Scripture: Topics: Numbers in the Bible
Numbers in the Bible, episode six. What a privilege to be able to examine the word of God and discuss these things.
It's exciting, the whole concept of numbers to see God's fingerprint on His words. Later, when we get through with all the numbers and all the fractions, we're going to come back and look at the King James Bible and we're going to see numbers in it. It's got its own unique set of numbers. You're going to see some rather amazing things that confirms the fingerprints of God on the King James Bible in a marvelous way.
We're going to cover 10 tonight and 11 and 12 and 13 and 14. So as the numbers get larger, they're not used as many times and I've kind of speeding it up a little bit. You've got the idea, the feel for it, so I'm not covering some of the numbers that are covered more times. I'm only giving you about half of the references or so and trying to be fair in representation of them.
I am Michael Pearl and you are at The Door located in Lobelville, Tennessee.
Proverbs 30:5-6 "Every word of God is pure. Add thou not unto his words lest he reprove thee and thou be found a liar." Certainly the numbers in the word of God give us a concept proof that it is the word of God.
"The mind becomes imprinted with that symbolic meaning of numbers."
When you read the Bible, whether you're an old man or a young child, if you read it enough, you soon get a feeling for the numbers. You begin to realize that God uses the numbers, every prophet, 40 different authors, writers, stenographers, writing over a period of 1600 years in three different languages at least, maybe four, and yet you find this continuity, this weave like in a tapestry that is common to every one of them in the use of their numbers. The mind becomes imprinted with that symbolic meaning of numbers. Even if you're not really interested in the meaning of numbers, you come to see that each number has a certain flavor, a certain color, certain tone.
Now, nine and 10 are similar but different. There are 98 cardinals, that is 10, the number 10 and no more, and that's not including 10,000 or three score and 10, that's just the cardinal 10. Then we have the ordinal, which is as in 10th, and it's found 81 times. 10 expresses a full measure, a unit rather than a point of termination.
Do you remember nine? It is the termination point. It is that at which you arrive, whereas 10 is a unit, a whole, which stands alone. The numbers are, the arrival is not the important thing, it's the unit that's important in 10. Whether it's 10 or 100 or 1,000 or 100,000 or whatever, in math, 10 is the whole, it expresses all, and so it becomes the basis of all future and larger numbers. It encompasses all of the digits, one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, and zero, 10.
10 or 10th, we're going to look at them together. We open the word of God to see what it says, our first mention.
Genesis 5:14 "And all the days of Cainan were nine hundred and ten years: and he died."
Now I made an exception here, that's a larger number, that's not actually the cardinal, but the reason I put it in there is it so jumps out as the whole. Look at, “all the days of Cainan,” that's the whole, the total amount, "Were nine hundred and ten”
Genesis 8:5 “And the waters decreased continually until the tenth month." You talking about Noah and the ark. "In the tenth month on the first day of the month were the tops of the mountains seen." That was the whole of the flood. That was the end of it on the tenth month.
Genesis 18:32-33, "And he said, 'Oh let not the Lord be angry and I will speak but just once.'" That's Abraham negotiating with God about his destruction of Sodom. "Peradventure," he says, "ten shall be found there," 10 righteous people in Sodom. "And he said," God said, "'I will not destroy it for ten's sake.' And the Lord went his way as soon as he had left communing with Abraham and Abraham returned unto his place." So it was over with, that was it. That was the total number required, the unit, the unit that was required for God not to destroy Sodom.
Genesis 24:10 "And the servant took ten camels." This is Eliazer going to get a bride for Isaac, "Took ten camels of the camels of his master and departed, for all the goods of his master were in his hand." Notice the total, all his goods, the entire amount.
Genesis 24:22 "And he rose and went to Mesopotamia under the city of Nahor. And it came to pass as the camels had done drinking that the man took a golden earring of half a sheckle weight in two sheckles for her hands of ten sheckles weight of gold." Now this is one that you might take to be incidental. That is, it's just happenstance that that's how much it weighs, but yet we find it in a context of him taking all that his master had and bringing it and placing it on her hand, 10 sheckles of gold, the whole.
