Here again the word of God as you find it in the 20th chapter of Genesis In beginning at verse 1 As we consider it together. Let me Remind us all that when God speaks he speaks for the good of his people he speaks for you And Abraham journeyed from there to the south and dwelt between Katesh and Sure and stayed in Gerar Now Abram set up Sarah his wife. She is my sister in the Bimilek King of Gerar sent and took Sarah But God came to a Bimilek in a dream by night and said to him indeed You are a dead man Because of the woman whom you have taken for she is a man's wife But a Bimilek had not come near her and he said Lord will you slay a righteous nation? also Did he not say to me she is my sister and she even she herself said he is my brother in The integrity of my heart and innocence of my hands. I have done this And God said to him in a dream Yes, I know that you did this in the integrity of your heart for I also withheld you from sinning against me Therefore I did not let you touch her Now therefore restore the man's wife for he is a prophet and He will pray for you and you shall live But if you do not restore her know that you shall surely die you and all who are yours So a Bimilek rose early in the morning called all his servants and told all these things in their hearing and The men were very much afraid And a Bimilek called Abraham and said to him what have you done to us how have I offended you that you have brought on me and on my kingdom a great sin You have done deeds to me that ought not to be done Then a Bimilek said to Abraham What did you have in view that you have done this thing? Abraham said because I thought surely the fear of God is not in this place and they will kill me on account of my wife But indeed she is truly my sister She is the daughter of my father, but not the daughter of my mother and she became my wife And it came to pass when God caused me to wander from my father's house that I said to her This is your kindness that you should do for me in every place wherever we go say of me. He is my brother Then a Bimilek took sheep, oxen, and male and female servants and gave them to Abraham and He restored Sarah his wife to him and the Bimilek said see my land is before you dwell where it pleases you Then to Sarah he said behold I have given your brother a thousand pieces of silver indeed This vindicates you before all who are with you and before everybody Thus she was rebuked So Abraham prayed to God and God healed the Bimilek his wife and his female servants then they bore children for the Lord had closed up All of the wounds of the house of the Bimilek because of Sarah Abraham's wife The word of the Lord Thanks be to God. Let's pray together
Lord Jesus, this is your word and You are the one who Through the Apostle Have said that your word is living and active and sharper than any two-edged sword and so, O Lord Would you the great physician of our souls Take this your scalpel and Do this surgical work upon us, which you alone can do be in our midst to be the one to preach to us Speak to us teach us and apply by your spirit the truth of your word
Lord you are in this place Faithful to your people We ask that each of us might know that faithfulness So come by your spirit and open up your word for us. We ask in your name Amen You may be seated
Lots of years ago as a very young Christian and as a freshman in college for the second time I recall sitting in a parking lot of the school. I was attending at the time and was listening to a friend Listening to a friend share his his very very deep deep sense of fear And this is as vivid as almost anything in my experience sitting in my 1974 Maverick and Listening to this friend Share his deep deep sense of fear that he was not a Christian His deep deep sense of fear that God would never love him could never love him his deep deep sense and And fear that he faced judgment that he faced being rejected by God and That forever and the reason that he believed them Is because he had sinned He had failed God and he hadn't failed God in a new way He'd failed God in an old way. He was a repeat offender again not sinning not failing God in some new and different way But sinning and failing God in a way that he had offended God and failed God and sinned before God And passed and he was deeply distressed and thought that God could never love him I was in court this last week Not for me, but for someone else And sat in the visitor's gallery And watched and listened during Ryan Stamper's trial and instead of going to trial Ryan pleaded guilty and pleaded no contest to the several charges against him. You need to pray for Ryan Over these next six weeks because his sentencing is in the next six weeks But he pleaded guilty and he pleaded no contest to the charges against him He sat in a court of law. He sat before a judge. The charges were read and there was no question of his guilt No question of his guilt
Threatening environment A terrifying Environment and there's no exit door There's no exit strategy That gets you out of that circumstance You have to face it And that's what my friend was feeling. That's what my friend was experiencing as we sat in my 1974 Maverick and he with tears in his eyes said God will never love me. God will never forgive me. There is no hope for me It was only despair and hopelessness Now this is a critical issue It's a critical issue for anybody who's a Christian And I doubt that anybody in this room who has been a Christian for more than five minutes hasn't experienced some of this What do you do when you fail? What do you think when you fail? How do you view yourself when you fail and and more pointedly and most pointedly all of all What does that failure do to your relationship to God? What does that failure do to your relationship to God? I know what it does to your consciences I know what it does to your hearts I know what it does to your sense of well-being But what in fact Does it do to your relationship to God?
