Sermon - June 29, 2014 - The Story Week 4 - Deliverance

A high-powered Chicago attorney went to Texas to dove hunt. He shot a dove and it fell over behind a fence. The attorney climbed the fence and saw his dove. He also saw a rough Texas farmer on his tractor. The farmer asked, “What are you doing here?” The attorney said, “I’m dove hunting and I shot this dove. I’ve come to get it.” The farmer said, “You can’t do that. This is private property.” The attorney puffed out his chest and said, “If you don’t give me my dove, I’ll sue you.” The wise old Texan said, “Well, that’s not how we do it down here.” “How do you do it down here,” the attorney asked. “We have the Texas three-kick rule.” Puzzled, the attorney asked, “What’s the three kick rule.” The farmer explained, “I kick you three times. Then you kick me three times. We keep doing it until one of us gives up.” The smart attorney thought about it and said, “OK, let’s do the three-kick rule.”  The rough Texan got off his tractor wearing big, heavy cowboy boots. “I’ll start,” he said. He kicked the attorney in the leg and the attorney felt sharp, searing pain, but he stayed up. The farmer kicked him again and the attorney doubled over and fell to the dirt in agony. Then, the farmer kicked him a third time in the head and the attorney saws stars. The attorney staggered to his feet and squeaked out, “Now, it’s my turn.” The Texas farmer said, “Nah, I give up. You can have your dove.” Sometimes a good swift kick with a cowboy boot moves things along. In our episode of The Story today, God is going to use a very big cowboy boot to move the king of Egypt along and in the process, deliver this new nation He had created.

If you remember back two weeks ago we talked about how God’s Upper Story is His plan to save all human kind and the Lower Story is the day to day stuff we deal with. We talked about how God used the Lower Story stuff of Joseph’s life, all the bad things, betrayal, slavery, prison, etc... to accomplish God’s Upper Story of moving the people of Israel into Egypt.

Now we turn our attention to life after Joseph and how God delivered His people out of Egypt.

Exodus 1:5-7

“⁵ The total number of Jacob’s descendants was 70; Joseph was already in Egypt. ⁶ Then Joseph and all his brothers and all that generation died. ⁷ But the Israelites were fruitful, increased rapidly, multiplied, and became extremely numerous so that the land was filled with them.”

This new Nation was small when Jacob passed, but scripture tells us it grew and grew. God was blessing the families of the Israelites, so much that it was starting to cause problems with the Egyptians.

When a Pharaoh came to power that no longer remembered or honoured what Joseph had done for the Egyptians and noticed that the Israelite’s were more numerous than the Egyptians he became nervous and felt action had to be taken. They enslaved the Israelites.

God continued to bless the Israelites and they continued to multiply and continued to spread out. The more they were oppressed, it seemed the more they multiplied. The Egyptians feared that the Israelites would turn against them, so Pharaoh decided that all the male Israelite children were to be killed upon birth.

Over 400 years the Israelites started as welcome guests in Joseph’s day, to foreigners, to slaves, and then they were seen as threats that must be destroyed. Was this change a surprise to God? Not in the least, He predicted this would come to pass.

Genesis 15:12-14

“¹² As the sun was setting, a deep sleep fell on Abram, and suddenly great terror and darkness descended on him. ¹³ Then the Lord said to Abram, “Know this for certain: Your offspring will be foreigners in a land that does not belong to them; they will be enslaved and oppressed 400 years. ¹⁴ However, I will judge the nation they serve, and afterward they will go out with many possessions.”

Since God new that the Israelites were going to be slaved and tormented by the Egyptians, did He cause it to happen? No.

The foul treatment of the Israelites was the result of fear and the sin nature of the Egyptian people. God did not cause it but, He used this bad thing and turned it good.

Romans 8:28

“We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God: those who are called according to His purpose.”

Again we find some pretty nasty things going on in the Lower Story, but we are about to see how the daily struggles are about to be turned into the Upper Story. God is going to use this opportunity to reveal Himself to His people and the world.

God reveals himself in three ways as He deliveries His people.

God reveals His name, His power, and His plan.

During this time of genocide where the Egyptians are tormenting the Israelites and slaughtering their young boys, a son is born. The mother did everything she could to protect her child and eventually she placed him in a basket out on the river. It was here that he was found by Pharaoh’s daughter. The mother’s faithfulness was blessed, by God orchestrating events so that she was able to raise her son for the first handful of years of his life. This young boy was Moses, who was raised as an Egyptian and then escaped into the dessert at the age of 40.

During his time in the dessert he met his wife, started a family, all the while he was being shaped by God for what was to come. 40 years later, God revealed Himself to Moses.

