Genesis chapter 11.
We were considering the last few verses here
of this chapter where we saw that God
called Abram from that land of idolatry, Ur
of the Chaldees, and from there he brought
him out, and we saw that he didn't
initially come to the place where God wanted
him to come.
Because his father took charge of that movement,
out of Ur of the Chaldees, and it
says in Genesis 11, verse 31, that Sarah
took Abram, his son, and Lot, the son
of Haran.
And they set out, verse 31, the last
middle of it, it says, to enter the
land of Canaan, but they went as far
as Haran, and settled there.
And we saw there how it is possible
for people to be called by God to
a particular task or ministry, and we can
apply that to our own lives, that God
may call a person to a particular task,
a particular calling.
It's possible that he can miss that if
he allows his relatives to interfere in God's
calling for his life.
This is why Jesus, when he laid down
the conditions of discipleship, the very first thing
that he mentioned was that if a man
wants to be my disciple, he must hate
his father, mother, and wife, and children, and
brothers and sisters.
Otherwise it's impossible to be a disciple of
Jesus.
We find the Old Testament is full of
many examples of this.
How right in the beginning, Eve tempted Adam
to sin, and Adam sinned because of his
wife.
And here how Abram missed out, for some
time anyway, on God's best because of his
father.
We need to see this very clearly.
We looked at Acts chapter 7 last time,
and we saw this verse that it was
that God called Abraham.
We read in Acts 7, verse 2, Stephen
saying, The God of glory appeared to our
father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before
he lived in Haran, and said to him,
Depart from your country and your relatives.
You see that?
That's the condition of following the Lord.
And come into the land that I will
show you.
And he departed.
And he settled in Haran, verse 4.
From there, after his father died, God removed
him into this country from which you are
now living.
Think if his father had not died, Abraham
would have stayed there a little longer.
It is right for us to love our
parents.
It is right for us to honor them,
and to always speak respectfully to them, about
them behind their back, always respectfully.
Never to speak evil to them, or evil
about them.
Provide for them financially, care for them in
every possible way.
But never, never, never to allow them to
hinder us from doing what God wants us
to do.
That is the teaching of God's word.
And I think when we get to the
judgment seat of Christ, we will discover, I
believe there will be hundreds of thousands of
believers who miss God's best, because they listen
to daddy and mommy, they listen to their
wife, they listen to their love for their
children, or love for their brothers and sisters.
Some think, and they miss God's best.
It is not that they went to hell,
but that there will be some regret in
their life, that if they had been a
little more wholehearted, they could have made much
more use of the one life that God
gave them on earth.
And there are enough examples in scripture to
warn us about that.
And, turning back to Genesis 11, Sarah died
in Haran, and the Lord said, now the
Lord had said, that's the right translation there,
chapter 12, verse 1, the Lord had said
to Abraham, go forth from your country, and
from your relatives, and from your father's house.
Notice that complete break, from your country, from
your relatives, and from your father's house, to
the land which I will show you.
That was the requirement in the Old Testament,
and it is the requirement in the New.
If you turn to the book of Hebrews,
in chapter 11, we read there a commentary
of the Holy Spirit on the act of
Abraham there.
Hebrews, in chapter 11, we read there about
Abraham's faith, in verse 8, By faith Abraham,
when he was called, obeyed, by going out
to a place which he was to receive
for an inheritance, and he went out not
knowing where he was going.
By faith he lived as an alien in
the land of promise, because, verse 10, he
was looking for the city which has foundations,
whose architect and builder is God.
Verse 14, For those who say such things
make it clear that they are seeking a
country of their own.
And indeed, if they had been thinking of
that country from which they went out, they
would have had opportunity to return.
But as it is, they desire a better
country that is a heavenly one.
Therefore God is not ashamed to be called
their God, for he has prepared a city
for them.
We saw last Sunday that Jesus is not
ashamed to call us brothers if we are
desirous of being sanctified.
That's the verse we looked at in chapter
2, verse 11 of Hebrews, that Jesus is
not ashamed to call us brethren, those who
want to be sanctified.
Now here it says, in Hebrews 11, verse
16, that God is not ashamed to be
called their God, because in the Old Testament
God is called the God of Abraham.
And there is a reason why God is
called the God of Abraham.
The reason is given us in this verse.
God is not ashamed to be called their
God, because these people, verse 16 of Hebrews
11, desired a heavenly country.
They were not interested in an earthly country.
Like Jesus said, My kingdom is not of
this world.
If it were of this world, My servants
would fight.
We need to understand that.
That Abraham, though we read later on that
he was very rich, he had much cattle
and all that, yet his heart was not
in them.
And you see that particularly when a conflict
arises with lots in the next chapter.
You find that Abraham's heart is not in
his wealth, which shows that he was desiring
a heavenly country.
It's amazing that way back there in the
Old Testament it says that they were desiring
a heavenly country, verse 16.
Therefore, that's the reason, God is not ashamed
to be called their God.
And God is not ashamed to be called
our God if He sees in our hearts
that we desire another country.
And there God searches all people's hearts.
The Bible calls Him the searcher of all
men's hearts.
And I believe it is possible for any
of us to have God call Himself the
God of so and so.
