The highly exaggerated dual emphasis in our Creator’s testimony should be extremely difficult to miss. But there are many issues that are silently shouted throughout our Creator’s intentionally complex testimony exclusively to those within the enlightened community who are and have developed the required seeing eyes and hearing ears Jesus references in order to escape the resulting filtering effect.

There is a dual nature to all divine truths and principles that is divinely shouted all through the two witnesses of our Creator’s righteousness. These two witnesses are the written word of God (the Bible) and the spoken word of God (creation). The created components and positioning recorded in the creation record reveal how all but one resulted from the verbal commands of the Creator. Man and woman were the only 2 components of creation that were not verbally commanded into existence or into place. They were crafted. Additionally those 2 genders were crafted in 2 stages with man first and woman second. Additionally we are only informed of 2 components in the construction of man. While the intelligent design of a human body is incredibly complex the Creator chose to communicate volumes to a select few by defining that design as being the dust of the earth to form the body and the breath of heaven being added to give life. This earth and heaven dual construction is the same pattern employed for the wilderness configuration for the national first born son of God (Ex. 4:22). That configuration is designed in 2 stages. The outer layer is political (earthly) with the 12 tribes positioned into a foursquare design. The inner layer is heavenly with the 3 Levite divisions and the priests also positioned into a foursquare design. In fact this is exactly the earth and then heaven pattern portrayed in Ezekiel’s prophecy of the 2 resurrection stages of that national first born son of God in the dry bones prophecy. 

Ezekiel is commanded to prophecy twice in chapter 37 in relation to the full restoration of the Jewish nation, including it’s repentance. As we noted in the 1st commentary in this Blog series, this first prophecy resulted in the skeletal reassembly of the dried out bones, followed by the sinew, flesh and then skin. This is the earthly or political resurrection that the world witnessed between 1947 to 1967 with the first 4 wars of Israel. The 2nd prophecy has not yet been fulfilled. This is when the 4 winds of heaven (Christ and the immortalized saints) will save Israel at the moment of their greatest peril and Israel will repent… being filled with that breath of heaven in their repentance before their Messiah. This repentance is detailed in Zechariah chapters 12-14. 

There will be a restoration of the Kingdom of God (Acts 1:6). This will be the 2nd Kingdom Age. The 1st was an earthly Kingdom, ruled by mortals. The 2nd will be a heavenly Kingdom, ruled by immortals. This 2nd Kingdom structure demonstrates the exact same dual pattern as the creation of Adam & Eve, the wilderness configuration and the 2 resurrections of the nation of Israel. Our last generation of the Ecclesial Age sits squarely between those 2 political and spiritual national resurrections.

These 2 Kingdoms of God (earthly preceding heavenly) parallel the 2 comings of Jesus Christ with his two identifications that is first earth and then heaven. Jesus came the first time to die, but without any personal transgressions. His death reconciled the faithful in that validation of the Creator’s rightness in demanding death for sin in Eden.  Christ comes again that 2nd time as an immortal to immortalize the faithful from among the enlightened community, demonstrating the right-ness of the Creator in graciously offering restored life despite His right-ness in first demanding death for sin. Judgment and grace are partners within the terms of our Creator’s righteousness… not contradictions. They are not equal, as equality is an illegitimate principle of the serpent frame of reference. Grace can be extended despite the legitimacy of judgment, but grace never eliminates judgment. That balancing equation is perfectly demonstrated in the divine response to King David’s sins of adultery and contract murder. Even after God forgave David so that he would not be executed, God judged David by requiring humiliating judgments against him including the death of that first son from Bathsheba. 

The 2 applications of the earth and then heaven Kingdom and the earthly and then heavenly coming of the Messiah are spelled out in the 2 names of our Savior. Jesus is the earthly name for the entirely mortal boy born of Mary. Christ is the heavenly title assigned our savior. In the same sense we have 2 saviors. Jesus could never have saved us independently of his Father. God makes this issue perfectly clear.  “And all things are of God, who hath reconciled us to himself by Jesus Christ, and hath given to us the ministry of reconciliation; To wit, that God was in Christ, reconciling the world unto himself, not imputing their trespasses unto them” (2 Cor. 5:19-19). 

This dual highlight in the context of a salvation theme is incredibly extensive, absolutely saturating the 2 avenues of Divine testimony, the written words of God (Bible) and the spoken words of God (creation). A very obvious application would be the 2 generations of the 2 genders of people saved on Noah’s Ark. That number structure of 2 people with 2 genders in the 1st generation and the 6 children in the 2nd generation perfectly match the structure of Abram’s heaven and earth covenant described in Genesis 15. There were 6 cleaved beasts of the earth and 2 whole fowl of heaven placed into 2 parallel rows for that heaven and earth covenant, paralleling the 6 and 2 structure of the 2 generations saved when the flood waters issuing from both the heavens and the earth, cleansed creation.

