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morning everyone and uh Happy Groundhog Day for those of you who celebrate that uh we’re going to continue our Series today in um the Patriarchs um and God’s covenant with Abraham so if you have your Bibles or your device please turn to Genesis 15 we’ll be spending our time mostly today in Genesis chapter 15 and 16 key verse for today today goes actually back a couple chapters um to Genesis 12 and Yahweh said to Abraham go forth from your land and from your kin and from your father’s house to the land which I will show you and I will make you a great nation and I will bless you and make your name great so you shall be a blessing a very foundational verse for us about the founding of the nation of Israel and also uh for us uh the foundation of the Gospel you notice in this verse that like with us in Christ God calls us from something and to something and we’re going to explore a little bit more what those specific things are from our chapter after these things the word of Yahweh came to Abram in a in a vision saying do not fear Abram I am a shield to you your reward shall be very great would you pray with me Father God we praise you for laying the foundation from eternity past for our Salvation today and I pray that we would learn to love your design through these flawed Patriarchs first and foremost of your perfect fatherhood in our lives your perfect Redemption of flawed men from these historical figures to us today and your Redemptive purposes from these foundational times right down to our lives today um I think of how the uh how King David prayed restore to me the joy of your salvation and part of that is just understanding where it came from and so I pray that this would be a great joy to us today as we explore your word together would you meet us and speak to each heart as only you can and transform us as only you can by your spirit amen amen well uh just a brief outline uh we’ve got a lot to cover today so I like to be a bit more interactive as you know I may have to just Tamp that down just a little bit to get through the material so I hope you’ll bear with me but my intent is to have a little bit more time for interaction toward the end okay so as you know from our previous lessons it’s kind of a question and answer thing as we just walk through the passage and observe it um so I’m going to give the answers but sometimes I will ask you for them before I give them okay so we’ll we’ll get through this together so I want to spend a couple minutes on what the patriarchy is and God’s design for that uh patriarchy is a can come across like a swear word I think in this cultural moment Am I Wrong uh abolish destroy the patriarchy right and it depends what you mean by that uh so uh when we when we read a a topic like this I think we want to be very clear on what that means and and embrace God’s design we’re going to give some SC scriptural and historical background so we’ll be primarily in Genesis 15 and 16 but we’re going to bounce around just a a little bit within the Book of Genesis mostly um and as we do in good Bible study we’re going to observe the passage we’re going to interpret and correlate it with other passages uh and then we’ll we’ll talk about life application which is the whole point right uh Jesus said uh to his disciples if you know these things you’re blessed if you do them and so let’s be blessed today as God moves in our hearts so patriarchy and God’s design uh this passage here uh from acts 8 acts 7 describes all really all of the characters that we’ll be covering in these in this series right and he gave him the Covenant of circumcision that’s Abraham and so Abraham was the father of Isaac and circum circumcised him on the eighth day and Isaac was the father of Jacob and Jacob of the 12 Patriarchs this is the only time this word is found that I could find in the Bible Patriarchs and the Patriarchs becoming jealous of Joseph sold him into Egypt yet God was with him and so we see that our series covers the foundational lives of these men these are these present to us kind of the found all of Genesis really as foundational to understanding the world understanding our faith and specifically to understanding the gospel and I want to point out that these men are flawed I call them flawed but faithful I think that’s how I think I got that from John Piper as he described some of these characters in The Bible flawed but faithful and they provide to us both positive postive and negative examples to me this is one of the great apologetics of the scriptures being true because they don’t sugarcoat the flaws of the people who came before us and so you can look at them and say Yes I want to imitate their faith but no I don’t want to imitate their sin and their deception which we see on full display don’t we as we read the book of Genesis I’m oddly encouraged by that if that makes sense there’s a sense in which we should be encouraged by that that the determining factor in making all this happen is God if it depended on us we would not be here today so praise God for his faithfulness um I looked in the dictionary to find um just some definitions of patriarch and and want to talk a little bit about its common use today and address that biblically uh first definition I found was a form of social organization in which the father is the supreme authority in the family Clan or tribe and descent is reckoned in the male line with the children belonging to the father’s Clan or tribe that’s kind of the traditional cultural view of historically what patriarchy has meant another definition is a social system in which power is held by men through cultural norms and Customs that favor men and withhold opportunity from women I think that’s what a lot of people think about today when they hear that word um the scripture affirms neither right uh there’s elements of Truth in the first but neither is a biblical definition only God is a supreme authority no father of his own no Pastor no male leader is a supreme authority in fact when it talks about elders and Pastors in a church it refers to them as unders Shepherds right and I hope you get that whenever we teach we’re not really the ones running this show right uh whenever I teach I hear some things for the first time too because God is guiding me right he’s really in charge of all of this and so we want to affirm that God