JAN 23 2022 | Genesis: Behind the Curtain S2E1 | Abraham

Sea Change Church · Genesis: Behind the Curtain · "Abraham" Pastor Adam Stadtmiller · January 23, 2022
Genesis 12
Automated transcript. Not reviewed for accuracy.

Good morning, church. My name is India Kern, and I'm one of the professionals at the Wellness Center. So I coach people who are going through life transitions. So if you want to know more about that, come talk to me after church. I also speak at our Emotional Renewal Series, and I lead a women's group on Tuesdays at 830. So today I'll be reading the scripture, and we are reading from Genesis 12, 1 through 5. The Lord had said to Abram, Go from your country, your people, and your father's household to the land I will show you. I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you. I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and whoever curses you I will curse. And all peoples on earth will be blessed through you.

So Abram went, as the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was 75 years old when he set out for Haran. He took his wife Sarah, his nephew Lot, and all the possessions they had accumulated, and the people they had acquired in Haran. And they set out for the land of Canaan, and they arrived there. The word of the Lord. Thanks be to God. Good morning, and welcome to church. I hope you're ready to dive into a brand new series. Actually, it's a continuation of a series we've been doing for the last couple years.

We start the year every year now in Genesis. We have a curriculum we go through, through scriptures. We have a gospel series after Easter. We do the Holy Spirit in the summer. This year we're going to be focusing on worship, and this week we're jumping after our Proverbs series, which I think you guys, I heard a lot of great things. It's just that practical wisdom of the Proverbs changing people's lives. Now we're going to dive into one of the heroes of the faith, and that is Abraham.

And Abraham is an absolute hero. He's in the chapter of the heroes of the faith. We know that Jesus is our only hero. But when it comes to an ordinary person who kind of looks like us, who got it right in a lot of ways, got it wrong in a lot of ways, we look to him as the beginning of our faith journey. And so let me pray, and then we're going to jump into this Genesis passage for the next eight weeks, and look at Abraham. Lord Jesus, I want to thank you, God, for your goodness. I want to thank you for all the things that you're doing, and I pray that the Word of God now comes alive, and in this eight weeks, a brand new series, Lord God.

You begin to build on the wisdom of Proverbs, and we begin to have a life that follows the Scripture, that follows the Word of God. God, we just thank you, and we give you praise in Jesus' name. Amen. Amen. There is a verse in the Old Testament, which is arguably the most important verse in the entire Old Testament. And it's in the book of Genesis. We're going to get to it. We're not going to get to it this year. We're going to get to it next year.

We are going to talk about it a little bit, because it's going to take us two years, probably, to get through Abraham's life. I remember it took us two to get through David's life. We're going to do it in series. And that verse is Genesis 15.6. If that's not in your notes, you want to write down Genesis 15.6. It says this, Abraham believed the Lord, and he, God, credited to him as righteousness. Let me say that. That Abraham believes something.

And this is really an important, it's technical, but it's also basic. It's technical that you could do the systematic theology of what it means to believe in faith, and how that works, and the patriarchs, and through the lineage of the Jews, and Jesus, and the cosmology of Jesus, and epistemology. It's incredibly technical. But it's incredibly simplistic. Einstein always said that true genius is not understanding the theory of relativity.

It's being able to explain it to a five-year-old. And so you saw Jay today up here singing, and that's part of our explaining to him what church is all about. I do love it afterwards. I think he did come up. I think I heard him say, do I get my donut now? I go to the cafe every time afterwards. I'm like, do I get my donut now? It's usually a scone. Please, go out there. Everything's free. You can donate if you want, and enjoy that.

It's super simple. Here's the simple thing. If you believe God, that he is who he says he is, that Jesus did what he said that he did, if you just believe it, you get the righteousness of God given to you. Imputed was the word we used last week. That is an incredible statement. That is an incredible belief, and it is probably one of the biggest chasms in spirituality. And it's one that the secular world doesn't talk about much.

The secular world will look at Christians this way or that way and give you a thought about why we do something wrong or whatever. But very few people take issue, because I don't think they understand the issue, that if you believe that Jesus is who he said he was and did what he came to do and is coming back again, if you just believe that, God takes his perfection and he gives it to you. It doesn't mean you're perfect.

It means that when he sees you, he sees you through the lens of Jesus, and now you have Jesus' resume. Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him as righteousness. And the Bible says, and we saw last week, that the blessing of the Lord rests on the house of the righteous. And so blessing, systematically, comes to your house because of belief. Why? In the belief of Jesus, because that gives you imputed righteousness.

