Now this is an amazing passage
of Scripture here in Genesis 21, verses 1-8. It really shows
the whole of a sinner's salvation accomplished by the Lord, by
His promise. Let's read it together. Verse
1, And the Lord visited Sarah as He had said. And the Lord
did unto Sarah as He had spoken. For Sarah conceived and bared
Abraham a son in his old age at the set time of which God
had spoken to him. And Abraham called the name of
his son that was born unto him, whom Sarah bared to him, Isaac. And Abraham circumcised his son
Isaac, being eight days old, as God had commanded him. And
Abraham was 100 years old when his son Isaac was born unto him.
And Sarah said, God had made me to laugh so that all that
hear will laugh with me. And she said, who would have
said unto Abraham that Sarah should have given children suck?
For I have born him a son in his old age. And the child grew
and was weaned. And Abraham made a great feast
the same day that Isaac was weaned. I've titled this, God Fulfills
His Promise. God Fulfills His Promise. Salvation's
according to the promise of God. And that promise of God is true
and it's certain and sure because God fulfills every aspect of
the promise that he makes. Now, it's impossible for natural
man to believe these things, and the reason it's impossible
for a natural man to believe the things of God is because
everything God does in salvation, A to Z, is impossible with man. There's nothing God does in the
salvation of a sinner that's possible with a man. It's all
impossible. That's why a natural man can't
believe God. Everything he does is impossible
with man. Here's the first thing we see.
God determined the end from the beginning. God determined the
end, how everything would would come to pass from the beginning.
Everything God does in salvation is exactly according to His everlasting
covenant of grace, His promise, His word. Our text says this
was the fulfillment of a promise God had said. He made this promise
a long time before to Abraham, many, many, many years before.
And it says the Lord did unto Sarah as He had spoken. The Lord
did exactly what He said He would do. Now, not long ago we saw
this. Turn to Galatians 4 with me real
quick and look at this again. Not long ago we saw from Galatians
4 that Sarah represents the everlasting covenant of grace. Galatians
4.22 says, For it is written that Abraham had two sons, the
one by a bondmaid, the other by a free woman. See that word?
By a free woman. But he who was of the bond woman
was born after the flesh, but he of the free woman was what? By promise. By promise. By the promise of God. And he
said, which things are an allegory for these are the two covenants. One's covenant of works, Hagar
and Ishmael. In Isaac, Sarah shows us the
covenant of grace, the promise God made before the world began.
Just like God promised Abraham a long time before this, years
before this, in eternity, before God made time, in eternity, God
promised Himself. Now get that. God promised Himself
to save a people for Himself. God made a covenant promise with
God. Everything that comes to pass
in time is through and according to that everlasting promise that
God made with God. Each person in the divine Godhead
had a part in it. God the Father, God the Son,
and God the Holy Spirit. And by doing so, by God fulfilling
every aspect of the covenant, God gets all the glory. His glory
is manifest. And sinners that are made to
see what He's done don't glory in ourselves or in other men,
we glory only in God. Now let's see, let me just go
over this a little bit with you. Each person in the divine Godhead
had a part in this. God the Father chose his Son,
and he promised his Son to give his Son, God the Son preeminence,
all preeminence, to give Christ all preeminence. He promised
to prepare him a body. Remember when Christ came, he
said, a body thou hast prepared me. He's God the Son, but he
had to come, his children were in flesh, he had to come in the
likeness of flesh. God promised him an elect people
who are his spiritual body. That's who he came for, that
he might be the firstborn among many brethren. And He promised
that when His Son finished the work, that God would exalt Him
above every name, give Him a name above every name, and that every
knee would bow and confess that He's Lord of lords and King of
kings. And God has fulfilled that promise
to His Son. God has exalted Him, and every
knee shall bow and confess Christ, either in this life, by grace,
by the grace of God, or in judgment. But every knee shall. So Sarah
hears a type of that covenant. This is the promise God the Father
hath said. And then God the Son promised. He promised to become a man.