is a supreme authority creating men and women in His image equal in value and also equally accountable to him amen we all have a role to play in this that God has designed and we do well uh we do well to follow that design we don’t do well to abandon it let’s talk about the father fatherhood of God this verse is precious to me I hope it is to you particularly if you are a parent I remember as a as a single man I appreciated this verse but I remember the first time I read this first after I became a father and it just it just leapt off the page for me if you then being evil know how to give good gifts to your children how much more will your father who is in heaven give what is good to those who ask him and in in other gospel says give the Holy Spirit what is ultimately good to those who ask him this is the fatherhood of God that we embrace the loving fatherhood of God so the Biblical word or concept of patriarchy simply refers to the founder or head of the household it’s a divine order which is to reflect the perfect fatherhood of God I was talking to a friend yesterday and I know that my effect in this or lack thereof as a parent is directly related to how I respond to my heavenly father as his child those things connect and that’s a wonderful thing if I didn’t have that to draw on I’d be totally lost and I would do really incalculable damage to my my children not to say that I haven’t made mistakes but I keep looking to the fatherhood of God so when we think patriarchy think about that and think about God’s design and providing these men for us as examples okay just wanted to in this cultural moment I thought that was important uh to talk about okay so our title today is God’s covenants with Abraham so let’s talk a little bit about what a covenant is um we see the word both in the Old and New Testaments and this was a great summary for us from the lexum Bible dictionary uh it’s a sacred kinship Bond or bond between a sacred kinship bond between two parties ratified by swearing an oath Covenant making was a widespread custom throughout the ancient near East and Greco Roman culture serving as a means to forge sociopolitical bonds between individuals or groups God’s covenants are prominent in every period of Salvation history Divine covenants reveal the saving plan of God for establishing communion with Israel and the Nations ultimately fulfilled by the death and resurrection of Christ with that in mind let me show you this uh this diagram that I found really helpful I don’t know how well you can see that um but uh this came from a pastor friend of mine named Reed Monahan and I just thought this was so helpful as he unfolded for us in a in a this is from a really a family discipleship class I’ll put this in the slides you can look at it and we see um how the covenants have unfolded throughout history and culminate in Christ you see that line in the middle it’s God’s decrees God’s purposes consistent throughout but it’s like a it’s like a wave coming into the shore right it keeps growing and growing and growing and growing it culminates in Christ Right started with Adam and then Noah then Abraham I can’t even read this make sure I get it right then David Moses I’m sorry Moses right then David uh and then the New Covenant uh which Ezekiel and really you see hints of this maybe not even so subtle hints of the New Covenant throughout uh the Old Testament particularly in Ezekiel I will give them a new heart and cause them to walk in me praise the Lord that he does that and so you see God’s purposes unfolding uh for for more detailed treatment on Covenant I I will put this uh Link in the slides that we send um our brother M ricardi has put together uh a detailed chart on how all the covenants work some are unilateral meaning carried out by one person and that’s God that’s the kind of Covenant we’re talking about today some are bilateral between two parties and so all of those foreshadow the gospel so I’ll send that out uh for your further study if you are interested so that’s the covenants so let’s get into Genesis chapter 15 God promises Abraham a son and many descendants now if you read read a little further on we we alluded to this that at this point his name was Abram not Abraham and when you think about him his him being an older man not being able he and his wife not being able to have children right Abram I think means father of many then Abraham means father of Nations and it sounds kind of sounds like a joke at this point that that would even be possible but it is based on the Promises of God so looking at the passage um I’m just going to read the first few verses in fact let me do this just to be uh uh for our benefit let me just read uh through chapter 15 which isn’t that long after these things the word of Yahweh came to Abram in a vision saying do not fear Abram I am a shield to you your reward shall be very great and Abram said oh Lord Yahweh what will you give me as I go on being childless and the heir of my house is Eleazar of Damascus and Abram said since you have given no seed to me behold one born in my house is my Heir then behold the word of Yahweh came to him saying this one will not be your Heir but one who will come forth from your own body he shall be your Heir and he brought him outside and said now look toward the heavens and Number the Stars if you are able to number them and he said to them so shall your seed be then he believed in Yahweh and he counted it to him as righteousness and he said to him I am Yahweh who brought you out of er of the calans to give you this land to possess it and he said oh Lord Yahweh how may I know that I will possess it he said to him bring me a three-year-old heer and a three-year-old female goat a three-year-old RAM and a turtle dove and a young pigeon then he brought all these to him and split them into Parts down the middle and laid each part opposite the other but he did not split apart the birds then the birds of prey came down upon the carcasses and Abram drove them away now it happened that when the sun was going down a deep sleep fell upon Abram and behold behold Terror and great Darkness fell upon him then God said to Abram know for certain that your seed will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and they will be enslaved and mistreated 400 years but I will also judge the nation to whom they are enslaved and afterward they will come out