Stories of the Old Testament: Savior Needed

By Jacob R. Klein

Familiar Stories...Made New Again! The best stories of all are the amazing tales of the Old Testament, but people often feel intimidated. It's the Bible, right? The language seems hard to understand, and what's with all those genealogy lists? Luckily, Jacob Klein is here to help, with warm, friendly, accessible versions of the Old Testament stories you need to know. Find out about the chaos of the Tower of Babel, Samson's strength and how he lost it, and why, although Solomon was the wisest king of legend, he still made mistakes. You'll be enthralled by the events leading to the destruction of Jerusalem, and you'll cheer as the Jews rebuild. But most of all, you'll be immersed in a world in which sin existed...but there was no salvation. This wonderful book illuminates the prophecies that pointed toward the arrival of the Messiah and the hope for humankind in Jesus Christ. Entertaining, compelling, and inspiring, this book is the perfect jump-start for your faith journey.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Outskirts Press
• Release date: Mar 25, 2019
• ISBN: 9781977211422

Jacob R. Klein

Jacob R. Klein is a screen printer who lives with his parents and brother in New York State. He is a proud member of the Castile United Church of Christ, where he also serves as an elder and puppet coordinator.

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Stories of the Old Testament

Savior Needed

All Rights Reserved.

Copyright © 2019 Jacob R. Klein

v1.0

This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, businesses, places, events, locales, and incidents are either the products of the author’s imagination or used in a fictitious manner. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

The opinions expressed in this manuscript are solely the opinions of the author and do not represent the opinions or thoughts of the publisher. The author has represented and warranted full ownership and/or legal right to publish all the materials in this book.

This book may not be reproduced, transmitted, or stored in whole or in part by any means, including graphic, electronic, or mechanical without the express written consent of the publisher except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

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ISBN: 978-1-9772-1142-2

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Scriptures from King James Version Bible (as appropriate)

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PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

Introduction

In my previous book, Stories of the Old Testament, I wrote out stories about some of the characters in the Bible’s Old Testament, but did it in a way that the average reader could at least somewhat comprehend. Notice, though, that I used the word some. Yes, I did cover people from Adam and Eve, to Abraham and Noah, from Moses and Joshua to Saul and David, and I even threw in Esther and Daniel. However, if you thought for one second that just because I wrote one book on such characters that I would not bother to follow up with some more, you would be sorely mistaken. What I gave was but a small sample of what is in the Bible.

When I was considering how to make this new book look as good, if not better, than the original, I noticed one interesting theme here: the original work I did was mostly of stories that I just plucked out. Yes, each one still had a lesson to tell, but at the end of the day, I left a gap in it leading to a conclusion, or a new beginning.

Well, this time, I considered what all of these stories had in common, and one thing came to my mind: these characters were real-life human beings who, while they did have good qualities, were nevertheless prone to sin and fall short of God’s glory. Abraham, for instance, was a man who sincerely was a man of great faith, but who also lived in fear on account of his beautiful wife, Sarah, and had on more than one occasion lied about his true identity. David, while a great warrior and king, also was an adulterer and murderer–not exactly a model father to his children. Then you had Moses, who was a great leader who led the Hebrews in the exodus from Egypt, but whose hot temper and uncontrolled anger denied him the Promised Land.

Yes, no matter what, you had people living in sin, with darkness growing worse and worse in the world, to the point in which even the nation of Israel was succumbing to it. The good news was this, though: God wants to save us, save people from themselves, and does not want to see us be destroyed by our own sins and shortcomings. Here in this story, I will reveal how each person had their strengths, while pointing out the flaws in their character, as well as stating the reason why God had to save humanity from itself, and what His plan was to do it through His chosen prophets.

So enjoy the ride I am taking you on in the tie-in to my original work, and just as I mentioned before, read the scriptures for yourselves, know what God is saying to your heart through prayer and understanding, and realize that while others can help you out, at the end of the day, it is up to you to draw your own conclusions.

Chapter 1

Tower and Languages

(Genesis 9-11)

English, French, Spanish, German, Latin, Arabic, Greek, Chinese, Russian, Hebrew. What do all of these have in common? They represent various cultures in the world, but more importantly, they are all different languages—languages that we use as a way to communicate with others within the confines of their respective nations and homes. Now, can you imagine a world where there is only one language and one culture? Some might cherish this as a sign of world peace, and nowadays you have the United Nations trying to develop a one-world government. Others, however, might see a planet with one language and culture as some sort of global dictatorship or just a place that is boring and lacks a certain texture and depth to it. Believe it or not, though, there was a point in time when this actually happened!

In order to understand the origins of the various languages in our world today, we must start off with the events that occurred after Noah’s Flood. In fact, you could go so far as to say that it starts off with God’s covenant with Noah and all humanity, promising never to destroy the Earth again by means of a flood. Most people who know the Bible remember that God confirmed this covenant with the symbol of a rainbow. That being said, there is also a message before the rainbow that is to become significant later on.

