All right, let's turn to Genesis
12. Genesis chapter 12. The Lord
had spoken to Abram. The scripture declares, verse
4, when he departed out of Haran, he was 75 years old. When he
left He left with his wife, Sarai, nephew Lot, all the substance
that he had gathered with the souls that he had gotten while
they were in Haran, and he went to Canaan. The God of covenant
grace toward all those that He's everlastingly loved in Christ
Jesus, the God of mercy, who loves to show mercy, delights
to show mercy, faithful God, faithful to His Word, faithful
to His people, blessed all His people in the person of the Lord
Jesus Christ, And it was he who directed Abram to go to Canaan. And the scripture, given the
account we've read before, it says in Hebrews chapter 11, verse
8, by faith. Abraham, when he was called to
go out into a place which he should after receive for an inheritance,
obeyed. And he went out. not knowing
whether he went. Now, the scripture says in verse
6 of Genesis chapter 12, And Abram passed through the land
unto the place of Sycam, unto the plain of Moreh. And the Canaanite was then in
the land. Now, the carnal mind, The carnal
religious minds, what I'm talking about, would surely teach that
everybody that is obedient to Christ will always be rewarded
with an outpouring of prosperity. Natural prosperity is what they're
talking about. Now every believer in the Lord
Jesus Christ is blessed. with all spiritual blessings
in heavenly places in Christ. All that is needful for the elect
of God, the Lord gives. All that's needful, they give.
But the religionists will say that you obey the Lord and you're going to be blessed
with honor and respect land, wealth, health, peace. That's going to be the experience
of your life. They promise that. And if you're
not, it's because you're not obedient. But that wasn't what
was revealed in God's word as being Abram's experience. And every believer experiences. Now all the circumstances I realize
are Maybe the details are different, but they all experience a general
way in which the Lord deals with his people. And Abraham's experience
as a type, as a picture of God's sheep in this world, walking
by faith, did just what the Lord told him to do. He left Haran
and he came into the land according to God's direction and leadership,
and the Canaanite was then in the land. The Scripture declares
that Abram had passed into the place of Sycam and there was
no recorded notice being taken of him. He's in a strange land
according to the Scriptures. He knew not. He obeyed God by
faith. He went not knowing whether he
went. Now he's come to a place that
the Lord has given direction, but now he's going to have to
walk by faith. He's going to have to walk trusting and waiting
on the Lord, and he's going to have to wait for the circumstances
that he viewed to be not what he saw by sight, because obviously
he's in a place where the Canaanite dwells. And there's obviously
no outward or apparent hope of peace. We're strangers. We're pilgrims in this land. But lest Abram should lose hope,
the God who promised, I'll never leave you. I'll never forsake
you. and lest he should lose hope,
viewing the Canaanite." Now you think about this. Now you go
somewhere and everybody that's outside of those that were with
you, everybody is not of the same mindset as you are. And
you're in a place and you're there by God's direction, but
they're hostile. They're a hostile group. Abram should lose hope. The scripture
says in verse 7, And the Lord appeared unto Abram, and said,
Unto thy seed will I give this land. And there builded he an
altar unto the Lord, who appeared unto him. What mercy! Abram had the Lord actually appeared
to him. It's to see in the manner of
a man. He saw him. The Lord was pleased
to appear unto Abraham and he heard his voice and the seeing and the hearing
of the Lord telling Abram, this is what I'm going to do for you.
would be the very ground of Abram's peace and comfort. If the Lord
is with us, we can settle down. What a promise. Now listen to
the promise. Unto thy seed will I give this
land. Now, hold your place right there.
