I want you to picture in your mind the first car you ever had. What make and model, what year, what color? I want you to turn to someone you came here with and describe that car to them!
Maroon 1979 Chevy Impala nicknamed the scud (slow and inaccurate) It had all the self inflicted dings and dents of a 16 year olds welcome to responsibility. Complete with a carpeted dash, 8 balls hanging from the rear view mirror, a hole in the back seat from a misguided bottle rocket shot from the inside by one of my friends, a box in the trunk with two ten inch woofers so the world could listen to my poor music choices...detachable face stereo so I could take it with me and ...eventually loose it...
There’s something special about the first of something isn’t there?
To this day I claim the Kansas City Royals because my first baseball team I played on was the Royals. My first "F" on a grade card! Your first boyfriend or girlfriend that you thought you loved...your first job, first house, first child. There’s something special about the first.
That’s why I love the book of Genesis. There’s a lot of firsts there. There’s a lot to learn from. The first knowledge of God, the first man and woman, the first sin of mankind. The first move that God made towards our impending rescue.
One of my all time favorite characters in the history of man is Abraham. Talk about something special about the first...
Abraham was the father of all nations. I grew up singing cheesy songs about "Father Abraham" in Sunday school. I knew him as the patriarch. The founding father. The old man that was willing to follow God even to the point that he was wiling to sacrifice his own son on an alter if it pleased God. Some of you are familiar with the life of Abraham, or as he was known in the beginning as ...Abram. Some of you are waiting to be introduced to the father of all nations...
That’s where I would like to start, with a brief overview of his life...in the beginning, with a man who would go down in history as being...the first.
WELCOME WHITEHOUSE CAMPUS
Gen 11:27-32, Acts 7:1-4 Abram comes out of nowhere in the scripture. All we knew about him is that he came from the line of Shem. He was a native of Mesopotamia, specifically Ur, one of the oldest known cities in the world.
Abram received a call from God to leave Ur (according to Stephen in Acts) and headed for Haran with his family.
Gen 12:1-4 God gave one command and two promises to Abram. God commanded Abram to separate himself from his family and go to Canaan, a land Abram knew nothing about. God promised if he did this, that He would make Abram’s name great. He also promised that, as a result of Abrams obedience to follow God, all nations of the earth would be blessed.
So Abram departed with his wife Sarai, his nephew Lot, and what little possessions they had.
Genesis 12:6, 14:24 Abram travels to Shechem in Canaan where God promised to give land to Abram and his family. The problem was the land was struck with famine. So Abram leaves the land God had given them and heads for Egypt. Abram abandons Gods plan and makes up his own. Never a good idea. Famine or not!
When Abram gets to Egypt, people start noticing how incredibly beautiful Abrams wife Sarai was! Abram had to come up with a plan...he was fearing for his life! Who wouldn’t want to kill him to get with her??? This is where all of you fellas turn to your wives and say "I know what he was going through"!!! Feel free to do that right now, you can thank me later.
Abram knows he’s in trouble here, so he comes up with another stupid plan! These are what we call plans that are not God’s...stupid. He decides to lie and tell everyone that Sarai is his sister!
Sarai is so beautiful that Pharaoh actually takes her into his personal harem! God, at this point decides to bail Abram out, and He inflicts Pharaoh and his family with plagues. Abram takes him family and flees for his life...once again, to Canaan...where God wanted him to be in the first place.
Genesis 15
Here God once again renews His covenant to Abram. God promises that He will provide a child, from Abram and Sarai, that will be an heir to the nations.
This seems simple enough, but the problem is, is that Sarai couldn’t have children...and they know that!
This is again the point where stupidity likes to creep in...you know -- the point in your life when God’s promises seem impossible according to you.
Genesis 16 Sarai comes up with a plan to "help" God along with this whole child thing. They decide to get Abram a concubine and have a child through her! Hagar was her name. Hagar had a son with Abram and immediately starting looking down on Sarai, so Sarai started all getting in her face in verse 16. So Hagar flees and the Angel of the Lord appeared to Hagar and tells her to get back to Abram and Sarai, God promises to multiply her descendants through her unborn child.
