As Jack mentioned tonight, we're going to be studying a lesson that is entitled, Faith and the Promises of God. And once again, it's a lesson that comes to us from Hebrews chapter 11, so if you have your Bibles, you can turn over there with me.
- Hebrews 11
- Genesis 15
I want to emphasize again, that these are series of lessons that are All About Faith. And what we're studying and what we want to achieve is, I think it's the goal of or should be the goal of everybody here tonight. In the end, we want to be pleasing in the sight of God. And the Bible teaches us it's going to take faith in order for us to accomplish that.
And so we have to have the faith to walk with God, as we looked at with Enoch this morning in our Bible class. We have to have the faith to work for God, as we looked at Noah in our Sunday morning worship period. And tonight we're going to look at the idea we have to have faith in the promises of God like Abraham and Sarah.
I'm reminded of the words of Jesus that He spoke to His disciples in the upper room just before he went out into the garden of Gethsemane.
- John 16:3
If the disciples of Jesus didn't know that by the time in about a week or so after his death, they certainly would have learned it by experience throughout the rest of their lives. Now, I find it interesting, that Peter, who would have been one of those people who was present in that upper room with Jesus when he spoke those words, would later write 1st Peter.
- 1 Peter 4:12
When we think about troubles and we think about the difficulties of life, it should not appear to be a foreign idea to us that those things are going to be. That they're going to exist in this world.
- Job 14:1
And the longer you live through life, the longer we experience living here on this earth, I think the more we begin to understand that this life is filled with difficult things. In this life, we're going to encounter troubling things. It's just a matter of life.
Jesus told his disciples, you're going to have tribulation in this world. Peter told first-century Christians when difficult times come, don't think it a strange thing or don't think it unusual as something weird is happening to us that has never happened to man before.
And what I want to point out tonight is; that it's important for us to realize the certainty of troubles and difficulties in this life. Because faith in the promises of God can help us during those difficult and troubling times. And that's what we want to talk about tonight.
Abraham and Sarah's Faith in the Promises of God
And that's what we want to look at in the lives of Sarah and Abraham.
- Hebrews 11:11-12
Tonight I want to point out three different things that for us to think about when it comes to the promises of God.
1) God Addresses PROBLEMS with Promises
The first one is the idea that it's often the case that God addresses the concerns that we have and the problems that we have in this life. And in fact, when you study the life of Abraham and Sarah, that's exactly how God operated.
- Genesis 15:1-6
Abraham and Sarah had a concern, and one of the great concerns that they had in this life was that they wanted a child. They wanted a physical heir. And God promised Abraham that he would one day have a son. I think all of us are probably familiar with the initial promises that God gave to Abraham in Genesis chapter 12.
We often refer to them in a threefold nature. We talk about the idea that God made Abraham
- a land promise
- a nation promise
- a seed promise
In order for that seed to come into existence, that would bless all nations of the world, Abraham had to have a son. And so God, in essence, promised him that one day he would have a son.
Now Abraham left Ur of the Chaldees; that was his homeland, and he left his family. With the idea that God was going to fulfill that promise. And we have no indication in the scripture that God ever said to Abraham, Now you're going to have to wait a long time before I do this for you.
I think probably in the mind of Abraham he thought, Well, I'll leave and a day or two later, or a week later, or a month, or maybe even a year, then I'll have a son just like God promised me. But the Bible indicates to us that Abraham had to wait many, many years before God would fulfill this promise to him. And he was constantly reminded in the back of his mind; there was this concern about having a child, about having a son, and about God fulfilling this promise for him.
- Genesis 15
You'll find a conversation that took place between God and Abraham. And I'm not exactly sure at what age Abraham was whenever this conversation took place. The, safest thing that I can say is he was somewhere between the ages of 75 and 86. I know that's not a minute gap, but that's about all the information we have.
- Genesis 15:1
I often think about when I read about the patriarchs and you read about God appearing to people, what that would be like. I can't even begin to imagine what it would be like to have God appear to you in a dream or in a vision like He did to Abraham. And there are not a lot of people when you study the Bible who can claim that privilege as their own; God appeared to me in a dream or God spoke to me in a vision. But Abraham was one of those people.
And so you think about how would you feel, if God showed up and he began talking to you, and then if he expressed to you what he said to Abraham. He said to Abraham, don't be afraid. And he told him, you don't have to be afraid because I'm going to be your shield. I'm going to be in front of you, and I'm going to take care of you, and I'm going to protect you, and your reward is going to be exceedingly great.
