Picture courtesy Ron
Wyatt Ministries| Jan 20, 2002 | The Lost Ark | Isaiah 18 |
Today; we need to act like detectives in search of the truth.
There is all kinds of evidence out there, and it points in all
kinds of directions, but evidence is not proof. Evidence can point
to a conclusion, but evidence that doesn't lead to Scriptural
conclusions is a waste of time. Today I want us to look at what
the Bible has to say about some important things from the past,
and some important things for the future. We are going to work
from the premise that the Bible is accurate in everything it tells
us. The Bible is an accurate book. It is historically accurate,
it is prophetically accurate, and it is accurate when it tells
us the things of God.
So just sit back, relax, and let the Bible show us how to make
sense out of history and tradition. Today is a day to rest and
enjoy all that God has provided for us, so let's be thankful,
get comfortable and do just that. Also, feel free to make notes
on your handouts, because when we get done, some of you might
have questions. That's cool, as long as you don't expect me to
have all the answers. Or maybe any of the answers...
First: who in here has seen the movie; "Raiders of the Lost
Ark?" Who has not seen it? That movie was typical
Hollywood; they got as much wrong as they got right. It was an
adventure movie about a search for an important Old Testament
item, the ark of the covenant. Since there might be someone here
that does not really know what the ark of the covenant was, let
me tell you a little about it. If you already know this stuff,
pay attention anyway.
The ark of the covenant was a box made of acacia wood. It was
about 3 feet long, 2 feet high and 2 feet wide. It was all covered
inside and out with a layer of thin gold veneer, and it was carried
by the Levites, the priestly tribe. They carried it by using two
poles that slid through two rings on each side, so that it was
never touched by human hands.
Inside the ark were the two tablets of stone that Moses brought
down from Mount Sinai, that had the Ten Commandments on them,
- the covenant. (that's why it was called the ark of the covenant...)
It also had Aaron's rod or branch that had budded out, and a pot
of manna inside it.
On top of the ark was a lid called the mercy seat. It was made
out of one large piece of hammered gold, and it had two cherubim
on it,-archangels-facing each other, with their wings pointing
toward each other.
Once a year, on the Day of Atonement, the high priest would go
into the holy of holies and sprinkle the blood of the atonement
on the mercy seat, on the front of the ark, and on the floor in
front of it.
Although we tend to think of the ark and the mercy seat as two
parts of the same item, they were two distinctively separate items,
and they had two very different functions. The ark carried the
Ten Commandments, the Law that condemned sin, and sitting on top
of it was the mercy seat, where the blood of an innocent sacrifice
was sprinkled to cover over that sin. And the mercy seat was always
seen as a covering, over the law. It stayed above the law, on
top of the ark.
After Israel had come out of Egypt, moving and camping in the
wilderness, the ark was carried by the Levites. When the camp
stopped, the ark was put inside a portable tent sanctuary, called
the tabernacle.
This tent had two rooms: a holy place, and the most holy place,
or the holy of holies. They used this tabernacle for about 500
years.
After King Solomon built the temple in Jerusalem, the ark was
put there, and it was not intended to be moved any more. It stayed
in the darkness behind a thick curtain, a veil; inside the holy
of holies in the temple.
After a few hundred years, the northern kingdom of Israel and
the southern kingdom of Judah had fallen into such sin and idolatry
that God delivered them into captivity and judgement. Somewhere
during this time, the ark disappeared. It was certainly not
in Herod's temple during the time of Christ. Where
did it go?
There are a lot of theories. The official position by the head
rabbis in Jerusalem today is that it is in a cave under the temple
mount, sealed up and hidden safely away.
Other scholars believe that Nebuchadnezzar carried it off to Babylon
and melted it down. The apocryphal book of 2nd Maccabees chapter
2 says that it was hidden in a cave on Mt. Nebo by the prophet
Jeremiah.
There was an explorer named Ron Wyatt who claimed that he had
found the ark in a cave under the hill of Golgotha, and when Jesus
Christ shed His blood on the cross, that blood ran down through
a crack in the rock and fell on the mercy seat, fulfilling the
pattern of the Old Testament sacrifice. Ron Wyatt also claimed
to have found Sodom and Gomorrah, Noah's Ark, the actual location
of Mt. Sinai, the place where Israel crossed the Red Sea, and
he sold a lot of video tapes telling about it. He's dead now,
so it's between him and God whether or not he was being honest.
