Genesis chapter 12. You and I
have spent two weeks on this chapter. I have tried lately to limit two messages
to a chapter. We looked week before last on
the call of Abraham. Last week we looked at the trials
of this young believer. I wanted to leave this and go
to the 13th chapter, but there's some things in here I want us
to look at. I don't want to spend a complete
message on each point here. It would take too long. It would
get us bogged down. But we'll probably have to refer
to this this morning as gleanings in Genesis 12. Because I want
to look at some different subjects, three or four different subjects
that we've not been able to look at. in this particular chapter. I want to begin reading in verse
11. Verse 10, we're told that there
was the famine in the land, and Abraham went down to Egypt to
sojourn there because the famine was so severe. And then in chapter
12, verse 11, it came to pass, when he was come near to enter
into Egypt, that he said unto Sarai, his wife, Behold, now
I know that thou art a fair woman to look upon. Therefore it shall
come to pass, when the Egyptians shall see thee, that they shall
say, This is his wife, and they will kill me, and save thee a
life. Say, I pray thee, thou art my
sister, that it may be well with me for thy sake, and my soul
shall live because of thee. And it came to pass that when
Abram was come unto Egypt, the Egyptians beheld the woman, that
she was very fair. The princess also of Pharaoh
saw her, and commended her before Pharaoh, and the woman was taken
unto Pharaoh's house. And Pharaoh entreated Abram well
for her sake, and he had sheep, and oxen, and he asses, and menservants,
and maidservants, and she-ashes, and camels. And the Lord plagued
Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai, Abram's
wife. And Pharaoh called Abram and
said, What is this that thou hast done unto me? Why didst
thou not tell me that she was thy wife? Why sayest thou she
is my sister? So I might have taken her to
me, to wife. Now therefore, behold thy wife,
take her, and go thy way. And Pharaoh commanded his men
concerning him, and they sent him away, and his wife, and all
that he had." Now let's read the first four verses of chapter
13. And Abram went up out of Egypt,
he and his wife, and all that he had, and lot with him unto
the south. And Abram was very rich in cattle,
and silver, and gold. And he went on his journeys from
the south even to Bethel, unto the place where his tent had
been at the beginning. between Bethlehem and Ai, unto
the place of the altar which he had made there at the first,
and there Abraham called on the name of the Lord." Now, these
are more or less going to be practical things today that I
want to look at, but I did want to take this time and share these
things with you. The first thing I saw as I read
this a few months ago was the last portion there in verse 11. The last portion of that verse.
I thought it was interesting to note how Abraham felt and
how he viewed his wife. And you notice there what he
said about it. This was his estimation of his wife. Thou art a fair
woman to look upon. Isn't that amazing? And one of
the things that makes this so amazing is Sarai, at this time,
was somewhere between 65 and 70 years old. And I don't know
how long her and Abraham had been married. The Scripture doesn't
tell us. But in chapter 20, and we'll
see this when we get over there, that he says the same thing about
her there, and she was probably 88 or 89 years old. You are a fair woman to look
upon. Now, there's one thing you and
I know about physical attraction. When you come right down to it,
especially if you really know somebody, if you've really been
married to them for a period of time, if that woman, if that
wife of yours doesn't have a personality to match her physical beauty,
then she'll cease to be pretty in your eyes." Now, ain't that
so? Abraham was very familiar with
Sarah. He knew her. That was his wife.
They lived together, ate together, slept together, shopped together.
And yet, after years, this man could look at his wife and say,
in my eyes, in my estimation of you, you're a fair woman to
look upon. And that tells us something about
Sariah. When you and I think that physical
attraction soon loses its beauty unless they have a personality
to match it, that tells us something about this woman. She not only
had physical beauty, but she did indeed have a character,
she had a personality to match it. And that's what 1 Peter tells
us about this woman. that she was indeed not only
a beautiful woman outwardly, an attractive woman, but Peter
tells us that she was of a meek and quiet spirit. That she loved
Abraham, that she obeyed Abraham, even addressed him as Lord. Now, when you read about this
woman's life, One thing you'll know, when we say she was a meek
lady, she was a quiet lady, she had an outgoing personality,
but when we say she was meek and lowly and of a quiet attitude,
I'm not saying that she would never speak up. When Agar, her
maid, gave her some trouble, boy, she got very stern with
us. And when Abraham didn't always do what was right, she could
tell him where he messed up too. But this woman was so gracious. She was so tender and kind and
obedient and loving. After all of these years, Abraham
said, Sarai, you sure got a personality that matches your physical attraction.
I remember one time I was in fifth grade. I changed grade
schools when I was in the fifth grade. And we'll forget this. I didn't know anyone at the new
grade school I went to, and when I stepped off the bus, there
was this girl there. And I'm telling you what, that
was the most beautiful girl I've ever seen in my life. I thought,
man, what a beautiful girl. I've never seen such a beautiful
girl. And I got acquainted with two or three of the boys that
day, and I made mention to them, boy, who is that girl? That's
the prettiest girl I've ever seen. And you know what they
did? They started gagging. I started gagging. And after
I got to know her, I started gagging. These two things go together.
