Don Stewart Genesis 22

[Music] do [Music] is that the best you can do good morning everybody there we go there we go there we go i know it's early but the first service you guys either get up early or you didn't go to bed last night right i'm not sure which one i meet both types so you're you're stay up all night or you're i'm an early riser i like it four in the morning 4 30 i'm up but that's just me you know so anyway it's nice to be here thank you again for um for asking me so much is going on um david mentioned the books educating our world.com is our website we now have 61 61 books that are for there for free download the last two um my favorite my 25 favorite messages that i preach and uh the second one is is called um well let me put this way my let me go to the 25 that's when you like david write the word david you leave oh yeah anyway my favorite 25 messages what i did i put those together i'll explain the story in a minute and then ancient mysteries of the bible saw volume one is the second one i did i did those in december because i was out for fifty five zero days with the coronavirus from december 2nd to whatever 50 days later was in january and actually my voice has only started returning the last couple three weeks believe it or not it was i had it really bad but it was a life-changing time for me because you're laying there and realizing reading that i had two two er visits and one to the hospital for four days when i got back and i was on oxygen after i came back for about three weeks day and night we read the notes of the doctors there and we didn't realize after we came back my wife's reading these and and basically to put it in a let's shall we say medical terms i had one foot in the grave and the other on the banana peel that's how bad i was i mean it was very very really really bad but i survived i'm here and god was good but what happened was when you you're faced with something like that you kind of give a reevaluation of life don't you well i did anyone i'm laying there i couldn't do anything couldn't move and couldn't go out and that and so i started thinking because previously many of you know i was doing six tv programs a week on his channel one radio program a week speaking almost every sunday and i thought you know i i'm you know i'm not getting any younger you most of you find that some of you haven't found that out yet but you get older by the years but anyway i uh i realized that there's certain things i wanted to do and i wouldn't have been able to do them had i you know gone the way of all the earth and so what i did i after a lot of prayer and that telling my wife i said look i'm going to stop doing the television stop doing his channel so december 2nd was my last date doing that five days a week of breaking news one day of uh world news briefing would give the events of the day from a biblical perspective stop that entirely and uh what i did during those 30 days i wrote these two books by the way because i'm late i got nothing else to do so i finished these two books the 25 favorite messages and you know the book also on ancient mysteries of the bible solved which by the way is going to be one of the top three or four best books i've ever written and then i decide okay the rest of my life what i want to do is something i've been desiring to do but haven't been able because i didn't have the time because what happened with the doing the programs and that i spent eight hours a day doing the tvs and that and so i'm not doing that now i'm now in the audio book recording business i've got three books now up on the website educationalworld.com three audiobooks about just finished the third one the other night 20 hours worth of audio and i'm trying to get through god willing all 61 of them hopefully there'll be more in that and so basically you can download the books you can listen to them on any particular device the books that i've done the first one is an introduction to bible prophecy god wants us to know the future i explain the whole what the bible says about the subject of bible prophecy the do's the don'ts and all that everybody ought to know that sort of thing the second book i recorded is called god's work in history 50 biblical prophecies made and fulfilled so we go all the way through the bible we start with adam and eve and go finally to the predictions of jesus his word will go to the entire earth and show how god's word has already been fulfilled in history so the first book kind of gives the basis for it the claims the second is god's track record so we we recorded that one and the third one i just finished is called what everyone needs to know about this is the bible um and this is a crucial one in fact when i have my books with me which i don't know i usually tell people if you want to buy one that's the first one you ought to get what everyone needs to know about the bible because the first two questions i deal with that is something every single christian ought to know so anyway that's what i'm doing so i'm in the midst of recording and uh editing that and so that's the fun thing i'm doing right now now on the favorite messages the message i'm giving today is one of my 25 favorites and i think you will hope you like it if not if you all get up and walk out obviously you didn't but uh hopefully you'll like it as much as i do so all that to say as a backdrop if you have your bibles would you turn with me to the 22nd chapter of the book of genesis genesis chapter 22 and we're going to read the very famous account of abraham and isaac on mount moriah and we title the message the lord will provide abraham and isaac on mount moriah and i trust this will be as big a blessing to you as it is to me doing this a particular passage um by the way i had i have 25 of my favorite messages i still got about 10 left over so i think i might have to do a volume two here because there's so many ones you know i've been preaching now for since 19 what 70 70 yeah 1970. actually yeah i've been 50 years in the ministry coming uh this uh september october and so um trying to put my best messages my favorite ones together was not easy but i figured 25 is a good number so we'll stop with that anyway um two things two things are going to stand out in this chapter first the examples of extraordinary faith particularly by abraham but also by isaac too as we will see and in addition this chapter presents one of the clearest prophetic types of the coming messiah that is found anywhere in the old testament and by the way this message is one of the ones that you can download for free in the books you don't have to take notes you can just listen and relax because it's all there in great detail on our educatingworld.com where it says download books this is under um christian living and that is of course my uh favorite uh 25 messages all right it's the one of the clearest prophetic types of the coming messiah you know it remind this passage every time i study it reminds me of moses and the passage about the burning bush remember moses he's out there minding his own business tending the