Introduction
When Robert Moffat, the Scottish missionary to South Africa, came back to recruit helpers in his homeland, he was greeted by the fury of a cold British winter. Arriving at the church where he was to speak, he noted that only a small group had braved the elements to hear his appeal. What disturbed him, even more, was that there were only ladies in attendance that night, for he had chosen as his text Proverbs 8:4, “To you, O men, I call.”
In his disappointment, he almost failed to notice one small boy in the loft who had come to work the bellows of the organ. Dr. Moffat felt hopeless as he gave the message, realizing that few women could be expected to undergo the rigorous experiences they would face in the undeveloped jungles of the continent where he labored.
But God works in mysterious ways to carry out his wise purposes. Although no one volunteered, the young boy assisting the organist was thrilled by the challenge. Deciding that he would follow in the footsteps of this pioneer missionary, he went on to school, obtained a degree in medicine, and then spent the rest of his life ministering to the unreached tribes of Africa.
His name was David Livingstone, the celebrated missionary and explorer in Africa! (Paul Lee Tan, Encyclopedia of 7700 Illustrations: Signs of the Times [Garland, TX: Bible Communications, Inc., 1996], 482).
God calls people to himself in different ways, as we shall see in today’s lesson.
We are currently in a series of sermons that I am calling “Bloodlines: The Genealogy of Jesus” from Matthew 1:1-17. What at first seems to be just a list of names is very important in helping us understand the person and work of Jesus.
Today, we are going to see that Jesus, “the son of Abraham,” is the fulfillment of God’s call to Abraham.
Scripture
Let’s read Matthew 1:1-17:
1 The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.
2 Abraham was the father of Isaac, and Isaac the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers, 3 and Judah the father of Perez and Zerah by Tamar, and Perez the father of Hezron, and Hezron the father of Ram, 4 and Ram the father of Amminadab, and Amminadab the father of Nahshon, and Nahshon the father of Salmon, 5 and Salmon the father of Boaz by Rahab, and Boaz the father of Obed by Ruth, and Obed the father of Jesse, 6 and Jesse the father of David the king.
And David was the father of Solomon by the wife of Uriah, 7 and Solomon the father of Rehoboam, and Rehoboam the father of Abijah, and Abijah the father of Asaph, 8 and Asaph the father of Jehoshaphat, and Jehoshaphat the father of Joram, and Joram the father of Uzziah, 9 and Uzziah the father of Jotham, and Jotham the father of Ahaz, and Ahaz the father of Hezekiah, 10 and Hezekiah the father of Manasseh, and Manasseh the father of Amos, and Amos the father of Josiah, 11 and Josiah the father of Jechoniah and his brothers, at the time of the deportation to Babylon.
12 And after the deportation to Babylon: Jechoniah was the father of Shealtiel, and Shealtiel the father of Zerubbabel, 13 and Zerubbabel the father of Abiud, and Abiud the father of Eliakim, and Eliakim the father of Azor, 14 and Azor the father of Zadok, and Zadok the father of Achim, and Achim the father of Eliud, 15 and Eliud the father of Eleazar, and Eleazar the father of Matthan, and Matthan the father of Jacob, 16 and Jacob the father of Joseph the husband of Mary, of whom Jesus was born, who is called Christ.
17 So all the generations from Abraham to David were fourteen generations, and from David to the deportation to Babylon fourteen generations, and from the deportation to Babylon to the Christ fourteen generations.
Lesson
In Matthew 1:1-17, we learn that Matthew calls Jesus "the son of Abraham" because Jesus fulfills God's call to Abraham that one of his descendants would bless the whole world.
Let’s use the following outline:
1. God’s Call Is Necessary
2. God’s Call Is Gracious
3. God’s Call Is Personal
4. God’s Call Is Non-Negotiable
5. God’s Call Is Missional
6. God’s Call Is Fulfilled
I. God’s Call Is Necessary
First, God’s call is necessary.
