will see Him as He is. But you
know the Lord's people, while you turn to Genesis 17, the Lord's
people, they know to some degree how great and glorious He is. He's made Himself known to us. He's revealed Himself to us,
to His people, His people. I'm going to read the first seven
verses here and then I'm going to turn to Romans chapter four
and read a few verses over there. Romans chapter four. You know,
James gives me these things that he gets off of church bulletin
boards. There's one up here in town.
Every time I see it, I wonder where in the world they get the
ideas to put on it. It just don't make any sense. But they had one that says, dreamers
and doubters. I don't have a clue what that
means. And here's one that just everybody ought to pay attention
to. It's the new year, another chance to give your life to God. The scripture says, in him we
move, live, and have our being. Another one tied on the bulletin
board, spring cleaning. God answers knee mail. Knee mail, not email, knee mail. Oh, thank God, thank God he didn't
leave me like that. I'd be in the same boat if it
wasn't for the grace of God. I really would be. All right,
Genesis 17. And when Abram was ninety, Years
old and nine, 99 years old, the Lord appeared to Abram and said
unto him, I am the almighty God. Walk before me and be thou perfect. And I will make my covenant between
me and thee and will multiply thee exceedingly. And Abram fell
on his face and God talked with him saying, as for me, behold,
my covenant is with thee. and thou shalt be a father of
many nations. Neither shall thy name any more
be called Abram, but thy name shall be called Abraham. For
I, father of many nations, have I made thee, and I will make
thee exceeding fruitful, and I will make nations of these,
and kings shall come out of thee. And I will establish my covenant
between me and thee, and thy seed after thee, and their generations
for an everlasting covenant. to be a God unto thee and thy
seed after thee. Now, Genesis four, I mean, Romans
four, excuse me. Romans four. Start at verse 13. Now we just
read where God made a promise to Abraham. I'm gonna make a
covenant with you and your seed after you forever. It says in
verse 13, for the promise that he should be the heir of the
world, going to be the father of many nations, was not to Abraham
or his seed through the law. God didn't give this promise
through the law, through the doing of anything that anybody
did, but through the righteousness of faith. For if they which are
of the law be heirs, heirs of God's promise, heirs of being
Abraham's seed, If it's by what the law, by you keeping the law,
if you become an heir, faith is made void. It has no power,
has no effect. And the promise is none effect.
If you're gonna be saved by doing, why do you need a promise? If
you're gonna be saved by what you do and by law keeping, why
in the world do you need faith? And that's what he's saying here.
Because the law worketh wrath. It just makes you angry at God
and God angry at you. And where no law is, there's
no transgression. If you're not under the law,
there's no sin. Now look what he says there. Therefore, that
he's heir of the world and the seed through him, that it might
be by grace that show us that it's of the grace of God. This
is the goal. This is the end of it. The promise
might be sure to who? All of Abraham's seed. He said,
between thee and thy seed, I'm going to make an everlasting
covenant. Going to be kings come out of you. Not to only that
which is of the law, those which are Jews, but to also which is
of the faith of Abraham, and this is my subject this morning,
who is the father of us all. Who is the father of us all.
As it is written, I have made thee a father of many nations.
before him whom he believed, even God, who quickens the dead,
gives life to the dead, and calls things which haven't even happened
yet as though they had, who against hope believed in hope that he
might become the father of many nations, so that which was spoken,
so shall thy seed be. All right. Good, good singing
this morning. Now look with me here in Romans
4, there where it says in verse 16, Therefore
it is of faith that it might be by grace to show that the
promise of God, the covenant of God, the salvation of God,
faith, all of it, is by grace. And the goal of it being that
the promise might be sure to all the seed. All the seed. Abraham's seed. You remember
the Jews said in John chapter 8, when our Lord told them, says,
know the truth and the truth will set you free. They said,
we've never been in bondage to any man. We'd be Abraham's seed. Abraham's children. But oh no,
not to that only which is of the law, those which are of the
Jewish faith. but to them also, which is the
faith of Abraham." We have the faith of Abraham, who is the
father of us all. God never changes. We know that. Our God never changes. I am the
Lord, I change not. Because I change not, therefore
you sons of Jacob, you're not consumed. That God, there's no
shadow, or variableness, or turning about Him. None whatsoever. Jesus
Christ, the same today, yesterday and forever. And if God never
changes, he only makes himself known one way, like he did to
Abraham. And if we're Abraham's seed,
Abraham, and we says he's the father of us all in the sense
that not by we're his seed naturally, we're Adam's seed naturally,
and our father's seed. But typically, typically, and
if God is the same, then he's going to do for us what he did
for Abraham. Because we're promised we're
Abraham's seed, we're his children by faith. And it's because of
this fact that how God dealt with Abraham, he deals with us.