And when you're righteous, God blesses your home. And we talked all about righteousness last week. This is central to the entire Christian message. It is central to the Old Testament. Let's look at Abraham. Who's Abraham? First thing I want to tell you is Abraham's ordinary. He's a shepherd. Like many of those that God chose, God chose shepherds. David was a shepherd. Isaac was a shepherd. The entire lineage of the patriarchs of the Jewish faith, whom we take our lineage from as believers, were shepherds.

He was an ordinary person. I want to assure you that God is in the business of using ordinary people to do extraordinary things. And if perhaps you have disqualified yourself because you're overly ordinary. Maybe you're exceptional at being ordinary. That you're just the person that God is looking for. He was looking for Abraham, and he made a nation out of Abraham and out of a promise. First thing, he was a common shepherd.

We serve a God of ordinary people. Hopefully that is you. We are in a world that strives to be extraordinary. It strives to have everyone know you're extraordinary. Yesterday I was, I think it's funny watching people take selfies. And there was this girl, and she was down at the beach. And they were setting up the shot, you know what I mean? Like it was Vogue, 1986. They're setting up the shot. And then she did this.

And then like her friend would shoot the picture. And then like six times she went. And I was. It's so funny. It was you. Was it Chris? It was you? Oh, sorry. We want to be extraordinary. God's not looking for extraordinary. You know why? Because he's an extraordinary guy. He doesn't need your extraordinary. God doesn't need you here. He wants to serve with you and co-labor for you. One thing I tell the staff on a regular basis, that God was, that this church was here 100 years without me.

And it could probably go on another 100 years without me. And none of us are indispensable, but God wants to use us. And I hope that doesn't sweep your feet in the understanding of how important you are to God. Because when it comes to how much he loves you, that's infinite. When it comes to how much he actually needs you to get his will done, not really necessary, but he loves to work with you. He works with Abraham.

Abraham is a patriarch. He's a father of the faith. He is a lineage. He passes down a lineage. The thing that he did passed him down. He is a father of the faith. He is a patriarch of the faith to Islam. He is a patriarch of the faith to the Jews, to Israel and the Jews and the Hebrews. He is a patriarch of the faith to Christianity. All three of those branches, the largest branches perhaps in the world of religion. Buddhism doesn't consider itself a religion.

It considers itself a path. The three largest religions in the world follow their path back to this person, who God said that he believed and it was credited to him as righteousness. If you want to be righteous, you can't get works righteousness. It isn't from what you do. It is from what you believe. And that is the biggest step that I don't think the secular world even understands. They want to point at other things.

And so first of all, he was a patriarch. The next thing, he was a covenant keeper. God chose somebody. He picked them out of their ordinary and lifted them up. Looked them in the eye and said, I want to do something amazing with you. I want to do it for my glory, but I'm going to do an amazing thing with you because I love you. I am going to give you my purpose. It's going to quasi look like it's your purpose, but it's actually my purpose.

And this is one thing we need to differentiate, that if God wants to do something with you, it is for his purpose. It is not for your purpose. And we need to be careful that we don't worship at the idol of purpose. We need not to worship at the idol of purpose. We need to worship at God's feet and see that he is the only one that we should worship. And it is his purpose that we get to co-labor in and be a part of. You get to have, as I read or as I remember in the movie, Dead Poets Society, you get to have one verse in the great sonnet that is the story of God.

Are you interested in being a common person in an extraordinary purpose? God picks him up and he says, I want to make a covenant with you. I want to make a deal with you. Remember, the devil went down to Georgia. He was looking for a soul to steal. You remember that? I remember he used to love that song. And he was looking for a deal. He was way behind. He was in a bind. He was way behind. And he was looking for a...

Really? I think everyone knows. God comes to Abraham and does the exact opposite. He says, I want to make a deal with you. Now, God, the thing is, is God was not in a bind and he was not way behind. God wanted to make a deal because he likes to co-labor with his highest of creation, which is human beings. And he says, I want to make a deal with you. I actually want to put myself in an agreement with you. I want to bind myself in covenant.

Now, if you had all the power in the world, if you were an oligarch somewhere in, let's say, Eastern Europe, and you were there and you had someone who was in no way could come against you, would you make a deal with those people? No, of course you wouldn't because you're an oligarch. You're in charge. You have all the power. One of the most incredible things is that God says, I want to bind myself through covenant to a lesser.

This is something that people who don't need to do, don't do. I hope that statement worked. But God says, I love you. I want to be in relationship and I'm going to bind myself through a promise and then a legal covenant. And this is the deal with God. He says, not only am I going to promise, I'm going to put some skin in the game. I'm going to give you 20% equity so you won't pay PMI. No. He says, I'm going to give you 100% equity.

