Address—Bill Prost
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Or perhaps we could sing a hymn together, one that's familiar to us 276.
Guide us, O thou gracious Savior, pilgrims through this barren lamp. Sometimes interesting to know where hymns come from. If you look in the back of the hymn book you'll see the name W Williams, 1774.
William Williams was a young man who grew up in England, but as a young man he intended to go to medical school.
Kind of comes home to my own heart. Want to go to medical school. But then after a while before he got there, he came under the gospel preaching of a Welsh preacher by the name of Howell Harris, who was, along with John Wesley and some others in that day, responsible for turning England completely around from the godlessness that characterized it at the end of the.
And so William Williams got saved, never did go to medical school, but spent his life preaching the gospel and serving the Lord.
276.
Let's look to the Lord for His help.
Loving God our Father, we thank Thee for the hymn that we have sung together, and we do trust that it is the prayer of each one of our hearts.
We thank Thee, our God, for each one who knows the Lord Jesus Christ as Savior here this afternoon, and we thank thee, Lord Jesus, that we can count on thee to bring us all the way home safely.
We thank thee too, for the hope of thy near return. Perhaps today keep that hope right before us, we pray.
But now we ask for Thy help as we open Thy word together and pray that Thou wilt encourage our hearts, stir them up if necessary. Bring Christ before us once again. We ask all this in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ, Amen. Amen.
Turn with me, please, to the 11Th chapter of Hebrews.
Chapter 11.
Well known, probably to most of us here as the faith chapter, that catalogue of those Old Testament servants and faithful people of old who walked when they did not, as we had this morning, have the same light and the same blessings as we have. And yet we're very faithful concerning what they did know.
And you and I are now in the last days, which were referred to in the prayer meeting this morning.
For those that were here.
And it tells us that perilous times shall come.
I don't suppose we need anyone to remind us that those perilous times are indeed here and we don't want to be pessimists, but they are going to get worse if the Lord leaves us here. But at the same time, the Lord, I believe, would encourage each one of us here.
And particularly to have faith in him. And that has what has kept believers going all down through the ages, whether in New Testament terms or in the Old Testament. There was that faith that trusted God, that believed in God as to who he was and what he could do.
This morning our brothers stand to my right ear, quoted an old brother.
And I knew whom he was quoting and I'm going to quote him again.
All our failure, whether as Saints or as sinners, stems from our unbelief of the goodness that is in the heart of God.
That's true. It's very true.
Do I really believe, even in the midst of all the difficulties of the day?
God, if we could put it bluntly, has my best interests and your best interests in his heart. Can we doubt it? It says in Romans 8. He that spared not his own son, but delivered him up for us all.
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How shall we not with Him also freely give us all things?
Now we want to add that that does not mean that God is automatically going to give me everything I want or make everything nice and smooth down here for me.
No, I'd miss out on the best things in the Christian pathway if there were never any trials or difficulties. But here in Hebrews 11, I have been impressed lately with the history of Abraham and his family.
Prior to what it says about Abraham, it says in verse one of Chapter 11.
And it tells us not what faith is. It's not a definition of faith, but rather what faith does.
Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
And then it mentions three men, Abel, Enoch and Noah.
And those three men cover, you might say, the whole panorama of God's dealings with man.
Because Enoch brings before us, first of all, redemption.
He was the first one, as far as we know, who offered a sacrifice.
He was the first one. I don't say that Adam and Eve didn't, but Abel in a special way, laid hold of what it meant to offer a blood sacrifice to the Lord.
Enoch is a type of the church first in God's purposes and blessings.
Caught up without having to go through death.
Noah is a type of the godly Jewish remnant being brought through those terrible waters of the Tribulation to repopulate a millennial earth. A panoramic view, so to speak. I'm in trouble with these panoramic view, so to speak, of all of God's purposes.
But then the Spirit of God launches into a discussion of Abraham and his family.
And I'd like to look at that practically for each one this afternoon.
There are younger ones here, maybe there'll be something for you in it, I trust. So there are those with young families, those that are middle-aged and there are people in my age bracket who are getting past the three score and 10 that God has allotted us. Some of us are living on borrowed time as we say.