We can say that history repeats itself. And God's dealing with
Abraham is just a foreshadow of his dealing with us, Abraham's
seed. Abraham's experience illustrates our experience. What God went
through with Abraham and how he dealt with Abraham, he pretty
much deals with us the same way. Now, how in the world is Abraham
the father of us all? Well, and I've told you this
before, I am an absolute true Jew. I am a full-blooded Jew,
spiritual Jew. You know, I shouldn't say blood,
but I'm a spiritual Jew. I'm a Jew. I'm a Jew more than
any Jew that's up there in New York City. That's got his black
hat on, his black coat on, his beard. I am. You know why I am? Because I'm one of Abraham's
sons. I'm a child of Abraham in the
sense that I believe God like Abraham believed God. And like
Abraham believed God and God counted him for righteous, we
believe God and God declares us to be righteous. And so it's
figuratively, typically. You know, the natural son, he
inherits traits from his father. I mean, I'm so much like my father
is spooky. I really, really am. I see so
much of my dad in myself. It's scary. I look like him. I act like him. I got the same
genes. I got the same body type. I got everything like him. But
I've outlived him quite a while so far. I've outlived him. I
have done that. But the natural sons inherit
traits from their father. There's a semblance between them.
Genesis 5.3 says that Adam begat a son in his own likeness and
in his own image. And that's what we do. We begat
sons in our own likeness and in our own image. And so if there
is a resemblance between the natural, there's also a resemblance
between the spiritual. There's a resemblance between
what Abraham was like and we are like. What Abraham believed
and we believe. What God did for Abraham and
he does for us. And there's such a resemblance
between Abraham's seed and the heirs according to promise. Now
I wanna show you two things in Galatians. Look in Galatians
three and then I'm gonna get on in with my message. You know,
John the Baptist told a bunch of Pharisees and Jews that was
gathered around him, he says, think not to say within yourself,
we're Abraham's children for God's able of these stones to
raise up children unto Abraham. And look what it says here in
verse seven. talking about Abraham, the father
of us all. Know you therefore that they
which are of faith, which believe, the same are the children of
Abraham. And the scripture foreseeing
that God would justify the heathen, us through faith, preached before
the gospel unto Abraham saying, in thee shall all nations be
blessed. Now listen to this. So then they
which be of faith are blessed with Abraham. What Abraham was
blessed with, we're blessed with. Now look down verse 29 of chapter
three, what it says here. Galatians 3, 29. If you be Christ,
then are you Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise.
It establishes clearly that we're Abraham's seed, Abraham's children.
Now, Abraham is a typical believer. You know, speaking of all, when
he says the father of us all, we walk in the footsteps of that
faith of Abraham. And so he's a picture of all
who believe. Paul said he was a pattern to
them which should after hereafter believe. And so that's what he's
saying about Abraham. Now, what was Abraham's beginning?
What was his beginning? He was a lost sinner like everybody
else. He was dead in trespasses and
sins like everybody else. He was an idolater over in the
air of the Chaldees. He worshipped idols. He says
over Abraham worshipped idols on the other side of the sea,
over on the other side of the river in Jordan. I mean before
he got over to the promised land. He was without God, without Christ,
without hope. But he was as lost as anybody
else was. He was dead in sins as anybody
else was. That's what his beginning was.
