Divine Covenant – Abraham Part 1
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[00:00:00] And take your Bibles and open up to Genesis 15.
We are going to read,
we're gonna read most of the, the chapter. I'm gonna skip a few verses here and there, but I'll let you know when we get there. But if, uh, you don't mind standing for the hearing and the reading of God's word,
and I would ask that you hear it for what it is. The true, the living, the words of God, almighty Genesis, chapter 15, verse one. After these things, the word of Yahweh came to Abram in a vision saying, do not fear. Abram, I'm a shield to you. Your reward shall be very great. Abraham said, OT. Yahweh, what will you give me since I am childless in the air of my house is Zer of Damascus.
And [00:01:00] Abraham said, since you have given me no seed, one born in my house is my heir. And behold, the word of Yahweh came to him saying, this man will not be your heir, but one who will come forth from your own body. He shall be your heir. And he took him outside and said, now look toward the heavens and count the stars if you're able to count them.
And he said, so shall your seed be. Then. Abraham believed in Yahweh. And God reckoned it to him as righteousness. And he said to him, I am Yahweh who brought you out of ear of the Chaldeans to give you this land, to possess it? And Abram said, oh Lord God, how may I know that I will possess it? So he said to him, bring me a three-year-old half or a 3-year-old female goat, a 3-year-old ram, a turtle dove, and a young pigeon.
And then he brought all these to him and cut them in two and laid each half opposite the other. But he did not cut the [00:02:00] birds, and the birds of prey came down upon the carcasses and Abram drove them away. Now, when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram and behold, terror and great darkness fell upon him.
If you jump down to verse 17, it came about when the sun had set. It was very dark and behold a smoking oven and a flaming torch, which passed between these pieces. On that day, Yahweh made a covenant with Abram saying to your seed, I have given this land from the river of Egypt as far as the Great River, the river Euphrates.
May God bless the reading, the hearing, and obedience to his word. Please be seated.
So we are in the midst of a series on [00:03:00] God's covenants. How does God interact with mankind? Has he done it in a variety of ways or has he done it in a very consistent way? And I have argued that he has always done it by means of a covenant. In fact, I have said, and I would continue to say that God's redemptive covenants actually structure the Bible.
I think the analogy that I used was a skeleton. So the covenants of the skeleton and everything else in scripture are conformed to the skeleton. The skeleton holds them in place. In fact, I would argue that you cannot make sense of scripture unless you understand it as a covenant document. Interestingly enough, 295 times the word covenant is used in scripture.
I've given you a couple definitions of what a covenant is. One comes from the book, the Christ of the Covenants, written by a man by the name of Old Palmer Robertson. I think it's a very [00:04:00] good definition, a bond in blood, sovereignly administered. And then I've given you a slightly different definition just to kind of help flesh things out.
And I've argued that there are at least three elements of every redemptive covenant in scripture, every covenant that God enters into with mankind. First and foremost, it is a relationship with God. That's what a covenant is. It's a friendship. It is a relationship. However, it is sovereignly administered.
God is the one who initiates. God is the one who controls. Every covenant has a promise. Sometimes it's implied. But as we'll see with Abraham as we continue, 'cause we're gonna take two weeks to look at Abraham, but the promise becomes crystal clear. I will be your God and the God of your seed. I will be your God, the God of your children, and you'll be my people.
And last but not least, there are consequences. I'm sorry, conditions and consequences. In every covenant, there are conditions and [00:05:00] consequences in every covenant, and therefore, we also find blessings and curses, blessings for those who obey curses. For those who disobey. It and hopefully the message of scripture is fairly clear.
None of us have obeyed, all of us have transgressed. There's not a single man, woman, or child save one who has truly lived up to their covenant responsibilities, and that's why we need to be in Christ. That's why the grace of God is so amazing that Jesus Christ would come and he would do the work in our stead, and he would pay the penalty in our stead.
So we're gonna pick it up today in chapters 12 through 15. But before we get there, I just wanna give you a running start because there's some important things, some contextual issues that you want to get, get down and kind of remember. So we're just gonna take a running start in chapter nine. You don't need to turn there 'cause we're gonna, we're gonna go that fast, but we, hopefully you'll remember we ended halfway through chapter nine.
We ended with Noah and his sons coming outta the ark and God [00:06:00] initiated a covenant sign, the sign of the rainbow. And God sets the sign in, in the clouds, and what does God say? I'm putting it there so that I remember. I'm putting it there so that when I see it, I will remember what God is saying is I will take all responsibility.
We'll see that again with Abraham, but sadly by the time we get to the end of chapter nine, Noah gets drunk. Noah gets drunk, his younger son. Somehow violates and we don't know. It's a very difficult passage to really understand what's going on there. But Noah sins by getting drunk ham sins, by violating his father in some capacity.
