The Promise Plan of God Progresses

All right. Well, Jesus on my cross have taken is one that's on the playlist for my memorial service. So, probably be a long memorial service.

I think there's several songs listed for that. And if you guys don't do it, it's okay. I'm not going to care anyway at that point.

But it's just such a great reminder because you can't help but sing that song and just recognize, all right, I struggle to stay here, but this is what I confess and what I believe to be true. And just always such a joy to have our hearts aligned in those things. I want you to take your Bibles this morning and turn with me to Genesis chapter 12.

And here we are now embarking upon this tremendous section of scripture together entitled this morning's message, The Promised Plan of God Progresses. Okay. The promised plan of God progresses.

And I decided this week I'm just going to call Abraham, Abraham, because that's what he ends up being later. So, I know it's Abram. I'll kind of be in and out of that, but expect me to just call him Abraham.

Today, we get introduced to what will really be the framework for the Abrahamic covenant. Okay. And this covenant looks back 2,000 years to the Garden of Eden, and it looks ahead 2,000 years from Abraham to the cross.

And of course, it has implications for us today. And so, this is really a key linchpin theological understanding from the Old Testament. And unequivocally, this covenant that God makes with Abraham demonstrates that salvation is of the Lord, and it is by grace alone, through faith alone, ultimately in Christ alone.

And so, here we have 4,000 years ago, God bringing about the next phase of his program of redemption, really his promised plan as it unfolds in history. And so, even years, millennia before Jesus is on the earth, God is calling pagans out of idolatry. He's bringing them into right relationship with himself.

He's forgiving their sins. And behind all of that is God's unchanging character and his unchanging promise. Okay.

What stands behind our confidence in salvation is that we do not trust in ourselves, but we trust in the character of God. We trust his revelation. We trust his promise.

And so, here we see the promised plan of God progressing. And Genesis 12 really just begins to introduce this to us. It's going to be reviewed and expanded as God comes again to Abraham, and chapter 15 is recorded, and chapter 17, chapter 18, chapter 22.

So, we're just starting to get the first taste of it today. But I want to begin by diving in this morning. Let's just read the text before us today.

Genesis 12, beginning in verse 1. And Yahweh said to Abram, go forth from your land, and from your kin, and from your father's house, to the land which I will show you. And I will make you a great nation. And I will bless you, and I will make your name great.

And so you shall be a blessing. And I will bless those who bless you. And the one who curses you, I will curse.

And in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed. So, Abraham, excuse me, went forth as Yahweh had spoken to him. And Lot went with him.

Now, Abram was 75 years old when he departed from Haran. So, Abram took Sarai, his wife, and Lot, his brother's son, and all their possessions which they had accumulated, and the persons which they had acquired in Haran. And they departed to go forth to the land of Canaan.

Thus, they came to the land of Canaan. And Abram passed through the land, as far as the site of Shechem, to the yoke of Moreh. Now, the Canaanite was then in the land.

Then Yahweh appeared to Abram and said, to your seed, I will give this land. So, he built an altar there to Yahweh who had appeared to him. Then he proceeded from there to the mountain on the east side of Bethel.

And he pitched his tent with Bethel on the west side of Ai on the east. And there he built an altar to Yahweh and called upon the name of Yahweh. And Abram journeyed on, continuing toward the Negev.

Last week in chapter 11, we were introduced to Abram. We got to meet the father of our faith. We got to be introduced to who Paul would say is our spiritual father.

We're sons of Abraham if we are in Christ. We found that Moses is intent on providing quite a bit of background material for us because understanding Abram's roots are significant in understanding how God works in salvation. Not just to know, okay, here's the father, the spiritual father of the faith, but to understand where he came from.

We saw those roots that were significant and we had somewhat of a long lead in there in chapter 11. First, we saw, of course, Abram's bloodlines. We saw his bloodlines that Moses really slows down and parks it on the generations of Shem beginning in verse 10.

He focuses on that one line, that one lineage. We said that's not without consequence. And what's happening there is Moses is connecting Abram to fulfillment of a previous promise.