He promised to liken to his brethren. He promised to magnify and honor
the law of God which all the elect of God broke in Adam, in
precept and penalty. so that by one man's obedience
many shall be made righteous. So Sarah's a type of this everlasting
covenant which the Son had said. And then God the Holy Spirit
promised to overshadow the virgin in the womb and to form Christ
in her womb. God the Holy Spirit promised
to be upon Christ as he walked this earth. God the Holy Spirit
promised since all the elect would be born dead in sins to
regenerate them to convince us of our sin. to convince us of
the righteousness of Christ, to convince us that judgment
is accomplished, and bring all the elect of God to trust Christ.
So Sarah here is a type of that covenant. This is what God the
Holy Spirit had said. So, since Sarah is a type of
that covenant, read verse one again, and we'll take Sarah's
name out, and let's read it this way. And the Lord visited through
the everlasting covenant as He had said, and the Lord did according
to the everlasting covenant as He had spoken. You could read
it that way, as Sarah being a type of the everlasting covenant.
God did exactly what He promised. Now, when have you and I ever
been able to do something that we purpose the end from the beginning. When have we ever been able to
do something like that? We never have. With men, we have
to say, if the Lord will, we'll do this or that, but not God. The Lord said, with men, this
is impossible, but with God, all things are possible. God
promises, and He works in saving His people what is impossible
with men. He doeth according to his will
in the army of heaven and among the inhabitants of the earth,
and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, what are you doing?
So believe him, believe God, believe his word. Everything
God's ever promised, he's fulfilled. He's not a man that he should
lie. He's not the son of man that
he should repent. He said it. He will do it. He's spoken it. He will make
it good. He will do what He has said. Look at the second thing
here. God fulfills His promise. Christ
came and accomplished the work of redeeming His people just
as God promised from the beginning. Look at verse 2. Sarah conceived
and bare Abraham a son in his old age at the set time of which
God had spoken to him. And Abraham called the name of
his son that was born unto him, whom Sarah bare to him, Isaac."
Now, Isaac's a type of Christ. Galatians 3.16 is clear to us
that this is what God is showing. He's showing us Christ here.
Now, to Abraham and his seed were the promises made. The promises. And he said not to seeds as of
many, but as of one, and to thy seed, which is Christ." That's
who we're talking about here in Isaac. He's a type of Christ. Now what are some ways we see
a type of Christ in Isaac? Well, both births were announced
long before they ever happened. Many years before this, God promised
Abraham that Isaac would be born. And God promised Christ was coming
from the garden. He's the one pictured in the
animals that were slain and the coats of skins that were made
to cover Adam and Eve's nakedness. He's the lamb slain from the
foundation of the world. God's been speaking of his son
since the beginning. Look at this next thing. God
promised both would come through the woman. Sarah is a picture
of the church. Paul told us that in Galatians
4.26. Jerusalem, which is above, is
the mother of us all. Sarah is a picture of the church.
You remember in the garden? God promised Christ would be
the seed of woman. He's coming. He's going to be
the seed of woman. He later promised that he would be of the tribe
of Judah, the line of the tribe of Judah. He promised he'd come
through the house of Jesse. He promised he'd come through
the house of David. Look at Matthew 1. Look at Matthew
1.1. What I'm trying to get you to
see is, whatever God says He will do, God does it. That's
how we're going to be brought to trust God's Word, to believe
God, is to see that what God says, He does. Look at Matthew
1.1. The book of the generation of
Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham. Here's where
Abraham begat Isaac. That's what we're looking at
now. And Isaac begat Jacob, and Jacob begat Judas. There's the
Judah. That's who Christ, he said Christ
would come through that tribe. Look down at verse five. And
Salmon begat Boaz. Remember Boaz? And Boaz begat
Obed of Ruth. Remember Ruth? And Obed begat
Jesse. There's David's daddy, Jesse.
And Jesse begat David the king. And David the king begat Solomon.
