The Covenant
Notes
Transcript
God’s Promise
God’s Promise
God’s plan to rescue mankind from their perpetual sin started very quietly, with one man.
Does anyone know what man I may be referring to?
Yep, Abram (his name changes later). We don’t know much about Abram from the start, just that he was a descendent of Shem, one of Noah’s sons.
Read
Pretty much, God tells Abram, leave everything you know, head to the land that I tell you to go to.
And if, IF, you do this, I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing......and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.
Now, pause here, because you might be tempted to read over these verses and say, okay....well that’s cool. God blessed Abram.
But don’t miss what’s happening here. God is officially kicking off his plan of redemption. He’s performing the ground breaking ceremony, essentially.
He’s already promised Adam and Eve, and Noah, and now Abram.
- 19 God is not man, that he should lie, or a son of man, that he should change his mind. Has he said, and will he not do it? Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?
19 God is not man, that he should lie,
or a son of man, that he should change his mind.
And Abram obeyed, this 75 year old dude with his wife Sarai, who has no kids, so Lot, his nephew tags along
Has he said, and will he not do it?
Or has he spoken, and will he not fulfill it?
So, some things happen in the story:
There was a famine, so Abram went to Egypt. Lied about his wife Sarai, saying she was his sister, and she became a wife of Pharaoh
Lot and Abram are too wealthy to stay in the same area, so they separate. Lot heads towards Sodom & Gomorrah, and Abram stays in Canaan
Abram rescues Lot
But we come to , the next important chapter in God’s plan of redemption.
Here, Abram, maybe not the best mathematician in the world, but he’s putting two and two together.
No heir
God says, no worries, you’ll have a son
And notice , “And he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness.”
And God made a covenant with Abram
Have any of you ever entered into a covenant with someone?
Bank account, car loan, house loan
Personal Example: My house, bought it off of my parents, each month I have to make a payment, or, the bank will come take it off of me
The weird covenant
Heifer, female goat, ram....all 3 years old
A turtledove
A young pigeon
Cut everything in half except the birds
Deep sleep on Abram
A smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between
But don’t miss the biggest point here
God made the covenant with Abram, and God agreed to it.
Abram did nothing, he slept through it!!!!!
Truth - we can’t do anything on our own today to earn this favor of God, to enter into the covenant of salvation with Him.
He does it all.
We just have to follow suit with Abram in , “Abram believed, and it was counted to Him as righteousness.”
Paul talks actually about this very verse in Galatians, where he is speaking to people after Christ had come.
So after God had worked the thousands of years towards this plan of redemption, and it had actually come to fruition.
, “ 7 Know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. 8 And the Scripture, foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preached the gospel beforehand to Abraham, saying, “In you shall all the nations be blessed.” 9 So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.”
The covenant God made with Abram was a picture of the salvation covenant He makes with us.
said that through Abraham all the families of the earth shall be blessed
We are part of all those families of the earth
Do you see God’s sovereignty at work here as we talked about in creation a few weeks ago.
God worked His plan of redemption from Abram all the way through to us.
But also, notice that in , God told Abram he did this so that he would be a blessing.
This blessing was meant to be shared, not hoarded. It wasn’t meant just for Abram
This is why I have such major issues with any church or pastor who preaches anything but the gospel of reconciliation
If we think the whole point of salvation is that we get blessed, we are missing the entire point!
The whole point is to bless others, which we do by “multiplying”
Application
Do you realize/have you ever realized that your salvation is completely independent of yourself?
Yes, you have to have faith, of course…but you only have faith because God acted!
God called Abram, God told him to move, God blessed Abram, God made the covenant.
Abram was the recipient
And this is important to realize and remember because we tend to make everything about ourselves, don’t we?
But when we remember that He blessed Abram in order to bless us, how can that not humble us and inspire us to help complete His mission?
Secondly, we saw that Abram believed God, and it was counted to Him as righteousness.
Now, that is entirely true, I don’t want you to hear something different.
But, Abram’s belief was evident in his action
God told him to go, he went
He built altars to God for his providence
He cut the animals in half like God said
He lived a life of faith…if you keep reading the story, which I encourage you to, you’ll see that he did things wrong.
But often, He followed the Lord because He believed in Him for his righteousness
Your belief is evident in your:
Faith that God will do what He says
Following of His commands
Are you gonna cut a heifer in half....probably not
But we are called to a life of following, I mean, that’s what a disciple is, a follower of Jesus
We live our lives for Him, because apart from Him, we have no hope, we have no redemption, we have no righteousness.