Very good. So I wanted to do
a few things today. I wanted us to go back to Genesis
22 and look at what we looked at briefly yesterday, last week. And I want us to consider that
We have been looking at John 8.39. If you're Abraham's child,
according to the promise of the Lord Jesus Christ, you will do
the works of Abraham. We've looked at some of the works
of Abraham. We've looked at the works of Abraham in bringing
the sacrifice and honouring the sacrifice and keeping it pure. The works of Abraham being a
participant in the covenant that God made with God. and Abraham not working. Abraham was asleep when God made
that covenant. And I want us to consider, and
I'd love for you to spend some time, if you can, to go back
to Genesis and just read those chapters about Abraham. It doesn't
take so long, and it's the most remarkable story. It's the most
remarkable gift from God. Do you realize that there are
230 verses in the Scriptures that speak of Abraham? and all
of them are talking about Abraham and his relationship with God.
I'll just list the books that Abraham is mentioned in. It's
quite remarkable, isn't it? That's why these foundational
activities of God and these promises that the Lord Jesus Christ makes
are so fundamentally important. Abraham is mentioned in Genesis,
of course, in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, Deuteronomy, Joshua. 1st Kings, 2nd Kings, 1st Chronicles,
2nd Chronicles, Nehemiah, Psalms, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Ezekiel, Micah. Then in the New Testament all
the Gospels, Matthew, Mark, Luke and John, Acts, Romans, 2nd Corinthians,
Galatians speaks a lot of him, Hebrews, James and 1st Peter.
Abraham is the father of the faithful. And so Abraham's walk
of faith and Abraham's walk with the Lord Jesus Christ is a picture
in so many ways of the walk of all of his faith children. We're
told to look to Abraham, our father. Look to Abraham, our
father. All of God's children are the
faith children of God. Abraham simply believed God. As I've been studying Abraham
and writing about it and looking at it and thinking about what
sort of messages to bring to you regarding Abraham, I have
continually struck by the fact that he just had a childlike
faith, didn't he? Abraham, leave your family, leave
all your relations, leave all your religion, And like a child, when dad says,
come, let's go. Child says, where? Dad says, well, I'll show you
where to go. And that's exactly what happened with Abraham. He
didn't know where he was going. He just had a voice and a word
and a presence of the Lord Jesus Christ, and he followed him. He followed him. Abraham is just
such a glorious picture and last week we looked at Genesis chapter
22 in terms of worship. I just wanted to read the last
few verses. You know the story that God came
to Abraham and called him and said, take now thy son, thine
only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, verse 2 of Genesis 22, and get
thee into the land of Moriah. and offer him there for a burnt
offerings upon one of the mountains which I will tell thee of." Now
that mountain, there's no doubt at all that that mountain is
the mountain upon which the temple was built. That mountain was
the mountain upon which David bought Aaron's threshing floor. And on Ariunas' threshing floor
that plague that had come upon Israel was stayed. The plague
was stayed. It is the place where the Lord
Jesus Christ was sacrificed. All of these are pictures in
the Old Testament. And we look at what it was for
Abraham to worship God. Abraham got up early in the morning.
I'm sure he didn't tell Sarah what he was doing. This was between
him and God, and Isaac didn't know all what was to happen. It's very obvious later on, isn't
it? Verse four, and then on the third day, Abraham lifted up
his eyes and saw the place afar off. And Abraham said unto his
young men, abide ye here with the ass. Now listen to this.
Listen, he's been told to take his son, his only son Isaac,
and you take him up onto that mountain, I'll show you, and
you have the fire, and you have the knife, and you plunge that
knife into the heart of Isaac, your son. Listen to what Abraham
says. You stay here, you men. This
is a transaction between God the Father and God the Son. And
I and the lad will go yonder and worship and I am the lad
will come again unto you. Abraham's faith is a challenge,
brothers and sisters. It's a remarkable example, isn't
it? But it's a challenge, isn't it,
to my faith? It's a challenge to how faithful
our God is. We'll come again. going up that
mountain and this is going to happen. And Hebrews 11, which
we'll look at later on, Hebrews 11 says as far as Abraham is
concerned, Isaac was killed and Isaac was resurrected from the
dead. And this is all a picture of the Lord Jesus Christ. I want
us to contemplate what it is to believe, what faith is. Faith has an object but faith
also is based on promises that God had made and God had made
promises about Isaac that in Isaac all of the nations of the
world will be blessed. In Isaac, Isaac will be the one
that brings so many seed to Abraham that you can come outside and
have a look at the stars, Abraham, and that's how many children
you're going to have. The victory of the Lord Jesus
Christ in his His faithfulness is an immense brick to you, brothers
and sisters. It doesn't seem so to us now,
but Abraham looked and he just believed God. He believed God
and God put that on his account for righteousness. And we know human examples of
it, don't we? and make a promise, we expect
people to believe it. And if they don't believe it,
they're saying something in their unbelief about our character,
aren't they? And so we have Abraham worshipping
God for who God is, worshipping God on the basis of what God
had said. He simply trusted God. And Isaac, Abraham, verse 6,
took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac, his son,
and he took the fire in his hand and in his knife. It's a great
picture of the fire of God's wrath falling upon the Lord Jesus
Christ because of all the sin that was laid upon the Lord Jesus
Christ on Calvary's tree. And they both went, they went
both of them together and Isaac spoke unto Abraham, his father,
and said, my father, he said, here I am, my son. And he said,
behold, the fire and the wood. But where is the lamb? Where
is the lamb? That's the best question you
can ever ask of any sermon you've ever listened to, in any sermon
you ever prepare, isn't it? Where's the lamb? The lamb needs
to be at the beginning of it. The lamb needs to be in every
sentence of it. The lamb needs to be the object of it. The lamb
needs to be the rejoicing of it. Where is the lamb? Abraham's
answer is glorious, isn't it? It is so glorious. This is what
faith answers. This is the works of Abraham
faith. Abraham, my son, Abraham said,
my son, God will provide himself a lamb for a burnt offering. God will provide himself a lamb. Only a lamb of God's providing
is going to satisfy the justice and the righteousness and the
holiness of God. And so this is just a glorious
picture of what happened on that same mountain 1,700 years after
these events. So they both went up together.