with many possessions as for you you shall go to your fathers in peace you will be buried at a good old age then in the fourth generation they will return here for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete now it happened that the sun had set and was very dark and behold there appear appeared a smoking oven and a flaming torch which passed between those pieces on that day Yahweh cut a covenant with Abram saying to your seed I have given this land from the river of Egypt as far as the Great River the great the river Euphrates the kenite and the kenite and the cadmon and hittite and the perizzite and the ref ream and the Amorite and the Canaanite and the girgashite and the jebusite jebusite All Peoples which notably do not exist anymore more so how did Abraham hear from God and we see it here in a vision right in a dream how did God identify himself I’ll let you guys chime in anyone want to shout that out how did God identify himself a shield yeah and a great a great reward it’s interesting that the various translations of verse two some say um so here it says I’m a shield to you your reward shall be very great some seem to implicate implicate that that reward is God himself I am your great reward I think that’s that’s part of it um but we certainly know that God is a shield and a rewarder right Hebrews 11:6 says that that he who comes to God it says without faith it is impossible to please God for he who comes to him must must believe that he is and know that he is a rewarder of those who seek Him is it worth it to seek God yes and yes and yes right not apparently so at this point for Abram what was Abram’s response to God’s appearance look at verse two he’s he’s a little confused right this does not make sense to me I’m childless and I only have an heir that’s a servant not an actual son and he he reminded God that he did not yet have an heir right I think God knew this um but it’s interesting that this is theer the first time it’s recorded that Abraham talked to God up to this point God is talking to Abraham this is the first thing he says to God I don’t think it’s a great start right you see those a little bit of doubt in that but he shared his heart which is important who did the Lord tell Abram his Heir would be his very own son not his legal Heir Eleazar and I think what we see unfolding In this passage is God’s design for things as ju deposed with cultural norms or Traditions right this is an this is one example of it right yeah legally culturally that would have been fine to make him your your Heir but that wasn’t God’s design God had something more and better in mind how many offspring would Abram have someone shout that out you’re going to have two kids you’re can have three kids count the Stars right as many as the stars as many as the Stars we see that in verse five right look toward the heavens and Number the Stars now for us it’s not as impressive as it probably would have been in the ancient near East with the lack of light pollution they could really see it if you ever talk to people who are as or people stargaze they go to these places and it it’s it’s like it’s it’s just a whole different experience than we experienc it and imagine seeing something like that every day you know on a clear night uh so Abraham Abraham had a very Vivid vision and of course scientifically we know billions and billions and billions and billions of stars right and so we’re not going to be literal in terms of are there billions of Israelites no actually the the population is is quite small but who is the seed as we know from the New Testament the seed is Christ and salvation to All Nations is part of this promise yeah well there we go where did Abram’s righteousness come from According to verse 6 a very foundational verse for us where did Abram’s righteousness come from from Yahweh how so what God put upon me yeah yeah look at verse five someone we’ll just read I’m sorry verse six and he believed in Yahweh and he counted it to him as righteousness what a great gospel foreshadowing that is right I think it’s clear that in many ways Abraham was not a righteous man at this point in fact we know from from the previous lessons that he was quite unremarkable you look at some of the the the passages in scripture you look at Noah right he was a righteous man he stood out right Daniel so many others Abram was not one of those people he wasn’t God just just chose him and I think there’s a message there for us so he he God credited him with righteousness because he believed God hopefully you know from the gospel we don’t earn righteousness we can’t achieve righteousness it’s got to be imputed to us right and so this is the case with Abraham and and I think this is a big part of why we read these stories and why he’s so flawed clearly he didn’t earn it clearly he didn’t have it right and that’s wonderful for us to know what figures symbols or practices do we need to understand to interpret or interpret from this passage and so this is we read this what’s happening with the animals and the smoke and that that’s kind of unusual right really foreign to our experience foreign to our understanding and so we’re going to we’re going to talk about that just a little bit understanding the dividing of the animals and what the fire pot and torch represent will be important in understanding the passage so I’m just going to read just a brief paragraph that was actually from this study guide that I just it could it explains it better than I ever could so if you don’t mind I’m just going to put this on the slide for us and just read it to you at the time of Abram a covenant was much more dramatic than a simple handshake it was a sacred sign it seems strange that God would request a three-year-old heer a three-year-old female goat a three-year-old Ram a turtle dove and a young pigeon after Abram questioned him about the land which he was to inherit but this was the requirement of some ancient covenants a promise between two individuals sometimes provided cutting animals in half and placing them on either side of a pathway the pledging parties would walk between the flesh freshly killed animals on the side of the curse as a sign of the curse they were willing to accept if they rened on their agreement may they too let me see can I read this may they too he cut a limb from he cut limb from limb as these animals had am I reading this right