13 years is a long time to get attached. Abram ages 13 years in between the last verse of chapter 16 and the first verse of chapter 17. So does his son Ishmael.

After rereading chapter 16, there isn't anything that would make Abram think that Ismael was not the son of promise. From his perspective, the fact that the angel of the LORD turned Hagar back to him and the fact that the angel of the LORD promised Hagar an unnumbered multitude of offspring would overlap with the revelation he received.

Hagar (and Ishmael's) presence brought conflict to Abram's home. There’s no reason to think that the strife stopped after their return. But in light of the amount of time since Ishmael's birth, the lack of any further revelation from God, and the reality that Abram and Sarai had grown too old to produce children themselves would have left Abram assuming that Ishmael was his man.

Even in the first part of the dialogue in chapter 17, when the LORD appears to Abram and guarantees the covenant (17:1-8) and gives circumcision as the seal/sign of the covenant (9-14), no hint of another son is found; Abram wasn't looking for one either.

His response in 17:18 confirms it. When God explicitly promises Abram a son through Sarai, Abram not only laughs at the idea that such an old couple could have a child, but he also asks God to choose Ishmael. God had other promises.

There are a couple ways to outline the chapter. One way is to observe two scenes in chapter 17, Scene One, verses 1-22, is a dialogue between God and Abraham wherein God explains the Covenant Responsibilities (for God Himself verses 3b-8, for Abraham verses 9-14, and for Sarah verses 15-21). Scene Two, verses 23-27, describes Abraham's Covenant Observance.

Another way to outline the chapter is to observe the series of five speeches that God makes to Abram (verses 1-2, 3-8, 9-14, 15-16, and 19-21). We’ll look at the first two speeches in verses 1-8 this morning, though the key outline will be from the second speech. God's first speech comes in verses 1-3.

When Abram was ninety-nine years old the LORD appeared to Abram and said to him, "I am God Almighty; walk before me, and be blameless, that I may make my covenant between me and you, and may multiply you greatly." Then Abram fell on his face. (Genesis 17:1-3)

Yahweh appeared again and announced Himself as God Almighty, El Shaddai, kyrios pantokratōr in Greek, Deus omnipotens in Latin. The title speaks of His complete, total power, and appears in the Pentateuch and over thirty times in Job. It emphasizes God’s power especially in contexts of personal need, such as barrenness, rather than the cosmic governance attributed to Elohim.

This is not the first time that Abram received commands along with the promises, but walk before Me and be blameless are perhaps the first moral commands. Previously Abram was commanded to "leave" (12:1); "lift up your eyes" (13:14); "fear not" (15:1); "look upward" (15:5); and "bring Me" (15:9).

God requires ongoing obedience from Abram, a life entirely devoted to God. To walk before Me means to recognize that all one does, every step taken and word spoken, is seen by God; it happens right in front of Him. We make different decisions when we know that certain persons are watching. To the degree that we consciously ambula coram Deo—walk before the face of God—we live with a single purpose.

That is related to the second requirement to be blameless. The Hebrew word tamim refers to the idea of being whole, complete. One Hebrew dictionary defines it as "entirely in accord with truth and fact" (BDB). We would also use the word integrity; being consistent and undivided. The LORD identified Noah as blameless before the flood (Genesis 6:9). The point is not necessarily that Abram was to be sinless, but that he was "not of a deceitful or double mind" (Calvin). There were to be no inconsistencies, no hidden compartments.

I'm disappointed with the ESV at the start of verse 2 because it makes the promise sound conditional, or at least cause and effect: “be blameless, (in order) that I may….” As if God said, “If you, Abram, obey, then I will do My part" (as the NIV translates). Most other translations make it a coordinate clause, which fits with the Hebrew conjunction: “And I will establish" (NAS, NKJV, NRSV). Obedience and promise are related but parallel, this promise is not contingent on obedience.

God Almighty has made the promise, but that doesn't mean Abram has nothing to do. Earlier in chapter 15 God alone walked between the divided animals as a demonstration of His shouldering of responsibility. Abram has always needed to obey, but the entire enterprise was God's.

Everything in God's pursuit of Abram and promises to Abram are gracious (undeserved) and generous (beyond what we could ask or think). And isn't it gracious again in light of Abram (and Sarai's) lack of faith in chapter 16?

Though Abram was commanded to a certain kind of life by God the Powerful, this life is also in response to God the Promise-fulfiller, Future-Maker. This is not a new covenant different than that in chapter 12 or 15; it reaffirms those revelations. The word covenant occurred only once in chapter 15 but, in chapter 17, it occurs thirteen times (verses 2, 4, 7 [twice], 9, 10, 11, 13 [twice], 14, 19 [twice], 21) (Hamilton, 463).

[It is] as if God had said, 'See how kindly I indulge you: for I do not require integrity from you simply on account of my authority, which I might justly do; but whereas I owe you nothing, I condescend graciously to engage in a mutual covenant.' (Calvin)

How else would we expect Abram to respond? He fell on his face. Before, in chapter 15, he questioned. If this is fear, it is reverent fear and awe-driven worship of such a Creator and covenant Maker.

Then we come to God's second speech, and there are three guarantees from God Almighty.

The first guarantee regards specificity to the multitude of offspring coming from Abram.

And God said to him, "Behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations. (Genesis 17:3b-4)

I really like the visible pattern in the NAS in verses 4, 9, and 15. In verse 4, As for Me, then in verse 9, “As for you,” and verse 15, "As for Sarai your wife." Though verse 4 is more precisely translated, "I, behold, my covenant is with you," the emphasis is that God puts Himself first. “For My part, I myself will do this.”

You shall be the father of a multitude of nations It is true that a nation and many princes came from Ishmael (see verse 20). At this point, I think we should assume Abram still had Ishmael in mind as the fulfillment of the covenant. For us, however, who also read the apostle Paul, we know that Abraham is the father of all those who believe (Romans 4:17-18), even among the Gentiles.

Names often mean something, this is the first time in the Bible that a name is changed.

No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations. (Genesis 17:5)

The LORD changes Abram's name to designate and always remind him of the promise. Ab means “father,”Abram meant “exalted father.” Abraham means “father of a multitude.” God changes his name based on a future yet to be seen; Abram still doesn’t have even one child.

God refers to a multitude of nations again.

I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make you into nations, and kings shall come from you. (Genesis 17:6)

Previously Abraham was promised that a nation would come from him, now nations and kings. A multitude of offspring, a multitude of people groups, a multitude of men excising dominion as image bearers taking dominion and ruling on earth. He will be exceedingly fruitful, which must have seemed as possible as an orchard growing in a rock quarry.

And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your offspring after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your offspring after you. (Genesis 17:7)

God's promises to be God to Abraham and to his offspring forever, that He will be their God (verse 8) is the sleeper but supreme promise of all these guarantees, similar to being the shield and reward in 15:1. Sons and offspring are good. Land is good, too, promised previously and again in verse 8. But this covenant relationship tops all.

An emphasis is also that this is an everlasting covenant, a permanent one. This confirms that the promise from God is God’s purpose even though Abram has responsibilities.

And I will give to you and to your offspring after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession, and I will be their God." (Genesis 17:8)

God called Abram from Ur to the land of Canaan and He brought Abram back to the land of Canaan from Egypt. Yahweh has promised the land to Abram. It is part of the package. There is no reason to see the land as a metaphor any more than interpreting sons or kings or nations as metaphors. It will be an everlasting possession.

The rest of chapter 17 adds responsibility for Abraham as he receives the covenant sign of circumcision. Sarai is also a key piece as the child of the covenant will come from her; it won’t be Ishmael. God continues to exercise their faith.

By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God. By faith Sarah herself received power to conceive, even when she was past the age, since she considered him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one man, and him as good as dead, were born descendants as many as the stars of heaven and as many as the innumerable grains of sand by the seashore. (Hebrews 11:8–12)

In Christ, we who believe are adopted as children of Abraham. The expansion of God’s blessing to the Gentiles does not mean, however, that God’s promise to bless His elect nation through Abraham (and Isaac) is canceled. He is still El Shaddai, He is still at work, and by grace He is now our God. We have every reason to walk before Him in faith and obedience.

At the last Men to Men we talked about the wartime mentality and about the militant language we employ. As a church we talk about battle, we talk about fighting, we talk about spiritual war and spiritual enemies and spiritual weapons. These are all biblical metaphors, so we are not wrong to use them, though that doesn’t guarantee that we aren’t using them wrongly.

I mentioned that I believe we use the military language like a son walks in his father’s boots: we can move around but we don’t yet fill them out. The fit is not right, though the aspiration is. Or, we are learning to do combat like the 4 year old boy with a water pistol in fierce conflict with the family schnoodle; it’s all fun until someone gets bit.

One area of battle we’ve attempted to learn more about is corporate worship on the Lord’s Day. You may remember a message titled, “Boom!” To this day, Ryan Hall texts a group on Sunday mornings that includes this one word charge.

What does Boom! refer to? What is making this sound? The idea comes from two passages: Matthew 16 and 2 Corinthians 10. In Matthew, Jesus told Peter that “the gates of hell shall not prevail” against the church. Gates are defensive, gates protect, they don’t attack. In the analogy, we could say that the gates of hell guard rebellion and idolatry and unbelief. Those three things define spiritual death and result in eternal death. These are the virtues of hell, but the church batters down the walls. Our worship of the true, Triune God, our submission to His Word, our praise of His glory, and our trust in Him batter down the gates.

Doug Wilson extends the metaphor to the gathered worship of the church as a battering ram.

As we gather in the presence of the living God on the Lord’s Day, He is pleased to use our right worship of Him as a battering ram to bring down all the citadels of unbelief in our communities. Just as the walls of Jericho fell before the worship and service of God, so unbelievers tremble when Christians gather in their communities to worship the living God rightly. (A Primer on Worship and Reformation, 32

Each week we grab a handle and take a swing at the gates. Worship…boom! This is a powerful picture, a spiritual battle that is much bigger than scribbling a new page of truth clauses for our sermon notebook to set with the others on the shelf at home.

Paul referred to “the weapons of our warfare” that “have divine power to destroy strongholds” in 2 Corinthians 10. “We destroy arguments and every lofty opinion raised against the knowledge of God” (2 Corinthians 10:5). Our weapons are more than sentences, we have lyrics of praise. We fight arguments with adoration. We don’t knock down lofty opinions from above, we strike at the base in humble confession and dependence and thankfulness.

Whether you feel like it or not, you are not an audience. We are an assembly of worshippers. Any given Sunday, you may feel that you don’t have anything to give, but when you join together with the body, you do make a statement against individualism, against self-righteousness, against many of the things our enemy prizes.

We all accomplish more than we consciously realize. Parents teach not only in what they say but how they talk and when they talk and also by what they don’t say. Wise parents think about what they’re saying, wiser parents will also think about the bigger, even unspoken lessons. Consumers support not only a company or brand purchased, but an entire economy. Wise shoppers will evaluate where their dollars go to some level, but there are many hidden (to us) cogs in the market we cause to turn.

So also, spiritual warfare occurs when the assembly worships. Some things we see, or think we see, some we don’t. A wise worshipper will grow in his understanding of what is happening.

Which leads me to an effort to increase your understanding of the personal benefits and the personal battle that happens in worshippers as well. I’ve mostly emphasized the corporate battering ram against the gates of hell. Worship transforms and unites and directs the church. But worship also works to mortify sin and unbelief in your own heart. When you grab your handle on the battering ram, you are becoming a less fearful soldier.

You are in the war against the seed of the serpent and while we knock against cultural defenses as an assembly swings against remaining sin and unbelief happen in your own soul. Corporate worship is part of your fight for individual sanctification.

Peter urged his readers in their own difficult days:

Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul. (1 Peter 2:11)

These passions of the flesh are part of your fallen being that is being redeemed. One day you will be completely delivered from them, now you must put them off, put them to death (see Colossians 3:5-8; Galatians 5:16-24), abstain from them. Such behavior fits those whose spiritual home is with the Lord who we do not see now, but who we believe in. We are God’s people now, we’ve received His mercy (verse 10) so we wage war back.

Peter does not explicitly tie the war in the soul to corporate worship. The flesh and the soul are both parts of the same person, though that doesn’t make it an exclusively private fight. Based on the following verse, the resulting spiritual lifestyle as opposed to a fleshly lifestyle should be honorable among unbelievers. That said, the previous verses include our being built together as living stones into a “spiritual house, to be a holy priesthood, to offer spiritual sacrifices acceptable to God through Jesus Christ” (2:5). To “long for the pure spiritual milk” of the word (verse 1) couldn’t happen at home for those who didn’t have their own copy of the Scripture. Even so, I wouldn’t press verse 11 into direct liturgical duty, but our liturgy does help us in the duty.

How? How does the gathering of the church to worship the Father in the Son by the Spirit help our souls do battle? How are we growing up into the mature, militant body we should be? Here are three ways, assuming a certain sort of worship. If rebellion, idolatry, and unbelief are found in our hearts, worship batters them down.

Hell would prefer us hostile to God’s authority, or at least confused or ignorant about His standards. The spiritual forces that we fight against are not in favor of the reading of God’s Word—the truth might get in-or our repentance in response to God’s Word. “Whatever you do, don’t listen to Him!” Our submission is a weapon against the ideology of Eden: you will be like God knowing/determining good and evil for yourself.

When we gather for worship. we discipline the unruly, rebellious, hostile passions in our flesh. We are not merely acknowledging the judgment mechanism inside of us, we are purposefully calibrating it according to divine revelation. This will enable us to discern between truth and lies, to call evil and good according to reality, maybe even to tell boys and girls apart. Obedience begins with knowing who to obey and what He wants. Worship batters down walls of willful/passionate ignorance in our flesh.

Hell hates God. The evil one loves himself, and his followers inevitably reflect their father. If full-fleshed self-adoration seems to far-fetched, then at least offer a substitute, a rival, an idol. It doesn’t need to have the name “god” as long as it takes up heart space and doesn’t make too many demands.

Our worship begins with praise, considering some of God’s infinitely excellent attributes. That we can pray to Him, that we receive His mercy in forgiveness, that we rehearse stories of His faithfulness, and that He prepares a Table of communion for us to enjoy with Him, these all give us reasons to love Him. But worship is an expression of love and enjoyment of fellowship, not a gathering of facts to be used for love and fellowship later.

I know you may be tired. I know you may be busy in your row caring for little wiggly ones. I know that I do not always do justice to justice or speak with beauty that beauty deserves. I know you may not be moved by certain songs. But remember that ease and comfort and personal preferences can become little gods. Passions of the flesh don’t always line up across from you on the battlefield with cannons, sometimes the battle is to get off the couch. Sometimes the passions of the flesh make you want to stay home from the fight even if it’s the time for kings to go out to battle. A well-known king lost the battle in the palace because he didn’t go with his troops. Let God’s glory batter down your flesh and inflame your affections.

Hell will not submit to, love, or believe God. The demons believe that God exists, but they do not trust Him. And if it’s too late to stop him, if a man must follow God, the evil one wants him to follow with no confidence. “Don’t make a ruckus about it. You could be wrong. Probably are.” How many of us have enough fears and doubts to build gates keeping us out of heaven? Our flesh does not approve of faith.

It isn’t just because we’ve hit faith highlights in Genesis that this comes up. Abram is “the father of all who believe” (Romans 4:11), but his stories are illustrations rather than the motivation for my understanding of the warfare happening here.

Hypocrites, posers, and almost-Christians exist. You can believe many things in the Bible and not be a saved believer. Christin fruit still grows in a cultural way, and you can enjoy the fruit without being a Christian. It is a real danger to refuse examination and to indulge fakers with false assurance.

But worship should not aim the flaming darts of the evil one at believers for him. You need the shield of faith, not to have your shield knocked down. So much preaching—I have done it—stimulates doubt instead of faith. This type of preaching in worship is warfare by one against the many, but the assembly is not the enemy! This is warfare by questioning again if you are even on the right side. It’s as if we said, “You can have the shield of faith when you prove that you have enough faith to hold it.” That is putting the hand before the shield. Show your faith by using the shield, not by proving you’re genuine without a shield.

Our service is here to help those of little faith. We are not naive or triumphalist, but we do know that “everyone who has been born of God overcomes the world. And this is the victory that has overcome the world—our faith!” (1 John 5:4)

Beloved, you are going to need faith. It is a gift of God by the Spirit, and one way that faith grows is by being used and built up in worship. You will not always need faith in worship. But now,

for a little while, if necessary, you have been grieved by various trials, so that the tested genuineness of your faith—more precious than gold that perishes though it is tested by fire—may be found to result in praise and glory and honor at the revelation of Jesus Christ. Though you have not seen him, you love him. Though you do not now see him, you believe in him and rejoice with joy that is inexpressible and filled with glory, obtaining the outcome of your faith, the salvation of your souls. (1 Peter 1:6–9)

Faith identifies you a sojourner and exile. Faith is opposite to the passions of the flesh. Flesh attacks faith, as does the world and the devil. Fight back. Do battle for your soul by hearing the promises, singing about His faithfulness, casting your anxieties on Him, and receiving His blessing as you go out.

John Donne, the pastor-poet who wrote “No man is an island” and “Don’t ask for whom the bell tolls, it tolls for thee,” also wrote this in one of his sonnets:

Batter my heart, three-person’d God; for you

Boom! Our hearts know well the treasures of hell. Our hearts are being redeemed, but rebellion, idolatry, and unbelief still resonate. As we pull down idealogical strongholds, we pull down surviving outposts in our souls. In worship God batters down the passions of the flesh in our hearts.