I'm going to give you all the flesh of Jesus in the game on the cross and I'm going to have skin in the game and I'm going to bind myself to you. Do you want to be bound to God as an ordinary person who says, I want to make a covenant with you? Then there's all these if-then statements in the Bible. It says, if you do this, if you do this, then I will do this. Why? Because God binds himself to a promise and he binds himself to Abraham through this covenant.

Well, let's look at what a covenant means. What is a covenant? A covenant is something that, like I said, binds you and it binds you legally. It says, the legal term is this. It says it's a contract drawn up with a deed. Now, it's interesting how many times God puts things in writing. If he's God and he knows that he's God, why does he put things in writing? Why does he put things on tablets? Why does he write laws that he binds himself to?

Why does he give promises that he binds himself to with an oath? You know, the only person God can swear to is himself. When God says, I swear to God, he actually means it. He's the only one that can actually swear to God because he's the only one that can keep his promise and his oath. And so when God makes a promise with Abraham, he says, I swear to God. I swear to myself. And I am going to bind this in a legal contract and I am going to intertwine the perfection that is me, the universality that is me, the infinite, you know, everything that is God, the fullness of God.

I am going to bind it and tie it to human beings. That is a deal. If I was God, I'm not sure I would make. But God makes it. And then it ends up that Abraham, through a series of ups and downs, through mistakes, because what we see is we keep breaking the covenant. We keep making mistakes. And God says, okay, well, let's draw it up again. We're going to start over. We're going to put a new date up. We're going to start over with you again.

But I fell. But I fell. Over and over again, God says, I will renew my covenant with you. And then this covenant that he makes with Abraham, you can go to Jesus and he makes a new covenant. We don't have time to go into all that today. But Jesus is the maker of a new covenant. Theological, it says that a covenant is a legal contract drawn up with a deed. Now, theologically, it says in your notes, an agreement which brings about a relationship of commitment.

That is a key word, right? Commitment. Circle commitment. A relationship of commitment between God and his people. God is in the business of relationships. Make no mistake about it. God is in the business of relationships. If he wants to be covenant with you and your purpose and the things that he wants to do in your life, it's because he loves you and he loves spending time with you. He wants to know you. And it says God is in the business of relationships.

And relationships, this is key, find their structure, character, and perseverance within committed covenant. Let me just say that again. Because what we see happening with this contract here is the archetype for modern Christian marriage. It is the archetype of covenant. And we base, Christian marriage is based upon this covenant. You don't just enter into a verbal agreement. There's actually a covenant, a written legal covenant that you bind yourself to the other person with.

And what is so interesting is that, as we'll see in a moment, that the promise is made before the covenant. And then after the covenant, there is an act of the flesh. And so, with Abraham, as you'll see, remember God made a promise. And then he made a covenant, as we'll see here in a moment. And then he said, we're going to seal this covenant with the flesh. It will be sealed after the covenant, after the promise, in the flesh by the act of circumcision.

Now, once Jesus comes, that washes away. But Christian marriage is based in this. There is a promise. I promise myself to you. There is a covenant. I will covenant with you. And I will legally contract and connect myself with you through a legal covenant that binds us both. And not until after that will there be an act of the flesh where it says, and two shall become one. That is the order. And that is the reason for that order is that it brings trust.

What the enemy wants to do is turn that all around. He doesn't mind if you start with an act of the flesh, followed by no promise or a lie, and no covenant. And so, we're moving further away. And God has designed us to show that that does not work. And so, if you want to know why we're adamant about sex after marriage, if you want to know why we're adamant about purity and the lineage and the systematic theology of covenant in marriage, it's because everything we do goes back to Abraham and his covenant that also runs through Jesus.

And so, to do it in any other way would be to besmirch the design of God and the pattern of God that he shows. And so, this is what we want to commit to just so you understand that. Now, what is interesting here is this covenant was doomed from the start. We'll see here in just a moment that this covenant was absolutely doomed from the start. And you know what? God loves a good comeback story. Have you had a comeback story in your life?

I love comeback stories. So, when I was in college, I was never good enough to be on the college basketball team. And so, I played intramurals. And we made it to the championship. I've always talked about my B-level basketball ability. And we were down by like 15. But I'm a grinder. I'm a hustler. You need me. I was at my daughter's game the other day. And she dove out of bounds to get the ball and slid on the ground.