I think there's something for each one of us here, and if you're the kind of person that likes numbers.
There are 7 by faith connected with Abraham and his family.
Verse 8.
By faith, Abraham, when he was called to go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance, obeyed, and he went out, not knowing whither he went.
We're going to make some practical applications of this to today's world.
Abraham lived in a place called Urba Caldes, which was a relatively well developed city of those days according to history.
And life probably was, in a measure, more comfortable than it would have been living in a tent in the desert of Canaan.
But here God tells Abraham to come out of that city and does not tell him exactly where he was going.
And it was a real test for a man who prior to his call by God, it tells us in another scripture which we will not turn to, but he worshipped idols. So God called Abraham right out of idolatry to worship him as the true God. And he said, I want you to leave everything behind.
And go to a place that I'm going to tell you about.
Permit me to say that in my lifetime I have seen the world turned practically upside down. At least the world that we know, the world in which I grew up, especially the Western world, was pretty stable when I was growing up. Oh yes, it was right after the Second World War, but everybody thought.
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We'll get back to normal, and of course, those of us that grew up in North America didn't feel the war very much.
I certainly didn't, because I was born toward the end of the war and I didn't know much about it, and life went on pretty peacefully. But then things started to be turned upside down to the point now where everything that once had stability seems to have been brought into confusion and difficulty.
When I was going to school, you could quit school if you wanted to at the age of 16. Go and work in an industrial plant, make enough money to buy a car, buy a home, raise a family, have a reasonably satisfying life. As far as it goes, yes, you weren't rich. You maybe didn't take exotic holidays. You maybe didn't have a cottage up in the Lake District or somewhere like that. Maybe you didn't do everything a few others could do.
The light was stable. It's not like that anymore.
And you young people, I don't envy you growing up and trying to decide how to make a living, how to make your way in the world of today. And I freely own that we who are older in most cases, don't have the answers for you. What I want to emphasize today is that God does, and He knows how difficult the day is.
And you may have to in some cases be like an Abraham and go out not knowing whither you are going.
The point is, what am I looking for?
What is before me? Is the Lord before me, or his interests before me? Or is it selfish interests?
You can make a lot of money in the world today if you make the right moves, if you do the right thing in business, if you get the right education.
I read some time ago that at a recent commencement which was presented at Well, rephrase that, at a recent commencement which concerned those graduating from law school at Yale University in New Haven, CT, the man who gave the commencement address said you young people are going to enter.
What is now known as a meritocracy, you are going to be some of the elite who will be able to do very, very well in this world because if you use your brains correctly, you will be able to get wealthy. And he was right. But is that what you and I are looking for? I hope not. Know the Lord's coming is very soon. We see things beginning to implode in this world.
But if you and I have the Lord before us and his interests, we can count on him to lead and to guide.
But it was one thing for Abraham to leave her of the colonies, but what happens next in verse?
By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise.
He didn't have all the comforts that he might otherwise have had.
He didn't have all the trappings that other people might have had.
Now if we read the history, was Abraham a well to do man?
He was, and when those who lived around him in the land of Canaan addressed him, you'll remember when he went to buy a plot of land in which to bury his wife Sarah, after she had died. They said to him, Thou art a mighty Prince among us. Oh yes, the Lord did bless him abundantly, and the Lord looked after him, and the Lord may bless you and me abundantly in this world.
Despite all of the things that I had mentioned a few minutes ago.
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Canada and the US are still the lands of opportunity.
Trust me, I've been around other places in the world, and so have others here, and they would agree with me in many other countries of this world. You cannot break out of the mold into which you are born if you're born in a poor situation.
That is where you stay unless some wealthy person chooses to help you. Somebody chooses to help pay for your education or give you a bit of a.
An encouragement and help you to get on in this world.
Over in North America, here, if you really want to get ahead, in many cases you can do it. And Abraham did become wealthy.
Did it go to his head? No, it did not.
Abraham continued living in a tent. He never, as far as we know, owned any property except a burial ground.
But he was able to provide very well when it was a question of providing. In fact, they couldn't help noticing, and this was brought out at a reading meeting many years ago, that when the Lord himself, along with two angels came to visit Abraham, the Spirit of God records that Abraham served meat that was tender and good.
