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No tongue declared, Oh, give our hearts its depth to prove and reign without arrival there from thee, O Lord, we all receive thine, Holy Thine alone we'd live 274.
Hey, Cortana.
These are completely.
Although I've ever had.
Continue with Genesis chapter 22.
I would suggest perhaps reading from verse 3. Read from verse 3.
Chapter 22, Verse 3.
And Abraham rose up early in the morning, and saddled his *** and took two of his young men with him, and Isaac his son, and clayed the wood for the burnt offering, and rose up and went under the place of which God had told him. Then on the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes and saw the place afar off.
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And Abraham said unto his young men, Abide ye here with the *** and I, and the lad will go Yonder.
And worship, and come again to you. And Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering, and laid it upon Isaac his son.
And he took the fire in his hand and a knife, and they went, both of them together.
And Isaac spake unto Abraham his father, and said, my father. And he said, Here am I my son. And he said, Behold the fire and the wood, But where is the lamb for a burnt offering? And Abraham said, My son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. So they went, both of them together.
And they came to the place which God had told him of, and Abraham built an alt sorry. And Abraham built an altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar upon the wood. And Abraham stretched forth his hand, and took the knife to slay his son. And the Angel of the Lord called unto him out of heaven, and said, Abraham, Abraham. And he said, Here am I. And he said, Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him.
For now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from me. And Abraham lifted up his eyes and looked, and behold behind him a ram caught in a thicket by his horns.
And Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for a burnt offering instead of his son.
And Abraham called the name of that place Jehovah Jireh, as it is said to this day. In the mount of the Lord it shall be seen.
And the Angel of the Lord called unto Abraham out of heaven the second time, and said by myself, have I sworn, saith the Lord, For because thou hast done this thing.
And has not withheld thy son, thine only, son, that in blessing I will bless thee, and in multiplying I will multiply thy seed as the stars of the heaven, and as the sand which is upon the seashore. And thy seed shall possess the gate of his enemies, and in thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.
Because thou hast obeyed my voice. So Abraham returned unto his young men, and they rose up and went together to Beersheba. And Abraham dwelt at Beersheba. And it came to pass after these things that it was told Abraham, saying, Behold, Milka, she hath also borne children unto thy brother. Nahor has his first born. And Buzz's brother Camuel the father of Aaron, and Chested, and Hazzo, and Pill Dash, and Jitlap, and Bethuel.
And Bethiel begat Rebecca. These eight Milka did bear to Nehor, Abraham's brother and his concubine, whose name was Rumah. She bare also Teba and Gahem, and Dehash and Mayaka.
I like to connect the first verse and the third verse together as we talk about Abraham's faithfulness toward God. He has faith, He has worked. He did not hesitate. So we commented yesterday that Abraham answered to God was behold, here I am. It shows his willingness. He didn't question what God wanted him to do.
They just simply say here I am. What an example to us when there when God has called us to do something. You know, we sometimes as children and perhaps even parents here where children would appreciate this. You call your young child or teenager over and you know that even before you ask them to do something. You see the attitude that I don't want to do this. It's not for me.
They will argue, Can you imagine you have a child that will come when you call for the name? They'll say, behold, here I am.
Mom dad, what would you like me to do now then in verse three it gives us more sense. It sets here and he rose up early in the morning. Now I don't know about you when there are things that I don't like to do things that I dread doing I don't get to it right away. I wait and here what an opposite. It was the thing that Abraham.
Not despised, must have grieved him to offer up his Son as a burnt offering, but yet because of his obedience to God, he rose up early as if he couldn't wait. He couldn't wait to do God's will.
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I have a question now, but I was wondering if someone could help me understand what gave.
Support The law is going up, but it's not quite Deuteronomy chapter 18 and verse 10. I think it's pathogen Leviticus also, but they're in Leviticus chapter, sorry, Deuteronomy chapter 18, verse 10. There shall not be found among you anyone that maketh his son or his daughter to pass through the fire.
