Key Of David - Part Two

THE KEY OF DAVID The Vestment Chain First Harvest Ministries International Rev. John Shane Vaughn, Founding Apostolic Overseer TEXT "And to the messenger of the assembly in Philadelphia write; These things saith he that is holy, he that is true, he that hath the key of David, he that openeth, and no man shutteth; and shutteth, and no man openeth; I know thy works: behold, I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it: for thou hast a little strength, and hast kept my word, and hast not denied my name." — Revelation 3:7-8 "And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder; so he shall open, and none shall shut; and he shall shut, and none shall open." — Isaiah 22:22 I. THE KEY IS AN OFFICE — NOT A FEELING Beloved FHaMIly, we live in a generation that has reduced everything YAHWEH gave us into a feeling. Men speak of the Key of David as though it were a mood that comes over you in worship, a warm sensation in a service, a private blessing you carry in your pocket. It is nothing of the kind. A key is an instrument of authority. A key says this house is mine to open and mine to shut. And YAHSHUA did not say He held a key. He said He holds the key of David — the key of a throne, the key of a dynasty, the key of a kingdom that has been running underground through the centuries and is about to surface in front of the whole world. Hear where that key comes from, and hear how it is worn: "And the key of the house of David will I lay upon his shoulder." — Isaiah 22:22 Laid upon the shoulder. Not seized. Not campaigned for. Not voted in by a committee. Placed there by YAHWEH Himself. And one chapter family away, the same prophet, the same anatomy: "...and the government shall be upon his shoulder... Of the increase of his government and peace there shall be no end, upon the throne of David, and upon his kingdom, to order it, and to establish it with judgment and with justice from henceforth even for ever." — Isaiah 9:6-7 The same shoulder. The key and the government rest in the same place, because they are the same thing. To hold the Key of David is to hold the government of YAHWEH. And every human steward before Him failed to keep it. Read Isaiah 22 from the top. Shebna was over the house — and Shebna carved himself a tomb in the rock, building his own monument in YAHWEH's house, and YAHWEH removed him. Then Eliakim was given the key, called a nail fastened in a sure place — and before the chapter ends, even Eliakim is cut down, and everything hung upon him falls with him. Hear it, FHaMIly: no man keeps this key. Not a bishop. Not a board. Not a denomination. Not a pastor. It passed through every hand in Israel's history and slipped out of all of them. Now I want to show you something the church has walked past for two thousand years. That shoulder is wearing a garment. And that garment has a history that runs from the garden of Eden to the foundations of the New Jerusalem. II. THE GARMENT YAHWEH DESIGNED WITH HIS OWN MOUTH Go to Exodus 28 and watch YAHWEH design a garment stitch by stitch — because He never described anything in that much detail unless He was teaching us something. First the shoulders: "And thou shalt take two onyx stones, and grave on them the names of the children of Israel: six of their names on one stone, and the other six names of the rest on the other stone... And thou shalt put the two stones upon the shoulders of the ephod for stones of memorial unto the children of Israel: and Aaron shall bear their names before YAHWEH upon his two shoulders for a memorial." — Exodus 28:9-12 Twelve tribes. Two shoulders. The whole house of Israel carried on the shoulder of the priesthood. Then the heart: "And Aaron shall bear the names of the children of Israel in the breastplate of judgment upon his heart, when he goeth in unto the holy place, for a memorial before YAHWEH continually." — Exodus 28:29 Now hear me carefully, because most people collapse these two into one and lose the revelation. The shoulder pieces and the breastplate are not the same garment. The shoulders carry two onyx stones with six names each. The breastplate carries twelve distinct stones, one for every tribe, and it rests over the heart. The shoulders bear the government. The heart bears the judgment. Aaron carried Israel on both at once. And now the connection — this is the hinge of everything I am going to preach to you today. The breastplate does not sit on the