I’ve always appreciated this comment from Nehemiah, “so we built the wall. And the wall was joined together to half its height, for the people had a mind to work.” A mind to work is good, and I pray that God will also give us much faith that works.

Understand (and thank God for) what He is doing in us and through us as we worship Him. May He make us strong in the Lord and in the strength of His might. We do not wrestle against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the cosmic powers over this present darkness, against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly places, and against the passions of our flesh. Fight back, equipped with the armor of God, that we might be able to withstand in the evil day, and having done all, to stand firm.

Automated transcript of the sermon audio, generated with OpenAI Whisper (small.en). It has not been checked against the recording and may contain errors, especially in names and Scripture references.

All right, I'm here to have my last talk in the Brown Paper Passage series that we're doing this year, that all of us were to choose a passage and then go off of it. And I kind of already chose the passage that I'm starting with tonight already, and kind of gave you my testimony off of 1 John 2-4. That was a couple messages back, or one back, or whatever. So, tonight I had Gail find me a brown paper bag so that I could bring my favorite passage here tonight too. And here it is. So, I've had this for a while. I had a classic book binder help me with the spine. And it has nice big print so that I could be. And it's nowhere is it underlined.

I have one pencil note in here about a textual problem and that's it. And I'll tell you that story as we go along here. So let's pray. Father, thank you for your word and what it means to us and that it gives us your specific revelation to us. and you have general revelation that you give us all the time, your world, your creation. But when we do approach your word, we want to be careful, help people to hear my heart and help me to be correct. And if it's not, help your spirit to correct that. So we thank you for all these things and for this time together. Amen. All right, my first favorite verse is Matthew 28, 18 through 20.

And Jesus came, now you guys can flip through the Bible if you want. I'm going to have Sean put this PDF up on the thing so you can match it with it. So I'm going to be jumping around a lot and talking about things. And it might be helpful if you turn to it and notice the kind of words I'm talking about, but you'll see my notes and what I'm going to hammer. It doesn't have a complete thing of everything I'm gonna say, but it'll give you an idea of what I was talking about in red underneath each verse. So, and Jesus came to them and said to them, all authority in heaven on earth has been given to me. Go therefore and make disciples of all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and the Son and of the Holy Spirit, teaching them to observe all things I have commanded you.

And behold, I am with you always to the end of the age. You've all probably heard this passage preached. A lot of people think it means go and things like that. The real and teaching and those things. Those are all participles. The main verb is to make disciples. And how do you do that? You find somebody that knows less than you do and get together with them. And sometimes you can get together with somebody that knows more than you do, learn from that person and pass it down to the person below you that knows a little less than you do. But the whole thing is when you get together, life on life with people, and they are interested in the Lord, you will go down all kinds of rabbit trails, but it's a great adventure to try to discover what the true meaning is of things that confuse you in that.

And as you do that, you will grow in the Lord. I was gonna use one of the passages in Isaiah about precept upon precept and stuff about that. I heard that taught a long time ago by John MacArthur. But when you really read the context of that, it's God absolutely coming down on the people because of their disbelief and the Assyrians come to conquer them. But the principle is there. We do learn a little bit here and a little bit there, and then you start matching that up and you go, oh, that sheds light on something I learned before, and now I wanna learn about this. And so you go over there, and then it all fits together better and better.

So that's the way it's progressed for me. Sometimes it's through a book, sometimes it's my own study, and things like that. Another thing I found incredibly helpful is reading it over and over and over, whether it be a paragraph or a chapter or even a whole book. Just keep reading that over, because it's amazing. The ninth time you read it, you go, OK, I know what's coming up next. And then all of a sudden, something will jump off the page at you like, oh, I didn't see that before. I wonder what that means. So that happens to you as you do that. Now that we've approached things where we can have earbuds in our ears, you can listen to things over and over.

You can get a great deal of information just listening to the Bible over and over also. And as Sean has said many times, it doesn't say anywhere we should read the Bible. We should hear the Bible. It is interesting how I've noticed, since we've started when we have our scripture reading, I used to grab my Bible and watch the guy intently to make sure he was reading every word right. And what happened to me is sometimes my mind would drift to, oh yeah, that's present active indicative and there's the verb and there's the subject and there's this. And I would lose track of the whole encompassing thing to draw us into the worship because I was too much thinking about it.

I wasn't listening and adapting to what was being proclaimed from the pulpit as a worship service. That's an interesting observation I made. So remember that the imperative is make disciples, okay? Then the other verse that I have to put up here is 1 John 2.4 that says, whoever says I know him but does not keep his commandments is a liar and the truth is not in him. But whoever keeps his word in him truly the love of God is perfected. By this we may be sure that we are in him. Whoever says he abides in him ought to walk in the same way in which he walked. The whole theme here is walk and keep. And this was the verse that brought me to my knees when the guy that discipled me and brought the gospel to me told me to read 1 John and when I got to this verse it stopped my progress.

I read it and I went, oh my goodness, there is no way I was keeping his commandments and his word, and so therefore I was not in him. And it reduced me because up until that time, I would have with a very colorful language told you that I was a Christian. And language that would embarrass a chief off a ship, okay?

And so, but when it got to me that time, that's what did it, and I asked the board to show me if that was right, And from then on, it hasn't been the same. So that's that. All right, so now before we jump off into the rest of the verses, we're going to take a peripatetic walk. I'm doing this just for Jonathan, because this is his new favorite word. And we learned about it actually in the dictionary. If you say peripatetic, the second noun definition is that you're an Aristelian philosopher. In other words, you follow Aristotle because he used to walk around and teach his students and they would all follow him around.

The other way is traveling from place to place, especially working or based in various places for relative short periods. We're going to parapetetically jump around the Bible. But it is fascinating as we have gone through omnibus to learn about things like I knew what parapetetic was, but I had no idea about the Aristotle part of it. And through omnibus we're learning that kind of thing. So there you go. Not much to do with the Bible, but we are gonna be jumping. So my first favorite verse is Genesis 1.1.

In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth. Is there any other argument that, you know, if God is giving us special revelation at that point, if you're a believer and you read that and you really ponder it, party's over. God made it, He created it, He created all of it, the heavens, the earth, all of it. So who are you to even question it, right? You have to come with a presupposition that, Oh my goodness, something way bigger than me made this. And it should really reduce you that in the beginning, God. And that beginning, you know, you've heard it. We'll get into it because John one is another one.

In the beginning, God, here's the beginning. Nope, before that, before that, before that, you know, he did it. So that's a big deal. And we just kind of glance over some of these things some of the time, but it's so foundational and just in your kitchen, you know. Then a next favorite verse, this is Revelation 22, 18 through 21, which is the end of the Bible. So we had the first of the Bible, now we got the end of the Bible. I warn everyone who hears the words of the prophecy of this book, if anyone adds to them, God will add to him the plagues described in this book. And if anyone takes away the words of the book, of this prophecy, God will take away his share in the tree of life and in the holy city, which we are described in this book.

Who testifies to these things? Surely, I am coming soon, amen. Come Lord Jesus, the grace of the Lord Jesus, be with you all, amen. That's the end of the book. You hear it said sometimes people say, Oh, that's just talking about the prophecies in Revelation. That doesn't mean I can't have special revelation and insert in the middle. Well, let's think about this. I read about the beginning. In the beginning, God created, and Revelation speaks about the end and the creation of the new heavens and new earth. So if I tell you I have special revelation and I wanna insert it in the middle of that, what am I doing? I'm adding to.

Do not listen to those people who ever do that to you. Let me tell you I have a word from God. If he's not reading the book, sit him down, throw rocks at him, do whatever. So beginning, end. Pre-supposition, God made it, God said it, we need to do it. And sometimes it gets tricky on what he means about all this stuff, or it gets to a point where he reveals these things in layers that as you peel another layer away you go, Oh wow, I didn't see that before. And oh my goodness, I need to study that. So the next verse that will go along here, Genesis 1.26. Then God said, let us make man in our image, after our likeness, and let them have dominion over the fish of the sea, over the birds of the heavens, over the livestock, over the earth, over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.

The big word here is us. And let us make man in our image. Sean beat on this when he preached through this passage. Also, a little story for you. My first year Greek teacher was actually a mega Hebrew scholar, translation committee of the NIV and the NASB, all kinds of things. I mean, he still teaches Semitic languages at UCLA and that kind of thing. But he said, this thing, whenever you go to a rabbi and you understand enough Hebrew to discuss with the rabbi so he can't give you some tap dance answer around it, this really stumps them. They know it's a plural, they know all of that, and they just, they don't wanna talk about it.

And here it is, 26 verses into the first chapter of Genesis, God is already veiling. The one true God is revealing us, our, more than one. And of course, the spirit hovering over the waters and all of that. So just, that's a rabbit trail you can go on that's just wonderful to study that kind of thing, which leads you to Trinity, right? Trinity, the Vangel church, right? Okay. So then we have Genesis 50, 20, nearing the end of Genesis. As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good to bring about it about that many people should be kept alive as they are today.

Whoa. You meant it for evil, God meant it for good. God using evil for good. I love that kind of stuff. It just makes you realize there's nothing by accident that happens, just relax, God's in control, even in the worst circumstances or whatever, he's working out his will over everything. And once you really accept that, you then can relax and get in the boat and take the ride. But before that, you go kicking and screaming and kind of every once in a while grabbing on the side and swimming in the water and he keeps saying, getting the vote is a lot better, you know, because you're trying to decide more what God should know than you think you know better than God, but he tells us how he is.

Then we have another one about evil that you've heard me go off on before, Isaiah 45.7. "'I form light and create darkness. "'I make well-being and create calamity. "'I am the Lord who does all these things.'" Calamity, as you've heard me say, is the basic word for evil. I create evil. That doesn't mean God's evil, but he's in control of that also. And once you can put that into your hopper, then sovereignty really starts to take big, big dominance in your life, because those are the real hard questions. Oh, God is so wonderful, and he's so sovereign. He gave me a new car, and we were able to buy this lovely house.

And then my two month old kid died. Oh, well God didn't do that, but he gave me the nice new house and the car, but God would never allow my little son to die. Well, that's a pretty weak God, isn't it? If he can create the whole universe and allow that tragedy to happen, then what's the deal? Who's he fighting against? So those are things to ruminate in your mind. Because when you don't want to say God's in control, Then we have a problem of, ooh, is he strong enough to beat that thing? Is he strong enough to win that? And we're probably up in arms wondering, oh my goodness, how's the game gonna end? So you need to get on board with those kind of things, I think, to be calm and be able to accept whatever's coming your way.

And that doesn't mean you have to like it. And that doesn't mean you have to, oh, why God, why right now? I mean, I think why questions sometimes with God, if you're honest, is good. But it's not, I can't believe you're doing this to me. It's why. And then expect an answer that you might not like. It might be, because I'm God and you're not, shut up. Or it may be he reveals some things to you that you just go, oh my goodness, I had no idea that was going to do that for other people or whatever.

So then we'll graduate on into Exodus now. In Exodus 3.14 God said to Moses, I am who I am. And he said, say this to the people of Israel, I am has sent me to you. God naming himself. This is where Yahweh comes from. This is, you know, I am the great I am, I'm the verb to be, I'm in the eternal present, I'm always there, I have been there since the beginning, I'll be there at the end, all of that kind of stuff. I mean it goes on and on, pages have been written about this and it's it's a great mental exercise to jump in and see all those things from a biblical philosophical study. Not an Aristelian or a Plato kind of study, but what God God wants you to think about.

Our philosophy should come from God. Our philosophical thoughts should be God-centered, not man-centered. So, but once you see I am who I am, then you find out that the Hebrew gives us Yahweh, and then in the Septuagint translation, you see Ego wimim, okay? We're gonna see that later on as we go through these passages, that I, I am is the way you would read that in the Greek. So the Septuagint scholars saw that term in the Hebrew and they translated it I, I am, which is kind of interesting as you see as we go along. Then in Exodus 4.11, the Lord said to Moses, who has made man's mouth? Who makes him mute or deaf or seeing or blind?

Is it not I, the Lord? This always makes the faith healers really happy because God's giving them a whole bunch of people that they can go out and cure. But oh, God made them that way. Does he want them cured? I don't know. So who makes is the issue? God makes. Nothing takes him by surprise. A great blessing, I think. Then moving on to Psalm 1.1.

Blessed is the man who walks not in the counsel the wicked, nor stands in the way of sinners, nor sits in the seat of scoffers, but his delight is in the law of the Lord. In his law he meditates day and night. He is like a tree planted by streams of water that yields its fruit in its season, and its leaf does not wither, and all that he does he prospers." I'd read that a lot of times because I was in the program when I first got saved, always read Psalms and Proverbs and then do other things, but always get through those in the month and read those things. Just get them in your head. I have never heard this until I heard Zemeck teach on it and it's in the MacArthur Bible study notes because he wrote those notes for this particular thing. But the actual Hebrew word says transplant not planted. And I think it's so wonderful that Blessed is the man who walks not in the council but is delighted in the law of the Lord. He is like a tree transplanted by the streams. So in other words where you and I were born or

started off is one thing but God then takes us and transplants us by the the streams so that we can yield much fruit and not wither and be prosperous.

God takes us and replants us in his dominion once we come to him, which is a great blessing and I think it's really so subtle but those are the little things that I think are really cool to discover in your Bible. So the next guy I want to introduce you to is Alfred Edersheim. He's a guy that wrote a book called the life and times of Jesus the Messiah and the last edition was 1886. This guy was a great scholar, he was a Jew who got converted to Christ in his 20s and he went on to write all kinds of books about the Old Testament and he was an expert in the Talmud and all the Jewish teachings so he brings in a lot of Hebrew things that we as Christians don't know about and when you read his descriptions of things that Jesus is saying or things in the Old Testament that we may not have the great Hebrew background. He brings it in but brings it in with that Christian oversight of it. You know that these things are being done for this to point out that. And one of the great things that this is kind of

the thing that launched me on this series is the issue of God is light. And And so that's where I'm gonna go with this now. And the part when I get to John 8, I'm basically taking it out of Edersheim's book. Okay, so light in the Bible. In Daniel 2.20 through 22, Daniel answered and said, blessed be the name of God forever and ever to whom belong wisdom and might. He changes times and seasons. He removes kings and sets up kings. He gives wisdom to the wise, knowledge to those who have understanding. He reveals deep and hidden things. He knows what is in the darkness and the light dwells with him. The light dwells with him." Then in Luke 2, 25 through 32, now there was a man in Jerusalem whose name was Simeon. And this man was righteous and devout, waiting for the consolation of Israel and the Holy Spirit was upon him and had been revealed to him by the Holy Spirit that he would not see death before he had seen the Lord's Christ.

And he came in the Spirit into the temple and when the parents brought in the child Jesus to do for him according to the custom of the law, he took him up in his arms and blessed God and said, Lord, now you are letting your servant depart in peace according to your word. For my eyes have seen your salvation that you have prepared in the presence of all people and a light for revelation to the Gentiles and for the glory to your people Israel." It's a great story and it's really when you think about it here's this older guy going all the time to the temple sitting there knowing that at some point somebody's going to come with the Messiah and then he finally comes Jesus comes and And then he tells us, this is the light for the revelation of the Gentiles and for the glory to your people Israel.

That he waited patiently and it was revealed to him. And he is an Old Testament saint. Remember, this is right when Christ is being dedicated. This is right from the get go, okay? Then we move on to John 1, 1 through 5. In the beginning was the word. Remember the God created the heaven and earth. In the beginning was God. You know, you're Shawn teach on that. That's another one, you know, put that stake over here. There's the beginning. No, he was there before. He was there before, you know, on and on. And the Word was with God and the Word was God. He was in the beginning with God. All things were made through him and without him, not anything that thing made that was made.

In him was life and the life was the light of men. the light shines in the darkness and the darkness has not overcome it. Again, the light comes on, okay? Then we move on through the Gospel of John, Jesus growing up, the ministry starts happening and stuff. And now we're coming to the temple in John 8.12. And this is the time of the Feast of the Tabernacles. And during this feast, the temple gets lit up with all kinds of torches and candles and all this lighting. And if you've ever gone and looked at pictures, you should do this. I was gonna put a big slideshow up, but I decided against that, because picture's worth a thousand words, but it's better when you guys discover it.

So the idea is you're coming up to the temple mount, the tabernacle, or the temple is glowing from all these torches and lights in the pitch blackness. And this is a time before electricity and spotlights and everything. So the light is happening in the temple. And Jesus is coming out of the temple. He comes through the court and through the porches. And today you can go to Israel at the south end of the temple mount and walk on first century stones that were the stairway up onto the temple mount. So you can literally walk on the stairs that Jesus walked on to get there.

He comes out to those stairs and he stands there with the Pharisees and everybody listening to him and he spoke to them saying, I am the light of the world. Whoever follows me will not walk in darkness but will have the light of life. They were furious at him because he declares he is the light and they're standing with his backdrop of the glowing temple and all of their ceremonies and everything and he says, eh, this isn't really it, I meant. And that picture is just incredible. And when you're standing on those stairs and you look out over this valley that's out there that you can look over and all this expanse and you realize he's up there and it's like a natural amphitheater so he could have shouted this out to the people and they would have all heard it and they they got mad at it. The other interesting little side note, and And this is a comment about, you know, should I study Greek or shouldn't I and that kind of thing?