I would say 10, 5, 10%, sometimes as much as 15% of them could be incidental in each number but the 85% are so overwhelming that we can read into the context a meaning that we've derived from the vast majority.
Genesis 24:55 "And her brother and her mother said, 'Let the damsel abide with us a few days, at least ten, after that she shall go.'" They didn't want to give up, their daughter wanted her to hang around, 10 days, that was the whole amount that she would hang around.
You see the difference in it and nine? It's not a point at which you arrive, but it's the whole unit.
Genesis 31:7 "And your father had deceived me and changed my wages ten times, but God suffered him not to hurt me." That was the total amount of times that he'd changed his wages and he'd had enough. He was going to leave his father-in-law, something he should have done 20 years earlier, and go back where he came from.
Genesis 42:3 "And Joseph's ten brethren went down to buy corn in Egypt". That was the whole lot, Genesis 45:23 "And and to his father and he sent after this manner ten asses laden with the good things of Egypt and ten she asses laden with corn and bread and meat for his father by the way." That was the total, the sum, of what they got there in Egypt.
Now the 10 commandments is mentioned three times and of course 10 commandments is the total number of commandments. It's the whole. That's pretty obvious.
Leviticus 25:9-10, "Then shalt thou cause the trumpet of Jubilee to sound on the tenth day of the seventh month." We've learned that seventh is that which God does on behalf of man. "On the tenth day of the seventh month in the Day of Atonement, shall you make the trumpet sound to it all your land and ye shall hallow the fiftieth year." Now the fiftieth is a memorial to God's people. It exceeds the principle. We'll see that next week. "And He shall hallow the fiftieth year and proclaim liberty throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants there of and it shall be a jubilee unto you and ye shall return every man to his possession and ye shall return every man onto his family."
See when someone had gotten so poor that they'd sold themselves as a slave or when the land had to been sold off to someone else, there came a jubilee, and that was the year of release. They had served their full time, they couldn't be a slave forever. That was the point at which they had to go back. If they had become a slave a year earlier, then their entire slavery was up in one year and they were freed, so that was the whole time.
Numbers 14:22 "Because all those men which have seen my glory and my miracles which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness and have tempted me these ten times," God says. God was through with them. He had had all he was going to take and he sent fiery serpents among them after 10 times. That was the whole of it.
In the temple sacrifices, a golden spoon full of oil is mentioned 14 times, which is seven and seven, which is what God does for man, significant number inside the temple.
Then the tabernacle and temple as you read about them in Exodus and again in Ezekiel and in Chronicles and Kings, you have 10 curtains mentioned several times. You have 10 cubits mentioned several times, 10 pillars, 10 sockets, 10 hooks, 10 candlesticks, and 10 tables. In fact, the temple was full of fives and tens, whereas other numbers, like six, were not mentioned inside of it.
Numbers 11:32 "And the people stood up all that day and all that night and all the next day and they gathered the quails. He that gathered least gathered ten homers:" Now that was about 25 bushels. That's a pickup truckload. You remember reading about that story, how they ended up puking up the quails? You can understand why. If the poor man, the man that couldn't gather them much, the cripple, got 10 homers. “and spread them all abroad for themselves roundabout the camp.” They had to, they couldn't put them in their tent.
Can you imagine everybody having gathered that many quail having scattered them all over the camp? It was once stinking place full of dead birds and that's why they all got sick with it. That was the total amount, the 10 homers.
Numbers 14:22 "Because all those men which have seen my glory and my miracle, which I did in Egypt and in the wilderness and have tempted me now these ten times and have not harkened unto my voice."
Deuteronomy 23:2 "A bastard shall not enter into the congregation of the Lord even to his tenth generation." That's not because God was stigmatizing the bastard as an unclean, unacceptable, unworthy individual. It's because a bastard did not have lineage as to property ownership or which tribe he belonged to. There was no way to identify him in terms of his place in the Jewish system, which was all based on which of the 12 tribes you belong to and what land mass you belong to. Someone who was born a bastard, he could get married to a legitimate person, but it took 10 generations of such marriages before that family line was adopted back into the tribe, so that was the full amount. 10 generations.