Put your name there instead of Abraham.
But I don't believe that every believer can
put his name there.
I don't believe that God is willing to
be called by the name of every believer
like He called Himself by the God of
Abraham.
Because the vast majority of believers are interested
in earthly things.
They fight for earthly things, they fight for
property, they fight for their rights, they fight
for position, they fight for honor in the
earth, honor in the church.
God is certainly ashamed to be called their
God.
I don't believe that God would ever be
willing to be called the God of a
man who fights for money, or property, or
honor, or for his rights.
God is ashamed, thoroughly ashamed, to be called
the God of such a person.
Even if that person says God is my
God, he may say that, but God is
ashamed to be called the God of such
a person.
But God is not ashamed to be called
the God of a man like Abraham, who
responded.
Very easy to look now and say, well,
he should have been more wholehearted and given
up his father.
That's right.
But remember, he lived in a time when
there was so little light.
There was no written word of God.
Think of all the people who have much
more light than Abraham today, who still don't
do what Abraham did.
He finally, anyway, broke free from his father
and came to the land.
But think of multitudes of believers who have
got God's word and never seem to break
free from their relatives.
I really believe, brothers and sisters, that many
of us may discover in the daily stand
before the Lord that we missed on a
lot that God had for us because of
an undue attachment to carnal relatives who are
not wholehearted.
There may be relatives who are believers, but
who are not wholehearted, and we are influenced
by them, affected by them, and the result
is that we just don't move to the
place that God has for us.
So that's something we must take seriously.
The Lord said to Abraham, Genesis 12.1,
Go forth from your country, from your relatives,
from your father's house to the land which
I will show you.
And he did it, and God was not
ashamed to be called his God, the God
of Abraham.
Here is an example for us to follow.
And I will make you a great nation,
I will bless you, and make your name
great, and you shall be a blessing.
Here are two things.
On one side, God says, I will bless
you, and on the other side, he says,
you will be a blessing.
In other words, I will fill your life,
and then your life will overflow in blessing
to other people.
Now that is the blessing with which God
blessed Abraham when he called him out.
Right at the beginning, before he told him
anything about all the other purposes he had
for him, the first thing he said was,
if you will do all these things, if
you leave your country and leave your father's
house and leave your relatives and come to
the land I'll show you, I'll do something
for you.
I will take the responsibility to bless you,
and I will make you a blessing.
And when you turn to the New Testament
in Galatians chapter 3, we read that in
the new covenant, we can receive the blessing
of Abraham.
This is why the study of Abraham's life
is appropriate for us, because it says in
Galatians 3 that Jesus redeemed us, verse 13,
from the curse of the law.
Galatians 3.13, becoming a curse for us.
Now we thought that the curse of the
law was physical.
Basically, you read that in Deuteronomy 28.
Physical sickness, madness, blindness, poverty, getting into debt,
all types of things.
You go through Deuteronomy 28 and you see
the curse of the law.
It says Jesus has redeemed us from that
because he has become a curse for us.
But it is not in order that the
blessing of the law might come upon us.
There's no word in the New Testament.
There are blessings mentioned in Deuteronomy 28, but
those are not the blessings promised to us.
We are redeemed from the curse of the
law, but not blessed with the blessing of
the law.
Notice that.
We've got to read Scripture exactly.
We are redeemed from the curse of the
law, verse 13, but the blessing that comes
upon us is not the blessing of the
law in Deuteronomy 28, but, verse 14, in
order that in Christ Jesus the blessing of
Abraham might come on the Gentiles.
So that, and here is the blessing of
Abraham, so that we might receive the promise
of the Holy Spirit through faith.
It's referring to the baptism in the Holy
Spirit.
What Abraham had in a very small way
was going to be ours in the New
Testament in fullness through the baptism and fullness
of the Holy Spirit.
And there we get an understanding of what
this new covenant blessing in Abraham is, and
what the power of the Holy Spirit is
really meant to do and produce.
That is, that God can say to us,
like he said to Abraham, I will bless
you and you will be a blessing.
You see, we can try to make ourselves
a blessing to others.
There are a lot of Christians who try
to make themselves a blessing.
God didn't give Abraham a command saying, make
yourself a blessing to others.
I cannot make myself a blessing to others.
There's a song we sing, Lord, make me
a blessing.
God can do it.
I can't do it.
And when I try to make myself a
blessing to others, usually people who try to
do that usually end up making a nuisance
of themselves to others.
But God can make us a blessing to
others.
And how does he do that?
Only one way.
And that is by filling us with the
Holy Spirit.
Then the word of God is fulfilled that
Jesus, like Jesus told the woman of Samaria,
that he would put a well inside her,
which would spring up into everlasting life.
That's the first part of that blessing.
I will bless you so that you're filled
with the Holy Spirit and you're never dry.
That's the meaning of what Jesus told the
Samaritan woman.
If you drink from this well, you'll thirst
again.
You'll run dry and you'll let it come
back.
But the one who drinks from the water
that I give him, I'll put a well
inside him, a spring inside him, that'll never
run dry.
That's the meaning of being filled in the
Holy Spirit.
It's not God's will that his children should
ever run dry.