chest by itself. It hangs from the shoulders. "And the other two ends of the two wreathen chains thou shalt fasten in the two ouches, and put them on the shoulderpieces of the ephod before it." — Exodus 28:25 "And they shall bind the breastplate by the rings thereof unto the rings of the ephod with a lace of blue... that the breastplate be not loosed from the ephod." — Exodus 28:28 Trace the load with me. Twelve stones rest over the heart — and every ounce of that weight travels up two braided gold chains and sets down on the shoulders. Nothing rests on the heart of the priesthood that is not carried by the shoulders. Aaron never felt that weight in his chest. He felt it where YAHWEH designed it to land. And the materials are not decoration. The upper binding is gold — the shoulder connection, glory and kingship. The lower binding is a lace of blue — the very blue YAHWEH commanded on the fringe of the garment in Numbers 15:38-39, that ye may look upon it, and remember all the commandments. Government above. Torah below. And the judgment of Israel suspended between them. Then read the command again: "that the breastplate be not loosed from the ephod." YAHWEH issued a specific commandment forbidding the separation of judgment from the shoulders that carry it. Every time it has come loose in history, Israel has paid for it. III. THE ORACLE HUNG ON THE SHOULDERS Now look at what YAHWEH put inside that breastplate. "And thou shalt put in the breastplate of judgment the Urim and the Thummim; and they shall be upon Aaron's heart, when he goeth in before YAHWEH: and Aaron shall bear the judgment of the children of Israel upon his heart before YAHWEH continually." — Exodus 28:30 Urim and Thummim. Lights and Perfections. This is how YAHWEH spoke to Israel to decide matters. When the nation did not know whether to go up or stay, whether a man was guilty or clean, whether the season had come — the answer came from that pouch over the priest's heart. And that pouch was hanging by gold chains from the shoulders. The oracle of YAHWEH was suspended from the shoulder of the priesthood. Everything I am going to show you today is already sitting in that one garment. And there is a gift buried in the name. Thummim comes from tamim — complete, whole, without blemish. It is the same word YAHWEH speaks in Exodus 12:5: your lamb shall be tamim, a male of the first year. The Yearling Lamb is sitting inside the name of the oracle. Hold that. We are coming back to it. IV. THE FIRST WEARER AND THE FIRST THEFT Now I will show you who wore those stones before Aaron ever put them on. "Thou hast been in Eden the garden of YAHWEH; every precious stone was thy covering, the sardius, topaz, and the diamond, the beryl, the onyx, and the jasper, the sapphire, the emerald, and the carbuncle, and gold... Thou art the anointed cherub that covereth." — Ezekiel 28:13-14 Every precious stone was thy covering. Stones and gold, worn as a garment, in the garden, by an anointed covering cherub. FHaMIly, that is a priestly vestment. That is the ephod described before there was an Aaron to wear it. Now let me be straight with you, because I will not build this house on sand. In your King James Bible you will count nine stones in Ezekiel 28, not twelve. Count them. I want you to count them. But the Greek Septuagint — the translation the scattered house of Israel was reading centuries before Messiah walked — lists twelve, and those twelve match the twelve of Exodus 28 exactly. I am not asking you to take the Septuagint as authority. I am telling you the older witness saw a full breastplate on that cherub, and I want you to know the ground you are standing on before somebody tries to move you off it. And what did he do with the garment he was given? "For thou hast said in thine heart, I will ascend into heaven, I will exalt my throne above the stars of YAHWEH... I will be like the most High." — Isaiah 14:13-14 Five times I will. Five times a steward reached for a key that had never been laid on his shoulder. He was permitted to carry the government. He decided he would rather own it. And he was stripped. That is the first stripping in the Bible. Remember it, because there is a second one coming, and the same accuser is standing in the room when it happens. V. THE GARMENT PLACED ON A MAN The vestment did not disappear. It was transferred. YAHWEH took the stones off a fallen guardian and laid them on a man — on Aaron, and on the priesthood