Deuteronomy 23:3 "An Ammorite or a Moabite shall not enter to the congregation of the Lord even unto their tenth generation." He treated the non-Jew the same way, an Ammorite or Moabite in particular. If they came to be converted, if a man married a Jewish woman, a Moabite man married a Jewish woman, it was 10 generations before his family could enter into the temple and participate. God was a bit more narrow-minded than we are today.
Job 19:1-3 "Then Job answered and said, 'How long will ye vex my soul and break me in pieces with words? These ten times have you reproached me.'" What you won't find in the Bible is these nine times, have you reproached me, these nine times you've sent. It's 10. Why? That's the whole. Can you see even in a secular literature, 10 would be a summation of the whole of something."You are not ashamed, that you make yourself strange to me,” Job said.
Ecclesiastes 7:19 "Wisdom strengtheneth the wise more than ten mighty men, which were in the city." Again, 10 represents the entire lot.
Daniel 1:20 "And in all matters of wisdom and understanding that the king inquired of them, he found them ten times better than all the magicians and astrologers there were in all his realm."
Now we come to the New Testament.
Matthew 25:1 "Then shall the king of heaven be likened unto ten virgins." These 10 virgins represent all of Israel, the entire lot, "Which took their lamps and went forth to meet the bridegroom." Now if you think that's the church or you, you need to read my book, Eight Kingdoms. Likened unto 10 virgins, that's the full group of Jewish people, the nation.
Matthew 25:28 "Take therefore the talent from him and give it to him which hath ten talents," that was the full amount, the full measure, that was the most.
Luke 19:13 "And he called his ten servants and delivered them 10 pounds and said unto them, 'Occupy till I come.'" 10 servants, again, represent the entire kingdom, all the people and the 10 pounds represent all that God puts into our hands for us to manage until He comes back.
Revelation 2:10 "Fear none of those things which thou shalt suffer. Behold, the devil shall cast some of you into prison that you may be tried and shall have tribulation ten days." This is a warning to the church of the coming tribulation that they would experience and it's summed up as tribulation 10 days.
Now once you get a taste for the number 10, once you've read it all the way through the Bible like we've just done, when you read this tribulation 10 days, you don't wonder was that like Monday through Wednesday or what was that, these 10 days? That'd be right or Monday through Thursday. What does this 10 days mean? Was it some particular time? You see that God is using that in a symbolic sense, that they're going to get a full measure of tribulation.
Then he says, Revelation17:12 "And the ten horns which thou sawest are ten kings." This represents the entire kingdom of men. All the way down through history to this present point, "Are ten kings which have received no kingdom as yet," and this will be the entire anti-Christ force during the tribulation. 10 different countries that will align themselves against Christ, "Which have received no kingdom as yet, but received powers, kings, one hour with the beast.”
Revelation17:3 “And he carried me away in the spirit of the wilderness and I saw a woman sit up on a scarlet colored beast, full of names of blasphemy having seven heads and ten horns." Those 10 horns were the secular powers that were assisting her and the seven heads were a mockery using the number seven of what God does for man.
Now we come to the number 11.
I saw this week some personality in the news, some woman said that her lucky number was 11. Well, she was not a Bible reader obviously, or she wouldn't have chosen 11 as a lucky number.
It's interesting that some of the numbers are absolutely positive all the way through and some of them are absolutely negative everywhere they're used, and some can go either way, like seven, that which God does for man, it's God doing it but it can be positive or negative, like seven years of tribulation, seven plagues, seven deadly sins.
But the number 11 is always negative. The number 11 is dissolution or incompleteness. It's that which has fallen short, something's missing from it. It's not all there.
The cardinal is found 21 times and the ordinal is found 20 times. It's not used a lot.
We open the Bible, Genesis 32:22 "And he rose up that night and took his two wives and his two women servants and his eleven sons and passed over the ford." Now you know how many sons he ends up with, right? 12 for the 12 tribes. So what you have here is an incomplete list of sons, just 11. The twelfth has not yet been born, so it's incomplete.