And the second part of it is what
he said in John 7, that from this
life would flow rivers of living water to
other people.
That means such a person would be a
blessing to others.
And this is the blessing of Abraham, which
Galatians says, is for us through the Holy
Spirit.
I will bless you and you will be
a blessing.
In those two statements, we have a picture
of the ministry of the Holy Spirit, the
blessing promised to Abraham, which is ours in
the New Covenant.
We can say that's our birthright.
And therefore, we should never be satisfied until
that is fulfilled in our lives.
Every one of us, we know that Jesus
spoke about those who are thirsty coming to
him.
Who are the thirsty ones?
Those who are thirsty and saying, Lord, I
want you to bless me.
Bless me in such a way that blessing
will overflow from my life to others.
Who are thirsty for that?
A person, for example, who is content that,
you know, I have no sickness in my
family, and my children are doing well in
their examinations in school, and they're getting married
off properly, and they've got good jobs by
God's grace.
He's got no thirst for anything.
He's quite happy with what he's got, with
a few material things that have been given
to him and his freedom from sickness.
He's quite content.
Yeah, I don't believe that such a person
can receive the blessing of Abraham, because Jesus
said, if any man is thirsty, let him
come to me.
And think that what God promised to one
man.
If you were living in 2000 B.C.,
around Abraham's time, that blessing was not for
you.
No, God said it to Abraham.
But think that because we are living after
the day of Pentecost, that every one of
us can have that.
It's not just for one person.
Everyone who has a thirst and a faith
to believe that what God did for Abraham,
He'll do for me.
Because it says in Galatians 3.14, that
the blessing of Abraham might come on us,
heathens.
The word Gentiles means heathens.
I'm one of the heathens.
You're one of the heathens whom God called
out.
But it's not automatic.
You can miss it.
I can miss it.
If I don't really thirst for it, if
I don't have faith that God can do
this for me.
So we've got to take that seriously.
I'll bless you, you'll be a blessing.
I will bless those, Genesis 12.3, 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 shall be blessed.
And of course, we know that that was
fulfilled because Jesus Christ came through Abraham.
Abraham's seed.
And now it is being fulfilled through the
church, which is the body of Christ.
We are now called the children of Abraham,
who is the father of faith.
And that's why the study of Abraham's life
is so important for us.
Because turning back to Galatians, we see there,
Galatians 3.29, first of all, Galatians 3
.16, now the promises were spoken to Abraham
and to his seed.
Galatians 3.16, and it does not say,
and to seed, as referring to many, but
rather to one, and to your seed.
That is Christ.
And we know that we are the body
of Christ.
Therefore, verse 29, and if you belong to
Christ, then you are Abraham's seed.
Not seeds, but seeds.
And connect that with verse 16.
You see that what God has promised to
Abraham was fulfilled through Christ, not through the
Jews, but through Christ.
And if you belong to Christ, then you
are Abraham's seed, heirs according to the promise.
And we know that those who are Christ
are those who crucify the flesh with his
affections and lusts, as he says later on
in Galatians 5.24. And that's why we
see that what God promised to Abraham is
relevant to us who enter into the new
covenant.
Because this is for us.
In you shall all the families of the
earth be blessed.
That applies to the church, which is the
body of Christ.
In other words, it is God's will that
through the church others should be blessed.
Families should be blessed.
Think how Jesus told his apostles, when you
enter a house, say, peace be to this
house.
And if there is someone sick there, heal
that sick person, so that when you go
away, those people are so thankful that you
have come there.
Think of that, my brothers and sisters.
We may not have the gifts of healing,
perhaps, but think that every one of us
can be a blessing to every family that
we ever visit.
Think of the stupidity of so many believers,
who all that they do when they visit
another family is sit and gossip and spread
the curse a little more in that home
before they leave it.
Talk all types of useless things.
Perhaps have a quarrel with somebody in that
house and then leave.
That's not the blessing of Abraham.
No.
That's the result of being under the curse
of the law.
When people were under the curse of the
law, they fought, they quarreled, they had strife.
All types of things.
Jesus has become a curse.
We are freed from all that.
Now, all the families of the earth are
to be blessed through us.
I cannot visit all the families of the
earth.
You cannot visit all the families of the
earth.
But we can visit a few.
The ones we visit should be blessed.
They don't have to be just believers.
Anyone.
Think of that calling.
Think that our life is to make such
an impression for God on the earth, that
families are to be blessed just because one
person enters that home.
And they are thankful that such a person
ever came into their home.
My brothers and sisters, that's not the calling
of some special group of people.
For every one of us.
Because the blessing of Abraham is for us.
So let's take that seriously.
Genesis 12 verse 4.
So Abraham went forth as the Lord had
spoken to him.
And we know that was after his father
died.
God had to deal drastically with him.
But then finally he got him moving.
I thought that what I see from here
is how much God is dependent on a
man.
And how, there's a phrase that came to
my mind when I thought of Abraham.
And that's the phrase that's mentioned in Ezekiel
22 and verse 30.
Ezekiel 22 and verse 30.
It says, the Lord says, I searched for
a man among them.
That is a phrase.
I searched for a man.