And so we see that Noah did not bring the promised rest, but it was a type A shadow, a picture of something coming. And then we see that Noah dies. He's 950 years old, but he still dies. It's a further reminder that sin is ever present. And then we get to chapter 10. And Chapter Ten's a really interesting chapter.
It's typically [00:07:00] known as the Table of Nations. And the reason that's important is because we see the genealogy of Noah's sons and 70 Nations come from the Sons of Noah. And the reason it's important is when we get to the book of numbers and we get to the ceremonial system and we get to the feast known as booze or tabernacles.
It's an eight day feast, and for the first seven days, 13, on the first day, 12, 11, 10, it goes down to day seven 70 bulls are sacrificed and these 70 bulls are sacrificed for the 70 nations found in Genesis 10. In other words, Israel is supposed to be a light to the nations. The the Gentiles were supposed to come into the nation of Israel.
In some sense, they were also heirs of the promise. And we see that, and it's tied to Chapter 10, but what's fascinating about the Feast of Booze, and I want you to think about this because again, I guess my theme today is the [00:08:00] consistency of scripture, the overwhelming consistency of scripture. But you have 70 nations, and in the Feast of Booth, you have sacrifices a bull.
For every nations. The Gentiles are supposed to come in and at the end of the seven days, it begins on the Sabbath. And at the end of the seventh day, seventh day, one more day, the eighth day. And the eighth day is called a Sabbath, the eighth day Sabbath. We've talked about it. So we have something, we have a picture in the Feast of Booze of the Gentile nations coming in, and then on the eighth day, which would be what the first day of the week, there's a Sabbath.
And I've argued before what happens with the coming of Christ Jesus. The Sabbath has changed. The Sabbath is no longer the seventh day. We no longer start our week looking forward to the Sabbath, but we actually begin our week reminded of rest because of what Christ Jesus has done. Just a, a side note, as we keep going, Noah's sons are named, uh, Shem, ham and [00:09:00] Jpe.
And, and just so you know, because it's really hard with the English Bible, we do not know their birth order. Okay. The only thing we know is that ham is not the oldest. Okay? Uh, you'll read in Genesis 9 24, uh, this is when Ham does something to his father, and most of your English versions will say something like, Noah's youngest son did X, Y, and Z.
The problem is, that's not really what the Hebrew word means. The Hebrew word literally just means his younger son. Doesn't mean youngest necessarily. It just rules him out as being the oldest. Now, why is that important? Well, in some sense it's not, but in another sense because of consistency, because of shadows and types.
We'll see why it's important in just a minute. Noah son, Shem would be in the line of Abraham, and Abraham was in the line of Christ. And then we get to Genesis chapter 11 and kids, you'll remember Genesis chapter 11 and kids, you can holler it out if you can think of it. But what happened? What was [00:10:00] built in Genesis chapter 11?
Anybody remember the Tower of Babel? The Tower of Babel, and we read about the, the Tower of Babel in verses one through nine and, and kids, there's a question on your handout about the, the, the Tower of Babel. What did God do? You see? God did something to the people he messed with their languages so they couldn't understand anyone.
Or each other. And then in chapter 10, or I'm sorry, in chapter 11, verse 10, there's a new section and we get a up close look at the genealogy of Shem. And this is really important because of how the genealogy is written. And in chapter 11, verse 10, you'll read the genealogy and it goes something like this.
Shem lived X number of years and he became the father of so and so. He had other sons and daughters. He lived another so many years and he died. What does that sound like? Genesis chapter five. You see Chapter 11, the [00:11:00] genealogy found in Chapter 11, verse 10. Forward is supposed to remind us of the genealogy found in chapter five.
Why? Because there's something of a new creation, because terror is the new Noah, and the Bible wants us to put these things together. It wants us to make these connections. Noah has three sons. Tara has three sons, and guess what? Tara's sons are, Abram, Nahor, and Harran. And we can't figure out their birth order.
You see the picture's complete. The only thing we know based on the old and New Testament, putting it together is Abraham is most likely the youngest son, but we don't know really who the firstborn was. And then we get to chapter 12, and that's where we're gonna pick up the story. But I just wanna give you some themes in chapter 12.
First of all, the word covenant is not used. The word covenant will not be used with Abraham until we get to chapter 15, but God enters into a relationship In chapter 12, God sovereignly establishes this relationship. Number [00:12:00] one on your, uh, sermon outline, you've got a sermon outline in your, uh, bulletins.
You also have a, uh, folded in a half page that we'll talk about here momentarily. Um, but number one on your sermon outline, God's command and promise to Abram. God's command and promise to Abraham, and it begins in chapter 12 verse one. So it's important. Follow along with me. Is this what your Bible says, Yahweh said to Abraham.