There is also an old tradition that says that King Solomon had
a son named Menelik by the Queen of Sheba. Supposedly Menelik
substituted a counterfeit ark for the real one, took the real
ark of the covenant back to Ethiopia with him, and it has been
there ever since.
Indiana Jones in the movie Raiders of the Lost Ark tells us that
Pharaoh Shishak took it to Egypt. The Bible mentions Shishak,
that is the oldest or earliest legend, so let's start there: if
you have your Bibles with you today, and I hope you do, turn to
1 Kings 14:22, or look in your bulletins.
"And Judah did evil in the sight of the LORD, and they provoked
him to jealousy with their sins which they had committed, above
all that their fathers had done.
:23 For they also built them high places, and images, and groves,
on every high hill, and under every green tree.
:24 And there were also sodomites in the land: and they did according
to all the abominations of the nations which the LORD cast out
before the children of Israel.
:25 And it came to pass in the fifth year of king Rehoboam, that
Shishak king of Egypt came up against Jerusalem:
:26 And he took away the treasures of the house of the LORD, and
the treasures of the king's house; he even took away all: and
he took away all the shields of gold which Solomon had made."
Well, this says that Shishak took away all the treasures. So did
he get the ark? Apparently not. Technically, the ark, the lamp
stand, the altar and the other items in the temple were called
it's furniture. The treasury was separate, and apparently that's
what Shishak got, because he raided Jerusalem around 928 BC, and
the ark is still in Jerusalem years later.
Around 701 BC, 227 years later, a very godly king named Hezekiah
had come to power in Jerusalem, and Jerusalem was under attack
by Assyria. And in 2 Kings 19:14, we find a very interesting few
words:
"And Hezekiah received the letter of the hand of the messengers,
and read it: and Hezekiah went up into the house of the LORD,
-the temple- and spread it -the letter- before the LORD.
:15 And Hezekiah prayed before the LORD, and said, O LORD God
of Israel, which dwellest between the cherubims,
thou art the God, even thou alone, of all the kingdoms of the
earth; thou hast made heaven and earth."
Notice here that Hezekiah addresses God as between the cherubims,
and he seeks an answer from God by going to the Temple.
If the ark was still in the temple, his actions make perfect sense.
Now hold that thought and follow along with me: Hezekiah had a
son named Manasseh who was terribly wicked.
Manasseh burned his sons as an offering in the fire to the god
Molech, he set up idols in the temple, and he filled Jerusalem
with innocent blood until God said he was the most wicked king
the country ever had.
He had a good grandson named Josiah, and Josiah followed the Lord
very faithfully. He restored the temple, he sought the Lord, and
he told the priests to ask the Lord concerning the Law, and what
needed to happen since the nation had sinned so seriously. Unlike
Hezekiah, who went to the Temple, and sought God there between
the cherubim, look what happens here:
2 Kings 22:14 "So Hilkiah the priest, and Ahikam, and Achbor,
and Shaphan, and Asahiah, went unto Huldah the prophetess,
the wife of Shallum the son of Tikvah, the son of Harhas, keeper
of the wardrobe; (now she dwelt in Jerusalem in the college;)
and they communed with her."
They don't go to the temple, they go to a prophetess instead.
Why? Is it possible that something happened to the
ark of the covenant during the time period between the days of
King Hezekiah and the days of King Josiah?
Over in 2 Chronicles 35, it tells about all the reforms that Josiah
did to restore pure religion back to Jerusalem, how he set about
to keep a great passover to the Lord, greater than had been seen
in years, and in verse 3, we find a curious thing; but let's start
at verse 1:
"Moreover Josiah kept a passover unto the LORD in Jerusalem:
and they killed the passover on the fourteenth day of the first
month.
:2 And he set the priests in their charges, and encouraged them
to the service of the house of the LORD,
:3 And said unto the Levites that taught all Israel, which were
holy unto the LORD, Put the holy ark in the house which
Solomon the son of David king of Israel did build; it shall not
be a burden upon your shoulders: serve now the LORD
your God, and his people Israel."