and they came to the place which God had told him of, and Abraham
built an altar there and laid the wood on the altar in order,
and bowed Isaac his son and laid him on the altar upon the wood."
Isn't it remarkable? Isaac was at least a late teenager,
and some people say he was 30 years old at this time. You try
and bind. If I tried to bind any of you,
if I tried to bind Ben or some of these people, I wouldn't have
a hope, would I? Abraham and Isaac were submissive in all
of this, and the Lord Jesus Christ was bound to the altar of sacrifice. He was bound to the altar of
sacrifice because of the covenant promises he made before the foundation
of the world. He was bound to that altar because
of his love and his union with his bride. He was bound to that
altar because of the glory of his father was at stake in him
and his sacrifice. God is glorified in the salvation
of his people. And Abraham stretched forth his
hand and took the knife to slay his son. And the angel of the
Lord called unto him out of heaven and said, Abraham, Abraham. And
he said, here am I. And he said, lay not thine hand
upon the lad, neither do thou anything unto him for now I know
that thou fearest God, faith and worship. is all tied up with a reverential
awe for who God is, saying, Thou hast not withheld thy Son, thine
only Son, from me. And Abraham lifted up his eyes
and looked, and behold, behind him a ram caught in the thicket. Anytime you ever look to the
Lord Jesus Christ, you can always look behind. You can always look
behind, he's always there. He was the lamb slain from the
foundation of the world. He was the lamb that Noah, in
representation, sacrificed after that flood. That lamb was in
the ark, wasn't it? The lamb protected, the blood
of the lamb sealed that ark. And the ark rose above all of
the cursing of God, and it was the highest thing on this earth,
and it was the place of safety for all humanity, all humanity
bound up in Noah, all of the saints of God. And Abraham went and took the
ram and offered him up for a burnt offering in the stead of his
son. And Abraham called the name of
that place Jehovah-Jireh. As it is said to this day, Moses
is writing hundreds and hundreds of years later, in the mouth
of the Lord it shall be seen God will provide. God will provide himself for
a lamb. Abraham's faithfulness is a remarkable
faithfulness. It's the promised faith that
God works in the hearts of his people. It's a faith that causes
God's people to simply take God at his word. He doesn't say that
we have to understand. We have to believe. Believing. Believing. Without faith it is
impossible to please God. Anything that is not of faith,
says Romans 14, is of sin. And this faith, before we think
that it's all about us, this faith is the gift of God. Turn with me to Ephesians chapter
2. We know the words well. We know the words well. Ephesians
2 is a wonderfully accurate description of all of humanity trapped in
this world, bound to Satan, That spirit, verse 2, that now worketh
in the children of disobedience, among whom also we had our conversation
in times past, in the lusts of our flesh, fulfilling the desires
of the flesh and of the mind, and were by nature children,
the children of wrath, even as others. You are no different
from anyone else, brothers and sisters. It was only God who
makes a difference, even as others. And this is one of the most glorious
phrases in the scripture, but God. That's what you were, but
God. Who began all of this? But God. How did Abraham get to be in
that place? But God came to Ur of the Chaldees
and called Abraham by his name and called him out of there.
