Sermons by Mike Blume

We have spent a few weeks on the issue of Jesus Christ being the ROD OF AARON that was laid in the Holiest of Holies and resurrected back to life again, with MORE ABUNDANT LIFE than he had before he died… like the rod of Aaron.

We explained how the holiest of holies represented the Garden of Eden with the cherubim on the veiled entrance, just like the Garden had cherubims blocking its entrance.
We showed how Jesus was put in a tomb that was in a GARDEN and resurrected like the rod of Aaron came to life in the holiest of holies model of the Garden.
And like the rod of Aaron that had naturally impossible simultaneous buds, and flowers and fruit, the BRANCHES OF THE CANDLESTICKS in the Tabernacle were depicted as almond branches with unnaturally and simultaneously occurring buds, and flowers and fruit – exactly what the rod of Aaron looked like when it resurrected.
And we tied all of that together to show that like Jesus resurrected, WE resurrected with Him, and are now all part of the same RESURRECTION TREE OF LIFE.

It appears like Jesus is the vine and we are his branches.

And all the biblical imagery points to the thought that we ARE IN THE GARDEN OF EDEN in a spiritual sense right now.

The olive oil that fueled the almond branched candlesticks shows UNNATURAL LIFE causing us as believers to live, as the SPIRIT OF GOD is unnatural to our humanity.

The gifts of the Spirit and fruit of the Spirit come forth from our lives due to this UNNATURAL LIFE from God to us.
Just as much as Aaron’s resurrected rod proved which tribe were the priests, Romans 6:13 says the qualification for ministry for God is BEING ALIVE FROM THE DEAD.

The almond blossom.

Ecclesiastes 12:5-7 KJV (5) Also when they shall be afraid of that which is high, and fears shall be in the way, and the almond tree shall flourish, and the grasshopper shall be a burden, and desire shall fail: because man goeth to his long home, and the mourners go about the streets: (6) Or ever the silver cord be loosed, or the golden bowl be broken, or the pitcher be broken at the fountain, or the wheel broken at the cistern. (7) Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was: and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it.

The almond tree seems to depict OLD AGE.

WHITE HAIR.

But there is more involved after we looked into the prophecy of JESUS the BRANCH.

Isaiah 11:1-10 KJV And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots: (2) And the spirit of the LORD shall rest upon him, the spirit of wisdom and understanding, the spirit of counsel and might, the spirit of knowledge and of the fear of the LORD;

(3) And shall make him of quick understanding in the fear of the LORD: and he shall not judge after the sight of his eyes, neither reprove after the hearing of his ears: (4) But with righteousness shall he judge the poor, and reprove with equity for the meek of the earth: and he shall smite the earth with the rod of his mouth, and with the breath of his lips shall he slay the wicked. (5) And righteousness shall be the girdle of his loins, and faithfulness the girdle of his reins. (6) The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. (7) And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. (8) And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice' den. (9) They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea. (10) And in that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles seek: and his rest shall be glorious.

In the first verse of Isa. 11, the Hebrew term for BRANCH is NETZER.

It is the ROOT WORD for NAZARETH.
A NETZER is not a branch like you would think it is.
THE MESSAGE VERSION gives the best translation I found.

Isaiah 11:1 MSG A green Shoot will sprout from Jesse's stump, from his roots a budding Branch.

Isaiah 11:1 Complete Apostles' Bible (1) And there shall come forth a Rod out of the root of Jesse, and a blossom shall come up from his root;

A NETZER is a SHOOT or SPROUT.

Shoots that grow from roots are not the normal sort of branches.
SHOOTS grow from the roots of TREES THAT WERE CUT DOWN and decayed.
And to really understand this prophecy, we have to go back a chapter and read what was written there before this idea came up.