First of all, since Josiah told the Levites to put the Ark back
into the Temple, we know that Pharaoh Shishak didn't carry it
off to Egypt 200 years earlier. Shishak couldn't have the Ark,
because the Levites had it.
So why did he tell the Levites to put the ark into the temple?
Why did he tell them not to burden themselves with carrying it?
If it was already in the temple, as it was supposed to be, they
wouldn't be carrying it. What had happened to get the ark out
of the temple, and get the Levites carrying it? And if the Levites
had carried the ark off somewhere, where did they take it?
There is a hint of what might have happened further along in the
chapter, verse 20: "After all this, when Josiah had prepared
the temple, Necho king of Egypt came up to fight against Charchemish
-a Babylonian city- by Euphrates: and Josiah went out against
him.
:21 But he -that is, Pharaoh Necho- sent ambassadors to him, saying,
What have I to do with thee, thou king of Judah? I come not against
thee this day, but against the house wherewith I have war: for
God commanded me to make haste: forbear thee from meddling with
God, who is with me, that he destroy thee not.
:22 Nevertheless Josiah would not turn his face from him, but
disguised himself, that he might fight with him, and hearkened
not unto the words of Necho from the mouth of God,
and came to fight in the valley of Megiddo."
A couple interesting things here: first, this Pharaoh believes
that God has spoken to him, that God is commanding him, and that
God is with him. And second, verse 22 is the record or commentary
of the writer of this book, and he notes that what Pharaoh Necho
said was from the mouth of God. We could ask the
question; how would an Egyptian Pharaoh hear the Word of God?
And why would Josiah go out and attack this Pharaoh? Did Pharaoh
Neco have something that Josiah wanted?
Let's do a little sanctified speculating here: let's suppose that
during the reign of the evil king Manasseh, the Levites took the
ark of the covenant out of the temple to keep Manasseh from either
defiling it or destroying it. That would explain Josiah telling
them to bring it back to the temple, and not to burden themselves
with carrying it any more. However, the Bible never says
that they did this. Josiah tells them to return
it, but there is nothing anywhere that says that they ever brought
it back.
Let's further suppose that the Levites took the ark out of the
control of Manasseh by taking it to someplace where Manasseh couldn't
get to it. Like maybe to Egypt. Maybe that's where Pharaoh Necho
had an opportunity to have God speak to him. How would that have
happened? I have no idea, we are only speculating. But if the
ark was in Egypt, that would explain why Josiah
told them in verse 3, "serve now the Lord your God and His
people Israel." Perhaps he was implying that they were in
the wrong country, serving Egypt instead of Israel. Perhaps he
was casting doubts on their patriotism and their loyalty. If Josiah
knew that Pharaoh Neco had possession of the ark, or if Josiah
thought that he did, that would explain why Josiah attacked him,
he was zealous for the restoration of worship, and he wanted
the ark back.
So where in Egypt would it have been? In the southern part of
Egypt, right in the middle of the Nile river, is an island called
Elephantine island. During the time of king Manasseh, history
records that a colony of Jews were inhabiting this island, and
they built a temple. There are ruins of an ancient temple on this
island, a temple dedicated to Jehovah, and that temple was the
same size and shape as the Temple of Solomon at Jerusalem. There
is a museum located there now, and they have some very ancient
documents that were found relating to this temple.
One of those documents was a letter sent to the priests of the
temple in Jerusalem from the priests of the temple at Elephantine
asking them for precise instructions on how to properly offer
sacrifices to Jehovah.
Now that is very remarkable. It was forbidden for an Israelite
to offer sacrifices to Jehovah at any place but the temple at
Jerusalem, but here you have a group of Jewish priests in Egypt
asking the Jewish priests in Jerusalem for specific instructions
on how to do it. Why would they need to know that, unless they
had some reason to think that possibly Jehovah was with them in
Egypt?
Well, time passes, Israel & Judah get conquered by Nebuchadnezzar,
they get carried away to Babylon, then they return and around
444 BC, they begin to rebuild the Temple at Jerusalem, but now
they have no ark of the covenant to put in it.
At roughly the same time, the Jews in Egypt abandon the temple
on Elephantine island and move south to Ethiopia, and take up
residence on an island in Lake Tana, which is the source of the
Nile River. The island in that lake is called Tana Kirkos, the
Island of the Forgiven, and today it is inhabited by Ethiopian
Christian monks. They believe that they are living on the island
where the ark of the covenant rested, and where blood sacrifices
were performed, up until 338 AD. Those people saw themselves as
the guardians of the ark.