And that was an abomination of the people of the land.
Of course, Abraham had here a very.
Close relationship with the Lord, but is there anything further that we should understand about how how it was known that this command of human sacrifice was was was ripe and for Abraham to do, but it would be clearly wrong under the under the law there.
School gardens were very slowly better.
This chapter is just one phase of the life of Abraham and the question is what gave him confidence. You have to go back to chapter 12 to start to get an answer to that question.
In chapter 12 it says Now the Lord God. In verse one, Now the Lord God had said unto Abraham, yet thee out of thy country.
And from thy kindred and from thy father's house unto a land that I will show thee, this is the beginning. God calls Abraham. He was living in a land of idolatry and among his family and his friends and so on in that land. And God calls him and says, Abraham, you're going to leave. I call upon you to leave everything that you've had in your life up to this point.
To go somewhere you've never been and somewhere you don't know what it's like.
And when you leave it?
I'll show you where to land. He didn't even know where he was going to stop. He was simply called to leave everything behind and go.
That's why in one sense he's called the Father of faith, because he is the first example in Scripture that we have of what it is to live by faith. And faith to be lived begins with the developing of a trust that God is to be trusted. Whether I have any idea or not what's going to happen, God is to be obeyed whether I have any idea or not what the outcome is going to be.
Of the result of that obedience, Abraham didn't learn the lesson immediately.
He starts out, but before very long if we follow the chapters which follow.
He ends up in Egypt, a picture of the world. What sent Abraham down to Egypt? His faith wasn't developed and it had to have learning by the experiences of life. And every one of us is in that same school. God has called us by faith, and in the beginning of that journey we put our trust in the Lord Jesus Christ. But it's just the beginning of the learning of what faith would bring us into.
And so.
The process starts in chapter 12, and I'm not going to try to develop it through the chapters that we would be done and not get through the first verse. But as it says in chapter 13, verse one, and Abraham went up out of Egypt, he'd already gone down to Egypt and in faith he doesn't want to let the king understand who his wife really is. He doesn't count upon God to preserve.
So he mixes his faith with some of his own devices, if you will, to protect himself in the circumstances. Because she was one that was beautiful and so on. But when we get to Chapter 22.
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Abrahams faith has been developed to that point where we can see him in the primary character of the chapter, which is a picture to us of the love of God the Father. And the first part of this chapter, as we had yesterday, is the major really thought of it until verse.
Through verse 14 from verse 1 to 14 there's a picture we see an M faith and we've been emphasizing what he did in obedience and so on. But it's all that which he had already gone through the process of learn and God's trying him in verse one to say have you learned the lessons yet Abraham and he had he had learned the lesson of being a heavenly man and he had gone out from his country not knowing where he went we.
Are to leave the world. We know where we're going. We know we're going to heaven.
What we have to learn by faith to leave the world behind and live as Abraham lived. And so in the 1St 14 verses in this chapter, it's bringing out that he's now a picture of the love of God the Father and the Son and giving his son. And then he in verse 15, you get a new start for himself. And God says, because you've done this, now I'm going to bless you. And so Abraham learns and gets blessing for himself.
As well as the beginning of the family of God on earth. He's the father of the family of Israel and God setting them aside as a people for himself. And that you get the start of that in verse 14.
Wonder if I could add to that.
Instead of looking at Genesis 12, go to Acts 7, which is really the same portion that you brought before us, but Steven takes it up in his discourse in Acts 7.
Acts Chapter 7.
Of course, the previous verse, they're all sitting in the council looking steadfastly on Stephen. The high priest says, Are these things so? And he takes up with what you've been bringing before us. He said, men and brethren and fathers hearken. The God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia, before he'd dwelt in Karen. And he said unto him, Get thee out of thy country and of thy kindred, and come into the land which I will, I shall show thee.
And then came thee out of the land of the Chaldeans that dwelt in care. And I've I've tried in my own life to try to.