What kind of a meal was Lot able to serve those same angels a little while after?
What? Living in a city like Sodom, which was a wealthy city? And there's every reason to believe that Lot was wealthy too. What did Lot serve them? Unleavened bread.
Yeah. Ever tried it? Not very good. No, you wouldn't want it. Poor lot. What was the matter? Oh, he lost his bearings. He lost his spiritual discernment.
By thinking that he could somehow reform this world.
What kept Abraham gold? He looked for a city that hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God. Now we want to say this, not to dwell on it. I don't believe that throughout his lifetime Abraham knew that he was going to have necessarily a heavenly portion. I would suggest that he probably looked forward if he was looking forward, and he was.
To an earthly paradise, it says further down in the chapter in verse 16. But now the desire a better country, O Abraham knows better. Now he's up there in glory with the Lord, and he knows that he's going to inherit the Kingdom on its heavenly side. But the point is Abraham gave up present advantage for future gain.
I say to my own heart, as I say to each one here.
Do I live my life in view of eternity?
And perhaps if it wouldn't be out of place, I can speak very plainly.
And I hope this doesn't offend anyone, but it's true just the same.
In the last few years.
There have been a lot.
Of what I call horror stories and they're true, that have been told about those who were true believers in many cases gathered to the Lord's name, and yet who deliberately went into sin that they knew was soundly condemned in God's Word.
Because they believed that somehow present advantage was better than future gain.
It hits close to home so don't think I don't know about it.
But those who are believers have broken up their marriages because they thought that present advantage was better than future gain. Dear believers have gone out into the world and committed unmentionable acts because present advantage was better than future gain. People have done things that were morally wrong, not only in the realm.
Of sexual sin, but of sin in the business world and many other things, and to do with addictions, alcohol and drugs and all the rest of it, dear believers, because present advantage somehow had a grip on them more than future gain. Oh, I say to my own heart, as I say to each one here, may the Lord keep us from that. And if we're tempted to do it, and we can be tempted.
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May the Lord give us to remember that first of all, He is worthy.
Yes, its not merely what's going to happen to me, but he is worthy And secondly.
Am I living my life?
With a long term view.
Everyone today wants you to take a long term view. I see all kinds of things. I, I don't particularly look for them on the Internet, but they, they pop up there because everybody wants to get you involved in things, trying to say what are you doing for your retirement?
Are you going to have enough money for your retirement? Suppose you've got $1,000,000. Is that enough to have for retirement?
And all the rest of it. But I've never yet seen a pop up on the Internet that said.
Have you made provision for eternity? Have you got what you need for eternity?
That's what counts, That's what counts. Yes, it may be well and good to plan for retirement, but am I living in view of eternity? Well, let's go on here. That's number two. By faith, he sojourned in the land of promise.
Verse 11 and we don't want to dwell on the details but simply those 4 words.
Through faith also served.
Why does it mention Sarah here?
Many, many reasons perhaps, but the one I want to dwell on is this, that here was a man whom God called from ur of the Caldes to leave a place of relative comfort and prosperity.
And go out not knowing whither he went. But what did the Lord do? Provided a helpmeet for him who shared his faith.
You know, today there are many young people who very much want a life partner.
And don't think that we who are older did not go through that, and don't think that we did not earnestly desire the same thing when we were your age.
Through faith also, Sarah. And sometimes if the right one doesn't come along as quickly as we think they should, then we resort to human beings, don't we? And I'm not going to go into it, and I'm not going to condemn human means altogether. That's a matter of individual faith and personal exercise before the Lord. But I do say this, that it is far better to trust the Lord.
And wait on him than it is to resort to human means.
Having said that, there are two problems extant today. On the one hand, there are young men and I blame them the most and don't think I'm pointing the finger at you because the tendency.
Even when my day was there, although not in the same way.
Too many young men are failing to step up to take their responsibilities. Today 30% of the young men in North America, I understand still live in their parents home. Why? Because it's easier, no responsibility, don't have to look after all the problems and difficulties of running a home, stress and strains of marriage and having children and all the rest of it. When you're at home, of course your mom does the cooking pretty much and maybe you pay some room and board, but.
