“all the earth is Mine” (Ex. 19:5, NKJV)
Our current exploration of the impossible depth of the Word of God brings Luke 24:45 into our prayers: “And He opened their understanding, that they might comprehend the Scriptures.”
For the argument concerning which type of anointing Jesus received when He was baptized with the Holy Spirit, it is important that we note that the manifestation of the Holy Spirit is described by John the Baptist as “like a dove”. In the previous teaching we started looking at the Biblical symbolism of the dove in the story of Noah (Gen. 8:1-14), as first typological key. It is important to remember throughout that the dove represents the revealing of the Christ. Within this the ark is certainly an image that points to Jesus the Christ. With the ark “the curse reversed”!
In Gen. 8:5-7 it notes, “And the waters decreased continually until the tenth month. In the tenth month, on the first day of the month, the tops of the mountains were seen. So it came to pass, at the end of forty days, that Noah opened the window of the ark which he had made. Then he sent out a raven, which kept going to and fro until the waters had dried up from the earth.”
This is the first action that takes place for the curse to be overturned, that which Hab. 3:10 beautifully describes as “The deep uttered its voice, and lifted its hands on high.” This is not only a gesture of surrender, but also of worship. Symbolically mountains possess the allure of eternity and of existing before time (see Hab. 3:6), and thus it is an important pointer to the way the overturning of the flood first becomes visible through markers of this period before time. The phrase “the heights of the hills” is only found in one other instance in the Bible, in Ps. 95:3-4, and this Scripture points to God’s mighty hand: “For the Lord is the great God, and the great King above all gods. In His hand are the deep places of the earth; the heights of the hills are His also.” In this phrasing God’s reclamation of the earth is foregrounded. Indeed, it is as an Old Testament David (Ps. 24:1) and a New Testament Paul (1 Cor. 10:26 & 28) makes clear: “for the earth is the Lord’s, and all its fullness”. Please take a moment to selah about this fantastic statement. We are so used to thinking of the earth with contempt, because it is wrongly associated with everything that decays. But remember – at the time of creation it was all good, all wondrous. Remember God’s powerful statement in Ex. 19:5: “all the earth is Mine.” It is this “living God, who gives us richly all things to enjoy” (1 Tim. 6:17)! If heaven is then His throne, and the earth his footstool (Isa. 66:1; Acts 7:49), He chooses to “make the place of My feet glorious” (Isa. 60:13)!
- Selah: Ensure your heart and mind are in accordance with God’s perspective on the earth.
- Read: 22-24
- Memorise: 22:20-21