they were willing to accept if they oh yeah if they were an agreement they too would be cut limb from limb just as the animals had done so so this is a very very Vivid image right this is this is a serious thing it’s not just you know I’ll see you tomorrow or I’ll do this for you this was a solemn oath with consequences right and so uh keep in mind that in the ancient near East there was two parties doing this but we see something just a little bit different here so let’s continue through the passage what attributes of God are on display here and here I’ll open it up what do you see about God In this passage it’s okay I can keep going I’m sure you guys will we’ll talk a little bit more later oh Magda I’m thinking maybe he is uh drawing on what Abraham would understand his culture for sure yeah that that’s one of the wonderful things I could say a lot about this um how culturally transferable the gospel is I don’t know if if if any of you have um I’ll go down this Rabbit Hole just a little bit I don’t know if any of you have any Muslim friends um I do and some who are very very devout and one of the things that intrigues me as I talk to them is I said why why is your faith not more culturally transferable to be faithful I have to learn Arabic to be faithful I have to dress a certain way you know like like an Arab from the Middle Ages like that’s to be faithful Christianity on the other hand transcends and speaks into all cultures right it’s amazing so this was part of God’s plan to have this be part of the cultural moment that he used for his purposes um what we see here is Independence right God doesn’t need people but he uses them to fulfill his purposes we see that that really threw out you know God could have just done this by Fiat but he he CH chose to use Abraham and by some wonderful Miracle he chooses to use us isn’t that incredible incredible I think we also see his Sovereign will uh God chose Abram who as I mentioned was really unremarkable nothing he was a he was a a moon worshipper just a pagan guy nothing about him stood out and God said I’m going to pick that that guy why because that’s just my choice right right and God does that with people through history and Us in Salvation what was required of Abraham Abraham in this contract what did he do if you look a little bit further uh starting in verse verse 12 uh what did what part did Abram play in executing this Covenant nothing nothing nothing that’s right you could keep looking for it but you’re not going to find it uh nothing in fact it was a unilateral Covenant as we referred to earlier fulfilled by God when Abram was asleep all right that didn’t require a lot of energy on Abram’s part or even his attention right uh God did it in his sleep can you think of others in the scripture who God worked while they were sleeping I know there’s some some really interesting examples and I I see you smiling Cheryl what what what came to mind no okay you’re just SM uh Magna again I think you go ahead Eve Eve yeah God created Eve while Adam was asleep yeah that’s something that’s the first one that that’s a big one that I thought about what else anything else come to mind now we have Cheryl go ahead actually okay I think you was he first I don’t know we’re not timing this it’s not precise So yeah thank um um this is kind of tricky to say it but when God was calling Samuel and um he every time he called him or before he finally followed the instructions that were given to him yeah by was it Eli Eli Yeah by Eli U Eli realized that yeah God was calling him but he was calling him when he was asleep he say here I am yeah that’s wonderful brother I hadn’t thought about that uh Eli as a boy was dedicated at the temple by his mom and then uh God woke him up yeah Cheryl Joseph Joseph yeah Jacob and the uh he was asleep on Holy Ground with the with the stairway um with the angels going up and down to Heaven Glenda Elish Eli Elijah when he was asleep and the angel woke him up and said get up get up what are you doing here mhm and then God spoke to him and said you know eat this and you you’re going to do is 40 days with on this fastest so he he was asleep because he was running from ahab’s wife M so when God met him in the wilderness he said why what are you doing here you just had a great Victory what are you doing here wake up eat this meal and you’re going with this me for 40 days yeah yeah um there’s a number of them Solomon is one to comes to mind um God get that trans that interaction with God was happened in a dream you know uh and I look at um Psalm 127 which is a Psalm of Solomon and um in verse two it says in in vain that you rise up early and you sit out late oh you who eat the bread of painful labors for in this manner he gives sleep to his his beloved another translation is he gives to his beloved in his sleep right so we see at the very least God as the initiator and certainly as as the one who accomplishes I think he’s sending us a message here how how much does God need us he doesn’t need us at all but he includes us and He blesses us Steve we say when we say Joseph I mean was it are we referencing Jesus’s father and or the patriarch so to speak is that what you were referring to Glenda Jo um I’m sorry Cheryl was it Joseph in his dream or yeah Joseph um the other patriarch that we get to his father Jesus his Earthly father Jesus his Earthly father as well both Josephs yeah great so we could probably keep going but we I think you get the idea God’s telling us something here so um he was asleep yeah go ahead Arthur oh I just wanted to mention one more put yeah mention one more when Jesus said to the crowd when they were bewailing the little girl the the daughters and he says she’s asleep yeah he uses that term we understood that she was dead but she was dead yeah and the interesting thing about it is that um even though Jesus brought her back to life we never get any of these wacky stories that when people die they go to heaven or you know we don’t see that ever in the Bible yeah so interesting I I was thinking about that and I wasn’t going to go there but I’m glad you did because a dead person has nothing to do with their Resurrection do they that’s pretty unilateral right we were we were dead in our trespasses and sins but God who is rich in Mercy raised us up to New Life that’s that’s kind of the ultimate and that’s what all of this foreshadows so uh verses 