If you're willing, if you're interested, if you would be interested in the blessing, if you would be willing of your own free will to, to do some things, I'll, I'll bless you and I'll make it worth your while. Is that what your Bible say? No, it's not what your Bible says. Now, Yahweh said to Abraham, go forth.
It was a sovereign command. Abraham did not have a choice. God chose [00:13:00] Abraham and God was going to use Abraham to do something. He didn't ask if Abraham would be a willing participant. He wasn't worried about Abraham's supposed free will. It, but God was sovereign and God initiated this relationship and God initiated the conditions.
Abraham go, go from your country, from your relatives, from your father's house to the land, which I will show you. And the interesting thing was he didn't even tell him where he was going. If you think about the text, I just want you to go and when you go, I'll give you further direction. I'll let you know where I want you to go, but for now, just leave.
Leave your family. Leave everything that's normal. Leave everything that that means something to you by yourself, your father, your brother, your nephew's gonna go, but that's it. Go Abraham. And then God promises Abraham. Seven things. And kids. This is [00:14:00] another question on your handout, and what we're looking for on your handout is the first three things that God promises.
Abraham, you see, God is gracious, God is sovereign, and God sets the conditions of the covenant. God sets the conditions of our relationship with him, and then he gives us incentive. I mean, think about it. God doesn't have to do that. God could just give us orders, but he gives us incentive. So what does he say to Abram?
I will make you a great nation. I'm gonna make you a great nation. I will bless you and I will make your name great and so you shall be a blessing, and I think it's important, this language. I will make your name great. It is ironic because you don't, you don't need to turn there, but just make a note of it in chapter 11, verse four, in the story of the Tower of Babel.
Why did they wanna build that, that tower? And just so you know, [00:15:00] it was, it was a temple. They were building a temple, a, a worship center, and they wanted to build it and go up into the sky. And what's the reason they give? Let us make for ourselves a name. We wanna make our name great and God came down and God shut it down and God confused them.
And God spread them out because God originally said, I want you to go and I want you to take dominion of the entire world. And they weren't going. And so God, so to speak, pushed them out of the nest. But you see, they wanted to make their name great and it wasn't gonna happen. And yet God uses the same terminology with Abraham.
I will make your name great. So it's ironic because again, we need to learn to make these comparisons. We need to learn how scripture goes back and forth and how it's connected. But you see, we also need to look forward because in Second Samuel chapter seven, when God enters into covenant with Abraham, what does God tell Abraham?
I'm sorry, [00:16:00] David, when God enters into covenant with David in two Samuel seven, I will make you a great name. You see we have a picture here. Abraham is royalty. God is treating Abraham as royalty. I'll make you a great nation. I'll bless you. I will make your name great, just like I'm gonna make David's name great and you will be a blessing.
Verse three. 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. Three things I wanna point out about this verse. He says, those, I will bless those who bless you, but the one who curses you. And this is an interesting word because the word simply means the one who dishonors you, the one who treats you slightly, the one who treats you in a trifling way.
That person, I will curse. But the second word translated curse [00:17:00] is a very strong term. It's used of the plagues in Egypt. It's used elsewhere of God cursing things in a mighty way. You see, Abraham, I love you so much, and from you, Abraham will come to Christ and from you, Abraham will come other believers and you will be my people.
And if anyone treats you even slightly, if anyone treats you as if you're not significant, if anyone dishonors you, I will deal with it. I will curse them. I will make things right. And how often today do we look around and we think, oh, the church is losing and we don't believe these promises? Partly because we don't understand God's timing.
Partly because God's timing's not our timing. But I will deal with anyone that curses you. I will deal with anyone that disrespects you, but I will deal with them in a mightier way, and we're gonna see that in a minute when God deals with Pharaoh. It. Not only that, but in you, all the families [00:18:00] of the earth will be blessed.
And God uses a word here and it's not, it's not the, uh, the small family. It's not mom, dad, and children, but it's a word that can be translated, clan or extended family. And there's a principle here, and if you get anything in your notes, get this in your notes. God works with families and we've lost sight of that in 21st century Modern America.
Because we're so individual and we think of individualism and you know, we individually need to come to Christ. And yet throughout scripture and even here at the beginning, God promises I'm going to work through families and not just mom, dad, and kids, but extended families. And not only am I gonna work through families, but I'm gonna bless families throughout the earth.
And it's Im, it's important to know here, it might seem odd at first, but it's important to know here. The Hebrew has two different words that you can translate Earth, and one can be confusing because oftentimes it means earth, but it can also mean land. And oftentimes it means the [00:19:00] promised land. And sometimes it can be hard to know.
Here Moses uses the word that is unambiguous, and it refers to the entire Earth. It refers to the entire globe. It includes the Gentiles. Why is God doing this? We need to ask ourselves, why is God choosing Abraham a foreigner, an idolatry? Abraham was not. We have, there's nothing in the Bible that would indicate that Abraham was a worshiper of God until God called him.
