Last week we kicked off a series on the Divine World Council. We’re looking at the idea that God’s supernatural kingdom is at least as large as the diversity we see in the Earthly kingdom. It’s not merely Angels, Demons and the Trinity. We looked at the word "elohim" and saw that although it can and does sometimes refer to Yahweh as God, it also, in a more literal sense, means “Supernatural being”.
This week I want to talk about rebellion and kingdoms. Modern Christians have been taught almost nothing about spiritual rebellions. Instead, we focus almost entirely on the human rebellions. We’re told that our fall came in the Garden of Eden. This is of course true but doesn’t paint a complete picture.
Let’s start with the 60k foot view. What is/was the garden? In scripture, we’re told that it’s the first place Yahweh created on Earth for people to inhabit. First, there was the Earth as a whole, then the Garden of Eden, and then in the center of the Garden were the tree of Life and the tree of the “knowledge of Good and Evil”. This is a brief encapsulation of Genesis 1-3. This setup is a perfect mirror of the tabernacle setup that God ordered to be made by the early Hebrews, post Exodus. It was a high holy place. We’re told that Yahweh physically walked around the Garden with Adam and Eve. Again, who's names literally mean "Humanity" and "Life". This was Yahweh’s first attempt to join together his earthly family and his supernatural family in one place.
But not everyone was onboard with God’s plan. Enter the serpent.
How many of you guys have ever wondered why God allowed the serpent into the Garden? I know, for me, this is a question that I’ve been asked quite a bit. Why was the Serpent even allowed in there. There are actually a few reasons. First, as Tim said last week, and we see in Revelation, Yahweh’s plan is to bring His two families together. He wants humans to live in complete harmony with the Supernatural realm.
For the second reason, you’d need to understand a little more about ancient Mesopotamian literature and their supernatural worldview. See, in that part of the world, at that time, the rulers of the supernatural realm always had "bodyguards" - supernatural creatures to protect them from rivals. Like the Divine Council, did Yahweh actually need bodyguards? No, of course not, but He had them anyway, it went with the position, and He was trying to create family. From what we know of that period, those bodyguards always took the form of Serpents. That’s how the Serpent got into the Garden; it was Yahweh’s "bodyguard".
Why did the serpent choose to tempt us? Well, he didn’t really like us.
Job 15:14–16 (NIV)
14 “What are mortals, that they could be pure,
or those born of woman, that they could be righteous?
15 If God places no trust in his holy ones,
if even the heavens are not pure in his eyes,
16 how much less mortals, who are vile and corrupt,
who drink up evil like water!
So, it’s clear by this text that Yahweh knows that some of his Divine Council are up to no good, and they don’t think very highly of humans.
But if we continue reading, we find out that corruption of humanity was not the only goal of the Divine Council. They were also trying to usurp Yahweh’s throne. They wanted to be the God of gods.
Isaiah 14:12–15 (NIV)
12 How you have fallen from heaven,
morning star, son of the dawn!
You have been cast down to the earth,
you who once laid low the nations!
13 You said in your heart,
“I will ascend to the heavens;
I will raise my throne
above the stars of God;
I will sit enthroned on the mount of assembly,
on the utmost heights of Mount Zaphon.
14 I will ascend above the tops of the clouds;
I will make myself like the Most High.”
15 But you are brought down to the realm of the dead,
to the depths of the pit.
Now, the confusing thing is that we’re not given names, which I think sometimes frustrates a lot of us. In Isaiah’s case it’s clear that he’s talking about one particular elohim. One he calls “the morning star”. This has become another euphemism for the Devil or Satan, but the text doesn’t spell that out. All we know for sure is that one of the heavenly bodies, one referred to as “the morning star” decided he could be greater than Yahweh and he launched a rebellion. This did not work out well for him.
Now Ezekiel seems to expound on this event.
Ezekiel 28:12–19 (NIV)
12 “Son of man, take up a lament concerning the king of Tyre and say to him: ‘This is what the Sovereign LORD says:
“ ‘You were the seal of perfection,
full of wisdom and perfect in beauty.