12- 16 what event is foreshadowed and this is really interesting we uh we went through Exodus um in the men’s group last last year um and it was interesting to see the background before it the the the time in Egypt was foreshadowed starting in verse uh verse 12 yeah well going ahead to verse 13 you will be enslaved and mistreated 400 years but I will judge the nation to whom you were enslaved and then really interesting um phrase we see it there in verse 16 for the iniquity of of the Amorite is not yet complete and there’s a lot that can be said here and we’ll get into this with the con conquest of Canaan the patience of God to give 400 years for evil Nations to repent right people get hung up on the the so-called genocide of the Canaanite Conquest two things I just want to point out there as an apologetic one is God’s patience right giving them time um he was forbearing with them secondly the curses That Came Upon them these were not ethnic curses right these curses were promised to Israel as well if they were unfaithful to God so God shows no partiality the blessings and the curses are available to all we’re going to get into that more with the Canaanite Conquest that’s a that’s a big objection I think that people have to both the nature of God and the veracity of the Bible so that one’s for free um note the forbearance of God I mentioned that right before the conquest of Canaan and that is really worth thinking about I don’t know if in your conversations with unbelievers if that has come up I think this is worth studying a little bit and talking about um you don’t see a genocidal angry out of control God you see a patient loving forgiving gracious God that’s what you see all right and that let’s go on the uh Genesis 16 let me go ahead before I go to Genesis 16 any any comments or questions about Genesis CH 15 15 all right Read With Me Genesis chap 16 I think we’re doing great on time now Sarah Abram’s wife had borne him no children and she had an Egyptian servant woman whose name was Hagar so Sarah said to Abram Now Behold Yahweh has shut my womb from bearing children please go to my servant woman perhaps I will obtain children through her and Abram listen to the voice of Sarah and after Abram had lived 10 years in the land of Canaan Abram’s wife Sarah took Hagar the Egyptian her servant woman and gave her to her husband Abram as his wife so he went into Hagar and she conceived then she saw that she had conceived so her mistress became contemptible in her sight and Sarah said to Abram my May the violence done to me be upon you I gave my servant woman into your Embrace but she saw that she had conceived so I became contemptible in her sight May Yahweh judge between you and me but Abram said to Sarah behold your servant woman is in your hand do to her what is good in your sight so Sarah Afflicted her and she fled from her presence now the angel of Yahweh found her by a spring of water in the wilderness by the spring on the way to Shore and he said Hagar SAR Sarah’s servant woman where have you come from and where are you going she said I am fleeing from the presence of my mistress Sarah then the angel of Yahweh said to her return to your mistress and humble yourself under her hands moreover the angel of Yahweh said to her I will greatly multiply your seeds so that they will be too many to be counted and the angel of Yahweh said to her further behold you are with child and you will bear a son and you shall call his name Ishmael because Yahweh has heard your Affliction and he will be a wild donkey of a man and his hand will be against everyone and everyone’s hand will be against him and he will dwell in in the face of all his brothers then she called the name of Yahweh who spoke to her you are a God who sees for she said have I even remained alive here after seeing him therefore the well was called beer laroy behold it is between Kadesh and bared so Hagar bore Abram a son and Abram called the name of his son whom Hagar bore Ishmael now Abram was 86 years old when Hagar bore ishmail to him okay let’s walk through this how long had Abram been in Canaan got to go a little bit to the broader context to find this out actually no you don’t it’s right there verse three yeah 10 years been 10 years in Canaan how old were Abram and Sarah at this point this is where you kind of have to go to the broader context so let me unpack it for you um we see um at the end that he was 86 right when Hagar bore ishmail to him um and so uh so in the earlier part of the narra narrative you look at Abra you kind of put it together that Abram left haran at 75 that’s in uh 12:4 and Sarah was 10 years younger than him so at this point before um this is before ishmail was born when he was conceived Abraham was 855 and Sarah was 75 so you think about this do you remember how old um Abraham and Sarah were when Isaac was born 190 right this is so this is still a little ways off 15 years later so it’s interesting you see these these two sons they’re 15 years apart I think it’s important to think about that as as a family Dynamic I don’t have kids that far apart I think oldest the youngest is well yeah 16 years right so maybe I do I’m old I don’t remember these things but that but that but that’s a big gap right uh they’re kind of really not not really growing up together in one sense experiencing some of the same things well what was Sarah’s proposition for providing Abram a child what was her suggestion and was it a good suggestion comments on that Glenda I want to go back we know that God was dealing all the time with with Abraham now in chapter 16 we see that Sarah bring up a suggestion and he jumped right on the suggestion he did right and then after she she turned on him and then he turned and tell her do what they made what you want to do so what what was the why did he jump at that suggestion so quickly I think the title of the uh chapter gives us that answer Abram’s impatience right we’re going to unpack this a little bit but but think about any other comments on that why would you say Abram was eager to jump on that yeah want to go ahead I I wasn’t going to answer that question I was going to answer your original question about Sarah she says uh maybe I can build a house yeah um when she used that expression says I can build a house when we know yeah it is God that is going to be building the house and that’s a that’s a theme throughout right