Exodus 3:2-6

“² Then the Angel of the Lord appeared to him in a flame of fire within a bush. As Moses looked, he saw that the bush was on fire but was not consumed. ³ So Moses thought: I must go over and look at this remarkable sight. Why isn’t the bush burning up? ⁴ When the Lord saw that he had gone over to look, God called out to him from the bush, “Moses, Moses!” “Here I am,” he answered. ⁵ “Do not come closer,” He said. “Remove the sandals from your feet, for the place where you are standing is holy ground.” ⁶ Then He continued, “I am the God of your father, the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob.” Moses hid his face because he was afraid to look at God.”

God was revealing His name.

Moses was not too sure about what God was asking. Moses felt he was not qualified to do what God was asking. Moses had a speech issue and he was a criminal with a death sentence. Moses seemed pretty convinced that he was the wrong man for the job. After all who was he to tell Pharaoh what to do? How was he going to convince Pharaoh to let go of his roughly 3 million slaves?

Moses thought he was not qualified, but God saw things differently.

Exodus 3:11

“But Moses asked God, “Who am I that I should go to Pharaoh and that I should bring the Israelites out of Egypt?”

Moses said his piece, but God clearly responds in verse 12.

“He answered, “I will certainly be with you and this will be the sign to you that I have sent you: when you bring the people out of Egypt, you will all worship God at this mountain.”

Moses said but I am not qualified, God said I am with you, I will see you through this. You would think this would be enough for Moses, but he had to ask more questions, he had to have more answers. He asked God, ‘who should I say sent me, what is your name?”

Exodus 3:14

“God replied to Moses, “I AM WHO I AM. This is what you are to say to the Israelites: I AM has sent me to you.”

God revealed Himself through His Name, then God reveals Himself through His Power.

Moses went and talked to Pharaoh and said “Let my people go.” As expected Pharaoh did not listen, he did not want to let his slaves go free. Pharaoh hardened his heart and resisted. When he would not listen to reason, God showed how powerful He is.

10 horrible plagues, the first 9 being all water turning to blood, frogs, gnats, flies, diseased livestock, boils, hail, locust, and darkness. God revealed Himself in power.

During some of the plagues Pharaoh would tell Moses his people could leave, but as soon as things cleared up he would quickly change his mind. These plagues showed the Egyptians that regardless of the gods they worshiped, that Moses’ God was the only real God. He was also revealing himself to the Israelites with power. God told Moses to say to the Israelites.

Exodus 6:6

⁶ “Therefore tell the Israelites I am Yahweh, and I will deliver you from the forced labor of the Egyptians and free you from slavery to them. I will redeem you with an outstretched arm and great acts of judgment.”

God revealed Himself in His name and He revealed Himself in His Power, and He revealed Himself in His Plan.

God had sent 9 plagues on the Egyptians but Pharaoh’s heart was hardened, so God sent the 10^th and final plague. This plague required something that the others did not and in it God revealed His short term plan and tipped His hand and showed us how salvation would come for all human kind.

If you have your copies of The Story with me, please turn to page 50 and follow along as I read.

Read pages 50-52

The new nation left Egypt by an undeniable demonstration of the power of God as seen in the plagues and the crossing through the Red Sea.

This could be a cowboy boot moment for you. I am serious. We all are in slavery to sin. The destroyer—death—is coming. We need the blood of a lamb just as the Israelites did. Where will we get it?

John 1:29

“Here is the Lamb of God, who takes away the sin of the world!”

Paul writes in 1 Corinthians 5:7,

“For Christ our Passover has been sacrificed.”

One of the biggest clues in the Story is in the deliverance: the blood of a lamb. Ask in faith for the blood of Jesus to be put on the door frame of your soul. The deliverance from sin is free, but you must ask for it. Humble yourself. If you have never asked God to apply the blood of Jesus to your life, do so now. 

If you have not started pick up your copy of The Story and read along with us. One small chapter a week. 

God Bless,

Robert

Sermon - June 15, 2014 - The Story Week 3 - From Slavery to Deputy Pharaoh

Before we get into the message this morning I want to start off recognizing all of the fathers here. As a father you have the responsibility to lead your family. It is not always easy balancing family life, work responsibilities, financial concerns, etc... but as a father that is what you are called to do. We also don’t always get it right, we get angry, we make mistakes, we make the wrong choices. But, everything we do is out of love for our children. Growing up without my father in my life I honestly did not know the value the father provided to a family, other than another pay check. As a father myself, I see how what I do, the life I live, the example I am, has an impact on the future generation. Fathers, I want to thank you for what you do. I pray today is a wonderful Father’s day for you. Thank You!

As we turn to the Story, we need to remember that during this series we will be looking at both the Lower Story and the Upper Story.