He was no, he wasn't nothing special. And the only thing that
made him special and singled him out was God in his blessed
grace. The only reason he had a promise,
because God willed to give him a promise. That's the only thing.
But what happened to him when he is over there in idolatry?
What happened to him when he's over there in sin? What happened
to him when he's over there lost? What happened to him? Says Acts
7, 2, when the God of glory appeared unto our father Abraham, when
he dwelt in Mesopotamia, he went out. And that's what has to happen.
No matter where you are, God has to come and appear to you.
And this is what I know without a shadow of a doubt. I know this,
and I'm not going to compromise this, and I don't think anybody
ever will. God only appears in one way. He makes Himself known
in one way. When He appeared to Abraham,
what did He appear as? The God of glory. What did Moses
want to see? God in His glory. What did Isaiah
see? God in His glory. And when men
see God in His glory, you know what they do? Like Abraham did,
he fell on his face. Isaiah did. He said, Woe is me,
I'm undone. And when God of glory appeared
unto Abraham, he went out. And you know what the scripture
said? He didn't even know where he was going. And when God called
us out, we didn't know where we was going. We just, we was
like Abraham. We just come out. And here's
what happened. When God called him, you know
what he called him to do? Leave your family. Leave your
friends. Leave that world over there that
you love and been in all your life. Leave them all behind.
Pack up your tent and you go to where I'm going to show you.
And that's what he said. I'll tell you what, beloved,
you got to leave everything. Our Lord Jesus said, if you love
your father more than you do me, you're not worthy of me.
If you love your mother more than you do me, you're not worthy
of me. And I'll tell you what, when God appeared to Abraham,
Sarah, get the tent together, we're leaving. Where are we going?
I don't know. We didn't know where we was gonna
end up when God began first to deal with us. And God told him
to separate from his old life. And I tell you, he didn't exactly
obey, but God meant to separate him unto himself. You know, he
stopped inheriting until his father died. And then afterwards,
it's a lot went down to Sodom. But oh, beloved, here was a man
that God separated to himself. But now listen, listen, here's
what happens to us. You know, when God separates
us to himself and calls us to himself after he appears to us,
And He has to appear to us. Let me ask you this, when God
first appeared to you, did you not repent and feel so awful
that you ever believed any other God besides that? Were you ever
so ashamed of anything that you've ever done other than the false
religion and the false belief you had in God before you ever
saw it? Nothing shames you and makes you feel awful like realizing
I've worshiped a false God. And that's why, beloved, you
never get over, like Abraham did, what God did for him. But
Abraham, after he got in the promised land, went to God over
to where God told him to go, you know what the first thing
happened to him? He had his first real trial of faith. And you
know, we get a little age on us before God really begins to
try us. But his first real trial of faith happened after he arrived
in Canaan. And you know what it was? It was a famine. It was
a famine. Well, what did he do? Instead
of believing God and trusting God, we're saying this morning,
God will provide, the Lord will provide. What did he do? He went down to Egypt. He went
to the world. He went to try to figure it out
for himself. And he trusted Egypt. He trusted
what he could get down in Egypt. And you say, well, it seemed
like the natural thing to do. It might've been to the natural
mind, but Abraham, didn't have a natural position. He was God's
child. And he should have trusted God.
He should have believed God. The scripture says we're bought
with a price. We're not our own. We're bought
with a price. We don't belong to ourselves.
Our Lord Jesus Christ said, without me, you can do nothing. And so
here he is. He looked at the circumstances
that was around him instead of the promise. And I tell you,
beloved, I've done that with myself. Have you ever looked
at the circumstances around you and tried to figure out how to
get out of them instead of saying, Lord, you saved me from this.