The salvation frame for those 2 divinely designed historical incidents is emphasized in their shared numerical frame of 8 (8 people saved on the ark and Abram’s 8 sacrificial components). Eight is the number of salvation, our Messiah and infinity. It is rather odd to see the extreme over-emphasis on the number 7 presented by our enlightened community’s speakers and writers over the last 150 years or so. While the number 7 certainly has its degree of significance, it pales next to the divine emphasis of the number 8 throughout scripture. The number 7 does not indicate a finality, as does the number 8. While this is emphasized throughout a parade of applications, this significance order is certainly emphasized in how the 7th millennium (divine day) does not witness the conclusion of the Creator’s plan. After the Millennial Kingdom concludes there will be a rebellion from the surely enlightened global residents that will be crushed and then followed by a resurrection to judgment followed by necessary judgment and then followed by a resurrection to immortality by the always few who are chosen from every divinely imposed judgment on the enlightened community recorded throughout scripture. Then death itself will be eliminated (Rev. 20:6-15; 1 Cor 15: 24-28). All that is flesh (subject to the curse of sin and death) will be cut away in circumcision like fashion in that 8th divine day, not the 7th. This is why the circumcision ritual, with its emphasis on the 8th day, was greater than Sabbath observance, with its emphasis on the 7th day. This is why the Abrahamic covenant of faith (with its 8th day circumcision signature ritual; Gen. 17:11-12) is greater than the Mosaic Covenant of works (with its 7th day Sabbath signature ritual; Ex. 31:12-17, Deut. 5:12-15, Ezek. 20:12,20). This is why Jesus confirmed the Jews were right to circumcise a boy on the 8th day even though that seemingly violated Sabbath Law (John 7:21-24).  

This 8-structure in the salvation images of Noah’s Ark and Abram’s heaven and earth covenant are shadows from the same substance as the numerical significance of the name of Jesus, meaning He Who Saves. The 6 alphanumeric Greek letters in the name of Jesus add up to three 8’s. Iota=10 + eta=8 + sigma=200 + omicron=70 + upsilon=400 + sigma=200. These six letters add up to 888. These 3 eights in the name of our Savior shadow prophesy of the 3 immortalization events in the Creator’s plan that will be accomplished over 3 divine days (millenniums Ps. 90:4; 2 Pet. 3:8). These are 1) the immortalization of Jesus Christ almost 2,000 years ago and 2) the immortalization of the first set of saints at the beginning of the Millennial Kingdom and 3) the immortalization of the 2nd set of saints just after the conclusion of the Millennial Kingdom. 

That salvation theme with its 8 frame is a frequent image strobe-lighting through scripture. Eight being the number of our Savior (in addition to salvation) is demonstrated in how Noah, projecting that ‘savior of the world’ status of Jesus, is scripturally defined as the 8th person (2 Pet. 2:5). Yet he was the 1st to be called, before his sons were even born. David, projecting the kingship of Jesus, was the 8th son of Jesse. Under the laws of the 1st Kingdom Age, 7 of the 8 acceptable animal sacrifice categories were acceptable to the Creator on the 8th day of its life (Ex. 22:30). Those 8 qualifying animal sacrifices were 1) male bovine – bullock, 2) male goat, 3) female goat, 4) male sheep, 5) female sheep, 6) genderless pigeon, 7) genderless turtledove and the 8th was the female bovine known as the red heifer. The fact that only 7 of these 8 animal sacrificial categories were offered in fire on the bronze Christ-Altar of Burnt Offering is highly significant in many ways, but those issues will only distract the foundational ‘dual emphasis’ narrative at this point. 

Additionally that circumcision ritual of cutting off the flesh on the 8th day shadow prophesies how the man of 8’s (Jesus) will eliminate death in that 8th divine day following the end of the Millennial Kingdom, that 2nd and heavenly Kingdom of God. 

That 8 salvation frame with an inserted dual emphasis is also very evident in the 4 divinely appointed rituals of the Ecclesial Age: baptism, memorial service, the gender based presence or absence of headcoverings during prayer and the gender based presence or absence of silence during Ecclesial worshipping and educational events. However the consideration of this application emphasizing the dual nature of divine principles within an 8 frame will be addressed in our next submission within a few days.

Again, if anyone has questions, objections, or criticisms you are welcome to communicate directly at BroJim@spiritsword.net .

Brother Jim Dillingham