Why is he doing this? To fulfill his covenant promises? Because God made a promise to the woman and that promise was passed down. Through Noah's line. In fact, Noah's father thought that maybe Noah was the fulfillment of that promise, and now God is gonna make the same promise and God is gonna fulfill this promise, and he's gonna continue this promise through Abraham.
And ultimately, as we've seen here to the world, and we need to remember that we get so hung up on the land of Israel. We [00:20:00] get so hung up on the boundaries of Israel and we forget that it was always meant to be a type A shadow. It was always meant to be a picture of the world. And here's the promise.
In verse four, we read very simply, Abraham obeys God. And then later in the chapter, verse seven, seed and land is emphasized. But again, again, and again, we get to verse 10, and Abraham fails. Abraham has a failure. Abraham Sins, you probably remember the story. He and Sariah are going to Egypt and Sariah is a beautiful woman.
So Abraham, much like Adam, who stood up for his wife, right? No, no. Abraham does the same thing Adam did. Uh, babe, you're kind of good looking. I don't wanna get beat up or taken advantage of. So you don't mind, like if Pharaoh shows an interest, [00:21:00] can you just do that for me? And they go to Egypt and Pharaoh shows an interest and Abraham tells a half truth.
She's my sister. Pharaoh takes her into his house. But listen to what God does in verse 17, Yahweh struck Pharaoh. In this word for strike, it's actually used of the last plague it's used of in Exodus chapter 11, verse one. Now, Yahweh said to Moses, one more plague. That's the same word. One more strike I will bring on Pharaoh and on Egypt.
And you all remember what that last plague was? The death of the firstborn. So this is a serious word. Now think of the context for all we know based on the story. Pharaoh believed that Sariah was his sister. In the heart of Pharaoh. He didn't do anything wrong, but he slighted Abraham by accident and God brings a curse on Pharaoh.
And what does it [00:22:00] say? Just Pharaoh? No. The Lord struck Pharaoh and his house. God bless his families. He also curses families and he strikes 'em with a great plague because of Saray. Abram's wife. So what can we learn from this? You see, I think the way that God deals with Abraham is a really good example of how God deals with us.
And I, I wanna add one caveat. God does not deal with everyone the same. We could read of how God dealt with Adam or Moses or David or Peter or Paul or Mark. God doesn't deal with all of us the same. So we need to read how God deals with people because we so often think I sin, I blow. It doesn't matter that I confess my sin.
Doesn't matter that I'm on my knees crying. God must hate me. God's done with me. God can't use me. And if you love Christ Jesus, I guarantee you, you have felt that way at some point in your life. I'm unworthy. Yeah, you're [00:23:00] unworthy and you've been unworthy from the start, and you will be unworthy in the end.
Your worth comes from Christ Jesus and from Christ Jesus alone. Amen. But how does God deal with Abraham? Number one, he does not cast him aside. Abraham commits the same sin that Adam did. Abraham was a wimp, and he didn't protect his wife. And most of us, if we're honest, first of all, we'll never be in that situation.
But most of us, if you're a man and if you're married. I can't even wrap my head around that. Uh, Stace, you're a beautiful woman and I don't wanna get in trouble. So if someone chose an interest, just tell 'em you're, uh, that ain't happening. This was a low point in Abraham's life. But God did not cast him aside.
And I'm not saying we shouldn't expect discipline because Hebrews chapter 12, and we'll get to it, eventually speaks of fatherly and godly discipline. But God actually uses the sin of Abraham to bless him because [00:24:00] Abraham sins and Pharaoh finds out about it, and Pharaoh is under God's curse. All of a sudden, Pharaoh makes Abraham rich, so God does not cast him off.
The other thing we learned in this story is that God is long suffering. You see, God had just entered into covenant with Abraham. Go, I'm gonna bless you. And then again, in chapter 15, he's gonna enter into covenant. He's gonna ratify his covenant. But what does Abraham do in chapter 16? Another sin with another woman.
He sins with Hagar. You see, Abraham has certain ups and downs, and this is important because we have ups and downs all the time. But God does not cast him aside and God is long suffering. And so God will be long suffering with us. So we come to chapters 13 and 14, and in chapter 13, Abraham returns to Canaan and Abraham and lot have to split up.
And here's the interesting thing, because it seems like Abraham has learned from his sin. It seems that [00:25:00] Abraham trusts God even more now because when they need to split up, Abraham had every right to choose. I'm gonna go this way. Lot you go that way. But Abraham trusted God and Abraham said lot. You make the choice.
And lot chose where he was gonna go. So it seems that Abraham's faith was strengthened in chapter 13 verses 14 through 17. We again, see the theme of land and see. We continue to see continuities and advancements. In chapter 13, verse 18, Abraham builds an altar because Abraham worships God. And then we get to chapter 14, which is an odd chapter.