Turn to Acts 7. Acts 7. Listen to what... The
Spirit of God moved upon Stephen to say, we read a little bit
of it the other night, but let's look what he said. Acts chapter
7 verses 2 to 5. Now this is what the Spirit of
God revealed concerning Abram's promise from the Lord. The Lord
has said in Genesis 12, unto thy seed will I give this land. The scripture says in Acts chapter
7 verses 2 to 5, and he said, men and brethren, fathers, hearken,
the God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham when he was
in Mesopotamia before he dwelt in Charon, and said unto him,
get thee out of thy country from thy kindred, and come into the
land which I will show thee. Then came he out of the land
of the Chaldeans and dwelt in Hiram. And from thence, when
his father was dead, he removed him into this land wherein ye
now dwell. And he, that is the Lord, gave
him none inheritance in it, no, not so much as to set his foot
on. Yet he promised that he would
give it to him for a possession and to his seed after him, when
as yet he had no child." So here's an amazing promise. He's in a
place inhabited by the Canaanite, And what the Lord is telling
Abram is this, I'm going to give this land to your seed for possession. Now, that means that God's going
to have to dispose of the Canaanites that was Canaanites, that was
in that country, they were now dwelling where Abraham was, and
God said, this is the land that I'm going to give you. But now,
He's telling him, I'm going to give it to your seed. He was
75 years old. He didn't have any children. And Sarai was barren. What a word to the natural mind
of impossibility. That, to the natural man, that
just doesn't really seem to be able to be possible. That is,
how can life come from an older woman who's past the age of childbearing,
and here's Abraham, old man himself, But this was given to Abraham
as a word by which God would try and show, proving to Abram,
God's faithfulness to give him faith, to believe. This man,
Abram, by faith, believed God. He believed what the Lord said. My wife is barren. I'm 75. She's past the age of childbearing. And God said, I'm going to give
this land, where all these Canaanites are, I'm going to give it to
your seed. And you know what Abraham did? They're building an altar unto
the Lord who appeared unto him. The Lord said, verse 7, unto
thy seed will I give this land, colon, and immediately Abram
built an altar unto the Lord. Abram worshipped God. Worship. Worship. He believed
Him. He obeyed Him. and surely worshipped
him as the Lord would be worshipped. Now, I want you to hold your
place again. Turn over to Exodus 20. The Lord
revealed something, and surely Abram was possessor of this revelation
also. But the Lord, in the book of
Exodus chapter 20, verse 24 to 26, Abram built an altar. And listen to the instruction
of the Lord on how this altar was to be constructed. Exodus
20, verse 24 to 26. An altar of earth thou shalt
make unto me, and shalt sacrifice thereon thy burnt offerings,
and thy peace offerings, thy sheep, thine oxen. In all places
where I record my name, I will come unto thee, and I will bless
thee. And if thou wilt make me an altar
of stone, thou shalt not build it of hewn stone, for if thou
lift up thy tool upon it, thou hast polluted it. Neither shalt
thou go up by steps unto mine altar, that thy nakedness be
not discovered thereon." Now, remember, the Scripture reveals
in the New Testament, Hebrews 13.10, we have an altar. We have an altar. Where of they have no right to
eat which serve the tabernacle. Now the altar of the believer
is the Lord Jesus Christ himself. The precious altar. We have an
altar. The Lord himself being God came
into this world made of a woman, made under the law, Assuming
flesh, the form of sinful flesh, the scripture says Hebrews 9.14,
through the eternal spirit offered himself without spot to God. So when we talk about the altar, the New Testament reveals the
believer's altar to be Christ himself. He's the altar, he's
the sacrifice, He's the great high priest to his people. He is the one pictured in type
and shadow of what Abraham was doing right here. The Lord gave
specific instruction as to the construction of this altar. It
wasn't left up to the mind of the person building that altar. He built it. Abraham built an
altar. But he built it as per the Lord's
instruction. It must either be an altar of
just earth, dirt, or stone. And it had to be done without
the workmanship of man involved, without trying to improve upon
it. The altar that God would accept was going to have to be
from that which God had provided. Remember when Abraham and Isaac,
his son, was going up and Isaac said, here's the fire, here's
the wood, where's the lamb? God will provide himself a lamb,
the sacrifice. And so here it was to be built
out of dirt, it was to be built out of dirt or stone, that which
was of the Lord's provision, the Lord's creation. And it was
to be used in its construction with no human effort or merit
to be added to that which God instructed. If you did, it was
polluted. If it was built out of rocks,
you just take those rocks the way they are and you build them
and lay them on there. If it was dirt, you mound it
up. But don't you try to improve in any wise. That altar of stone,
if it was built out of stone, it could have no steps going
up. Why? Lest a man think that he
can by degrees. ascend up into a greater position
of standing or sanctification before God, thinking that he
had the right to ascend up upon the altar of Christ. But to do
so would be to do nothing more than just show his spiritual
nakedness before God, his unworthiness. We come to Christ God's way by
faith alone. Believing God, trusting Him alone,
who Himself tread the winepress of God's wrath on behalf of His
people. That's what Isaiah 63.3 said.