flocks of his father-in-law jethroat midian and he sees this bush that's burning but not consumed he goes and i love the way the king james has it in fact they did the same thing in the ten commandments charlton heston i must turn aside and see this amazing sight you know see moses goes over and here's a bush that's burning but not being consumed and he hears a voice it's the voice of god saying take your sandals off your feet the place you stand on here is holy ground and he did and that's where the lord revealed himself to moses well in the same sense here i think genesis 22 is in kind of the same category there's a few chapters in the bible where you literally have to take off your your your shoes or your sandals because you're on holy ground now we need to approach the chapter the same way with reverence and respect uh jay vernon mcgee gave a great summary here's what he said in this chapter we come to another great high point of the bible we are walking on mountain peaks in the book of genesis chapter 22 is the account of abraham's offering of his own son god commanded him to offer isaac on the altar and then restrained him at the last minute when he saw abraham was willing to go through with it this chapter brings us to the seventh and last appearance of god to abraham after this there is nothing more that god could ask abraham to do this is the supreme test that he brought to this man so here now this is as we read genesis not coincidental seven specific times okay seven is the number of completion in scripture we have revealed god appears to abraham this is the last one he's been walking with the lord for 50 years five zero years 50 years and this is the last time he's going to speak to him because after this what else is there to do as we're going to see and so this is the like the high point the crescendo of god working with this man of faith so first and foremost 50 years and that's why at that particular time the lord decided to put him to the ultimate test okay we start out reading in verse one it says sometime later god tested abraham's faith now that's from the new living translation the way they put it genesis 22 1 some time later god tested abraham's faith now if you if you're reading through genesis in chapter 21 isaac is just a toddler he's just a young kid okay you know now in chapter 22 he's a grown man at least to the place he can go with abraham for a three-day journey to mount moriah to a specific place to sacrifice number one he's able to carry the wood up the hill number two so he's a full-grown adult you know we don't know how old he is it's been estimated anywhere from 18 to 30 years of age something like that abraham's he's in his hundreds he's about 120 years of age he's a very old guy but god now appears to him for the last time because he's going to die soon after this and asked him the ultimate sacrifice but notice what it says god tested abraham tested abraham now what i want us to do and i want what you to do in those watching is try and put yourself in abraham sandals at this particular time the first thing that we're told here in reading this passage is this is a test so we know it's a test god knows it's a test abraham doesn't know it's a test he doesn't know that god's testing his faith abraham just believes it's another command of god so we have to read it in that light and put yourself in the place of abraham because he has no idea what god is going to do what god has in mind but this is a test now one of the other messages i have my 25 favorite is the different it's called you know what does the bible say about temptation well whole message on that temptation versus testing the same word is used for both the test god tests us to bring out the best in us satan tempts us to bring out the worst in us a testing or a temptation if you're tested or tempted it's not that's not sin to be tested or tempted what it depends on what you do with it and the example i always love to give which most people could identify with because it's an easy one to identify with let's say you're going through and a lot of people are now with the whole cove 19 some financial hardships so you come to church and you pray to god and ask him lord i really need answers you know i need some help financially so as the church service is over you're one of the last to leave you go out to the parking lot your cars park way out you know in the nowhere's and you're about to go to it you go and look and there right outside your car is a wallet and the wallet is full of cash go wow praise the lord thank you lord for providing and but you open the wallet and there's someone's name their driver's license they just have to have a lot of cash well that would be a temptation particularly you know if you're if you're having struggles financially but obviously you can't keep it you you've got to give it back and so finding the wallet is not sin okay what you do with it could be you know it doesn't belong to you it belongs to somebody else i actually had this situation once believe it or not i'd lost my wallet and um didn't have a phone number or anything like that it my driver's life in it uh at one of the local shopping centers i looked all around called the places i went to couldn't find it i come home someone actually found it saw my address and brought it back and left it on my front porch man and that's i thought boy i wish i could have rewarded the i don't know who it was and maybe it's an angel i don't know but anyway the point is being tempted being test it's not sin jesus was tempted for 40 days he didn't succumb to it but this is the ultimate test so i want you again all of us to put ourselves in the place of abraham here and um you know try and get your mind the same with his would be all right anyway here we go in verses one to two this is the lord he says to abraham and the lord abraham says here am i abraham replied god said take your son your only son whom you love namely isaac and go to the land of moriah offer him up there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains which i will indicate to you wow okay first god calls out abraham by name again this number seven seventh time they've talked and abraham says here i am hinani in the hebrew here i am okay abraham's not just saying oh yeah it's me god here's what he's saying he says i'm ready what do you want from me in other words um just like isaiah chapter 6 verse 8 where the lord says you know who whom shall i send who will go and isaiah raised his hand says here i am lord send me this is what abraham is saying as god you know you know it was it was not infrequent over 120 years seven appearances is not frequent but it happened to abraham but at this particular point if you know an old man with his son isaac the son of promise here i am send me he says yeah i am ready to go so this is basically what abraham's saying not that yeah i'm here but i'm ready to do what you want me to do we're going to find abraham's faith all the way on something like this he's going to do what god wants him to do so he says here i am so it's underscoring