And you go right on down the line to verse 16. And Jacob begat
Joseph, the husband of Mary. And Mary was from that same tribe.
of whom was born Jesus, who is called Christ. See, he came through
the lineage, through the church, through the woman, just like
God said he would from the beginning. Here's a third thing. Both births
occurred at the set time that God had set. Look at verse two
of our text, Genesis 21. Sarah conceived and bear Abraham
a son in his old age at the set time. of which God had spoken
to him. Remember, God came and he said,
at this set time next year, Sarah's gonna have a child. Well, Galatians
4.4 tells us, when the fullness of time was come, God sent forth
his son, made of a woman, made under the law, to redeem them
that were under the law. Everything that God's showing
us here, He's showing us everything He does, He does according to
His promise as He had spoken. Here's another thing. Fourthly,
both were named before their birth. Both were named before
their birth. Look at Genesis 17, 19. God said, Sarah thy wife shall
bear thee a son in thee, and thou shalt call his name Isaac. God told him what he would name
him. Thou shalt call his son Isaac, and I will establish my
covenant with him. You see that? Who's God's covenant
established with? It's established with Christ.
It's established to Christ, and Christ is the one who came forth
and established. It's been established with Christ,
by Christ. I'll establish my covenant with
him for an everlasting covenant, and with his seed after him.
You know what the angel of the Lord told Joseph? When He came
to Joseph in Matthew 1.21, He said, Do you see how much Isaac
and Christ are alike? Here's a fifth thing. Both births were
supernatural. This was a miracle of God that
Sarah had Isaac. She said there in verse 7, Who
would have said unto Abraham that Sarah should have given
children such? I have borne him a son in his old age. She's past
the age of childbearing. God waited till it was obvious
that this was a miracle of His grace for Isaac to be born. Well, of Christ's conception,
in Luke 1.35, the angel answered and said unto Mary, The Holy
Ghost shall come upon thee, And the power of the highest shall
overshadow thee, and therefore also that holy thing which shall
be born of thee shall be called the Son of God. Both are supernatural
births. Then here's another thing. Both
births were the occasion of great joy. Isaac means laughter. That's what his name means. It
means laughter, rejoicing. In verse 6, Sarah said, God hath
made me to laugh, so that all that hear will laugh with me.
Before she laughed and and she wasn't faithful. She didn't believe
God. Here she's laughing with joy. She believes God. Luke 1
46, Mary said, My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath
rejoiced in God my Savior. You see? It's just parallel.
God's showing us this in Isaac. Both verse were associated with
life beyond. Look down at verse 12. He said,
In Isaac shall thy seed be called. Look over at chapter 22 and look
at verse 18. God says there, He says, And
in thy seed in Isaac, shall all the nations of the earth be blessed,
because thou hast obeyed my voice." Look over at Revelation 5. Revelation
5. Does that mean that all the nations
of the earth were going to be saved because of Look, in Isaac,
no, Paul's clear on that. He said, it's not as though the
word of God's taken none effect. They're not all Israel which
are of Israel. He said, neither because they're the seed of Abraham
are they all children, but in Isaac shall thou seed be called.
This is a picture of Christ. They which are the children of
flesh, these are not the children of God, but the children of the
promise. are counted for the seed for
this is the word of promise, the word of promise. At this
time I'll come and Sarah shall have a son. Everything's according
to God's promise. We saw there he said in Christ
all the nations of the earth would be blessed. Look at Revelation
5 and 9. They sung a new song saying, thou art worthy to speak
into Christ, to take the book, to open the seals thereof, for
thou was slain and has redeemed us to God by thy blood out of
every kindred and tongue and people and nation. See, God was
saying in Isaac, when he was born, he was saying, my son's
coming forth and he's going to be the one in whom I'm going
to call all my elect from the four corners of the earth. In
Him, all my elect scattered throughout all the nations of the world
are going to be blessed by the blessings of God's grace. You
with me? You see what we're seeing here?
Now look at this next thing. Both sons were offered of their
father as a sacrifice. Genesis 22, look at verse 2.