Deuteronomy 1:2-3 "(There are eleven days' journey from Horeb by way of Mount Seir unto Kadeshbarnea.) And it came to pass in the fourteenth year in the eleventh month on the first day of the month that Moses spake unto the children of Israel according to all that the Lord had given him in the commandment unto them." The subject right there is; Moses is addressing Israel for the last time. When he gets through with this address, they are going to cross over the Jordan into the Promised Land to inherit it. But God told Moses, "You're not going to get to go. You're going to have to go up on the mountain and die." Moses makes his a final address and then dies. His life journey is incomplete because of a sin he committed. This is the 11 days and eleventh month, dissolution, incompleteness on Moses' behalf.
Joshua 15:20 "This is the inheritance of the tribe of the children of Judah according to their families. And Goshen and Holon and Giloh; eleven cities and their villages." There's a long list there of the different cities and villages that each individual among the tribes inherited. The number varies here and there. This just happens to be 11 cities which they inherited. Now could that be just incidental? It could be and it may not be that God intended to communicate anything in particular with that. Then it may be that we just don't know what became of those 11 cities, what happened. It may not be a record recorded, but that there was actually some incompleteness or dissolution that occurs.
I did take it upon myself to look at some of them and I found that there were other places that expressed that dissolution.
Jeremiah 52:1-2 “Zedekiah was one and twenty years old when he began to reign and he reigned eleven years in Jerusalem and he did that which was evil in the eyes of the Lord according to all that Jehoiakim had done." This is interesting. “eleven years in Jerusalem and did that which was evil.”
There are five 11 year reigns and they're all say, "And they did that which was evil." These 11, there are no 11 year reigns that were good. They all came out of very negative, you see. Now what's the odds of that? What's the odds of a good guy not getting to reign 11 years? They reigned numbers that are consistent with their reign. By the way, God killed all these 11, that's why it was dissolution.
Ezekiel 26:1-4 "And it came to pass in the eleventh year and the first day of the month that the word of the Lord came into me saying, 'Son of man, because that Tyrus has set against Jerusalem, aha she's broken. That was the gate of the people, she turned unto me, I shall be replenished now she is laid waste. And they shall destroy the walls of Tyrus and break down her towers."
Let's go back. "And it came to pass in the eleventh year," what happens? "The word of the Lord came saying, 'Going to break down the gates,... destroy the walls of towers, break down her towers.'" That is dissolution.
Ezekiel 31:1 "And it came to pass in the eleventh year, in the third month, in the first day of the month," you can recall the meaning of those numbers, "That the word of the Lord came to me saying, 'To whom art thou thus like a glory and in greatness among the trees of Eden? Thou shalt be brought down with the trees of Eden unto the nether parts of the earth.'" In the eleventh year, the pronouncement is made and the king and speaks of Lucifer will be brought down to the earth.
Eleven/Eleventh appears nine times in the New Testament, the two together, the cardinal and the ordinal, just nine times in the New Testament.
Matthew 28:16, "And the eleven disciples went away into Galilee into a mountain where Jesus had appointed them." The 11 is used six times. Now how many disciples were there? 12. What happened? One of them sinned and committed suicide so the number is incomplete here. It has gone backwards, it's dissolution. That's why the 11 fits so well, this definition of 11.
Matthew 20:6 "And about the eleventh hour, he went out and found others standing idling said unto them, 'Why stand ye here idle all day?" The eleventh hour is used two times and it's expressing that lack of one hour before the midnight hour when something occurs.
Revelation 21:20 "The fifth sardonyx, the sixth sardius, seventh chrysolite, the eighth beryl, the ninth topaz, the tenth chrysoprasus." I wouldn't want to wear one of those. "And the eleventh, jacinth, twelfth an amethyst." This may be incidental because he's simply telling you the 12 stones, but the eleventh wouldn't be complete. It has to be the twelfth.
Now we come to the number 12. Headship or rule. Cardinal's found 189 times, the ordinal is found 23 times, so we're not going to be able to cover all of these. We're going to hit some highlights for you. Now when I say hit highlights, I'll show you the incidental ones, the possibly incidental ones in proportion to the number.