after him. And He commanded that the ark, the throne of His presence, be carried the same way the garment was worn. David tried it once with a new cart. Innovation. Efficiency. Good intentions, good music, and a wagon — and a man died reaching out to steady what was never supposed to be riding there. When David came back the second time, he had learned: "And the children of the Levites bare the ark of YAHWEH upon their shoulders with the staves thereon, as Moses commanded according to the word of YAHWEH." — 1 Chronicles 15:15 Upon their shoulders. Not on wheels. Not on whatever conveyance seemed reasonable that season. The presence of YAHWEH travels on the shoulders of ordered, appointed, consecrated bearers — and every generation that tries to move the government of YAHWEH by machinery instead of by shoulders buries somebody. VI. THE SCEPTRE THAT NEVER DEPARTED Now bring the throne into it, and hear the oldest prophecy of the Kingdom, spoken from a deathbed: "The sceptre shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet, until Shiloh come; and unto him shall the gathering of the people be." — Genesis 49:10 This is not ancient history. This is end-time prophecy, and we are watching it come to term. The sceptre — Hebrew shevet — is the ruler's rod, David's throne. The lawgiver — Hebrew mechoqeq — is the one from whom the statute proceeds. Jacob is declaring that from the tribe of Judah there will never be an hour when the rod of rule and the authority to legislate are absent from the earth. Look at what that claim survived. Babylon burned the temple and carried Judah away — and the sceptre did not depart. Rome hung the King of the Jews on a tree under a mocking sign — and the sceptre did not depart. The nations have spent two thousand years trying to erase the seed of Judah from the earth — and the sceptre did not depart. Empires that swore they would bury this throne are museum exhibits, and the throne of David is still standing. And David himself — mark this — ruled over all twelve tribes. "So all the elders of Israel came to the king to Hebron; and king David made a league with them in Hebron before YAHWEH: and they anointed David king over Israel." — 2 Samuel 5:3 Seven years over Judah alone at Hebron, and then the whole house. Twelve tribes under one throne. The same twelve names that were cut into the stones on the shoulder. The garment and the throne are describing the same government. Until Shiloh come. That word means the one to whom it belongs — the rightful Heir. The sceptre was held in trust across the centuries until the true Heir came to claim what the covenant had promised Him. VII. THE SILENCE Now I must preach to you about a silence, because you cannot understand the Son until you understand what stopped. The oracle went quiet. When the exiles came back from Babylon they could not settle a priestly claim, and the ruling handed down was that the matter must wait: "...till there stood up a priest with Urim and with Thummim." — Ezra 2:63 No such priest stood up. The second temple had a priesthood, an altar, a schedule of sacrifice, and a building — and no answer from YAHWEH. The stones were on a chest and the lights were out. And there was a deeper departure underneath it. Ezekiel watched the KAVOD, the weighty glory of YAHWEH, rise up from the cherub, move to the threshold, and go out of the city (Ezekiel 10-11). The glory left. And it did not return to a building. It was waiting for a Firstborn Son to dwell in. So hold this picture, because it is the saddest scene in Scripture and it is the setup for everything that follows: a high priest, standing in a temple, wearing a garment that no longer speaks, in a city the glory has left. VIII. THE COURTROOM — THE PRIEST IN THE FILTHY GARMENTS Into that silence, YAHWEH gave Zechariah a vision. "And he shewed me Yahoshua the high priest standing before the messenger of YAHWEH, and Satan standing at his right hand to resist him." — Zechariah 3:1 "Now Yahoshua was clothed with filthy garments, and stood before the messenger." — Zechariah 3:3 FHaMIly, understand what you are looking at. The accuser is standing in a room where vestments are about to be handed out. Why would he care? Why does he show up for this? Because he wore those stones in the garden and he lost them, and he cannot bear to watch them go onto somebody else. This is not general malice. This is a specific grievance about a specific garment. Now watch what