The Lower Story is the things we deal with on a daily basis. It is the choices and decisions we make. The Upper Story is God’s big plan, tied to His supreme passion of wanting to spend eternity with us and how it works out in our lives. We saw the Upper Story being worked out in the last two weeks of The Story. We say God created everything in the universes and yet God’s passion is His final creation, human beings and His desire to be with us. So when Adam and Eve sinned, God made a plan to get us back through the promise of a Savior. The Upper Story continued as God built a nation upon faith of the most unlikely couple.

This morning we pick up The Story and get to see the Upper Story and Lower Story played out in the life a man named Joseph. Joseph was dealt a bad hand in life but he continued to honor God and was eventually blessed beyond his wildest dreams. As we look at The Story let’s remember that both the Upper and Lower Stories are playing out in our own lives. We need to be careful to not let the Lower Story bog us down so much that we cannot see what God is doing in the Upper Story. If you think about it, we need to keep our eyes open to what God is doing in the Upper Story to make sense out of all the stuff we deal with in life.

Joseph’s life started out fairly pampered.

Genesis 37:3

“³ Now Israel loved Joseph more than his other sons because Joseph was a son born to him in his old age, and he made a robe of many colors for him.”

While Joseph was the son of a sheep herder, Joseph was treated better than his brothers. He is given nicer clothes to wear and most likely was not expected to work as hard as the others. This created some serious tension, which did not get any better when Joseph started having prophetic dreams and shared them with his family.

Genesis 37:5-8

“⁵ Then Joseph had a dream. When he told it to his brothers, they hated him even more. ⁶ He said to them, “Listen to this dream I had: ⁷ There we were, binding sheaves of grain in the field. Suddenly my sheaf stood up, and your sheaves gathered around it and bowed down to my sheaf.”

⁸ “Are you really going to reign over us?” his brothers asked him. “Are you really going to rule us?” So they hated him even more because of his dream and what he had said.”

Talk about not the smartest thing to do. Here Joseph already despised by his brothers, thinks it’s a good idea to tell them about his dream. A dream that shows that they are going to submit to him, probably not the wisest thing to do. As if that was not bad enough and the hatred it earned him from his brothers, he went and did it a second time. He brothers were full of jealousy and hatred, which tends to lead to bad things.

Shortly thereafter, we find Israel sending his favorite, unwise, son out to check on his brothers and that is where things get real ugly. The brothers first plotted to kill Joseph but decided it might be better to get some money out of him. They sold him to a slave trader and dipped his prized cloak in blood and lied to their father saying Joseph had been killed. Joseph was then sold in Egypt to Potiphar, an officer of Pharaoh and the Captain of the guard.

Imagine how down Joseph must have been feeling. His life starts out with s silver spoon in his mouth, but then he is betrayed by his own flesh and blood. He went from a life of privilege to one of servitude. Thankfully this all fit into God’s plan, the Upper Story.

Genesis 39:2-6

“² The Lord was with Joseph, and he became a successful man, serving in the household of his Egyptian master. ³ When his master saw that the Lord was with him and that the Lord made everything he did successful, ⁴ Joseph found favor in his master’s sight and became his personal attendant. Potiphar also put him in charge of his household and placed all that he owned under his authority. ⁵ From the time that he put him in charge of his household and of all that he owned, the Lord blessed the Egyptian’s house because of Joseph. The Lord’s blessing was on all that he owned, in his house and in his fields. ⁶ He left all that he owned under Joseph’s authority; he did not concern himself with anything except the food he ate.”

Joseph honored God and God blessed everything he did. No matter how bad things were God was with Joseph.

Could Joseph have been preoccupied with the betrayal? Could he have let everything weigh him down? Could he have allowed all that happened turn to bitterness and hatred?... Yes, he could have. Joseph did not let the things of the Lower Story, the here and now, ruin him.

Joseph was successful and was probably thanking God for making lemonade out of the lemons he had been given. His brothers had intended for things to be horrible, but God had other plans. Then the rug was pulled out from under Joseph once again.

Potiphar’s wife tried to seduce Joseph, but honoring God and respecting the man who had elevated from scrubbing floors to running his house, Joseph resisted. She tried time and again, until one day when Joseph turned her down she accused Joseph of attacking her. Which landed Joseph in prison, life was going good and then he was knocked down once again.

The prisons of this time in Egypt did not have running water, free TV, weight rooms, and three square meals a day. This would have been a cold, wet, dingy, stinky place to be. Joseph was knocked down once again.