That's why we're saying the promised plan of God is progressing right now. So you remember back in the garden, Genesis chapter 3, Adam and Eve have just sinned and they're reeling from their decision to rebel. All right, we know what that feels like.

You know what it feels like when you really blow it and you have a sin issue that is just painful and you know the consequences are going to be painful and you're feeling ashamed and discouraged by it, perhaps even hopeless and despairing. I mean, Adam and Eve rebelled against the law of God. They instantly lost intimate fellowship with God.

They lost fellowship with one another. They experienced for the very first time the feelings of guilt. I mean, can you imagine to have never known guilt and then suddenly get hit with it for the first time? It's about enough when you're used to it.

And then they're ashamed. They cover themselves with leaves. They would have been filled at that time with wicked desires.

So they would have suddenly been reeling from the noetic effects of sin and their minds have been filled with sinful thoughts and corrupt desires, not to mention the fear of death that instantly would have come into their hearts. So they're reeling and right there in that bitterness, God comes to them. You remember what he promised in chapter 3 verse 15? He promised that there would be a seed of the woman who would crush the serpent's head.

He said, of course, there would be enmity. There would be a challenge now between Satan and the offspring of the woman to try to attempt to snuff out the Messiah's line. And in fact, the Messiah would be bruised on the heel.

That would be Jesus on the cross. But he would ultimately crush the serpent's head. And so for Adam and Eve, this was a moment of hope.

God is going to fix the problem that we now find ourselves in that we cannot undo or fix ourselves. And so that Proto-Evangelion, that first mention of the gospel, is not merely something to be discussed in ivory towers. This was their reliance.

Adam and Eve believed God. They were in the garden, hopeless and ashamed and guilty, believing that there would one day be a child that would come who would fix what they had messed up. It was a lifeline of hope.

And so then for the last 2,000 years, God has been providentially bringing about that seed of the woman in the progress of his promise plan. And we've seen throughout this plan various righteous lines. Adam, to Seth, and eventually to Noah, and to Shem, and to Peleg, and to Abram.

And so when you read about those bloodlines of Abram, we're to see that this is part of God's promise plan. And get this, it cannot be stopped. It can't be stopped by human sin.

And God flooded the entire earth except for one family. And what happens? His promise plan is still just marching along as he intended. So a wicked man comes together to create a one-world alliance to make a name for himself and reject God.

And what happens? It doesn't stop the plan. God just disperses everyone into their places with separate languages. He does that easily with great ease.

And yet he comes here to Abram, and he calls this man from a very dark background. And so we see that this bloodline of the line of the Messiah attests to God's faithfulness, his goodness, his trustworthiness. And it is not without consequence that Abram came from a very messed-up home life.

We saw his background, and we looked at that. He grew up in Ur, a city that worshipped false gods. His own wife, his brother's wife, they both had names associated with idolatry.

According to Joshua 24, the family served other gods. So Abram grew up just as a little guy learning the practice of idolatry. Isn't that helpful? And sometimes you might meet someone, and you think, man, there's no hope for that person.

I mean, they've been discipled in godless ways of thinking from their earliest breath. Well, that was Abram. He grew up bowing down to the moon and doing whatever else the family did in their idolatrous worship.

And that was his practice, and it was what he knew, and it was what was familiar, and all of his lifestyle was built around that. And so God's grace comes then not to a bright, shining family, but into the darkness. And of course, Abraham eventually will be an example of God's grace to Gentiles, because Abraham is declared righteous before he's circumcised, he's not Jewish.

And so we're to see a bit of ourselves in Abraham to learn that God's salvation is offered freely to all. God's salvation is offered freely to all, and God glorifies Himself by graciously saving, graciously setting His love and mercy upon people who don't deserve it. And Abraham stands as an example of how God's Word works, because as we'll see, God comes and He speaks to Abraham in that moment of his idolatry, and he responds.

It's effectual. Didn't need a bunch of pre-evangelism before he came. He didn't need to be convinced of all the rational reasons to believe in God.

God came and He spoke, and it was effectual in his heart. And then we saw the break that Abraham made. He was still Abram, but he left his homeland at that time.