And I used to say it's kind of like you had a black and white TV and you had a color TV. And the other day I read a description that it's more like you had a analog TV and then you got a digital TV so you could see things clearer and your analog TV was black and white. But the new one was color and digital, so now all of a sudden the pixels get small enough to where you can follow the golf ball in the tournament or you can really see the detail. And so here's a little detail out of the Greek of that verse where he's declaring he's the light. He says, egoemii, I am the light. So now Christ, and a lot of times in John he does this, you can look it up in your of study bibles, but he says, I am the light.

So not only is he declaring he's the light that the temple was glowing, but he's also using the name of God. And this really makes him mad. We know that if you just read on through chapter eight and see that. Another veiled reference to the light would be declaring to those Jews that he was the light, would be a veiled reference back to the pillar the cloud and the fire that they followed through the wilderness to get to the Promised Land, right? They're following the light. So at that point, he's declaring I, I, am that light. Then at the end of John 8, 858, he says, truly, truly, I say to you before Abraham was, I am.

And again, it's I, I am. And what did they do? We all know that one. They picked up rocks to stone. So this was not a popular thing for him to say. And so they clearly understood though what he was claiming, that he was claiming to be God, all right? Now, another little rabbit trail. As you go through your Bible, you sometimes, or I don't know if you have or think about it, how do we know that we got the Bible? We got all these manuscripts and we got this little manuscript they dug up over here and we got this and we got that. How do we know that's really the thing, right? because we don't have the original autographs.

So then you get into the thing, we've talked about it on and off, about textual criticism or the best manuscripts and all of that kind of stuff. It's a fascinating study and it shouldn't shake you up. We have more evidence for the Bible by just thousands of manuscripts versus like Aristotle or whatever. I don't even know what it is for Aristotle, but I think Plato, we have eight manuscripts of his writings and they're like, I don't know, 600 or something. I mean, they're ridiculously removed away from him. We have over 5,000 manuscripts of the New Testament and then the Hebrew Old Testament was really proven when they dug up the Dead Sea Scrolls.

We used the Masoretic Text, which is 1200 AD, but had been copied laboriously by scholars that if they got one little line wrong, they'd destroy the whole page, burn the pins, and start all over to get it meticulously copied. So when they dug up the Dead Sea Scrolls that are at 100 to 1200, and they started comparing what the little fragments that they found in the Dead Sea Scrolls, and then looking at the Masoretic Text, they were line for line, letter for letter, jot and tittle what that was. and they just freaked out, they couldn't believe it was that accurate. And so have trust that that manuscript evidence gives us a good proof of what the real stuff is.

So this is an interesting one and used as your first thing when you take textual criticism. And I've always thought it's interesting because it talks a lot about the dedication of people that have brought the Bible to us, okay? So Romans 5.1 says, Therefore, since we have been justified by faith, we have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ." OK, sounds good to me. I believe that. Well, it could be translated if I looked at a different manuscript. Therefore, we have been, or we should be justified by faith, and we should have peace with God through our Lord Jesus Christ. Ooh, that's different. Do we have it or should we have it?

What do we do with that? And the problem is the have is echoman, and it can be either an omicron, which is like an O, or it can be omega, which is the last bit of the way. And it's pronounced the same way. Now, why would that occur in the manuscripts? Because one of them you would write like a W, and the other one you would write like an O. even in Greek. So how did that happen? Well, you are a great friar in some monastery and you've been, got up at four and you've been out hoeing the beans and now it's, you know, you had your breakfast of gruel and you're sitting in the library on your hard desk and you got your little thing and you got your pen and there's a reader standing up in front and he's reading this to you.

And everybody in the place is copying the manuscript so you're creating more text that can get passed around. And he says, Echelman, well, which one do I write? The one with the W or the O? And if you're just too tired and you're just writing along trying to be very careful to make your penmanship look good, you could write either one. One of them's so junky, and the other one is arised and done. Now, the problem becomes, how do I know which one is right? Should we or shouldn't we? Do we have it or don't we have it? Well that gets solved by what? What's the solve? What is the most problems in your Bible study? How do you cure it?

Content. Read the verse in front and the verse in back. That'll cure most of them, right? Well, same thing here. the last verse in chapter four and it says you have these things you read the next verse chapter or Romans 5 to you have all errors past tense so why would it be we should in the middle of everything together in the past so that solves it in a unique way because it it just stands out that why would that be in there and it shouldn't be there because some guy listening tired desired rights what he heard. He didn't technically make a mistake, but he didn't ask. And what tickles me is, 2,000 years, we have been having scholars look at this stuff, and the more they look at it, and the more you study it, the better it gets.

Not the worse it gets, the better it gets. Provided you're not sucked into arguments of, well no, these are the new Bibles. discovered the Gospel of Thomas and we got to insert that one and all of that. So don't buy into those things. But as you study this and you stand on the shoulders of all these people who study this is really amazing how these little details pop out like that. So that's kind of a comment on that. Another one, 1 Corinthians 6, 19 through 20, or do you not know that your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit within you whom you have from God. You are not your own, for you were bought with a price, so glorify God in your body."

So why am I reading that one? Well, have you ever told somebody that you're the temple of the Holy Spirit and you don't want to mess it up, right? So sometimes when you say that, somebody might say to you, well, where are you getting that? And you might say 1 Corinthians 3.16, because it says that there too. Well, the problem there is that in 1 Corinthians 3.16 is talking about the corporate body in Corinth and Paul is telling them to purify the plural corporate body that's a plural view, not a singular view. But then when you go to 1 Corinthians 6, you find out he's definitely talking about individuals because he's talking about individual sexual sin.

So there's the verse, if you want to prove it, go to the right one in the right context to prove that. Don't use 1 Corinthians 3. Again, rabbit trail, minor thing, da da da da. If you have been using 1 Corinthians 3 and you feel your body is the temple of the Holy Spirit, are you in great sin because you've done that? No, just become a little more careful. That's all. So interesting little side notes. Another verse for me that is like a major verse that I think about a lot and you hear me a lot of times introduce it in prayers or just talking with people is Galatians 2 20 and it just blows me away that I have been crucified with Christ obviously it's Paul talking but put yourself in it. We have been crucified in Christ. It is no longer I who live, but Christ who lives in me. Right? It's no longer the old man, it's the new man.

Christ, the Holy Spirit lives in me. And the life I now live in the flesh, I live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. That's really rich. That's a big deal. And that is each one of you who believes that's who you are. It's no longer you who live, but Christ who lives in you. And yes you screw up and all the rest of it. But the thing is, by faith you correct that and you keep doing that. And God promises that he's conforming you to his image.

So on that journey you can, I have been crucified with him. We don't need to re-crucify Christ, we're not Catholics, we don't ring the bell and do all of that, but the idea is it's been done and we are in him and he is in us. That's really an amazing powerful verse I think and one to dwell on. Another one that's really been brought, it was when I first studied it but it's even more now that we've read these ancient books and omnibus and Herodotus and those kind of things, getting back to source documents of world history. And this is Galatians 4, 4 through 5. But when the fullness of time had come, God sent forth his Son, born of a woman, born under the law, to redeem those who were under the law so that we might receive adoption as sons. The fullness of time. Jesus didn't come just because God was flipping a coin up there going, oh well, you know, so we haven't born here or this or what. No.

At the exact right moment he comes to his creation to declare himself and all of that needed to happen because the right language, the right road system so that could easily be dispersed. Alexander the Great had conquered the world and given coin a Greek as a common language kind of like English is a common language today and all those roads were connected the people were connected through that and he comes in that time to give you know the gospel to the Jew first and then to us and that fullness of time is that point in history.

So when you watch those documentaries don't be bored of not another stupid thing and they're fighting. Understand that those battles and all of that stuff are all parts of the puzzle. You know, maybe little pieces, maybe giant pieces, but they all fit together to make the fullness of time. So then now we're graduating to Ephesians, and so we have Ephesians 1, 3 through 6. Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. That's enough, right? Every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places. Even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world.

If you ever have problem with your doubt and your understanding God's sovereignty and what about this and what about that and how about Bob and how about, you know, whoever it is you're concerned about. Understand that even as He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before Him in love. He predestined us for adoption through Jesus Christ according to the purpose of His will, to the praise of His glorious grace with which He has blessed us in the beloved. That's huge. So when When did we get saved? Well I got saved in 1984, but actually I got chose before the foundation of the world.

Ah, I can't do that, it's too much for my head. That's right, you're not God, so get over it.

But it's really cool when you think that God is even revealing to us that He is that much in control, that much it's all planned out, which is really exciting, you know, for me anyway. I think it's great. The older I get, the better that gets. So then we have Ephesians 4, 11 through 14. And he gave the apostles and the prophets and the evangelists and the pastors and teachers to equip the saints for the work of the ministry, for the building up of the body of Christ, until we all attain to the unity of the faith and the knowledge of the Son of God, to mature manhood, to the measure and stature of the fullness of Christ, so that we mean no longer be children, tossed to and fro by the waves and carried about by every wind of doctrine, by human cunning, by craftiness and deceitful schemes. You are the disciples, you people, not the pastors and the teachers and the apostles and the prophets and the evangelists. Thus, you saints are the ones that need to do the work of the ministry for the building up of the

the body of Christ. So the discipleship process is to transfer the information so that you can do the work of the ministry. And that's so foreign to most churches or most church thinking. That's the pastor's job. No, that's your job. If you're a saint, you are one of those that is to equip the saints. We are to equip the saints, but the saints are to to do the work of the ministry. And that's the glorious thing. When a church really is doing that, that's when you have that body life. And I think we have that here. I think that you guys are practicing that to a great extent. It can always be better, it can always be, you know, all the rest of it.

But it's, that's what really happens when ministries are solid and the people are solid. You don't have to go ask the pastor, you know, I don't know the answer, dad, you have to ask the pastor. No, get together and seek it out, try to find it out. And then if you don't think you have the right answer or whatever, yeah, ask somebody else. And sometimes, you know what, there isn't an answer to that. It's one of those paradoxes in the Christian life. God is totally sovereign and you are totally responsible. I know, you can't put that in your thing, but that is the way it works a lot of time. You're totally responsible, he's totally sovereign.

He gets to be God. So then, I have a little verse for you for all the JWs that come to the door. And Ryan got to use this with a son that came to the door and he has a worker that he's using now. So this one's Titus 2.9-15. Slaves are to be submissive to their own masters and everything. They are to be well pleasing, not argumentative, not pilfering, but showing all good faith. But in everything they may adorn the doctrine of God our Savior." And that JW will say, see, God is your Savior Jehovah. And then you read on, "...For the grace of God has appeared, bringing salvation for all the people, training us to renounce ungodliness and worldly passion, and to live self-controlled, upright and godly lives in the present age, waiting for our blessed hope, the appearing of the glory of our great God and Savior, Jesus Christ, who gave himself for us to redeem us from all lawlessness and to purify himself for a people for his own possession, who are zealous for good works.

Declare these things, exhort and rebuke with all authority. Let no one disregard you." The JWs in their own translation absolutely translate it this way. And I've stumped a mini on the doorstep when you say, oh, do you have your copy of your Greek New Testament? Most of them don't have it. I happen to have it, so I will go get it, bring it back and show them. And they look at that and you can see them, they're spinning and they do the classic cult thing. Oh, well let's look at another verse. No, no, no, no. The way to, if you're gonna get involved in a discussion with cults, don't let them jump around. Stay on that verse.

And if they can't give you the right answer, thank you for sharing your time. See you next time. Don't let them do the jump around thing, because that's the classic, right? You see it all the time in political discussions. How about this thing? Well, he did it, so I can do it. No, no, I'm asking you why you did it. Everybody does it. stupid. So keep them nailed to the thing. And this is a great one for them and a great verse that we are looking for our great God and Savior Jesus Christ. Which of course people say, oh the Bible never says that Jesus is God. Well there you go. And they go with me, they knew he was God, all that kind of stuff.

It goes on and on and on. That's another lie from the pit. Another good one, and here's one that calls Jesus God again that you might not have noticed. Hebrews 1.8. But of the Son, this is God talking, but of the Son he says, Your throne, O God, is forever and ever. The scepter of uprightness is the scepter of your kingdom. This is known in Greek as the voketive, and God is saying to Jesus, Your throne, O God, is forever and ever." Whoa, the Godhead talking to itself, calling each other God. Yeah, that's pretty cool. So I like that one.

Another one that's good for us is John 5.13. I write these things to you who believe in the name of the Son of God that you may know that you have eternal life. First John was the book that my My disciples told me to read first, not John, because John is kind of a complicated book and it's long. First John is really short and it's really black and white. If you're doing this, you shouldn't do that, you should do this. If you say you have no sin, you're a liar. If you, you know, on and on and on, it just draws those, you know, hard distinctions. It is written so that we may know, who may know, to the ones who are believing in the name of the Son of God.

So by faith you believe and He will give you the assurance. And it's a step-by-step process. And I know sometimes when you first come to the Lord, you know, you get all sketchy and you wonder, oh my goodness, you know, I was this and I'm still thinking that and all of that. Sometimes you can slip back into that as you go along in your life, but to remember that you're one of His, He's the One, Galatians 2.20, it's not you are living anymore, He's living inside of you, and the reason you have these feelings is because you're trying to buck the system. He's got you in His grasp, He's conforming you, He's molding you around, sometimes when He squeezes on the clay, it hurts, it's good, it's all part of the thing.

And all of that done together really helps us to grow and make people understand. I mean I've had so many times when people come to me and say, you don't understand, I've got this great problem and it's just horrible, I can't fix it, I don't know what I'm going to do. And so I have the person explain the problem and they say, well I need a verse and I need you to tell me what to do. And I said, oh well I don't really think that's a problem. What do you mean it's not a problem? I have those thoughts. I'm a human just like you. I you know you do I thought you were you know you you're You're supposed to be a pastor. You're supposed to know this stuff Well just because you know this stuff sometimes the more you learn What do you find out the more wicked you find out you are?

the more holy you become Separated and understanding where God is taking you the more unrighteous you know you are That's another one of those paradoxes to the Christian life. The more you learn, the more you know you need to learn, and the more you learn about God, the more you understand you're not God and you're never going to be like God. But he keeps giving you these glimpses and causing you to be conformed into the image of his son so that you can see that. But it's still then you realize, but I got all this baggage. Yeah, we all have a lot of baggage. And that stupid Adam shouldn't have given that apple to his wife.

It's all his fault, not mine. So anyway, all of that to comfort you, these little passages kind of gave you some little tidbits to think about. And I've got, let's see here, one, two, three more verses. And this is another cool one that in our, this is my second year Greek class. assignment was to read Revelation for the class and it's very simple Greek John wrote it it's like John and 1st John those are simple books to read they're not hard 1st Peter and Hebrews may break but these are straight ahead and our class noticed as we were reading through this that this was there and it It has been mentioned in commentaries and stuff, but it really was something that really hooked our class and our instructors was a very learned guy and had studied in Europe and gotten all kinds of doctorates and stuff.

And he, after we looked at it and then we got into other things, he said that'll really preach. And in Revelation 1a, Jesus says, I am the Alpha and the Omega, says the Lord God, who is and who was and who is to come the Almighty. And again, that's ego, amen. But then the alpha and omega, the first letter in the Greek alphabet and the last letter in the Hebrew alphabet. But in the Greek manuscripts, it's written out, alpha is spelled out, and omega, but it's only the omega. It isn't written out, omega. Now why would that be? Because the end hasn't happened. So the beginning has happened, Alpha and Omega, but not spelled out because he's never ending. That's really cool I think.

And it's done three times in Revelation. In Revelation 21 6, and he said to me, it is done. I am the Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end, to the thirsty I will give from the spring of water of life without payment." And again it's Agoe, me, and Alpha and Omega not spelled out. And then in 2213, I am the Alpha and Omega, the first and the last, the beginning and the end, Alpha and Omega not spelled out. So those are funky little facts that you can find out and have fun rabbit trails with, and there are lots of them in the Bible. When you start getting into prophecies and understanding the day of the Lord is like one to do a study on whenever the day of the Lord is mentioned, try to figure out, oh, that's interesting, what does that mean? Where is that at? What is, you know, especially when you're reading through the minor prophets. And you'll find that there are near and far and things that are happening in the prophecies that will just make your heads pair. And if you haven't ever been introduced to that, you need to listen to Chris's series

on eschatology that he did when we...man, was that our first year you did that series? Yeah, but it's really good to give you the background of that. But it's amazing. The more you study it, the better it gets for you. It doesn't confuse you more, I feel. I think it makes it clearer. So with all of that said, I got through it in time, and I had it timed out pretty good. But the whole thing that Dale wanted me to talk on discipleship and pounded into everybody, they need to be discipling, and how important it is, because we're some of those that came to the Lord through discipleship, not through listening to preaching, but for any person to invest themselves in our lives and then the word and different preaching does meld that into you.

But the passion is, the great commission is not to build churches, not to build schools, not to do all the things we're doing, which is good, not to get kids adopted and bring the gospel to India and all of that, but to make disciples who then go in their sphere of influence and make another disciple in their sphere. And all of that develops into incredible things. If you just, doesn't even, you don't need to live very long to see it. And it's one of the coolest things that'll happen to you is if you disciple somebody and that person goes and disciples somebody and then the person that that person disciple comes back to you and starts talking to you and, oh, I heard you discipled, you know, Bob.