Which has been true of God's working in
the human race in all generations.
In Enoch's time, it was true.
God searched for a man and he found
an Enoch.
In Noah's time, he searched for a man
and he found a Noah.
And then in Nimrod's time and afterwards, in
the subsequent generations, with all the world in
idolatry and rebelling against God, he searched for
a man.
Because the world was full of idolatry.
We read that in the book of Joshua
and chapter 24.
Joshua 24 and verse 2 and 3.
Joshua said to the people, Thus says the
Lord, the God of Israel, From ancient times
your fathers lived beyond the river, that's the
river Euphrates, in Ur of the Chaldees, namely
Terah, the father of Abraham and the father
of Nahor.
And they served other gods.
Abraham was an idolater.
We can say he was like a Hindu.
Abraham was like a Hindu.
He was an idolater, worshipping many gods.
Then I took your father Abraham from out
of there and led him through the land
of Canaan.
They were idolaters.
And in the midst of all these idolaters,
God searched for a man whom he could
deliver from this idolatry.
And we have seen that idolatry is more
than worshipping images.
Idolatry can be idolatry of people, of things,
of a profession.
And in the midst of all the idolatry
there is in the world, God still says,
even today, I searched for a man.
I believe he is searching for many men
in many parts of the world today.
But he is searching, searching.
And in Ezekiel's time it says he found
none.
And in Abraham's time he searched.
He must have searched before, but he never
found anyone.
But finally he found one in Abraham who
didn't have light.
But there must have been something in Abraham
that God saw with all his lack of
light, that there was a responsiveness to God.
And that's the thing that encourages me, brothers
and sisters.
It is not light that God looks for.
Because all of us have much more light
than Abraham had.
But we may not be as responsive to
God as Abraham was.
So what if you've got more light, if
you're not responsive?
God still has to leave us aside and
says, I searched for a man.
I'm not searching for a man who's got
a lot of light.
Light I'll give him.
I'm searching for a man who will be
responsive when I call him.
It's a very wonderful phrase that comes about
Abraham later on.
Whenever God says, Abraham, he says, here I
am.
Have you noticed that?
You'll see that in later chapters in Genesis.
The Lord called Abraham.
Abraham said, here I am.
He didn't say, Lord, just wait, I've got
something else to do now.
No, here I am.
That was his attitude.
A man who was responsive.
And that's the thing that encourages me tremendously,
that there may be so many things on
which we don't have light.
It doesn't matter.
If we are responsive, God will lead us
on.
So we're not to glory in the fact
that we have a lot of light.
Are we responsive when God speaks?
And I believe it's in little things that
he tests us.
I think of people, for example, to whom
God speaks about baptism, and they take years
and years to think about it and finally
obey.
We can say that such people, I mean,
they may not go to hell, but it's
very unlikely that God can ever do anything
with such people.
Or for that matter, in some other area,
God asks them to give up something, and
they think about it and think about it
and think about it and think about it.
Don't give it up.
I mean, we know that, for example, there
are people who say, I've got this bad
habit and I can't give it up.
I heard of a man who, in another
country, who was a slave to smoking, and
he became a believer.
And he said he couldn't give it up,
because he said, I've been a slave to
it for so long.
Till one day he had some serious problem
with his chest, and the doctor said, if
you smoke cigarettes anymore, you'll die.
And he stopped immediately.
How is that?
The fear of death was more than the
fear of God.
That was the reason.
And I believe with many believers, the fear
of death is more than the fear of
God.
For example, when some people are dying, they
suddenly begin to confess all their sins and
make restitution and ask forgiveness.
They never did it in all their lifetime,
because they never feared God.
But now they're afraid of death.
Fear of God.
The fear of pain and sickness is more
than the fear of God, because when sickness
and pain come, they begin to confess everything
and set all things right, which they never
did all the rest of the time, when
they don't fear God.
So you see, God is always searching for
people who will respond.
Think of that.
Who will respond, who may not have so
much light on so many things, but when
God calls them to do something, they say,
Lord, I'm going to do it.
If the fear of God doesn't do it
in me, nothing else must do it in
me.
And there each of us can profitably examine
ourselves.
Can the fear of death make us do
something which the fear of God will not
do?
Then we are just like all the other
human beings in the world, who are just
the children of Adam, who have no fear
of God.
I believe that if we examine our lives,
we shall discover how many things we would
do out of the fear of death, which
we wouldn't do out of the fear of
God.
There are believers who do things out of
fear of the government authorities, who wouldn't do
the same thing out of the fear of
God.
They do something righteously because they're afraid they'd
get caught, but they wouldn't do it righteously
out of the fear of God.
And that's why God's search continues throughout the
world today.
I searched for a man, God searching for
those who will respond like Abraham.
Finally, Abraham moved.
And Abraham took Sarah, his wife, Genesis 12,
5, Lot, his nephew, and all their possessions,
which they had accumulated, the persons which they
had acquired in Haran, and they set out
for the land of Canaan.
Thus they came to the land of Canaan.
I don't know why Abraham took Lot, whether
Lot came along, because God's word was very
clear in Genesis 12, 1, Go forth from
your country and from your relatives and from
your fathers out.