Exodus 28:21 "And the stones shall be with the names of the children of Israel, twelve, according to their names. Like the engravings of a signet, everyone with his name shall they be according to the twelve tribes."
We said 12 appears 12 times, and it is headship, 12 apostles, and that's 27 times, and of course that's headship, right?
Genesis 14:4 "Twelve, years they served and thirteenth year they rebelled." Remember 13? Sin, death, judgment, rebellion. "The fourteenth year King Chedorlaomer and the kings that were with him and smote the Rephaims in Ashteroth Karnaim, and the Zuzims in Ham, Emis and Shavh Kiriathaim." Now if you speak Hebrew, I apologize for all those pronunciations, but I've just never met anybody named Kiriathai. All right? thirteenth year they rebelled. That's the number of rebellion. The fourteenth year came this king and watch smote them and freed them from that bondage. He was in control, he was the head.
Genesis 17:20 "As for Ishmael, I have heard thee. Behold, I have blessed him, I will make him fruitful, I'll multiply him exceedingly; twelve princes shall he beget." He's talking about the Arabic people here. " twelve princes shall he beget and I will make him a great nation." This is Ishmael, becomes the cousin to the Jews, becomes the enemy of the Jews down through the ages, but God promised to make 12 princes, headship, rule from him.
The 12 wells are headship as well. 12 cities, 12 pillars represent headship, and 12 princes obviously.
Now Matthew 19:28, "And Jesus said unto them, 'Verily I say unto you that ye which have followed me in the regeneration, when the son of man shall sit in the throne of his glory, ye also shall sit upon twelve thrones," there's your headship, thrones, "Judging," rule, "The twelve tribes of Israel."
Matthew 26:53 "Thinkest thou this that I cannot now pray to the father and he shall presently give me more than twelve legions of angels," rule, authority. The angels coming in power to overthrow.
Luke 8:41 "And behold, there came a man named Jairus and he was a ruler of the synagogue and he fell down at Jesus' feet and besought him that he would come to his house for he had only one daughter about twelve years of age, and she lay adying. But as he went, the people thronged." He healed her, 12 years of age, by exercising authority over death.
John 11:9 "Jesus answered, 'Are there not twelve hours in the day?'" He's talking about the day ruled by the 12 hours.
Luke 2:42 "And when he was twelve years old, Jesus went up to Jerusalem after the custom of the feast," so he to whom belongs the kingdoms of this world was about his father's business. He was beginning his messiahship right there at 12 years of age, his rule, his kingdom.
Revelation 12:1 "And there appeared a great wonder in heaven, a woman clothed with the sun, the moon under her feet, and upon her head a crown of twelve stars." These 12 stars, again, represent the 12 tribes of Israel.
Revelation 21:12-14 "And had a great wall and high and had twelve gates." This is the new Jerusalem. "And the gates had twelve angels, and the names written there on are the names of twelve tribes, the children of Israel, and the wall of the city had twelve foundations, and in them the names of the twelve apostles of the Lamb." 12 is rather prominent right there. This is the city of the great king. You can understand why it would be replete with 12s.
Now we come to the number 13, that number. Everybody knows 13 is a bad number, right? But it is the least well represented in all of the Bible, of all the numbers, and the least definitive in about half of its usages.
In fact, it only appears, sin, death, and judgment 13 times. 13 appears 13 times, the cardinal, and the ordinal appears 11 times, which is de dissolution.
It's interesting that the number of appearances in the King James Bible represent numbers that are also negative, but it is sin, death and judgment.
Thirteen and thirteenth never appear in the New Testament. That's fascinating. Not even the book of Revelation. No 13s anywhere in the New Testament, just in the Old. We'll open our Bible and read some of those.
Genesis 17:25 "And Ishmael, his son, was thirteen years old when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin." Now Ishmael, if you remember, was not God's chosen. Ishmael was an act of the flesh. Ishmael was a seed of Abraham, but not of Sarah as God had promised. Ishmael, the father of the Arabic people, was rejected to be in the lineage of the Messiah. "Ishmael was thirteen years old when he was circumcised in the flesh of his foreskin," that's certainly death, the circumcision.