And Bob discipled me and this guy is absolutely pounding you with stuff that you just smile and know you taught the guy that taught him. So you have successfully made a grandchild, right? First one is a child, then the child has to reproduce so it goes on to the next generation. But when that generation comes back to you and gives you the same doctrine, you realize, wow, it's really happening. And the great thing about our reading of Eusebias and the church fathers and all of this stuff, as you realize for 2,000 years, that's the way it's been being done. And you see ups and downs and stuff, but always there was that thread of the gospel being given to people.

Even when they had great error in other departments, the gospel marched forth. And as it got stronger and stronger, people then wanted more information, which caused them to want the Bible and all of that. And then we have the Protestant Reformation, the printing press, and we have all these things. And now, you know, we have more power in our phones than we used to have in, you know, IBM computers. And we can look all this stuff up and get the references. I mean, there's no reason you can't read that passage over and over, you know, stuck in the doctor's office or waiting, you know, for your sandwich or something, you can keep rereading that chapter that you're concentrating on or that passage. And I guarantee you that'll grow your faith and all the rest of it. So with all those things said and done, that's the end of my brown paper bag Bible passages.

But it could go on from there, but we won't do that for now. So let's pray and then we Father, thank you for this time. Again, thank you for your word and for just all the joyous little nuggets that you have that are to be discovered and to be appreciated and for us to go, oh wow. and just the great experience that is for us and how you promise to keep conforming us to your son. We thank you for that and we thank you for him. Without him we wouldn't even be able to pray to you and we would have no hope. So we thank you for that and your power in us. So it's in his name Jesus Christ we pray. Amen.

Trying to get to God’s promised end without faith is like driving home blindfolded; you may start off in the right direction but you’re likely to cause a lot of damage along the way.

Abram and Sarai were in a unique and hard position. The LORD promised Abram a multitude of descendants and they didn’t even have one; any number multiplied by zero is still zero. Neither husband or wife were getting any younger and the word of God seemed less probable (from their perspective) day by day. In Genesis 15 Abram asked if he needed to take legal steps to secure an heir and the LORD said No. Abram did not ask if he should take a second wife to jumpstart the family train. The LORD would have said No.

Sarai knew the LORD’S promise and His power. She recognized that the He had prevented her pregnancy. She considered her options, thinking through the reproductive ethics of her day. It was culturally reasonable to use the surrogacy of a maidservant to overcome the infertility of the mistress. Her desire for a child did not come because of baby-idolatry or pregnancy envy. She longed for the fulfillment of the LORD’s promise. So she used the fertility technology available to her and gave Hagar to her husband.

Because it wasn’t consistent with the word of the LORD, Abram shouldn’t have listened to the voice of his wife, just as Adam should not have listened to the voice of Eve. Even the verbs in Genesis 16:3, she took and gave, are the same as what Eve did in Genesis 3. If there was any doubt about the couples’ motivation, their reactions confirm a lack of faith. Damage is done.

Hagar despises Sarai. Sarai berates Abram. Abram shirks responsibility. Sarai abuses Hagar. Hagar takes off. Relationships break. A servant and a son are lost. These are fruits of the flesh not fruits of faith.

Of the three key characters in this episode, Hagar’s behavior is the least surprising or blameworthy. She’s a servant, far from home. She does what she’s told, perhaps even excited that she was chosen for this important task by her mistress. So she gets proud…had she ever had anything to be proud about before? She didn’t ask for this, scheme for this, seduce Abram or deceive Sarai. Someone should have talked to her, sure. But Abram should have protected her and Sarai should have backed off.

Hagar runs away, alone and pregnant and without status. But the LORD pursues her in her affliction and not only makes a great promise to her, He exalts her in a couple ways unlike anyone else in the Old Testament. In the last part of Genesis 16 we’ll see the Lord’s Pursuit, Hagar’s Response, and a final Summary.

All of grace, God goes and finds Hagar.

The angel of the LORD found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, the spring on the way to Shur. And he said, “Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from and where are you going?” She said, “I am fleeing from my mistress Sarai.” (Genesis 16:7–8)

I’ve been saying that the LORD found her, but the passage says that it was the angel of the LORD. That title is used four times in five verses, the last three times to start consecutive sentences. “Angel of Yahweh” is used almost sixty times in the OT and, while there may be some distinction between the angel of Yahweh and Yahweh Himself, the story itself reveals by the end that Hagar believed that the angel of the LORD was the LORD (verse 9). “The angel of Yahweh is more a representation of God than a representative of God” (Hamilton). He often arrives when the need is great.

He found her, not that she was off the LORD’s radar, but this means that He went after her. She was by a spring of water in the wilderness, a necessary pit stop for a traveller, and it was on the way to Shur. Shur was in southern Canaan, so Hagar was heading home (see verse 1) to Egypt.

He starts with a question to this woman at the well. “Hagar, servant of Sarai, where have you come from and where are you going?” He’s not asking for information. He starts with her name and her position. How did He know that? It’s not a question of her identity or itinerary. The question gets her thinking about her motivation not her direction.

She answers honestly: I am fleeing from my mistress Sarai. Hagar doesn’t say why; she doesn’t add anything about Sarai’s maltreatment. She does acknowledge that she’s on the run from her owner.

Then come three statements from the angel of the LORD with no record of her response until the end. He instructs her and then makes a promise and gives a prophecy.

The angel of the LORD said to her, “Return to your mistress and submit to her.” (Genesis 16:9)

Return and submit. Both of these commands could seem harsh. But when Hagar finally says something, she doesn’t argue. Though she was carrying Abram’s baby, being pregnant didn’t change her relationship with Sarai. For that matter, Sarai’s treatment didn’t change Hagar’s responsibility. The Hebrew emphasizes, “put yourself under her hand.” Sarai’s the authority. Hagar exalted herself over Sarai, now she needed to humble herself under Sarai.

Part of the reason for this instruction is that it’s right; a servant shouldn’t run away. Another part of it is the LORD’s intention to bless her and her child.

The angel of the LORD also said to her, “I will surely multiply your offspring so that they cannot be numbered for multitude.” (Genesis 16:10)

This is astounding. She gets the same promise that Abram did about a multitude of offspring, but this is for her. In fact, Hagar is the only woman in the Old Testament to be addressed by name by God and the only woman in Genesis to get a promise like this from the LORD. And she’s an Egyptian. And she’s a servant. And she’s a sinner—having become proud over Sarai and having run from her mistress. This is grace. Even if the LORD is blessing her because of Abram, He’s still blessing her with favor she has not earned.

The LORD adds some specificity about the first child of the coming multitude.

And the angel of the LORD said to her,

No ultrasound was necessary, and hopefully she wasn’t big into being surprised: she’s having a son. And if she’d started a mental list of possibilities, maybe after her dad or a brother, she won’t get to name him. You shall call his name Ishmael and the reason is because the LORD has listened to your affliction. Ishmael means “God hears.” It was wrong how Sarai treated her. It was hard. Whether Hagar prayed or not, the LORD sees and hears the troubled. She was headed back into the strife, but now in the knowledge that the LORD knew.

As for her son, he would be a blessing (to her) and a bane to pretty much everyone else. He’s the sort of son only a mother can stomach. He’ll be an untamed ass, a wild donkey, not even a domesticated sort of stubborn. He’ll wander the wilderness, and some of that is because no one can handle being his neighbor: his hand against everyone and everyone’s hand against him. He’s a piece of work—and it’s not artwork. Even his own family will grow tired of him: he shall dwell over against all his kinsmen. “His restless existence [is] no pilgrimage but an end in itself; his nonconformism a habit of mind, not a light to the nations” (Kidner). The strife among Ishmael and his kin continues even today in the conflict between many Middle Eastern descendants, let alone between his descendants and Isaac’s offspring.

Based on what she says, maybe Hagar didn’t hear the last part of what the angel of the LORD said, though, if she hadn’t, we might ask how Moses knew it. No matter, Hagar believes and praises the LORD.

So she called the name of the LORD who spoke to her, “You are a God of seeing,” for she said, “Truly here I have seen him who looks after me.” (Genesis 16:13)

The Hebrew name, El-Roi = You are a God of seeing, and her explanation behind it, I have seen him who looks after me, have been and still are debated by translators. The two main possibilities are 1) God sees Hagar or 2) Hagar sees God. Is God the subject of the object? If she see’s Him, she’s rejoicing in the revelation, and perhaps rejoicing that she’s not dead. There is significant difficulty translating this last phrase. In fact, the ESV is the only major English translation that does not translate it as a question. For example, the NAS, "Have I even remained alive here after seeing Him?" Or the NKJV, "Have I also here seen Him who sees me?" Or YLT, "Even here have I looked behind my beholder?"

I think it’s better, though, to understand it as He sees her. Just as He “heard” her, He sees and cares for her. She is not alone. She responds in praise.

God reveals specific names for Himself to other persons; He names Himself, but no one names Him. Hagar is the only person in the Old Testament, woman or man, to give God a name. No patriarch, no prophet, not Adam or Abram, not David or Daniel.

In order to preserve the honor, she named the well.

Therefore the well was called Beer-lahai-roi; it lies between Kadesh and Bered. (Genesis 16:14)

The translation of the name of the well, ** Beer-lahai-roi** meaning “the well belonging to the Living One who has seen me,” corroborates the emphasis of God watching.

Three names are repeated in the final scene and not one of them is Sarai.

And Hagar bore Abram a son, and Abram called the name of his son, whom Hagar bore, Ishmael. Abram was eighty-six years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to Abram. (Genesis 16:15–16)

Sarai’s plan was to get a child for herself through Hagar’s surrogacy (verse 3). It wasn’t supposed to be like this. Hagar wasn’t supposed to get uppity. The son was supposed to be theirs, to be hers. Abram called the name of his son…Ishmael; he acknowledged his part. Sarai had no part.

Things often don’t end up like we thought they would, even when we make our decisions by faith. But at least when we live by faith we don’t have the regret of knowing that we made the mess.

Abram was eighty-six now and it would be thirteen years before the start of the next chapter (17:1).

For Hagar, though she sinned in despising and fleeing from Sarai, God heard and saw her affliction and blessed her by His grace.

For Abram and Sarai, God also heard and saw their affliction, but they did not trust Him.

Was this the will of God? In one way, No. Sarai and Abram did not live by faith. Their sin brought about damaging consequences. In another way, Yes. God is sovereign, and God does plan to fulfill some of His promise to Abram about a multitude of nations through him via Ishmael. God’s grace worked for good even in their unbelief, though there are also some consequences of sowing unbelief that cannot be undone.

He is a God of seeing. The righteous live by faith, including faith that God sees and will fulfill His promises without our help, however culturally reasonable our decision seems.

Making decisions can be very difficult when we don’t have a verse for it. As Christians, we know that if God said what to do in any given situation, we must do that. He is the Lord.

What about the times when we need to choose a direction and we don’t have a verse? Are we free to do whatever we want? How do we know what is right? What is better?

Or what about when God has promised to bring about a specific end but He has not revealed the specific path to that end? We know the What but not the How. If he hasn’t told us how, does He care how?

He does care how, and He sees all that we do. Solomon wrote that young men should rejoice in their youth, that they should walk in the ways of their hearts, and that they should “know that for all these things God will bring you into judgment” (Ecclesiastes 11:9). He is a God of seeing. He sees what is happening and what will happen as the sovereign Future-Maker. What He wants is for us to hear and obey His Word, and in the absence of a clear word to follow, He wants us to trust Him in faith.

Abram has demonstrated great faith since the LORD called him out of Ur at the beginning of chapter 12. The only faith-hiccup we know about is the trip to Egypt and his lie to Pharaoh in the back half of chapter 12. We understood Abram’s desire to provide for his family during a famine, we understand his desire to protect his family from foreign threats. But he did not seek the LORD or seek to honor the LORD in his behavior. Though the LORD protected and provided for him, it was not an unmixed blessing. He would have to earn his reputation back even in his own household.

He did that by showing generosity to Lot in chapter 13 and by showing strength to rescue Lot in chapter 14. At the end of both episodes Abram receives some sort of reaffirmation, from the LORD directly or from the priest of the LORD, Melchizedek. Abram built an altar to the LORD in worship, and gave a tithe through Melchizedek to the LORD in worship.

So when the LORD made a covenant with Abram in chapter 15, Abram believes. It isn’t that he doesn’t have any questions, but his questions appear to come from his trust in the LORD. “Lord, you say this, how can I know it?” And the LORD gives him a vision of stars and a ceremony that plants Abram’s faith deep.

Some time has passed and the situation hasn’t changed. Abram and Sarai know the end, but they make some guesses about the means to the end because the end hadn’t happened yet. It was too slow from their perspective. They come up with their own solution in chapter 16. Verses 1-6 show Human Prerogative against Divine Promise in verses 7-16 (which we’ll see next week).

In the first part of the chapter we seen the Problem, the Proposal, and the new Problems.

It isn’t a new problem at all, but it is a big problem that Moses has already told us about a few times.

Now Sarai, Abram’s wife, had borne him no children. (Genesis 16:1a)

We knew Sarai was barren from the first time we met her in chapter 11 (verse 30). In the previous chapter Abram just asked about the potential need to take an heir in a legal or adoptive way rather than through having a son of his own. This isn’t a recent realization.

The second half of verse one points in a foreboding direction.

She had a female Egyptian servant whose name was Hagar. (Genesis 16:1b)

The most important thing to know about this woman is not her name but her position. She is a servant, a “maid” (NAS). The word referred to a servant of a mistress (verse 4), which is not a name for a secret, extramarital lover, but the name for the woman of authority in the house. Sarai owned Hagar, Hagar reported to her mistress, not to Abram as master.

A number of ancient laws made room for alternative methods to family planning, including the Code of Hammurabi and various Assyrian marriage regulations. This makes the proposal that Sarai presents a culturally reasonable solution. Let’s see what she suggests.

Sarai feels the weight of her barren condition and presents a way out.

And Sarai said to Abram, “Behold now, the LORD has prevented me from bearing children. Go in to my servant; it may be that I shall obtain children by her.” And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai. (Genesis 16:2)

She acknowledges her situation and, to one degree or another, recognizes (or blames) God for it: The LORD has prevented me. She knows the LORD. Abram worshipped the LORD and he must have told Sarai every time the LORD spoke to him. She knows the LORD’s name and His abilities and His promises. She rightly says that the LORD prevented her, but she wrongly assumes that He would always prevent her.

She also assumes that her maid’s womb will work. But who would make her maid’s womb fruitful? The same LORD. Instead of thinking that the LORD could powerfully work in her belly, she concludes, based on her assessment of her age, maybe menopausal symptoms, or the amount of passed time since the initial promise, that the LORD can’t or won’t use her.

But look, she is after a child for herself. It may be that I shall obtain children by her. Because of her maid’s status, what belonged to her maid belonged to her. Children were a sign of blessing so that the family, in particular, the father’s, name would continue. Sarai had God’s word saying that Abram would be blessed as the father of a multitude. She knew the end, and she took a frequently practiced, culturally acceptable, a legally recognized approach to getting a child.

Sarai wasn’t pandering for Abram. She wasn’t finding him a prostitute. She took advantage of the fertility technology available in her day. She perceived that the way to get to the LORD’s promise was through the surrogacy of a servant. From her perspective her proposal wasn’t indecent, it was reasonable. And Abram listened to the voice of Sarai. She “fanned in her husband the same flame of impatience with which she burned” (Calvin).

The recap in verse 3 does more than summarize verse 2.

So, after Abram had lived ten years in the land of Canaan, Sarai, Abram’s wife, took Hagar the Egyptian, her servant, and gave her to Abram her husband as a wife. (Genesis 16:3)

Why is this verse here? The only real new information is a more explicit timeframe: ten years in the land of Canaan. Perhaps this adds to the burden of barrenness. Then the roles are restated centered around Sarai - Sarai: Abram’s wife, Hagar: Sarai’s servant, Abram: Sarai’s husband.

But consider the verbs: took and gave. Do those sound familiar? How about a wife taking and giving to her husband? These are the same verbs used from Eve to Adam in Genesis 3:6. Even the end of verse 2: “Abram listened to the voice of Sarai” parallels Genesis 3:17, “Because you have listened to the voice of your wife.” Moses isn’t only recapping. He is commenting on the similarities of the falls. In both cases, the word of God was not sufficient and unbelief wins.

We sympathize with Sarai. Our culture does surrogacy more clinically, but we still seek alternative solutions to get to God’s blessing. We understand her desire and her desperation to have children. We get that she knows enough to know that the LORD hasn’t wanted her to be pregnant yet and we know that waiting, even on the sovereign Future-Maker, is hard. She knew the law of the land and how a servant could produce for her. So she did what she thought was best for the family. But she did it without faith.

More damage is done than overcome. A lack of faith produced results, but not good ones. Here are four new problems that make the situation worse.

And he went in to Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, she looked with contempt on her mistress. (Genesis 16:4)

God did cause Hagar to get pregnant, and her pregnancy made Hagar proud. Solomon added a proverb from Agur about this to his collection.