Sometimes we can think that, yeah, surely God
can't mean it so exactly.
But He did mean it exactly.
And who did Abraham go out with?
He went with his father and with Lot.
And we can see that those were the
two people who were the cause of problems
in Abraham's life.
First of all, his father got him stuck
in Haran.
And secondly, Lot brought strife into that family.
So you see, sometimes we can think that
we are wiser than God, but we're not.
When God says, Go forth from your relatives,
it's best to go forth from our relatives
and not try and modify it and be
diplomatic and do it in some other way
and end up in some halfway home, like
so many believers have ended up.
It says here he took his nephew, Lot
his nephew.
Well, God didn't stop him.
But later on he had to be separated
from him also.
Both were painful experiences.
He had to be separated painfully from his
father through death and painfully from his nephew.
But God was determined to do something.
And if I don't do it the way
God wants me to do it, in a
peaceful way right in the beginning, then God
has to do it in a drastic way
later on.
So it's always best to obey God exactly
and implicitly right from the beginning.
And Abraham passed through the land and says
the Canaanite was then in the land, verse
6.
God had not yet determined to give this
to the seed of Abraham.
That was still more than 400 years to
go for that.
And the Lord appeared to Abraham and said,
To your seed I will give this land.
So he built an altar there to the
Lord who appeared there.
Notice it says there, the last part of
verse 6.
The Canaanite was then in the land.
And the Lord appeared to Abraham and said,
To your seed I will give this land.
And he built an altar there to the
Lord who had appeared to him.
That was his saying, Amen.
I believe that.
I built this altar to show that I
believe that one day you're going to give
this land to me.
I'm a lonely man here.
This land is flooded with Canaanites, massive giants.
And Abraham was like a little pygmy before
these giants.
Lord, I don't know how, but I believe
it.
You see, that was the faith which later
on his descendants called Joshua and Caleb had.
That when they looked at the Canaanites, they
had the same faith that Abraham had when
he looked at the Canaanites.
Remember, the first person to look at the
Canaanite giants was not Joshua and Caleb.
It was Abraham.
Abraham was the first person to look at
these Canaanite giants and to whom God had
said, I'm going to give you this land.
And he said, it's very significant, that statement
there.
The Canaanite was then occupying that land.
We can apply that to the flesh.
We know that Canaan is a picture of
the flesh.
And the Canaanites are a picture of all
the lusts that rule in the flesh.
And to come to faith like Abraham is
to hear God say to us, when the
Canaanites are ruling the land, I will give
this land to you, to your seed, that
is to Christ.
As we saw in Galatians 3, we've just
got to build an altar there and say,
Lord, I believe that.
I believe you'll do that.
I can't say how.
I'm so weak.
I'm just lonely, alone, with these massive giants
around me, but you'll do it.
So we see that Abraham was the first
person to do that, and Joshua and Caleb
just followed in his footsteps.
Then he proceeded from there to the mountain
on the east of Bethel and pitched his
tent, and he built an altar there again
and called on the name of the Lord.
It's a very beautiful picture.
Abraham was always building an altar.
And we have seen before that this altar
is a picture of our presenting our bodies.
Whenever you read an altar like this in
Genesis, it's not referring to the sin offering,
which came later on in Leviticus.
It's referring to the burnt offering, which refers
to Romans 12.1, present your bodies as
a living sacrifice to God.
Reading this in New Covenant terms, it means
Abraham presented his body as a living sacrifice
to God.
And Abraham journeyed on, continued on toward the
Negev.
Now there was a famine in the land.
And we read here, it's very significant, I
just want to mention one thing about the
Lord appearing to Abraham in verse 7.
It doesn't say that the Lord appeared to
Abraham when he was in Haran.
The Lord appeared to him when he was
in the Nur of the Chaldees and said,
go into the land which I will tell
you.
He came halfway to Haran and stopped there.
God never appeared to him.
God only dealt with him in judgment there
by allowing his father to die.
He brought him into Canaan and then the
Lord appeared to him.
Which teaches us something, that when the Lord
has given us revelation at one point, until
I move to that place to which God
has told me to move, until I take
that step of obedience which God has told
me to take, I will not have further
revelation.
That's the reason why many people stay without
revelation.
Because there's something in their life which they
haven't settled.
Some restitution not made, somebody they have not
apologized to.
Something, they've come halfway and got stuck.
They are in a Haran.
God has told them to go all the
way and do that, they've done it halfway.
They're stuck there.
They'll never get further revelation until they move
to complete obedience.
Then the Lord appeared in Canaan to Abraham.
And then we find a second test.
That was a famine in the land.
That can be a test.
That when God calls us to a place,
we think the place should be all full
of comfort and ease.
And we come to the place which God
has called us to and we find that
there are problems.
There are difficulties.
There is a famine.
And when there is a famine, it is
easy to lean to our own understanding and
not trust in the Lord.
The question is, has God called me here?
Yes, He has called me to Canaan.
Then famine or no famine, I must stay
here.
But Abraham didn't do that.
So Abraham went down to Egypt.
And we'll discover that as a result of
going down to Egypt, he got into a
lot of problems which were worse than a
famine.
