Then the LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it.
Gen 2:15-17, NKJV
In my last blog, we examined the commendation that God gave to Abraham:
And I will make your descendants multiply as the stars of heaven; I will give to your descendants all these lands; and in your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed; because Abraham obeyed My voice and kept My charge, My commandments, My statutes, and My laws.”
Gen 26:4-5, NKJV
We discovered that the term “keep My charge” means to “keep watch”, as a soldier might watch over those things put under his control. And we further discovered that Abraham kept God’s watch by keeping the promise that God made to him, having faith that God would be true to His promise. And his crowning act of obedience in keeping the promise? His willingness to sacrifice his son Isaac to God, believing that God would raise Isaac from the dead.
By faith Abraham, when he was tested, offered up Isaac, and he who had received the promises offered up his only begotten son, of whom it was said, “In Isaac your seed shall be called,” concluding that God was able to raise him up, even from the dead, from which he also received him in a figurative sense.
The letter to the Hebrews 11:17-19, NKJV
God gave Abraham a promise to watch over, and Abraham kept an active hold of that promise. Did Jesus keep the watch given Him? In order to answer this question, let’s return to that first scriptural mention of the primitive root of “charge”, shamar.
Then the LORD God took the man and put him in the garden of Eden to tend and keep it. And the LORD God commanded the man, saying, “Of every tree of the garden you may freely eat; but of the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat of it you shall surely die.”
Gen 2:15-17, NKJV
Here, as we have seen, God gave Adam charge of the Garden with but one instruction – not to eat of that fateful tree. Adam failed to keep this charge. Let’s take a look at the consequence of his failure:
Then the LORD God called to Adam and said to him, “Where are you?”
So he said, “I heard Your voice in the garden, and I was afraid because I was naked; and I hid myself.”
And He said, “Who told you that you were naked? Have you eaten from the tree of which I commanded you that you should not eat?”
Then the man said, “The woman whom You gave to be with me, she gave me of the tree, and I ate.”
And the LORD God said to the woman, “What is this you have done?”
The woman said, “The serpent deceived me, and I ate.”
So the LORD God said to the serpent:
“Because you have done this,
You are cursed more than all cattle,
And more than every beast of the field;
On your belly you shall go,
And you shall eat dust
All the days of your life.
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.”Genesis 3:9-15, NKJV
Notice that the first consequence of Adam’s failure (sin) was a separation from God. Adam abandoned his post out of fear. A failure to keep the charge inevitably leads to a recognition of failure and inadequacy, and ultimately an abandonment of that very charge.
But did you notice that, in the midst of God’s righteous curse of the serpent for drawing Adam away from his charge, God also gave the first promise of His redemption?
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.”Genesis 3:15, NKJV
So, here we see that the first man, Adam, was unfaithful to God’s charge, but someday, the “woman’s seed” would be faithful to bruise the head of our mortal enemy. Here in only the third chapter of the Law (Torah), we are given a glimpse of the ultimate charge keeper. Let’s examine just a couple of the many promises – and fulfillments – regarding the charge that this man, the seed of the woman would keep.
Behold, the Lord GOD shall come with a strong hand,
And His arm shall rule for Him;
Behold, His reward is with Him,
And His work before Him.
He will feed His flock like a shepherd;
He will gather the lambs with His arm,
And carry them in His bosom,
And gently lead those who are with young.
Isaiah 40:10-11, NKJV
And that wonderful, well known psalm of comfort, Psalm 23:
The LORD is my shepherd;
I shall not want.
He makes me to lie down in green pastures;
He leads me beside the still waters.
He restores my soul;
He leads me in the paths of righteousness
For His name’s sake.
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death,
I will fear no evil;
For You are with me;
Your rod and Your staff, they comfort me.
You prepare a table before me in the presence of my enemies;
You anoint my head with oil;
My cup runs over.
Surely goodness and mercy shall follow me
All the days of my life;
And I will dwell* in the house of the LORD
Forever.
Psalm 23, NKJV
Did Jesus fulfill this charge?
Then Jesus said to them again, “Most assuredly, I say to you, I am the door of the sheep. All who ever came before Me are thieves and robbers, but the sheep did not hear them. I am the door. If anyone enters by Me, he will be saved, and will go in and out and find pasture. The thief does not come except to steal, and to kill, and to destroy. I have come that they may have life, and that they may have it more abundantly.
“I am the good shepherd. The good shepherd gives His life for the sheep. But a hireling, he who is not the shepherd, one who does not own the sheep, sees the wolf coming and leaves the sheep and flees; and the wolf catches the sheep and scatters them. The hireling flees because he is a hireling and does not care about the sheep. I am the good shepherd; and I know My sheep, and am known by My own. As the Father knows Me, even so I know the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep. And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd.
“Therefore My Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father.”