Picture what this looked like.
So just picture Abraham. He's umm.
He's he's there in Mesopotamia.
He he has this message from the Lord.
He loads his camels up or whatever he had. I don't know what he had at that point and and the neighbors, they say so.
So where are you going?
Well, I don't know.
And they say, well, are you kidding me? Here he is. He's all packed up, ready to go.
Obviously with with some intent, Abraham, I'm sure his neighbors recognize them as someone that was a reasonable person. And his answer is I, I don't know where I'm going. And I think that was.
A very impressive in connection with what our brothers bringing before us because if we go over a few chapters in Genesis.
Look at Genesis 15.
I'm going around in circles here, eventually your question, sorry.
So in Genesis 15.
We have this statement. It's repeated enrollments.
Like Paul, It's repeated in Galatians by Paul. It's repeated in James by James.
And it's this statement.
In verse 6.
He believed in the Lord.
And he counted it to him for righteousness. And so we have in Romans, he believed God. We have in James, in Galatians, rather he believed God's.
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Three times in the New Testament, this this item of faith, which is is so impressive that we have it repeated that he obviously developed from that time that he sat on his camel and had to tell his neighbors. I don't know where I'm going. He had the he had to, he had to lay hold of something. And I think what we see in our chapter is, is the experience of him having laid hold on that and now here years later.
As our brothers brought before us, the Lord brings this test to see what was so manifest to so many people that was so real in His life, and with which the Lord desires to be real in our own lives as well.
After 13, the Lord's promise to Abraham in verse 16, I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth, so that man can number the dust of the earth. In shall thy seed also be numbered.
And in chapter 15 the verse was before where you read.
Verse five He said he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven until the number of the stars.
They'll be able to number them. And he said unto him, So shall thy seed be.
And later on, we know that Sarah didn't bear him any children so.
She makes a suggestion and through that suggestion.
A son was born, but it's Ishmael, and the Lord says this shall not be the one through whom I will give you blessing.
And so it seemed pretty impossible situation that Abraham 99 years old. And that's what we have in verse seven, chapter 17.
He's 99 years and nine the Lord.
90 years old and nine. The Lord appeared to Abraham and said I am the Lord Almighty God, walk before me and be thou perfect.
You know, we, we tend to look at difficulties, brethren, in our own ability to meet those difficulties, and that's what gives place to doubt.
But he is the Almighty God, and I think it's so amazingly wonderful that finally, at 100 years old, Sarah bears him a son, Isaac. And this was must have been a tremendous joy to Abraham's heart.
This was the son of promise, and so now he says.
Take that son and offer him for a burnt offering and you can imagine what it must have meant. But it was so I think this is the way God developed his faith, like you were mentioning, Don, and through those circumstances, through those experiences.
He learned that God is faithful to His Word.
And so when this test came, there is no evidence of any delay on Abraham's part. He rises early in the morning, saddles his *** and goes off to do what God had asked him to do.
You know, Abraham, I don't know how old Isaac must have been at this juncture. I don't know that there's any way of knowing. But the fact that.
Abraham laid on Isaac the wood for the burnt offering, and I would imagine you'd need quite a bit of wood for a burnt offering. He was not just a young boy, he was a young man, probably, we don't know how old, but he was one also, who had evidently seen his father offer sacrifices before.
And so, when they leave the two servants behind, he asks his father.
Where is the Lamb? And I say all these things, brethren, so interesting to me. I just wanted to mention something that I find very helpful. In Romans chapter one, there's an expression. It's mentioned twice in the book of Romans at least.
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In verse.
5 Romans, 1/5.
Apostle Paul says, By whom we have received grace and apostleship or obedience to the faith among all nations, for his name Romans 16.
And verse.
26.
Talking about the revelation of the mystery that is now made manifest and by the scriptures of the prophets according to the commandment.
Of the everlasting God made known to all nations for the obedience.