It would have been better to stay there
and trust God.
A lot of problems he got by going
into Egypt.
For example, when he came out of Egypt,
he brought an Egyptian woman called Hagar with
him.
There would have been no Hagar in his
life if he had not gone to Egypt.
And through Hagar came Ishmael.
Through Ishmael have come all the Arabs who
have troubled the Jews all the centuries.
Through Ishmael has come Mohammed and the Muslim
religion that has troubled Christianity through the centuries.
Just think of all the consequences that come
out of one little step of disobedience.
Of course, God forgives.
Forgiveness, we can always repent and say, Lord,
please forgive me.
But the reaping is still there.
Even though God forgives our sins, we still
have to reap some of the consequences of
our sins for a long time.
And sometimes our children also, unfortunately.
Abraham's children are certainly reaping the result of
Abraham's folly there.
Think how much depends on one little act
of leaning upon our own understanding.
There is a famine here.
What shall I do?
Go to Egypt.
I hear there is plenty of food there.
Go to that rich brother.
Go to that influential brother.
He will help you out of that.
The point is, does God want you to
go there?
That is the point.
Don't lean to your own understanding.
Trust in the Lord with all your heart.
I'm not criticizing Abraham.
I would never do that.
I believe he had far more faith than
a lot of us.
He didn't have God's word.
I'm saying we can apply this to us
who have so much of God's word and
learn something.
When God calls us to a place, famine
or no famine, we got to stay there
till he tells us to move.
There is a saying that what God shows
me in the light, I should not doubt
in the darkness.
To use an illustration, supposing I've got a
hundred rupee note which I've examined very carefully
in the light and I'm convinced that it
is a true note.
Afterwards in the thick darkness I take it
out and it doesn't look like a real
currency note, I don't have to doubt it.
Because in the darkness, I cannot be so
sure.
There are times when God makes something very
clear to us.
Later on, maybe some months later, some years
later, there's famine, there's darkness, there's a storm
and I begin to doubt.
Has God really shown me that?
That's what I've got to remember.
What God has shown me in the light,
let me not doubt in the darkness.
God has shown me in the light that
I must go to the land of Canaan.
I go there.
Famine or no famine?
We see a very beautiful contrast to this
in the New Testament in Acts of the
Apostles chapter 16.
In an earlier meeting once, we considered how
when Jesus told the multitude to go away
in Matthew 14 and then told the disciples
to go out in a boat.
It says he compelled them to go in
the boat.
What did the disciples face?
Do you remember?
What did they face?
A storm.
When they obeyed Jesus, they faced a storm.
What did Abraham face when he obeyed God?
A famine.
Is it the obedient people who have a
comfortable life?
No, sir.
It's the disobedient people who have a comfortable
life.
If Abraham had been disobedient and stayed in
Ur of the Chaldees, there was no famine
in Ur of the Chaldees.
If the disciples had been disobedient and stayed
on land, there would have been no storm
there.
It's the obedient who face the storms.
Here's another example in Acts 16.
It says here, a vision, verse 9, appeared
to Paul in the night, and a man
from Macedonia, that is a vision from God,
saying, come over to Macedonia and help us.
When he had seen the vision, immediately we
sought to go to Macedonia, concluding God had
called us to preach the gospel there.
And the chief city of Macedonia was Philippi,
verse 12.
And when they came to Philippi, within a
short time, it says here, they were beaten,
verse 23, and thrown into the jail.
How do you like that?
For following a God-given vision that lands
you in a jail.
That's like the famine that Abraham faced when
he obeyed God.
That's like the storm the disciples faced when
they obeyed God.
A jail when he obeyed the vision and
went to Philippi.
But how did Paul and Silas respond?
It says at midnight, verse 25, they were
praying.
If it had only been written they were
praying, we don't know how they would have
prayed.
Because there are various ways of praying.
Lord, why in the world have you put
us here?
No.
But it also says here, they were singing
hymns of praise.
Then we understand what type of prayer they
would have prayed.
You can't sing hymns of praise, hallelujah, and
then say, Lord, why in the world have
you put us here?
No.
When you say, sing hymns of praise, then
your prayer is, well, Lord, if this is
why you brought us to Philippi, that's fine
with us.
We're quite happy.
Maybe there's some purpose here, and there was.
That was to save the jailer.
So, we see quite a contrast in the
New Testament.
And there we see when we receive the
Holy Spirit, how we can respond.
When there is a famine in Canaan.
When there's a storm in the middle of
the sea after Jesus has told us to
go there.
When we're locked up in jail after we
have obeyed God and gone into our Macedonia.
And that can have many applications in our
lives.
We take a step of obedience, and lo
and behold, there's a storm in the family,
and a storm at home, and a famine,
and all types of things.
And then, I'm confused.
Then we can think of how Abraham responded,
don't go down to Egypt, and you may
get into all types of difficulties there.
Stay there, and say, Lord, I obey you.
And there, God will sanctify you in the
midst of that famine, and that storm, and
that jail, and make you a blessing to
others.
Even though Paul and Silas got a beating
on their backs, the blessing of Abraham was
still fulfilled in their lives, because the blessing
overflowed from them to the conversion of the
whole jailer's family.