YAHWEH does in front of him: "And he answered and spake unto those that stood before him, saying, Take away the filthy garments from him. And unto him he said, Behold, I have caused thine iniquity to pass from thee, and I will clothe thee with change of raiment. And I said, Let them set a fair mitre upon his head. So they set a fair mitre upon his head, and clothed him with garments." — Zechariah 3:4-5 The filth comes off. The clean raiment goes on. And the tzanif, the high priestly turban, is set on that head — the very headpiece that carried the golden plate reading HOLINESS TO YAHWEH. And the accuser has to stand there and watch it. Beloved, this is the Jordan. This is a baptism. The old garments go down into the water and stay there, and the man comes up robed and crowned and set apart — and the voice from heaven says this is my beloved Son. Whatever was behind Him was buried in that water. The learning was finished; the demonstrating was ahead. And do not miss the terms He was given, because the FHaMIly must hear this exactly right: "Thus saith YAHWEH of hosts; If thou wilt walk in my ways, and if thou wilt keep my charge, then thou shalt also judge my house, and shalt also keep my courts." — Zechariah 3:7 If. If. Then. The priesthood and the rule are not handed over unconditionally at the water. They are promised on condition and then walked out — through one acceptable year, the ministry of the Yearling Lamb, a male of the first year, all the way to the altar. The crown of Zechariah 6 comes after the walk, not before it. Hold the guardrail with me here, FHaMIly, because this is where careless preachers fall in. What travels down this chain is the garment and the office — never a person. The vestment moves from Eden, to Aaron, to the throne of David, and waits. No Son is walking through the centuries in it. The Man comes at the appointed hour, in Miriam's womb, and receives what was being kept for Him. The Kavod is given, not native — the glory which thou gavest me I have given them (John 17:22). That is why He can sit on the throne. IX. THE SON WHO IS THE ORACLE Now put the silence of Ezra beside the opening of Hebrews and hear what YAHWEH actually did about it. "YAHWEH, who at sundry times and in divers manners spake in time past unto the fathers by the prophets, hath in these last days spoken unto us by his Son." — Hebrews 1:1-2 He never restored the device. He sent the Priest. Israel had no Urim for four hundred years. And YAHWEH's answer to that silence was not a better breastplate, not a repaired stone, not a returned oracle. His answer was a Man. So hear this plainly, and hear the order of it, because the order is everything: The Son is the Urim. The shoulders carry Him to the body. The oracle hangs on the chains — the oracle is not the chains. X. THE SHOULDER THAT CARRIES THE HEAD TO THE BODY Which brings me to the office standing in this room right now. Ask what a shoulder actually is. It is the joint between the head and everything the head intends to do. The head gives direction — but nothing moves until the shoulder transmits it. Every arm that lifts and every hand that labors passes through that joint first. "And he gave some, apostles; and some, prophets; and some, evangelists; and some, pastors and teachers; for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry, for the edifying of the body of Messiah." — Ephesians 4:11-12 Five offices. One shoulder. Now watch the direction of the flow: "...may grow up into him in all things, which is the head, even Messiah: from whom the whole body fitly joined together and compacted by that which every joint supplieth, according to the effectual working in the measure of every part, maketh increase of the body." — Ephesians 4:15-16 It comes from the Head. It passes through the joint. It arrives in the Body. "And not holding the Head, from which all the body by joints and bands having nourishment ministered, and knit together, increaseth with the increase of YAHWEH." — Colossians 2:19 Joints and bands. The nourishment of the Head does not fall on the body like rain. It is ministered through joints. A body without the five-fold is a body with a severed shoulder — the Head still speaking, the direction still given, and nothing reaching the hands. And ministers, hear the weight of your own office. The shoulder carries the Head to the Body. The shoulder does not become the Head. Verse 12 says exactly why the joint exists — for the