And Abraham was given the faith to simply believe God and go
with him. But God, who was rich in mercy,
for his great love wherewith he loved us, even when we were
dead. Even when we were dead. So people
think people are alive, don't they? And people talk about free
will. What's God say? Dead. If you just have a problem
with your will, then you have some life and you can exercise
that will. If you are dead, you need a Saviour. You need life from above. The
problem's not education, the problem's not instruction, the
problem is life itself, isn't it? When you were dead, when
you were dead, hath quickened, made us alive, but listen to
this alive, isn't it? When Abraham went down from that
mountain, he was rejoicing in the faithfulness of God, wasn't
he? He quickened us, made us alive together with Christ. When Christ was raised from the
dead, all of God's children were raised from the dead. When the
Lord Jesus Christ ascended into heaven's glories and sat down
at the right hand of God in heaven, we ascended with him. We simply
This is what God says, isn't it? Abraham had a childlike faith
in all these words that I'm saying now. Abraham saw the Lord Jesus
Christ, he saw his day. This is speaking about the day
of the Lord Jesus Christ, isn't it? That glorious day of his
crucifixion, the glorious day of his resurrection, the glorious
day of his exaltation, the glorious day of the promise of his coming
back again to gather all his people to himself. He's quickened
us together with Christ by grace. You are saved. It doesn't say
by grace he offers salvation or he tries to save. By grace
you are saved. Every one of God's children was
saved from before the foundation of the world. They were saved
by the electing purpose of God. They were saved in the Lord Jesus
Christ when he died on Calvary's tree. They are being saved. They are saved when the Gospel
comes to them with power and they have new birth, a new life
to be able to see. and rejoice in who God is and
to know that their sins have been dealt with perfectly and
completely. And one day we're going to be properly saved completely,
aren't we, brothers and sisters? We'll be saved from this flesh
and we'll be saved from this world and we'll be saved from
Satan and we'll be saved from all the deceitfulness of our
own wicked hearts and this world that we live in and we will go
to a place which God calls the home of the righteous. The home
of the righteous. And what's he done, by grace
you are saved, and has raised us up together and made us sit
together in heavenly places in Christ Jesus. Do you believe
that? Abraham did. Abraham did. When he went up to Mount Moriah,
he was believing resurrection, wasn't he? He was believing in
the resurrection of the Lord Jesus Christ. He was believing
in the resurrection of Isaac. that in the ages to come he might
show the exceeding riches of his grace in his kindness toward
us through Christ Jesus. And as you go through Abraham's
life you realise the exceeding riches of the grace of God in
his life all the way through. Abraham is no different to us,
brothers and sisters. It's God who makes the difference
and God who raised him to be this wonderful example for us.
For by grace are you saved through faith and that not of
yourselves. And people will say, well, is
it the grace that's not of yourselves or the faith not of yourselves?
Yes, it's both. It's both, isn't it? Not of yourselves,
it is the gift of God, not of works. lest any man should boast. For we are, all of God's children,
are his workmanship. That means masterpiece. He's
not making any mistake, brothers and sisters, with anything he
does in all the hearts of his people. He works all things together
for the good of those who are thee called, the ones loved of
God. We are His workmanship, created
in Christ Jesus unto good works, which God hath before ordained,
that we should walk in them. Now just go down to verse 19
with me. I want us to look at Abraham's
faith. And Abraham's faith is the faith that God promises is
going to be the faith of all the children of God. We'll walk
in the works of Abraham. Now therefore you are no more
strangers and foreigners. That's what Abraham will look
at that in Hebrews 11 later on. But Abraham saw himself as a
stranger and a foreigner in this world and so do all the children
of God. This is not home. This is not our home. We're from
heaven. Heaven is our home. No more strangers
and forerunners, but fellow citizens with the saints and of the household
of God, and are built upon the foundation of the apostles and
prophets, Jesus Christ himself being the chief cornerstone,
in whom all the building fitly framed together groweth unto
an holy temple in the Lord, in whom you also are builded together
for a habitation of God through the Spirit. of church, brothers and sisters.
That's just a wonderful description of church, isn't it? We're being
knitted together with him. If you go back while you're there,
verse 13, we talked about strangers, strangers and outcasts in this
world, foreigners to this world. We're foreign to them, aren't
we? We are foreign to this world.
But now in Christ Jesus, verse 13, you who sometimes were far
off are made nigh, made near by the blood of Christ. How does he knit his people together?
If the Lord Jesus Christ has taken away all of your sins and
he dwells in you, We have every reason to look
upon our brothers and sisters with love and delight. And we have the works of Abraham
to do, isn't it? So what encourages you most in
this world? and his people, isn't it? It's
hearing about faith in action and faith in reality, and that's
what we see in Abraham's life, isn't it? Abraham really did
believe. Abraham really did act on that
faith. It's all the work of God. But
when we encounter God-given faith in the midst of circumstances where the mountains are too high
and the rivers are too deep and the way forward is too hard and
we can see no way and we can say to our brothers and sisters
as Moses did at the Red Sea, stand still. Stand. Stand still on that rock. Stand
still and see the salvation of the Lord. My God, grant us that faith.
Let's just have a quick break.