He received the call of God, and he departed. And so this morning, we come now to God's initiation of His relationship with Abram. And so if you're keeping an outline this morning, it's the outline for our text today.

Verse 1 begins with His call to Abram. So God initiates a relationship with Abram, and first we see His call to Abram. Verse 1, And Yahweh said to Abram, Go forth from your land, and from your kin, and from your father's house.

All right, this is the message. This is what Abram hears from the Lord. Now, we have a family member, and this family member does not withhold information, doesn't necessarily withhold truth in like a deceptive way, but they're also not known for presenting like a logical, cohesive, comprehensive story at the get-go.

So information kind of leaks out. You get a little bit here, and then you get a little bit there, and you get a little bit there, and then you get the joy of like piecing it all together and trying to get a complete picture, okay? Well, it's kind of what God is doing with Abram here. He's not giving him the whole enchilada right up front, okay? He's giving him some instructions, but this is really just the very beginning.

We could say broad brush strokes, 30,000-foot view, just a few details, kind of the rough outline and framework, and then He's going to fill it in later as we go. And so, if you were Abram, and you're the kind of person that has a lot of questions about things, you like to know the details, you read labels, you like to know what to expect, or you prefer to be in control of your circumstances or the outcome, this would be a very challenging message to receive because it is bare bones indeed. Abram's not given the full picture up front.

He's given minimal information, and surely his questions would not have been answered to human satisfaction. He did not have a complete understanding or a visible guarantee of what is to come. Rather, we just read, Yahweh said to Abraham, go, go forth from your land and from your kin and from your father's house.

Now, go is an action word, is it not? It's an imperative. If you want to know the Hebrew here, the nuance is this, go. God is issuing a command, okay? It's a divine order.

It's forefronted in the words. I mean, that is the first word it would seem when God came to Abram. He says, go.

Reflecting on this a little bit, it's interesting in the gospel, primarily we hear or think of come, do we not? That's what the prophet Isaiah would say, Isaiah 55, one, ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters. And you who have no money, buy and eat, come buy wine and milk without money and without cost. Jesus in John 7, 37 says, if anyone is thirsty, let him come to me and drink.

Matthew 11, 28, come to me, Jesus says, all you who are weary and heavy laden, it's an invitation, it's a beckoning. And Abram right here, rather than get immediately an invitation, he gets an eviction, does he not? The first offer of the gospel to Abram is to get up and go, to leave it all behind. Look at the separation, go forth from your land and from your kin and from your father's house.

Separation language. Abram, I want you to separate right now, make a clean break from that which is near and dear to you. And salvation is, of course, not conditioned upon human performance, this idea that I kind of gather up my stuff and I offer it to Jesus and that's how I gain salvation.

But that gate is, in fact, narrow and the allegiance is a full requirement. It's very similar then to what Jesus said, and we read it in our Scripture reading this morning to the rich young ruler. Jesus looking at him, according to Mark 10, verse 21, loved him.

Side note, that's fascinating. Here's a man that maybe doesn't even believe ultimately in Jesus, but he still looks upon him and he loves him, he has compassion for him. And he says, one thing you lack, what? Go, go and sell all you possess.

And then he ends it with, come, follow me. So, it's not two distinct separate activities that we merely go, we merely come. It's the same action here in repentance that we're turning from something to something.

But it's also true the emphasis here is a little bit different, and Abram is called first and foremost to leave what he knows and trusts in, what he finds comfort in, what is familiar to him, what makes sense, and he's called out of it. It's interesting to note here that God is breaking up a family, and that's not really the primary purpose. Okay? That's not the mission of God to destroy families.

But it's also true that he makes himself the dividing line and the dividing issue. And so, sometimes God separates families. And that's what happens to Abram.

He has to leave his pagan roots. And so, although he starts out on the journey with his father and he starts out on the journey with his nephew, his father dies, what does that mean? It means he left a brother back in Ur. We'll find out later that Laban is back in Ur, and Rebecca, and Leah, and Rachel, and there's a whole clan, a whole kin that he is leaving behind.

