"The Promise Of El Shaddai"

The promise of El Shaddai Genesis 17:1-8, 15-16.

1. Gods promises last ours do not

• We learn In this Genesis text we read God makes a promise to Abram and Sarai.

• We also learn God keeps promises and covenants

• We know something's don't last very long . . One married couple realized when they celebrated their 10th anniversary that their marriage had lasted longer than almost everything involved with the actual wedding. The bridal store had gone out of business. The bakery went bankrupt. The florist and the church janitor had both died. And the pastor who performed the ceremony had left the ministry.

2. Consider The Promise God makes

• In Genesis 12 There, God promised the then 75-year-old Abram that he would be the father of a great nation.

• God promised Abram would have a Son

• God even promised to give land to Abrams off spring 12:7

3. Consider the Problem

• Abram wife, Sarai, who was well past childbearing years

• In Genesis 15, Abram, now older and still childless, assumes -- as is the custom when a man dies childless -- that one of his slaves will be his heir.

• Abrams seems not to believe, God says, "your very own bowels shall be your heir" (15:4).

• Eventually, at Sarai's suggestion, Abram fathers a son, Ishmael, by his wife's maid, Hagar. Abram assumes that it's through Ishmael that God's promise of descendants will be fulfilled. Abram is now 99 and Sarai is 89. Ishmael is 13.

• We're never told why, but for some reason, Ishmael is not to be the seed for the line of descendants with whom God intends to make a covenant. God will bless Ishmael with descendants in his own right (v. 20), but God now tells Abram that he will have another son, born to Sarai, who shall be called Isaac.

4. Let us consider The Promise-Maker

• the promise maker gives Abram a new name , the promise maker gives Sarai a new name

• the promise maker himself has a new name Elohim , God, El Shaddai

• The Bible first identifies God by the name Elohim; it appears in the very first verse of the Bible: "In the beginning God [Elohim] created the heavens and the earth." This name appears more than 2,500 times in the OT.

• At the same time, God takes on a new name. Most Bible versions render this as "God Almighty," but the actual Hebrew term is El Shaddai. And when Abram was ninety years old and nine , the LORD appeared to Abram , and said unto him, I am the Almighty God ; walk before me , and be

5. Let us consider the Promise Keeper and his promises

• When God comes to Abram as El Shaddai, God comes for a specific purpose -- to remind Abram that God keeps promises.

• El Shaddai said “And I will make my covenant between me and thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly. And he did

• El Shaddai said “and thou shalt be a father of many nations . And he was

• El Shaddai said, “ I will make thee exceeding fruitful , and I will make nations of thee, and kings shall come out of thee.

• El Shaddai said “ this is an everlasting covenant , to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee . And he was

• El Shaddai said “I will give you the land wherein thou art a stranger , all the land of Canaan ,

• El Shaddai gives comfort, but it's comfort with substance or stuff involved

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El Shaddai promised Abram that he would be the Father of all nations and he was. Jesus promise us eternal life if we will believe in him.

He tells us to confess with our mouths he is the Lord, and believe in our hearts that God raised him from the grave then thou shalt be saved. It is a promise I believe do you?