When disappointment hits, we might take it out on God or we might use it as an excuse to turn away from God. If we are focused on ourselves, that is likely to happen. If on the other hand we can see that God has a plan, an Upper Story and our Lower Story is a part of something bigger. When you find yourself in a position like Joseph, you need to ask one simple question. Does God Love Me? If you believe that God loves you, you will know that God wants to be with you. Joseph believed God loved him and it showed in his life.

Genesis 39:21-23

“²¹ But the Lord was with Joseph and extended kindness to him. He granted him favor in the eyes of the prison warden. ²² The warden put all the prisoners who were in the prison under Joseph’s authority, and he was responsible for everything that was done there. ²³ The warden did not bother with anything under Joseph’s authority, because the Lord was with him, and the Lord made everything that he did successful.

Once again, God works in Joseph’s life and turns something bad into something good. This was true for Joseph and it true for you. Do you believe that God loves you right here and right now? When you go through the disappointments and trials of life, His love never stops. God NEVER stops loving you. The next time you go through a trial, remind yourself “Jesus Loves Me.” You could sing the song “Jesus Loves me this I know”. If your are having marriage issues, “Yes, Jesus loves me.” Bad report from the doctor, “Yes, Jesus loves me, the Bible tells me so.” The next time you are going through something tough, remember that Jesus Loves You!

So far all of this has happened to set Joseph up for something that will change His life for good and be a major step in the history of the Nation God is creating.

While Joseph is in prison God gives him the ability two interpret two dreams. One for the royal cup bearer and the other for the chief baker. The cup bearer was to be restored to his position and the baker was to die. It took the cup bearer two years to finally tell Pharaoh about the gift God has given Joseph when Pharaoh could find no one to interpret his dreams.

Genesis 41:15-16

“¹⁵ Pharaoh said to Joseph, “I have had a dream, and no one can interpret it. But I have heard it said about you that you can hear a dream and interpret it.”

¹⁶ “I am not able to,” Joseph answered Pharaoh. “It is God who will give Pharaoh a favorable answer.”

Joseph was summoned and gave credit where the credit was due when he said it was God who will give the answer Pharaoh was looking for.

The dreams told of 7 wonderful, bountiful years, followed by 7 years of drought and famine. God was warning Pharaoh of what was to come and giving him a chance to prepare. Seeing the wisdom that God had given Joseph, Pharaoh elevated Joseph over all of Egypt. He had authority over everything. Once again God blessed Joseph and took calamity and turned it into good.

Joseph started as the favorite son and ended up as a slave. He was put in charge of the Captain of the Guards house and then ended up in jail. From the lowest position of his life, he was elevated to 2^nd to only Pharaoh.

As it said in Genesis 39:2

“The Lord was with Joseph”

Joseph could have easily let life pull him down, but instead he honored God and was blessed and the blessings kept coming.

If we take a step back and look at what God was doing, we can see that God had a plan all along. The dreams Joseph shared with his brothers do come true. At the age of 39, Joseph’s brothers come to Egypt and bow down to Joseph asking for food.

In Genesis 42, the sons of Israel come to Joseph asking for food and he treats them harshly. In chapter 43 they return to Egypt and bring their youngest brother Benjamin with them and in chapter 44 Joseph lays a trap for them planting his cup in Benjamin’s bag. When it is found Judah begs to be punished in Benjamin’s place. Upon seeing Judah’s love for his youngest brother, Joseph reveals himself to his brothers in chapter 45.

Genesis 45:3-8

“³ Joseph said to his brothers, “I am Joseph! Is my father still living?” But they could not answer him because they were terrified in his presence.

⁴ Then Joseph said to his brothers, “Please, come near me,” and they came near. “I am Joseph, your brother,” he said, “the one you sold into Egypt. ⁵ And now don’t be worried or angry with yourselves for selling me here, because God sent me ahead of you to preserve life. ⁶ For the famine has been in the land these two years, and there will be five more years without plowing or harvesting. ⁷ God sent me ahead of you to establish you as a remnant within the land and to keep you alive by a great deliverance. ⁸ Therefore it was not you who sent me here, but God. He has made me a father to Pharaoh, lord of his entire household, and ruler over all the land of Egypt.”

It is hear that Joseph understands and reveals that his struggles in life, the Lower Story, was all part of God’s Plan, the Upper Story.

Genesis 50:19-20

“¹⁹ But Joseph said to them, “Don’t be afraid. Am I in the place of God? ²⁰ You planned evil against me; God planned it for good to bring about the present result—the survival of many people.”

Joseph was God’s agent to save the new nation by bringing the new nation to Egypt. If this had not been done, there is no telling if they would have survived in Canaan for another 5 years without a harvest. Instead they flourished in Egypt and the Israelites grew to a great nation of over a million people.

God is at work in all the details of our lives to accomplish His purposes.