Life is relaxed, life is easy.
That's not what you were made for, young men. That's not what the Lord called us to. Therefore shall a man leave his father and mother and cleave unto his wife. Now again, I don't say that marriage is for everyone. That again has to be a personal exercise before the Lord. But when young men are doing that, what are the young women doing? Their biological clock is ticking and they say, well, I need to provide for myself.
So then sometimes they, and it's not at all wrong, but sometimes they go out and get a good education in order to look after themselves and then the guy that doesn't have quite as good an education gets spooked by them.
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Everything's out of whack, isn't it?
Young men, you need to take the position of leadership and responsibility that the Lord gave you. Young women, you need to remember what the Lord has given you to do. And again, I'm not speaking against education. I'm saying remember that all the hype you hear in the world today about you can have it all is not true. You can't have it all. No, God has provided for proper roles for both men and women.
And happiness results, as we had this morning, from obedience. And here was Sarah, who followed Abraham, who was a helpmeet to him, who sometimes gave him good advice when he didn't perhaps appreciate it. Sometimes, of course, she led him the wrong way when she suggested that he take Hagar as his wife. But nevertheless, God provided for him. And I say to each one of us here.
The Lord will provide for you and for me, as He did for Abraham. Remember, as we said a few minutes ago, He has your best interests at heart.
And what was the result of Abraham's faith? Oh, it says in verse 12.
From him.
As many as the stars of the sky in multitude, and the sand which is by the seashore innumerable. You notice the stars are mentioned first. Why? I believe that speaks of the heavenly company. They have the 1St place, the church. But the sand that is by the seashore speaks of an earthly company.
God has in His purposes the blessing of the Church in heaven and the blessing of Israel on earth, and all of that came from Abraham in the sense that his faith proved to be an example for all that came afterward. And it was through him that the Lord Jesus Christ was born, his seed, through whom all this blessing came.
Well, we go on now, verse 17.
By faith, Abraham, when he was tried, offered up Isaac.
And he that had received the promises offered up his only begotten Son, of whom it was said, that in Isaac shall thy seed be called accounting, that God was able to raise him up even from the dead, from whence also he received him in a figure.
I don't expect that those here who have never had children, and I say this very kindly because I was the same, would be able to enter into this in the same way.
But when you have had children of your own.
You perhaps can enter into at least a little what kind of a trial was for Abraham to go through.
And especially because this was not a child that he had along with many others.
This was the child of promise.
This was the child that had been born to them.
Supernaturally, when, humanly speaking, both he and Sarah were too old to bear a child in the normal way.
And God gives Abraham Isaac.
And what must it have been to a father's heart?
To take that three day journey.
To that mountain.
And there go right to the brink of offering up. That's a.
I've tried to imagine myself, if I could say it, as a father.
Taking up that knife, ready to plunge it into my own sun.
And offer him first sacrifice.
You know, it wasn't the first thing that the Lord required of Abraham. If the Lord had said to Abraham 25 years before, or maybe more, Abraham, I want you to offer up your son. Abraham, I say it reverently, might well have failed the test.
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But what gave Abraham, shall we say, the faith to do it? He had learned by virtue of walking with the Lord for some years.
That the Lord was as good as His word and that He could trust Him. And how do we increase our faith? By exercising. Exercising it. Sometimes we may complain that we don't have the faith for something. Well, it's good if we're honest. But we get more faith by exercising our faith and believing in God.
And trusting him.
Will you allow a personal story?
Back when I started university.
I pretty much needed a car, although everyone didn't have one, but I didn't live close enough and it wasn't suitable at that point to take public transportation, so I had a car.
Whatever the rest of you might think about insurance, and I don't know how others feel, but in those days it was not necessary to have insurance on your car and I decided to trust the Lord.
No insurance, none at all. Not even for the other guy. You didn't have to have it. No mistakes.
Not too long after I started university, I was trying to navigate Toronto traffic and anyone that knows anything about it knows that it's a bit of an interesting place to drive.
And sure enough, I rear-ended somebody.
I can still remember what it felt like, Lord now what I thought I had faith.
I trusted and now look.
If I tell you how much it costs to fix the other guy's car, and by the way it was a brand new one, you'll know how long ago it was.