It's a war of kings, and Abraham goes into battle and he fights against kings. The other thing we see in chapter 14 is the story of Mel ek, which is the first thing we're gonna look at when we get back to Hebrews. But then we get to chapter 15, number two on your outline. God's promise, clarified and ratified.
God's [00:26:00] promise. Clarified and ratified seed and ceremony,
chapter 15, verse one. After these things, and we've given you a survey of what the these things were, Abraham fails. Abraham's a mighty warrior. He battles kings. God protects him. Abraham is blessed by melek. After these things, the word of Yahweh came to Abram in a vision saying, do not fear. Do not fear.
Abram, I am a shield. Literally, I am your defense. Again, these promises apply to you and me. And contextually here, specifically here, the idea here is do not fear the world Abraham. Do not fear man, Abraham, and even more specifically, and maybe something we all need to hear, because this I think is the context.
Do not fear circumstances. You see, circumstances cannot [00:27:00] derail my promises. Circumstances cannot remove you from my care, from my shield, from my defense. Do not fear Abraham. And all of this takes place in a vision, and God reminds him, your reward will be very great. And again, it's important to understand that this fear has to do with man, has to do with the world, has to do with circumstances.
Because later in this chapter in verse 12, there is going to be a great fear and a great dread that falls upon Abraham, but it is God word, Abraham fears, Yahweh, and rightly so. But here, don't fear kings. Don't fear man. Don't fear circumstances. And something else about Abraham here, he receives this vision, this prophecy, this encounter with God in a vision.
You see, Abraham is presented as a prophet. And earlier we read that God was gonna make his name great. Abraham is presented as a king. And throughout this story, Abraham stops and he makest alters and he offers [00:28:00] sacrifice. And when we get to chapter 22, he's gonna sacrifice his son Isaac. And it's gonna be a, a picture of Christ.
Abraham is pictured as a priest, a prophet, a king, and a priest. Abraham is a prefigure of Christ Jesus. Abraham is a type. Abraham is a shot shadow. Ultimately, the promised seed will be Christ and none other can fulfill it. Verse two. Abraham said, ot, Yahweh, what will you give me since I'm childless in the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus, and Abraham said, since you have given no seed to me, one born in my house is my he.
A couple of things on this verse. I think two important things. Listen to how Abraham prays. He doesn't just cry out Yahweh, which is God's covenant name, which would've been sufficient, but no, here, Adonai, Yahweh, and I tried to translate most of the names for God because I think it's helpful because they have meaning.
[00:29:00] And Otai emphasizes the fact that God is sovereign over everything. God is the owner of everything. God can do whatever he wants. And so he changes the name that he uses, Adonai Yahweh. He prays and he reminds God who God is. Does God need to be reminded? No, but we do.
In addition to that, and I think this is like the best thing, if you could take this home with you, he prays back to God, God's own promise. We need to learn to do that. We need to learn to address God. I know Yahweh, sovereign God master of all things and he prays his promise back to God and that is not bla this, that is not sinful.
It is not wrong to remind God. God, you promise this to me. You said you would be my God and the God of my children, and so I will pray for my children until there is no [00:30:00] breath left in me. Because you are God. You are Adonai. You are Yahweh. You are covenantal, faithful, and you own all things, and there's nothing too hard for you to do.
Do we pray like that? Do we pray God's promises back to him in humility, but we expect something from God. We expect God to be faithful. That's not sinful, that's not blam, that is faith. So Abraham addresses God in a way that would remind Abraham that God can do all things, and then he prays God's promises back to him.
Verse four. Then behold, the word of Yahweh came to him saying. This man will not be your heir. Now, pay attention here because something I talked about last week is this. Hebrew term for seed can have two different meanings. It can have a singular meaning, a singular seed, a singular offspring, and Paul makes very clear [00:31:00] that what we're reading here ought to be understood singularly because ultimately it refers to Christ Jesus.
Isaac was a type and a picture of Christ. But this word can also be used in the plural, and Paul uses it that way too. He says, seed singular speaking of Christ. And at the end of uh, Galatians chapter three, and if you are in Christ, you are the seed plural of Abraham. And so Moses is using it the same way here.
Verse four. Then behold, the word of Yahweh came to him saying, this man will not be your heir, but one singular. It's very important in the Hebrew one who is in the singular one who will come forth from your body. He singular, he shall be your heir singular. So God is treating this promise of a seed in a singular manner.
There is coming a male seed and he will come through you Abraham, and it will begin with your son, Isaac. But then look at verse five. [00:32:00] He shifts gears back to the pearl, plural, and then he took 'em outside and said, now look toward the heavens and count the stars if you're able to count them. And he said, so shall your seed be.