And part of that separation was even necessary in God's design because Abram is going to be a new nation, and a new race, and a new people who break from idolatry, or at least theoretically that's the point. Israel, of course, will struggle with that. And so, sometimes faith in God separates families.

Jesus himself said in Matthew 10, verse 34, do not think that I came to bring peace on earth. I did not come to bring peace, but a sword. For I came to set a man against his father, and a daughter against her mother, and a daughter-in-law against her mother-in-law, and a man's enemies will be the members of his own household.

And Jesus goes on to say that he's the thing, he's the deal. He says, he who loves father or mother more than me is not worthy of me. And he who loves son or daughter more than me is not worthy of me.

And he who does not take his cross and follow after me is not worthy of me. He who has found his life will lose it, and he who has lost his life for my sake will find it. And so, Abraham is a pioneer in the faith.

And he's called out as a pioneer from his family. And part of that separation, even from his brother, no doubt, was a religious separation. Yet, of course, Abraham, as we will find, loses nothing.

It's the same way if you're in Christ. If you've lost a family relationship, not due to your own sin and your own folly and you've created separation in a relationship due to dishonoring the Lord and the relational dynamics. But if you've lost a relationship simply over the gospel of Jesus Christ, you need to be comforted by Jesus when he says that no one who's lost anything for his sake won't get it back.

Matthew 19.29, everyone who's left houses or brothers or sisters or father or mother or children or farms for my sake will receive 100 times as much and will inherit eternal life. For Abraham, this is what was near and dear to his heart, and it's what the Lord asked him for. It's not the last time that Abraham is going to be asked for something near and dear to him.

He's going to be asked for Isaac later to see if he really trusts the Lord. And so, when we look at Abraham, the father of our faith, it immediately puts the question right in front of us. Am I attempting to straddle two worlds? I mean, Abraham does not continue to cling to those relationships, the wealth that he had amassed there.

He's going to take his animals with him. He's a wealthy guy. But think about it, him and his wife are barren at this point.

They don't even have offspring. And so, the thought is we're going to leave all the family roots and whatever is established here in the name and reputation for we don't even know yet. That's the call.

See, Abraham, as the father of our faith, demonstrates saying goodbye and parting with anything that Jesus would ask of you to part with. You know, sometimes you'll hear a preacher get going on the cost of discipleship and they're waxing eloquent about all the things that you must have given up for Christ. And I hear that and I think, well, here's the deal.

Maybe Jesus hasn't asked that of you yet, you know? Like, you don't feel bad that you haven't given up your life yet and been a martyr for the sake of the gospel. Like, it'd be pretty tough to do that right now in the U.S. But I do think this, it would be that I've given up anything in the path of discipleship that Jesus has asked me to give up. That I can say there's nothing that I'm hanging on to as though this is protected.

Like, if you were to get into a lawsuit, right, your 401k employer sponsored is theoretically protected. You know, your primary dwelling is protected so they can take everything else, but not those. There's no protected assets in your discipleship with the Lord.

It's all to be His. And if you want to follow your father in the faith, Abraham, understand that when he left Ur, he never went back. He left and he never went back.

And that's the willingness of the heart of a disciple, is it not? Lord, I give it to you and if you require it of me, it's yours. And Abraham, of course, receives back so much more. He gets a relationship with the living God who he now loves and trusts.

And so, I'm sure if you visited Abraham at some point, years down the road, and said, hey, if you could do it all over again, take me back to the call of the Lord in Ur, would you do it all over again? And he would say, I wouldn't even think twice. I'd give it all up again gladly. And so, the cost of discipleship for Abraham is to leave his extended family.

He leaves his brother, he leaves his nephew, all of his kin, and he goes out into verse 1 to the land, the Lord says, which I will show you. I mean, can you? You have no coordinates, you have no GPS, you don't have like one of those little things they have at AAA that you get to fold out and kind of see where you're going and start to imagine what it's going to look like. No website to check out.

All he has is the naked promise of God. And that is hard when you have nothing in the flesh to assure you of the outcome before taking the step of faith, other than the naked command of God. And all you have is a principle or a promise or a truth that you're clinging to.