Numbers 29:13 "And ye shall offer a burnt offering, a sacrifice made by fire, of a sweet savour unto the Lord; thirteen young bullocks, two rams, fourteen lambs," scores 13, if this is the number of death, these animals were being put to death.
Joshua mentions five heads of tribes that inherited 13 cities each. There's a long list of different cities that they inherited and incidentally, possibly five of those heads did inherit 13 cities. II Chronicles mentions 13 cities, two more times. We're going to look at ...This is one of them.
Joshua 19:6 "And Beth Bethlebaoth and Sharuhen, thirteen cities and their villages."
What I decided to do was to trace down one of them and the context didn't say anything about sin, death, and judgment so I just looked the rest of the scripture and cross-referenced with places and names and events. I found something very interesting about this one. The others, I didn't bother to do so, but this is the one I looked at.
Joshua 19:8 "And all the villages that were roundabout these cities of Baalathbeer, Ramath of the South, this is the inheritance of the tribe the children of Simeon according to their family." It seems to be incidental just 13 cities. But if you look it up, what you find is that there was a great slaughter of people who dwelt there recorded in I Chronicles 4:41 and 43 later.
Also when Sampson killed the 3,000 Philistines, it was in the immediate vicinity of this area where these 13 cities were. These 13 cities did result in judgment and death.
Now here's another one. 1 Kings 6:38 "In the eleventh year, in the month which is the eighth month was the house finished." The eleventh year is a number of dissolution, the eighth number is a number of new beginnings when the house was finished. "Was the house finished throughout all the parts thereof, according to the fashion of it. So was he seven years in building it." Now this is not God's house, this is Solomon's house. It took him three years to build the temple and seven years to build his own house. That house was torn down in 536 BC, I believe it was, 586 BC, when Nebuchadnezzar came in to invade Jerusalem.
1 Kings 7:1 “But Solomon was building his own house thirteen years and he finished all his house.” Seven years in building it and it was torn down.
1 Chronicles 26:11 "Hilkiah, the second, Tebaliah the third, Zechariah fourth, and all the sons and brethren of Hosiah were thirteen." Incidental? Could be.
Ezekiel 40:11 "And he measured the breadth of the city of the gate, then cubits; and the length of the gate, thirteen cubits." This is the only time 13 appears in relationship to the temple, but it's not in the temple. 13 is the distance that a man must walk through the gate to get to the door of the temple. He walks through the path of sin, death, and judgment before he enters a seven cubic wide, that which God does for man, doorway into the temple.
Genesis 14:4 "Twelve years they served Chedorlaomer, and in the thirteenth year they rebelled." That fits real well of rebellion.
Esther 3:12 "Then were the king's scribes called on the thirteenth day of the first month and they were written according to all that Haman had commanded under the king's lieutenants." Now this is when the children of Israel are in danger of being put to death, if you remember Esther. "And the letters were sent by posts under all the king's provinces to destroy, to kill, and to cause to perish, all Jews," Thirteenth day of the first month, primacy, first, 13, death. "All Jews, both young and old, little children and women, in one day, even upon the thirteenth day of the twelfth month," twelfth, the number of ruling, "Which is the month Adar, and to take the spoil of them for a prey. “
Esther 8:11 “Wherein the king granted the Jews which were in every city to gather themselves together to stand for their life, to destroy, to slay, and cause to parish all the power of the people and province that would assault them both with little ones and women and to take the spoil of them for a prey." Six usages of 13 in Esther, all in reference to this death that was to come upon Israel.
Jeremiah 1:2 "To whom the word of the Lord came in the days of Josiah, the son of Amon, king of Judah, in the thirteenth year of his reign." This could be incidental, but the word of God comes to him in the thirteenth year. He was a good king and we do not know what became of that.
Now we come to the number 14, our last number for this lesson. 14 is divine guidance and blessing. Quite a contrast to 13 or 11. Divine guidance and blessing. It's a delightful number and everywhere it's used it's divine guidance and blessing. It's a decoration.