Under three things the earth trembles;under four it cannot bear up: a slave when he becomes king,and a fool when he is filled with food; an unloved woman when she gets a husband,and a maidservant when she displaces her mistress. (Proverbs 30:21–23)

Hagar began to act like Sarai was beneath her. Sarai and her empty womb were worthless. If the earth can’t bear up under that, how much less one household.

Sarai apparently hadn’t prepared herself for this possibility.

And Sarai said to Abram, “May the wrong done to me be on you! I gave my servant to your embrace, and when she saw that she had conceived, she looked on me with contempt. May the LORD judge between you and me!” (Genesis 16:5)

Sarai blows up at Abram even though it was her idea, not his, not to mention that he wasn’t the one despising her, Hagar was. Sarai calls the LORD to judge between she and her husband, believing that she would win the case and Abram would get the curse.

If she hadn’t been blinded by her bitter rage, she might have realized what she was asking for. If the LORD had come to judge, she was first in line. Instead, she resents Hagar and harasses Abram.

Abram may not have initiated the plan, he also didn’t stop it or step in to help now.

But Abram said to Sarai, “Behold, your servant is in your power; do to her as you please.” (Genesis 16:6a)

It’s hard to know everything he was thinking at this point, but he may not have even looked up from his evening paper. If he had been thinking earlier, he could have prayed to the LORD about Sarai’s possible pregnancy. There’s no mention of him calling on the name of the LORD. For that matter, if he wasn’t going to need to adopt (Genesis 15:4), why would he need a second wife?

Even now, why isn’t he helping, leading, comforting, or protecting his child? He must have assumed Sarai would calm down. She doesn’t.

Sarai takes it out on Hagar.

Then Sarai dealt harshly with her, and she fled from her. (Genesis 16:6b)

The word dealt harshly or “mistreated” (NIV) is exactly how the Egyptians treated the Israelites when the Israelites were their servants; God said it would happen in Genesis 15:13. Whether it was verbal or physical abuse or both, the mistress punishes her former maid and Hagar runs. We’ll see more about that in part two of the chapter next week. To note is that, by the end, a son is born for Abram but not for Sarai as she expected (verses 15-16).

[T]he first scene ends in total disaster for all concerned. Hagar has lost her home, Sarai her maid, and Abram his second wife and newborn child. (Wenham).

Be careful before deciding that you know the right means to the Lord’s ends, especially if those means don’t require faith. The righteous live by faith, not by doing whatever is culturally reasonable that could get close to the thing it seems would please God. What pleases God is believing that He will use us as instruments in His hands not that He will ask us to take matters into our own hands.

Abram sinned in light of both the revelation and responsibilities given to him. He doesn't help/stop/lead Sarai. He doesn't refuse or then help/stop Hagar. He doesn't help/stop/lead Sarai again. His passivity is not of faith.

God sees it all, more on that in verses 7-16.

Automated transcript of the sermon audio, generated with OpenAI Whisper (small.en). It has not been checked against the recording and may contain errors, especially in names and Scripture references.

I would invite you to join me tonight in 1st Peter chapter 3 verses 8 through 12 That's going to be the paragraph that we will be looking at in our time together The fact is self-evident that men pursue happiness We make decisions and we act Based on what we think will bring about our greatest happiness in the end If a robber comes up to you with a gun in hand and says give me your wallet You surrender your wallet not because you think that will make you happiest right now but because that will affect your greatest happiness in the end, right? Because lots of people push back and say, well if man does what he wants to do, if he's actually bound by his will, then how do we explain when I do things that I don't want to do?

Well, in truth we don't. We are always striving for our happiness. The Greek philosopher Aristotle, along with a host of other philosophers, understood this well. And it is confirmed by the Christian worldview. In fact, this greatest happiness that men pursue is what philosophers have over the ages called the good life. It's true, the ancient Greek philosophers pursued the good life with calculated determination. But they couldn't agree on how to get there. Just looking at three big ones, Socrates, Plato, Aristotle, Spa, if you ever have a hard time remembering who discipled whom. Socrates and Plato thought reality transcended what we perceive.

Aristotle was much closer to the truth and his insistence on the reality of the particulars, what can be perceived here with our senses. So you get that. So Aristotle was more here, and Socrates and Plato were more here. That's Raphael's painting, School of Athens. And of course, the biblical worldview teaches something, well that is true of course, but Aristotle was closer to the reality, namely that what we perceive with our senses is absolutely real. This is real. Heaven will be real and we will perceive it with senses. It's not just this ethereal dream state, it is real. And even if we're looking forward to more profound, real experience yet to come after this life, that doesn't mean that this is not real.

This is more than just shadows on a cave wall or something. So for Socrates, the good life existed in the realm of the forms. The ideal situation was to graduate past the corrupt realm of the physical to the realm of the forms, as the good life has neither shadow nor substance, just essence.

And if it's hard to figure this stuff out, it's because it's hard to figure this stuff out. And I think that largely these philosophers themselves confused and not self-consistent. So it's hard to keep track of them because I think they did a poor job keeping track of themselves and their own teaching. But Plato, a disciple of Socrates, taught that this life is but shadows of a reality. And the philosophers are closer to seeing accurately the reality than the normal numbskulls like you and me might be.

And the allegory of the cave, the normal folks like you and me were just ones who were strapped to these chairs looking at a cave wall for our whole lives. It could turn either to the right nor the left, seeing these shadows. And the shadows are being cast by an artificial light, namely a fire that was set behind us. And then imagine one person getting free and actually going out of the cave into the sunlight and seeing things as they actually are. And coming back and telling everybody, no this is fake. This is all, these are all just shadows. Well they may well kill that man. And of course he was making a to comment on, the philosophers are the ones who are truly enlightened and not only might they hypothetically kill such a man, they did kill Socrates. So Plato sympathized with Socrates in that. But for you and me, all we're seeing are just shadows. Right, the question is not whether or not this is a music stand. That's actually, that's fine, well and good, but how does it embody the essence of music stand-ness?

So what about it is fundamentally, essentially characteristic of music stands. Because somewhere in the ether there's a music stand that is the music stand. And this is just a picture. I know there's black ones back there in the closet or up on the stage. Those are also. fine, but they're shadows of a reality. The forms, I mean that's where the reality actually is. No doubt, he must have been a lot of fun at parties. But Plato, who not surprisingly held the general disdain for matter, so this is a reflection of shadow, whatever. For whatever. For him it was unconscionable that God would take on flesh. It's like God becoming a shadow on the wall of the cave and that's something that was that he could not imagine. For Plato then who held the general disdain for matter the best we could do was live in potentially political harmony in community one with another because it was all for now Matter can't be avoided.

What also you see with Plato, for instance, is the folly of men defining their own terms for morality. So Plato identifies, you know, justice is what creates, what does the greatest good for mankind. And that is, that is consummate morality. And when you're not doing the greatest, when you're not doing what you're supposed to do, when you're not doing your job, that is immoral when you're not doing your job in a culture, so says Plato. Well, on an IQ test, Plato would score pretty high. But what we see with Plato and Aristotle and Emma Socrates are men grasping at truth apart from the capital T, truth. So what else are they going to do?

Of course they're going to define their own terms. And so, as we mentioned, Aristotle, the disciple of Plato, thought that the particulars were real. Thought this matter that's around us is real. And so it's at least okay. So, Aristotle got a whole lot closer to the truth than did his predecessors. He thought the man could actually find happiness in this earthly life. And he prescribed ways to go about it. But once again, he was at least conjecturing. He was the least speculating because he didn't have an objective source of morality to return to. So he was saying that in his school, it was actually on a grove, and they walked around.

They're called parapetetics. And they would just walk around and do their lessons. And he would say, all this that you see is real. And men pursue happiness, and the way for men to pursue, to attain the greatest happiness, the good life, is basically a life of moderation. It's a life of finding the mean between extremes. That is a virtue. A virtue is finding the mean on a spectrum between excess and deficiency. So it might be any number of things, but that again, that's well and good. But why? Who? How? Those are all fair questions. And that's called again the doctrine of the mean. These virtues were means to be attained between in any set of actions.

So enter Peter, for instance. There's a sense in which Aristotle may well have agreed with much of what Peter had to say in our passage tonight. And even Peter is quoting David from Psalm 32. We'll look at that. But if you write nothing else down, write this down. So Peter makes one point. He comes at it a bunch of different ways, but in the passage we're looking at tonight, this is it. The good life is the blessing of God and It comes to those who bring the greatest blessing to others I'll repeat that Yeah, I'll talk first so what what it's not the good life is not the pursuit of some moderate mean between extremes the the the The good life is not pining for death when the good is yet to come.

And yes, it is true. The good is yet to come. But I think it's far too low of a bar for us to suppose that Peter is just trying to help his readers muddle through this life and make it into heaven. In fact, emphatically, that's not the case. It is true. And he opens his letter by talking about an inheritance that is undefiled in Paris when and won't fade away and all the rest. That's great. There's a lot coming. That actually ought to motivate us to live righteously now. But this is a formula for real happiness in this life in the pages of scripture. And that is not something that Aristotle or Plato or Socrates had.

Or really, they might have been able to appreciate it if they had God's word. But I'll give it again. Contrasted with the Greek philosophers, The good life is the blessing of God, and it comes to those who bring the greatest blessing to others. That's the case that I wanna make tonight, and we'll do so as we examine this passage. There's no need for spiritual empowerment if you wanna obey Aristotle. Natural man can do what Aristotle prescribed. He only needs to be interested in his own happiness to pursue those virtues, but to obey Peter, a man must be spirit-filled, And in his blessing of others, he, by the grace of God, brings about his own blessing.

By the blessing of others, the Spirit-filled man brings about his own blessing. That is the good life. Our culture is too easily satisfied. Well, we think of as the good life is something like a beer commercial or like the life of the celebrities, a rock star, like how they live. We know on one level that's empty, but because the suicide numbers are uncannily high. But man does it look attractive. Luxury, no worry. Don't, yeah, don't mistake. Sometimes temporal blessings come about as blessings from God, that's fine. But in scripture we do not find lasting satisfaction coming about from the pursuit of earthly pleasures.

It doesn't happen. Sometimes God gives, good gifts, material gifts. The things of earth are themselves blessings from God for our enjoyment and it is wrong for us not to receive them with thankfulness. I would say it's wrong for us not to receive them in the first place as many ascetics do. No, Lord, I'm satisfied in you, I don't need food. Okay, but what if he wants you to enjoy that? That's a blessing from him, but we must receive those things with thankfulness and yet The pursuit of those things in and of themselves forsake of themselves is idolatry but too much good stuff though didn't seem to be the problem of Peter's readers Now he wrote this letter to have the dispersion in Pontius, Galicia, Cappadocia, Asia, Bithynia This is Asia Minor modern-day Turkey Those were all provinces of the Roman Empire and on the throne in AD 64 ish Anybody know who was the Emperor at that time?

In 64 who was a Mrs. Ratzlaff? It was Nero, not a hero Yeah in the wake of AD 64, what happened in the summer of AD 64? Anybody know? Something really bad happened, was it? Rome burned And how much time do I have? I'll go fast Nero was opportunistic. Whether or not he actually was the one who initiated that fire or not, he at least had the negative character that an accusation like that would stick. And he didn't help himself when in the wake of that fire, like eight of the twelve districts of Rome were burned to the ground, and he used that opportunity to build himself a new palace. So he infamously played his harp and sang while Rome was burning.

marveling at the spectacle. But that actually was not a good PR move, so he took opportunity to then deflect some of that attention by persecuting Christians. Empire-wide, starting in Rome and then going outwards. So in the wake of the summer of AD 64, there was a wide-scale persecution of Christians. And Peter, I think Peter and Paul both died under Nero's rule. But in this time, Peter is looking at this tremendous opportunity. Here we have an unprecedented opportunity to be as lights in a dying world in the midst of tremendous persecution. The persecution of the Christians by the Romans was a lot like water on a grease fire.

Far from extinguishing the flames, it just scattered them without having any sort of dousing effect. And Peter's big picture focus then is on the testimony of his readers in a time of tremendous opportunity and persecution, that opportunity being brought on by their suffering. Because when a martyr is tied to the stake and wishes to issue a few last words, those who are gathered around the flames will tend to perk up and listen. Sometimes they cut out his tongue, but other times they'll listen. And that was the sort of opportunity that they had here and now. And when you read the whole of First Peter with that in view, it's really remarkable.

So, their affliction gave them great opportunity as witnesses. And he really wants them to take full advantage of that opportunity, proclaiming Christ to the Gentiles with their words and with their actions. 1 Peter 3 verses 8 through 12 is at then the back end of a section that stretches. Well, it's introduced in chapter 2 verses 11 and 12. Let's read that real quick, just two verses. Chapter 2 verses 11 and 12, where he says, Beloved, I urge you as sojourners and exiles to abstain from the passions of the flesh, which wage war against your soul, keep your conduct among the Gentiles honorable, so that when they speak against you as evildoers, they may see your good deeds and glorify God on the day of visitation."

And after that he gives a host of directives related to how to go about that, how to put feet to that charge. And that runs from then verse 13 of chapter 2 through the paragraph that we will look at tonight. So if you would please join me In reading this passage, I would be glad to do that.

First Peter chapter three, verses eight through 12. Finally, all of you have unity of mind, sympathy, brotherly love, a tender heart, and humble mind. Do not repay evil for evil or a violin for a violin, but on the contrary, bless, for to this you were called that you may obtain a blessing. For whoever desires to love life and see good days, let him keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit. Let him turn away from evil and do good. Let him seek peace and pursue it for the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and his ears are open to their prayer but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil." This is at the back end of a passage then where Peter is instructing his readers on how to impact a dying world while dying themselves. How to live dynamic lives of faithful submission in appropriate submission one to another.

And submission, that's kind of a funny term, but we're talking about appropriate submission. So you have a submission to civil authorities, you have submission slaves to masters, you have submission wives to husbands, you have an appropriate submission that comes from dying to self of husbands to their wives, living with their wives in an understanding way as someone weaker. And all of this, it is more than just how Christians ought to live in community, it is more than that, it's how they are to live in society. With one another there's a there's a lot of Christian to Christian interaction direct this direction here But also how you are to live in a culture. So what do you do if you have a godless?

Husband master if you're a slave and so on and so forth Well Yes, he is offering a recipe for that sort of impact But he also offers a formula for the good life for our greatest happiness While we are not called to pursue fleeting pleasures in this life, neither are we simply to muddle through somehow. The teaching that he offers is dynamic, it's radical, it's Christ-centered, and they're being equipped, these readers are being equipped to impact eternity through their conduct. And Peter, Paul, other apostles, by applying these same principles of boldness and joyfulness in the face of godless persecutors, We're said to have turned the world upside down, you may recall from Acts 17.

This is powerful, impactful obedience to Christ. Well, I would add that if the good life were attainable in the first century for believers of Peter's audience, how much more ought we to desire to love life and see good days? Yeah, if they could apply this paragraph with a promise of spiritual blessing, then Don't think that the payoff is any smaller for us today. Yeah, I grant that the distracting presence of temporal blessings, like all of those crazy temporal blessings that we enjoy, food on the table, MP3s on our iPods, cell signals, our idea of persecution and affliction is being laughed at or having to wait and align more than three deep at Starbucks.

That's not in my notes. It should be easier for us to apply these principles in the society where we don't face the fear of real persecution for doing so. But here we are. We find ourselves then in this passage. It's a beautiful and encouraging paragraph with rich promises for the believer, but it also has plenty of warnings, and I don't want us to miss those. It seems as though there are four keys, and I want to key in on four keys to the good life, according to Peter, in this paragraph, and they will serve as our outline. The first key is a good attitude. The second key is a good response. The third key is a good commitment, and fourth, a good motive.

This is a life for tremendous blessing. It's possible to thrive in this world, but to do so, we have to be living for the next one. Let's look at Peter's keys then, the good life. First is a good attitude, and we find this at the back end of verse 8, where he says, Finally, all of you have unity of mind, sympathy, brotherly love, a tender heart, and a humble mind. Finally, can also be translated to sum up, finally actually is telos, I love it. It's like my new favorite word. So Aristotle believed that human conduct was teleological. There was an end to it and it was our happiness. And this is finally, that is to get to the end of this instruction, Peter is saying, have this unity of mind, sympathy, brotherly love, a tender heart, a humble mind.

So he's not talking about the end of the letter, what he's saying at the end of this section. That's what the finally means here. We could consider it with particular focus on submission, all these things that I've said, this section. But a larger heading might be related to the believer's relational conduct. Whether it is in the form of submission to authorities, or in the home, or other principles from this paragraph, Peter is aware that his reader's conduct and interaction are important for their testimony. But here he wraps up this particular teaching. What follows then are five attitudes. These are Christian virtues by which Peter would like his readers to be characterized.

He lists, they're actually adjectives describing words that have a very instructional sense to them. The ESV renders them as nouns and having these things is understood. They're both good translations in the end, the NAS with the adjectives like the Greek es or the ESV, because the idea is clear. Be marked by these things, have these things. And let's look at them one by one. Interesting that intentional or otherwise, there's actually a key asset structure to these five attributes. The first and last deal with the mind, and then the unity of mind and a humble mind. The second and fourth deal with feeling. And then right squarely in the middle is what is central to this all, namely brotherly love.