I'm like, yeah! Ah! I'm the, I'm the, like, I'm a really good, I'm just loud. Like, as you know. Like, so, I know I'm annoying to the other team's parents. I never say anything negative. I don't do whatever. But I'm all, but like, she got, she did get the foul non sequitur. She did go up, get the foul, and made the shot, and got the and one call. And I come off the seat, I'm like, yeah, and one! JV basketball. I'm looking at Viking uniforms.

I want to get the full Viking uniform to wear it to the Vikings game and bring my dog and dress him up. I went to the game on Friday. My daughter didn't even go. She's at youth camp. I went to the game on Friday and sat there. And I'm so, I'm such a fan of the JV basketball team, the girls. You got to come check it out. One of them actually sent a text. Hey, thank your dad for coming, even though you weren't here. We really appreciate it.

Everybody on the team was super stoked. So, you got Ray Ray on D. You got Tessa underneath. Okay, nonetheless. So, come to the game. Check the schedule. God loves a comeback story. So, in college, chasing guys down. We're down by three. There's a few seconds left. I go to a move. I blow my knee out, my ACL. Tear my ACL. Oh, I'm on the ground, whatever. There's nobody left that can come into the game. I limp back into the game.

This is my greatest moment in sports history, which happens to be an intramural basketball game at Point Loma Nazarene. So, I know like Bill here is in the Hall of Fame of rugby, like in the world or something like that. So, let me have my moment, Bill. And so, the ball rolls in. They pass it in. And I get it on one leg from half court. I throw it. Three-pointer. Goes to overtime. Woo! We lost in overtime. But, God loves a comeback story.

This covenant was doomed from the beginning. Let me go back. The Lord said to Abraham, go from your country, your people, and your father's household to the land I will show you. I will make you into a great nation. I will bless you. I will make your name great. You will be a blessing. I will bless those whom you bless. And whoever you curse, I will curse. All the peoples on earth will be blessed through you. He says, I'm going to give you a great nation, which means you have to have children.

The problem is that there was a little glitch in the plan that God knew about in advance. And that was this. He says, in verse 2, I will make you into a great nation. Now, if you go back one chapter from here to chapter 11, it says, now Sarah was childless because she was not able to conceive. This is interesting. God made the promise knowing that she was childless. He made the promise knowing that the odds were stacked against him.

Sometimes you feel like there's been a promise from God. And then along the way you find some difficulties and we get confused or upset. And we doubt God. God went into this promise already knowing that she was not able to keep the promise. That is the God that we serve. That when God gives a promise, he isn't surprised after the fact when something happens, when an obstacle comes up in your life. He actually knows it in advance.

And he makes a promise to Abraham knowing that there were obstacles that he was willing to and was going to overcome. But we see, as we'll see later, that both Abraham and Sarah were challenged. And they didn't believe God at that point because they did all these other things to make sure that God's promise would be kept because of them, not because of God. Have you ever done that with your promise? Have you ever taken your promise and you said, God, I don't like the way you're managing at the moment.

I'm tired of riding shotgun. Could you just sit over here? And I'm going to take my promise and I'm going to take charge of it. Remember, Sarah takes her maid and gives the maid to her husband and says, have children with my maid. That didn't go so well as we'll see in a little bit. So he says, I'll make you into a great nation. And God makes a promise knowing that there was an issue. In verse 1, it says, the Lord said to Abram, go from your country, your people, and your father's household, and I will show you a land.

So he tells him to do something once again. Do this, go from your family, go from your people, and then I will show you where I'm going to take you. Now, this is interesting. There's a little problem that I would have setting my Google Maps heading out on this call. Let me read it again. The Lord had said to Abraham, go from your country. Fine, God, cool, I'm down. Your people and your father's household. That's going to be rough.

I mean, I'm going to hate to leave my family and everyone, but, you know, his extended family is what they meant, not Sarah. And go to the land, and then you're waiting for the GPS coordinates, right? And I'll show it to you as we go. Excuse me, how do I punch that in, you know? How do I punch that destination in? Sometimes God just wants you to move. You see, God's the primary mover, and sometimes he wants you to wait, but some of us haven't moved, and we know that God has told us to move.

He's told us to move on an addiction, but how will I survive without my fix? He's told you to move on or move into a relationship, but you haven't moved on from a relationship you shouldn't be in, or opened yourself up to a relationship perhaps you should be in. He's told you to this. He's told you to that. He has told you something, but you won't go until it pencils out. It's got to say something about faith. It doesn't pencil out.

Faith never pencils out. That is why we call it faith. It is impossible to have a religion of the knowns. The world is in love with knowing things that constantly change. This is why they love science. I love science, and I love science. I'm not sure I trust all scientists, but I love science, and because we want to know. Faith is different than that, and when you believe and when you step out, God credits that to you as righteousness, and the blessing of the Lord, as it says in Proverbs, will rest upon the righteous.