You see from this singular seed will come, will come a multitude. And in Christ Jesus the singular seed, there will be a multitude of believers, which is what we read in the next verse. Verse six, then he, Abraham believed in Yahweh and God, Yahweh reckoned it, counted it to him as righteousness. And this is, this is an important verse.
It's an important verse because Paul refers to it in Romans chapter four, Galatians chapter three, because it is the foundational verse in the New Testament for the doctrine of justification by faith alone. Justification by faith alone kids, there's a, a question about justification or saved by faith alone on your [00:33:00] handout.
And I just wanna repeat something that I've repeated multiple times. We are saved, we are justified by faith alone, but faith never comes alone. But it is important not to mix the categories. And what we have here is justification. By faith alone, Abraham believed God. And there's a couple of different ways you could translate the Hebrew, but basically the best way to do it in English is simply he believed God, he trusted God, he exercised faith in God.
That's how the New Testament translates it. That's how the Stigen translates it. Abraham put his faith in God, that was it. And then Yahweh counted it to him. This is a logical term. It's a mathematic term, but it's also a legal term depending on the context. And the idea here is Yahweh imputed righteousness to Abraham because Abraham believed God.
Yahweh counted it and imputed to Abraham righteousness. When you believe in Christ Jesus, he does the same to [00:34:00] you. He imputes righteousness to you, and if you're chosen of God and if you are his people and you exercise faith, you are saved. And I'm not trying to give anyone a false sense of security, but I also, we got to quit doubting.
It is sinful to doubt the promises of God. With all due respect and with all due honesty to question, can an elect believer, can a person chosen of God lose their salvation? That's blasphemous, that is attacking the character of God. But we need to ask a question. What is it that Abraham believed? What exactly did Abraham believe?
Because again, we don't give these people enough credit. What did Abraham believe? Well, Abraham was promised a singular seed that Abraham would have a son, a male child, and from this son, a multitude of other children would come. And certainly Abraham [00:35:00] believed that. But you see, Abraham also understood the promises of God.
Don't forget, we've gotta go all the way back to chapter 12 and whoever this singular seed was, he was gonna be a blessing to the nations. I didn't have time to do it this week. I'm hoping to maybe give you a chart this, this coming week. We'll see if I can get to it. But we tend to read the genealogies as if, you know, as we move from one person to the next, you know, a death has taken place.
Guess what? Abraham would've known Shem. Okay. When you look at the genealogies and you add up the years and things like that, Abraham would've known Shem. He would've known she's children. Okay. Abraham would've heard about the promises. Abraham would've known the promise concerning the seed of the woman.
Why is seed so important? Why is this singular child so important? Because the only way to read this text and make sense of it is Abraham believed these promises all the way back to the promise of Eve. [00:36:00] A future male child will be born and will crush. The head of Satan, will overturn his work and it will bring salvation to the world.
God expands it with Abraham. It's the same seed, it's the same promise. That is what Abraham believed. Abraham believed in Christ. Abraham believed in Jesus. He didn't know he was gonna be called Christ. He didn't know he was gonna be called Jesus. But. As I, as I said before, in the Old Testament, they looked forward to this coming seed.
We looked backwards to the seed who came, and that's why Christ, that's why God counts it as righteousness, because Abraham believed in all of God's covenant promises and he was expecting this coming seed to bless the world. And in verse seven, God said to him, I'm Yahweh, who brought you out of? Irv of the Chaldeans to give you this land to possess it.
And Abraham says, oh, I don't know. [00:37:00] I don't know Yahweh. How may I know that I will possess it. And what we have here, we have something interesting and it's, it's easy to miss. Couple of things. God says, I am Yahweh. Who brought you out of Irv the Chaldeans? Again, we're supposed to make connections. What does God say to Israel when he brings them out of Egypt?
In Exodus chapter 20 verse. Two, I'm Yahweh, your Elohim, who brought you out of the land of Egypt. You see there's a recurring theme that we'll see in these texts, and it's the theme of the Exodus. And what's fascinating is we're gonna see that same theme in the New Testament. Jesus comes to initiate a new exodus to continue to fulfill covenant promises.
And so God speaks the same way to Abraham that he will later speak to Moses. I brought you out of this land, and here's the interesting thing again, we see in scripture, this is just another example of divine sovereignty, side by side with human responsibility. And the authors of scripture have no problem with it.[00:38:00]
You see earlier God says, go and Abraham, we read Abraham obeyed. Abraham chose to obey, and he went, and yet here I brought you out of earth. Of the Chaldeans. I chose you. I chose you, and I'm going to use you. I'm going to use you to bring blessings to the world. So we see sovereignty and human responsibility again, side by side.
And then Abraham, pray again. How will I know
Iai Yahweh? Verse nine. So God says, bring me a 3-year-old heifer, a 3-year-old female goat, a 3-year-old ram, a turtle dove, and a young pigeon. And again, this is one of those things that I wanted to get to, but I just didn't have time. But I find it fascinating that each of these animals is three years old.