Can you imagine if God said that to us in a dream or a vision today? I think all of us would be like, man, that's awesome, isn't it? You know, I think all of us would be joyful at what had taken place, and be thankful, but it's kind of interesting to me what happens in verse 2.
- Genesis 15:2
How often are we like Abraham? We have all these overflowing blessings in our lives, and we often concentrate on the one thing we do not have. And that's our focus and our main concern. Again, think about what God has just said. Don't be afraid. I'm your shield. I'm going to reward you greatly. And Abraham says, Yeah, but I don't have a son. And remember, you made me that promise. You said, you know, through my seed, all nations of the earth were going to be blessed.
You said you were going to make of me a great nation. And what are you going to give me? Because the person who's standing to inherit everything that I have now is, is one of the male servants within my household. And so God takes him by the hand in verse six, and he takes him outside and he shows him the stars of the heaven, and he gives him a great promise.
- Genesis 26:4-5
And so he's telling Abraham, I've got it. Don't worry about it. You're going to have a son. He's going to be a son from your own seed. And your nation, your descendants are going to be like the stars of the heavens. Abraham has these concerns and how does God address the concerns of Abraham? He says I'm going to take care of it.
It's going to happen. Don't worry about it. And we read in verse, uh, six, kind of the crux of the matter here. The Bible makes this statement about Abraham. It says, and he believed in the Lord and he counted it unto him for righteousness. What I want to emphasize to you is for probably about the next 25 years of Abraham's life, he had to live relying upon the promise of God.
He had a concern that always was in the back of his mind. He had some difficulties that he went through in life, but the thing that helped him through those next 25 years was this great promise that God had given him. And you know what it took to believe that promise? It took faith, didn't it?
Abraham believed God when he promised him great rewards in the future, and great things would happen to him in the future. And it was counted unto him for righteousness. So I want us to think about this idea tonight.
2) Why does God PRESENT us with Promises?
Why does God present us with promises? Why isn't it the case that God just tells us we're going to get something, and like in the case of Abraham, we don't get it the very next day?
Or we don't get it the very next moment, or why is it when we obey the gospel of Christ, God doesn't immediately transport us into heaven, and give us salvation and eternity? Why is it that he gives us these promises, and then tells us we've got to wait on them? I think there are two things that really come to mind, but before we go there, let me emphasize to each one of us as Christians tonight, that God does give us promises.
- 2 Peter 1:3-4
Some of the greatest concerns that we have concerning our future, God gives us promises. In other words, He doesn't immediately work out our future. He doesn't immediately transport us into the future and say everything's okay. He just says, listen, I'm promising you, in the end, it's going to work out. In the end, you're going to have great reward. In the end, you're going to be blessed more than you've ever been blessed before.
Kind of the same promise that He made to Abraham. And as Peter described these promises, the way that he described, describes in the King James Version are exceeding great and precious promises. In other words, they're promises of great reward, aren't they? They are high-value promises, high-return promises, we might say.
And when you think about God's people in the Old Testament, the Israelites, they were always a people who were living on promises, weren't they? There was always something that they were looking forward to in the future, whether it was a land or whether it was a descendant. There was always something that they were holding on to and some promise of God that they were anticipating to come in the future.
They were just waiting for God to fulfill those promises. God's people today are no different. We are still looking and waiting on the promises. We are still hoping for the future. These exceeding great and precious promises that God has given to each one of us. But why? Why just a promise? And why do we have to wait?
He Gives us Promises to Heighten our PERSPECTIVE
I think one of the reasons that God tells us or gives us promises is to help us heighten our perspective, help us broaden our view of things beyond this world. Several key scriptures in the New Testament remind us that as Christians we're supposed to have this broadened view of exactly what's happening and the things that are awaiting in the future.
As a human, I always find that sometimes difficult to do.
- 2 Corinthians 4:18
Do you find that hard to do sometimes? Do you find it hard to look upon the things that you can't see, and instead we're looking at only the things that we can see? Well, God says you have to look to the future. You have to look beyond this world. You have to be able to see beyond the things that can be seen with the physical eyes.
And so God is teaching us to lift up our eyes. He's teaching us to be able to look further than what is exactly in front of us. Too often as a human being, I'm narrow-minded in the sense that I'm near-sighted. I have, I have trouble sometimes seeing those things that are far off in the distance, especially when it comes to spiritual matters.
And a lot of times the things that are right in front of me are the things that cloud my vision. And the things that cause me not to be able to look beyond our current circumstances.
But faith. What we've learned about faith. Faith is not being able to see necessarily what you believe in and what your confidence and trust are in, but it's being convicted of the reality of what you cannot see.