God had made a promise the question is can we trust God or not here’s what’s so interesting Abraham believed God and it was reckoned to him as righteousness sometimes it seems like he doesn’t really believe God that’s interesting want to we’re going to want to unpack that a little bit so hang on for that um verse two go into my servant woman a common practice of the day not God certainly not God’s design for marriage that does not sound beautiful like we understand marriage to be not just go into her that’s not yeah that’s not it that’s not it it’s kind of actually kind of crude crude language have intercourse with her and bear a child she would be his wife but you can see how far that is from God’s design can’t you and how did Abram respond you mentioned it Glenda um yeah he he just agreed with her y let’s just let’s just do that that sounds that sounds good that sounds like that might accelerate God God’s taking too long uh this might accelerate things right and I’m just going to pause here this is actually part of our application anybody ever do anything like that in their own life and and how does it generally work out not good not good this whole idea of waiting on the Lord is huge I think it’s one of the hardest things about being a Believer because the scriptures say that the days of our lives are 70 80 years if we’re fortunate right so teach us to number our days that we might present to you a heart of wisdom redeem the time it says in Ephesians and yet with such little time we’re told to wait to me that is one of the hardest exercises of Faith there is I’m impatient and I’m I’m sure I’m not the only one here so he listened to the voice of his wife agreeing said yeah that sounds like a good plan let’s do that um have we seen this kind of thing before in the scriptures even in Genesis Adam yeah he listened to the voice of his wife now let me be really clear about this there are times when listen when a man to listen to his voice of of his wife it’s a sinful thing if it’s against the will of God but it’s a very good thing if it is towards the will of God I know it’s very important for me personally to listen to the voice of Betty I’ll just say a couple words about this uh Betty’s level of Faith compared to mine it’s it’s embarrassing it’s embarrassing right um and so um don’t read this as uh diminishing women at all this was just a situation where um Sarah had a bad idea and Abraham deferring to that bad idea was a bad idea right yeah did Sarah’s plan succeed what are your thoughts on that she got a son so and it was Abram’s son so yes no it would seem to it would seem to have let’s unfold this a little bit a child was conceived notice the phrasing that Sarah said I will obtain a child to her did she really wasn’t her child she didn’t really obtain a child right and and this is not to diminish uh the beautiful opportunities that we have for adoption in today’s culture that that’s a wonderful thing you know my sister has three adopted children um I was talking to some good friends yesterday they’ve got two adopted children they are they are very much their children in that sense and and God and His graciousness talks about salvation both in terms of New Birth and adoption so both of them are beautiful so I’m not diminishing that but in this case it went against the promise that God had given Abraham and so what happened to the relationship between the two women after conception confusion confusion you said yeah contempt what’s the word that’s used contempt um contemptible that’s strong language right angry angry yeah yeah and we know from the scriptures yeah yeah a anger that shows itself in relationships yeah I could say a lot about that that’s been a big battle for me but yeah and as the scriptures say the anger of man does not achieve the righteousness of God Ian Judy’s got something back there Sarah referred to it as violence M that’s interesting yeah I was I I noticed that as well the violence that you have done to me uh let’s see where is that verse n thank you the angel of Yahweh said to her return to your mistress and humble yourself under hands more fair no where are we that’s not it five five thank you may the violence done to me be upon you and I’m a little confused by that to be honest I I don’t necessarily see violence there right it’s it’s certainly um a disrespect uh but keep in mind it was her idea so that’s really interesting you know um so we see here in both those verses Hagar became contemptible to Sarah and Sarah became contemptible to her to Hagar so there was this Strife right this is this is not working out well when you think about God’s design for the family this is not it on several levels right so whom did Sarah excuse me blame for the situation Abraham now let’s let’s think about this just for a minute was that a legitimate accusation excuse me okay how so how was it legitimate well if he was a righteous man he would have said no we can’t do that yeah that’s right I I think so um even though it was her idea she blamed Abram who in God’s design is the head of the household deferring him deferring to his wife’s desires is not necessarily serving her well right this this this is a whole topic on marriage right where God calls us husbands to love our wives as Christ loves the church right and I and I listen you know to my wife’s desires and we seek the Lord together that doesn’t mean that a husband is to always to defer to the wishes of her wife of his wife or vice versa if they’re against the Lord right it’s a submission to the Lord that one was for free we could talk a lot more about that um and how did Abram respond we mentioned it he deferred to the wishes of his wife do to her what is good in your sight and that that just seems kind of passive in a sense right he he just like look you guys work it out I don’t want to deal with this right um and I I think you know I’ll just say it I I think God calls uh calls more calls us husbands to more more than that right uh more than that that that is not that’s not godly leadership right okay how are we doing on time let’s fly through this what names or attributes of God do we learn In this passage so I’ll just unpack this um these next few questions and we’ll get to application Elroy you are the God who sees that’s wonderful even though Sarah had rejected Hagar God had not God saw and he had compassion right and the the well that was there