And I've shared this with you before and I wanna be really careful. I think there is something to numbers used in, in the Bible, but I think we need to be really careful. 'cause sometimes they're just used [00:39:00] as a number. But I, I've shared this with you before, the number three is often tied to life. The number three is often tied to the trinity.
He hasn't bring him 3-year-old animals. There's a reason for that. Don't think that it's here accidentally. Even if I haven't figured it out yet, which I haven't completely, there's a reason for that, something to look into. But three is typically tied to life. Typically tried to the the triune God, and we see the triune God working here.
Bring me these animals. So Abraham brings them and he cuts 'em in two and he laid each half. Opposite each other, but he did not cut the birds. Now this is interesting because this is a traditional ancient covenant ceremony, and just so you know, we have widespread evidence. We have tons of evidence from the ancient world that covenants were initiated this way.
It was common. Two people would enter into covenant and they would kill animals, and they would lay them side by side. And [00:40:00] most of the time, but not always because there's variety in these, these ceremonies. But most of the time both would walk through. Every once in a while the superior would walk through by themselves, and that's what we have here.
We have, God, we're gonna see this in a minute. God is going to walk through these covenant pieces by himself. But what this symbolized was, I'm making a covenant with you, and if I violate this covenant, may I be like these animals, a blood bond. If I violate this covenant, may I experience death like these animals have experienced death.
And then in verse 11, extremely interesting. The birds of prey came down upon the carcasses and Abram drove them away. And the reason this is interesting is the way birds of prey is used throughout scripture in Deuteronomy 28 verse 26. Uh, it's in a, it's chapter eight of Deuteronomy, and it's where we read blessings and curses.
And I find this [00:41:00] fascinating in the first four verses, you have the blessings, but then from verse 15 to 68 are the curses and in the midst of the curses, in Deuteronomy 28, verse 26, God says this, your carcasses shall be food for the birds of the sky, the beast of the earth, and there will be no one to frighten them away.
And I don't have time to do it now, but I, I would, uh, encourage you. Go home and read Jeremiah 34 verse 17. The same kind of language is used in Jeremiah 34 verse 17. Go home and read Revelation 18 and 19. Let me read one verse from Revelation 1921. Again, this is in the midst of curses. This is in the midst of unbelievers.
And the rest were killed with the sword, which came from the mouth of him who sat on the horse. Yes, the gospel saves and the gospel kills, reject Christ Jesus and it is a death sentence. [00:42:00] The rest were killed with the sword, which came from the mouth of him, who sat upon the horse, and all the birds were filled with their flesh.
You see the birds coming on. The sacrifice is a picture of judgment. It's a picture of the birds coming and, and eating the non-believers. But we also read that Abraham drove them away, and it should remind us of chapter 14, where Abraham is a protector. He went and he protected lot, but there's a deeper meaning there.
You see, every Israelite, every believer needs to work and strive to be holy. We need to fight off the birds of prey. This is why the book of Hebrews is full of so many warning passages because birds of prey are real, and leaders in the church and leaders in Israel should have the prophets and the priests should have been fighting them off.
And so we need to be seeing that today. The leaders, the prophets, the priests, the kings, they should have been fighting these birds of prey off. But there's something else that, [00:43:00] if I'm honest, haunts me about this, this passage. Yes, we miss it because we don't understand our Bible, so we miss the whole picture of the birds of prey and, and why Abraham drove them off.
Hopefully that makes sense.
But you see so often we treat God lightly. You see, God is entering into a covenant with Abraham, and yes, ultimately it pictures Jesus and ultimately it pictures Jesus going to the cross and dying. But this is a serious thing. A covenant is a bond in blood. It is a life and death situation, and yet we treat God so lightly.
And just so you know, I am guilty of this. I'm gonna read you a list of things that I want you to think about, and these were questions I needed to ask myself. Why do we treat God so lightly? We treat God lightly in what we do. In the sin that we [00:44:00] continue to commit. We treat God lightly in what we don't do.
We treat God lightly in how we dress. We treat God lightly in how we talk, in what we read. We treat God lightly in not reading our Bibles, not going to the scripture. We treat God lightly that when we read our Bibles, we're not gonna let it challenge us. We act as if we've got it down. None of us do, but we treat God lightly.
We treat God lightly being in his very presence. Did you prepare for today? Did you start preparing yesterday? Does Sunday look different? Does it look different for your family or does it look like any other day of the week with a short stop in the morning? We treat God lightly in how we present ourselves to him.
We treat God lightly in how we talk to him. How often do you talk to God as if he's just a buddy? [00:45:00] And yes, sometimes it's a hard line because Jesus is our brother, Jesus is our friend. He calls us that we are called children of God, but he's still God. He's not your buddy. He's not a pal. He's God almighty that went to the cross on our behalf.
