1. Lesson One of the Book of Daniel, Introduction to the Book of Daniel

Lesson 21: Geography Study Concerning the Scriptures, Physical Topography - The Hydrology of the Holy Land, Continued

God told the children of Israel that the land in which he would place them was to be a different land than that of Egypt.   

Deut 11:10-17, For the land, whither thou goest in to possess it, is not as the land of Egypt, from whence ye came out, where thou sowedst thy seed, and wateredst it with thy foot, as a garden of herbs:   But the land, whither ye go to possess it, is a land of hills and valleys, and drinketh water of the rain of heaven:   A land which the LORD thy God careth for: the eyes of the LORD thy God are always upon it, from the beginning of the year even unto the end of the year.   And it shall come to pass, if ye shall hearken diligently unto my commandments which I command you this day, to love the LORD your God, and to serve him with all your heart and with all your soul,  That I will give you the rain of your land in his due season, the first rain and the latter rain, that thou mayest gather in thy corn, and thy wine, and thine oil.   And I will send grass in thy fields for thy cattle, that thou mayest eat and be full.   Take heed to yourselves, that your heart be not deceived, and ye turn aside, and serve other gods, and worship them;   And then the LORD’S wrath be kindled against you, and he shut up the heaven, that there be no rain, and that the land yield not her fruit; and lest ye perish quickly from off the good land which the LORD giveth you.

God told the children of Israel that the land which he would bring them to was not a land in which the labor of man would bring water to the crops of the field.  

Egypt was such a land, where the river Nile was used to bring water by man’s devices (and wateredst it with thy foot) to irrigate the crops that men had sown.

No! The land that God provided for his people was a land where man’s devices could not bring rain. 

Egypt is a picture where the world system of doing without God is demonstrated. 

God desired a land where God’s provision of blessing in response to faith was to be demonstrated.  

The men of the world desire a world without God and therefore when technology rules the same men declare, by the pride of power, the God is dead.

But God declares that the just shall live by faith and He goes about seeing to it that the conditions of life for His children promote His declaration that the just shall live by faith. 

That is something that a Christian can count on for God is a good husbandman and he intends for His children to bear fruit so he brings into each life that which it takes to bear fruit.

So take the children out of the world, Egypt, and place them in a particular land where faith is a must if rain is to come.

So in Exodus we read of God’s intention.

Exodus 3:8,  And I am come down to deliver them out of the hand of the Egyptians, and to bring them up out of that land unto a good land and a large, unto a land flowing with milk and honey; unto the place of the Canaanites, and the Hittites, and the Amorites, and the Perizzites, and the Hivites, and the Jebusites. 

A land flowing with milk and honey is a land that depends upon rainfall.   

This phrase may bring into our mind a picture of a Garden of Eden but this is not the picture that the Bible paints.  

Goats milk and bees honey are products produced from a pastoral environment.   

This is in contrast to the agricultural products produced in Egypt, cucumbers, melons, leeks, onions, and garlic.   

Numbers 11:4-5,  And the mixed multitude that was among them fell a lusting: and the children of Israel also wept again, and said, Who shall give us flesh to eat?  We remember the fish, which we did eat in Egypt freely; the cucumbers, and the melons, and the leeks, and the onions, and the garlic: 

So the expression “a land flowing with milk and honey” did not guarantee milk and honey.   

It was meant to describe a pastoral land, a land of uncertainty, and vulnerability.   

It was a land where rainfall determined the goings and comings of the nomadic farmer, versus the land from which they came, the stationary farmer. 

The word “flowing” also reveals much about the land and the faith that is required in the land.   

Look at its use in the passage in Joel that describes what takes place in the millennium.   

For what takes place in the millennium could have taken place in Old Testament Israel if the children of Israel had exercised faith in God. 

Joel 3:18-21,  And it shall come to pass in that day, that the mountains shall drop down new wine, and the hills shall flow with milk, and all the rivers of Judah shall flow with waters, and a fountain shall come forth of the house of the LORD, and shall water the valley of Shittim.   Egypt shall be a desolation, and Edom shall be a desolate wilderness, for the violence against the children of Judah, because they have shed innocent blood in their land.   But Judah shall dwell for ever, and Jerusalem from generation to generation.   For I will cleanse their blood that I have not cleansed: for the LORD dwelleth in Zion. 

The Promised Land will flow with milk and honey is to declare that it is a place that will experience fertility as a function of faith and as a consequence of obedience.   

It is to declare that showers from heaven will be responsible for creating a land that will flow with prosperity and fertility. 

It is to see once again that this land has been sculpted by a sovereign God.