So here's the life of a believer. Here's the experience of a believer. We're in a world that's not our
home. We're strangers, we're sojourners,
pilgrims in a world that Scripture reveals Hates us. Hates the God that we love. Hates
the gospel that we preach. And here was Abram in a place,
and the Canaanite dwelt there. But God assured him. God assured
him, I'm going to give you this. I'm going to give this to your
seed. And immediately, he built an
altar and worshipped God. And verse 8 says, And he removed
from thence unto a mountain on the east of Bethel, and pitched
his tent, having Bethel on the west, and Hai, or Ai, on the
east. And there he built an altar unto
the Lord, and called upon the name of the Lord. I read that verse of scripture
time after time after time after time, asking the Lord for some
instruction. And I think the Lord has given
me some instruction on it. There's something to be said. You know, it just, isn't it amazing
how exactly, we've been talking about the experience of Abram,
the experience of a believer. He's directed by the Lord. He's
got to walk by faith. He's in a world that is inhabited
by those that know not our God. He's going to have to wait on
the Lord. The Lord's directing him. And
here, he's moved. He's removed from things. They that are led by the Spirit
of God. They are the sons of God. So I know this, that whenever
he moved, he moved according to the Lord's direction. But
it was amazing to me and I knew that there was not insignificance
in beholding exactly where He was. He removed from things,
again as the Spirit directs, You know, when the children of
Israel were in the wilderness, we've looked at this before,
they would be going from here to there. You start tracing where
they went. You look at a map and look where they went, and
they went all over the place. It was about, I don't know, three
days journey, Neil, from Egypt to the land of Canaan, if they
just walked straight across. Forty years. Forty years they
were in there. You know why? You remember why?
They sent spies into the land. They were there 40 days. And all of them but Joshua and
Caleb came back. All of them said, we can't do
it. There ain't no way. There ain't no way. They're giants. We can't do it. And the Lord
said, for every day that you were there, you're going to walk
in this wilderness a year. That's why for 40 years they
were in the wilderness. And so here, here's, here's,
here's, he's been moved. He's coming and he's, he's gonna,
and we're, we're remembered. While they were in that wilderness,
when the pillar of a cloud moved, they moved. Pillar of a fire
moved, they moved. If it didn't move, they didn't
move. So here, there, he was removed from where he was in
Sycum, the plain of Moreh, and, and the Lord had appeared to
him, said, I'm gonna give this to you and to your seed. He built
an altar and he was removed from thence. Now look where he went.
Exactly where he went. He removed from thence onto a
mountain on the east of Bethel. Pitched his tent on a mountain.
Bethel on the west, Hai or Ai on the east. Now Bethel means
house of God. Hai or Ai You remember that little
incident that happened when Aiken had gone up? They were going
to fight with the city of Ai. And the man told Joshua, it's
just a little old place. Don't send everybody. We can
take them. We'll just send a few of us.