Of faith, that expression, the obedience of faith.
If you really trust God, you're going to obey Him what he says.
If I don't obey him, what am I basically saying? I'm saying, well, this time I think I know a little bit better than God, so I'm going to go my own way. That sounds pretty bad, but that's basically what we're saying if we don't obey. So there's one characteristic of faith. It's obedient. And so we see the obedience of faith in Abraham here in these verses. What a wonderful thing.
I'd like to make another formula, one of the same time will come on and one of those Abraham's. Abraham starts out in the life of faith and as we've already had bought before us he.
He stumbles in it, he has to learn it. And until the 22nd chapter.
Where we have him in a mature faith. But I want to comment on it in connection with the comment made last night in the gospel meeting where Jonah, it was commented on Jonah. There was not only what was going on in Jonah, but he had an effect on those around him.
And so he was having an effect on the others in the boat by his own.
Disobedience to the will of God at that point and not being willing.
In Abraham's case, and in your life and mine, learning the path of faith is a humbling experience.
We're all learned to be humbled in it, and in Abraham's case.
He had been promised a blessing when he was told to go out. And yet what happens? He's old and nothing's happening. You know, sometimes we believe God's going to read the word of God and we say, well, God's going to do this or that. Time passes and it we don't see the result. So what sometimes happens, our faith fails and we take matters into our own hands.
And so he did, Sarah said. I'm old. I can't have kids. I can't have a child. It's too late.
So what happens? The handmaid Sarah was put in the picture and she has the child Ishmael, which is already said in pictures, a child of the flesh. But what's the consequence for Abraham, the children of Israel to this day and in the coming day of tribulation?
Are going to feel the effects of Hagar's descendants. He also when he leaves in chapter 12 when he's called to leave, he takes luck.
Is relative with him.
What's the consequence? Lot wasn't a man of faith like Abraham. He didn't have the same character of faith. And so the effect was Lot chose the world. He goes into Sodom, and while there was faith in law, I believe he has to be dragged out of the city before the judgment falls on it. He'd gone into what we call the world, to live in the world and try to mix the world and have it with his faith and when they go out of it.
His wife, who didn't have faith, has turned into the pillar of salt. But then he.
By his two daughters starts another family, not a family of faith. From that point on, those children, along with Hagar's children, were a constant born in the flesh of Israel.
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They became the enemies in many cases of the Israelites. And so the bottom line message is, brethren, we're in the path of faith too. But it's a humbling path. And sometimes when we don't walk in faith, in the learning process, we bring upon ourselves or upon our children or upon the assembly where we are consequences that go well beyond our own generation.
God will thank you, Abraham.
He's proving Abrahams faith, perhaps to us to show that he was right. His faith was counted to him for righteousness. These two verses you mentioned, the one in Deuteronomy and the one here in Genesis 22, they seem contradictory, but I don't believe they're contradictory at all. God never intended to allow Abraham to kill his son. And when Abraham got to the appointed place on the mountain.
God stopped him. He did not allow him to sacrifice his son, to pass his son through the fire. I think perhaps the thought may be substitution.
Abraham turned around and saw behind him a ram caught in the thicket by the horns.
And he was able to use that RAM.
In the place of his son as a substitution.
If you look in verse of our chapter, look in verse 12.
God commands Abraham not to not kill his son, he says in verse 12.
Lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him. For now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son from thee. Neighbor him lifted up his eyes and looked. And behold, behind him Iran caught in a thicket by his horns. And Abraham went and took the ram, and offered him up for his burnt offering.
In the state of his son. So God never planned for Abraham to go through with this sacrifice of his son. These two verses are not contradictory.
Like to comment?
Part of a verse that was read yesterday and briefly commented on.
Where at the end of verse six it says they went both of them together.
That same expression occurs at the end of verse eight again. So they went both of them together.
And.
Then we see a modification of that statement again in verse 19.