the fact that more than he was simply present but i want you to notice the description of how god described his son isaac his son his only son whom he loves namely isaac now this underscores the depth of feeling the father had towards his son now it didn't mean when he said his only son ishmael was not his son but this is the son of promise this is the one they've been waiting for and again if you don't know the story abraham and sarah were beyond the child bearing years when the lord sent a couple of messengers to him angels and said next year sarah's going to have a child have a son and you and sarah laughed i mean come on i'm going to have a son look at me look at abraham we're too old you know but god and an angel said why did sarah laugh and she tried to say well no i didn't laugh well the word isaac in hebrew means he shall cause to laugh isaac means laughter because arab sarah laughed at that promise because it seemed impossible but again with god nothing's impossible right but so here's what he's reminding him of and i'm sure this hit him to the the depths of his soul take now your son your only son your son of promise the one you've been waiting your whole life for you know and then offer him up uh as a offering a burnt offering on one of the mountains i will show you in other words your beloved son isaac and so abraham now gets this command from god who he's been walking with for 50 years now this is this is this there's so many things here in this passage the next thing i do want to talk about before we get into abraham's feeling is mount moriah in jerusalem now let's remember this god told him to take him to a very very specific place not you know he could have he's three days away from from mount moriah he could have had him offering isaac right there no no i want you to go to a very specific place now why is this important the mountains of moriah the only time we see this word used again in the entire bible is in second chronicles 3 1 but listen to what it says so solomon began to build the temple of the lord in jerusalem on mount moriah where the lord had appeared to david his father the temple was built on the threshing floor of aruna the jebusite the site that david had selected so the only time we see this uh term moriah used in scripture it's here in genesis 22 and later in second chronicles 3 where we're told this was the exact site the mountain range where the temple was built that solomon's temple was built and so there's an appointed spot moriah literally is a mountain range there in the city of it and that includes the city of jerusalem and it's going to be somewhere near abraham is going to go where the temple was built okay there's no doubt about this a very specific spot and so one of the questions we ask well did abraham take isaac to the site of the future temple and this is a this is you know very much possible the jewish tradition says abraham took isaac to the site where the first temple was built where david built the altar to the lord after he ceased punishing you know the people for david's sin since it was a specific place where abraham was told to take isaac the location the temple the altar of sacrifice seems to be the appropriate answer if you go to israel today on one of the tours and someday god willing they'll open up the tours again you go on the temple mount if you're able to get there your jewish guide will tell you this is the place of many events that happen in the past and one of the major events in scripture uh it's called the akhodema the binding where abraham bound his son isaac to sacrifice him but at the last minute as we're going to see god state his hand so that's one of the possibilities here of the site of where god brought abraham now this is certainly possible and it's very logical but there's another place on mount moriah that would seem to be more appropriate rather than the altar of sacrifice i believe and you can't prove this and i always get emotional excuse me when i say this but i believe god led abraham not to the place of sacrifice where the temple was but a few hundred yards north of that to a place called mount calvary or golgotha the same place where the lord jesus was crucified some 2000 years later i think that was the exact spot where the father offered the son as a sacrifice to god as a picture of god the father offering god the son some two thousand years afterwards interesting this happened this event four thousand years ago so you have two thousand years from the time of abraham isaac to christ and we're looking at approximately 2 000 years in the time of the offering of jesus on mount calvary and right now now again this is you can't prove this one way or another but the emphasis here is the specific spot because god told abraham you go to a very specific spot and then you stop and we're going to see that as we go through the account so we're going to see like i said at the beginning beginning this is a wonderful picture of god the father sacra you know of offering god the son uh father offering his own son as a sacrifice now what's really interesting about this and this is what we're going to read in our next verse verse 3 abraham responds immediately look at verse three early in the morning abraham got up saddled his donkey he took two of his young servants with him along with his son isaac when he had cut the wood for the burnt offering he started out for the place that god had spoken to him about now there's something here that should get our attention notice the unquestioning obedience of abraham wouldn't you think abraham said wait wait a minute god this is the son of promise this is the one we've been waiting for all these years uh we were beyond the child bearing years as sarah and i and now you're telling me to sacrifice him but what's interesting here there was no complaint there was no questioning there is immediate obedience now why because as we're going to see abraham had walked with the lord all these years and he knew he could trust god as we're going to see this we're going to read in the book of hebrews he had he figured out what god was about to do now here's something that we learn this prac this test was given to abraham after walking with the lord for 50 years god will only test us to the able we're able to bear it first corinthians 10 13 says it he wouldn't give abraham you know this this test the moment isaac was born as a young child many many years later and so any test you and i get and we have to remember that god always promises you know to pull us through one way or another we'll get a way out but abraham now simple obedience now this is amazing now again we know it's a test abraham doesn't know what's going on okay but what's what's taken place well we get the answer basically in the new testament in the book of hebrews hebrews 11 17 to 19 here's here's here's the explanation it says by faith when abraham by faith abraham when he was tested offered up isaac he had received the promise promises okay of a son yet he was ready to offer up his only son god had told him through isaac's through