$50.
Yeah, I know, you laugh. Cost $50.
I can tell you that was a lot of money in those days. It hurt. It really hurt.
Ikar wasn't damaged. It was an old beer. It didn't matter.
I was really cast on the Lord.
In about two or three weeks later, I got a letter in the mail.
$50 checked in it.
From the high school from which I had graduated.
Sit inside. We gave you a $50 scholarship when you graduated from this high school, but here's the 2nd installment.
Never heard of such a thing. There was number second installment. I knew about that $50 scholarship. They gave it out every year. There was no second installment. It was a one time thing. Why did I get another $50?
Those little were told them to.
And I paid for that, you know, it restored my faith. Lord knew that I needed that little shot in the arm. The Lord was saying, you're going to be tested.
But the Lord tests her faith. He doesn't disappoint our faith. There's a difference.
Why did Abraham have to go and OfferUp Isaac? First of all, it was a beautiful type of the Lord Jesus. But there's more than that in it.
And I don't know if I can get the point across, but let me try.
When Abraham received the promise of God that he was going to have a son.
It seems that Abraham really believed God, he was just so happy. But we know that Sarah in the tent laughed with a mocking laugh because she thought what? Me, I have a child. No way.
And she was reproved for it, and I believe she profited by that reproof.
And finally, when they got that child, they had the grace of God to name him Isaac. What does Isaac mean? Laughter. Laughter.
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Referring, no doubt, to the fact that.
Abraham laughed with joy when that child was born. He laughed before, too.
But then if we're not careful, sometimes when we receive something from God that He has given us, perhaps if we're not careful, our thoughts consider on what He has given us, and it can be something that is very, very good.
Suppose the Lord gives you a home.
I can be very thankful for it, but I can get taken up with it. Or let's make it even more difficult. Supposing the Lord gives you a Good Wife or a good husband, Your heart can be taken up with it, and so can mine. Or if the Lord prospers my business, my heart can be taken up with it.
Or if the Lord gives me good health, I can be taken up with it.
And the Lord doesn't want our hearts to be taken up with anything but with Himself.
And so the Lord, I believe, says to Abraham, you go and sacrifice that son. And Abraham's thoughts were turned away from that son of Proms to the Lord himself. And what's the result? Abraham says, if I kill my son and sacrifice him, God has told me that that is the son in whom all the promises will be fulfilled.
He'll raise him from the dead, and that would have been, in one sense, an even greater miracle than having a son born to a man and a wife who were too old to have children.
The Lord doesn't want our focus to be on anything but Himself.
And sometimes he may strike at something that is so very near and dear to us, and something which he has given us.
In order that we might be focused on himself.
I hesitate to mention it because I don't want to speak about that about which I don't know. God doesn't tell me why He allows things in other people's lives, but a dear brother and sister whom some of us here know in Fremont, MI had to stand and watch their home burned to the ground a few weeks ago.
A godly family. I know them well.
And I can only try and put myself in their shoes, thinking that perhaps here the Lord had given them that home, and now it's gone.
Yes, I was insured and it'll be rebuilt, but a lot of priceless things will not be able to be recovered. And everyone here that has a whole knows that knows what it feels like to think of things that could not be replaced.
But God stops Abraham short here. But I believe Abraham learned.
The Lord is to be before me. Not even that wonderful son, Isaac. Well, let's go on.
What about Isaac? Is he going to have faith as well? Indeed he did. But Isaac's faith was in one sense different from Abraham's. Abraham, if we could represent him by one word, we might say Abraham typifies before us, calling the calling of God.
But Isaac he might bring before a sonship.
Isaac didn't have to go through all the exercises his father Abraham went through. He was born into a family of faith. He didn't have to leave idolatry.
He didn't have to leave a city which was relatively well developed. He didn't have to travel a long distance. He was already there. He grew up with tent life. He grew up with a father who didn't own anything.
He grew up in that Pilgrim character, Sonship.
And there was Saddam, say, failure in Isaac's life.
Part of it we have to lay at the feet of his dear wife Rebecca, who was a woman of faith.
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But she brought some baggage with her into the marriage from a family character and a family background, and I may say that just in passing.