Romans 8:28

“We know that all things work together for the good of those who love God: those who are called according to His purpose.”

Knowing that God is working in our lives even when things seem to be crumbling around us, allows us to honor Him and remember that we need to look to the Upper Story and see what God has in store.

Remember God loves you and He wants to spend eternity with you! 

If you have not picked up your copy of The Story please do and join us on this amazing journey!

Blessings,

Robert

Sermon - June 8, 2014 - The Story Week 2 - God Builds a Nation

I hope everyone is enjoying The Story so far! I think it is going to be a great experience for us as a church as we walk through the Bible.

Last week we took at look at God’s vision in creation. We saw how all aspects of creation tied together and supported His ultimate goal of creating humans so that we could be in a relationship with Him. Adam and Eve were the first to have a choice on whether they were going to adhere to God’s plan or choose a different path. They chose that different path and sin entered them and all of human kind that came after them. Cain slew Abel and so forth. As time went on and humans turned their back on God and the wickedness prevailed in all of creation God regretted making humans. God found one man and his family and decided to use Noah to give human race a chance to restart. While the floods wiped away all the wicked people of the time it did not change the sinful nature of His creation. Thankfully God is not content to be the creator and to let His creation do whatever. He wants to be in a relationship with us and is pursuing us at great cost. As we continue in the Story today, we are going to discover that God decides to build a nation. It is through this new nation that He plans to win us back.

To see how God does this we need to turn to the man you read about in chapter 2 this past week, Abraham.

Genesis 12:1-3

“12 The Lord said to Abram: Go out from your land, your relatives, and your father’s house
to the land that I will show you. ² I will make you into a great nation, I will bless you, I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. ³ I will bless those who bless you, I will curse those who treat you with contempt, and all the peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

Abram started out in the city of Ur, the city of his father. Ur had an interesting history in that it was where the Tower of Babel was being built before God scattered the people and made it so they spoke different languages. That must have been interesting. One moment you are having a conversation with a group of people and then everyone starts speaking different languages.

Genesis chapter 11 tells us that Terah, Abram’s father, took his family from Ur to Haran. Abram was to leave Haran and head to the west and eventually end up in Canaan. It is on this journey and in this new land that God begins to build a nation.

Abram, who God renames as Abraham is to be the father of a great nation. Some would question why God would use Abram, as he came from a family of idol worshipers. Terah, Abram’s father was an idol worshiper. Ur and Haran were known for worshipping a moon god. In addition Abram and his wife Sarai, later known as Sarah, were old and had no kids. Abram and Sarai were not the obvious choice to build a nation. God does not always use who we would expect or pick through our worldly eyes. He uses people who the world sees as weak to fulfil His purposes. Think about it, the Bible is full of people who were perfect ... NO, the Bible is full of imperfect people used by God to further His will. God uses those the world would toss aside to accomplish amazing things.

Let’s read Genesis 12:1-3 again.

Genesis 12:1-3

“12 The Lord said to Abram: Go out from your land, your relatives, and your father’s house
to the land that I will show you. ² I will make you into a great nation, I will bless you, I will make your name great, and you will be a blessing. ³ I will bless those who bless you, I will curse those who treat you with contempt, and all the peoples on earth will be blessed through you.”

In these verses God has laid out His plan.

1.      God will make the new nation great.

2.      God will make Abraham’s name great.

3.      God will bless all who bless Abraham and curse those who curse him.

4.      God will bless everyone through Abraham and the new nation. In other words He will use the new nation to reveal His plan to win us back.

We have the benefit of hindsight and can see that God did these things. We have hundreds of years of documented history and the Bible that point to how the nation of Israel has had its ups and down but it has had an impact on history and the world today. Abraham’s story should remind each of us that no matter where we are at in life, no matter what our circumstances are, and no matter how difficult the challenge seems to be, God can use us to do amazing things. We also know that a young baby was born to Mary who is a descendant of Abraham has had the biggest impact on the World. Little Jesus was a blessing to all human kind and was the instrument used to win us back.

For all of this to happen, one man who is the son of an idol worshipper had to have faith in what he was being told by God. God told Abram to leave his family and go to a new land. Abram and Sarai probably had doubts, might have wondered if they were going to see their families again, probably wondered if it was safe especially at their age.

Genesis 12:4

“So Abram went, as the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. Abram was 75 years old when he left Haran.”

Regardless of the doubts he may have had, Abram simply obeyed God in faith. Faith is obeying God even when you are not sure of where you are going. Abram had faith and went. Abram and Sarai leave their home town of Ur, then they leave Haran, and they head toward Canaan. Overall they travel roughly 800 miles to arrive at their destination, the land given to them by God.