was named after his well The Well of the living one who sees me and one of the things we see as a principle in the scriptures is that God sees and has compassion on The Afflicted regardless of who they are that’s the nature of God to do that and I think that’s just so interesting even though Hagar legitimately had a lesser role in the in the history of Salvation um God saw and God even had a plan for her and her family um wonderful and then we see hopefully you’re seeing this as this unfolds God’s plan for salvation wasn’t just for Israel that’s where it started but it expands to the Nations right Hagar was an Egyptian right and so um there’s a lot that could be said here but I’ll I’ll move on what did the son communicate to Hagar this is the Angel of the Lord we’ve talked about this before in this case it’s a theophany it’s a it’s an appearance of Jesus uh in the Old Testament and she acknowledged that um she called the name of Yahweh who spoke to her in verse 13 she understood that it was God who had spoken to her and had such compassion on her instructed her to return and submit to Sarah uh and that he would multiply her descendants and so God and His Mercy spoke to Hagar as well as Sarah okay how would you contrast God’s behavior and man’s in this narrative and we’ve talked about this right God is a promis making and a promis keeping in God man here is is we see unbelief we see blame shifting as things um unfold we see deception right very sharp sharp contrast knowing that the Covenant in many cases has to be unil unilateral God is the only one capable and worthy of carrying it out what action and this is an example what action had Abram previously taken that demonstrated his lack of faith in God’s promise of an air and we saw that um actually we uh this when he told Pharaoh that Sarah was his sister and not his wife that too did not work out well and it’s interesting here we see the growth of Abram’s Faith uh he was fearing that he would be killed now look with me at if you would just turn briefly to Romans chapter 4 starting in verse 20 and I think we’ve established that Abram’s Faith at this point was not all that it should be but it grew and this is important that just just hit me this past week as I Was preparing Romans 4 starting at verse 20 yet with respect to the promise of God he did not waver in unbelief but grew strong in faith giving glory to God being fully assured that what God had promised he was able also to do it’s a curious verse to me because it does seem like Abram wavered in faith doesn’t it but he grew strong in faith to the point that if you see in um Genesis 22 explained in Hebrews 11:19 when he went to sacrifice Isaac we’re going to get there in this series God said sacrifice your son your only son and he went up and he said to the men we’re going to go up and we’ll be back we’ll be back um Isaac asked where’s the sacrifice what did Abram say God will provide for himself a sacrifice Hebrews 11:19 I’ll just read it let’s just go there real quick this this this this tells you how much Abram’s Faith had grown this is super encouraging anyone here feel weak in faith today maybe stronger than you were yesterday but not as strong as you wanted to be God understands that he gives us examples of that Hebrews 11: 19 he considered that God is able to raise people even from the dead from which figuratively speaking he also received them back that was his mindset when he want to sacrifice Isaac even if I kill him God can raise him back right that’s how much that that’s a level of faith that In this passage he didn’t have yet is that encouraging may God may God grow our faith in such a way what part of God’s created order did Abram violate in trying to bring an heir into the world through Hagar I think we’ve established this marriage between one man and one woman um choosing to follow culturally accepted practices in set of God’s Design This plays itself out right I right today right what do we do I it’s so interesting um I think it’s important to defend marriage but when you go to a wedding that is Christ centered and gospel centered my son just got married back in um um December 28th and you just sit there and you watch this and you hear the gospel and you see it on display and it just the sheer beauty of it just makes everything else look so ugly right and um and I think that’s what we see here a deviation from that is an ugly thing that creates nothing but but Strife so a couple things by way of interpretation I thought we were doing good on time we’re not so I’m going to speed it up a little bit Abram allowed Sarah to do whatever she wanted after Hagar conceived what consequences might have happened had God not intervened and told Hagar to return well he would have lost he would have lost them right he would have the son he believed was the promised air may have been lost in Egypt without gods intervention we see God’s gracious gracious Choice acting in action here God preserving this family in some fashion how would you explain how Abram went wrong in not waiting for God’s timing Abram and Sarah sought to bring about God’s plan on their own timing and by their own methods sound familiar rather than waiting on God’s timing and trusting him to bring about these promises God fulfilling his promises I hope we can see is much better than trying to make things happen right amen I see some of you are taking pictures of the slides we’re going to send the slides out too so um you’ll have those so let’s let’s interact a little bit we got about 10 minutes I think um on application this this to me is the question and I’d love to hear from some of you on this so you can go over to Magda here she’s raising her hand what happens when you take matters into your own hands I was just thinking that Abram and Sarah’s unbelief precipitated multigenerational hate and violence to this day yeah I yeah I’m not an expert in this area but you could see the seeds of what’s happening in the Middle East back then sometimes I say to myself boy if these folks could could have just gotten along right yeah many many deaths in history that’s right Magna yeah what else Glenda just on what Magus said um because you see that because of the The Strife that is now going on in the Middle East they saying we are Abraham’s firstborn right ishmail so that’s down to now as Magda said The Strife is still going on because they took matters