isaac your descendants will carry on your name so here's what he reasoned and he reasoned that god could even raise him from the dead and in a sense he received him back from there that's hebrews 11 17 to 19. all right here's what's going on it seems abraham had such faith in god and he when god promised something it's always come true been walking with him for at least 50 years okay it's the end of his life the miraculous son of promise is born so abraham thinks this isaac is the son of promise even if i sacrifice him even when i take his life god's got to raise him from the dead so whatever happens he's got to continue on because isaac has not married he has no children okay and so somehow someway in abraham's mind he's thinking this is what's probably going to happen but he thinks he's going to have to go through with it and this is what we have to understand and this is why to me this is a very very if we put ourselves in abraham's place a very emotional time for him because as we're going to see there's a lot of a lot of feeling going on right now that's uh well let's put it this way that's very very emotional for anybody so then we we told in verse excuse me verse 4 he arrives on the third day in the distance abraham then sees the place where he is to poor perform this deed on the third day of his journey abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance that's genesis chapter 22 and verse 4. all right don't miss the fact that it's the third day this is the third day after god gave the command that isaac was to be offered not a coincidence that there was a three-day journey why because jesus christ rose from the dead on the third day he was just as a quick aside he was crucified on friday he rose from the dead he was there you know the tomb was empty sunday morning and one of the questions we often get asked one of my books i think it's the one what everyone needs to know about jesus we go in great detail how can you have a friday crucifixion and a sunday resurrection get three days out of it well real simple uh the way they reckon a day friday uh when jesus was crucified it was the day before the sabbath all four gospels says tell us it was the day before the sabbath uh that he was crucified that was that would have been friday friday night after you know actually started the second day because the jewish day starts in the evening he's put in the tomb on friday afternoon day one he's put you know day two starts friday evening day three starts saturday evening and when the women come on sunday it's the third day because 11 different times in the new testament said he rose from the dead he came back on the third day and according to jewish reckoning it's on the third day but anyway this is what's happening here it's on the third day now abraham lifts up his eyes and sees the place you know in the distance where god the mountain range where he's to go at this particular time in history and so again think about what he's feeling because now it's going to take place but as we're going to see it's going to be more and more um emotional here as this takes place the father and son go up alone this is something else that we don't want to miss in verse 5 abraham has these two young men stay behind stay here with the donkey abraham told his servants the boy and i will travel a little farther we will worship there and look what he says then don't miss this and then we will come right back all right we're going to travel a little further we're going to leave you here with the donkey and isaac and i are going to go up and but we're gonna come back we're gonna worship then come back now what's interesting here the servants don't speak in this account they just merely obey told to stay with the donkey while abraham and isaac worship together we should note that abram again told them that both he and isaac would return to them why because abraham's thinking well if necessary god's going to have to raise him from the dead because he's going to have to come back so again the father and son doing this together again the son total obedience to the father here what a great picture of christ scripture emphasizes this in the next verse in verse six abraham took the wood for the bird offering and put it on his son isaac then he took the fire and the knife in his hand and the two of them walked on together now again something else we should notice isaac the son was carrying the wood for his own offering and but isaac as we're going to see did not know this at the time don't miss the connection between jesus carrying his own cross but again complete harmony the father and son are in at this particular time complete harmony okay they're fine but then comes the time the moment that again i try to imagine this moment and it's just it's well it grabs me it'll grab you isaac now it's the only time he's going to speak he says uh i isaac said to his father my father and what is it my son abraham replies well here is the fire and the wood isaac said but where is the lamb for the burnt offering the fire by the way was a fire pot they're not holding onto fire walking up the mountain there's a fire pot there we've got the fire pot and the wood but where is the lamb for the burnt offering now these are the words the only words isaac says in this whole account entire episode he notices there's no lamb to be offered for a sacrifice you know so he asked his father about it so what does this tell us it tells us the entire journey where abraham's taking his son up to the specific place on mount moriah to sacrifice him that he has not told isaac what his plans are so here's isaac his son the son of promise you know the son they've been waiting for he asked the obvious question well hey dad you know where is the uh you know where's the lamb that that uh you're you're going to offer here now can you imagine the emotion at that time the feeling that abraham must have had any of you that have children put yourself in that place i have two daughters and every time i read this i you know take my oldest one user as the example i i could not even begin to comprehend if god asked me to do something like that and then she asked me the question you know in all sincerity because isaac is totally sincere isaac has total trust the son has total trust in his father he you know very naively humbly asks well where where's the lamb dad and you know i i'm trying to picture myself if one of my daughters asked me that how i would respond and how it would literally you know break my heart and to say the least in fact you know you probably want to say god take me don't don't take them but anyway so now he hadn't told his son now here's the answer of abraham now listen to this it's it says in in verse 22 uh verse 8 chapter 22 god will provide for himself a land for the lamb for the burnt offering my son abraham replied the two of them then continued on together now his answer showing tremendous faith god's going to provide for himself a lamb for the burnt offering all right isaac now is satisfied with the answer and the two of them will continue on together