And you can't yet see how it's all going to map out. Abraham didn't know where he was going. That's amazing.

He was a wealthy guy. We'll find out later. I mean, he had hundreds of sheep and goats, perhaps even thousands.

He had herdsmen that he was traveling with. So, you just picture, I mean, these entourages, they move pretty slow. They'd move along the river and could have some animals that are pregnant or some that are babies.

You're just kind of trucking along. You're doing the thing. You're going pretty slow.

You're working your way out. You imagine, you know, Lot, the nephew at some point saying, Abram, can you just, like, can you tell me where are we going? Abram says, well, I'll tell you when you get there. Well, it sounds kind of like a smart aleck.

No, I don't know. Like, if I knew I would tell you, but I know as much as you do right now. We are departing and the Lord will show us, look at that, to the land which I will show you.

So, just start making your way north. When you get there, I'll show you where you want to be. And do you understand the benefit it is to us to see this faith on display? I mean, I just love the way the Scripture works, as a side note.

We have all these instructions in the New Testament regarding faith. And they're so important in defining faith, helping us understand what it looks like in the principles. And then we have these examples in the Old Testament.

What do they do? They bring a living color. Same principle. It's just a kind of a way to enter in and see it.

And so, for Abram here, he has to believe God and hope in that which is unseen. Means he doesn't have to experience it first in order to believe God. He doesn't need additional guarantees in order to believe God.

And so, faith is somewhat uncomfortable for us because there's no assurance beyond the promise of God. That's it. It's like all of the eggs are in that basket.

And yet to say, for Abram, God has a land that he's going to show me. And guess what? That's all I need. That's all I need.

Oswald Chambers said, faith never knows where it is being led. I think that's true. Faith never knows where it's being led.

I don't know where the Lord is going to take me this afternoon. Faith never knows where it is being led, but it loves and knows the one who is leading. And that is so good.

Faith never knows where it is being led, but it loves and knows the one who is leading. And so, Abram is trusting the Lord. His faith is in action.

And if you want the kind of simple breakdown of faith, we talk about this a lot. It's really three things. First of all, you have to have the contents.

You have to actually know what it is that God has promised. Okay, number two, you have to believe it. So far, so good, but we're only to where the demons are at, right? They know the truth and they believe it.

The third is very critical, and that is entrustment. It's relying upon it. And so, when you see in your life an area where you would say, I know what the Bible says, I think I believe what the Bible says, I affirm it, but I'm not able to act on it.

The issue is that area of entrustment. You're not relying upon it. There's still a leaning on your own understanding.

And so, Abram here relies on God. His faith then is going to manifest itself in action. It manifests itself in action.

And of course, he finds something better. So, this is God's call to Abraham. It's first point is God initiates a relationship with him.

Our second point is his promise to Abraham. His promise to Abraham. God issues not only a command for Abram to obey and to obey by faith and to obey out of love for him, but in addition to that, he gives him a promise to believe that God is good to us.

The Bible certainly is filled with many commands, but those commands are nestled between promises. Promises about God's grace to us, promises that empower our obedience, promises of the rewards of obedience. And so, God is so good and so gracious that not only does he call Abram out of idolatry and give him an instruction, but then he gives him the comfort and the confidence of promises.

These promises are reiterated all over the New Testament, and you and I are benefiting from these promises even right here, right now. The Lord says in verse 2, and I will make you a great nation and I will bless you and make your name great. And so, you shall be a blessing and I will bless those who bless you.

And the one who curses you, I will curse. And in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed. Do you see the work of God here? This is how God works in the lives of his people.

Yes, Abram received very specific promises as the father of our faith, but he's also considered in Scripture to be an example of God's salvation. And look with me at the sovereign grace and the power of God. Look at the grammar.

Notice the subject, which is the one doing the action, the verbs, and the object, which is the one being acted upon. What is God's role and what is Abraham's role? Verse 1, I will show you. That's the Lord doing the action upon the object, which is Abram.