Abraham is a repeat defender
Abraham is a repeat defender Abraham who is the model of faith Now let this lodge all right let this stick in the gray matter in your skulls Abraham is held up throughout the scriptures as a model of faith as the model pilgrim Paul looks to Abraham in Romans and other places The author of the letter to the Hebrews looks to Abraham More than anybody else in his letter saved Jesus who is the fulfillment of everything that is anticipated in the Old Testament But looks to Abraham more than any other if you read In in Hebrews 11 all of those all stars of the faith Abraham gets more time. He gets more ink more press than anybody else James Looks to Abraham as a model of what it means to be faithful To walk before God be a faithful pilgrim and Abraham is a repeat defender Abraham is a repeat defender What does it like to walk with God? What was it like for Abraham to be a repeat offender and what happens to his relationship to God As he is a repeat offender
Want to come at this in a series of questions three questions What did Abraham do? What did God do in response? And what about us that is what does God do with us? When we fail What did Abraham do what did God do in response and what about us? And I want to say that while there's a lot that needs to be said About us when we fail and there's a lot to be learned from Abraham As we look at him in the midst of his failure. I want to say to you that this sermon is specifically Specifically for people whose consciences are deeply troubled And who like my friend wonder Whether God's love is really that big and that deep and that high and that wide who wonder If they will ever change who wonder if God will cast them aside who wonder if God will grow weary
So first of all, what did Abraham do?
Well, Abraham betrayed his wife Again and Abraham betrayed the institution of marriage Again and Abraham Put the promise and program of God at risk Again, when you read these first couple of verses while they're Elaborated a little bit later in the text and Abraham is the one who elaborates what transpires in these first couple of verses Nevertheless, when you read these first couple of verses it automatically it automatically triggers in our minds The previous incident in Genesis chapter 12 Where Abraham after God has spoken the promise to him and calls him out of darkness calls him out of error brings him to the promised land But there is a famine in that land and Abraham because of that famine leaves the land of promise and goes down into Egypt And he goes down into Egypt to dwell there and when he comes to Egypt This is what he says he instructs his wife to say this first 11 of chapter 12 It came to pass when he was close to entering Egypt
When he was close to entering Egypt
He said to his wife indeed I know that you are a woman of beautiful And therefore it will happen when the Egyptians see you they will say this is his wife and they will kill me But let you live But say that you are my sister so that it may be well with me for your sake And that I may live because of you so it was when Abraham came into Egypt that the Egyptians saw the woman that she was very beautiful And the princes of Pharaoh also saw her and commended her to Pharaoh and the woman was taken in the Pharaoh's house
And Pharaoh treated Abraham well for her sake See when you read those first couple of verses Automatically it triggers in your minds what had happened in Abram's life and experienced previously And here Abram is in chapter 20 and yet it's only a few chapters after chapter 12 But it's a lot of years after chapter 12 here is Abram
Having committed this crime once before and now years and years later And through the course of those years the beneficiary through all of those years of God's Constancy and God's Perseverance and God's Faithfulness Abram the beneficiary the recipient of repeated acts of kindness from God Abram the beneficiary of God's limitless grace and mercy across all of those years having experienced all of that Here is Abram Confronted with another temptation confronted with another opportunity to show his faithfulness to God his belief in God his confidence in God And what does he do he bales He caves in He fails he sends
Anybody in that camp Anybody been there and done that I look around this crowd and I know there's some folks here who are newer and younger Christians But I look at this crowd and I see folks who know this stuff and who have been down this road Anybody in the camp that Abram was in