Peter says have unity of mind. Well, true of this attribute and all the others is that they are completely appropriate for believers. Sure, and impossible for unbelievers. True unity can characterize believers because we're indwelt by the same spirit. The same person of God, the Father, the Son, the Spirit, the Third Person, the Trinity, actually resides within each believer. He cannot be at odds with himself. So when we are being controlled by the Spirit, of course we're going to live harmoniously. We're going to have a unity that the world can neither understand, really nor appreciate. It's a unity the only true believers can enjoy.

Second, he points to sympathy. This is exactly like it is in English. Feeling the same thing as someone else. That is to be compassionate. And this is what Christ does for us. Hebrews teaches us that as much, that he can sympathize with our weaknesses. And it ought to be what we do for one another. When we feel one another's hurts. we are better equipped to minister and to be a blessing to one another. So in the greater context of being a blessing to others, feeling for them helps us to do that. Brotherly love is sinful in these five, literally and figuratively, because the other four attitudes simply can't exist without love.

This is a particular love that believers share as they are united in the spirit. Unbelievers can't take part in this love. Peter was most certainly present when Jesus told his disciples in John 13, 35, by this All people will know that you are my disciples if you have love for one another. That brotherly love characterizes Christians and is a hallmark of believers. Fourth he calls these readers to have a tender heart. That deals with a deep-seated kindness actually from bowels like the splognan, right? Way down here, deep in the core of your being. I suppose the contrast of this might help if you think of a surface level, superficial, plastic niceness on the outside sort of compassion.

A simple good deed to impress other's stance in contrast with a kindness that actually comes from deep within you. And it's also worth noting that a superficial kindness demands to be seen, but deep-seated, tender heartedness and compassion doesn't need to be seen by others. It actually flows from who we are. And fifth and finally, a humble mind. That is the most basic of Christian attitudes really because while love may drive all these other attributes, a humble mind makes them possible. There's no place for self-promotion. There's no place for self-glorification in the Christian life. Neither is there salvation without any humility.

The proud person doesn't recognize any need for a Savior. So Peter has shown then what sort of attitude accompanies the good life. This is a good attitude that accompanies the good life. So how does this play out in our response to evildoers? Helpful again thinking about the context of this letter. Let's look at our second key to the good life, namely a good response. We find this in verse 9. A good response, do not repay evil for evil or reviling for reviling. But on the contrary, bless, for to this you were called, that you may obtain a blessing." Peter is, he's not just expecting it. He knows that they are being paid evil and reviling and they have opportunity to repay something different.

He's suggesting that those who seek revenge on other people will never actually find the satisfaction that they're looking for. Think for a moment of why you might want to get back at someone. If you have any siblings, you don't have to use your imagination. We say things, we'll say things high and mighty like, I just want to see justice served. Because or, it's just not right. Well getting beyond that, we know that that's not the case because we're not actually that hungry for justice. I mean if we were, then the cross would be offensive to us as well. As the wrath of God was poured out on Christ for sins that we committed, the demands of God's justice we're met at the cross make no mistake but at the expense of Christ while we benefit. So justice for justice sake is hardly what motivates us.

Rather we actually want to feel better and it makes us feel better to put somebody in his place when other people get what they deserve. But then what? Does that bring back the thing that was taken or destroyed? Does that bring satisfaction? Well no. The key to the good life is not to actually return evil for evil but it is to return good for evil. Again, something evidently not of the mind of men. Do not return evil for evil or reviling for reviling because it won't bring the satisfaction you're hoping for. Think about how freeing it would be to be able to return good for evil every time. How would that like change your family dynamic? There are also, think about politics, this season of political turmoil and mudslinging.

There are also practical benefits to this kind of patience. So Proverbs 51, a gentle answer turns away wrath. When you respond righteously to an unkind gesture or a word, you heap coals on the head of your enemy. Well, Peter strengthens this case as he suggests that this is part and parcel to the Christian life. To this you were called. This, here that he's talking about, is a life and a pattern of blessing our enemies. The calling is the call of salvation. The call of a believer is to be afflicted, potentially, and to respond by blessing his enemies. But the linchpin is the last phrase of verse 9, that you may obtain a blessing.

That's huge because the implication is if we don't do that, then we won't be blessed ourselves. I'll return to that in just a moment. But as you've already said, the good life is full of blessing from God as we bless others. And if we would obtain a blessing, we must bless others. I do want to take a moment to emphasize that phrase because it's critical to Peter's argument. Even in the face of persecution, our marching orders are clear. Bless, for to this you recalled, that you may obtain a blessing. It is the design of God that he would bless us as an outcome of our being a blessing to others. God blessing us is the end.

Our blessing of others is the means to that end. Now, I get that he's talking about enemies. And I am taking this and applying from the greater to the lesser, because if Peter expects for us to be a blessing to our enemies, how much more so ought we to be a blessing to our brothers and sisters? If we are to be eager to be a blessing to our persecutors, How much more ought we to strive to bless other believers or those around our dinner tables? But how can we know then that these concepts are tied together? Namely, bless and you'll be blessed is tied to any of the rest of it. Well look at our next key to the good life in verses 10 through 11.

Third, a good commitment. A good commitment. Four. That is pointing back to what we just said. In fact, let me read verses 10 and 11 together with verse 9. Do not repay evil for evil or reviling for reviling, but on the contrary, bless. For to this you were called, that you may obtain a blessing. 4. Whoever desires to love life and see good days, let him keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking deceit. Let him turn away from evil and do good. Let him seek peace and pursue it." It looks a lot like Peter is using this passage to clarify what he is saying in verse 9. Whether that's the intent or not, that is what happens.

This clarifies how we are to then bless and be blessed. To drive home his point, what Peter is saying, he uses scripture. This section may look like indented poetry in your translations. That's because it's from Psalm 32. He's quoting here from David, Psalm 34, verses 12 through 16 in the same way that you or I might use scripture to drive home a point where we're having a casual conversation. He's defending his position by using the word of God. says, let him keep his tongue from evil and his lips from speaking to see. Well that's an interesting passage for him to quote. One that speaks of the importance of taming the tongue.

Well elsewhere in the New Testament, James echoes a similar sentiment that a man who can tame his tongue is capable of taming the rest of his body as well. From the mouth comes the outflow of our hearts. our mouth out of man's heart he speaks says Christ but if you can tame that little rudder you can tame the whole ship. The only way then to keep our tongues from evil and our lips from speaking deceit is to actually purify our hearts and minds. Take away the defilement on the inside and it won't come out in our speech. That's the recipe for the good life. The one with pure speech will have a pure heart, righteous conduct, a good testimony, and the blessing of God.

I'll say that again. The one with pure speech will have a pure heart, righteous conduct, a good testimony, and the blessing of God. So in other words, he goes right to the tongue because you actually can't tame it naturally. Well, that is the opposite of the world's recommendations for a good life. There's no suggestion here to make lots of money, eat lots of red meat, have lots of parties, go bowling as much as possible. Where's Ryan? Jim, yeah. Rather, this is a promise for any who would wish to love life and see good days. Peter goes further in verse 11. Let him turn away from evil and do good. Let him seek peace and pursue it.

Well, most of us are really glad when peace comes our way, but we're not active about pursuing it. Well, the grammar here is emphatic. The pursuit of peace is no casual affair. We are to seek after it in the same way as you would seek for anything else of value that might be elusive, hard to find, hard to capture. Love or treasure, if it's valuable, you'll pursue it. In quoting the Psalmist David, Peter is urging his readers to seek peace. Go after it. Don't wait for it to come to you. And the call to do good hearkens back all the way to verse 15. I read you verses 10 and 11. We, yeah, let's see, it was back here.

I read you 11 and 12, but a few verses later, he says in verse 15, for this is the will of God that by doing good you should put to silence the ignorance of foolish people. When believers do good as they are supposed to do, it quickly silences our adversaries. But that's not the only reason we are to do good. Peter suggests that a key to the good life is also to have the right incentive. We find that here in verse 12, and that's our fourth key here. Our fourth point is what we're calling a good motive. For the eyes, verse 12, of the Lord are on the righteous, and his ears are open to their prayer. But the face of the Lord is against those who do evil.

It seems to me like an understatement here, but one that needs to be said. Namely, God likes it when people are godly. His face looks on with favor to the one who does righteousness and who can do righteousness. Only those who have been filled with the Spirit who are His. You may know the term anthropomorphism. It's attributing man-like characteristics to someone that's not a man, like God in this case. This is anthropomorphic language and it's crystal clear. Though God does not actually have eyes, David states and Peter reiterates that God is attentive to the prayers of those who obey His law. This is true for at least two reasons.

Well, their prayers are not impeded by sin and they pray according to the will of the Father. His ears are open to their prayer. He doesn't have eyes to see, but they are on the righteous. He looks with favor on the righteous. We can understand it very, very well. Conversely, his face is set against those who do evil. We would not wish to be counted in this number. That's a sobering warning for Peter's audience who are here living the good life. They're called to live the good life, and that's antithetical to a life outside of God's favor. Living the good life is synonymous with living righteously and living under the loving gaze of our Heavenly Father.

This is blessing and this looks to the future. It is also something the Socrates and Plato and Aristotle could not have understood. Living Koram Deo, knowing his favor. Now, those Greek philosophers thought that the Greek pantheon was ridiculous. And they were right. But one thing that characterized the societies in which they lived, the polytheistic societies, was an ongoing hope that the gods were not angry with you, but without any sort of certainty that that were the case. There is no concept of true satisfaction before the gods. Because if you were to satisfy one, you would just enrage another. And when you satisfied one, his satisfaction was never final.

It was temporary until such time as he wanted more. So the notion of being able to, again, the eyes of the Lord are on the righteous and and his ears are open to their prayer, but the face of the Lord is against those who do evil." It's unconscionable to the natural mind and to the polytheistic mind of this first century audience. The good life, as the Bible is concerned, is not eating and drinking and making Mary continually. It's not about fame, money, relaxation, parties, or worldly success, but it lives about God's favor on those who look to bless others just as Christ has done. Christ was born in the fullness of time. The time was right for Him to come when He did and the closer you drill down and look the more evident that is, the stronger the case to be made that the time was right, the language was right, the place was right for the gospel to come, for Christ to come, for God to come in the flesh and to live and die for men.

The gospel dawned on a culture that was saturated though with the influence of the Greek philosophers. It was brimming with the worship of ridiculous gods and it was dominated by dissatisfaction. The right reader of Aristotle would have had to have said, is that it? That's all you've got. The thoughtful respondent would say, finding the mean between this and this, like, that's it? Does that ever change? Maybe having enough bread and water to have my temporal needs met, and then, hopefully, not to live and worry. Is that supposed to get me through the hard times of life? Is that supposed to convince my enemies not to pursue their own greatest happiness at my expense?

Right? So because you've got to think about that. When there's no object of source of morality to go back to, when men are pursuing what makes them happiest, a lot of times, we've seen this, they will do that at one another's expense. And a slap on the wrist is the recourse. Let's invent laws with no moral backing behind them. Well, how far is that going to last? Why do this?

Come on, Aristotle, who says that your virtues or all your categories will even work? Then the light of the gospel dawns with a law that is written authoritatively and consistently, affirming the law that is written on our hearts since they're both written by God. And Peter, speaking for God, offers a recipe for the good life that does not depend on circumstances, it does not depend on the performance of others. Peter's readers, many of them, would be familiar with Aristotle and the other Greeks, could say, yes.

Aha, that makes sense. Step aside, Aristotle. This will hold up amid trials, this satisfies, and it's backed by the promises of God. So when the best that Aristotle could do to convince a bad guy not to be a bad guy is, That's not going to make you happy. He might rightly say, watch me. But when we actually have God's authority, when we have his word, when we have a standard that is unchanging, well, we ought not to be surprised when it does resonate deeply within our hearts, but it also makes sense. God used the philosophers to show how close to the truth men can actually get using their own natural wisdom. And for some really smart guys like Aristotle, it's fairly close, but it's not nearly close enough to save.

There is no dependence on the righteousness of another to satisfy a holy God in the teachings of Aristotle. The best we have is pursuing a virtue because I promise that'll make you happy, I think. So it really ought to have whetted the appetites of the Roman culture for the feast of the gospel. The gospel ought to have been like a fountain of living water for their otherwise parched souls that have been licking sand from this Greek philosophy. And guess what? Here we are almost two thousand years later and it still is immensely satisfying.

The Gospel is the bedrock of our world view and it cannot be shaken by unbelief or by worldly wisdom or the philosophy of men. It offers hope and it offers direction when trials come and when we are prone to doubt. I returned then to my thesis, my point earlier, the good life is the blessing of God and it comes to those who bring the greatest blessing to others. So little ones, there is application here. You seek to be a blessing to others even when nobody is looking and God's favor will find you. For old ones, the promise is identical. When He's not looking and you have the deep-seated bowels of compassion, when you have that deep-seated tenderheartedness, a love for others that comes from Him, you can know, you can know, you can know that God is effecting your blessing.

He is bringing about your blessing as you bless others. I hope you're as impressed as I am with how counterintuitive that is to the natural mind. It defies the very best human reason as is exhibited in Aristotle, for instance. But this too is an evidence that it comes from the mind of God. The philosophers could have had the good life by surrendering their lives to Christ and by living for others. And the good news is that we have the good news. And it ought to make us tremendously grateful to have been born now. To be in a time where we actually have this recorded, to live this side of the cross, and to see these things by faith.

Let's pray for God to apply this to our hearts. Father, we are grateful that you have given your word, and we are grateful how clear it is. We're grateful for the work of your spirit to illuminate and to help it to make sense to us. We are stricken with how this does not resonate with how men think. So it must be from you over and over and over again. Men scratch and claw to trying to avail themselves of some power higher than themselves and to try and pacify the gods who hate your image in them and how satisfying we are, how satisfying we find the gospel. We thank you for Peter's direction here and that as we look to be a blessing to others, yes, we will stand out in this world.

That is the idea. Others will look at us and see that there is something different. They will even and then be caused to ask for a reason, for the hope that's in us, and we ought to be ready for that. But in the process, in the process, we can actually attain, by your grace and by your spirit, what the philosophers tried to and never could. That is the good life. So help us to lead a good life now by your spirit and then also to appropriately long for the one that is to come. We depend upon you for all these things and we make these requests in the name of Christ. Amen.

We regularly make agreements. Part of the human reality is that we can’t do everything by ourselves and neither do we need to. We are made in the image of a relational God who made us for relationship, and in these relationships we often make contracts to serve or provide for one another.

If the contract involves significant stakes, we sign documents binding each party to terms. Most of the time, we simply agree verbally. Our comfort in the contract depends on the character of the other party. It’s one reason we read seller ratings on Amazon and do background checks. The more dependable we deem the other person to be, the more dependent we allow ourselves to be.

In Genesis 15 God makes a covenant with Abram and it could not be more bona fide. God obligates Himself to fulfill the terms, Abram has only to believe. His belief is justified because God is faithful. There are good grounds to believe because God is the sovereign Future-Maker.

Abram’s belief is justified in another sense as well. Not only does it make sense—there is every reason for Abram to be confident in the other party—Abram’s believing is “counted to him as righteousness” by God. God justified Abram based on his faith. This is because God wants, most of all, for us to depend on Him. Our trust in Him honors Him and straightens the path for His glory to be displayed when He does what He said He would.

Abram trusted the One who is faithful to make the future He promises. Abram’s faith is reasonable considering the One making the covenant, though unreasonable from the this-worldly context of the covenant. The promises are too amazing and too unlikely except for the power of God “who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist” (Romans 4:17).

Abram moved from Ur to Canaan in chapter 12, then left Canaan for Egypt when the famine hit. Abram and Lot separated in chapter 13 because their prosperity was too much for their property. Then Abram rescued Lot in chapter 14 by defeating the eastern overlords.

Chapter 15 contains two main concerns: offspring in verses 1-6 and land in verses 7-21. Each section includes a promise from the LORD, a question from Abram, and a reassurance from the LORD. The LORD unconditionally obligates Himself in covenant and Abram has shows faith in the Future-Maker.

After these things the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: "Fear not, Abram, I am your shield; your reward shall be very great." (15:1)

After these things refers to the rout in chapter 14.

The word of the LORD came…in a vision suggests nighttime (see verse 5), and the vision ends as Abram makes preparations for a ceremony during the next day, followed by another evening when “the sun was going down” (verse 12).

Fear not seems an odd way to start. Perhaps it was intended to relieve Abram of potential fears of Chedolaomer's return. He may also have started receiving suspicious or even hateful glances from the people. No victory under the sun is without (subsequent) problems. It may also relieve Abram of being addressed by God Himself, though God had spoken to him previously.

Here is the foundation for no fear: God Himself. I am is an important identifier.

The LORD is shield (connected with “God Most High who has delivered” in 14:20) and the LORD is reward or “inheritance.” He protects and He gives good, more than can be taken for ourselves. Abram refused to take the spoil of his victory, but he will get better. Abram's safety and satisfaction were in the LORD.

God is great, we still have questions. So did Abram.

But Abram said, "O Lord GOD, what will you give me, for I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus?" And Abram said, "Behold, you have given me no offspring, and a member of my household will be my heir." (15:2-3)

These are the first words from Abram to God written in Genesis. Previously it was only God speaking to him (Genesis 12:1ff; 13:14ff).

This could appear to be a "yeah, but" response from Abram, even a bit unthankful. Nevertheless, God receives our cares. In this case, the LORD's promises to Abram depended on offspring, so there is some specificity in the question. Abram could not get this one thing out of his mind and, from his perspective, he was unable to own the benefits of the more general promise. His address, O Lord GOD, Adonai Yahweh or “Sovereign LORD” (used again in verse 8) shows respect.