Ethiopia has had a race of black Jews named Falashas living there
for 2,500 years. In the 1990's, they began to come under Moslem
persecution, and the Israelis evacuated them to the land of Israel.
Very remarkably, it was discovered that they still practiced a
form of Old Testament worship that had not been seen since before
Nebuchadnezzar invaded Israel. They knew nothing of the Jewish
feast of Purim, or of Hanukkah, and they knew nothing of the Babylonian
Talmud, or the Jerusalem Talmud, Jewish holy books written after
the Jews were carried off to Babylon. That gives us a good idea
as to when their ancestors had left Israel and how long they had
been in Ethiopia.
In 338 AD, the Christian King of Ethiopia came and took away the
ark from Lake Tana, he took it to the town of Axum, where it is
reputed to still be today, in a fortified shrine, a building across
the street from Saint Mary of Zion church. There is an iron fence
around the building, and an old man lives inside the fence, he
has spent his whole life guarding the ark. He will stay there
until he dies, and then his place will be taken by the next guardian.
He says that he has only seen the Ark twice in his life, for about
ten minutes each time, and he says he is terrified to be in it's
presence.
The president of Ethiopia is a Christian, he says that the item
in that shrine is not a replica, it is not an imitation, he believes
it is the true ark of the covenant, and he believes that God has
chosen Ethiopia as an out of the way country to guard the ark
until God is ready to use it again. He sees himself as the latest
in a long line of rulers chosen by God to guard and protect the
ark.
So; is it really the ark of the covenant? Or is it an ancient
forgery? If all we had to go on was history and tradition, we
would probably not be able to figure it out; however the Bible
is not done teaching us it's secrets.
In Isaiah 18 there is a very interesting prophecy concerning the
Messiah. Verse 1 says: "Woe to the land shadowing with wings,
which is beyond the rivers of Ethiopia:
Isa 18:2 That sendeth ambassadors by the sea, even in vessels
of bulrushes upon the waters, saying, Go, ye swift messengers,
to a nation scattered and peeled, to a people terrible from their
beginning hitherto; a nation meted out and trodden down, whose
land the rivers have spoiled!"
Verse 2 is a wonderful description of the land of Ethiopia. 2/3rds
of Ethiopia is a high plateau surrounded by lowlands, and it is
a land of mosquitos and flies, and the word shadowing also means
buzzing. It is a land of buzzing flies.
Verse 2 speaks of a land that the rivers have spoiled, the word
spoiled also means to divide or cut through: the plateau is cut
through everywhere by huge eroded canyons where the rivers run
down to the lowlands.
It says that they were a people terrible from the beginning until
now: at one time the Axumite kingdom was very powerful, and then
it fell away to almost nothing. Nowadays the Ethiopians are a
trodden down third world country just as the verse predicts.
Verse 2 also speaks of a people scattered and peeled: the word
scattered also means prolonged or drawn out, and the word peeled
means smooth. All the other modern translations of this verse
use the words tall and smooth, and the Ethiopian people tend to
be tall, slender and smooth skinned.
Skip down to verse 7, all of this is a Messianic prophecy, it
speaks of the time when Messiah will rule and reign on the earth,
and notice what it says: "In that time shall
the present -a gift- be brought unto the LORD of
hosts of a people scattered and peeled, and from a people terrible
from their beginning hitherto; a nation meted out and trodden
under foot, whose land the rivers have spoiled, to the place
of the name of the LORD of hosts, the mount Zion."
At some future time, there will be Ethiopians who will bring a
present to the Lord of Hosts, it will be brought to the place
of the name of the Lord of Hosts, to mount Zion; which is Jerusalem.
When Jesus Christ returns to rule and reign from Jerusalem, the
Ethiopians will bring Him a gift.
The present ruler of Ethiopia knows of this prophecy and he believes
that it refers to the article that is guarded in the shrine. He
believes that being the trustee of the ark of the covenant, for
the Messiah, is a responsibility that Ethiopian rulers have had
for thousands of years.