That's what Abram did what did Abram do he betrayed his wife Betrayed the institution of marriage He put the program and purpose of God at risk why did he do all of those things He did all of those things simply to save his own skin And what lies beneath this activity and this is something Something I think for us to wrestle with something for us to understand and really take time to reflect upon What is beneath Abram's behavior? That is what is beneath Abram's betrayal Is simply unbelief That's the first sin the first sin is the sin of unbelief and it's the sin of unbelief That leads to all of the other behavioral sins That you find in Abram's life and make no mistake about it. It's sinful to do what Abram did It's wrong To put your wife at risk When God created the man and the woman in the garden and God gave the man a responsibility for his wife I'm convinced it didn't have anything to do with who's going to take the garbage out Who's going to write the checks and take care of the finances? I'm convinced it didn't have anything to do not at bottom with who is going to be the primary breadwinner and wage earner I just don't think so I think what God commanded and commissioned the man to do was to be a protector and a defender Against every alien attack Every threat Every influence that could rob that marriage and that family of the glory that God intended for it And what does Abram do? He betrays a trust And he fails to be the defender and protector And he leaves his wife exposed and he leaves the institution of marriage exposed and all of it flows out Of what is beneath his behavior and that is unbelief and what is unbelief? It's simply a failure to believe God unbelief is simply a failure to trust God Simply a failure to believe that God will take care of him no matter where he finds himself Whether in Egypt or in Gerar as a pilgrim and sojourner in the midst of the world God had manifestly demonstrated to Abram that he was worthy of his trust
And that he would take care of Abram And on this particular occasion Faith buckled collapsed and unbelief took hold And Abram violated the trust of God That's what sin is all about at every point examine it look beneath the surface Look beneath the behavior look beneath the attitudes reflect upon this contemplate this at bottom What's in is is a failure to believe to trust to rest in God as entirely capable of protecting defending preserving and caring for you
It is a failure to believe God and to rest in God and to trust that God himself Not the applause of men not the security that a king can give Not the security that the right clothes can give or the right job or the right boyfriend or the right girlfriend But God himself alone satisfies the deepest longings of the human heart At that point Abraham caved in Lied about his wife and in effect entrusted his well-being To the care of a pagan king Abimelek Think about what God had said
Chapter 12 verse 1 and following God had promised Abram That he would bless him and that he would bless all of those who blessed him Abram It's a promise of God Think of the promise that he made to Abram in Genesis 15 the first few verses where God again comes to Abram And promises to Abram that he will be his shield and his defender and his very great reward You see those two things that I've just described for you about what it means to trust God A right in those verses in Genesis 15 one and following he promised that he would be his shield and defender That is he would care for him protect him and defend him and he would be his very great reward His exceedingly great reward Greater than anything That this Fallen and broken world could ever give That's what God had promised and Abram Collapsed when troubled in his own mind about the threat that Abimelek posed How do we get into trouble in the Christian life Where do we go wrong? We go wrong And it's a lesson we have to learn over and over and over again. We go wrong We get in trouble when we fail to believe God and trust his word That's when we get into trouble We get into trouble when we fail to believe God and trust in his word when I desire the approval of men More than the approval of God when I find my security and who I know and what I look like or what I possess rather than God When I trust anything to keep me safe instead of God that is when my trouble begins And here's another thing that you need to see in this passage when my trouble starts it only starts trouble for others It only starts trouble for others. It started trouble for Sarah It started trouble for Abimelek It started trouble for Abimelek's wife It started trouble for all of the households under Abimelek's care because God closed up The wounds of all of the women in that household and all of the trouble starts With Abrams failure to believe God and trust in his word
Here's the second thing. What did God do? Isn't this great? I mean don't you just love this. What does God do? Does God do what we would expect?