perfecting of the saints, for the work of the ministry. The five-fold was never given so five men could do the work. It was given so the whole body would be equipped to do it. Do you want to see how the shoulders are permitted to carry a decision? Read Acts 15 and read it slowly. A plurality deliberating. James laying the prophet Amos on the table before any ruling comes down. And then the wording: it seemed good to the Holy Spirit, and to us. The shoulders carried judgment to the body — and the safeguards are printed in the same sentence. XI. SATAN'S GREAT WRATH Now you know why the road is hard. "Woe to the inhabiters of the earth and of the sea! for the devil is come down unto you, having great wrath, because he knoweth that he hath but a short time." — Revelation 12:12 Great wrath. And now you know what it is about. It is not vague hatred. He wore the stones. He lost them. He watched them go onto Aaron. He watched them go onto the throne of David. He stood in Zechariah's courtroom and watched a Man be robed in what he forfeited — and now he is watching YAHWEH prepare to put a breastplate of judgment on you. He cannot take the key. That question is closed — YAHSHUA holds it, and what He opens no man shuts. So the adversary does the only thing left to him: he attacks the ones standing in the open door. Hear it again: "I have set before thee an open door, and no man can shut it: for thou hast a little strength." Little strength. Small assembly. Limited resources. Few names. And a door that hell cannot close. That is why the accusation comes. That is why the harassment comes, the slander, the pressure on your household, the long seasons where every hand seems to be against this house. It is not because you are failing. It is because the door is open and he cannot reach the latch. And mark the words that follow the wrath: he knoweth that he hath but a short time. That rage is not the confidence of a victor. It is the panic of a defendant who has already read the verdict. XII. OBEYING FAMILY GOVERNMENT Now I bring this into your house, because the Key of David is the key of a house. Isaiah did not say the key of the nation of David or the key of the army of David. He said the key of the house of David. The government of YAHWEH has always been shaped like a family, and it is administered first in a home. You cannot rule a kingdom you would not rule a kitchen for. "And these words, which I command thee this day, shall be in thine heart: and thou shalt teach them diligently unto thy children, and shalt talk of them when thou sittest in thine house, and when thou walkest by the way, and when thou liest down, and when thou risest up." — Deuteronomy 6:6-7 Sitting, walking, lying down, rising up. That is not a Sabbath program. That is a household under government — every hour of it, every room of it. Husbands: the key was laid on a shoulder that carried a cross first. Your authority is measured by what you are willing to carry, not by what you are able to demand. A man who rules by volume has already forfeited the office. Wives: your submission is not weakness and it is never servitude. It is the posture the nations themselves will take, practiced early and practiced willingly. Children: honor in the home is the training ground for authority in the Kingdom. You will never carry a rod you would not first receive one under. And to this whole FHaMIly: when correction comes into this house, do not despise it. Every time you submit to order you did not choose, you are being fitted for a throne you did not earn. XIII. THE BREASTPLATE COMES BACK — AND IT IS WORN BY OVERCOMERS Now hear where all of this has been driving. That breastplate of judgment was never meant to stay on one man's chest in one tent. "Until the Ancient of days came, and judgment was given to the saints of the most High; and the time came that the saints possessed the kingdom." — Daniel 7:22 "Do ye not know that the saints shall judge the world?" — 1 Corinthians 6:2 And then John is shown the count, tribe by tribe: "And I heard the number of them which were sealed: and there were sealed an hundred and forty and four thousand of all the tribes of the children of Israel." — Revelation 7:4 This is not a head count. It is a quality count. Read the arithmetic as the Kingdom writes it: twelve times twelve times a thousand. Twelve tribal foundations. Twelve apostolic foundations. And the thousand — go back and see where YAHWEH first used