so is abraham lying to isaac well we don't know i mean he he he god's going to provide and he believes that and he's he's prophesying now he did not realize all that's going to take place because he's thinking you know i don't know i'm going to have to take the life of my son there's going to be a resurrect or he probably didn't know what to think but can you imagine the emotion he's going through this man of god been walking with him 50 years the ultimate test okay so there's a profound answer and isaac is satisfied and so they continue to walk up the mountain together all right now a couple things here that we need to deal with number one will god provide himself unfortunately there has been the notion that the scriptures here in recording what abraham said uh that the answer was god would provide himself as the offering this is how we read in the king james version um king james and genesis 22 8 says abraham said my son god will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering and they both went together now so it's been a popular view that the lord you know abraham says god is going to provide himself as the offering uh no not that's not really the what the scripture says uh the hebrew is very clear god's going to provide for himself an offering he's not going to provide himself if you want if if the hebrew wanted to say god would provide himself it would've been very clear there's a little uh thing that hebrew has when it's something is the direct object of the sentence it would say that he is going to provide himself that's not there uh he's going to provide for himself in all modern translations you know fix that and keep it uh you know clear that he's not going to provide himself although as we're going to see not in that case he's going to but eventually he will but anyway that's it it makes for a nice sermon i used to preach it many times till i found out i learned hebrew oh it's not what it says anyway okay well we learned i how many times over the years yeah you say something you that's why we keep studying i know you guys are big on studying here i love it and getting taught but the more we learn sometimes we have to say oh i didn't realize that particularly let me tell you something when you start writing books and you're thinking oh i didn't know that i mean that comes about every every every few moments and then you you try and do the best job you can anyway so they reached the spot okay the drama is about to begin when they came to the place god had told them about god you know abraham's walking and the lord said stop here right here okay so what happens abraham builds an altar he arranges the wood on it he ties up his son and places him on top top of the on the altar on top of the wood now again picture this situation now both of them he's already told his son the lord is going to provide and the lord brings in the specific place he prepares to make the sacrifice he builds the altar and then his and and then he prepa isaac shows no resistance whatsoever physically he could have easily overpowered his father but what isaac sees is the altar built the wood that isaac was carrying is put on the altar and then god then abraham binds his son it binds probably the feet in the hands that's why the the hebrew the jews call today the academia the binding he binds him so isaac probably hands and feet bound this young man he's put on top abraham's able to do that isaac does not resist at all isaac has complete faith as the son had complete faith in the father when he was sacrificed on mount calvary and so abraham now is planning to go through it to go through with it because isaac is offering no resistance and again put yourself in the place of this loving father who cares so much about his son but cares about god more god is the most important thing in his life as much as he loves his own dear son as much as he loves his family he loves god more and if god tells him to do it he's going to do it so in verse 10 it says abraham reached out his hand took the knife and prepared to slaughter his son all right so he takes out the knife now and it's all ready to go and to and literally to slaughter the hebrew word here is the same word when you slaughter a sacrifice so that the knife is there he's ready to slaughter his son and he figures you know i'm gonna do it total faith and then of course the angel from heaven calls out this was not to be he was not to sacrifice his son an angel from heaven called out to abraham but the the lord's angel called him from heaven saying abraham abraham here am i he answered in other words i'm waiting for further instructions he's probably i'm so glad for further instructions and then he heard the words he was hoping for do not harm the boy the angel said do not do anything to him for i know that you fear god because you did not withhold your son your only son from me all right there's a number of things here in these um this these two verses that we need to explain a little further here to tell you what's going on first of all the angel of the lord appears you see this uh happening a lot of times in the old testament and in the new testament an angel from the lord a messenger from the lord appears the word angel in both hebrew and greek simply means messenger don't always think when it says an angel you know it's the divine being the created being hebrews 1 7 and 14 that are created as ministering spirits to to help god's people it could mean this but the word angel just means messenger six times in the new testament the word the greek word angel angelos is used for human messengers okay pence depends on the context john the baptist luke tells us sent his angels to uh talk to jesus we didn't send angels he sent us messengers here so the first and foremost thing we realize this is some messenger from the lord that's going to speak to abraham now the question is well who is this messenger possibility number one it is god himself giving the message and the member of the trinity that would do it is god the son and the reason this is believed is because the language that's used there where it says i know you fear god because you did not withhold your son your only son from me so it sounds like god is speaking in the first person the angel equates himself with god and many assume it's god directly speaking now this is definitely possible this is not impossible it may be the best answer but there is another possibility all right that time in history when there was a messenger that was to give a message from let's say a king or someone else to to another king the messenger would always speak in the first person in other words the messenger says i am here to tell you that i want you to do this i want you to do that you're going to do this this is my solemn proclamation now everyone knew it wasn't the messenger who was behind this it was the person who sent the messenger and so they could speak in the first person use the word i and the recipient would realize well it's not this guy it's the guy that you know the one that the king that sent the messenger so it's