Here they arrive in the new land and when the Lord appears to Abram in a vision, Abram asks how he is going to be the father of a nation as he and Sarai are both too old for children. God speaks in Genesis 15:5.

“⁵ He took him outside and said, “Look at the sky and count the stars, if you are able to count them.” Then He said to him, “Your offspring will be that numerous.”

Having faith is believe God period.

Romans 4:18-21

“¹⁸ He believed, hoping against hope, so that he became the father of many nations according to what had been spoken: So will your descendants be. ¹⁹ He considered his own body to be already dead (since he was about 100 years old) and also considered the deadness of Sarah’s womb, without weakening in the faith. ²⁰ He did not waver in unbelief at God’s promise but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, ²¹ because he was fully convinced that what He had promised He was also able to perform.”

Abraham believed in God.

So Abram and Sarai were advanced in years and obviously passed the child bearing years and God says Abram will be the father of a great nation. Abram believe that God could and would do it. The issue comes in play when Sarai is not sure she is going to be the mother of the nation and they take matters into their own hands. Sarai offers up her servant, Hagar to be a surrogate mother. This was not unusual in that day and age. If women were unable to conceive their servant would take their place to give their husbands a child. Hagar did have a son who was named Ishmael, but he is not the child that is promised by God. God does only what He can and allows Sarai or Sarah to become pregnant and she gives birth to a son, Isaac. Image how strong Abraham’s and Sarah’s faith would have been when Isaac was born. There were fully dependent on God and believed that He would provide.

Abraham and Sarah’s faith was to be tested yet again. One key aspect of having faith is trusting God even when it doesn't make sense.

Genesis 22:1-2

“22 After these things God tested Abraham and said to him, “Abraham!” “Here I am,” he answered. ² “Take your son,” He said, “your only son Isaac, whom you love, go to the land of Moriah, and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.”

It is hard to imagine how Abraham must have felt getting this message from God. Could you imagine how much his faith must have been tested. Isaac was roughly 15 years old at this time so to say they had become attached would be an understatement. No matter how much your teenagers test you and drive you crazy, you still love them. I am sure it was the same with Isaac and his parents. At times he drove them crazy, but they loved him as much as any mother and father would their child.

If it was me, I would be devastated that God was asking such a thing. My faith would be tested beyond belief.

Genesis 22:3

“³ So Abraham got up early in the morning, saddled his donkey, and took with him two of his young men and his son Isaac. He split wood for a burnt offering and set out to go to the place God had told him about.”

Abraham got up and went. Why do you think Abraham did that? One, he believed all that God had told him and that Isaac was the beginning of a nation, but Hebrews 11:19 tells us:

“¹⁹ He considered God to be able even to raise someone from the dead,”

Abraham believed that if God was really going to have him sacrifice his son, who was the first of many of the decedents needed to build a nation, God was going to raise Isaac from the dead.

Believed whole heartedly, with faith that is hard to imagine, Abraham went up that hill, laid his son on the altar and raised the knife to sacrifice his only child to God as commanded. It was only when Abraham had shown to be faithful that God sent an angel to stop him at the last possible moment.

Genesis 22:12

“¹² Then He said, “Do not lay a hand on the boy or do anything to him. For now I know that you fear God, since you have not withheld your only son from Me.”

Then, in place of Isaac God provided a ram to be sacrificed. God said the world would be blessed by the nation that Abraham fathered. On that same hill, which is known as Calvary another lamb would be sacrificed. It was on that hill that Jesus Christ, would be THE Lamb that would pay for the sins of all of us. God provided His only begotten Son to be offered in our place on that hill to pay for our sins, and the resurrection of Jesus defeating death brought us one step closer to God’s ultimate passion.

God’s passion and plan is to be in a relationship with us and having Abram move from Ur, to Haran, to Canaan was just one step in the process to make that happen. Abraham had faith and that faith was necessary for all of us to be able to spend eternity with God. Think about it, a couple of people who the world would not have chosen to begin a nation were instrumental pieces in God’s plan to have our sins cleansed.

If God can use the faith of Abraham and Sarah to build a nation and pave the way for the birth, death, and resurrection of Jesus Christ… what can He do through you if you have faith in Him? God can do amazing things, all it takes is faith.

In our reading this week, we also saw that Isaac had two sons, Jacob and Esau. God gives Jacob the name of Israel and he has 12 sons, who become the head of the 12 tribes of Israel and a nation is born. This week we get to read about how God takes Joseph from being a slave to the second most powerful person in Egypt.

I am looking forward to continuing our journey through the Bible with the help of the Story.