Genesis 22, verse 2. He said, God said to Abraham,
take now thy son, thine only son, Isaac, whom thou lovest
and get thee into the land of Moriah and offer him there for
a burnt offering upon one of the mountains, which I will tell
thee of. You know what it says of Christ? And this was manifested
the love of God toward us because that God sent his only begotten
son into the world that we might live through him. And then Isaac
was offered on Mount Moriah and either that same mountain or
on the same ridge connecting with it was Mount Calvary where
Christ gave himself on the cross. Both of those sons bore the wood
on which they'd be offered. In Genesis 22, 6, it says, Abraham
took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it upon Isaac, his son. John 19, 17 says, Christ, bearing
his cross, went forth into a place called the place of a skull,
which is called in Hebrew, Golgotha. Isaac freely submitted to the
work. He freely submitted to be bound
on that altar on Mount Moriah. And the Lord Jesus voluntarily
gave himself as he had spoken, as he said he would, as he promised
God he would. The obedience of one, by the
obedience of one, shall many be made righteous. Remember in
John 17, Christ prayed, I have finished the work you gave me
to do. He hadn't been to the cross yet. What work was that
that he finished? He came to magnify and honor
the law, fulfill the law for his people in precept. He had
finished that work. He'd done it. He was proven through
all his life obeying that law and precept to be the spotless
lamb of God. But he not only promised that,
he promised to obey the penalty of, to obey God in bearing the
penalty of that law. So being proven spotless and
perfect as a man by his own will, He became that perfect lamb to
make atonement to God for His people, to make propitiation,
to make satisfaction with God for His people. Christ promised
that. He promised in the everlasting
covenant to willingly be made the sin His people are. to bear in His body the sins
of His people. And having been made sin, to
bear divine justice in the place of His people, which His people
owed to redeem us from the curse of the law." I realize it's a
great mystery how that Christ could be made sin. That's a mystery. The Lord said, I'm going to do
a thing in which even if you're told it, you won't believe it. We want Christ preeminent. He's
preeminent in our hearts. We want Him to have all preeminence.
We don't want anything said of our Redeemer that's going to
taint the perfection that He is. We love Him. We want Him to be upheld. We
want Him to be exalted high. But we must remember this. The
very purpose for which Christ came into this earth was to declare
the righteousness of God. The very purpose for which God
prepared him a body was so that Christ, out of necessity,
went to that cross. was to manifest the righteousness
of God in what He did in justifying His guilty people. God is holy
and He's just. He's the holy and He's the just
God. Proverbs 17, 15 says, He that
justifieth the wicked, He that justifieth the wicked, and He
that condemneth the just, even they both are abomination to
the Lord. Because God is righteous, because
He's the just judge. He will not clear the guilty.
And God is righteous and He will by no means condemn the just. Not at all. So if God ever did
so, He ceases to be the just judge. He ceases to be righteous. That's the whole purpose for
which Christ came, was to declare His righteousness. The very confidence
we have in God is that God is just and everything He does is
according to His word of promise. Shall not the judge of all the
earth do right? That's our hope. That's our confidence
in God. And from the womb, Christ Jesus
is the just one. He's perfectly just. He's perfectly
spotless. He did no sin, knew no sin, had
a perfect holy nature. So the righteousness of God required
that Christ, before He could bear the punishment for our sin,
because God will not condemn the just. Christ had to first
be made sin. And only then could the just
judge execute Christ justly, and thereby remain just in justifying
his people. That's the very issue, is the
righteousness of God. Take away God being righteous,
and you've got no righteousness at all. And because Christ satisfied
that justice fully, this is being made sin. I think being made
sin was what made Christ sweat great drops of blood in the garden,
more than bearing the punishment of that sin, or as much. To be made what he hated? To
be made that this loathsome thing called sin? But because he did
it, he justified his people, and God did it in perfect righteousness. So that God is just in showing
mercy, and He's just in showing forgiveness to everybody for
whom Christ died. And that same justice demands
He show them mercy and forgiveness, because their sins are put away.