If you read Genesis 9:1, you will notice God commanding Noah and those with him to be fruitful and multiply, and to increase their numbers through all the Earth. This command is repeated again in Genesis 9:7. Why is this significant? Because of the whole world being destroyed by the flood, there were only eight people left on it: Noah, his wife, his three sons, Ham, Shem, and Japheth, and the three women who were wives to each one of the sons. That was it, no more than those eight. Now, God does want people to have dominion over the whole world, as was commanded to Adam in Genesis 1:28, meaning that humanity needs to maintain the plants and animals of the entire world and be good stewards of the planet. The problem, though, is that it would be very hard for people to be good stewards of the Earth if we all were confined to one space, since you know full well that the animals in the ark were going to roam around. Also, if you had too many people confined in just one place, that area would reach the point in which it could no longer be sustainable, since people are bound to repopulate at some point.

There is another aspect to this, however. Many people (and rightfully so) think that the first time the Bible commandment was made: ‘thou shalt not murder’ happens when Moses is given the Ten Commandments. After all, it was the finger of God that wrote them. What people do not realize, however, is that such a command was given much earlier, albeit in verbal form, to Noah and his family, when God makes the post-flood covenant with them. God even states that when someone murders another, an account would be held against them, since mankind is in the image of God (Genesis 9:5). This also was to be significant.

After the covenant was made, Noah decided to plant a vineyard, because, after all, as a man who lived most of his life before the flood, he was a man of the soil, (Genesis 9:20) relying on vegetation instead of animals for his food. In fact, it wasn’t even until after the flood that eating meat was apparently considered acceptable, provided that they didn’t eat the blood of it. Only thing is, in producing a vineyard, Noah was making some of what grew out of it into a form of wine, and it didn’t take long for Noah to get drunk and naked, which, I’ll admit, was partly due to the fact that the events of the flood would probably drive just about anyone to drink. It also shows you that even Noah, as wonderful as he was, had his flaws (could alcoholism have been one of them?).

Anyway, you now have a man who has lived for at least six centuries now, he is asleep and nude; who is the first person to see this? You would think it would be Noah’s wife, but no, that is not the case (makes me wonder where she was in all of this). Instead, the first person to see Noah in this drunken stupor was his son, Ham. Ham, being, well, a ham of sorts, did not cover his father up or turn away, but rather mentioned this to his brothers as if this was some sort of gossip from People magazine. Thankfully, Ham’s two brothers, Shem and Japheth, are more responsible. They covered their dad up in a blanket while doing basically a moonwalk without dancing because they did not want to see that side of their father. First off, he was of the same gender as them, and let’s face it; God would have destroyed them in the flood if that was how they rolled. That, and who on Earth wants to see their dad naked? That is just plain sick.

Well, when Noah found out about what his son, Ham, did, Noah was not too pleased about it, going so far as to usher a curse of sorts onto Ham’s son Canaan, or that is at least what it appeared to be. In reality, what Noah was also doing was prophesying the future concerning his sons’ descendants. What this entails is that Ham’s descendants through Canaan would become an evil and perverse people who would fall into slavery at the hands of Shem’s descendants. Japheth helped Shem in the covering of their dad, which meant simply that Japheth’s descendants would share in the blessings of the descendants of Shem.

Eventually, the table of nations would evolve through the descendants of Japheth, Shem, and Ham, and while I am not going to bore everyone reading this with the meaning of every single name, there are some that have a sort of significance to them. For instance, one of Japheth’s sons was named Magog. The name Magog is mentioned again in Ezekiel 38:2, and many people believe that Magog really means the country of Russia. Meshech and Tubal are also mentioned in the same chapter of Ezekiel, with Meshech meaning Moscow and Tubal being Tobolsk, although they also could be tribes of the nation of Turkey (Epicenter; pg 86), and as they are also Japheth’s sons, this means that Russia and her allies, all of whom are descendants of Japheth, are going to lead a movement that includes some of the descendants of Shem, in a final battle against Israel in what is now known as Ezekiel’s war. Fortunately, though, a supernatural event will take place whereby Israel is saved by the hand of God without firing a single shot.

Then, you had a couple of Ham’s sons named Put and Cush. Put was the ancestor of what is today the countries of Libya, Algeria, and Tunisia, and Cush is the father of Sudan, Ethiopia, and possibly Eritrea (Epicenter; pg 132). They too would join Russia in Ezekiel’s war in a final attempt to destroy Israel. There was another man named Cush, though, who had significance of his own. It is possible that this Cush was a son or descendant of the Cush that was fathered by Ham, but in any event, this second Cush was the father of Nimrod, and this Nimrod, as you might see later on, had a significant impact as to why we have different languages today.

Of course, we also have to mention something about Canaan, the one upon whom Noah put a curse. Some of Canaan’s descendants include the Hittites, the Jebusites, the Amorites, and the Hivites. What makes these people significant is that starting in Exodus 13:5, and going on up until the reigns of David and Solomon, the Israelites were commanded by God to wipe them off the face of the Earth, and take over the place where they reside, since the Hebrews are God’s chosen people, and the descendants of Canaan were living in Israel’s promised land.

Finally, you have the descendants of Shem, and there is significance to Shem’s name. You see, originally, Shem’s descendants were known simply as