13 You were in Eden,
the garden of God;
every precious stone adorned you:
carnelian, chrysolite and emerald,
topaz, onyx and jasper,
lapis lazuli, turquoise and beryl.
Your settings and mountings were made of gold;
on the day you were created they were prepared.
14 You were anointed as a guardian cherub,
for so I ordained you.
You were on the holy mount of God;
you walked among the fiery stones.
15 You were blameless in your ways
from the day you were created
till wickedness was found in you.
16 Through your widespread trade
you were filled with violence,
and you sinned.
So I drove you in disgrace from the mount of God,
and I expelled you, guardian cherub,
from among the fiery stones.
17 Your heart became proud
on account of your beauty,
and you corrupted your wisdom
because of your splendor.
So I threw you to the earth;
I made a spectacle of you before kings.
18 By your many sins and dishonest trade
you have desecrated your sanctuaries.
So I made a fire come out from you,
and it consumed you,
and I reduced you to ashes on the ground
in the sight of all who were watching.
19 All the nations who knew you
are appalled at you;
you have come to a horrible end
and will be no more.’ ”
This echoes what we spoke about last week. The idea that there are supernatural creatures over every nation of the earth. The human king of Tyre was obviously not alive in the Garden of Eden. The passage is referring to its spiritual overseer. Zeek names this creature a Cherub, which we have often called angel. But one does not necessarily equal the other. This creature is not a messenger, it’s a guardian. A guardian of Eden. He was beautiful and brilliant and blameless since his creation. (In case you we’re wondering if the other elohim were created or not, now you know. They were part of Yahweh’s great creation.) Blameless – until, wickedness was found in you.
Yahweh drove him out of the garden and reduced him to ashes in the sight of the others. This act combined with humanity’s fall, brought death to the Earth. Leaving the Fallen One as lord over the earth. Since now everyone would die. Humanity would be his.
This would be the first of 3 supernatural rebellions. The second one, we touched on last week.
Genesis 6:1–4 (NIV)
Wickedness in the World
6 When human beings began to increase in number on the earth and daughters were born to them, 2 the sons of God saw that the daughters of humans were beautiful, and they married any of them they chose. 3 Then the LORD said, “My Spirit will not contend with humans forever, for they are mortal; their days will be a hundred and twenty years.”
4 The Nephilim were on the earth in those days—and also afterward—when the sons of God went to the daughters of humans and had children by them. They were the heroes of old, men of renown.
I mentioned last week that the Phrase “men of renown” means “sons of the name”. This is another title for elohim, or in this case human elohim hybrids. There’s also a little addition in line four. Did you notice? “And also afterward”. The flood did not kill the Nephilim.
Peter actually spells this scenario out a little clearer for us in 2 Peter 2:4-5
For if God did not spare angels when they sinned, but sent them to hell (Tartarus), putting them in chains of darkness to be held for judgment; if he did not spare the ancient world when he brought the flood on its ungodly people, but protected Noah, a preacher of righteousness, and seven others;
Jude too explains this in Jude 5–7 (NIV)
5 Though you already know all this, I want to remind you that the Lord at one time delivered his people out of Egypt, but later destroyed those who did not believe. 6 And the angels who did not keep their positions of authority but abandoned their proper dwelling—these he has kept in darkness, bound with everlasting chains for judgment on the great Day. 7 In a similar way, Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding towns gave themselves up to sexual immorality and perversion. They serve as an example of those who suffer the punishment of eternal fire.
I included the beginning few sentences to fuller explain what I said last week. This was how the ancient world looked at these stories. Some of this may seem foreign to our modern understanding, but this was how they ALL saw things.
The fallen “sons of God” we sent to Tartarus and they’re locked there until the “Day of the LORD”.
We often think this must be the type of creature, or the very creatures that Jesus encountered when he “cast out demons”. But these guys are locked up, so where did Jesus’ demons come from?