John 10:7-18, NKJV
Do you notice what this is saying? The charge Jesus is fulfilling is none other than to keep God’s sheep! What wonderful words of comfort, knowing that we are His sheep the people of His pasture. And how has Jesus kept His sheep?
“I have manifested Your name to the men whom You have given Me out of the world. They were Yours, You gave them to Me, and they have kept Your word. Now they have known that all things which You have given Me are from You. For I have given to them the words which You have given Me; and they have received them, and have known surely that I came forth from You; and they have believed that You sent Me.
“I pray for them. I do not pray for the world but for those whom You have given Me, for they are Yours. 10 And all Mine are Yours, and Yours are Mine, and I am glorified in them. Now I am no longer in the world, but these are in the world, and I come to You. Holy Father, keep through Your name those whom You have given Me, that they may be one as We are. While I was with them in the world, I kept them in Your name. Those whom You gave Me I have kept; and none of them is lost except the son of perdition, that the Scripture might be fulfilled.
The gospel of John 17:6-13, NKJV
Jesus has indeed kept His sheep by manifesting the holy Name of God to them. God gave His sheep to Jesus, and gave Jesus the charge to keep them. Jesus did so, even insomuch as laying down His life for His sheep:
I am the good shepherd; and I know My sheep, and am known by My own. As the Father knows Me, even so I know the Father; and I lay down My life for the sheep. And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd.
“Therefore My Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father.”
The gospel of John 10:14-18, NKJV
We have read the above passages several times before; and I have commented on the fact that Jesus chose to lay down His life willingly, not through coercion or force. But notice verse 16:
And other sheep I have which are not of this fold; them also I must bring, and they will hear My voice; and there will be one flock and one shepherd.
The gospel of John 10:16, NKJV
And let’s add a continuation of the passage in John 17, above:
“I do not pray for these alone, but also for those who will* believe in Me through their word; 21 that they all may be one, as You, Father, are in Me, and I in You; that they also may be one in Us, that the world may believe that You sent Me.
John 17:20-21, NKJV
It never fails to impress me when I read this passage that Jesus is praying for ME personally! Did you notice it? He is praying not just for the sheep that He was given during His earthly life, but He was praying for all the sheep that would someday ultimately come to believe in His Word! That means you (if you have believed), and ME!
Now let’s look more closely at what Jesus says about laying down His life:
“Therefore My Father loves Me, because I lay down My life that I may take it again. No one takes it from Me, but I lay it down of Myself. I have power to lay it down, and I have power to take it again. This command I have received from My Father.”
The gospel of John 10:17-18, NKJV
Do you see that the result of Jesus’ keeping His charge (keeping His sheep given Him by His Father) includes having the power to take up His life again? Jesus is talking here about His personal resurrection. The scripture clearly teaches that Jesus arose from the grave on the third day, and that He subsequently met with His disciples, eating, and drinking with them and continually teaching them until He ascended into Heaven. Let’s take a few more minutes to dig a little deeper into this resurrection, courtesy of Paul’s first letter to the Corinthians:
But someone will say, “How are the dead raised up? And with what body do they come?” Foolish one, what you sow is not made alive unless it dies. And what you sow, you do not sow that body that shall be, but mere grain — perhaps wheat or some other grain. But God gives it a body as He pleases, and to each seed its own body.
All flesh is not the same flesh, but there is one kind of flesh of men, another flesh of animals, another of fish, and another of birds.
There are also celestial bodies and terrestrial bodies; but the glory of the celestial is one, and the glory of the terrestrial is another. There is one glory of the sun, another glory of the moon, and another glory of the stars; for one star differs from another star in glory.
So also is the resurrection of the dead. The body is sown in corruption, it is raised in incorruption. It is sown in dishonor, it is raised in glory. It is sown in weakness, it is raised in power. It is sown a natural body, it is raised a spiritual body. There is a natural body, and there is a spiritual body. And so it is written, “The first man Adam became a living being.” The last Adam became a life-giving spirit.
However, the spiritual is not first, but the natural, and afterward the spiritual. The first man was of the earth, made of dust; the second Man is the Lord from heaven. As was the man of dust, so also are those who are made of dust; and as is the heavenly Man, so also are those who are heavenly. And as we have borne the image of the man of dust, we shall also bear the image of the heavenly Man.
Paul’s First letter to the Corinthians, 15:35-49, NKJV
Notice here that it was precisely by dying that Jesus was able to arise with a new heavenly body. The first man, Adam, was made of dust, he did not keep God’s charge, he sowed to corruption, and he reaped the harvest of death. But the second man, Jesus, kept God’s charge, He sowed of the Spirit, and He reaped spiritual resurrection – a resurrection that He willingly gives to all of His sheep. Thanks be to the Holy and Righteous God!
Now we have seen that Jesus kept God’s voice and His charge; next, we will examine how Jesus kept God’s commandments, statutes and laws – as we continue to examine His life and mission.
May God richly bless your study of His holy Word! Selah!
YouJi