God Bless and Thanks for reading,

Robert

Sermon - June 1, 2014 - The Story Week 1 - Creation

The Story Chapter 1

If you have paid attention to the movies we have talked about going to see, you might have realized I am a super hero junky. One thing that most super hero movies have is a lot of action. Most of them start off with some major action scenes that get your blood pumping and setup the battle that the super hero is going to face. In many cases if you miss the opening minutes of these movies you are trying to play catch up and figure out what is going on.

The beginning of our journey through the story of the Bible is like the beginning of an action packed super hero movie. If you miss the beginning of a fast paced movie you will struggle to understand the film. It is the same way with the Bible’s grand Story. The Story opens with a ‘big bang.’ Not the ‘big bang’ of evolution, but the ‘big bang’ of the revelation of God, Who is the main character of the Grand Story we are embarking on.

The Bible Story opens with the “big bang” of creation.

The opening verse, Genesis 1:1, introduces us to the Story’s main character: God. 

Genesis 1:1

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

“In the beginning” this is before time ever began. It might be impossible for the human mind to understand whatever was before the beginning. God obviously existed before Genesis 1, but what was it like. Before time, before creation, before there was anything, was it just chaos, nothingness, like I said it is probably impossible for us to comprehend.

Genesis 1:1 then goes on to introduce the Story’s main character; God.

“In the beginning God”

See God is not something man dreamt up or He is not something that can be explained through evolutionary theory of a ‘big bang’. God is the main character of our Bible’s and as it tells us right here He existed before time, He always was, The Creator, and a God with a plan.

Genesis 1:1

“In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.”

God created everything out of nothing. He created order and wonder out of chaos.

The ‘big bang’ of creation is presented poetically and artistically.

Days 1, 2, and 3 are places created by God.

Day 1 –Light and Dark

Day 2 – Sky and Water

Day 3 – Land

Days 4, 5, and 6 God created the things that filled those places.

Day 1 was Light and Dark – Day 4 were the Sun, Moon, and stars

Day 2 was the Sky and Water – Day 5 was the birds and creatures of the sea

Day 3 was land – Day 6 was all of animal kind and human beings

Even each day of creation was magnificently tied together with another part of creation. Think about it, it would not have worked out so well if Adam was created before the land.

In 1996, astronomers focused the powerful Hubble telescope on a small and utterly black patch of space right next to the Big Dipper constellation.  They left the shutter open for 10 days.  Do you know what they found?  They found 3000 more galaxies.  In 2004, they did it again, this time focusing the telescope on a patch of darkness next to the constellation Orion.  They left the shutter open for 11 days and found 10,000 more galaxies.  But, scientists say there are over 1 billion galaxies in our universe.  Can you even conceive of the vastness of space?  Can you even take in the complexity of all of creation.  You might read through Genesis 1 and think that the point is the creation of the universe, but that would not be correct.

The ‘big bang’ of creation concludes with God’s core passion: human beings.

Genesis 1:26-27

“²⁶ Then God said, “Let Us make man in Our image, according to Our likeness; and let them rule over the fish of the sea and over the birds of the sky and over the cattle and over all the earth, and over every creeping thing that creeps on the earth.” ²⁷ God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”

It is nice even in the first chapter of the Bible we are finding references to the Trinity.

‘Let Us’ is referring to Father, Son, and Holy Spirit... ‘Let Us make man in Our image’

Now I would be hard pressed to stand up here today and say that God looks like us. After all, who would look more like him Homer, Becky, Chris??? We all look different, so it is obviously not a physical resemblance.

Genesis 1:27

“God created man in His own image, in the image of God He created him; male and female He created them.”

If we look in chapter 2 of the book of Genesis I think we get a little more information on what it means to be created in the image of God. See God caused the man to fall asleep and God pulled a rib out of him and made the woman. Now physically speaking the rib bone is the closet bone to the man’s heart to create the woman.

Genesis 1:24

“For this reason a man shall leave his father and mother, and be joined to his wife; and they shall become one flesh.”

The Father, Son, and Holy Spirit were bound together in love. A man and woman were created in the image of God as people who are supposed to be bound together out of love. Being created in the image of God means that we are meant to love.

As we look through the creation story, you will note that at the end of every day ‘God saw that it was good’ but at the end of the sixth day after the creation of man and woman, God saw that ‘it was very good.’

The crowning accomplishment of all creation was God’s core passion, and that is that people were made in God’s image. In God’s opinion all of creation regardless of how remarkable or beautiful we say it is dulls in comparison to you. God’s sees you as His ultimate creation.

When you are feeling down or discouraged, read Genesis 1 and remember that all of creation was good, but you are ‘very good’ in the eyes of the Creator. Who can argue with that? You are more beautiful than the grandest mountain, more beautiful than the rarest of flowers, you are God’s reason for creation.