If we can digress for a moment or two on the subject of marriage.
It's become, rather, shall I say it, fashionable today.
To break up marriages if things aren't working out very well. And the most disappointing thing about it all is that the statistics for divorce are not much better among those who profess to be Christians than they are in the world at large. At least not in the Western world. A terrible blot on the testimony to the name of the Lord.
But when we come to marriage, we all bring things with us. Sometimes good things, sometimes things that aren't so good.
We sometimes bring outlook and character and family traits and personal things.
That we perhaps need to deal with. And we bring them into the marriage and our spokes brings them to. And pretty soon we start, as we say, to strike sparks off one another, don't we?
A marriage out West a number of years ago, a brother who's now with the Lord made this remark. I found it rather interesting, he said to the groom. Both of them gathered to the Lord's name, the bride and the groom, he said to the groom.
He said. Right now you probably look at that girl and you just feel so enamored with her that you think you could eat her.
He said. But you know, it may well be that six months down the road you'll wish you had.
He was, in a backhanded way, saying that things might not always go smoothly.
But here's the point.
Very often the Lord uses the stresses and strains of marriage to not the rough edges of us to make us deal with issues in our lives that we haven't dealt with. Because when you live with somebody as husband and wife, you get to know them pretty well.
And the Lord uses that to enable us to deal with things.
And all too many today are saying I'm not going to deal with it. I'm going to find somebody else who won't bother me in the same way. The trouble is, the next one usually bothers you just as much. Maybe in a different way, but just as much. Second marriages fail more frequently than first ones do.
No, the Lord uses it all.
But anyway, what about Isaac? It says he blessed Jacob and Esau concerning things to come.
Did Isaac really do that by faith?
Think about the circumstances.
Think of how it happened, Isaac, who favored Esau, says Esau. Go hunting and get me some of that good venison that I really like.
Rebecca, for her part, says to Jacob, Listen, trust me, I can. I know how to cook, and you do too. We can fake that venison pretty well. We'll get the blessing before Esau gets back.
And Isaac unwittingly blesses Jacob.
By Faith Isaac. Really.
Yes, she did. Isaac had really, I believe, laid whole of what was said to Rebecca before those two boys were even born, that the younger would serve the elder.
And poor Isaac.
He knew that, and yet his own desires got in the way of things.
His own enjoyment of Esau's food got in the way of what he knew was right, but thank God, he overruled. Did Isaac do it by faith? I believe he did. And when he understood what had happened, Isaac doesn't say, oh, dear, I bless the wrong man. He doesn't say that. He says yeah, about Jacob and he shall be blessed. Oh, he realized that the Lord had intervened.
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Albeit in a way that didn't do any credit to Jacob and Rebecca. Oh no, Jacob had to suffer the consequences of all that, and so did Rebecca. But the Lord overruled. And I say in your life and mine, we sometimes look at things in our lives and perhaps looking back on the way we've acted and perhaps on failure, we may say, oh.
I failed. I did it wrong. I messed up, to use a current term. I didn't use wisdom from the Lord. I allowed human feelings. I allowed my own thoughts to get into the mix, and I did things in a wrong way.
All I say is, let's remember this verse. The Lord accomplished His purposes in spite of Isaac's failure, because deep down inside the Lord saw the faith now again.
Isaac suffered on account of it all. He suffered.
Jacob suffered, Rebecca suffered, there is a government in the House of God and thank God for it, but at the same time the Lord overruled for blessing and I think many times when you and I have failed.
We will see in the coming day.
How the Lord overruled?
Again, pardon a personal story. Maybe I say that too often.
But I will remember being on an airplane traveling over to India.
It was a long time ago, almost 30 years ago.
And it was a Middle Eastern airline that allowed smoking.
And like most Christians I abominate smoking and I ended up right in the middle of the smoking section and then they all came back from the non-smoking section after the meal of the smoke till it was like having to find your way through a fog to get out of your seat and I complained about it.
And a feisty stewardess got into a verbal battle with me, and I'm afraid I wasn't.
Happy with the situation and I reminded her that they had armed guards on the plane to prevent hijacking and why couldn't they enforce the smoking regulations?