possible that the angel of the lord here was uh just a messenger from the lord but he spoke in the first person not either option is possible but the point is god's telling abraham you know that he is pleased with his faith now notice here also too where it says don't do anything for him because you did not withhold your son from me the you here is singular and it's referring to abraham's faith he is the one being tested now isaac had to show faith too let's face it at that last moment but you did not withhold your only son for me one of the problems we have here with the english word you at least in modern times uh it can mean it's singular or plural right when i say you over there who am i talking to all of you or one of you could be either depending on you know context the old king jimmy you know it has thou and ye thou is singular ye is plural so you always knew if it was singular or plural unfortunately in all our modern translations we don't have a a distinction there like the old english did so the you sometimes uh is you know there's problems in in knowing who it is in fact i've i've done i've heard many sermons talking about you know where someone you the word you was used and it's in the singular not the plural when there's a group of people there he's speaking to someone but he's speaking to someone singular like simon peter now you here but he's with the disciples he said no peter it's you you singular anyway bottom line is the hebrew is very clear it refers to abraham alone being tested now here is where we start getting some really really interesting insights here from the book of james later in james 2 21-23 listen to how james explains this don't you remember that our ancestor abraham was shown to be right with god by his actions when he offered his son isaac on the altar you see faith and his faith and his actions worked together his actions made his faith complete and so it happened just as the scriptures say abraham believed god and god countered him as righteous because of his faith he was even called the friend of god that's james 2 21-23 i'm reading that from the new living translation also abraham's faith was made complete by what he did faith and actions work together and this is one of the great lessons we learned from this particular account faith and actions work together let me give you a great illustration of this what it means i um many many years ago i was listening to the radio and paul harvey the late paul harvey radio broadcast used to have this broadcast at noon nationwide if you've never heard him you really missed out tremendous tremendous insight tremendous uh man of reasoning logic and that anyway he was once asked by a writer who was collecting a book called favorite sayings of famous people he wanted to know what his favorite saying was and i will never forget obviously i didn't forget it i'm going to tell you right now i'll never forget what he said he said i have a saying that basically guides my life he said i have a plaque this thing above my bed it's the last thing i see before i go to bed at night it's the first thing i see every morning when i wake up when i go to work at my desk during the day the same saying is right in front of me the whole time the entire time and here's how the saying goes if you don't live it you don't believe it if you don't live it you don't believe it now i love that because this is exactly what we're told right here with abraham he believed it because he lived it and this is where christians need to be very very careful here where we say well we have faith we trust god are you living it because if you're not living it you really don't believe it you believe god is really looking after your life you believe god is really you know in control of all things you believe god's going to get you from point a to point b like he says many christians you know don't live that way they really don't they want to help god out in other words there's there's situations we have where basically you get in a place like i was i'm laying in bed with the coveted 19 realizing lord it's up to you and i'm going to trust you and one of the difficult things for all of us to do is and i confess this very very often i have a talk i give based on one of my books on the final antichrist and whenever i give the talk people think i'm going to talk about you know the 666 and all that or the mark of the beast the uh you know the the false prophet no no what i do i have a a question there a comparison between jesus christ and antichrist here's how we should act here's how we shouldn't act a man of faith you know jesus comes humbly you've got the arrogant person you've got you know doing the will of the father doing his own well it's about a dozen comparisons between the two and i have to confess it's still after walking with the lord this long for me difficult to realize i don't belong to myself i belong to the lord and so basically you have to offer yourself up and like when i was going through this time it was very very difficult i said lord i would like to live but you know i don't belong to myself anymore but if i if you do graciously allow me to keep going i'm going to do a b c and d and if not you know i'm yours and you know i i was at peace with that in fact i've never had such peace in my life i'm tell people it's when i made the decision to do what i'm doing right now but i really want to walk my talk i want to live what i believe i really do it's very important we all do this as much as possible because here's our example the man of faith abraham who james tells us now was called a friend of god because in this extraordinarily difficult circumstance he decided to believe god he trusted god all through this when um you know it seemed impossible well anyway we there's another question we have here too the the response of the lord here could be read as meaning he was waiting to find out what abraham will do because the passage says now i know that you know they're in genesis now i know he said um that you fear god because you haven't withhold held your only son from me um some people read this unfortunately it's the wrong way to read and say well god finally found out when abraham was waiting to the last minute to see what abraham would do believe it or not people there there are christians i'll put this in quote christians today who are in leadership positions who teach in these theological colleges and seminaries who believe that god doesn't know the future god knows the past uh he knows the present to some degree but he doesn't know what's going to happen in the future so they actually believe that god was you know up there going wonder what abraham was going gonna do i hope he's gonna you know i'm pretty sure he might but maybe we don't know and everybody's kind of staring and looking you know this is not the god of the bible he knows there he has all knowledge he's omniscient past present and future but passages like this people read and say well gee god didn't know no what we have here is the lord communicating to abraham as a human would do saying now