MESSAGE SERIES
“Look to the Stars”- Message I
The Life of Abraham
God keeps His promises; we must remain obedient to Him even when the future isn’t clear.”
TODAY
We are going to talk about the connection with Obedience and Blessing.
ABRAHAM COMES ON THE SCENE IN GENESIS 11
We are introduced to him in the Genealogy of Terah his Father.
Most people don’t like Genealogies but often in scripture we find some great lessons when we look at family trees.
For example, by the time we get to Genesis 11 and you compare that to Genesis 5, man is having kids earlier but not living as long.
ILLUSTRATION
Lot of times we find things we don’t want in family trees like the Smith Family.
The Smith’s were proud of their family tradition. Their ancestors had come to America on the Mayflower. Their line had included Senators, Pastors, & Wall Street wizards.
Now they decided to compile a family history, a legacy for the children. They hired a well known author. Only one problem arose: how to handle that great-uncle George who was executed in the electric chair. But the author said not to worry; he could handle that section of history tactfully.
When the book appeared, the family turned to the section on Uncle George.
There, they read "George Smith occupied a chair of applied electronics at an important government institution, was attached to his position by the strongest of ties, & his death came as a real shock."
Well this morning we are going to look into some Biblical Family Trees on our study of Abraham, and we might find some things that become a real shock.
Look with me into Genesis 11 this morning.
Gen 11:27-32 (NKJV)
27 This is the genealogy of Terah: Terah begot Abram, Nahor, and Haran. Haran begot Lot.
28 And Haran died before his father Terah in his native land, in Ur of the Chaldeans.
29 Then Abram and Nahor took wives: the name of Abram's wife was Sara’i, and the name of Nahor's wife, Milcah, the daughter of Haran the father of Milcah and the father of Iscah.
30 But Sarai was barren; she had no child.
Let me stop here before we go on this morning, the Bible points out to us that Abraham’s wife was barren because she didn’t have any children. I have gotten written in the margin of my Bible, “THE MAKING OF A MIRACLE.”
The very thing that you may be going through today that seems so desolate and hard may be the very place in your life that God is preparing to work a great miracle.
It may very well indicate there is a miracle in the making.
31 And Terah took his son Abram and his grandson Lot, the son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, his son Abram's wife, and they went out with them from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to the land of Canaan; and they came to Haran and dwelt there.
32 So the days of Terah were two hundred and five years, and Terah died in Haran.
INTRODUCTION
The goal was set, the destination to leave Ur and go live in Canaan was made but from some reason Terah never made it to Canaan he stopped at a place called Haran and lived there, worse still he died there, without ever reaching his goal.
HOW EASY IT IS TO START SOMETHING BUT NEVER FINISH.
Ecclesiastes 7:8, “The end of a thing is better than its beginning; the patient in spirit is better than the proud in spirit.”
EXAMPLES
Resolutions are made and broken.
Diets are begun and ended.
Home improvement projects lie around our houses half completed.
One wise man once said, "When everything is said and done, there is a whole lot more said than done."
THREE PLACES IN TODAY’S SCRIPTURE
You have a place called “UR” of the Chaldeans, a Southern City of Babylonia, and centre of moon worship. I want to call it “Sin City!”
This father decides to get his family and leave this sinful place and move to a place called Canaan.
We often talk about Canaan has Heaven, but it is not Heaven. It is a place of blessing that God wanted to give His people, a place of milk and honey, a place of plenty; it was a place of victory. That is still what God wants for his people spiritually today. He wants His people to live in a land of:
• Spiritual victory
• Spiritual plenty
So you have this father who wants to get his family out of sin city and take them to the land of Canaan but on the way he finds a place called Haran and he stays there so long he dies there.
• He died short of the blessing.
• He died short of the goal
• He died without getting to Canaan.
POINT OF THE SERMON TODAY: A lot of people are living their lives short of being what God wants them to be. They have heard the message they have left their land of “UR” but for some reason they have never got all the way over into Canaan, the blessing of blessing, victory and spiritual plenty.
We stop short of the goal God has for us.
We will call that this morning, “THE TEMPTATION OF TERAH”
Quote one preacher that said, “The temptation of Terah surrounds everything we do. However, critical mass is reached when the temptation of Terah engulfs our spiritual obedience, our journey of faith from God.”
We have all admired the inspiring obedience of Abram, Terah’s Son.
• We have all admired Abraham’s faith as he set out to find a city he could not see.
• Believing for a son he could not hold.
• Trusting for a miracle that could not be conceived.
• Trusting God for a miracle over a span of two decades.
Yet the opposite is seen in His father, who camped out in fear and satisfaction in the land of Ur.
What could have caused Terah to not go into Canaan?
• Fear could have gripped his heart. We find in Genesis 12 that the Canaanites lived in the land of Canaan.
• Complacency may have gripped his heart. He may have justified himself by saying, I am not living in Ur, where all the idolatry was, but I don’t think I want to go all the way to Canaan, maybe God is leading me to avoid the people there.
• Sorrow often keeps us from moving forward to be what we should be for God.
I want you to notice two passages of scripture this morning.
Genesis 11:27
27 This is the genealogy of Terah: Terah begot Abram, Nahor, and Haran. Haran begot Lot.
28 And Haran died before his father Terah in his native land, in Ur of the Chaldeans.
Genesis 11:31
31 And Terah took his son Abram and his grandson Lot, the son of Haran, and his daughter-in-law Sarai, his son Abram's wife, and they went out with them from Ur of the Chaldeans to go to the land of Canaan; and they came to Haran and dwelt there.
The place Terah camped at had the same name of the son he had lost.
I talked with Chris Crank yesterday because this jumped off of the page at me, we don’t know if Terah named the town Haran after his son, or did he come to the town because it was named after his son, but he felt complacent there and died there without ever getting to Canaan.
One preacher said, “Our task is not to understand God, appreciate God, or explain God, but it is our task to obey God and to love God.”
Job of old said, “Though He slay me, yet will I trust Him.”
CONCLUSION- The story doesn’t end with Abraham living in Haran.
Gen 12:1-5 (NKJV)
1 Now the LORD had said to Abram: "Get out of your country, From your family And from your father's house, To a land that I will show you.
2 I will make you a great nation; I will bless you And make your name great; And you shall be a blessing.
3 I will bless those who bless you, And I will curse him who curses you; And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed."
4 So Abram departed as the LORD had spoken to him, and Lot went with him. And Abram was seventy-five years old when he departed from Haran.
5 Then Abram took Sarai his wife and Lot his brother's son, and all their possessions that they had gathered, and the people whom they had acquired in Haran, and they departed to go to the land of Canaan.
Some of you God is calling you this morning to a deeper Christian walk.
He is calling you to trust Him even though it hurts and you don’t understand.
He is calling you to Higher Ground.
God has not only saved you from the world but for his glory.
I am going to plead with you this morning, don’t settle too soon.