that word for governing: "...and place such over them, to be rulers of thousands, and rulers of hundreds, rulers of fifties, and rulers of tens." — Exodus 18:21 The thousand is the administrative division YAHWEH gave Israel through Moses. That number is written in the vocabulary of government. And the city says the same thing — the New Jerusalem measures twelve thousand furlongs each direction, and its wall a hundred and forty-four cubits (Revelation 21:16-17). Nobody reads a wall as a population. Two things in that tribal list are preaching to you. Levi is counted. Go check any land census in Torah — Levi is always left out, because Levi's inheritance is YAHWEH Himself, not acreage. But in Revelation 7 Levi is in the twelve. A roster that counts Levi is not a census. It is a priestly order. The breastplate list confirms itself. And Joseph stands where Ephraim's name belongs. For a people who have preached the restoration of the two houses, that is not a problem — that is the scattered house of Israel coming home into the count. This is the company of the first resurrection: "...but they shall be priests of YAHWEH and of Messiah, and shall reign with him a thousand years." — Revelation 20:6 Priests and reign — in one verse. Priest and king. The breastplate and the sceptre on the same body at last. And the rest of the dead lived not again until the thousand years were finished — the second resurrection, when the just and the unjust are raised (Acts 24:15) and are ruled over by those who qualified. And qualifying is the whole point, which is why Paul refused to presume: "If by any means I might attain unto the resurrection of the dead... I press toward the mark for the prize of the high calling." — Philippians 3:11, 14 Paul coined a word there that appears nowhere else in Scripture — exanastasis, the out- resurrection, the rising out from among. The apostle who had seen the Messiah on the road was still straining toward a resurrection he would not assume he had. If he pressed, so do we. And hear the mercy in it, FHaMIly, because we do not preach a Kingdom of the abandoned. The overcomers do not rule over the damned. They rule over the raised — and the judgment they carry over their hearts is corrective, restorative, the judgment of a Father who finishes what He starts, until all things are restored. XIV. THE GATHERING — YIK-KAW- HAW Now come back to Jacob's deathbed and finish the verse. "...and unto him shall the gathering of the people be." The Hebrew is yiqqahah (יִקָּה ה) — pronounced yik- kaw-HAW, the weight falling hard on that last syllable. Say it with me. Yik-kaw-HAW. And it does not mean a crowd. It does not mean a headcount. It does not mean a stadium full of people who came because the music was good. Yiqqahah means obedience. Submission. Do you see what YAHWEH did? He defined the gathering as the obeying. In the Kingdom, to be gathered is to be surrendered. There is no such thing as a gathered rebel. And this is why we do what we do right now. Somebody has asked you why you keep Sabbath when the world does not. Why you keep the feasts. Why you eat the way you eat, order your home the way you order it, submit to correction when everyone around you does as they please. Here is the answer. *We are learning yik-kaw- HAW now so that we are not strangers to it then.* When the whole earth is called to bow to the sceptre of Judah, the FHaMIly will not be learning submission for the first time — we will be at home in it. That gathering has a date on YAHWEH's calendar: "And it shall come to pass, that every one that is left of all the nations which came against Jerusalem shall even go up from year to year to worship the King, YAHWEH of hosts, and to keep the feast of tabernacles." — Zechariah 14:16 Every year you go up to Tabernacles you are not observing a quaint custom. You are rehearsing the gathering of the nations. And notice what the sealed company is called: "These were redeemed from among men, being the firstfruits unto YAHWEH and to the Lamb. And in their mouth was found no guile: for they are without fault before the throne." — Revelation 14:4-5 Firstfruits are never the crop. They are the sheaf brought in ahead of the harvest as the proof that the field is coming. And that phrase without fault is the offering word — the same word as tamim. The same root as Thummim. The same word as the lamb of Exodus 12:5, a male of the first year. The oracle, the Lamb, and the overcomers are