Lord, you keep me through this. And I'll tell you something else
that he did. You know, he's just, he's typical of a believer. And
he yielded to the flesh and he took Hagar. God made him a promise
that you're going to have a son. You're going to have a son out
of your own loins. Well, Abraham got tired of waitin',
Sarah got tired of waitin', he yielded to the flesh and took
Hagar, her handmaid, to help God fulfill his promise and his
purpose. Well, God ain't look like he's
not gonna give me a son, so I'll have one by this maid woman,
this bond woman. And oh my, but even when he denied
God doing that, do you know what the scripture says? God cannot
deny himself and he abides faithful. You know, if God didn't abide
faithful, what would happen to us? Huh? What would happen? Oh my, Ishmael, after he is born,
God told Ishmael, told Abraham, Ishmael can't stay here. He's
not a child of promise. He's a child of your flesh. He's
a child after your flesh. There's nothing that I had to
do with this. You did it all. And we have to
understand that, that everything that this flesh does is not worth
having, that only what God does for us is only worth having.
And Abraham decided, you know, him and Sarah, well listen, I'm
gonna have a son. If it, I have to do it myself.
And that's the thing about it, we learn quickly that this flesh
profits nothing. That this flesh, if it's not
God, if this flesh, all it can do is cause us trouble. All it
can do is get us in trouble. All it can do is make us to do
something that'll dishonor God, like Abraham did. And all of
his experiences that he had in his whole life, had prepared
him for the greatest trial that he ever had. God's tried him
over and over and over and the fire had done its work. God had refined the gold in this
man. He's not only willing to give
up his father, not only willing to give up his nephew who went
down to Sodom, not only will give up Ishmael, his son, but
he was willing to take the son of his love that promised son
and take him up on a mountain and offer him to God. And you
know, I have found out this, that the older you get, the more
severe your trials are. And as Abraham got older, his
trials got harder. They got harder. But grace does
what it always does. It triumphs. It triumphs. And
now look here, here's a man of faith. Here in Romans 4, you
know how many times faith is mentioned? I started trying to
count them this morning, but I lost count of them. But there's
faith is mentioned here, I don't know how many times. And Abraham
was a man of faith. And God's people are faith. They're
people of faith. They believe. They believe. They believe. I read something
yesterday and I read it to Shirley sitting there. Here's the president
of a Baptist college. This is what he said. He said,
I would not dare say that Jesus Christ is the Son of God. What he said was that he's a,
I would say that he was a peculiar man. He was a wonderful man. He was a precious man. He obeyed God even when he was
here. But I could not say that he was
the Son of God. I believe with all my heart that
Jesus Christ that came into this world is the Son of God then,
is the Son of God now. Him and His Father are co-equal. Our Lord Jesus Christ was the
Son of God, was in the beginning with the Father. I believe that. If He's not the Son of God, who
in the world's gonna save me? Who's gonna save Abraham? Who's
gonna fulfill the promise if He's not the Son of God? Who's
gonna fulfill the covenant if He's not the Son of God? And
if He's not the Son of God, He can't save anybody. But if He's
God the Son, and here's the situation, God can't die. God cannot die,
but man can. So God prepared His Son, and
this is why He made that promise to Abraham, in thy seed. shall
all the nations of the earth be blessed. And I'll make a promise
and enter into company with you and thy seed. And God prepared
him a body. Now God can't die, but he can
come and become a man through the womb of a virgin. And because
a man says God can't die, man can. Man can't satisfy God, but
the God-man can satisfy God. Christ who is the Son of God
and the Son of Man, sinless man, perfect man. He can honor God
and satisfy God. Huh? And that's why we say we're
a faith. I believe that. What did you
do to get to believe that? I didn't do anything. Where'd
you get your faith? For by grace are you saved through
faith and that not of yourself. It's the gift of God. If I got
faith, God gave it to me. If I'm going to keep believing,
God's going to keep me believing. We are justified through the
faith or by the faith of the Lord Jesus Christ, the Son of
God. That don't mean, beloved, that means that we are justified
by the faith and what He did, not what we did. He's the one
that satisfied God, not us. He's the one that put away sin,
not us. He's the one that had the perfect
faith, not us. But we have His faith and we
believe in Him. I'm going to go into eternity
trusting the Lord Jesus Christ. Like Brad preached here a while
back. He said, He's the Savior of sinners. Well, you're looking at a man