Isaiah 10:1-6 KJV Woe unto them that decree unrighteous decrees, and that write grievousness which they have prescribed; (2) To turn aside the needy from judgment, and to take away the right from the poor of my people, that widows may be their prey, and that they may rob the fatherless! (3) And what will ye do in the day of visitation, and in the desolation which shall come from far? to whom will ye flee for help? and where will ye leave your glory? (4) Without me they shall bow down under the prisoners, and they shall fall under the slain. For all this his anger is not turned away, but his hand is stretched out still. (5) O Assyrian, the rod of mine anger, and the staff in their hand is mine indignation. (6) I will send him against an hypocritical nation, and against the people of my wrath will I give him a charge, to take the spoil, and to take the prey, and to tread them down like the mire of the streets.

God would punish disobedient Israel with the ASSYRIANS as though Assyria was a tool of wrath in the hand of God.

Then God would deal with Assyria as well after using them to punish Israel.

Isaiah 10:12 KJV Wherefore it shall come to pass, that when the Lord hath performed his whole work upon mount Zion and on Jerusalem, I will punish the fruit of the stout heart of the king of Assyria, and the glory of his high looks.

Isaiah 10:18-19 KJV And shall consume the glory of his forest, and of his fruitful field, both soul and body: and they shall be as when a standardbearer fainteth. (19) And the rest of the trees of his forest shall be few, that a child may write them.

He called ASSYRIA A FOREST WITH GLORY.

Isaiah 10:27 KJV And it shall come to pass in that day, that his burden shall be taken away from off thy shoulder, and his yoke from off thy neck, and the yoke shall be destroyed because of the anointing.

Notice the term ANOINTING that has come up in our references to OLIVE OIL that fuels the resurrected almond branches of the candlestick.

Isaiah 10:33-34 KJV Behold, the Lord, the LORD of hosts, shall lop the bough with terror: and the high ones of stature shall be hewn down, and the haughty shall be humbled. (34) And he shall cut down the thickets of the forest with iron, and Lebanon shall fall by a mighty one.

IT IS THEN THAT WE KEEP READING INTO CHAPTER 11 and see this:

Isaiah 11:1-10 KJV And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots:

Earlier in Isaiah 6 we read similar pictures of Israel like a tree cut down, but something growing again.

Isaiah 6:11-13 KJV Then said I, Lord, how long? And he answered, Until the cities be wasted without inhabitant, and the houses without man, and the land be utterly desolate, (12) And the LORD have removed men far away, and there be a great forsaking in the midst of the land. (13) But yet in it shall be a tenth, and it shall return, and shall be eaten: as a teil tree, and as an oak, whose substance is in them, when they cast their leaves: so the holy seed shall be the substance thereof.

It is a perfect contrast from one end of the spectrum to the other.

Israel is cut down as an oak tree.

And the tree has nothing but a stump left.
The trunk and branches fell and decay and rot.
The leaves and wood turns to mulch.
Walk through a forest and see a dead tree all decayed, with moss is all over it.
You walk on what was formerly a branch or trunk of the tree and it is a mossy and soft mass on the ground that your foot sinks in.

Assyria is a grand cedar forest.

But the tables turn.

OAKS, and TEIL TREES have SUBSTANCE IN THEM.
The holy seed shall be the substance.
THEIR LEAVES is not in the original Hebrew and the KJV shows that by putting those words in italics.
So the idea is more that the tree itself is fallen with its trunk and branches.
AND SHOOTS RISE UP FROM THE LIFE AND SUBSTANCE IN THE ROOT.
There is life way down in the root.
The tree is cut down and the trunk decays, but the ROOT HAS LIFE.
And it springs forth a shoot or sprout.
A little tender plant that is FROM THE SAME LIFE OF THE OAK.
And this NETZER shall grow.
The term GROW in Hebrews means BECOME FRUITFUL.
It is the SAME HEBREW WORD in Gen 1:28 where God told Adam to be FRUITFUL and multiply.

The cedar trees do not spring forth suckers, or shoots and sprouts.

It is cut down and that is the end.