We read in Matthew 1:1, “The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.” Matthew wanted his readers to know that Jesus was not only a descendant of David but also a descendant of Abraham.
Abraham is a very significant person. The three major world religions are Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. It may surprise you to know that adherents to each of these religions consider themselves to be children of Abraham. To understand world civilization, one has to know the story of Abraham.
So, let’s go back to the beginning.
After God created Adam and Eve, sin entered the world. God banished them from the Garden of Eden. As the population grew in numbers, so did wickedness and sin. God said in Genesis 6:5, “The Lord saw that the wickedness of man was great in the earth, and that every intention of the thoughts of his heart was only evil continually.”
God sent a flood and wiped out the entire human and animal population at that time, except for Noah, his wife, his three sons, their wives, and pairs of all the animals and birds on the earth.
Once the flood subsided, Noah and his family began to populate the earth again. They spread throughout the earth. But as the people spread throughout the earth, so did sin. At that time the whole earth had one language (Genesis 11:1). In their arrogance, some people decided to build a tower with its top in the heavens. God dispersed the people from Babel, and they scattered throughout the earth.
Reading through the first eleven chapters of Genesis is a description of the human race spiraling into increasing depravity, increasing sin, increasing wickedness, and increasing violence and brokenness.
At the end of Genesis 11, we read about a man named Terah. He lived in Ur of the Chaldeans. He had three sons named Abram, Nahor, and Haran. Haran had a son named Lot but then Haran died in Ur. Abram and Nahor each got married. (Abram’s name was later changed to Abraham.)
For some unstated reason, Terah took Abram, Abram’s wife Sarai, and his grandson Lot and decided to head west to go to the land of Canaan. But about halfway there, he decided to stop and settle at a place he most likely named after his deceased son Haran. Eventually, Terah died. It seemed that Abram, Sarai, and Lot continued to live in Haran.
But then we read in Genesis 12:1, “Now the Lord said to Abram, ‘Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.’ ” And this is where we see that God’s call is necessary. Abram was a pagan who did not know God. He had probably never heard of God. He most likely worshiped the gods of Terah and the people of Ur of the Chaldeans.
If God had not intervened, Abram would have carried on with his life and he would never have known the God of the Bible. He was living in a way that he thought suited him. He may have been moral. He may have been upright. He may have been religious. But, he was utterly lost.
There are people in parts of the world who have never heard of God and his Son, Jesus Christ. And some people grow up in churches just like ours and have heard of God and his Son, Jesus Christ.
However, God’s call is necessary to bring each one to himself. God’s call is necessary to give them new life. God’s call is necessary to bring about change in their lives.
II. God’s Call Is Gracious
Second, God’s call is gracious.
According to the website called Our World in Data, the population at the time that God called Abram was about 72.59 million people (see https://ourworldindata.org/grapher/population). How they can be so precise, I don’t know. My point is simply that there were millions of people in the world at the time that God called Abram.
Now, God did not look all around the world and say to himself, “Who is searching for me?” Or, “Who is a nice man whom I like?” No. God looked around and saw that there was no one righteous, no not one.
God did not call Abram because he was trying to live a good life. God did not call Abram because he was faithful. God did not call Abram because he was deserving.
God called Abram because God’s call is gracious. Abram deserved God’s wrath. Abram deserved to go to hell. But God’s grace is to extend mercy to the undeserving.
That is what grace is. Grace is unmerited favor. No one merits God’s favor. Everyone merits or deserves God’s wrath. But grace is receiving God’s unmerited favor.
Alexander Whyte, the great Scottish preacher, once stood up in his pulpit in Edinburgh and said, “I have discovered the most wicked man in Edinburgh....” Then he paused, while the congregation eagerly awaited the name. Then Whyte continued, “His name is Alexander Whyte” (Paul Lee Tan, Encyclopedia of 7700 Illustrations: Signs of the Times [Garland, TX: Bible Communications, Inc., 1996], 528–529).
God’s grace comes only to those who know that they do not deserve favor from God.
III. God’s Call Is Personal
Third, God’s call is personal.