just like Abraham was, a sinner. And if I'm a sinner and Christ
came to save sinners, well, I'll tell you what, He saved one horrible
sinner when He saved me. He had to go reach. We sang that
song, He reached way down for me. He reached way down. And I'll tell you what, so three
times in Hebrews 11 when it talks about Abraham, his faith is mentioned
three times. By faith, Abraham, by faith,
Abraham, by faith, Abraham. And I say this, and even understanding
what happened to Job, but I think his faith was probably more tried
than anyone else. Leave your kindred, leave your
birthplace, go on a long journey. When he arrived there, he lived
in that country Decades year after year after year after year
and he never occupied He was a stranger and a sojourner going
through it stranger and a pilgrim and you know what? It was all
said and done all he owned in that promised land Was a place
to be buried. That's all he ever owned He bought
a place when Sarah died and he buried her and he said I've got
me a burying place And when it's all said and done when we leave
this world, that's the only spot of ground Then we alonged. I
already got my name on my tombstone. I remember, I'm going to tell
you a true story. My mother, when her husband died,
We said, well, we'll put a tombstone up for him. Put a tombstone up
for him. I said, now, let's put your name on it. No, no, no,
no, don't put my name on it. Why? I don't want to go out there
and look at my name on a tombstone. She was scared to death to go
out. You know, she didn't want her name on a tombstone, like
she's not going to die. But I can go look at mine, and
I can see the day I was born. And when I'm gone, I'm going
to have somebody going to go up here and have somebody. Well,
that's the day that he died. Listen, we're gonna all own a
six feet piece of ground, four feet, five foot deep, six foot
wide, about two foot long or three foot wide. And that's all
Abraham. After all his soldiering and
pilgrimage, he ended up with a place to be buried. And I tell
you what, get your house in order, because it's gonna happen. That's
all we're gonna have. And oh, beloved, his faith, his
faith was tried. His faith was tried. Oh my goodness,
how he was tried. His faith was tried by the son,
promise of a son by Sarah. Look back here in Romans four.
Look at this with me for a minute. Look what it says about him down
here in verse... He says in verse 18, excuse me,
who against hope believed in hope. Hope has to do with the
future. that he might become the father
of many nations according to that which was spoken, so shall
thy seed be. And he being not weak, listen
to this, in faith, he considered not his own body, now dead, I
mean, he is an old, old man, 125, and Sarah was 99, and when
he was about 100 years old, he didn't even stagger at the deadness
of Sarah's womb. And he staggered not at the promise
of God through unbelief, but was strong in faith, listen to
this, giving glory to God, and being fully persuaded, fully
persuaded, that what he promised, he is able also to perform it. And then, you're talking about
tried. Isaac got up to be he's about
20 21 years old and his father said son We're gonna go up yonder
on this hip mountainside. We're gonna worship and they
started up that mountainside and he Had the wood he had the
fire and he is gonna give up the son the promised son And
you know why he was going to give up his promised son Because
he knew that God had made a promise that through that son through
that son all the nations of the earth gonna be blessed And he
said, if I slay him, I'm still gonna come off this mountain
with that boy, because you know why? God's gonna raise him from
the dead. He calls his things that be not
as though they were. And I'll tell you what, beloved,
and that's every time we take somebody that we love or know
to the graveyard, we go there in hope, staggering not at the
promise of God through unbelief, giving glory to God that one
of these days, God's gonna raise them from the dead, just like
he brought Isaac down off that mountain. Did Abraham's faith
ever waver? Did his faith ever waver? Did
yours? We're talking about he's the
father of us all. And we're so much like him, we carry the spiritual
resemblance of him. Did his faith ever waver? Well,
what do you think? Now I'm going to tell you something
about what happened in the Old Testament. All of God's people,
they see their faults and their blemishes and their failings.
But when you come to the New Testament, none of them is mentioned.
Not one of them is mentioned. Do you know why? Because Christ
died. And back there, but boy, I tell
you what, when you're in Christ and God views you in Christ,
there's nothing wrong. You ain't done nothing wrong.
But Abraham, did his faith ever waver? Did his faith ever waver? He obeyed and he left Chaldea,
the Ur of the Chaldeans. But by unbelief, he took his
father and his nephew, and he stopped short. By faith, he entered
the promised land. He entered the promised land.