Now the next thing, in both cases, with Isaac and with Christ, God
provided Himself a sacrifice. whenever they got up there and
Isaac said, where's the lamb? Abraham said, God will provide
himself a lamb. And he did, he provided a ram
caught in a thicket to take Isaac's place, a picture of Christ. But
on Calvary's tree, that's God, that's God the Son, providing
himself as the sacrifice, as the lamb. So that the scripture,
Romans 3 says, to declare his righteousness, I say at this
time that he might be just, and he's the justifier because he's
the one who did all the work. And this work that he, this is
the work Christ cried out from the cross then and said, it's
finished. One work was finished, was obeying all the precept of
the law for his people. The other work that he finished
was obeying the penalty and putting away their sin forever. So that
now everyone that he calls, they're made the righteousness of God
by the obedience of one. What I want you to see is that
God does nothing by accident. He's the just judge. What He
speaks, that's what He does. What He says He would do from
the beginning, that's what He's done. And He did it in the Word. Christ the Word. And He brings
this Word to His people in truth. Would God do all this to declare
His righteousness on Calvary's tree and then save sinners through
a lie? Through a gospel that's not the
gospel? I don't think so. Not the just judge of heaven
and earth. Not him who has power to send his gospel where he will
and call out his people. Not him who said it pleased him
by the foolishness of preaching to save them that believe. All
right, here's the third thing I want you to see. You see the
promise the Spirit made. The Spirit of God had a promise
He made in this thing. We've seen what God the Father
did. We've seen what God the Son did. God the Spirit said
He promised to do something, too. Look here. We know that Isaac is also a
picture of a born-again child of God, a believer. We were told
that in Galatians 4.28. Now we, brethren, as Isaac was,
are the children of promise. God's promise, He's gonna call
out everyone of His sheep. He's gonna give them faith. He's
gonna grant them repentance. He's gonna bring them to see
what great things God has done for them. That's the work of
the Spirit of God. That's what He's promised to
do. Ishmael was a type of those born after the flesh. Isaac is
born of divine grace, by power, by the power of God, according
to the promise of God. Look at verse two again. For
Sarah conceived and bear Abraham a son in his old age at the set
time, of which God had spoken to him. It was impossible for
her to do this. It's impossible for a sinner
to be born again. It's impossible for a sinner.
We can't bear fruit. We cannot bear fruit. We're dead
in sin. So our salvation from beginning
to end has to be by the grace of God, by His Word. The Word
of God's promise was to regenerate His children at the set time. You know what Ezekiel 16 said?
When I passed by thee and looked upon thee, behold, thy time was
the time of love. And he said, and I spread my
skirt over thee, that's his righteousness, and I covered thy nakedness.
And he said, and I swear unto thee, he made a covenant with
us, he swore unto you, and he entered into a covenant with
thee, saith the Lord God, and thou becamest mine, he said. Now, look what happened in verse
four. Abraham circumcised his son Isaac being eight days old
as God had commanded him. Circumcision was a picture of
the work of the spirit in regeneration whereby God writes his everlasting
covenant of grace on our heart and makes his child to see Christ
has put away the filth of our flesh by his one offering. That's
what circumcision was given. That's when God brings us into
covenant with him to see that his covenant's sure. Deuteronomy
30 verse 6 says this, the Lord thy God will circumcise thine
heart and the heart of thy seed to love thy God with all thine
heart and with all thy soul that thou mayest live. This is the
Spirit's work in this promise. Romans 2 says, he's not a Jew
which is one outward, and neither is that circumcision which is
outward in the flesh. But he is a Jew, a true son of
Abraham, a true spiritual elect child of God, who's one inwardly. Circumcision is that of the heart,
in the Spirit, not in the letter, whose praise is not of men, but
of God. God the Holy Spirit does this.