And while Assyria was a grand forest, and Israel a fallen and decayed oak tree, ASSYRIA IS MOWED DOWN BY GOD, and a SPROUT comes forth out of the root of David and Jesse’s family.

This green shoot is budding and flowering and will come forth into a HUGE OAK TREE AGAIN.
CEDARS CANNOT DO THAT when they fall.
And this oak stands for the KINGDOM OF DAVID that would RISE AGAIN to greater prominence than it ever knew before in its heyday under David and Solomon.

Jesus is the LAST ADAM.

He would BE FRUITFUL AND MULTIPLY just like Adam was told.
But he would come from death and place of decay and cutting down.

This has various levels to it.

Matthew 2:23 KJV And he came and dwelt in a city called Nazareth: that it might be fulfilled which was spoken by the prophets, He shall be called a Nazarene.

This prophecy is one of the oddest little references found in the Bible.

There is no prophecy in the entire Old Testament that says “He shall be called a Nazarene”.
But scholars agree that Isaiah 11:1’s reference to Jesus as the NETZER is the idea.
THE NETZER would come forth from a decayed and fallen and ugly situation.
Prophets also told of Jesus having no beauty nor comeliness that we should desire him.
He is despised and rejected of men.
NAZARETH was never even mentioned in the Old Testament, but it was a small town that was in Galilee.
NEZTER is the root word for the name Nazareth.

John 1:46 KJV And Nathanael said unto him, Can there any good thing come out of Nazareth? Philip saith unto him, Come and see.

John 7:52 KJV They answered and said unto him, Art thou also of Galilee? Search, and look: for out of Galilee ariseth no prophet.

It was LOW-LIFE city.

Despised.

And Matt 2 says the PROPHETS (plural) said He shall be a Nazarene.

It is the general idea of all the prophets speaking about his lowliness.

Even the family of David had fallen into decay and almost non-existence.

It’s glory was gone as MARY and JOSEPH, of the line of David, were POOR and had no grand reputation at all.
He was born in LITTLE BETHLEHEM-EPHRATAH, smallest among the nations.
In a STABLE!

And the idea of a NETZER coming forth from an ugly and decayed source perfectly shows the same idea Matthew 2 showed.

You could say the BRANCHES on the candlesticks in the midst of which Jesus stands in Rev 1 are NETZARIM.

Nazareth can be called the BRANCH TOWN.

And Isaiah 11 is speaking about the KINGDOM OF DAVID rising up to glory again.

In fact, Zechariah called Jesus the BRANCH in the day after Israel came forth from Babylonian captivity, and had no king, when Zech said a KING PRIEST would rise up!

Zechariah 3:8 KJV Hear now, O Joshua the high priest, thou, and thy fellows that sit before thee: for they are men wondered at: for, behold, I will bring forth my servant the BRANCH.

Zechariah 6:12-13 KJV And speak unto him, saying, Thus speaketh the LORD of hosts, saying, Behold the man whose name is The BRANCH; and he shall grow up out of his place, and he shall build the temple of the LORD: (13) Even he shall build the temple of the LORD; and he shall bear the glory, and shall sit and rule upon his throne; and he shall be a priest upon his throne: and the counsel of peace shall be between them both.

Jeremiah had no use for any kings of Israel, they were so corrupt.

But he spoke excitedly about the BRANCH who would come.

Jeremiah 23:5 KJV Behold, the days come, saith the LORD, that I will raise unto David a righteous Branch, and a King shall reign and prosper, and shall execute judgment and justice in the earth.

Jeremiah 33:15 KJV In those days, and at that time, will I cause the Branch of righteousness to grow up unto David; and he shall execute judgment and righteousness in the land.

KINGDOM!

And what makes this more powerful is that JESUS RESURRECTED FROM DEATH like the dead almond rod of Aaron in the most holy place, and from the tomb of death and decay came the KING OF KINGS AND LORD OF LORDS.