And yet we treat him lightly in how we address him, how we talk to him. We treat him lightly in how we don't talk to him. We treat him lightly in how we see and treat our own sin. We should be confessing sin every single day, but we spend more time rationalizing it. I didn't go that far. We treat him lightly in what motivates us, what motivates us to go to work, what motivates us to be a mother, what motivates us to be a father?
You see, Abraham went and drove the birds of prey off who were already eating dead animals because the covenant is serious [00:46:00] stuff. Do you treat God serious? And we'll see the seriousness of Abraham. Look at chapter 15, verse 17. It came about when the sun had sat and Abraham's having a vision. So there's a day passes in his vision because the vision sets.
Starts at night. If you remember earlier in the chapter, it started at night, but God is walking Abraham through something. So a day has passed in his vision and now another day is coming to an end. And it came about when the sun had set. It was very dark and behold there appeared a smoking oven and a flaming torch which passed between the pieces.
And that should remind you of Exodus chapter 19. That should remind you of Mount Sinai. Interesting. Listen to this Exodus chapter 19, verse 16. Remember I told you that the number three has significance? Listen to Exodus chapter 19, verse 16. So it came about on the third day. [00:47:00] It came about on the third day when it was morning, that there were thunder and lightning and flashes in the thick cloud upon the mountain in a very loud trumpet sound, so that all the people who were in the camp trembled.
And Moses brought the people outta the camp to meet God, and they stood at the foot of the mountain. Now, Mount Sinai was all in smoke because Yahweh descended upon it in fire, and its smoke ascended like the smoke of a furnace and the whole mountain quaked violently. Sounds a little bit like what Abram is seeing.
It was frightening. And the text says that Abraham became terrified and that a great darkness fell upon Abram. Not because he was afraid of man, not because he was afraid of circumstances, because right then and there he was afraid of Yahweh, and he should have been afraid of Yahweh and Yahweh by himself in the picture of this oven and flaming torch.
And just to let you know, uh, the oven is described as a, as a flaming torch smoke, but this word translated smoking can [00:48:00] also be translated angry. And I want you to try to get your heads wrapped around it. It's not saying that God was angry, it was not saying that God was doing these things, but the look, the appearance was frightening.
The, the, the vision itself seemed angry because Yahweh is nobody to trifle with, and yet Yahweh goes through the pieces. By himself, and what he is saying is this, and this is so important because again, we lose sight of it. God's redemptive covenant with man is a unilateral covenant. God does all the work.
Yes, we're unworthy and God picks us anyway. We're unable to obey him, and God chooses us anyway and God performs our obedience in the person of Jesus Christ. Anyway. And God gives us the gift of repentance and faith. And when we exercise faith, God gives us Christ's righteousness. He imputes the [00:49:00] very righteousness of Christ to our account, and our sin was taken by Christ and our sin is imputed to Christ, and Christ takes it to the cross.
So the curse is removed on our behalf. Why? Because God is a covenant faithful God. Verse 18. On that day, Yahweh made a covenant. With Abraham, and again, the emphasis to your seed, I will give this land. And then he starts to describe the boundaries. So what have, what have we seen? We've seen that God enters into covenant with Abraham, and this is an extension of his first two covenants.
This is an extension of his covenant with Adam and his covenant with Noah. We see that God initiates the relationship. God is sovereign. There are promises, conditions, blessings, curses, seed, land, earth, sin, death, and, and if you get nothing from this, this sermon, I, I hope that you get this Scripture is consistent and [00:50:00] we have to quit reading it in inconsistent ways.
God has always worked with mankind through a covenant. I have so much more to say. Scripture is consistent. God loves you and God is faithful. Let's pray.
Father in heaven, thank you for your covenant. Thank you for your promises. Thank you for Christ Jesus. Thank you that he lived this out in our stead. Help us understand, Lord, that your love, just like your covenant is conditional. We, we, we want to talk about unconditional love. That is nowhere, father nowhere have you revealed that your love is conditional.
Your covenant is conditional, but your love is also sacrificial. Your love is also faithful. And so you supply the conditions you live up to, the conditions you save a people to yourself. Father, may [00:51:00] we fall to our knees. Either literally or figuratively. May we fall to our knees in gratitude, may we let you be God, and may we hang on to you and may we grasp you through faith.
Father, thank you for your faithfulness. Thank you for your hassed, your covenant love, your covenant faithfulness, your covenant. Mercy. Help us understand this more and more and more so that the scriptures will come alive. Help us see the connections. Help us see the beauty of the consistency, how this can only be your word because nothing else can make sense of it.
Father, son, and Holy Spirit, thank you for your love and your covenant faithfulness, and all of God's people said, amen. Amen. Take.