Cardinal, 26 times, in the ordinal 25 times. This number 14, every time 14 is mentioned, it's in a very positive context. It's a beam of light, a ray of hope.
"Every time Fourteen is mentioned, it's in a very positive context."
It's a beam of light, a ray of hope.
Genesis 31:41 "Thus have I been twenty years in the house." Now that's Jacob talking to his father-in-law. 20 years, 20 is the number of maturity, we'll come to that. You see it there. "And served thee fourteen years." That's divine guidance and blessing and God blessed him there with two wives and a bunch of kids and a whole lot of animals. "For thy two daughters and six years," the number of man, "For thy cattle and thou has changed my wages ten times." That's the total amount of his wage change, the whole amount. You see several numbers, four of them used there together.
We read among the temple 14 lambs were offered in sacrifice, eight times. Eight, number of new beginnings, where their sin was forgiven.
1 Kings 8:65-66 "And at the time, Solomon held a feast, and all Israel with him, a great congregation of the entering of Hamath unto the river of Egypt, before the Lord our God, seven days and seven days, even fourteen days." Seven days, that which God does for man, again, that which God does for man, two sevens, even 14 days, a great blessing of God. "On the eighth day," new beginnings, "He sent the people away." New beginnings. "And they blessed the king," remember this is a blessing, 14, "And went unto their tents joyful and glad of heart for all the goodness the Lord had done for David his servant, and for Israel his peoples." The divine guidance and blessing. You see the numbers there lining up one after the other.
1 Chronicles 25:1-6 "And moreover, David and his captains of the host separated unto the service of the sons of Asaph." Now, that was the musician, a lot of the Psalms were sung by them. This is you're talking about the praise and worship group here now. "And of Heman and of Jeduthum and who should prophesy with harps." It's interesting. They were prophesying where their harps. "With psalteries," singing Psalms, "With cymbals," they were prophesying with their cymbals, "And the number of the workmen according to their service was," and he goes on. I'm skipping a few verses. "All these were the sons of Heman," so one man has all these children. "The king's seer in the words of God to lift up the horn," that's they blow it. "And God gave to Heman fourteen sons and three daughters," and that makes his band and that's the praising worship band, one family, all of them playing musical instruments, singing, dancing. "All these were under the hands of their father," so the daddy was the head of the band, not the mama, "For songs in the house of the Lord with cymbals, psalteries, and harps," I'd like to hear that band, "For the service of the house of God according to the king, according to Asaph, Jeduth, and Heman." Now can you see divine guidance and blessing in all of that? I can.
1 Chronicles 25:7 "So the number of them with their brethren that were instructed in the songs of the Lord, even all that were cunning was two hundred fourscore, and eight." That's 288, all total was in the band. Now that's the only time 288 is used so I do not know what it means. We can guess.
2 Chronicles 13:21 "But Abijiah waxed mighty, and married fourteen wives." He'd have to wax mighty to marry 14 wives, "And begat twenty and two sons and sixteen daughters." He either didn't live very long or ... I've got five or six vehicles and two or three of them I only drive a couple times a year. Can you imagine having that many wives? No wonder you didn't have all the kids. You couldn't get around them all.
Matthew 1:17 "The generations from Abraham to David are fourteen generations and from David unto the carrying away into Babylon are fourteen generations, and from the carrying away and the baby unto Christ are fourteen generations." Divine blessing are the generations leading up to Jesus Christ.
2 Corinthians 12:2 "I knew a man in Christ about fourteen years ago," divine blessing, "Whether in the body I cannot tell or whether out of the body, I cannot tell, God knoweth, such a one caught up to the third heaven." Now if that's not a blessing to get caught up into the third heaven and see it, divine guidance and blessing.
Galatians 2:1-2 "Then fourteen years after I went up again to Jerusalem with Barnabas and took Titus with me also, and I went up by revelation, and communicated to them that which was I preach among the Gentiles."
This is the total number of 14s in the New Testament we're looking at here and every one of them are divine blessing and guidance. Can you see how the flavor of 14 is so different from 11?
14 does not appear in the book of Revelation at all.
Now we come to number 15 next time. All right?