And he ascended to the throne of God.

AND from this NETZER, NETZARIM have grown.

NAZARENES!

Sprouts from the sprout.

Shoots from the shoot.
With the same resurrection life HE HAD!
HIS DEATH is the sap that flows into us and is OUR DEATHS.
HIS BURIAL AND RESURRECTION flows in and is our burials and resurrections!

What is interesting is that Isaiah 11 mentions the WOLF AND LAMB lying together after it speaks of Jesus being the SHOOT and SPROUT from the root of David.

And after mentioning all these references to animals – clean and unclean playing together – comes verse 10 which Paul quoted in Romans 15.

Isaiah 11: . (6) The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard shall lie down with the kid; and the calf and the young lion and the fatling together; and a little child shall lead them. (7) And the cow and the bear shall feed; their young ones shall lie down together: and the lion shall eat straw like the ox. (8) And the sucking child shall play on the hole of the asp, and the weaned child shall put his hand on the cockatrice' den. (9) They shall not hurt nor destroy in all my holy mountain: for the earth shall be full of the knowledge of the LORD, as the waters cover the sea. (10) And in that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles seek: and his rest shall be glorious.

Paul quotes Isaiah 11 here:

Romans 15:7-13 KJV Wherefore receive ye one another, as Christ also received us to the glory of God. (8) Now I say that Jesus Christ was a minister of the circumcision for the truth of God, to confirm the promises made unto the fathers: (9) And that the Gentiles might glorify God for his mercy; as it is written, For this cause I will confess to thee among the Gentiles, and sing unto thy name. (10) And again he saith, Rejoice, ye Gentiles, with his people. (11) And again, Praise the Lord, all ye Gentiles; and laud him, all ye people. (12) And again, Esaias saith, There shall be a root of Jesse, and he that shall rise to reign over the Gentiles; in him shall the Gentiles trust. (13) Now the God of hope fill you with all joy and peace in believing, that ye may abound in hope, through the power of the Holy Ghost.

He told Jewish Christians to receive the Gentile believers since Jesus received them.

And he proves they need to receive them because ISAIAH PROPHESIED it in Isaiah 11:10.

And between this verse:

Isaiah 11:1 KJV And there shall come forth a rod out of the stem of Jesse, and a Branch shall grow out of his roots:

And this one:

Isaiah 11:10 KJV And in that day there shall be a root of Jesse, which shall stand for an ensign of the people; to it shall the Gentiles seek: and his rest shall be glorious.

And verse 10 is said by Paul to refer to Gentiles coming in the CHURCH to be RULED OVER BY JESUS FROM DAVID OF ISRAEL, we read of the WOLF AND LAMB, LEOPARD AND KID, YOUNG LION AND CALF – the very animals where one was food for the other.

The very animals where CALF, KID and LAMB are clean animals, and WOLF LION AND LEOPARD are unclean.
And Paul is talking about JEW AND GENTILE coming together in the KINGDOM OF JESUS IN THE CHURCH AGE!

We are the TREE OF LIFE!

In the holiest of holies… THE GARDEN OF EDEN.

As the rod of Aaron was taken out and shown to the people to stop their fusses and prove who the tribal priesthood was, JESUS WAS SHOWN IN RESURRECTION POWER FOR FORTY DAYS AND SPOKE OF KINGDOM.

Acts 1:3 KJV To whom also he shewed himself alive after his passion by many infallible proofs, being seen of them forty days, and speaking of the things pertaining to the kingdom of God:

Forty days of SOLID KINGDOM TEACHING!

WOW!

He SHOWED HIMSELF ALIVE!

Like the rod of Aaron proving in everyone’s eyes that it resurrected.
And Paul turns around and tells us to PRESENT OURSELVES TO GOD as those alive from the dead!
And the rod of Aaron remained in the ARK OF THE COVENANT for the rest of its days in Israel.

DEEPER TRUTH ABOUT THE BRANCH