no now i know that um you have trusted me well again it's not recount it's not talking about god's lack of knowledge it's talking about basically uh from a human perspective how god's explaining this statement well now i know now i know that you know god knew what he was going to do but abraham didn't know what he was going to do abraham didn't know god was going to stop him at the last minute um i've actually written a whole book on the subject under my category of god does god know everything because there are a number of passages in the entire old testament predicting the old testament seem to talk about the limited knowledge of god we explain no that's not the case and unfortunately there's this terrible view of god that's there today that he knows he doesn't know the future in fact there's a tremendous uh you know um example in the life of david that and and this is something that is amazing we like to in fact i think i bring it up in some place and one of these things already recorded um god not only knows everything that's gonna happen you know he knows everything that could possibly happen every even possible in your life and mine there's an interesting you can read the account it's david uh is going to the city of kayla k-e-i-l-a-h and he says if i go oh he's on his way if i go to the city of kayla he's running from seoul will the men of calet turn me over to saul in other words if i go to this city will they turn me over and the lord said yeah if you go there they're going to turn you over well david didn't go but and so he wasn't turned over to saul but if he would have gone there and entrusted himself to these people he would have been turned over to seoul so what god is telling him i know what could have happened had you gone there this is what's gonna happen uh and so david said well i'm not gonna go there and he wasn't turned over which tells us something interesting too that god knows everything you do uh he knows everything you could have done all the possibilities but also past present and future our god has all knowledge and so no god we're not talking about the lack of knowledge here but it is interesting that we have to deal with that okay now providentially a substitute is found a substitute is immediately found verse 13 abraham looked up and saw behind him a ram caught in the bushes by its horns so he went over got the ram offered it up as a burnt offering instead of his son genesis 22 13 the ram was offered as a sacrifice in place of abraham the beloved son so god supernaturally provided as he stopped you know god stayed his hand from slaughtering his son all of a sudden he looks and there's a ram caught in the thicket able to be sacrificed so abraham then makes this great prophecy one of the greatest prophecies in all the bible the abraham called the name of the place the lord provides it is said to this day in the in the mountain of the lord provision will be made don't miss the meaning of these words on this mountain mount moriah in this place someday this and this particular mountain god's provision will happen now also too in some of your translations say it says in this the mountain of the lord it will be seen this is actually the word in hebrew means provide or to be seen it's going to appear and so you can look at it either way on this particular mountain in this particular place someday god's provision will be made but it wasn't that day the ultimate provision it was with the ram there and of course this is precisely what happened on that mountain in the second corinthians 5 21 we're told that 2000 years later god the son became the sacrifice for the world's sins uh ii corinthians 5 21 says for god made christ who never sinned to be the offering for our sin so that we could be made right with god that's from the new living translation and they they explain it correctly here when it talks about christ being made sin for us he didn't become sin he was a sin offering he he took the penalty of the sins of the world upon himself he didn't become sin for those six hours on calvary's cross he was the sin offering this is what it's talking i like what the nlt the way it explains it here he was the offering for sin two thousand years ago he was our substitute and therefore the lord what we find here the lord who tests you and i is the lord who provides for you now he's going to provide he always provides uh philippians 4 19 he's going to pro through his great riches he's going to provide for all our needs not all our greeds but all our needs through our writ his riches in grace and christ jesus all right now here's also where it becomes very very interesting when i became a christian uh let's see next it'll be 50 yeah march that's next month isn't it 51 years in march and 50 years been in the ministry at the end of this this year um i it was march 1970 i became a believer in christ lost as a human being could be now let me ask you this you may have the same issue we had you ever have something in your house that the only time you ever see it is when you move to the next place it's in the garage or something yeah right you know what i'm talking about all right i've moved a lot in my life and it's amazing i go through and you know this last time i saw it so i moved the last time in the last time before the time but someday i may need it so i'm going to move it to the next place well we had in our house and i'm you know i'm just 19 years of age now you're almost 20 in 1970 we had this bookcase that was there taken everywhere we went we moved it was about you know four foot high about two foot wide and had been there forever and every house we ever lived in but nobody ever looked at the books because these these books belong to my father before i was born he was in the he was in the ministry and he went to the korean korean war he turned his back kinda on the lord and uh you know i wasn't my mother was a believer he wasn't acting as though in his life at all and so we had his books from all the years in the 1940s where he actually studied under j vernon mcgee in the 1940s at biola college so we had all these books sitting there they were never looked at ever we just had the bookcase so i get home i just become a christian i look and here's ah god's treasure look all these christian books hooray you know because i'd seen them but i never read them once so i go in and one of the first books i pulled out was on genesis 22. i'd never read genesis 22. i didn't know so this passage i read for the first time i think i'd ever read it or may have heard it earlier in my life so i'm reading it through and a guy's explaining it because i read i've actually read books all night i stay up the whole night reading these books this is one of them but here is my question about wait a minute now this is interesting abraham was told told his son isaac god's going to provide a lamb in place of his son right well there's another animal there it was provided a ram instead of a lamb so my question was well wait a minute where is the lamb of god so then i noticed there was something called a concordance