Colossians 2.10 says, you're complete in Him. which is the
head of all principality and power, in whom also you're circumcised
with the circumcision made without hands and putting off the body
of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ." When
we're circumcised in the heart and given a new heart, born again,
made to see Him, that old flesh is is put off so we can a new
man now we can see christ and we see that christ has put away
all our body of sin he's put away our filthy flesh by what
he did on calvary's tree and god enters into covenant with
us and makes us see We've been redeemed by God. God hadn't left
anything in our hands. God's done everything that he
promised himself he would do from the beginning. And you know
what'll happen when God does that? You'll worship God. We'll
worship God. We'll stop worshiping ourselves.
We'll stop bragging about something that we did and trying to fool
men into thinking we've done something to make ourselves be
born again. Isaac was eight days old. He didn't have a thing in
the world to do with this. God did that on purpose to show
that when He regenerates His child, you're as helpless as
an infant. You got no word in it. You got
no stake in it. You can do nothing in it. Your
Father sends forth the Spirit of God according to promise,
and He does this work in His children. We're born a second
time of the everlasting Father, Christ Jesus. The first time
we're born a corruptible seed of Adam. The second time we're
born again, we're born of the everlasting Father, Christ, our
everlasting Adam of incorruptible seed. And we live forever with
him because of what he's done. You see how sure this promise
of God is? God's not left anything in the
hands of men. Now I want you to see one last
thing. This is the fourth thing. We see a picture of God's promise
here to keep us and bring each of His believing children to
the marriage feast with Christ. Look at verse 8. And the child
grew and was weaned, and Abraham made a great feast the same day
that Isaac was weaned. Every child born of the Spirit
of God right now, just like Isaac when he was an infant and he
fed upon his mother's breast. Every child born of God, God
will plant him in the church of God and he will feed him by
the gospel from then on. And he will eat and grow. That child will eat and he'll
grow. As newborn babes desire the sincere milk of the word
that you may grow thereby, if so be you've tasted the Lord
is gracious. Christ our head will feed us, in Colossians it
said, the head from which all the body, by joints and bands
having nourishment, ministered to us. And knit together, increaseth
with the increase that comes from God. And eventually, we're
going to be weaned, just like Isaac was. He was weaned, and
Abraham made a great feast the same day that Isaac was weaned.
Paul called all of these things. It's called the foolishness of
preaching. That's what it is. The foolishness
of preaching. Paul called all the gifts of
faith and hope, these other gifts we have, he called these childish
things. But one day, we're going to be
weaned from all these things. And in that day when we're weaned
from these things, just like Isaac was weaned and Abraham
made a great feast, his father made a great feast, we're going
to be weaned from these things and God our Father is going to
bring us to a great feast in glory with Christ, the marriage
feast of the lamb. And we're going to sit and enjoy
with no sin whatsoever and enjoy the strong meat and see everything
Christ has done for us and see him as he is. Every word, I want
you to turn to 2 Samuel 23, we'll close with this. 2 Samuel 23. Every word that God promises,
God fulfills. Now this is why David said this.
David died, and this is what he said, 2 Samuel 23, 5. He said, although my house be
not so with God. David's house was a mess. His
house was a total mess. And he said, although it be not
so with God, yet he hath made with me an everlasting covenant. Now watch this. Ordered in all
things and sure. And this is all my salvation,
he said. He didn't leave anything in David's
hand. It was ordered and sure. And
it was all his salvation. God did it all. God did it all. And he said, this is all my desire.
Although I may make it not to grow, although I'm about to die,
I know this is my salvation. He's done everything. See, this
is it. All the promises God has made
are yes and they're amen in Christ. To the praise of the glory of
God's grace. God fulfills His promise. Rest in the promise of God, just
like Abraham did, just like Sarah did, just like Isaac did, and
you will rejoice in the Lord. You'll find rejoicing in Him.
And in that day, in the end, just like Isaac was weaned and
he enjoyed that feast with his father, God guarantees His children
that He regenerates and calls by His grace, they shall be weaned
from this world, from all these lesser things. And we'll feast
with Him one day for all eternity. God fulfills His promise. Amen.