A physical attraction and an inward beauty. And physical attraction soon
loses its beauty if you don't have that inward beauty to go
with it. Now, ain't that so? Ain't that so? Abraham looked
upon his wife and said, you're so fair, you're so fair. It's
because he knew her, he knew her. Such a meek and quiet lady. Secondly, and this is the second
point and I want to stress this and it's practical also. It's
found here that I read to you in verse 12 and verse 14 and
verse 15. And here's the point about this.
She not only was beautiful in Abraham's sight, she was indeed
a physically attractive woman. And my point is, she didn't hide
her beauty. She didn't hide her physical
attractiveness. Did you notice what Abraham said
in verse 12? He said, the Egyptians are going
to see you. And they did there indeed in
verse 14. The Egyptians beheld the woman,
and they had the same opinion of her as Abraham had. She's
a fair woman. And the princess of Pharaoh saw
her. And they said, boy, she is a
beautiful woman. And my point is this, brothers and sisters,
she didn't cover herself with a burka. She didn't have a veil
across her face that you could see only her eyes, if that. Her dress wasn't so long it was
dragging the ground and you couldn't see her ankles. See my point
in this? There's no doubt that Sarah dressed
in modest apparel. She didn't dress to be attractive
to the opposite sex. Her intent was not, when she
got up and made herself up, not to go out and dress in such a
provocative way that men would lust after her. She dressed in
modest apparel. Neither did she try and make
an attempt to totally cover her beauty. You could look at her
and tell she was a beautiful woman, physically attractive. You see the Eastern women today,
the way they dress, especially in the Islam religion, and you
can't even see their eyes. You can't see any of their flesh.
And somebody, somebody either thinks or they say, now that's
the way the Bible tells women to dress. That's what the Bible
says about women. That's how the Bible degrades
women. That's not scriptural at all. If that had been scriptural,
this woman who loved the Lord would have dressed that way.
The Lord never commands a woman to hide her beauty. And neither should you hide your
views. See what I'm saying? Sure, ladies
are to dress in modest apparel. Sure, they're not to dress in
a provocative way to attract the opposite sex. But to cover
up oneself? You know what happened to Jacob?
Remember what happened to Jacob when Laban He said, you work
for me seven years and I'll give you Rachel. And he worked for
seven years and he didn't give him Rachel, he gave him Leah. And you remember about Leah.
She had these soft eyes, tender eyed person. How come Jacob didn't
know until the next morning that he married Leah instead of Rachel? You know what
she did? She covered herself up. Would
you marry a woman that you've never looked into her eyes? You could see Sarai down in the
market, and boy, that beautiful hair was blowing in the breeze.
She had such a glow and countenance. You could talk with her, and
boy, look into those deep, dark eyes. And you'd come away convinced
just as Abraham was. And the more you got acquainted
with her, the more convinced you would be. Boy, this is indeed
a fair woman to look on. A fair woman to look on. We can overly dress, can't we?
We don't have too much a problem with that. But you can. You can. And I'd never date a
woman or especially marry a woman. But I hadn't looked at her face,
her countenance, her eyes, her hair, and got acquainted with
her. Here's the third practical thing. It may be a little bit more serious
probably. But it's found here in verse
17 through verse 19. And the reason I wanted to bring
this out, one of the reasons I wanted to bring this out, because
we've been looking at some of the places in the book of Genesis
where something was first mentioned. We looked at the first murder.
We looked at the place where we plural marriages. We looked
at the first time it ever rained, the first time the rainbow was
given, the first burnt offering that was ever sacrificed. And here we have the first place
where adultery is mentioned. Though it's not adultery, but
it was potentially that. If God hadn't intervened, it
could have went for that. And here in verses 17 through
verse 19, we have the first place this is mentioned, and we have
God's attitude toward it. And not only God's attitude,
but Pharaoh's attitude toward it. Here in verse 17, And the
Lord plagued Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because
of Sarai, Abram's wife. And the reason the Lord plagued
his house was not only to deliver Sarai, but to remind Pharaoh
of something. What an awful sin adultery is. That's what this was about. What
an awful sin, what a defiling sin, and how God hates it. And to teach him that and remind
him of that, the Scripture says here that he plagued Pharaoh
and his house. We don't know what he did, but
he plagued the house. You know, isn't it sad? It's sad when this happens for
some reason or another, whatever reason it happened for, sometimes circumstances or whatever that
brings us to pass. But I have performed several
ceremonies now, men and women, being brought together in the
holy bonds of matrimony. And it especially bothers me
when I have joined someone as the minister in the holy bonds
of matrimony and they divorce. That is heart-wrenching. And
it's sad because you try to talk to them, especially young people. Do you know what you're getting
into? Are you serious about this? You're taking these vows before
God. You're promising before God,
I will live with this man, I'll live with this woman as husband
and wife. We promise to do that till death
we part. And then two years, six months
or whatever, they just break that covenant. Think they have
the liberty, they have the freedom to break that covenant. And here
this man is, he don't have the Ten Commandments to go by. He
doesn't have a plaque on the wall that says, down there, thou
shalt not commit adultery. But boy, he feels this in his
conscience. When God approaches him about
this and says, look what you've done. This man, this woman that
you've taken into your house, she's another man's wife. And this man's conscience was
fearful and he confronted Abraham and said, what have you done
to me? What sin have you brought upon me? This is adultery. You know we've had, how long
have we had now? Four thousand years or so? Two
thousand years, whatever, to think about the dreadful consequences
of this sin. temporal consequences and eternal
consequences. I just wonder if our generation
really ever thinks about the terrible, dreadful consequences
of this sin. God has plagued kings. He has
plagued society because of this sin. And I tell you, brothers
and sisters, it's a sin. It's a sin. That if a person
commits it and dies unsaved from it, He'll destroy a person's
soul. The man that commits adultery
lacketh understanding. Ain't that what the Proverbs
said? He lacketh understanding, and he that doeth it destroys
his own soul. You say, Bruce, isn't there salvation?