there i found that i pulled that out and i started looking lamb all the all the times it was in the old testament lamb of god and i couldn't find it in the entire old testament wait a minute god's going to provide a lamb where is it ah then i came to the new testament john 1 29 john the baptist sees jesus coming remember what he said yeah behold the lamb of god who takes away the sins of the world and so the lamb was provided not that day on mount moriah but two thousand years later on that exact same spot and funny i learned that like the first night as a believer it's like has anybody else ever seen this well there's hat obviously but i i hadn't seen and the guy didn't explain it in the book there uh but again it came up the answer john 1 29 god did eventually provide a lamb his own son now again i'll quote javern and mcgee a great summary of this episode through this episode he says through this incident god is making it clear that there will have to be a man to stand in the gap there will have to be a man capable of becoming the savior of the race if anyone is to be saved this is a great lesson given to us in this chapter abraham said that god would provide himself a lamb and he found a ram and offered it but god did provide a lamb 1900 years later in christ and here's the amazing thing god stayed abraham's hand and he and did not let him go through with the sacrifice of isaac because it would have been wrong god spared abraham's son but god did not spare his own son but gave him up freely for us all and that indeed is the message of scripture god who would not allow abraham to sacrifice his son freely gave his own son for our sins and that is the wonderful picture we have here now it is interesting back to the messenger of the lord if it is it is god's speaking there from mount either god the father or god the son to abraham is eventually you know the words of god to abraham not to sacrifice his son it's the message that's god saying i won't let you do this i won't let you sacrifice your son but 2 000 years later the father allowed his own son to be sacrificed for your sins and mine something he would not let abraham do and this is the great love of god because god the son took the penalty of your sins and mine two thousand years ago on calvary's cross something that only he could provide the sinless son of god who knew no sin was made a sin offering for us that we might become the righteousness of god in him a number of years ago i was um and this kind of puts gonna tie a ribbon around this puts all this together uh moving i lived in iowa for a while coming back out to california and i was um i was uh my family had already come back but i'm driving out with some of the stuff and i was trying you know you could make it i i stupidly sometimes drive like 20 hours i've done that before this time i didn't i was getting there i got as far as el centro and i couldn't make it all the way you know i you know i was i came over from orange county uh riverside county at the time went back but bottom line is i didn't quite make it all the way back i'm tired of that i got to stop the wind's blowing you know and all that and it's cold so i'm going to stop so i stopped in el centro it's on a saturday night then sunday morning i was going to get up and make the end of the journey but i thought you know it's sunday morning and i'm you know starting a new phase of my life here and so i thought you know what i'll do i'll turn on the tv and i'll get a good message you know trying to find a good message on tv um and something i need to hear something that'll encourage me uh you know to go on the journey here and i'm so glad i did because again just like this is something i've never forgotten i turned on i watched a message from charles stanley and he was teaching about obedience about how we're called to obey god in everything but many people say well god you got like 95 of me you got 98 of me but you know i think that's pretty good it's better than you know most people i know you're not going to get a hundred percent of me and then he said this a phrase i've never forgotten partial obedience he said partial obedience is disobedience if we decide to partially obey god we are being disobedient oh lord you've got this and that no no no you're being disobedient i'm being disobedient if the obedience is only partial he doesn't expect 98 he wants a hundred percent and that's what he got from abraham complete obedience there in offering his son and so kind of putting all this together as we read genesis 22 we see that god not only blessed this man blessed his faith gave us a great picture of christ but gave us an example of what we can be it is possible for us to be you know now abraham took him 50 years to learn to trust god but he trusted god in all things again the more you know your lord the more you follow him the more you know you're going to be able to trust him with everything and it comes by doing it it comes by time but the goal is is to act like abraham did so long ago on mount moriah and said lord if necessary you have to raise isaac back from the dead okay because he is the son of promise so i'm going to obey i don't understand it but i'm going to obey you then i'm going to let you be god and that's where you and i need to be today gang we live in a very very difficult world and unfortunately it's not going to get any lighter it's going to get darker but at the same time god's word and his message is going to go out people are going to come to faith in christ because human beings are looking for examples right now of people who have peace in their heart with all the difficult circumstances that are going on not that everything's going easy oh no in this world we're going to have tribulation we have it big time but we have something that brings us through this something different that we have that no one else has and that is by the grace of god his holy spirit that we know christ is with us no matter what happens again back to what i said earlier we don't belong to ourselves we belong to him when he says it's time for us to go we go when he says this we're going to go through this difficulty he allows it because he knows at the end of the day he's going to bring us through he starts with 100 sheep he's going to get 100 sheep to the finish line that's his job not ours because we go off this way and that way he says nope here's a straight arrow get back on that and so we have an opportunity right now in this world in a time where in our country it's very very dark and very difficult to be that person matter woman boy or girl who shows faith in jesus christ and so let's today as we leave here remember abraham remember what he did remember his faith there and remember that god is going to be with us no matter what and god knows the end from the beginning so just trust him okay and then watch and see what the living god will do let's pray

Channel: LivingWayTV

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Id: S0bfelHGsvs

Length: 58min 19sec (3499 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 22 2021