Then it ended up, and I say this in humility, I'm telling a bad story on myself, she said. What do you do for a living?
How do you answer that when you've given up your practice to go out in the work of the Lord a few years before?
Oh, I was embarrassed.
I said, well, I'm a Christian.
And I serve the Lord. That's what I do. That's that's what I do for a job.
Did the Lord overrule? Yes, He did the most humbling experience. Her eyes got big. She said, do you know something about the Christian religion? I said, well, I think I do. Yes, when you talk about it. I said yes, I will.
Come to the back of the plane please when they turn the movie on.
I did.
I'm not telling you this to.
Put any crown on my head was failing. What happened? The other four flight attendants came back. There were five of them for an hour and a half at the back of that plane in the galley, we had a gospel meeting on a Muslim aircraft.
Wonderful.
Does the Lord overrule through our failure? Sometimes He does. So don't be too discouraged. Judge your failure. But remember, as with Isaac, the Lord overrules for blessing.
Verse 21 by faith Jacob, when he was a dying bless both the sons of Joseph and worship, leaning upon the top of his staff.
If Isaac is sonship and Abraham is calling, we might say that Jacob speaks of government or discipline.
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Oh, Jacob was a schemer and a planner. Did he have faith he did.
Did he want the blessing? He did. But he felt he had to do his bit to get it. And his bit he did. And you know the story. We don't have to go over it until it became first of all, after.
Doing his best to get the blessing from Esau, it becomes a battle of wits between Jacob and Laban to see who could outwit and outsmart the other.
Poor Jacob.
And then after a while, he judges it, at least partially, and goes back to the land of Canaan. But what happens there? Oh, the Lord teaches him an awfully difficult lesson by turning the tables on him. And his own boys, who had learned all those tricks from him, do the same thing back to him. Yes, they deceive him about selling Joseph into Egypt, persuading their father that he had been killed by a wild animal.
And then, in hypocrisy, all of them rose up to comfort him. Can you imagine we're going to come for dead now, after we've been the ones to deceive him and sell his favorite son into slavery? Imagine, poor Jacob, you know sometimes the Lord has to teach us a hard lesson, and sometimes He does it by giving us a dose of our own medicine.
But you know, the thing that impresses me here is that Jacob profited by it. He profited by God's discipline. He profited by what God put him through. And what happens when Jacob gets to the end of the pathway?
Joseph.
Brings his sons to Jacob to be blessed, and of course Manasseh being the eldest.
Joseph naturally assumed the nuts still the way in Eastern culture that he would get the 1St place.
And he brings Manasseh there and places him on Jacob's right side, so that he would get the blessing with Jacob's right hand. And he puts Ephraim on the left, Jacob's left there is.
But Jacob had learned through his own experience how the Lord worked.
And what does he do?
Crosses his hands. Why?
Oh, he knew that the blessing rested on the younger son. Isn't that beautiful? Jacob had learned. And he worships at the end of his life.
Oh, it's too bad that he had to wait till the end to worship, isn't it?
Jacob no doubt went through a lot of difficult experiences, but the Lord worked. The Lord helped.
The end of his life there was worship. Oh, how good if we can deal with those things when we're younger so that we don't have to go through a life as Jacob did for many years with a bad conscience. But how wonderful that he did that.
Why did the younger son have to get the blessing though? What's the significance of that?
Oh, the 1St man is of the earth. Earth. The 2nd man is the Lord from heaven.
And if there are children here, I challenge you to look in the book of Genesis and see how many couplets you can find.
Where the younger son was the more godly one than the older son. Sometimes there's more than one in the same family, but in a number of cases throughout the book of Genesis you will see where the younger son is more prominent in a spiritual way.
Than the older son. Oh yes, the older son could be blessed as well, no question about it. It's not that God wouldn't bless, but the older son speaks of the first man. The younger son speaks of Christ, the 2nd man.
Well, finally we come to Joseph.
By faith, Joseph, when he died, made mention of the departing of the children of Israel.
And gave commandment concerning his bolts.
If in Abraham we have calling, and in Isaac sonship, and in Jacob discipline or government.
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I would suggest in Joseph we have glory.