Isn't that what we learned with Noah? Noah was moved with fear. He'd seen, or he believed in things that he had not yet seen. So faith is not seeing. If you can see something, you don't have to have faith that it's there. It's a reality if you know that it's there. But faith is believing in that which you cannot see, being convicted of the reality of it, although you cannot see it with the physical eye.
And so that's what Abraham had to believe. Could he see his son that God promised him? Could he see the land? Could he see his descendants living in that land? Could he see this great nation that God had built of him, built from him? No. But through the eye of faith, he could. Through the eye of faith, the Bible says that he was completely convinced that what God said was going to happen.
- Genesis 15:5
Abraham asked God about the question about his child, his descendants, and his children. And God said, Don't look here upon the earth. He said I want you to lift your eyes. I want you to look at the heavens to be able to see what I'm going to do for you.
And sometimes I think, as Christians, again, our eyes are too low. You know, we're not lifting our eyes up. We're not looking at heavenly and spiritual things, and we're not seeing the big picture of things as God often sees it.
We think about success in earthly terms. And we think about when we look at our lives, we aspire to be successful by measuring it in earthly or physical ways. And so we think, well, if, if I'm going to be successful in life, I've got to have a, you know, a three-figure salary, or I've got to have a certain size square footage house, or I got to drive a certain car, or I got to wear certain clothes, or, there are certain goals that I have accomplished in life. in order to be successful. And we often miss the big picture of things.
None of those things are the way that God measures success. And so here's Abraham, and he's looking around on this earth here, and he's saying, where's my son? God tells Abraham, He says, I want to let you to lift your eyes higher. I want you to look up toward the heavens.
Abraham just wanted a son, but God wanted more than that for Abraham. What? What God wanted to do for Abraham was establish a race through which one of his descendants would bless all nations and all people of the earth. And so Abraham's goal was a little bit less lofty than what God's goal was for him.
But I think God uses those promises to try to help us to look higher than this earth.
- 1 Corinthians 2:9
The promises that God has given to us as Christians, a lot of times people ask the question, you know, we read about these descriptions in the Bible, about all these amazing things of what Heaven is going to be like. Is it really going to be that good? And the answer is no.
It's going to be better than what we read about in the Bible. We can't even begin to imagine the things that God has prepared for us. Our eyes have never seen anything like it. Our ears have never heard anything like the sounds of heaven. Our minds cannot even begin to fathom the great place that God has prepared for each one of us who loves him.
And so the point that I'm making is this, the success that we often envision is so much lower than the success that God actually has planned for us. And it makes it difficult for us to look beyond the world. But that's what God wants us to do. And so he gives us these promises to try to help us look beyond the current circumstances.
He Gives Promises to PREPARE us for Greater Things
To try to look beyond this world in which we live. The second reason I think God presents us with promises is to help prepare us for greater things. Sometimes when we think about the life that we live here upon this earth, I think we think this is all there is. In other words, this is the main point of living.
But I think the Bible teaches us that there's more to living than just what this earth has to offer and this life is going to give to us. In fact, when we get beyond this life, I believe the Bible clearly teaches us that there are greater plans that God has for each one of us. I know sometimes when we talk about Heaven, we like to envision it as sitting around in lawn chairs, you know, drinking lemonade and fishing out of a pond. But it's much more than that because God created us for a purpose.
- 1 John 2:17
It's no secret that this earth is winding down, that it is deteriorating, it's not going to last forever. And while we're living upon this earth, God is conducting us on a journey. That journey is the journey of our soul.
God did not create this earth intending for our soul to live here forever. He has greater plans for us beyond this realm. And so, He knew that our souls are not going to live in a mortal body forever. And He's prepared a place for us where those souls can live.
But think about the purpose of our creation.
- Ecclesiastes 12:13
Or, in other words, this is the whole of man. This is the reason why we were created. We were created to serve God. And just like angels serve God in Heaven when we get to Heaven, we're going to be serving God there. We're going to be worshipping, we're going to be doing whatever God tells us to do, going on whatever missions God tells us to go on.
And so it's something greater that God has prepared for us than this world. Jesus described it.
- Luke 16:11
Why are we living here right now? This world is a testing ground for greater things that God has planned for us. And the test, as Jesus put it right here, is can we be faithful with valuable things that are temporary in nature? So God takes these valuable things that are physical and he entrusts them into our care. And, can we be faithful with those things? Well, Jesus pointed out, if God is trusting us with these physical things and we're not being faithful to Him, do you think He's going to entrust us with greater things than physical?
