alive! Yet this is the “traditional” teaching of modern Christianity. We cannot get into this subject in this article. I am only touching on this subject to point out that man never was created to be self-sufficient and in this respect is not like God. Man was created to live by “every Word which proceeds from the mouth of Yahweh!”
As long as Adam was in the place where he heard the Word of Yahweh, he lived comfortably. As he progressively moved further away from His voice, Adam’s life became more futile, fearful and empty. He became a murderer and a liar. Instead of giving life to his surroundings under the covering of Yahweh, Adam started producing death. The produce of the ground symbolized what was going on in his heart. First, the eating of his bread in the sweat of his face, which speaks of the difficulty of sustaining life in His own strength. After Cain killed Abel, the earth produced nothing for him (Gen. 4:12). We must see this spiritually and prophetically if we are going to understand the significance and ramifications of the actions of the characters portrayed in Genesis. We also must see them through a Semitic mind.
Ultimately the earth would produce nothing which represents death. This is what happened when Adam lost the “covering” of God’s Word. He replaced the glory he had with the sweat on his forehead, instead of the name of His God written on his forehead (Rev. 22:4). Man went from being covered by the Name/Nature of God to borrowed leaves from another tree (fig leaves) to being covered with sweat and ultimately being covered with the earth from which he came. Adam and Eve were likened as trees covered with leaves in the garden of Yahweh. Due to the traditions of Western Christian man, this has been hidden from us. It is another beautiful, but broad topic I am not going to get into at this time. (For a further understanding of the subject of “coverings,” mankind’s fall and ultimate resurrection, order the article entitled, “Leaves for the Healing of the Nations.”) Suffice it to say that mankind apart from the Word/Work/Will of its Creator can produce nothing but death no matter how much man tries to pretty it up with borrowed leaves (glory).