Verse 2, I will make you. I will bless you. For simplicity, the text doesn't say, I will make your name great, but it's there too.

I will make your name great. Verse 3, I will bless and I will curse. You're seeing the sovereign grace of God dripping all over this.

I mean, this is the same in our salvation. God is the one that is the actor acting in mercy to us. And so we'll fill this in in the coming weeks, but just briefly to look at kind of the broad framework of this promise that God makes to Abram.

He tells him that he will be a great nation. There's really three parts to this. I don't really like sub outlines, but I'm doing it.

So here it is under point number two, there's three little sub points. And these are the framework for this promise. First, it is you will be a great nation.

Verse 2, I will make you a great nation, a people group, a defined group of people by geography and language and government. And of course, this will happen through his line through Isaac and then through Jacob, who becomes father Israel, and then the 12 tribes. Not only that, but he will make Abram's name great.

So he gets a nation and he gets a name. God says, I will bless you. Verse 2, and I will make your name great.

That night over dinner, I don't know what it was like. I would think, you know, Abram and Sarai are enjoying a meal and he's like, baby, we're going to be famous. I mean, the Lord said, we're going to get a great name.

God is going to make his reputation honorable. This is an expansive blessing, an expansive supply that will be good for all people. And that blessing is going to spill out really on to others.

And so the third part of this blessing is that Abram himself will become a great blessing to others. Here's an Abram's blessing is not a zero sum game. It's not as if God had a set limited amount of blessing.

And he said, okay, I gave the portion to Abram and now there's a little bit left. Rather, the picture is he's giving blessing to Abraham and he will now be a conduit of blessing ultimately to the families of the nations. In fact, God is going to offer divine protection.

It's the same for us in our salvation. Verse three, I will bless those who bless you and the one who curses you, I will curse. This is going to be very important as he gets to Canaan, the very specific parameters there that God has given for divine protection.

And you and I are not protected from physical harm. In God's design, sometimes we are physically harmed. Christians are even persecuted and put to death.

So this idea is not that you're protected from all difficulty. Rather, your faith is protected and preserved. And then your Testament even teaches that God's stores up wrath and vengeance for those who harm his people.

So God comes and he gives this promise to Abram. I'm not sure if it conjured up in your mind, but think of the contrast with what we just read about in chapter 11. Chapter 12, we read, I will.

I will do this. I will do this. I will do this.

Great name, a great nation. Back in chapter 11, verse 2, and it happened as they journeyed east that they found a plain in the land of Shinar and settled there. Then he said to one another, come, let us make bricks and burn them thoroughly.

And they had brick for stone and they had tar for mortar. And they said, come, let us build for ourselves a city and a tower whose top will reach into heaven and let us make a name for ourselves, lest we be scattered over the face of the whole earth. I mean, right here you have man trying to do it on his own for his glory and the futility of that.

God's rejection of that. God being unwilling to share his glory, unwilling for allowing man to make a name for himself and to trust in himself, to glory in himself, desire reputation and honor for his own sake and to control his own destiny. Now he comes to Abram and there on the shores of Euphrates, he grabs this pagan idolater and says, guess what? Jackpot.

I mean, you're going to get the name and the nation and I'm going to do it all for you because that's how I work. I do all things to exalt my name and for my glory and for my purposes and for my counsel. And right here, that very idea of blessing stirs this up in our minds.

I will bless you, the Lord says. And whenever you read that, it just should jump off the page two things. Now we're like sub points under sub points.

We're getting really crazy this morning. When you read blessing in the scriptures, understand it has a divine origin. It has a divine origin.

It comes from God. He is the source. I mean, the true source of all blessing comes from God.

It's the only blessing that truly matters. Not only that, but blessings are always undeserved. They say God bestows blessings as a gift.

That's part of what makes them so glorious. I mean, yes, in one sense, there's a blessing and a reward with exercising faith that comes. It's often connected by God's design to obedience.

If you want the path of greatest blessing on this life and greatest joy and fulfillment and favor, certainly give yourself to submission to God. But the blessing of God, categorically speaking, is never earned. It's always bestowed as a gift.