You know does does God do What the judge Maximum Bob did With Jim Baker you remember that Remember when Jim Baker got caught got caught with his hand in the cookie jar
Built this great empire on sand and for personal gain He went before the judge and unfortunately who did he get? He got maximum Bob I don't know what his last name was. I only know he was called maximum Bob and what did he do with Jim Baker He gave him the maximum sentence. You need to pray for Ryan because the reputation of the judge that he is before Is that this judge is tough crimes with guns in the state of Florida Don't merit mercy. But what does God do with Abraham? He's no maximum Bob. He's no maximum Bob. Look at what he does God in his mercy intervenes He intervenes in Abraham's case in Abraham's life God comes to a bimolec he goes right to the king And confronts the king That's in verse three Indeed you are a dead man because of the woman whom you have taken for she is my wife But I want you to see that this isn't this isn't the first point at which God intervenes in Abrams case in Abrams life And Sarah's life or even in a bimolec's life as you read on in the text you see in the text that it is God God himself who restrained a bimolec from taking Sarah into his harem and touching her God restrained God in his providence intervened from the very beginning at the moment of Abrams fall and restraints in and kept sin from wreaking havoc upon Abrams and Sarah and a bimolec and his whole household God is no maximum Bob. He intervenes for Abraham And protects him and why does he do that? Why does he do that? I think back again on what you've learned and what you've seen in Genesis I've already alluded to this Genesis 12 Get out of your country from your family from your father's house to a land that I will show you I Might make you a great nation And I might bless you and I might make your name great So that you might be a blessing So that I might bless those who bless you and I might curse those who curse you So that in you all of the families of the earth might be blessed
The promises of God to his people are not conditional
The promises of God to his people are certain and fixed and God says I will bless you and you will be a blessing to all of the nations And in you will all the earth be blessed look at Genesis 15 Do not be afraid Abram Do not be afraid I am your shield Your exceedingly great reward Chapter 12 chapter 15 God makes promises to Abram and they are certain and they are fixed and for Abram's good and for your good Because you are the children of Abram and you stand in the same stream Abram is the father of faith And he is the father of the faithful and the promises spoken to you are promises Promise is spoken to him are promises that are spoken to you and later in chapter 15 do you remember what God did He's spoken the promise but because our faith is weak and because we need tangible reminders Of God's faithfulness to us God did something tangible Something Abram would never forget Later in chapter 15 Abram slayed those beasts. He cut them in half He made a gauntlet of those beasts and after he had slain the beasts He went over and he sat down and he watched and at a distance He saw the smoking pot pass between those pieces and in that act God was ratifying his promises to Abram and he was saying in effect to Abram if I fail in any one of these promises that I have made to you If any one of these promises does not come true may happen to me what has happened to these beasts
May I be slain God put himself on the line And ratified the promises of God with this oath
God put himself at risk and guaranteed for Abram that the promises would be fulfilled When sin poses a threat to Abram when sin threatens to undo all that God has started When sin threatens to undo all of God's purpose and program you understand what is really at stake
What is really at stake in that is the honor of the name of God Because you see God has fixed his name upon Abram And God will see to it that his name is exalted and honored and glorified That his integrity is lifted up That his faithfulness is extoled And that he will be acknowledged as beautiful and lovely and gracious and kind and merciful and faithful Because he keeps his promises and after having ratified these promises With this ceremony Having made certain for Abram that God would fulfill with all his end of the bargain he gave him another sign The sign of circumcision he gave him a mark in his body That he would carry with him wherever he went And that would be a reminder to him not so much who he is But who God is because God put the mark on him And when God puts his mark on something it is a sign of his ownership and God will never fail To be faithful to what he owns Why does God act? Why does God intervene for Abram? Why is God no maximum Bob?
Because he has so identified with Abram He has so identified himself with Abram that he, God, the God of heaven and earth, will not be satisfied Will not rest, will not finish working until every promise he has made to Abram is fulfilled for Abram and all of his descendants
Because his name is on the line His name is at stake Isaiah 48 verses 9 to 15 For my name's sake I will defer my anger And for my praise I will restrain it from you so that I do not cut you off
So that I do not cut you off and destroy you forever that's Graphic language it is the language of circumcision God in the act and in the right of circumcision gives Abram this act And in this act which is painful and which is bloody Abram comes to understand that there is cost involved in this But in this act there is symbolized the idea that something is removed and it is cut off and it is taken away from the presence of God removed from him What is impure what is unholy what is not worthy of his name is removed and God says here to Israel to his nation Because of promises that he has made to them Promises which will lead ultimately to the Messiah who is their great head and their great king and their great deliverer God says because of those promises and because of that issue he will not cut Israel off
Behold I have refined you but not as silver I have tested you in the furnace of affliction for my own sake for my own sake I will do it for how should my name be profaned So that I would give my glory to another
You see if the name of God is profaned that is if his name does not prove to be faithful and upright and beautiful and true a name with integrity And the glory which he deserves would be given to another who would be more faithful than God Why is God faithful to Abram? Why is God faithful to Israel? You should read Ezekiel 20. It's a fabulous chapter Where repeatedly God says for the sake of my name I will not do it for the sake of my name I will not do it. Yes Israel you deserve it make no mistake about it, but for the sake of my name I will not do it. So what did God do? God intervened Why did God intervene needing for the sake of his name because Abram bore his name his name was fixed upon Abram And that name represents promises and commitment and God will show himself faithful to those things
So what about today? What about you? What about you repeat offenders?