The answer is the Nephilim. Their descendants became the giants that we read about in scripture. They also went by the name; Anakites, Anakim and Rephaim.
If you’ve ever wondered about OT genocide? This is where most of that is explained. Between numbers and Joshua and Kings there are several times the LORD says something like “go in and wipe them out, leave no survivors.” But then in a very similar situation he says to drive them out. Leave survivors.
Here’s one example.
Numbers 13:31–33 (NIV)
31 But the men who had gone up with him said, “We can’t attack those people; they are stronger than we are.” 32 And they spread among the Israelites a bad report about the land they had explored. They said, “The land we explored devours those living in it. All the people we saw there are of great size. 33 We saw the Nephilim there (the descendants of Anak come from the Nephilim). We seemed like grasshoppers in our own eyes, and we looked the same to them.”
Ok, so they’re giants. The descendants of Anakim, or Anakites are the progeny of Nephilim. It’s also important to know that this was already the focal point of the conquest of the Holy Lands. These men talked the Hebrews out of attacking and earned them 40 more years in the desert.
Let’s jump to Joshua.
Joshua 11:21–22 (NIV)
21 At that time Joshua went and destroyed the Anakites from the hill country: from Hebron, Debir and Anab, from all the hill country of Judah, and from all the hill country of Israel. Joshua totally destroyed them and their towns. 22 No Anakites were left in Israelite territory; only in Gaza, Gath and Ashdod did any survive.
If we jump back and read all of Chapter 11, which we’re not going to do, we see that Joshua is fighting all the armies of the northern kingdoms, plus a few more. It’s unclear, but it reads to be between 11-13 kingdoms. Guess how many they annihilated? One, only the descendants of the Nephilim. These beings have been raised up by supernatural rebels to defy Yahweh. This conquest of the Holy Land was actual spiritual warfare played out on earth. This is the everlasting story of good vs evil. Joshua and the Hebrews would drive out people, but the descendants of the Nephilim, they had to die.
On a quick side note for today, here’s some more vocabulary. Another $5 Hebrew word, "Rephaim". The Rephaim literally translates to “the dead ones”. They are referred to in Isaiah, Deuteronomy, Samuel, and Joshua, but in all English versions the word has been translated. Which is disappointing because it draws away from the nature of these entities. The name Rephaim carries with it three different states. Sometimes in scripture it’s a foreshadowing of things to come. In Amos “Og the Anakin” is referred to as Rephaim. He is, of course killed in the story. In Ezekiel, the Rephaim are shown to be disembodied spirits. Those listed as dead, but not in the grave. There is an inherently evil connotation and the Rephaim are shown to be the descendants of the Nephilim when they are dead. Again, this concept is fleshed out much more in 1 Enoch, and the Book of Giants, a work found amongst the Dead Sea Scrolls. The final, and much less used version of Rephaim is for a dead Holy person. Much like the Roman Catholics consider Saints to be. When the dead prophet Elisha is summoned from the dead, he is listed as Rephaim. This middle example, the evil disembodied spirits are the ones running around and challenging Jesus and us today. More about that another day.
Ok, back to the Nephilim and Anakin. Why would Yahweh single these guys out and order them killed? Like I said before, they were evil. They were competing spirits and human spirit hybrids that devolved to try and overthrow Yahweh and destroy humanity. The Hebrew attacks were targeted. They only went after the Anakin in the Holy Land that Yahweh promised them. Yahweh was establishing a new Garden; first in the form of a roaming Tabernacle, and then in the form of the great Israelite Temple. As is recorded in scripture, His point was to make Israel a nation of priests.To pull humanity back from the evil spirits we had been worshiping and remake his Garden of Eden. In order to do that all the evil spirits and their children must be eliminated. The land needed to be cleansed.
Ok, trust me we’re getting to Jesus, who by the way, understood all of this to be true. I want to take this in smaller bits so we can question and absorb it all. Questions?