Do you think he's going to hand us over spiritual things and say, now I know you can't be trusted while you are on earth with physical things, but I think you'll be reliable in heaven with spiritual things? Not going to work that way, is it? God is not just going to hand over to us true riches without us proving whether we are trustworthy, whether we are faithful.
And so you have this principle in the scripture where God is basically saying, can I trust you to trust me? Can I give you things and tell you what to do with them, and you're going to, you have so much confidence and faith and belief in me that you're going to do whatever I tell you no matter what? God is preparing us for higher things and so one of the ways that He helps prepare us for those things is not just by handing us the keys, but by giving us promises of greater things to come.
3) We must PAUSE for the promises of God.
One of the key things that we learn about with Abraham and Sarah is that we have to wait, or if you're into alliteration, pause for God's promises. And that's one of those things that's not an easy thing to do. What, what you read about, even for Abraham and Sarah, it wasn't easy.
I know sometimes we read in the Bible about Abraham and his great faith. And, I'm not saying that Abraham doubted God, but there were times I think there were questions in his mind. I think when you read about what he did and what Sarah did, you have to say, maybe a little bit of doubt right there, right?
Don’t Employ Man’s PROCESS to Achieve God’s End
Maybe a little bit, we need to get on top of this thing before it gets out of hand. And so you see those ideas that are presented to us in the scripture, and what we learn from that is we can't use man's process to try to accomplish God's means, to fulfill God's promises. It's not going to work.
Abraham and Sarah tried it, didn't they?
- Genesis 16:1-4
What we read about here is, remember God gave Abraham this initial promise. He even takes him outside and holds him by the hand and says, Look at the stars, these are going to be your descendants. You're going to have, a son through your own seed, through your own body. Ten years later, he still doesn't have a son.
And so, Sarah came up with this idea. And, I know a lot of people would like to just blame Sarah and say, well, it was her fault. But Abraham went along with it, didn't he? He didn't, he didn't withdraw from what Sarah wanted to do, and she says, listen, I'm not gonna have a child. And so here's what we need to do. We need to be sure, while you can still have children, that we're able to bring a child into this world through my handmaiden, Hagar. And so she encourages him to take Hagar and to have a child with her.
Well, Abraham did exactly what Sarah wanted him to do. They got impatient. They got a little bit concerned about these promises that God had made to him that maybe they had misinterpreted, that maybe it just wasn't going to be like they thought it was going to be.
And so they thought, we've got to do something about this. And at the time, when Hagar becomes pregnant, I imagine that that seemed like an answer to their prayers, don't you? I imagine they thought, this is awesome. This is great. You know, now you're going to have a son. Now you're going to have a nation. Now they're going to inherit this land. Now there's going to be one of your descendants who's going to come into this world and bless all nations of this earth. They thought; this is truly a child who is a blessing from God.
But it didn't take long for them to change their attitude, did it? In fact, we read about how immediately after this takes place, and Hagar has this child, there was a conflict, there was turmoil that began within the house of Abraham.
- Genesis 16:4-5
There was turmoil in Abraham's house. There was this bitter war of pride and place and authority. Because now Hagar says, Hey, guess what? My son is the one in charge. My son is going to receive all these blessings. My son is going to inherit Abraham's possessions. And so now I'm more important than you are, Sarah. Now I have a bigger place, a position inside this family.
And there was that constant turmoil between those two individuals. Undoubtedly, the next 13 years had to be almost miserable, I think, for Sarah. And finally, whenever she does have a child, as God had promised, she takes some drastic measures.
- Genesis 21:8
This turmoil and this conflict, this man-made means to accomplish the promises of God finally came to be the curse that it was. It finally came to a boiling point within the house where Ishmael is once again making fun of Isaac, Abraham's heir. And Sarah says this isn't going to happen anymore. And so she said we got to get rid of Hagar and we got to get rid of your son Ishmael.
You know, you think about Abraham's position. It had to be a difficult one. But ask this question; How did he get in that position? And how did Sarah get in that position? And the answer is they became impatient with the promises of God.
Think about that as Christians. How many times do we get ourselves in a difficult position because we become impatient with the promises of God?
Things aren't happening like we want them to happen. We aren't seeing the results in our lives, that we want to see. We aren't having the immediate gratification that we want to have. And so we get impatient and we try to find this man-made means to accomplish, or carry out, or help God fulfill His promises.
God doesn't need our help to fulfill His promises. He's going to do it in His own due time. And he's going to do it without our interfering.
And that's one of the lessons I think that Abraham and Sarah learned along the way. You know, this idea, that Abraham had grown weary, and Sarah had grown weary of this idea of an elderly couple bearing a child. In their minds, it was humanly impossible. And so they became discouraged, and they became impatient with the promises of God. And they made a mess of things.