Don’t listen to what the world has to say, don’t pay heed to some comments made to you this week, last year, or whenever they were made. Do you really want to listen to what some person said about you or to what God says? How are you going to judge yourself worth, from your thoughts and the thoughts of others or are you going to listen to God?

God created Adam and Eve and placed them in the Garden of Eden. Probably one of the most beautiful places on earth, but that was not enough. God walked through the garden with them. Think about how amazing and powerful and awesome our God is and yet he is found walking on one of those tiny planets that He created.

God’s supreme passion is to be with us at all costs.

Think about that for a moment. The God that existed before anything else, the God that existed before all of creation, the God that existed before the creation of the universe, the God that already exists in a loving community as Father, Son, and Holy Spirit wants to spend time with you. You may not feel like God is with you, maybe you wonder if He has forgotten all about you, but Genesis 1 tells us something different. There is not even the slimmest of chances that God has forgotten or overlooked you. His supreme passion is to be with you at all costs. The whole story we are starting today is about God’s passion for being with you.

God created you to be with you!

The Bible Story continues with the ‘big bang’ of the Fall. Adam and Eve were created with the freedom and power to chose, our God does not force His creation to love Him. God gives us a choice, He wants our love to be freely given. He does not want blind obedience, He wants us to willingly follow Him. You could call it the tale of two trees.

Genesis 2:9

“⁹ Out of the ground the Lord God caused to grow every tree that is pleasing to the sight and good for food; the tree of life also in the midst of the garden, and the tree of the knowledge of good and evil.”

God gave Adam and Eve both the Tree of Life and the Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil with one simple rule.

Genesis 2:16-17

“¹⁶ The Lord God commanded the man, saying, “From any tree of the garden you may eat freely; ¹⁷ but from the tree of the knowledge of good and evil you shall not eat, for in the day that you eat from it you will surely die.”

God gave them the choice, you can eat from anything else in the garden but that one tree. That one tree is off limits. Basically He was saying if you eat from that tree you are choosing to live a life different than what I created you for. God had a plan and in some ways it could be summed up with, He was God and Adam and Eve were not. Eating from The Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil would be like telling God He was no longer God. That is essentially what the serpent said.

Genesis 3:4-5

“⁴ The serpent said to the woman, “You surely will not die! ⁵ For God knows that in the day you eat from it your eyes will be opened, and you will be like God, knowing good and evil.”

Adam and Eve made the choice to try to be like God. It did not work out to good for them or us.

Adam and Eve rebelled against God and ate from the forbidden Tree of Knowledge of Good and Evil and God’s vision to be with His people was ruined. He had to take His plan to the next step and begin the process of restoration. The rest of the story, the rest of the Bible is about God’s pursuit to get us back.

The Bible Story reports the ‘big bang’ of sin’s damage to the human race. Because Adam and Eve chose a different vision than God’s vision, sin became part of their spiritual DNA and they produced more sinners. As we look through the next several chapters in Genesis we find sin upon sin upon sin in the human race. Starting with Cain killing Able continuing all the way to where God is disappointed in His creation and is considering wiping human kind out.

When God begins to question what to do with the growing sin problem, He finds Noah. Noah is a man who loves God and it is through Noah and his family that God gave the human race a chance at a ‘do over’.

Sin was so rampant in the world that God could no longer allow it to continue. God gave mankind the ability to choose, and it choose to not follow God’s plan for His creation. The judgement came in the form of a great flood that wiped away all signs of the wickedness but it did not erase the sin DNA out of Noah and his family. During and immediately after the flood sin was minimal, but it still existed.

The Bible Story offers a salvation clue even in the midst of the opening ‘big bang’.

After Adam and Eve sinned and became aware of their nakedness, they made fig leaf clothing to cover their nakedness. Then God intervened.

Genesis 3:21

“²¹ The Lord God made garments of skin for Adam and his wife, and clothed them.”

God knew that they need more than garments to cover their nakedness. They needed to have their skins forgiven. As we will see in the Old Testament, blood of animals was used to pay for the sins of human kind. The clue to the coming salvation story is that blood was shed to pay for their sins as Christ’s blood was shed to pay for our sins.

From the creation story we discover the value of all human beings. God wants to be with you. Think about that. He wants to be with YOU! God wants to personally be with you. At great cost to God, God had done everything possible to get you back. You are Valuable. True, lasting self-esteem begins by believing what God says about you.

If you want to join the Clark Baptist Family over the next 31 weeks as we journey through the Bible, please come see us. If you are not local, pick up the Story from your favorite book store (online or brick and mortar) and read 12 pages a week as we go through the Bible cover to cover.

God Bless,

Robert