into their own hand way back and the fruit is now being exposed every year yeah if you read the Quran on this narrative it it’s kind of tracks right with it and then it takes a hard left it’s like wait a minute that’s not what happened yeah that’s right that’s right other examples of what happens when we take matters into our own hands brother yeah uh what I wanted to say if we go back to uh the beginning of Genesis and we give we’re given a depiction of you know how God created man and an important part of that story is that it says God planted a garden um East of Eden and he placed man in the garden um you mentioned the something about what how can we things about God’s character um unfortunately for us today in America we don’t understand what it means to live in an we don’t understand what it means to be a a a oh my good aarian yes Society the idea an great in society where what we depend on we actually labor for the food that we’re going to eat but there’s something about plants When You observe how they grow that teaches us something about God because we use the word impatience yeah not understanding time how God operates in time we become impatient I think that’s what gets us in trouble yeah you know if we want something we’re not willing to wait the example Christmas kids want to know what their I’m not a Christmas person but you know um they want to know what their presence are before the day comes there they kind of annoy their parents let me say a couple words about that because um I think what we’re saying is is faith means believing that God is who he says he is and will do what he says he will do right that’s what it comes down to with the farmer the scriptures say that the farmer tills tills a soy plants a seed but what does it say it says how it grows he himself does not know right because God does it there’s a level of hard work but trust in that right and that’s what life is like how it happens you know I I somebody shared this phrase with me as and go back to the notes on trusting God we went into this in great detail right we’ve got to trust him I’ll let I’ll just let that land and we’ll just give in for the sake of time we’ll go through a couple of these other ones what truth in the scriptures we looked at today has helped you to see God’s grace in the account of Abraham maybe I’ll let one of one or two of you answer that what truth today has helped you to see God’s grace I can move to go ahead Steve all Journey what’s that we’re all on a journey we are all on a journey and hopefully grow growing in faith don’t we see God’s immense patience with us right incredible and his graciousness to us yeah yeah not that we want to justify failure or seek failure but to know as as as Paul said to Timothy when we are faithless he is faithful Our Lives depend upon that amen hey Mark yeah yeah even though they were unbelieving and Unfaithful um they did God didn’t disqualify them from what he had planned for he didn’t talk about Grace yeah you talk about Grace and you see that to this day is is Israel faithful to God as a as a nation as a as a people know but he still has a plan for them which is amazing why does this country exist because of what we’ve read here we’re reading here today that’s why this the country exists it’s amazing I’ll just walk through these real quickly how does knowing that God is unchanging and absolutely faithful give you peace and Assurance of your own salvation Philippians 1:66 says that he who began a good work will bring it to completion right he saved us he is sanctifying us he will glorify us he will do it right he will do it we cannot maintain our own salvation we participate in it in it but its final outcome we we participate in it in terms of sanctification submitting ourselves to his work which is really what faith is Faith at its core um we’ve been going through Hebrews right faith is the Assurance of things hoped for the conviction of things not seen by it the men of old gained approval Hebrews 11:1 Faith at its core is complete trust and utter Reliance Faith doesn’t accomplish anything it’s the object of the faith that accomplishes the question for us is are we fully surrendered to fully trusting in God I I’ll just I’ll just leave the rest for the slides look with me at Jeremiah 17 I think God will have us end with this god require both requires and grants us Faith he requires our complete trust and what I mean by that is is you you can’t trust at the at your core you can’t trust in two things at the same time I remember when I first started meditating on this passage it really convicted me starting at verse 5 Jeremiah 17:5 cursed is the man who trusts in mankind and makes flesh his strength and whose heart turns away from Yahweh stop when we trust in human strength our hearts are turning away from him do you get that yeah so I would challenge today at your core in your decisions and how you live your life what are you trusting in so whose heart turns away from Yahweh he will be like a juniper in the desert and will not see when Prosperity comes but will dwell in Stony waste in the wilderness a land of salt which is not inhabited ah but blessed is the man who trusts in Yahweh and whose trust is Yahweh you get that it’s not a it’s he is our trust that’s something very strong and what’s the result he will be like a tree planted by the water that sends forth its roots by a stream and will not fear when the heat comes but its leaves will be green and it will not be anxious in a year of drought nor for frin from yielding fruit and we see this in the life of Abraham all the way through history to our lives today the extent to which we trust him is the extent to which we will be fruitful so let me end with that and let’s pray father God uh we see your mercy your your grace your your great patience with us as we waver in unbelief um as the disciples prayed I believe Lord help my unbelief and so you know what’s in our hearts father um I pray that these promises um not just on a page but the realities of these events would bolster our faith things that have occurred in Millennia past um impact us today and have have been predicted from eternity P are being carried out in the present and will be completed in eternity future father may we ride the wave of your Providence fully submit to your plans um humbly reflect your character and Lead many to righteousness in Jesus name amen