And so are you at the crossroads? We see that Abraham was living now at the intersection of duty, destiny, dreams, and desire. You ever feel like you're at that crossroads? He's at a crossroads. There's a duty. He feels like there's a duty to do something for God. He feels called. He's a righteous man. He wants to do the things. He wants to be righteous. He wants to do what his wife's at. He feels a duty to his wife, as you'll see, and she uses that to manipulate him on multiple occasions, and one we'll see here right as we close.

Duty. He's a man of high duty, but he also feels like there's a destiny. There's a destiny that he's called to, that is somewhere out upon the horizon. There's dreams. He's laid in bed at night, and God has said, Look up at the stars. I'm going to make you a nation that is greater than you, uncountable like the stars, and then there's a desire to get on with it, and he is stuck there at the intersection and the crossroads, and what do you do in your life when you're stuck at the crossroads of duty, destiny, dreams, and desire?

It says this. It says that in verse 4, So Abraham went. So Abraham went. That's it. You could end it right there. Abraham went. Do you want to know the problem? He hedged his bets. He hedged his bets. Probably because of Sarah. Maybe not for Sarah. We see that she is manipulative with him. He can be manipulative on his own. He lies, as we'll see, and they're both a manipulative, dysfunctional couple. But he hedges his bets because God said, Go from your family.

But what does it say? He took Sarah and his nephew, Lot. He took Sarah and his nephew, Lot. This is going to cause him all types of problems because Lot has lots of problems, and if it comes to real estate, Lot wants the lot. He wants that terra firma. He wants that ground, and they are going to fight after it. And so he hedges his bets, and for one reason or another, he doesn't do exactly what God told him to do. So I'm going to get free from my addiction for 30 days.

I'm going to get free from my addiction. I'm only going to, as they say in the big book of Alcoholics Anonymous, I'm only going to drink beer from now on. Like that doesn't work to get you stumbling drunk. Or whatever the thing is, he hedges his bets because he wasn't willing to believe God fully, and we know it's a few chapters until we get to a place where it says Abraham believed God, and God credited to him his righteousness.

So where do we end on this passage today? We end in that God is calling us to make a decision to go. Somewhere in your life, God is saying, I want you to go. I want to send you, and now is the time. Now is the time. Now is the moment of faith. Now is the moment of destiny. Now is the moment of desire. And sometimes that means to stay put. I'm going to say, one of the hardest things to do is sometimes to stay put. Sometimes going with God means staying where you are.

That could have to do with the job. Definitely has to do with the relationships. That God is saying, I want you to stay where you are. Only you can know that. But know how you'll know it? Because it'll be difficult within your spirit often. Oftentimes the simplest solution, this is called Occam's razor, that the simplest answer is most always the right answer. If you look at Occam's razor. And so sometimes God is just telling you, you just know.

You already know what God has called you to do. It's very simple. And sometimes the simplest answer is the right answer. As a church, imagine if we all began to rise up, and from the place of destiny, dreams, desire, and duty, we begin to say, I believe you, God, and I don't need no one to go with me. I don't need to hedge my bets. And he will credit it to you as righteousness. And the blessing of the Lord falls upon the house of the righteous.

Amen? Stand if you would. God, God, I love this scripture. Abraham said, God says to Abraham, I will bless those who you bless, and whoever curses you, I will curse. And so, it looks like there's some autonomy here, from Abraham, to say, I choose to bless you. And God says, I will bless them, because you bless them. Somebody asked me this week, where does that blessing come from? The blessing always comes from God. But I want to choose to bless you right now.

We want to choose to bless you, and I pray that you would choose to bless others. Bless your children, bless people on the road, just on a regular basis. Say, bless you as we go. I want to bless you. Let blessing be the words on your lips. If we would close your eyes, and bow your heads, and if you want to extend your hands, as I bless you. Lord Jesus, we bless these people, Lord God, that they would be a people who went.

God, that they would be a people who sometimes stay, but in staying, are actually going, and following you. We pray that they would have wisdom. And God, they wouldn't have to know all the answers. They wouldn't always have to pencil out. We bless them, God, and may the house of the righteous, God, be filled with blessings. May it be filled with provision. Bless these people. Bless this corner. We send them out with a new vision, God, and a new heart to follow you.

In the name of the Father, Son, and the Holy Spirit. Amen. If you need prayer today, come forward. If you want questions about the faith, or anything about our church, back in the foyer. Bye, guys. Have a great day. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you.