Hierarchy in Heaven: Difference between revisions

 

Will William Branham rule over people in heaven?  Will message pastors rule over their congregations in heaven?

 

This message concept comes from a fairly innocuous phrase in the Old Testament. Referring to Abraham, the Bible states that when he died "he was gathered to his people.”  

 

 

 

 

The Bible refers a person being gathered to his people in the following passages:  

:''“Altogether '''Ishmael''' lived a hundred and thirty-seven years. He breathed his last and died, and '''he was gathered to his people'''...”<ref>Gen. 25:17</ref>  

:''“Then he [Isaac] breathed his last and died and was gathered to his people, old and full of years. And his sons Esau and Jacob buried him”<ref>Gen. 35:29</ref>

:''“When Jacob had finished giving instructions to his sons, he drew his feet up into the bed, breathed his last and was gathered to his people”<ref>Gen. 49:33</ref>

:''“Aaron will be gathered to his people. He will not enter the land I give the Israelites”<ref>Num. 20:24</ref>

“Then the LORD said to Moses, ‘Go up this mountain in the Abarim range and see the land I have given the Israelites. After you have seen it, you too will be gathered to your people, as your brother Aaron was”<ref>Num. 27:12–13</ref>

Many Old Testament scholars regard the phrase “and he was gathered to his people” as being nothing more than a conventional way of saying that he died. It is to be explained, so they say, by the thought that the individual was being placed in the same graveyard as those who had died before him. But this is hardly satisfactory in the case of the Bible stories involved. When Abraham died he was buried in a cave at Machpelah in the land that was to become Israel, but it was not the burial place of his ancestors. They had been buried back in Ur of the Chaldees, and his father had been buried at Haran. Moreover, in reading the account of his death, it is hard to overlook the fact that Abraham is said to have been gathered to his ancestors in verse 8 of Genesis, but to have been buried only in verse 9.  

Consequently, the phrase “gathered to his people” cannot refer to the burial but must refer to the death itself as a result of which '''Abraham joined those who had gone before him'''.<ref>James Montgomery Boice, The Gospel of John: An Expositional Commentary (Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2005), 1071.</ref>

==What does the Bible say about the hierarchy in heaven?==

''I've got to leave here. You've got to leave here. And if I go as a false prophet, '''I'll lose my own soul and lose yours with me'''.<ref>QUESTIONS.AND.ANSWERS.ON.THE.HOLY.GHOST JEFF.IN 59-1219</ref>

''And I set there, and then a voice said, "'''You've been gathered to your people like Jacob was gathered to his people'''."

''He said, "Well now, He will--He will come someday, and '''He will come to you first, and then you'll be judged'''." Said, "These people are your converts that you've led."

''I said, "'''What about Paul?'''"  He said, "'''He will have to be judged with his'''."

''"Well," I said, "'''if his group goes in, so will mine''', 'cause I've preached exactly the same Word." I said, "Where he baptized in Jesus' Name, I did too. I preached..."