God said, look there as far as you can in every direction. This
is yours. I'm going to give it to you and
your children after you. But through unbelief, forsook
it when a famine came. When a famine came. When he's
seen that, you know, I can't trust God, I'm going to have
to go down to Egypt. And God says, I don't know how
many times to woe unto them that go down to Egypt. He saved Israel
out of Egypt. But that's where he went. And
by faith, he returned. But by unbelief, he took Hagar
to have a son through a bondwoman. By faith, he went out against
those five kings. with 318 people to rescue his
nephew Lot, but by unbelief, he lied to Abimelech about his
wife. And what does this show us? This
shows us that we have two natures. Oh my goodness, we have two of
them. One of them cannot sin. One of them loves God, obeys
God, delights in God, believes the Scriptures, loves the Scriptures,
loves Christ, and the other one is absolutely the opposite of
that. And I'm telling you something,
that old nature is not any better than it's ever been. No, it don't
get, age does not improve it, does it? You know, Paul said,
oh, let us forsake the sin that so easily besets us. What sin
do you reckon so easily besets us? When you say unbelief? Oh
my goodness. The flesh lusts against the spirit. And you cannot do the things
that you would. When we come in this service, we can't worship
God the way that we would. We can't do it. We come here
to listen to the Gospel. We come here to hear God's Word.
And we gather around the Word. And we come in here to sing songs
and to pray and worship the Lord. But while we're worshiping the
Lord, how many times does that old nature interfere with that
worship? How many times does it happen? While you're in a
service, your mind wanders. You're worried about what happened
yesterday, what you're going to do tomorrow. I hope I don't
forget to do this. I've got to be such and such.
And your mind, and you come in these services, and this flesh
will not let you enter into the perfect, glorious, blessed worship
of the Lord Jesus Christ. But that new man, that spiritual
man inside of you is crying out against that flesh. Oh, I despise
you. I want to hear about Christ.
And that spiritual man, he's trying to put that old man away
long enough to hear the gospel without interference. Ain't that
right? Oh, this is struggle. And listen,
I have the same struggle while I'm up here preaching. Like Bruce
said that time when he was preaching, said, boy, that's good preaching
if I say so myself. Now that was just, you can't
get no more fleshly than that. But yet he was preaching good.
That'd be like me said, boy, said, ain't I shelling the corn
down now? But that's not the way it is.
We have this, these two natures. And I tell you, Paul called it
a dead body. And anything that's dead, after
it's dead a while, it begins to stink, it begins to rot, it
begins to corrupt. And that's why he says, you know,
woe unto me, that we carry this old dead man around with us and
boy, there's times that he is so corrupt and he is so rotten
and he stinks so bad, you wanna just reach back there and pull
him off if you could and throw him away, but you can't get him
off. Well, one of these days, God's going to take him off.
Huh? You know when we're not going
to deal with him anymore? When we don't live in the body anymore.
That's when we're going to be rid of him. But, oh, this shows
we have two natures. Let me give you some illustrations
about this. When Israel was at the Red Sea,
God brought them up out of Egypt. And they got to the Red Sea.
And there's Pharaoh's army coming behind them. And they said, oh,
why in the world did you bring us out here? Why did you bring
us out here? We're going to starve to death
out here and these enemies are going to catch us. They just
forgot that God had just brought them out with a high hand and
all the miracles and signs that Moses had done. But oh my, they're
at the Red Sea and they're worried about Eden. David slew Goliath
as a lad, as a boy. as a very, very young man. He
went down there and killed Goliath with a stone, with a rock. That man was nine foot tall,
that's how big he was, nine foot tall. And he killed him, David
just a boy, and he killed him with a stone, and took his sword
and his shield. And you know what? When Saul,
the king, started after David, you know what David did? He fled.