Or we could say it this way. The blessed life is not something you achieve, but something you receive. See, Abram receives this blessing because God decided he wanted to give it to him.

And then he says so wonderfully at the end of verse three, and in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed. It's not because Abram is so great, but God will bring a great one forth from his family descendants. Abraham then is blessed to be a blessing.

Do you understand that? God was gracious to Abraham so that he might be gracious to you and me. And the picture here is the blessing then spreads. The promised plan of God is progressing.

It's kind of been in what appears to be neutral for a couple thousand years. I mean, God saved Noah. There's a little bit of deliverance.

We haven't seen a whole lot of progress, it would seem. Now in Genesis chapter 12, on the banks of the Euphrates, we take a leap forward in the promised plan of God in redemptive history. And we're still benefiting from that today.

I want you to turn with me to Galatians chapter three as we finish out this morning. Galatians chapter three, Paul here picks up this very theme. He wants the churches to understand their connection to Abraham.

He wants them to understand Abraham's salvation so that they better understand their own salvation in Christ. They want to understand that God makes good on his promises and he saves apart from works. Galatians chapter three, verse five.

So then does he who provides you with the spirit and works miracles among you do it by the works of the law or by hearing with faith. Just as Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness. So you know that those who are of faith, those are sons of Abraham.

And the scripture foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith. That's you and me. Proclaim the gospel, proclaim the good news beforehand to Abraham saying, all the nations will be blessed in you.

It was last time someone asked you what the gospel is and you thought, you know, I'm going to open and turn to Genesis chapter 12, verse three, to explain to them the gospel. God proclaimed the gospel beforehand to Abraham when he said, all the nations will be blessed in you. So then those who are of faith, verse nine, are blessed with Abraham, the believer.

We share in his blessing. So here we see this undeserving pagan blessed by God. He says, I'm going to bless you so you can be a blessing to others.

And guess what? Here we are. Is that not magnificent to you? I was just thinking about it. You know, today you kind of hear the talking point.

Someone will talk about, you know, white evangelicals and it kind of sounds like we have this recent faith that we just came up with and it's very Western in nature and it's United States related. I'm thinking like, man, the father of my faith is 4,000 years ago from the Middle East, like right here in Genesis chapter 12. I mean, this is the promise of faith that we are connected to.

All of this, of course, would come to the promised seed, which was the Messiah. Verse 10, for as many as are of the works of the law are under a curse, for it is written, cursed is everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law to do them. Now that no one is justified by the law before God is evident for the righteous shall live by faith.

Now that no one is justified by the law before God is evident for the righteous shall live by faith. However, the law is not of faith. Rather, he who does them shall live by them.

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law, having become a curse for us, for it is written, cursed is everyone who hangs on a tree. Now get this, in order, verse 14, that in Christ Jesus, the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles so that we would receive the promise of the Spirit through faith. I was reflecting on this this week.

I was thinking, man, Abram was presented with that call of God to go forth from Ur. And all he would have been able to see in that moment would have been the family relationships, the logistics, the wealth. Here we are 4,000 years later in a congregation experiencing the blessing of Abraham.

He would have had no concept. I don't think he would have had any concept of all that God was going to do, even the details of Jesus of Nazareth crucified at the hands of the Romans. But when he heard in you all the nations, all the families of the earth are going to be blessed, he said, all right, I trust you.

And he believed God. Isn't that an encouragement? Makes you instantly feel humbled at all the times you ask God for more than what he's revealed, does it not? I invite you to pray with me. God in heaven, thank you so much for the father Abraham who trusted you and followed you, Lord, and ultimately became the father of our faith.

Thank you for the Lord Jesus Christ, his promised seed in whom all the nations of the earth find blessing. Lord, we thank you that we get to share in what you gave to him. Lord, knowing that the ultimate fulfillment of that promise was in things that Abraham did not see in his own lifetime, but things that he would receive later.

And so in many ways, we are in the same place today, recognizing that we have a foretaste of what you've promised, and yet we're still waiting to receive an inheritance that is laid up for us. We love you so much. We praise you.

Amen.