We don't need to all go. 3,000 men went. And they turned
their backs on the men of Ai. There was sin in the camp. Achan
had found this Babylonian scar and hid it. The Lord had told
him don't touch anything, don't touch that. But that's where
they are right there. Now Bethel means house of God. A.I. or A.I. means Heap of Ruins
on the East. And Abram's on a mountain, the
scripture says. It says he'd be removed from
thence unto a mountain. And so he can see. He's got Bethel
on his west. He's got A.I. on his east. And whenever you look at this,
I see a couple of things in here. Just some observations that I've
seen for myself and I pray that they're honoring to the Lord.
I pray that they'll be a blessing to you. The Scripture says he
looks and he can see Bethel, the house of God. He can see
Ai. Now remember, he's in the land
inhabited by the Canaanite. Those who would be removed, those
who would surely be the means by which the Lord would try Abram's
faith. And look what he does on this
mountain. There's Bethel, the house of
God. There's Ai, a heap of ruins. And the Canaanites, they inhabit
the land. And the Scripture says in verse
18, he's on that mountain. Bethel, Hai, and there he built
an altar unto the Lord and called upon the name of the Lord. Now,
he's in a heathen place. He's in a place that people that
don't know God. And he built an altar and sacrificed
unto the Lord, called upon the name of the Lord. You know, truly,
the fear of man bringeth a snare. But Abram believed God. I thought
to myself, he built that altar on top of a mountain. It could be seen. He wasn't ashamed
of the God who called him and given him a promise concerning
the land. And he acted. He acted by experience. That's what a believer does.
They believe God. Paul said, I'm not ashamed of
the gospel. I'm not ashamed of the gospel
of Christ. It's the power of God unto salvation. I thought, there he was. He said
he went up there on top of that mountain, Bethel, and he worshiped
God. But there's something else that
I saw that I think in Abram's experience that is the same with
all believers. I'd like for us just to consider,
in closing, as we look at this picture of how the Spirit of
God led Abram to this place. And you know, all Scripture is
given by inspiration of God. And it is profitable. It's profitable. It's profitable to us. It gives
us light. It gives us instruction. for
rebuke and reproof, exhortation. Here he is, and Abram is a picture
of all God's sheep that walk by faith. And he's on a mountain. He is following God. He's doing
that which the Lord has commanded him to do. And there's something
that I see as a picture and a type And it's this thing with the
continual struggle that every believer has in this world. There's an observance of two
natures. Bethel, the house of God, sets
forth that place. of a believer, as he is regenerated
and indwelt by the Lord of glory, that new man, which after God
is created in righteousness and true holiness, Ephesians 4.24. Abram could see Bethel. He, on the other hand, could
see Ayah on the east, a heap of ruins. And is this not a fit
description of the old man? who from the sole of the foot
even to the head, there's no soundness in it. And from the
position of Abraham in his pitched tent. Now remember, that tent
set forth this temporary dwelling in this world. We're sojourners. He was looking for a city that
had foundations. Who's builder and maker is God.