He ran. He ran. Elijah, he called fire
down and destroyed the prophets of Baal. 450 of them were slain. He stood there and 67 words he
prayed. and consumed the sacrifices and
killed all them false prophets. God's gonna kill a bunch more
false prophets before it's all said and done. But oh my, Jezebel
said, if I don't kill him by tomorrow, I'm not here. And you
know what? He killed all them false prophets,
called fire down from heaven, but Jezebel said, I'm gonna get
him. He got afraid and run from a
woman, run from a woman. And you know what God did for
him? Instead of chiding him and saying, boy, you little old weak-kneed
preacher of you, you know what God did? He took him over to
Brooke Cherith, said, I'll tell you what I'm going to do. He
sent ravens and fed him. Every day, a raven came and fed
him. Oh, my. I'll tell you. And Peter walked on the sea. walked on the water. He cut off
a Roman soldier's ear. But when a maid said, you're
one of them, he trembled before that maid and said, I'm not.
I don't know that man. And he denied the Lord. Oh my. So no matter who you look at,
who you look at, we can find ourselves, find ourselves. Now doesn't this show us, let
me say this, doesn't this show us the long-suffering of God
towards His own people? I've often said this and I say
it often, I think the most precious, one of the most precious and
blessed attributes of God to me is His long-suffering. His
long-suffering. His long-suffering towards His
own. If He wasn't long-suffering towards His own, what would happen?
What if He got impatient with us? I get impatient with myself. Do you get impatient with yourself?
Do you get aggravated at yourself and say, why in the world did
I do that? How could I have said such a thing? Did I say that?
Did I do that? And we're so unconscious of some
of the things we do. But oh, how God is longsuffering
towards His own. Thank God He is. If He endures
this much longsuffering, the vessels of wrath that He's fitted
and made fit for destruction, How much more is he towards us? Oh my. You know, Israel, when
they was murmuring about hunger and being hungry, they didn't
perish from hunger. You know how God fed them? The
scripture says that he sent them angels' food. He sent them manna
from heaven. He said, y'all hungry? He said,
I can feed you. I can feed, and there was over
two million of them, and he sent manna, bread down from heaven.
And you know what it tastes like? Like it's bread made with honey. I tell you what, and that's why
Christ is so sweet to us. Oh my. And oh listen, Saul was
after David and after like a partridge on the side of a hill. After
him year after year after year and tried to kill him. But David
wasn't slain. He ended up sitting on the throne
and being the most famous king in Israel. Here's one of the
most famous kings in all the world that people still talk
about David. Elijah, Jezebel said, I'm going
to kill you. Elijah didn't die at Jezebel's
hands. But you know what happened to
him? God come down in a chariot. And we sang that old song, Swing
Low, Sweet Chariot. Well, there's a chariot come
down from God and took Elijah and picked him up. And they watched
it and it just went out of sight. And he went to heaven. He went
to glory without dying. That's what's going to happen
to a lot of us. We're gonna go with that. Peter was not disowned when he
denied the Lord Jesus Christ three times. Instead of our Lord
Jesus saying, Simon Peter, I ain't having nothing else to do with
you. But you know what our Lord said to him? He said, I give
unto you the keys to the kingdom. And you know when he used them?
He used them on the day of Pentecost to open the gospel, the door
to the Jews, And he opened the door to the Gentiles in Acts
chapter 10 when he preached to Cornelius. That was the keys
to the kingdom. He opened the doors. He opened
the doors. Huh? And oh my, God used him
so gloriously, so gloriously. And beloved, I'm telling you
that our Lord Jesus Christ, the blessed, blessed Son of God,
and God didn't forsake Abraham when his faith faltered. And
oh how it faltered. But let him on away until he
by faith was able to do on Mount Moriah with his son that which
was a type of calvary itself. You think God is not going to?
He said, Abraham, He said, I'm going to let you enter into my
heart. I'm going to let you see my son. I'm going to let you
see what's going to happen to save you from your sins. I'm
going to show you what it's going to take to save you. Take your
son, your only son. And then he went on to say, not
your only son, but the son of your love. Take him unto the
place that I will show you and there offer him as a sacrifice. They started up that mountain.
