Tangible Verses Intangible Series

Tangible verses Intangible.

Abraham set free to be blessed and a blessing! Genesis 17:1-10 and 17:15-22.

We carry on today with number two sermon of this four-part sermon series “Steadfast.” The verse that sort of ties the series together is Psalm 16:8 “I have set the LORD always before me: because He is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.” Last week we looked at covenant and contract. We are looking today at Tangible verses Intangible. Intangible meaning, unable to be touched; not having physical presence.

If we look at the lives of many Biblical persons, we see lives that are not what we would call, particularly normal, in places where God has them for a period, sometimes before he moves them to something unknown or into something that appears to be intangible but based on His, that is God’s promise. In the case of a young couple, who lived between 1960 and 1785 BC. This couple started out in a place called Ur which was an important city-state in ancient Sumer located in what is now modern Iraq. This couple started life with the names Abram and Sarai.

A few things about this couple:

• Terah, Abrams father had originally left Ur and settled in Haran (MAP)

• Abram was called by God to leave Haran and to travel to the land that he, God would give him

• Abram (meaning exalted) had his name changed by God to Abraham (meaning ‘father of many’), we will find out more about this soon

• Abraham’s ancestors were worshippers of other God’s prior to this, “Joshua said to the people, “this is what the Lord, the God of Israel, says; ‘Long ago your forefathers, including Terah the father of Abraham and Nahor, lived beyond the River and worshiped other gods.” (Joshua 24:2) They were idol worshippers.

• Abraham lied to preserve his life. I say this to prove the man had faults, he was not perfect.

• God made a covenant with Abraham that would lead to the birth of the nation of Israel. Interestingly all that he would possess of that nation was a field and a burial cave. He was, however, promised land, descendants and blessings. The same covenant is part of the reason that we are all here today worshipping God.

This is Abram's call from God.

“I will make you into a great nation,

and I will bless you;

I will make your name great,

and you will be a blessing.[a]

I will bless those who bless you,

and whoever curses you I will curse;

and all peoples on earth

will be blessed through you. Abram was 75 years old when he was called. If you are around that age, hold onto that point.

• He had a son called Ishmael with his wife’s maidservant Hagar (we could spend days debating the morals of this but remember, different times, different way of living, laws etc)

• He then had a son Isaac with his first wife Sarai who was afterwards known as Sarah (meaning princess)

• Sarai gave permission for Ishmaels conception

• Sarai treated Hagar badly after Ishmael was born

I’m keen to look at a small part of this couple's journey. For while Abraham and Sarah were a couple with a fair number of faults, it was their response to God, that changed their lives and from that place, changed the earths future and hundreds millions of lives forever to the glory of God. Their reality was to follow God into a future that was completely unknown, intangible, what many of us would consider a possible work of fiction if it was presented to us in their places. We are all here today because of their response.

When we take a look at Abraham’s family we see that most of the Arab people, and the Jewish people, today are his descendants, in the main Ishmaels family are the Arab people, though not all and Isaacs’s family are Jews and there are some who are Palestinian Arabs. The current war in Israel and Gaza is in part being fought on both sides by direct descendants of Abraham and Sarah. Please don’t get stuck on the point, let's move on.

However, God has blessed both family lines of Abraham’s descendants. Abraham married again after the death of Sarah, to a lady called Keturah, their descendants have pretty much combined with the descendants of Ishmael.

So, we see this direction that God took Abraham and Sarah, the patriarch and matriarch of most of the Hebrew people and Abraham and Hagar the patriarch and matriarch of most of the Arab people. They left Haran on a promise that was in part fulfilled in their lifetimes. But it was not, as is foretold by God in Genesis fifteen, until 400 years later that the Hebrew people enter the promised land. These were people of a promise, something that seemed intangible but...the reality is?