Genesis 17 God ONCE AGAIN renews his promises to Abram.
Isn’t this how it goes with us???? We keep trying out our own plan, and God is left to constantly remind us that He loves us and is still with us???? It’s a good thing God got good with this early on because some of us really put Him to the test!
God decides to change Abrams name to Abraham and Sarai’s name to Sarah
Genesis 18-19 We have a very familiar event in the life of Abraham. It’s the destruction of Sodom and Gomorrah by the hand of God and His angels. Abraham pleads for the cities, as he knows his nephew Lot and his family are there. So the angels of God rescue Lot and his wife and two daughters but they are commanded, as they flea, NOT TO LOOK BACK!!!!!!!! Lots wife disobeys and looks back at the destruction Chapter 19:26 and she is turned into a pillar of salt! BUMMER??? There’s a lot of ways to go, but you have to admit, God was creative on that one!
Salt????? I always thought it would be funny to have a salt lick for deer in the backyard, but have it be a life-size woman running...looking back...(Act it out)
It’s completely plausible that Lot and his daughters didn’t even know what happened at the time! They’re all running, they can’t look back to notice mom...they probably got to their destination and sat down to eat dinner, "Where’s mom?"
I don’t know, but can you pass the salt? Wow that joke just keeps giving. (salt lick pose)
Genesis 20 Abraham fears for his life, lies once again and says Sarah is his sister. This guy just doesn’t get it! God has offered him more than anyone in the bible, and he still battles with doubt and fear!
Genesis 22-25, Hebrews 11:17-9 God had given Abraham and Sarah a son, just like He had promised, His name was Isaac. Abraham is put to the ultimate test when God says he must sacrifice his son Isaac on an alter! At the last moment, God intervened and stopped him. SOMETIMES GOD JUST WANTS TO KNOW THAT WE ARE WILLING. God renews His covenant ONCE AGAIN with Abraham for his willingness to obey Him no matter what.
Genesis 23 Sarah dies
Genesis 25 Abraham dies at the age of 175 years old.
That was a brief overview. I love to study the Old Test and draw from peoples experiences so many years ago. It’s amazing how it is every bit as applicable now as it was then!
Lessons from the Life of Abraham
The call -- Islam claims him, Judaism claims him, Christianity claims him.
God, out of nowhere, clears His divine throat and spoke to this man...a man who came from a background of idol worshipers. He’s not introduced as being a particularly good or moral man! Noah was at least introduced as being "righteous".
Abraham never asked the question, "Why?" "Where?" "For what?" Remember, this had never been done before. Abraham didn’t know anything about God. He didn’t have a playbook to read from!
Abraham was a YES man. We despise the yes man at work don’t we? We counsel our friends that seem to say yes to everything...we just have it in our nature to say no, especially when we’re not sure of something! After all, it’s a lot easier to say no! One thing we can take home about Abraham is that he always said YES to God...it may have taken him a while, but he always said YES.
What is it God is waiting for you to say YES to? I’m guessing there’s something in your life that God wants an answer to! Maybe you have been saying NO for a very long time. Maybe it’s about serving Him in a certain capacity, maybe it’s about going on that missions trip you have been putting off forever...maybe it’s Him waiting for you to say YES to you FINALLY letting go of yourself and letting Him take control of your life?
Abraham says YES to a God he really doesn’t even know much about, if anything at all! Abraham simply leaves his family and goes. Interestingly enough, God didn’t call Abraham into ministry! He didn’t’ ask him to be a pastor of a church, or get a seminary degree.
The thing about a call by God is that each and every one of us that claim to be Christians are called! We are called to claim God’s promises of love, eternal life and forgiveness. And just as Abraham was called to leave his life as he knew it...we too are called into a life that should look different from our past.
You have to ask yourself that question! Does your life look radically different since Jesus saved you? Are you stuck in the same rut? Do you harbor the same old dependency to rely on yourself to get things done?