They had wood. Our Lord Jesus Christ was crucified
on a tree. It had fire. Our Lord Jesus Christ
consumed God's wrath, the fire of God's wrath on the cross. And they went up there with fire
and wood. And Isaac was carrying them both. And he says, Father, here we've
got the wood and here we've got the fire, but where is the lamb?
My son, my son, God will provide himself a lamb. He'll not only provide himself
a lamb, but he himself will be the lamb. And he said, I'm going
to let you see what it's going to take. And when he got up there,
Isaac was so obedient, like our Savior, he says, Father, if it
be possible, let this cup pass from me. If it's any other way.
But Isaac, he laid down. Let his father strap him to an
altar. Let his father put that wood
under him. And about that time, there's
a ram caught over here in a thicket. God said, now stop. Stop right
now. I see that you love me above
everything in this world. I see that you're willing to
give up everything that's precious to you. Take that ram. Let Isaac
go and put that ram in his stead. And beloved, when we should have
been on the altar, our Lord Jesus Christ said, take him off. And he went to that cross, and
he bore our sins there on that blessed cross. And God's wrath,
just like us consuming fire, fell on him. And instead of the
fire consuming him, he consumed the fire. Instead of the wrath
consuming him, he consumed the wrath. And that's why Isaac came
off that mountain with his father. And it says they worshiped. They
went up there to worship. And you know where we worshiped
at? Just the same place Abraham did when the Lord met him there
in the plains of Mamre at his tent. Under a tree, we have fellowship
with our Lord Jesus Christ at the cross, at the cross. And
all beloved, we see God's sovereignty in choosing him. Why didn't he
choose somebody else instead of Abraham? God willed to do
it. God's purpose to do it. It's God's sovereignty that gave
him the promise. God's sovereignty was displayed
in Abraham's character. And you know, let me show you
this. I'll be done here in a minute. But look over here in Isaiah
51. Look at his unworthiness. Remember
he said, I think it was last week I was preaching on this,
where he said that He said, you know, who am I but dust and ashes
to speak unto the Lord? But look what it says here in
Isaiah 51. We see God's sovereignty in choosing him. Passed by others,
but saved Abraham. Passed by Ishmael, saved Isaac. Passed by Esau, saved Jacob. And God's sovereignty is displayed
in his character by believing, by giving him the promise, by
entering into covenant with him. And look what it says here. In
Isaiah 51, one. Hearken to me, ye that follow
after righteousness, ye that seek the Lord. Look, look unto
the rock which ye are hewn, and to the hole of the pit which
ye are digged. Listen to it. Look unto Abraham
your father, and unto Sarah that bear you, for I called him alone,
and blessed him, and increased him. God said, I did it, I did
it. Just like Abraham was an election
of grace, even so at this present time, there's a remnant according
to the election of grace. And he was called an object of
God's love. And talking about Abraham and
us being like him, he was an object of God's love. God loved
us with an everlasting love. He is the friend of God. Our
Lord Jesus Christ says, a servant don't know what his master does.
Hitherto I've called you sir, now you're my friend. I'm gonna
let you know what I do. And he ate and drank with Abraham
under the tree, and God even told him what he's gonna do with
Sodom. God had fellowship with Abraham, and God has fellowship
with us the same way he did through Abraham, through a covenant,
through a promise, and through Calvary, through our Lord Jesus
Christ, doing for us what only He can do, and did do. Our Father, the precious name,
blessed name, of the Lord Jesus Christ, we're like Abraham, strong
in faith, giving glory to God, and yet we're like Abraham. We
have unbelief, we falter, but we believe, we believe. And as
he died in faith, we'll one of these days die in faith. We're
strangers and pilgrims here. This is not our home. This is
not our abiding place. This is not where we're going
to spend eternity. This is not it. This is just
a place we're passing through. This is a place, Lord Jesus,
will you try us like you did Abraham? Will you preserve us
like you did Abraham? Will you keep us believing like
you did Abraham? And O Lord Jesus, thank you for
obeying your Father, going to the cross, bearing our sin, rising
from the dead, ascending to the Father, and pleading for us even
today. We bless you and praise you in
your holy name. Amen. Amen.