But he lived in tents. Traveled in tents, set up in
a temporary manner. journeying here and there. And
from where he was, he could behold both places. Believers see both natures, one
for sure, the other by faith. Two natures that never find common
ground. Two natures, not insinuating
that Abram was a double-minded man. You know, when we talk about
two natures, I got to thinking about this today. And this is
the question that went through my mind. What's the difference
in seeing and knowing and believing that there's two natures in a
man, in a believer, and that same man, that same believer
that knows and believes that there's two natures that he's
not a double-minded man. What is a double-minded man? One that is unstable in all his
ways. One who waivers. Now this is
a description, this is a definition. Double-minded man. One who waivers. One who is unsure. One who is
unsettled. One who is uncommitted. That's
a double-minded man. Abraham was not a double-minded
man. He was in a place where he could see the house of God
in a heap of ruins. And every believer sees that,
but he's not double-minded about it. He's sure about it. A double-minded
man is one who wavers, who is unsure, unsettled, and uncommitted. Now let me tell you what Paul
the Apostle said under the inspiration of the Spirit of God concerning
the beholding of these two natures. For I know, Romans 7, 18, for
I know, now that's not the words of a double-minded man. For I
know that in me, that is in my flesh, dwelleth no good thing. For to will is present with me,
there's that new man. I can truthfully say, for every
believer, I want to be obedient. I want to follow the Lord. I
do. I want to walk after Him. I want
to be pleasing unto Him. That's not the mind of a carnal
heart. That's not the mind of a carnal
heart. Abram could see. He knew. Both places. For I know that is me, that is
my flesh, to all is no good thing. For to will is present with me,
but how to perform that which is good I find not. By the Spirit placing Abram where
he was, we learn that the old man is there. He's there from
birth, even especially seen in the vessels of God's mercy. That
old man that sets forth the proof of indwelling sin, the presence
of sin, a sin that does not have dominion. over us. That was proven to my heart when
he said he removed, verse 8, he removed from thence unto a
mountain on the east of Bethel, pitched his tent, having Bethel
on the west and Haiah on the east. And what did he do? Now
here's the evidence of a man that sin does not have dominion
on him. Two natures? Yes! They're both there. Are
they both real? Yeah! I see in me, O wretched
man, I see in my flesh that there was no good thing. But that sin
doesn't have dominion over it. How do you know? There he built
an altar unto the Lord, and called on the name of the
Lord. Scripture says in Romans 10,
13, For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall
be saved. What does that mean? What does
it mean to call on the name of the Lord? To call, to beseech, to cry unto
from the heart by faith upon the Lord Himself, the fullness
of the Godhead bodily, as He has been pleased to discover
to His people, reveal to His people, His will, His attributes, His character,
Himself. This is what it is to call on
the name, that's what it means, the character, the character
of the Lord. To reveal to them God's good
pleasure, to save His people, those who believe, those who
have been given faith to believe, to save them from their sins. Now, in closing, Remember, and
this is the experience of every believer. Abram was in a place
where men, women that didn't know God resided. That's where
we are. But God was with him. And God
revealed himself. And God spoke to him. And we
come together. We come together twice a week
by the grace of God. And through these scriptures,
God speaks to his people. The Gospels proclaimed the message
of God's salvation in the person of the Lord Jesus Christ, and
the Spirit of God blesses it to His people. And they hear.
They hear His voice. They hear and they believe Him. They believe Him. They follow
Him. Led by the Spirit of God, they
worship Him. And after Abram had called on
the name of the Lord, Abram journeyed, verse 9, going on still toward
the south. Now there's the third mention
of Abram being removed from a place that he was, moved somewhere. He left Haram for Canaan. He
came to a place called Sycam to reside there later in Bethel
and Ai, and now he continues his journey going on toward the
south. We're never going to be allowed to forget. This world
is not our home. He's going. We are never going
to forget. To walk by faith is our life. That's the way it is. That's
the way it's going to be. It's going to be like that until
the Lord takes us out of this world. Our experience is going
to have to be that change is all around us, but He who never
changes is leading us. Our circumstances may change.
We may see things differently. I ain't from around here. But
I can tell you this, this is where I'm convinced the Lord
has brought me. He who never changes changed my location. And He's put me where I am now,
but He's leading all of us unto Himself. Ever teaching, ever
preparing us to soon inherit the kingdom prepared for God's
people from the foundation of the world. Those little short
few verses, what a wealth of revelation as to the experience
and the life of a believer. Abram was a man that suffered. He suffered. I mean, he went
through this. We're going to look at some things.
His nephew, they had a falling out. He's getting ready to go
into Egypt. He's going to tell them, but
Sarah says, I'm not going to preach it. He's got some stuff
coming up. But he believed God. He believed
God. And that's where we settle down. You know, the Lord's leading
me. I'm thankful. wherever he leads
me, it's gonna be for his glory, my good. I pray the Lord bless
this to our heart for Christ's sake. Amen. Okay, Gary.