And that's the important thing.
Whether we get a few strikes on our
back doesn't really matter.
But Abraham went to Egypt because the famine
was severe.
And that can be a test.
When you pray and the famine doesn't go,
the situation doesn't ease up, but the situation
becomes more severe.
Think of that.
Here I am, great man of God, one
man whom God has called in the whole
world, Abraham.
I am the one to whom God has
given revelation in the whole earth.
God has chosen me, and I have obeyed
God, and I've come out of Ur of
the Chaldees, and I pray and pray, and
the famine doesn't seem to go.
That's really humbling.
All you can do is put your mouth
in the dust and say, Lord, I can't
understand.
I'm not the great man of God I
thought I was.
I'm just a little creature, but I trust
you.
It's good.
It's good to put our mouth in the
dust, as Lamentations 3 says.
Then there's hope.
And it came about when he came here
to Egypt, here's the first problem that arose.
Soon as you land in Egypt, there's problems.
You know you're out of God's will immediately,
as soon as you've followed your own reason.
He said to Sarah, his wife, he's already
begun to scheme, he's seen the Egyptians all
eyeing his good-looking wife, and he said,
see now, I know that you're a beautiful
woman.
And it'll come about when the Egyptians see
you, that they will say, this is his
wife, and they will kill me.
You see the selfishness of this man.
I mean, just like us, we have the
same flesh as us.
But they will let you live.
Please say that you're my sister, so that
it may go well with me because of
you.
I mean, didn't Abraham think that if you
go around saying this good-looking girl is
my sister, somebody will just say, alright, I'm
going to marry her.
And that would be common sense.
But there, he was so much thinking of
preserving his own life, they will kill me.
So I'm willing to risk my wife becoming
immoral, so that I can preserve my life.
It doesn't matter what happens to my wife,
so that I can preserve my life.
Now today, we won't act like that.
But we can act like that when it
comes to our inner self-life.
That to preserve my self-life, I'm willing
to let my wife suffer.
It's the same thing.
They will kill me.
I don't want to be killed.
So, tell a lie that it may go
well with me.
Verse 13.
Please say that you're my sister, so that
it may go well with me.
You see, this is typical of the human
race.
That it may go well with me.
What about going well with you, Sarah?
Yeah, never mind that.
But that it may go well with me
because of you.
That I may live on account of you.
And came about when Abraham came to Egypt,
Egyptians saw that the woman was very beautiful.
I just want to mention something here.
That Sarah was 65 years old, and she
was so beautiful.
What's the secret of that?
I want to turn to a verse in
1 Peter chapter 3 in this connection.
1 Peter chapter 3.
1 Peter 3 verse 3 to 6.
Let not your adornments, your wives, be external,
braiding the hair, wearing gold jewelry, putting on
dresses.
Let it be the hidden person of the
heart, with the imperishable quality of a gentle
and a quiet spirit.
For in this way, verse 5, which way?
In this gentle and quiet spirit, in former
times, the holy women also who hoped in
God used to adorn themselves, being submissive to
their own husbands.
Thus Sarah, thus Sarah had a beauty in
her life, as she obeyed Abraham, calling him
Lord.
And you have become her children.
Not only Abraham's children, wives, you can be
Sarah's children, if you do what is right,
without being frightened by any fear.
You know, there was a beauty in her
which was more than physical.
And when you see in 1 Peter chapter
3, you see that beauty was the beauty
of a submissive spirit.
Think that Sarah knew how to submit to
Abraham, without a commandment saying, wives, be submissive
to your husband.
And she had no scripture, but she submitted
to her husband calling him Lord.
Amazing.
And she is put forth as an example
for new covenant sisters.
It's not only Abraham, Sarah is also put
forth as an example.
And Pharaoh, Genesis 12 verse 15, and Pharaoh's
officials saw her and praised her to Pharaoh,
and the woman was taken to Pharaoh's house.
You see, they had some morality there in
Egypt, they knew you can't take somebody else's
wife, but they thought she was Abraham's sister.
Pharaoh decided, all right, I'm going to marry
her then.
And therefore he treated Abraham well for her
sake, and gave him sheep, and oxen, and
donkeys, and male and female servants, and female
donkeys and camels.
He exchanged his wife for all these animals.
And think that he kept quiet with all
this.
It's amazing.
That Pharaoh's taken her, and he still keeps
quiet.
He doesn't say, hey, I was just bluffing,
she's not really my sister, she's my wife.
He didn't even say that, he just let
her go.
And those of you who are single, you
may say, boy, I'll never do that.
I'll tell you something, you'll never discover how
selfish you are until you get married.
Never.
I believe when you get married, you get
a revelation on selfishness that dwells in the
flesh that you never even knew was there.
So, just hang on a little before you
judge Abraham, and wait till your time comes
and see if you can do it any
better in relation to various little things.
It may not be exchanging your wife for
animals, you may not do any stupid thing
like that, even the heathens don't do that.
But it can be another thing.
It can be exchanging your wife and her
rights for your rights.
So that it may go well with me.
So that my self-life is preserved.
So that my convenience is preserved.
My comfort is preserved.