When the time comes that Messiah returns, will the Ethiopians
bring Him the ark? Or will they bring Him something else? Jeremiah
3:16 tells us: "And it shall come to pass, when ye be multiplied
and increased in the land, in those days, saith
the LORD, they shall say no more, The ark of the covenant of the
LORD: neither shall it come to mind: neither shall they remember
it; neither shall they visit it; neither shall that be done any
more.
:17 At that time they shall call Jerusalem the throne of the LORD;
and all the nations shall be gathered unto it, to the name of
the LORD, to Jerusalem: neither shall they walk any more after
the imagination of their evil heart.
:18 In those days the house of Judah shall walk
with the house of Israel, and they shall come together out of
the land of the north to the land that I have given for an inheritance
unto your fathers."
In the days to come when the Messiah has returned, the Lord will
have His throne in Jerusalem, all nations will be gathered to
it, but this passage in Jeremiah says that in those days they
will not care anything about the ark of the covenant of the Lord.
In those days, the emphasis will not be upon the ark of the covenant,
instead it will be upon the throne of the Lord, which
will be in Jerusalem, rather than on the ark; so let's talk about
the throne of the Lord for a minute.
Back in Leviticus 16:2, the Lord told Moses: "...I will appear
in the cloud upon the mercy seat."
In Exodus 25:22 God told Moses "... I will meet with thee,
and I will commune with thee from above the mercy seat, from between
the two cherubims which are upon the ark of the testimony...".
In Numbers 7:89 it says: "And when Moses was gone into the
tabernacle of the congregation to speak with him, then he heard
the voice of one speaking unto him from off the mercy seat that
was upon the ark of testimony, from between the two cherubims:
and he spake unto him."
Something that I think is easy to overlook is that the mercy seat
is a seat, it is something to sit on, it is called a seat because
it is a glorified chair, a throne. Maybe that sounds obvious,
but Barbara and I were talking about it, and come to find out
that she had always thought of the mercy seat as a place where
mercy proceeded from, like a central point. Sort of like Blountville
is the county seat, the focal center of government. And the mercy
seat was the focal point of mercy back then, the focal point of
God's government. Which it was, that's true, but
it was primarily a throne.
In this depiction of it here, which is one of several assumptions as to how the cherubim were above the mercy seat, the cherubim have one wing above and in back, sort of like the back of a throne, and if the picture was more in line with our analogy, the other wing ought to be above the lid, and horizontal, like a seat or cushion. Then you would have the Shekinah glory of God resting in a cherubic "seat," instead of hovering above the golden lid.
Picture courtesy Ron
Wyatt Ministries
In Ezekiel 43:7, God refers to the place of the ark of the covenant
and the mercy seat in the temple, and He calls it: "the place
of my throne, and the place of the soles of my feet, where I will
dwell in the midst of the children of Israel for ever"
That explains why the blood of the sacrifice on the day of atonement
was sprinkled not just on the mercy seat, but on the floor
in front of it also, because God said it was the place
of the soles of His feet.
One more piece to the puzzle and then we'll be done. There is
a very interesting passage in Acts chapter 8 about a person who
got saved. Phillip was right in the middle of leading a wonderful
revival in Samaria, when suddenly the Holy Spirit tells him to
stop what he's doing, and go off to witness to just one particular
individual.
Verse 26: " And the angel of the Lord spake unto Philip,
saying, Arise, and go toward the south unto the way that goeth
down from Jerusalem unto Gaza, which is desert.
:27 And he arose and went: and, behold, a man of Ethiopia, an
eunuch of great authority under Candace queen of the Ethiopians,
who had the charge of all her treasure, -interesting
idea- and had come to Jerusalem for to worship,
:28 Was returning, and sitting in his chariot read Esaias the
prophet.
:29 Then the Spirit said unto Philip, Go near, and join thyself
to this chariot.
:30 And Philip ran thither to him, and heard him read the prophet
Esaias, and said, Understandest thou what thou readest?
:31 And he said, How can I, except some man should guide me? And
he desired Philip that he would come up and sit with him.
:32 The place of the scripture which he read was this, He was
led as a sheep to the slaughter; and like a lamb dumb before his
shearer, so opened he not his mouth:
:33 In his humiliation his judgment was taken away: and who shall
declare his generation? for his life is taken from the earth.