It seems that Terah, Abram, Sarai, Nahor, Milcah, and Lot were very comfortable in Haran. They enjoyed living there. Then Terah died.
Sometime later, God said to Abram in Genesis 12:1, “Go from your country....” The Hebrew is emphatic. It is a command. God said to Abram, “Get yourself out of this country.”
Perhaps Abram was thinking, “I like it here. It is a comfortable place. I know my way around here. I am with my family.” But God insisted, “Abram, you go!”
Do you know what we learn here? It is not enough to say, “I am from a Christian family.” Or, “I am a Presbyterian.” Or, “I like hanging around with other Christians.”
God encountered Abram personally and called him to go from his country.
In the same way, every one of us must personally encounter God. We cannot get into the kingdom on the coattails of our family. We don’t get to heaven because we belong to a church—even a Presbyterian church! We don’t become God’s children because we hang around with his children.
In The Christian Reader, Paul Francisco writes:
When I was a child, our church celebrated the Lord’s Supper every first Sunday of the month. At that service, the offering plates were passed twice: before the sermon for regular offerings, and just before Communion for benevolences. My family always gave to both, but they passed a dime to me to put in only the regular offering.
One Communion Sunday when I was nine, my mother, for the first time, gave me a dime for the benevolent offering also. A little later when the folks in our pew rose to go to the Communion rail, I got up also. “You can’t take Communion yet,” Mother told me.
“Why not?” I said. “I paid for it!” (Craig Brian Larson, 750 Engaging Illustrations for Preachers, Teachers & Writers [Grand Rapids, MI: Baker Books, 2002], 211–212).
No one buys his or her way into God’s family. No one is a member of God’s family without a personal call from God.
God’s call is personal. You must encounter God for yourself.
IV. God’s Call Is Non-Negotiable
Fourth, God’s call is non-negotiable.
When we invite someone to come over to our home for a visit or a meal, we usually give them our home address. Almost everyone nowadays has a smartphone. So, they plug in our home address, and their Maps app will direct them to our home. They will know right from the start that it is 7.2 miles to our home, and they will be able to see the turn-by-turn directions to our home.
God said to Abram in Genesis 12:1, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.” Perhaps Abram may have wanted to ask God for the address so that he could plug it into his Maps app!
But no such likelihood. God just said, “Abram, you get out and go. But I am not going to tell you where you are going.”
There was no negotiation with God. Abram could not say, “Well, God, what is it like there? Will I have to face difficulties? Will I like it? Will it be better for me there than it is here?” God simply said, “Go!” and Abram had to follow.
Many people today want to negotiate with God. They may say, “God, I am interested in becoming a Christian. But will I have to give up my lifestyle? Will I face difficulties if I become a Christian? Will I like being a Christian? Will things be better for me as a Christian?” And so on.
When a person says that he will follow only if God first shows him where he will take him, then that person is not answering God’s call. That person is negotiating with God. That person is like the person with the bumper sticker that says, “God is my co-pilot.” A co-pilot is not in charge, you see. A co-pilot assists the pilot. And that will never do.
God’s call is non-negotiable.
V. God’s Call Is Missional
Fifth, God’s call is missional.
I will explain in a moment what I mean by the word “missional.”
In his call to Abram, God went on to say in verses 2-3, “Abram, I will bless you....” Why? “…so that you will be a blessing, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” Do you see that? God said that he would bless Abram. But Abram was to do something with that blessing. He was to pass the blessing on to others. Indeed, that blessing was to be passed on to all the families of the earth.
God did not call Abram to a life of ease and comfort and safety and security. God called Abram to first experience the blessing of God in his own life. And then, having experienced the blessing of God in his life, Abram was to pass that blessing along to others.
When God calls you to become a Christian, God is not calling you to a life of ease and comfort and safety and security. You don’t go about your Christian life by asking, “What is the best for me?” Or, “What will keep me safe?” Or, “What will make me most comfortable?”
