Ephraim And The House of Judah: Part 8 of 9.

Part 8:  Ephraim and the House of Judah.
 

Ezekiel 37:15-20

¹⁵ Again the word of the Lord came to me, saying, ¹⁶ “As for you, son of man, take a stick for yourself and write on it: ‘For Judah and for the children of Israel, his companions.’ Then take another stick and write on it, ‘For Joseph, the stick of Ephraim, and for all the house of Israel, his companions.’ ¹⁷ Then join them one to another for yourself into one stick, and they will become one in your hand.
¹⁸ “And when the children of your people speak to you, saying, ‘Will you not show us what you mean by these?’— ¹⁹ say to them, ‘Thus says the Lord God: “Surely I will take the stick of Joseph, which is in the hand of Ephraim, and the tribes of Israel, his companions; and I will join them with it, with the stick of Judah, and make them one stick, and they will be one in My hand.”’ ²⁰ And the sticks on which you write will be in your hand before their eyes."

(Aaron's rod budded overnight.)

We are nearing the end of this exciting topic.  But before we see how the House of Judah relates to Ephraim, we’ll need to know all about ‘the family stick.”

Every Jewish family in ancient Israel had something called, “The family stick.”  On it was written the head of the family and all their patriarchs.  It was a sign of authority and leadership.  Abraham had such a stick as did all the leaders of the tribes of Israel.  

Remember when the leaders of Israel complained to Moses about Aaron being their leader?  Each of the tribal heads brought their family stick or rod to Moses who set them down before the Ark of the Covenant.  In the morning, Aaron’s rod was the only one that had buds, blossoms and mature fruit on it, showing them definitively that Aaron was indeed the leader whom God had chosen.

God has two families of people in covenant with Him in the world:  The Jewish people and The Church.  We have the full blessing, they have only part of the blessing of Abraham.  When they get saved they receive the full blessing.  Righteousness is by far the biggest part of those blessings.

(We are grafted into a Jewish tree.)

You remember from an earlier portion of this study that Ephraim and Manasseh were both adopted by Jacob to be as sons to him in place of Reuben and Simeon.  In the same way we, the non-Jewish Church, have been adopted into the family of God and grafted in to the Jewish family tree!  (For more on this topic, follow this link:
http://emmausrevelations.blogspot.com/2014/11/part-13-of-16rightly-dividing-word-of.html)

Who are Reuben and Simeon?  Reuben means “See the Son” and Simeon means “Hear.”  They represent Natural Israel.  It was Jesus’ natural family, the Jewish people, who primarily got to “see and hear” Jesus when He walked on earth.

Reuben and Simeon lost their positions as first and second born, though they are still family. That doesn’t mean the Church has replaced Israel.  NO.  We have simply been given first born status.

Has God forgotten His natural family?  CERTAINLY NOT! They were set aside for a time, temporarily you understand, while Jesus became the Savior to the whole world:  To the Gentiles.  Please refer to the link above for more on this topic.

How exciting to see how, in these last days, God has turned back to the Jewish people just prior to Jesus’ return.  That miracle we are waiting to see:  Jewish people getting saved, is beginning to unfold right before our eyes!  HALLELUJAH!!!

Please proceed to part 9 where we’ll wrap up this exciting topic.  The final clue of Eprhaim and the House of Judah is found in what may seem the unlikeliest of places:  http://emmausrevelations.blogspot.com/2016/04/ephraim-and-house-of-judah-part-9-of-9.html