:34 And the eunuch answered Philip, and said, I pray thee, of
whom speaketh the prophet this? of himself, or of some other man?
:35 Then Philip opened his mouth, and began at the same scripture,
and preached unto him Jesus.
:36 And as they went on their way, they came unto a certain water:
and the eunuch said, See, here is water; what doth hinder me to
be baptized?
:37 And Philip said, If thou believest with all thine heart, thou
mayest. And he answered and said, I believe that Jesus Christ
is the Son of God.
:38 And he commanded the chariot to stand still: and they went
down both into the water, both Philip and the eunuch; and he baptized
him.
:39 And when they were come up out of the water, the Spirit of
the Lord caught away Philip, that the eunuch saw him no more:
and he went on his way rejoicing."
For years Bible scholars have wondered about this section of the
Bible, it is almost like it is out of place. It sort of doesn't
fit in right where it's at. Was God just showing His grace and
mercy, that He had Phillip stop what he was doing just to go save
one man? Or is there some greater hidden truth that this passage
is supposed to reveal to us?
Let me suggest a possible answer, and then we'll be done: Candace
is the queen in Ethiopia and she has heard that the Messiah has
come, that He is in Israel, and she sends her treasurer -the keeper
of the ark- to Jerusalem to find out if this is really the Messiah,
is it time to return the ark of the covenant and the mercy seat
to it's rightful owner, or does she need to wait?
The Ethiopian eunuch goes to Jerusalem, and when he gets there,
he discovers that an amazing thing has happened, the man that
everyone thought was the Messiah has been crucified. So he turns
around and heads back toward Ethiopia, and he is reading Isaiah
53, trying to make sense out of it all, and God sends Phillip
to explain it to him.
He gets converted, he receives Jesus Christ as his Messiah, his
Savior, and he goes back to Candace, and tells her that yes; truly
the Messiah has come. Then when she asks him if it is time to
return the present described in Isaiah 18; the mercy seat, the
throne of God back to Jerusalem, back to Zion, he tells her, no;
not yet. It is not yet time. The Messiah has come, and He has
gone. We must wait until He comes again. Then it
will be time for the Ethiopians to take the present back to Him.
At that time, when He rules and reigns from Jerusalem,
no one will care about the ark of the covenant, because at that
time we will have the Lawgiver Himself in our midst, and He will
sit upon a throne of mercy, the mercy seat, the throne that speaks
of His own shed blood.
Do I know where the ark of the covenant is today? Maybe. Do I
know where the mercy seat is today? I can't prove anything. But
from the Word of God, I think it is probably in a stone building
in Ethiopia.
So what does all this mean to us here today? Can any of us prove
beyond any shadow of a doubt that this is the way it will all
play out? No. Is this something that we should teach and preach
as a doctrine of the second coming? No. Then why is it worth me
taking 40 minutes of your time to tell you about it?
It's worth it because some of you have got a lot of complicated
things going on in your lives right now and you need to know that
God does not overlook any details.
Some of you have had crazy things happen in your lives and you
are wondering if things will ever get sorted out or ever get made
right. Well; I'm here to tell you that God doesn't let anything
slip through the cracks. God is still in control of all the details
of your life.
Some of you have had things that were very important to you get
taken away, family members, saved loved ones that you have been
separated from, and you have no idea what the future holds. Beloved,
God knows about your future, and He has a guardian over the things
that are precious to you. Even if it should turn out that you
would never get to see them again in this life, that doesn't mean
they are gone; God still has them in safekeeping for you.
Some of you need to learn to have a higher opinion of God's Word.
Some of you need to know that God's Word is a deep treasure, it
is a wealth of riches. There are things in there that God wants
you to know, but unless you take the trouble to really dig for
what God says, you'll never know what's happening.
All of us need to spend more time in God's Word. Sometimes it
is deep. Sometimes it does not easily give up it's secrets. That's
OK. Jesus told His parables in such a way that the casual, indifferent
listener wouldn't understand them either. The reward goes to the
one that wants it and digs for it.
Finally, the Word of God and the promises of God are simply awesome,
and sometimes we need to just take the time to stop and appreciate
them. Maybe the best reason for me presenting this today is simply
so that all of us can look at God's Word and just go; Wow! Our
God is an awesome God!