So Abraham returned unto his young men, and they rose up and went together. Well, we know that Abraham in this case pictures the Father, and the Lord Jesus would picture that son who willingly gave himself for us. So we see unity here. We see communion between the Father and the Son that was never interrupted.
Which was constant and consistent. And so I believe we have that thought and there were a couple verses that came to mind that.
I was just looking at the other day in connection with walking together, and here it's not the father and the son, but it's the believer walking.
In communion with the Lord and walking in communion with His brethren. Let's just turn to 2nd Kings chapter 2 for a moment.
We see Elijah and Elijah here brought before us in this chapter and I just want to call the mind.
Several expressions that occur here in the chapter the end of verse 6.
And says they too went on. There's a togetherness there, isn't there? There's communion not only with the Lord, but with one another.
The end of verse seven. They too stood by Jordan.
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The end of verse eight, they too went over on dry ground, but I think that verse 11 is a culmination of what we have in the earlier versions and it says and it came to pass as they still.
Went on, we read in Galatians, it says we did run well, who did hinder you? And so it's the Lord's desire that each one of us go on in communion with himself. The Lord looks at the end as well as the beginning. And so may we be like the apostle Paul to finish our course.
With joy. And so I just thought of that word together they.
Still went on.
Just said further justify God and then to Abraham.
Very quickly, Hebrews 11 gives Abraham credit, in God's view for completing what he was told to do. It says in Hebrews 11 clearly that he offered up his only begotten son. Here in this chapter, he was told to offer up his only son, and so he did what God told him to do, and God gives him credit for the ACT. That his son wasn't burnt wasn't something that Abraham could have seen. In fact, Hebrews 11 Says he looked past death to resurrection, something he'd never seen.
But he knew the heart of the gods that was calling to him, giving him instructions, and so he continued on, even though he thought the flames would end up consuming his son. But He carried out what we were reminded yesterday was a voluntary offering. The burnt offering character, the voluntary character of it. God credited him with it in Hebrews 11. There was no inconsistency between what happened and what God told him to do. Also, one other point in Deuteronomy 18.
Verse 9, prior to the instruction in verse 10, the key to that is that they were not to get their instructions from the abominations of the Canaanites. Their instructions were to come from God and they were not to follow the people in the land. What's Abraham doing here is getting his instruction from God. So he's consistent in getting his instruction from God. God's consistent in what he asked him to do and what he credited him with doing.
And there's no.
There's no injustice or inconsistency with God in it. There's one count that you referred to in Hebrews 11. If we read the first part of verse 19, it says accounting that God was able.
That's a powerful statement, isn't it?
I should comment on this. Thank you for the question to a lot of young people here, younger ones too, I think it's good to raise questions and don't feel that you've been corrected. Sometimes we listen to the answer, we feel like we're being corrected. No, we're trying to help. So thank you for that. One more thought. And that is often we found in the Word of God. It would tell us something and then Satan will come along.
And he would trust that just so slightly. Either he adds a little bit to it or take a little bit away from it or simply just lied about it. So it should be an encouragement to us in a sense that we're the search the scriptures, we need to study the scriptures study so that we can be approved of God, not of men. So we know how to cut a straight line when the time comes.
Like that or a few more words about they went together to.
And what it's a picture of.
As we know, here is the burnt offering, and the Father and the Son.
The New Testament picture is carried on in John's Gospel.
And in John's Gospel, you have the character of the burnt offering and you have the Father and the Son going together. And when you get to what we read about in the end of the life of the Lord Jesus, we have nothing about the three hours of darkness recorded for us. We have it in Matthew, we have it in Mark, we have it in Luke, but you don't have it in John.
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The Father and the Son together in the matter of atonement, go beyond what is revealed or our capacity to know, and it's well for us to respect and reverence. There are things in which the Father and the Son go together that go beyond whatever we will ever be able to comprehend or understand.
It's their own, and uniquely their own joy.
In some things and their own understanding.