The reality of Sarai’s barrenness and a promise of a multitude of descendants have been reported three times before now. How can those facts fit? From Abram’s perspective his heir would have to come some other way. Eliezer of Damascus was likely a servant, someone close (since Abram had other servants) enough to adopt, as it were, to become heir.

The question in verse 2 becomes more like an accusation in verse 3, repeating himself with more vigor.

The LORD does not condemn Abram's questions. Presumably this means Abram's attitude was right when asking.

And behold, the word of the Lord came to him: "This man shall not be your heir; your very own son shall be your heir." (15:4)

Abram will have his very own son but the LORD still provides no timetable. Abram still must wait. In fact, Abram will wait over two decades and we will wait six more chapters to learn about it.

And he brought him outside and said, "Look toward heaven, and number the stars, if you are able to number them." Then he said to him, "So shall your offspring be." (15:5)

Consideration of the stars not only brings to mind a numerical thought, but a creative thought; the same power that created the stars promises to make Abram's offspring. He wasn’t looking for constellation patterns he was just supposed to count. It would have caused him to ask himself:

He who by his word alone suddenly produced a host so numerous, by which he might adorn the previously vast and desolate heaven; shall not He be able to replenish my desolate house with offspring? (Calvin, 403-404)

And he believed the LORD, and he counted it to him as righteousness. (15:6)

Abram believed. He trusted in the LORD. He heard the word of the LORD, accepted it as true and obeyed because he believed.

He, the Lord, counted or calculated. When sins and blood are “counted” it means that a man is guilty. Here Righteousness is “counted” meaning that Abram was innocent. He was received into the group of just persons.

This verse is quoted four times in the New Testament (Romans 4:3, 22; Galatians 3:6; James 2:23).

Two things are needed for a nation: people and a place.

And he said to him, "I am the Lord who brought you out from Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to possess." (15:7)

Here is the second I am promise in the scene. The formula "connotes unimpeachable authority of the declaration that follows" (Waltke, 242). "This kind of identification formula legitimizes the credentials of the one introducing himself, and speaks particularly to the availability and resources of the vision speaker to the vision receive" (Hamilton, 429). Here, the Lord reminds Abram of His past work as a basis for trust going forward.

But he said, "O Lord God, how am I to know that I shall possess it?" (15:8)

As Abram asked about offspring so he asks about the land.

He said to him, "Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtledove, and a young pigeon." And he brought him all these, cut them in half, and laid each half over against the other. But he did not cut the birds in half. And when birds of prey came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away. (15:9-11)

Usually the explanation for this ritual connects to contract ceremonies of the time. The two sides would half the larger animals and then walk together between the halves. The liturgy communicated, “May the same (death) happen to me if I do not fulfill my agreement.” This may sound too good to be true. Nevertheless Abram prepares animals for this covenant according to God’s direction.

As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram. And behold, dreadful and great darkness fell upon him. Then the Lord said to Abram, "Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years. But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions. As for yourself, you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried in a good old age. And they shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete." (15:12-16)

Sojourners…afflicted for four hundred years (Exodus 12:40-41), which actually ends up being 430 until the Jews exit Egypt.

you shall go to your fathers in peace; you shall be buried in a good old age means that Abram himself will die after a full life.

the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete explains that Israel's "conquest and settlement of Canaan is based on God's absolute justice, not on naked aggression" (Waltke, 244). God was patient with them and gave them four centuries to repent, which they did not.

When the sun had gone down and it was dark, behold, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces. On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, "To your offspring I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadmonites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites and the Jebusites." (15:17-21)

When the sun had gone down brings us to the second night.

a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch were symbols of the LORD's presence.

The land of Canaan, occupied by various -ites, has never been in Israel's possession and even when the boundaries were close to this, it was only held “as an empire rather than a homeland” (Kidner) during David and Solomon’s reign. Many commentators assume that the size is more ideal than concrete, even hyperbole. But what if it means that the promise is still to be fulfilled?

There are no requirements put on Abram in this chapter. Every obligation is taken by God, "and that is the obligation to implement His promise of descendants, and especially of land, to Abram and to his descendants." (Hamilton, 438).

The LORD's covenant (verse 18) is:

Abram is the prototype, the model of faith in the Future-Maker. His imagination was shaped and expanded by God’s Word. Those who read this story know that his belief was justified because God did give offspring (Isaac) and did bring a multitude back from sojourning in Egypt (Exodus).

We are the people who believe. Abram is "the father of all who believe" (Romans 4:11). He is our father in one sense. We are believers. That's how we're known. That's our people. We receive the word of the LORD and count on it. The righteous shall live by faith.

A few things turned my attention to a passage outside of Genesis and caused me to want to speak to you a little different than usual this morning.

It started at Together for the Gospel during John MacArthur’s message. He gave an overview of the letters to the seven churches in Revelation 2-3. His primary point, built on the key word in those two chapters, was about repentance. Jesus commanded five of the seven to repent from various sinful compromises. Then MacArthur asked, “Have you ever heard of a church repenting?” It was the mic drop moment in the sermon. Some of the other speakers echoed the point over the remaining sessions. It clearly hit a nerve and, conveniently, it was short enough to tweet.

The question, “Have you ever heard of a church repenting?” applies to local churches, not to the Universal Body of Christ. The churches addressed in Revelation were local churches, and MacArthur pitched the question to a room with many pastors representing many flocks. And all I could think of in the moments after the holy hush fell on the group was, “Yes. I have heard of a church repenting.”

That’s you, of course. I say “you” rather than “us,” at least for the moment, because I’m speaking in my role as one of the shepherds, though, I am also one of the sheep. In my role as a shepherd I want to commend you. Beloved, well done in your repentance. As a flock, you receive the Word as from the Lord, you look into it as into a mirror, you confess your sin and embrace Christ’s forgiving and cleansing work. You do this each Lord’s day morning as part of our service, but you are not merely going through the liturgical motions.

I’m aware that not every member of the body is humbled as he ought to be. Some sheep in the flock have gotten their heads stuck in the fence trying to get at the goat food and need to turn back. As a flock we have not arrived. But in many ways we, considered as an assembly, are not the same, and much of that can be traced to repentance. Together we have repented of bitterness, anger, lust, doctrinal pride, division, dualism, and more. I thank God for you. Thanks be to God for such a gift. I commend you for turning from sin to serve the living and true God.

God calls men everywhere to repent. Sinners should repent. Families, led by their father, may need to repent. We’ve already talked about churches repenting. And nations, too, must repent.

It’s easy, at least in one way, for Christians to call The Nation to repent. It’s easy if we approach it as “Us” and “Them.” The “Thems” over there should confess their sin; we can see it so clearly on cable news. It may be easier to see because it’s public, recorded and replayed and retweeted. It may also be easier because it takes the attention off of our sins.

This problem—and it is a problem—led MacArthur to say the following when he repreached a version of his Revelation message back at Grace Community Church.

Why should Christians be calling for our nation to repent when even the church won’t repent?

If Christians do not repent when they sin, their message of repentance may be correct in content and also laughable. What self-righteous hypocrites. If a local church is filled with non-repentant, proud people, then it does not matter how eloquent or brimstone colored the preacher’s tongue is.

But what if Christians do humble themselves before God? What if they do not lie or hide or rationalize or ignore their sin, no matter the size? What if spouses repented, and father repented before their children, friends and fellow church members repented to one another? What then?

This makes your commendation not only an end, but a means to an additional end. Your repentance positions you to be a true blessing to your unbelieving neighbors, near and national. You know the diagnosis (sin) and the treatment (repentance and faith in Christ) and can testify to the healing (in conscience and in relationships). You are an example of “godly grief [that] produces a repentance that leads to sanctification without regret,” and your exhortations are not empty. You can call for repentance from a position of repentance.

Beloved, repentance is the need of the day. It has always been, but it is very inescapable now. Unrighteousness used to be more ashamed of herself, at least in public, now she flaunts herself and tries to take the moral high ground. Our typically conservative political party has squandered its inheritance and has nothing much to conserve. It’s one thing when a liberal candidate wins the presidency by a slight majority, or when the Supreme Court (illegally) rules 5-4 against a creational reality like marriage. But a “conservative” is not a person who glories in telling you that he’s a liar. Are we really going to have to choose between Hillary and Donald? This is almost enough to cause discouragement.

But we don’t need to be sorrowful without rejoicing, or surprised at unrighteousness apparently winning the day, or even surprised when unrighteousness mocks or reviles or fines or imprisons or kills the righteous. Fiery trials, the kind that burn, are not strange (1 Peter 4:12). “If you are insulted for the name of Christ,” called a hater, intolerant, “you are blessed because the Spirit of glory and of God rests upon you” (1 Peter 4:14). We are in the right place when the world treats us harshly.

John Bunyan, who knew some about suffering, wrote:

Carnal men cannot endure to hear [about God's righteousness]; because it quite excludes them, as such, from a share in the kingdom of heaven. To this, again, the Christian stands and backs what he says by the Word of God. The game begins, and the men of the world are thoughtful how they may remove such troublesome fellows out of the way. But because the Christians love their neighbors, and will not let them thus easily die in their sins, therefore they contend with them, both by reasonings, writings, sermons, and books of gospel divinity; and stand to what they say. The world, again, are very angry with these sayings...for that by them they are concluded to be persons that are without repentance, and the hope of eternal life. Here again, the carnal world judges that these people are proud, self-willed, pragmatical, contentious, self-conceited, and so unsufferable people. (Seasonable Counsel, or, Advice to Sufferers, 712)

We also need not be surprised at cultural difficulty because God disciplines those He loves through the unbelieving culture. Writing to believers throughout the Roman Empire, Peter said:

For it is time for judgment to being at the household of God. (1 Peter 4:17a)

In context this is a threat but also an encouragement. It clearly threatens since the verse continues:

and if it begins with us, what will the outcome be for those who do not obey the gospel of God? And

If the righteous is scarcely saved, what will become of the ungodly and the sinner? (1 Peter 4:17b-18)

God hates sin. He takes sin seriously. He judges sin. And He starts with the church, the household of God.

Related to this, you may have noticed a liturgical change last Sunday and earlier in today’s service. For as long as we’ve made a corporate prayer of confession I have confessed our sin as part of this nation and then as part of the Church/church, not always limited to our local body. I followed that order to move from furthest out to closer in. We may not be, indeed hopefully are not, sinning in as egregious ways as our unbelieving neighbors. We are connected to their sin, but not always sinning like them. I decided that I would change the order in light of 1 Peter 4. It’s a better (though not binding) statement. We confess our sins first, then acknowledge that we are part of groups of sinners. This, by the way, is a good practice for husbands and fathers. Start by repenting from your sins; take the log out of your eye first.

But back to Peter’s argument, the threat is for those who will not repent. That’s part of obeying the gospel, repenting and believing. It is not much different from chapter 5, “God opposes the proud but gives grace to the humble.”

But it is a comfort to the humble, an encouragement to the repentant. When we suffer as Christians in a culture/state/nation opposed to the will of God, when they are, as 1 Peter 4:4 describes, “surprised when we do not join them in the same flood of debauchery, and they malign” and charge us with hate speech, what should we do?

This is our calling:

I want to argue that repenting from our sin is the key to transformation in individuals, families, churches, and even nations. Those who repent are those who are humble and those whom God will exalt at the proper time. Cultural reformation may not happen even if we continue to repent, but it cannot happen if we won’t.

Those who repent are those who realize they deserve judgment and those who rejoice that Christ took judgment and those prepared to follow Christ’s example of suffering. Those who repent are those who submit to God’s will relating to sin and those ready to submit to God’s will related to suffering and those ready to do good anyway.

This is why your commendation is so crucial to any hope for those around us. You are light, hated for your hunger and thirst for righteousness, and God says, “Have no fear of them, nor be troubled” (1 Peter 3:14). Be zealous for what is good (3:13). Let all the good you do be revile-able (3:16). Entrust your soul to a faithful Creator while doing good.

This is the only time in the New Testament that this title, faithful Creator, is used for God, even though His work of creation is frequently mentioned. It stresses that He is capable of our care. The power that created the universe is at His disposal in our sufferings, and to help us do good.

When we talk about cultivating a Trinitarian community of worshipping, maturing disciples who acknowledge Jesus Christ as Lord over all the world, we are talking about the fruit of repentance. When we look at the state of the Church in the West, and as we watch absolutely non-sensical things happen in our government, it may seem disheartening. When we remember that we are sojourners and exiles (1 Peter 1:1; 2:11), that this world is not our home, and wonder how that relates to life now. It fits in Christ and we get to Christ by repentance from sin and faith in the gospel.

What good will we do? When we talk about engaging or changing the culture, we are talking about challenging their gods. The cultural battle is a battle of cultus, of worship, and repentance before the god. They want us to repent, too, before their gods. Every people have a god, and every god demands repentance. We are not calling them to something they don’t understand how to do, but their gods have deceived them. We have a better God. He calls us to repent and turn from death to life.

Church, you are here. You are doing well. You are to be commended for naming your sins and turning away from them. Excel still more. Repentance is what our culture needs, and we must go first.

The end of all things is at hand; therefore be self-controlled and sober-minded for the sake of your prayers. Above all, keep loving one another earnestly, since love covers a multitude of sins. Show hospitality to one another without grumbling. As each has received a gift, use it to serve one another, as good stewards of God’s varied grace: whoever speaks, as one who speaks oracles of God; whoever serves, as one who serves by the strength that God supplies—in order that in everything God may be glorified through Jesus Christ. To him belong glory and dominion forever and ever. Amen. (1 Peter 4:7–11)

Abram routed four Mesopotamian overlords who themselves had routed a five king coalition by stepping on their neck of the woods. With only 318 trained men from his house and three more allies, Abram showed himself to be a real force in Canaan.

But when we tell the story of Abram to our children, we do not tell them about Abram as a man of force. He does not headline any so-called Hall of Force chapter in the New Testament. God did not justify Abram according to his good warfare. Abram’s victory positioned him to rule the land of Canaan by might or by threat. But he returned from battle and returned all the possessions and refused to take anything more. He would not grab at what God promised to give. That’s why we tell our kids about Abram, the man of faith.

As we saw in verses 1-16, five city-kings in the Jordan Valley decided that 12 years were enough of coughing up tribute taxes to four eastern tyrants. They stopped payments and about a year later the overlords got their armies together and left a trail of destruction as they routed the entire Dead Sea region on their way to teach the five a lesson. The five kings retreated as quickly as they had gone out to battle, some diving into tar pits and others hightailing it into the hills. The four oppressors had their way. No one could stop them and they took whatever they wanted from whomever they wanted.

For some reason, on their way of out Sodom, they took more than possessions and provisions, they also "took Lot, the son of Abram's brother" (verse 12). They must have taken other persons, too (see verse 21), but now Moses reveals why the war story is so important: it’s personal.

An escapee ran to Abram in Mamre and, without hesitation, Abram mustered up troops, chased down the kidnapping armies more than 150 miles to the north, and defeated them in one night. Nothing was lost; all the stolen goods and captured people were rescued.

Doesn't it seem like something is still missing from the story? For all the details, the repeated names of people and places, the thorough rout, to give us only a quick in-and-out rescue account seems unsatisfactory. That's because the international conflict, Lot's predicament, and Abram's victory were not the point.

The battle done is only half begun. Now Abram has another temptation. Will he take the land by force or receive it by faith from God’s hands in time?

The conquering hero makes his way back home. As Abram travels south he is welcomed by two kings.

After his return from the defeat of Chedorlaomer and the kings who were with him, the king of Sodom went out to meet him at the Valley of Shaveh (that is, the King's Valley). (Genesis 14:17)

The last time we saw the king of Sodom he was the chicken running to keep his head on (verse 10). He escaped to live another day—though this could be a replacement king—and after hearing about Abram's rout and that Abram was returning, the king of Sodom went out to meet him, the one who accomplished what he (and his four co-belligerents) could not.

They met in the King's Valley, a location likely north of the Dead Sea around Jericho and Salem as Abram headed home to Mamre.

We meet a brand new character in the story.

And Melchizedek king of Salem brought out bread and wine. (He was priest of God Most High.) (Genesis 14:18)

Melchizedek comes out of nowhere; no background information is provided about him at all, yet both the king of Sodom and Abram appear to recognize his prominence. The king of Sodom, mentioned first in the welcome, defers to Melchizedek, and Abram will give Melchizedek an offering.

The name Melchizedek means "king of righteousness" (confirmed in Hebrews 7:2) and he wore two hats: he was a king and a priest. He was king of Salem which seems to be a shortened version of Jerusalem (Psalm 76:2 uses the shortened version, Salem, in reference to Zion.) We're not told how Melchizedek avoided paying tribute or attack. Perhaps he was good at minding his own business, but then why does he get involved now?

Melchizedek was also priest of God Most High. A priest was one who ministered on behalf of a God, performing religious services, offering sacrifices and leading worship. Melchizedek is the first priest mentioned in the Bible. He wasn't a Jewish priest because the Jewish priesthood was through Aaron and Levi, both of whom were descendants of Abram. There are arguments that God Most High (El Elyon) is a Canaanite deity/idol, but that doesn't fit the narrative, especially since Abram clarifies Yahweh as El Elyon in verse 22.