all named by one word. XV. THE RESTITUTION OF ALL THINGS "Elias truly shall first come, and restore all things." — Matthew 17:11 An Elijah came in our own era, and the government of YAHWEH — the Sabbath, the feasts, the law, the throne, the very Key of David — was restored to the assembly. But understand the boundary of that work. It was restored to the Church, not to the world. Measured against the billions on this earth, only a remnant ever heard it, and a smaller remnant ever obeyed. The full restoration is not a man's work. It is the Messiah's. "And he shall send YAHSHUA Messiah, which before was preached unto you: whom the heaven must receive until the times of restitution of all things, which YAHWEH hath spoken by the mouth of all his holy prophets since the world began." — Acts 3:20-21 Restitution of all things. Not most things. Not the salvageable things. All things — restored, healed, set right, brought back into the order they were made for. The government the covering cherub was given and rebelled against will be re- established over the whole earth, and this time it will rest on a shoulder that will not drop it. And the stones come all the way home. The twelve foundations of the New Jerusalem are jewels, and its twelve gates carry the twelve tribal names (Revelation 21:12-14, 19-20). Eden. Ephod. City. The garment that was stolen in a garden becomes the foundation of a city that never ends. XVI. THE CHARGE FHaMIly, hear the charge. The key is not in your hand. It is on His shoulder — and that is your security. Nothing in your life is being opened or shut by an accuser, a court, a critic, or a circumstance. It is opened and shut by the One who prevailed. The door in front of you is open and it will stay open. Not because you are strong. He said plainly you have little strength. It stays open because He is holding it. The wrath against you is a receipt. It is the measure of what the adversary sees coming and cannot stop. He has watched this garment leave his hands once already. And the obedience you are practicing today is the throne you will occupy tomorrow. Every act of submission in this house is a rehearsal for the gathering of the nations. So keep the Sabbath. Keep the feasts. Keep the order in your home. Keep the Name you have not denied. Keep His word when it costs you. Because the stones are coming back. The sceptre never departed. Shiloh is coming. And unto Him shall the yik-kaw-HAW of the people be. Let the FHaMIly say amen. APPENDIX — PRONUNCIATION GUIDE Stress falls on the CAPITALIZED syllable. Hebrew almost always stresses the last syllable — resist the English instinct to hit the first one. The key word yiqqahah — יִקָּה ה — the gathering that is obedience (Gen. 49:10) Traditional (Strong's)yik-kaw-HAW Modern Hebrew yee-kah-HAH Break it down slowly: yik (rhymes with kick) — kaw — HAW. Hold the middle k just slightly, like the k in bookkeeper, because the Hebrew doubles that letter. Then drop your voice into the last syllable and land there. Construct form as it appears in Genesis 49:10: yiqhat ammim — yik-HAT am-MEEM — "the obedience of the peoples." The throne words WordSay itMeaning shevet (ט  שֵׁ בֶ)SHEH-vet sceptre, ruler's WordSay itMeaning rod mechoqeq (ק ק  חֹ  מְ)meh-kho-KEK lawgiver, one who decrees Shiloh (שֵׁ ילֹה)shee-LOH the one to whom it belongs Shevet is the exception to the stress rule — hit the first syllable. Shiloh is shee-LOH, not "SHY-loh." The American church has said it wrong for two hundred years because of the battlefield in Tennessee. *The guttural in mechoqeq: the ch is not the ch in church. It is a scrape at the back of the throat — the sound in Bach, or in challah bread. Write it in your notes as kh: meh — kho — KEK*. The garment words WordSay itMeaning ephod (אֵ פוֹד)ay-FOD the priestly garment with the shoulder stones choshen (ן  שֵׁ  חֹ)kho-SHEN the breastplate of judgment Urim (אֵוּרִ ים)oo-REEM lights Thummim (מִּ ים  תֻּ)too-MEEM perfections, completeness WordSay itMeaning tamim (תֻּמְ ים)tah-MEEM whole, without blemish tzanif (צָנִ יף)tsah-NEEF the high priestly turban kavod (כָּ בֶוֹד)kah-VOD weighty glory Names in the sermon NameSay itNote Shebna (נִאֵ  בֶ  שֵׁ)shev-NAH the steward who carved his own tomb Eliakim (יק ים  לְ  אֵ)el-yah-KEEM "El will raise up" The Names YAHWEHYAH-weh — two beats, stress the first YAHSHUAyah-SHOO-ah — three beats, stress the middle Rev. John Shane Vaughn First Harvest Ministries International