No, you and I have experienced God’s amazing grace in our lives. So, we need to ask ourselves, “How can I bless others? What can I do to help others find the amazing grace that I have found in my life?”
So, to be “missional” is to live your life with purpose. It is to live in such a way that you are blessing others with the good news of the gospel.
God’s call is missional.
VI. God’s Call Is Fulfilled
And finally, God’s call is fulfilled.
Abram never saw the fulfillment of God’s call in his life. In fact, Abram had to wait for twenty-five years before God gave him and Sarai a son, whom they named Isaac.
Matthew went on to record the genealogy from Abraham onwards in Matthew 1:2, “Abraham was the father of Isaac, and Isaac the father of Jacob, and Jacob the father of Judah and his brothers.” This genealogy continued for forty-two generations until it got to Jesus.
It is in Jesus that all people come into a right relationship with God. Even Abram was declared justified before God by faith in him. We read in Romans 4:3, “Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.”
Paul later wrote to the Galatians 3:13-14, “Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us—for it is written, ‘Cursed is everyone who is hanged on a tree’—so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith.”
God’s call to Abram is fulfilled in Christ.
Conclusion
Since Jesus is “the son of Abraham,” he calls us to himself to bless us and he calls us to be a blessing to others.
The story is told of Mr. Yates, who owned a farm in Texas. The Great Depression came and he was having trouble keeping up with the payments on his farm. The bank began to press Mr. Yates and gave him thirty days to pay his back payments or face foreclosure.
With three weeks left to go, a man came to Mr. Yates’s door. He worked for an oil company. He asked Mr. Yates to give the company a lease to drill on his farm for oil. Yates knew he was going to lose the farm anyway, so he decided that it couldn’t hurt.
Well, that oil company did drill and hit a gusher—eighty-two thousand barrels of oil a day. Mr. Yates immediately became a multi-millionaire, many times over.
So, let me ask this question. Exactly when did Mr. Yates become a millionaire?
Did Mr. Yates become a millionaire when the oil company struck oil or did Mr. Yates become a millionaire when he bought the farm?
Mr. Yates was a millionaire the moment he purchased the farm, but he lived in poverty because he didn’t know what was underneath the ground.
When God calls you to himself in salvation, the moment you become his child, you are blessed “in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places” (Ephesians 1:3). But like Mr. Yates, some of you are living in the Great Depression. You are living spiritually poor, spiritually defeated, spiritually weak, and spiritually anemic lives even while you are sitting on top of this incredible blessing, because you don’t know that it is yours (Tony Evans, Tony Evans’ Book of Illustrations: Stories, Quotes, and Anecdotes from More than 30 Years of Preaching and Public Speaking [Chicago, IL: Moody Publishers, 2009], 24).
In the early 1800s in Scotland, during worship in a little church, as the ushers were returning to the front with the offering, a small boy tugged at the sleeve of one of the men, whispering, “Please put the plate down on the floor.”
Shocked and perplexed, the usher obeyed. And to further complicate matters, the boy stepped into the offering plate.
It was his way of saying, “I give my whole life to you, Lord. Not just the coins in my pocket, but my time, strength, and all the days of my life.”
Who was that little boy? That boy was none other than Robert Moffat, who became a pioneer missionary to Africa and father-in-law of the well-known missionary, David Livingstone. Moffat understood that his life was to be a blessing to others (G. Curtis Jones, 1000 Illustrations for Preaching and Teaching [Nashville, TN: Broadman & Holman Publishers, 1986], 263).
Friend, what about you?
If God has called you to himself in salvation, you are incredibly blessed. You are blessed in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places.
But that blessing is to be passed on to others.
So, let me ask you: What are you doing to pass the blessing on to others? God may be calling you, like Robert Moffat, to go and serve him in another culture. But God is calling most of you to serve him right here, right now. Get involved in teaching Sunday school. Get involved in the Missions team. Get involved in hospitality. Get involved in evangelism. Get involved in serving others.
Become active in some ministry so that you can be a blessing to others. Amen.