Where did Melchizedek come from? Who were his parents? How did he become a priest? We do not know.

What we do know is that he not only went out to meet Abram, he also brought out bread and wine. There are three reasons that I think this is saying more than that Melchizedek brought snacks to hungry troops. First, bread and wine is very specific rather than a generic term such as "provisions." Second, the enemy took all the "provisions" or food (verse 11) in their rout and, if Abram was capable of defeating them, then he was certainly capable of remembering that his trained men needed food. And in fact, according to verse 24, the young men had already eaten. Third, the parenthetical addition, He was priest, follows the fact that he brought bread and wine rather than following the fact that he was king. The parenthesis, then, may explain why he brought bread and wine. The point is: this was a toast, a praise party, a royal banquet. The tone of worshipful celebration is corroborated by the blessing.

And he blessed him and said,

"Blessed be Abram by God Most High,Possessor of heaven and earth;and blessed be God Most High,who has delivered your enemies into your hand!"(Genesis 14:19-20)

"Blessing is a solemn act of prayer with which one who is endowed with some outstanding public honour commends to God private individuals who are under his care" (Calvin).

Twice more we see El Elyon, God Most High. Melchizedek prays God's favor upon Abram and praises God as the deliverer of Abram. God is also identified as Possessor of heaven and earth. He is the King, the authority over all. He is exalted as the One who sustains the universe and saves His people from enemies.

There are two significant responses that Abram makes to Melchizedek. First, he receives the blessing. That stands out because according to God's promise, blessing would be meditated by Abram to others, not by others to Abram. Usually, the superior gives blessing to the inferior; for example, fathers to sons, not the other way around. Somehow Abram recognized Melchizedek as his superior.

Secondly,

And Abram gave him a tenth of everything.

The ESV clarifies that Abram gave Melchizedek the tenth of everything, but as the NAS translates, he gave him a tenth.

Abram gives Melchizedek a tenth; the first time tithe is references in the Bible. Why? Later in the Old Testament there were laws that combatants were to share their spoil with non-combatants, with those who stayed home (see Numbers 31:27). But Melchizedek wasn't connected to this conflict in any way that we know about. Besides, Abram gave a tenth rather than half. This is something different. It is Abram's worship to El Elyon through the priest. Giving the first-fruits is a way of honoring the LORD.

It is totally odd behavior from God's chosen man toward this basically unknown priest-king. Melchizedek must be someone special. But he leaves the scene almost as quickly as he entered.

This guy came out first but didn't say anything. He might have been better off keeping it that way. Melchizedek's first words were "Blessed be" and this king's first words were "Give me."

And the king of Sodom said to Abram, "Give me the persons, but take the goods for yourself." But Abram said to the king of Sodom, "I have lifted my hand to the Lord, God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth, that I would not take a thread or a sandal strap or anything that is yours, lest you should say, 'I have made Abram rich.' I will take nothing but what the young men have eaten, and the share of the men who went with me. Let Aner, Eshcol, and Mamre take their share." (Genesis 14:21-24)

The king of Sodom doesn't make an unreasonable request, but it is a bit presumptuous and it dishonors Abram and God.

It's presumptuous because Abram has the upper hand; the king of Sodom is empty-handed. Abram routed the four eastern kings, the king of Sodom ran from them. Abram possessed everything that had been taken in the entire region, including the king of Sodom's previous stuff. The king's offer to Abram was like saying, "You can have all the stuff you already have." The king of Sodom should have been thankful for his life. He expresses no gratitude and barely, if any, humility. He doesn't say "Please," instead, he "tries to assert his nonexistent authority" (Waltke) and starts with taking rather than giving.

The king of Sodom was in no position to make demands; the victor had the right to decide how to divide the spoil. Abram went out of his way to acknowledge that the king of Sodom had nothing to do with Abram's prosperity, even though it would have been an irrational claim. I would not take a thread or a sandal strap, in other words, he wouldn't take even the smallest, least valuable things. The phrase was similar to other Near Eastern legal terms.

The Aramaic term (“be it a bad of straw or piece of string”) is used in the division of marriage property after a divorce, while the Akkadian expression (“be it a blade of straw or splinter of wood”) is found in a discussion of the liquidation of partnership holdings. (Hamilton)

Abram refused to win political clout or material prosperity from an unrighteous man.

This makes the men of Sodom more inexcusable. Their lives had been delivered by the Almighty Maker of heaven and earth. Yet by Genesis 18 and 19 they were so wicked that God destroyed them.

Why is this war story, including Abram's interaction with Melchizedek, recorded in Genesis?

First, this story honors God Most High, Possessor of heaven and earth. Abram is the conquering hero, he is welcomed home as the victor, but his defeat of enemies was due to God who delivered them into his hand. Abram and Melchizedek acknowledge the Lord’s work.

Second, this story is told is because it foreshadows another Priest-King who will deliver His people. David acknowledged it in Psalm 110 and the author of Hebrews repeatedly connects Melchizedek to Jesus. It is not that Melchizedek sets the pattern and Jesus follows it. Rather, the record about Melchizedek is so arranged that it brings out certain truths that apply far more fully to Jesus than they do to Melchizedek.

Third, this story makes Abram's unbelief in the following chapters less explicable and God's faithfulness even more gracious. God demonstrates that He can be trusted over and over; He will fulfill His promises and defeat the enemies of His people. Yet His people toggle back and forth between belief and fear, between trusting God and taking things into their own hands. Even heroes fear and fail, yet God never fails.

And a fourth reason this story is told is because, at least for now, Abram will trust God to provide rather than take for himself.

The histories of all times sufficiently declare, that even they who have had just causes of war have, nevertheless, been incited to it by the thirst of private gain. And as men are acute in devising pretexts, they are never at a loss to find plausible reasons for war, even though covetousness may be their only real stimulant. Therefore, unless Abram had resolutely refused the spoils of war, the rumour would immediately have spread, that, under the pretence of rescuing his nephew, he had been intent upon grasping the prey. (Calvin)

God will get His glory by providing for us according to His promises and not by our working or warring ourselves into position.

Here is a one of a kind account in Genesis. The word "king" occurs twenty-eight times in this chapter and, for the first time in the Bible, the word “war” is used. Moses wields the language of ambition, international conflict, invasion, military campaigns, political allies, and spoils.

Here’s the basic plot: five kings from the Dead Sea region revolt against four eastern tyrants (so called "Mesopotamian overlords" in the ESVSB) who suppress the revolt through an imposing rout and plunder everyone's possessions on their way. Lot is also taken and Abram goes to bring him back.

At the end of the chapter we encounter the mystery-man, the priest-king Melchizedek. The entire chapter belongs together, but there is too much in verses 17-24 to be able to cover them well and the events leading to Abram’s interaction with the King of Sodom and the King of Salem.

That’s an overview, but why is this account here at all? It is history about the promised land, especially in terms of the conflict in it and over it. It is insight into Lot’s entanglement with the people of Sodom and the consequences that brings. It’s also about the development of God’s chosen man; Abram appears to be a different man than two chapters ago. But there is a very specific point that this event exhibits, a point built on verses 1-16 and proven in verses 17-24.

The rebel forces say, "Stick it."

In the days of Amraphel king of Shinar, Arioch king of Ellasar, Chedorlaomer king of Elam, and Tidal king of Goiim, these kings made war with Bera king of Sodom, Birsha king of Gomorrah, Shinab king of Admah, Shemeber king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (that is, Zoar). And all these joined forces in the Valley of Siddim (that is, the Salt Sea). Twelve years they had served Chedorlaomer, but in the thirteenth year they rebelled. (Genesis 14:1–4)

This is a war story and Moses records the places and players. The parenthetical identifications with modern names (five verses in the chapter: 2, 3, 7, 8 and also 17) suggest that Moses was updating an existing record.

There are two coalitions.

Four kings of an eastern alliance are listed in alphabetical order, though Chedorlaomer was obviously the top dog (see the summary in verse 4, they had served Chedorlaomer). Speaking of whom, Chedorlaomer comes from Elam, part of modern day Iran, and possibly connected with the Scythians (Wenham). Amraphel came from Shinar, identified in Genesis (10:10, 11:2, 9) with Babylon and part of modern day Iraq. Arioch and Tidal (from Ellasar and Goiim respectively) are probably from the area of modern day Turkey. This is Mesopotamia, later known as the Babylonian Kingdom, and always known as trouble.

According to verse 1 and the first part of verse 2, at some previous point in the past, four kings made war against five kings and made them subjects.

Five (western) small-town kings near Salt Sea (so called because the saline content is 10 times more than the oceans (Waltke), now called the Dead Sea) are listed next in the second part of verse 2. Bera from Sodom, Birsha from Gomorrah, Shinab and Shemeber and the unnamed king of Bela.

ForTwelve years they had served Chedorlaomer, meaning that they served as subjects, they were under his rule. That almost always included a required tribute (a payment made periodically by one ruler to another as a sign of dependence), and probably also whatever else Chedorlaomer demanded.

Twelve years is a long time and a lot of tax money spent, so in the thirteenth year they rebelled, if nothing else, aiming to stick it to the man. These boys got together in the Valley of Siddim for a convention, joined forces (verse 3) forming their own Freedom Coalition. In some cases, not paying your bills is a declaration of war. Before Troy, before the Peloponnesian, before the Punic, this is the first time in history that nations go to war.

The overlords say in return, "Oh, really?"

Even though the ESV doesn't start a new paragraph here, a whole year has passed between verses 4 and 5.

In the fourteenth year Chedorlaomer and the kings who were with him came and defeated the Rephaim in Ashteroth-karnaim, the Zuzim in Ham, the Emim in Shaveh-kiriathaim, and the Horites in their hill country of Seir as far as El-paran on the border of the wilderness. Then they turned back and came to En-mishpat (that is, Kadesh) and defeated all the country of the Amalekites, and also the Amorites who were dwelling in Hazazon-tamar. (Genesis 14:5–7)

The four guys from the northeast are about to teach a lesson to the five guys from the southwest. It took them a year (from the rebellion on the thirteenth year to now in the fourteenth year) to get ready and then, holy cow.

This is a proverbial trail of destruction. It looks like they followed the "King's Highway" (see Numbers 20:17; 21:22), a road that runs through the Jordan Valley on the eastern side of the Sea of Galilee and the Dead Sea, often used by caravans and armies. The suppression is over the top, and side to side, and all the way to the bottom. The overlords “defeated the Rephaim in Ashteroth-karnaim, the Zuzim in Ham, the Emim in Shaveh-kiriathaim, and the Horites in their hill country of Seir as far as El-paran on the border of the wilderness. Then they turned back and came to En-mishpat (that is, Kadesh) and defeated all the country of the Amalekites, and also the Amorites who were dwelling in Hazazon-tamar” (Genesis 14:5–7).

The hill country (of Seir, where the Edomites later lived (up in difficult to access caves) didn't bother them. They covered the territory to the border of the wilderness, because, after all, who was living beyond there to pick on? They defeated (verse 5) everyone everywhere they went. It's an impressive resume of wreckage. This is how you suppress a revolt. Perhaps the people in these regions were easy targets, scattered, small in number, and unorganized. More likely, that’s how powerful the Eastern horde was.

The overlords now say, "Resistance is futile."

Then the king of Sodom, the king of Gomorrah, the king of Admah, the king of Zeboiim, and the king of Bela (that is, Zoar) went out, and they joined battle in the Valley of Siddim with Chedorlaomer king of Elam, Tidal king of Goiim, Amraphel king of Shinar, and Arioch king of Ellasar, four kings against five. (Genesis 14:8–9)

The four bullies finally get to the guys they're after: the original trouble-making five. The rest of the region simply got in the way; verses 5-7 are collateral damage.

The five kings of the rebel coalition finally got their pants on, went out and they joined in battle (verse 8), four kings against five (verse 9), the five on their home turf. Commentator Phillips imagines the kings sitting in the war room, looking at a map, wondering whether or not they stood a chance. They had at least a few advantages. The enemy was a long way from their home with the supply line. The enemy was laden with weeks worth of plunder. The enemy's kings, though perhaps not troops, were outnumbered. They were fighting not only in their homeland, but for their homeland. They knew the terrain.

Yet the home team didn't last too long. It doesn't seem like the Five counted the cost of their refusal to pay tribute, let alone the cost of meeting the Four face to face in battle (cf. Luke 14:31-32).

Now the Valley of Siddim was full of bitumen (tar) pits, and as the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, some fell into them, and the rest fled to the hill country. (verse 10)

The battle ended so quickly that the battle itself isn’t even mentioned. "Charge! ... Retreat!" The Four make quick work of the Rebel Forces.

The kings of Sodom and Gomorrah fled, and presumably their troops on retreat, running away like school girls. Apparently, the king of Sodom was not one of the bitumen/tar/asphalt pit victims, since he shows up in verse 17. To say that some fell into [the] pits is interesting. We'd normally think that trained soldiers in their homeland would know about these pits. That's led some (such as Calvin) to conclude that they threw themselves into the pits rather than face the sword of the enemy; soldiers often chose suicide rather than captivity or torture. A couple other commentators suggest that the falling was more like hiding. Those that didn't die in the tar pits fled to the hill country with their skirts between their legs.

So the enemy took all the possessions of Sodom and Gomorrah, and all their provisions, and went their way. (verse 11)

This is known under various terms: pillage, loot, ravage. Veni, vidi, vici. They got what they came for and went their way. This was a rout. The repetition of and went on their way (verses 11 and 12) is deliberate; no one could stop them. The systematic beatdown over such a large geographical extent with virtually no resistance proved their total mastery.

They also took Lot, the son of Abram’s brother, who was dwelling in Sodom, and his possessions, and went their way. (verse 12)

The war story gets personal. On their way out of town, the four northern kings abduct Lot, the son of Abram's brother...and his possessions. Last we knew Lot moved toward Sodom, now he’s dwelling there. Everything up to verse 12 is background for this.

Search, rescue, and recover. Abram says, “I’m coming.”

Then one who had escaped came and told Abram the Hebrew, who was living by the oaks of Mamre the Amorite, brother of Eshcol and of Aner. These were allies of Abram. (verse 13)

The one who had escaped is a fugitive, and he comes with a report. Abram is the Hebrew, a descendent of Eber, the last ancestor in the line of Shem before the earth was divided (10:21-25).

Mamre, Eshcol, and Aner were three brothers, and brothers in arms with Abram. They were allies, bound by treaty. This was good for them more than Abram, at least from the Genesis 12:3 viewpoint.

When Abram heard that his kinsman had been taken captive, he led forth his trained men, born in his house, 318 of them, and went in pursuit as far as Dan. (verse 14)

Think Abram might have asked, "Who's Lot?" Wouldn't we prolly think more like: "Oh, sad." Or, "You get what you ask for." Or maybe more spiritual, "I'll pray for him." Or, probably a very reasonable question, "Why should I put myself on the line for him? I've got family and responsibilities here at home to take care of."

Even once Abram decided to do something, why not write a letter? Send some camels? Negotiate and offer a payment from his great wealth in return for Lot's life?

Instead, Abram wastes no time . Led forth is from a Hebrew word that means "emptied out." We might say, he went "all out," or he "unsheathed" the troops, or he opened a can of whoop-behind. He got everybody he could. It could be translated "muster," to mobilize an army.

Abram engages in a war that wasn't his. He doesn't run back down to Egypt. He is not the same coward who threw his wife under the bus to protect his own behind just two scenes earlier. This also gives evidence that his offer to Lot in the previous chapter was not passive. He takes initiative, responsibility, and makes sacrifices to get his nephew. This is man's work.

We might suppose Abram thought this was important in order to defend the land, or that it would have economic impact on his assets (herds). But remember that the four tyrants were on their way back home already; they had already went on their way, twice! Abram has to go to get them. He's not defending his land; he's defending his nephew.

Abram, living among allies, takes his trained men, those prepared to fight, who were born in his house and, therefore, loyal to him.

And he divided his forces against them by night, he and his servants, and defeated them and pursued them to Hobah, north of Damascus. (verse 15)

It is approximately 125 miles from Mamre to Dan. It is approximately 50 more miles from Dan to Damascus.

How long did it take the tyrants to plunder the region? How many weeks, or months? And Abram takes them in one night? Five kings couldn't fend them off four kings who ravaged six tribes, but one man and his household can? That is a rout.

Then he brought back all the possessions, and also brought back his kinsman Lot with his possessions, and the women and the people. (verse 16)

Nothing was lost; he brought back all the possessions and brought back his kinsman. Abram was wealthy in Ur, more wealthy on his way out of Egypt, so prosperous that he and Lot separated, and now he holds in his possession the wealth of and power over every people group around the Dead Sea. His victory put him in a position to dominate.

The rescue was a bigger, more significant rout than that of the four kings.

Preserving peace with bickering herdsmen is one thing, this is actual life-risking, on the line war.

Normally, in a military story like this, the victory against great forces and recovery would be the climax. But in Moses' version, something is still missing. We'll see that in verses 17-24.

The ESV Study Bible summarizes the point of the account.

Although Abram can compete militarily against powerful kings, he rejects the use of power to achieve God’s purpose. Thus he does not use force to take control of the land of Canaan. (ESVSB, 74)

Abram could have said, “Anyone else want to go against me?” Abram was willing to fight for God’s sake but not to take by force for himself what God had promised. Abram routed the tyrants, but he would not become one by overpowering the people in the promised land.