And the Lord struck Pharaoh and his house
with great plagues because of Sarah, Abraham's wife.
And it's amazing that Pharaoh knew that when
sickness comes, he's got to judge himself.
A heathen man like Pharaoh, sickness comes into
the home and he says, boy, what did
I do wrong?
And he thinks, what did I do wrong
in the last few days?
Must have been that I took this woman.
I can't think of anything else that I
did wrong that all of a sudden sickness
has come to everybody in the house.
Good thing to do.
When sickness strikes everyone, to ask ourselves, what
did I do wrong in the last few
days?
Follow Pharaoh's example.
And he discovered something.
And he came to Abraham and said, what
is this you have done to me?
Why did you not tell me she was
your wife?
I think he must have gone to Sarah
and said, tell me, are you his sister?
And she said, he must have said, no,
I'm his wife.
And he rebuked Abraham.
This heathen man rebuking a prophet of God.
Have you had that experience?
Where a heathen man says something and you
feel humbled that a heathen man says something.
I'm supposed to be a new covenant believer.
And what this man says is so upright
and righteous, it puts me to shame.
Yeah, I'm sure all of us have had
experiences like that.
Well, Abraham had one there.
Pharaoh called Abraham and said, what is this
you have done to me?
And why did you say she is my
sister?
So that I took her for my wife.
Now then, here is your wife, take her
and go.
Pharaoh commanded his men concerning him and they
escorted him away with his wife and all
that belonged to him.
And we read, thus Abraham went up from
Egypt to the Negev and he and his
wife and all that belonged to him and
lost with him.
Now Abraham was very rich in livestock and
silver and in gold.
It's very significant that this is the first
time in the Bible that it says that
somebody was very rich and it is when
he came out of Egypt.
That was the second problem that came there.
First, he got into trouble with Pharaoh by
telling a lie.
The second thing, of course, he must have
had a lot of things when he came
out of Ur of the Chaldeans.
But I think those days a lot of
people had camel and livestock and other things
like that.
But when he went to Egypt, Pharaoh the
king, it says there, he gave him so
many things, verse 16.
And apparently he didn't take it all back.
He took, he gave it actually in exchange
for Sarah.
But he told Abraham, you can keep it.
And Abraham came out very rich.
And not only Abraham was very rich, but
Lot also was very rich.
And there we see the root cause of
the problem that came later on between these
two people.
They were, they had far too much wealth
now that they got into conflict with each
other, their herdsmen.
Why didn't their herdsmen get into conflict before
that?
Because they didn't have so much.
But when they came out of Egypt, they
had so much.
Yeah, when you miss God's will, you can
become very rich.
Very rich by missing the will of God.
And so many people are so foolish to
think that all that riches has come by
obeying God.
Did Abraham become very rich by obeying God?
No.
By missing God's will and going to Egypt,
he came out with all this wealth and
the wealth became the cause of his problem
with Lot.
Learn a lesson.
The blessing of the Lord makes rich and
there is no sorrow.
But those who want to be rich and
go into Egypt or instead of Egypt you
can put dot dot dot, put some other
country or any other name there.
Go to such and such a place in
order to become rich.
Yeah, they will become rich.
God doesn't stop them.
But there is something that will be lost.
I just want to mention something here in
passing.
That the first rich man mentioned in the
Bible is Abraham.
And it is after he came out of
Egypt.
And the last rich man mentioned in the
Bible is in Luke 18.23, the rich
young ruler who turned away from Jesus because
he would not give up all that wealth.
And there is a contrast there.
The first rich person and the last rich
person.
And Genesis 13 verse 3.
He went on his journey from the Negev
as far as Bethel to the place where
his tent had been at the beginning.
Notice that phrase, at the beginning.
When you go astray from God to Egypt,
you have always got to come back to
the place where you were at the beginning.
We say there is a phrase in English
saying, which says going round in circles.
Or another phrase which says back to square
one.
Like the snakes and ladders game.
You climbed up to 56 and then down
to square one.
Because at some point you missed the will
of God.
Back to square one at the beginning.
And all that time and labor lost.
Think of people who are at square one
when they die.
What a tragedy.
At square one when they die after having
been believers for 30-40 years.
Still losing their temper, still lusting after women,
still loving money, still defeated, still bitter, still
easily offended, still upset, still disturbed, still irritated.
After years, back to square one.
Occasionally after a convention they would move out
to square number 10 or 12.
But after a few weeks after the conference
was over, back to square one.
But think, alright, that happens for a little
while, but think if you spent all your
life like that.
Being eaten up by a snake and back
to square one and end up in square
one when you die.
We really got to take it more wholeheartedly.
We got to walk carefully.
Thank God it doesn't depend upon a throwing
of a dice, like in snakes and ladders,
that you don't know where you're going to
land.
We know where we're going to land.
And we can be careful that we don't
land there.
It's not a throw of a dice.
We choose to land into some square where
there is a snake, called the love of
money perhaps, or the love of a profession,
or advancement for oneself, or some personal gain.
I know there's a snake there, but I
go and land there.
I choose that it may go well with
me.
Yeah?
But praise God he didn't keep going round
in circles.
He didn't spend all his life going back
to square one.
He made a move.