We are called on a journey that will look unfamiliar to us. No one said it would be an easy journey. Why did God call you? You’re so ordinary??? I’m a big mess inside! Abraham wasn’t special or different. He didn’t have the gift set Moses did! He didn’t’ have to build an ark. He didn’t have the tremendous pressures David did in leading a nation.
Who is Abraham? He’s you and me. He’s every man and woman. He’s anyone who struggles a little to believe the promises of God in the teeth of a reality that seems at times to be all but designed to make like difficult. Thankfully, God’s faithfulness towards us is more constant than ours towards God!
What made Abraham noteworthy is that he said YES to God, no matter what.
Do you have a faith like that? Do you realize that, apart form God, your plans just don’t work as well? ABRAHAMS FAITH WAS STRONG, UNSHAKEN AND DETERMINED.
His faith pleased God, not necessarily his works
Paul stressed this in Romans 4:1-3
Abraham defined faith according to Hebrews 11
We too, like Abraham, are justified by God for our faith, not by self righteous law keeping. Obedience is necessary, but we cannot work enough to deserve heaven. Salvation comes by way of God alone, not what we can do for Him in the way of works.
As Christ followers, we are all spiritual descendants of Abraham.
God said He would bless the whole world through Abraham, and a couple of millennia later a man completed that promise, as He cried out "it is finished"!
We see a God that is willing to complete a promise...no matter what. Abraham was able to forego the sacrifice of his son Isaac, but God would lead His straight to the cross.
A plan beginning with Abram, finalized with the death and resurrection of Jesus Christ. There is nothing more to be done. It is finished.
Even though sometimes, like Abraham, our faith gets bumped around a bit. We do stupid things like lie to save face. We fear for our safety, even though we are in Gods hands.
We read of the numerous blessing for us in scripture, yet we often fail to obey those commands that bring blessing.
Just like Abraham, we may move to an area of life that is unfamiliar and even difficult because God wanted us to...only to turn and head on our own for the safety of known, comfortable territory.
We are an awful lot like Abraham. We are not the first, but we may very well be the first to turn our families around in the direction of God and His commands.
We may be the first of our friends to say "yes" to God and His will for our lives.
Who knows what descendants will inherit blessings because of our obedience?
MY GRANDFATHER...HIS LEGACY...HE DIDN’T LIVE LONG ENOUGH TO SEE IT PLAY OUT TO THE FULLEST, BUT HE HAD FAITH GOD WOULD BLESS HIM. Truth is, Abraham never got to see the full blessing of God in his life. He couldn’t, he couldn’t have lived that long to see you and I. You have to trust, have a faith like Abraham!
No matter who you are or where you’re at in life...no matter how far or fast you have ran...
God is EVERY bit as close as He has ever been.
You are worth so much to Him.
You mean everything to Him. He wants you to know that, that’s why He gave you His word. He knows that some of us only excel when we feel like we’re valued. At work, our bosses encouragement/vision, at home...you’re a great dad/wife son/daughter.
How can we possibly feel any more valued than a life...traded for ours? We are who we are. A mess inside, we doubt, we forget, we devise our own plans. God had to keep showing Abraham He believed in Him...not because God forgot, but because Abraham...just like you and me, got caught up in the things of this world. The feelings, the frustrations, the fears, the doubts...that’s when God seems to draw so near...He loves to remind us that He cares.
SHOOTING STAR
Stop using my like this, (4 words) I’M NOT WORTH IT!!!!!!!
It’s like God wiped His prevailing finger across the sky and said, "ENOUGH"! SHUT YOUR MOUTH, BOY.
I felt I shouldn’t be called to ministry. Christianity not so much about quitting as it is about taking up.
God saying, "Just start saying YES to me"...like Abraham, all the inadequacies I can deal with!
Like God was saying, :You cry out to me, from this little driveway, beneath my blanket of stars, millions of light years away.
You cry like I am on that furthest star???? Like I am so far away!
God again and again reminds us in scripture, like Abraham...that there will be many collisions between our desires and His throughout our lives. But when He calls, we must say YES...and that is why God constantly reminds us,
"I’m not far away...I’m right here".