Remember that God not only gave Abram a promise He not only gave him a covenant Remember that he gave him a sign What about you? This is Pentecost Sunday
And on Pentecost Sunday The church And can I say this again the reason we talk about these seasons of the year is because we understand time differently We understand that time is the environment and space is the environment time and space so the context in which God does his work time and space aren't about earthly kings and princes time and space aren't about earthly nations and empires time and space are about God And what God does and we mark time on a weekly basis observing a Lord's Day celebration of the resurrection of Christ Because God is acted in time and space And we recognize these seasons of the year from Advent to Christmas and Epiphany and Lent and Easter And the season of Easter and ascension and now Pentecost because God is acted in time and he's done things differently
We observe Pentecost because on the day of Pentecost you see God gave to his church not only power He certainly did that He gave his church power for the execution of the purpose which God had given to the church to take the gospel in all of its glory to the Etermost parts of the earth
If you read the Epistles of Paul first Corinthians or second Corinthians chapter one and Ephesians one God gave the spirit As a feel of God's ownership you see if you're a Christian today You've been baptized and that water That water which doesn't stay on you in the way that circumcision stayed on male children in Israel
And so is easy to lose sight of and easy to forget That water nevertheless is a sign that points to a Feeling work of God in the person of the Holy Spirit And if you are a Christian today Listen to what Paul says Ephesians one and this is after he has talked about the work of the Father in setting you apart for himself This is after he has talked about the work of Jesus Christ in securing your redemption by the shedding of his blood After talking about the work of the Father and then the work of the Son He goes on to talk about the work of the Spirit and in effect what he says is that the Father who has loved you And the Father who has secured your salvation in Jesus Christ has sealed you as belonging to himself by the Holy Spirit Verse 13 in him in Jesus you also trusted after you heard the word of truth the gospel of your salvation In whom also having believed you were sealed with the Holy Spirit of promise Who isn't he of our inheritance Until the redemption of the possession which he has purchased to the glory of his grace Do you hear the language a seal makes you the possession of the King of glory
So how are you to think about it? How are you to think about it when in the Providence of God you find that you failed Here's how you think about it when sin poses a threat to you When sin seems to pose a threat to God's purpose for you You remember that you are marked with the sign of the trying God And there is no power no authority in all of heaven or earth that can mess with that sign And mess with that seal and that sign and seal are for you a down payment a promise Of your future inheritance when all of your stumbling and struggling and unbelief are finally gone And you enjoy the fullness of the spirit and all of the blessedness of the kingdom Christ has purchased for you
What happens when you struggle when you stumble when you fall have you failed yes you have
Have you sinned yes you have have you grieved the Holy Spirit yes you have But look at Abram and remember Abram and look at the text again and see that God commissioned Abram to get back on his feet And the pray for Abimelec To get back on your feet and go back to work
Because you are sealed With the seal of the king and because you're sealed You're safe You're secure Thanks be to God Let's pray together Lord Jesus I pray for these folks There is so much more That needs to be said, but this is for people whose consciences are troubled and I pray oh Lord That their hearts would be encouraged that they would be lifted up Oh Lord our sin is grievous and there is repentance involved and there is Independence upon you and the grace which you bestow in the persons of the person of the Holy Spirit. There is a need for us To turn away from evil and turn away from sin and seek To reform and amend our lives by your grace Oh, there is all of that, O Lord But none of that will begin and you know it, O Lord none of that will begin until we are assured in our consciences That the blood of Jesus really has cleansed us and that the sealing of the Holy Spirit is forever So I pray for my friends And especially for those in trouble That you would take this truth of your word and seal it to their hearts And send them out of this place with great joy to serve you in the midst of the world
And we pray for the ongoing work of Jesus by the person of the Holy Spirit in our lives So that our lives might be amended and reformed So that our lives might bring you glory Here are prayers Lord Jesus we make them in your name Amen