Joseph was a type of Christ, perhaps the most beautiful type in all of the Old Testament of Christ himself. And Joseph, though when he was there in Egypt, he had everything at his feet. Joseph was governor over all the land of Egypt. Joseph's brothers go back to Jacob and say, Joseph, my son is yet alive.
And he is governor over all the land of Egypt.
I'd rather selfishly would like to have been there though.
Because when those brothers went back and told their father that scripture doesn't go over that scene, but evidently there was a real work of grace in their souls.
It all had to come out, didn't I?
No doubt, Jacob said. Oh, Governor, overhaul the land of Egypt. How did he get into Egypt? What about that coat of many colors that all had all the blood on it? What about that, boys? Where did that all come from? Oh, it had to come out. It all had to come out. They couldn't hide it. But Joseph, he's there in Egypt. He has everything at his feet.
But no.
He gives a commandment concerning his bones. Why? Oh, because?
His heart was in that land of Kingdom. His heart had laid hold of those promises that they worked to stay in Egypt.
What had God told Abraham way back in the 15th of Genesis? I think it's the 15th. Just turn to it to make sure that I'm right there.
Think it's Genesis 15.
Yes, Genesis 15 and verse 13.
And he said unto Abram, No, of a surety, that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them, and they shall afflict them 400 years. And also that nation whom they shall serve will I judge. And afterwards shall they come out with great substance. And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace. Thou shalt be buried in a good old age, but in the 4th generation they shall come hit her again.
For the iniquity of the amorites is not yet full.
That prophecy no doubt, had been passed on down the line from Abraham, Abraham to Isaac to Jacob to Joseph. And Joseph realizes that I don't belong here. When you leave this land, he says, take my bones and make sure you bury them in the land of Canaan.
What does that mean for you and for me?
Are we looking to be buried here? No, we're looking for the Lord to come. Where are our hearts?
I'd like to turn in closing to a verse.
In Joshua, I believe it is.
Joshua.
But I'm not 100% sure.
Maybe. No, it's in Judges. I beg your pardon. Judges Chapter 2 is the verse I want.
Judges, Chapter 2.
And verse 8.
And Joshua the son of Nun, the servant of the Lord, died being an 110 years old, and they buried him in the border of his inheritance.
I will remember quite a few years ago now, quite a few years ago.
Standing in a Funeral Home as a teenager.
And lying there in the casket was an older brother.
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Who in his early 80s had been taken home to be with the Lord. He had been a very faithful brother from a faithful family.
And I well remember his wife who was standing there, whom I knew quite well, because she outlived him for a number of years. She was his second wife and she outlived him for a number of years. And I will remember standing there.
And another brother came up, looked at the body lying there in the casket, and then said to his wife.
He said. You know.
That reminds me of Joshua.
He said, and he turned to this verse that I have just read in judges to he said your husband, I believe has been buried in his inheritance.
What did he mean by that? He meant that that brother had walked with the Lord and had enjoyed much of the precious things of Christ, much of the precious truth which has been committed to you and me as believers.
All those blessings that are ours in Christ, blessed with all spiritual blessings in the heavenlies in Christ.
The blessings that you and I have in Christ.
Are in type. Or let me rephrase that. The blessings that Israel had in natural things in the Old Testament are in tight. The blessings that you and I have as a result.
Of Christ going up there to glory and bringing us into all those blessings in the heavenlies.
And that brother who made that remark meant that the one who laid there in the casket was being buried in his inheritance.
Again, we say you and I don't look to be buried in this world, so the type falls short. But there will be an inheritance of those things which you and I have appropriated to ourselves and made our own in this life down here, which in that sense will be our inheritance, the things which we have laid hold of, enjoyed and walked in down here.
May the Lord give us grace to value.
Let's close in prayer.
Our loving God and our Father, we thank Thee for Thy word which we have had before us, and we pray that in these things which have been mentioned concerning Abraham and his family, we in these last days, as strangers and pilgrims too, may be able to walk through that this world. In that same character. We thank Thee for those things which have been brought before us, different things that characterized each one in the life of faith.
And yet all of value to thee are God.
Commend ourselves to thee and give thanks and ask all this in thy name, Lord Jesus. Amen. Amen.