Our lives can get into a pretty big mess when we become impatient with the promises of God. As Christians, we have to have the faith. We have to have the confidence and the trust and the endurance that God is going to do what He said He was going to do.
Waiting Implies PERIODS of time
We just have to bear with it. We just have to patiently hang in there. And here's the thing about the idea of waiting. I don't know if you know it or not, but waiting implies a period of time, doesn't it? I'm reminded of that from time to time when I go to the waiting room. Uh, I'm always amazed when you go to a doctor's appointment.
You know, they're, you gotta be there 15 minutes early, but they can be an hour late. But you sit in the waiting room, right? And they call it the waiting room for a reason. Because you're gonna be there for a while. There's gonna be a period of time where you're gonna have to sit in this room, and you're gonna have to wait it out.
And, listen, patience, I don't know how you guys are with patience, but patience isn't one of my big attributes. I'm, generally speaking, an impatient person. Have I grown better at it? I think so. But I'm not perfect. And as Americans, I don't think patience is one of our strong suits. You know, you have all these different ideas.
I know I'm getting older, but I can remember when I was a kid, you would order something. It would take like a month for it to get there. And then, you know, you had Amazon. They came out with a two-day shipping. You could order stuff now. It's more like two weeks. But you, they came out with a two-day. You could order it in two days. You would have it. We want stuff now, don't we? We want immediate gratification. We want to see results right now.
From time to time, whenever I, fish or hunt, I'm reminded of that idea, because one of the great attributes of any good fisherman or hunter is patience. And, as people say, they call it fishing for a reason. It's not catching. You know, every time you throw out there, you don't catch something. You've got to be patient. You just got to keep up with it. And generally speaking, if you do that, good results come from?
Well, Christianity is a lot like that. We want immediate gratification. We want to see instantaneous results. We want the promises that God has made us right here and right now. But you know what the Bible says? We're gonna have to wait. We're gonna have to wait until after this life to receive those great rewards, those precious promises that God has made to each one of us. You can read these passages in the book of Psalms.
- Psalm 27:14
- Psalm 37:7-8, 34
- Psalm 130:5-6
I'll not read them to you tonight. But they're talking about the idea of waiting on the Lord, of being patient with God, of operating on God's timetable. And that's not an easy thing to do. The Bible tells us that time is nothing to God.
- 2 Peter 3:8
He's just talking about time doesn't mean anything to God. Listen, if you've got all the time in the world, and somebody says, hey, 30 minutes, what does that mean to you? Nothing. That's God. Time means nothing to God. And as Christians, we have to have enough faith where time means nothing to us too.
Abraham had to have 25 years' worth of patience before God eventually fulfilled the promise that He made to him. But did God do it? Were those promises that, God made to Abraham, were they worth waiting for? Were they worth bringing about those great and precious rewards that God had said would come to him?
You know, despite a few setbacks, Abraham is a great example of waiting on the promises of God. And I want to leave you tonight with a scripture that's found in Romans.
- Romans 4:18-22
You know, you have this principle where God, or where Abraham believed these promises that God made to him. And because he believed him, we talked about it this morning, He was right in the sight of God.
That's what God wants from each one of us. Unwavering faith. Unwavering confidence and trust in Him.
- Romans 4:18-23
You see, we have this great story about Abraham and his faith and the promises of God. It's not just a good story in the Bible, it's a lesson for us. Abraham believed God. Abraham waited on the promises of God. And he was rewarded because of it. And he was counted righteous in the sight of God because of it.
God gives us exceeding great and precious promises. Promises of great reward. Promises of an unimaginable future. And if we believe those promises, just like Abraham, we're going to be counted righteous in the sight of God, just like Abraham was too. We know that God knows what he's doing. Don't get impatient with God.
His way is always going to be the best way. Our job is to be patient and to wait on those precious promises. And the only way we're going to accept and inherit those promises is by or through faith?
Maybe someone is reading and listening to this lesson who has not obeyed the gospel of Jesus Christ. Some great and precious promises are given to Christians in the Scripture. We just touched the hem of the garment here in this lesson. But don't you want to inherit those promises?
One of the greatest things blessings that we have in Christ is the forgiveness of our sins. What God does, is the operation that He performs in washing away our sins by the blood of Christ when we obey the gospel.
If you are somebody who needs to do that, or if you're an erring child of God who's sinned in a public way, and you need to make a confession, or you just desire the prayers of the church on your behalf we'd ask you to please contact us so we can assist you in coming to obedience of faith.
