Marriage throughout the Bible is pictured as the closest of relationships, and I want to spend a few minutes at this moment focusing on the type of the bride of Christ. It appears in the Old Covenant God made with Israel.
These are fairly well known scriptures to us all, but I would like us to take a few minutes looking at this relationship that God had with a physical people, although I do not want to dwell on this other than to show that God's selection is on the part of Israel, what He is going to do with them going forward, but I just want to show what He gives us in type in Israel.
Here is the beginning of a betrothal promise between God and physical Israel. This is a type of our betrothal promise. It is a type of the eternal betrothal mutually made with Christ and spiritual Israel.
They had promised, a physical nation, a type for us, to be His holy and righteous people.
We have advanced to the place chronologically to where God formally proposes an agreement with them in which He will be their ruler (governor, king) if they will consent to be obedient. There is the "if." How many times have you heard the statement that "God will not save anybody He cannot rule"? If a person does not voluntarily consent to be ruled by God, then God will not be that person's Governor, King, Ruler, or Savior.
That appears right here in the Old Covenant, and these people gave their consent. Now notice the next thing that happened. Please, if you do not get anything else out of the sermon, please, get this! (And remember this, because it becomes very important to the Christian.)