Well, sure there's salvation for it. Are we going to use that
as an excuse? There's two attitudes that I've
noticed. And what little bit of counseling I've done. There's
two attitudes that people take. Number one is, usually by the
time a man and his wife come to counseling, so many of the
time, one of them already got their mind made up. One of them either, four people,
four people already come to my mind that I'm just thinking about.
Just off the top of my head. that I can remember when they
came to me and sat down with me, they either already had their
minds made up, either the man or his wife, that I'm either
going to commit adultery or they already had committed adultery.
I've noticed that in counseling people. And there's something
else. And this is a dangerous attitude.
It's for either the man or the wife to say, I'm going to go
ahead and do it. And I'll just ask for forgiveness
later. I'll go ahead and do it, and
I'll ask for forgiveness later. And what they dream is this.
They think that forgiveness comes just because they confess something
with their mouth. It ain't so, is it? What I'll do,
I'll live until I get in trouble, or I'll live until I get on the
deathbed, and then I'll confess this. Well, here's the only problem,
you see. Forgiveness comes. Yes, it comes. But it comes through a true heart
confession and forsaking of sin and faith in the blood of the
Lord Jesus Christ. It's just not confession with
your mouth. Pharaoh said, I've sinned. And
he went to hell. Judah said, I've sinned against
innocent blood. And he went to hell. Adultery
is a sin. that we must be saved from. It
must be forgiven. We must be washed from it and
saved from it. Paul said, Don't you know that
the unrighteous shall not inherit the kingdom of heaven? Be not
deceived, neither adulterers. And such were some of you. But
you were washed. You were justified. You were
sanctified in the name of the Lord Jesus Christ. But here was
a king that never even read the Ten Commandments. Never had them
to look at. But he was so awakened to what
a dreadful sin this was. It scared him to death. Scared
him to death. Just his conscience. Just his
conscience. Boy, we see all around us, and
I'm just trying to emphasize this, we see all around us in
our society today, the devastating consequences
of this. I mean, it has all kinds of consequences, not only financially,
but physically. And it's going to have some eternal
consequences if a person's not saved from this sin. Something else here in chapter
12, 17 through 20, and I want us to see these things. I can't
dwell very long on these. But here's three things I want
to see else in these verses here. One is this. And this is a thing
I think we can all relate to. If you've been on this way very
long, you can relate to this. Did you ever get yourself into
a snare that you couldn't get out of? You got yourself in a
place. Either you got yourself there.
And it's not that you've always got yourself there. But you're
there. Well, you've got yourself there,
or the devil got you there, the world got you there, but did
you ever get in a situation that you couldn't get out of? That's
where Abraham and Sarah got themselves in a situation they could not
get out of. Big time situation. With a king. A king. With an army. And Abraham was right in the
middle of it, and he couldn't get out of it. And what we see here in
verses 17 through verse 20 is the Lord had to intervene and
deliver this man and his wife. Aren't you glad for that, brothers
and sisters? If you've been on this way long,
you know what I'm talking about. David said this, I sank in deep
waters where there's no standing. I'm wiggling, trying to get out,
and the more I wiggle, the deeper I go down. These waters have
overflowed me, He said. And now, oh God, I wait upon
You. Why are you waiting upon Him,
David? If You don't come deliver me, I'm in a dilemma I cannot
get out of. I tell you, this is a dangerous
world you and I are walking through. We've got a devil that hates
us. We've got a world full of lust and sins that always lure
in us. We're in a flesh that's weak.
And sometimes the best we can do, we're going to get ourselves
in some places that we cannot get out of. I got myself in the
court system one time. My family, we got ourselves in
the court system. And I'm telling you what, we
got wrapped up with judges and lawyers and officials. I remember
one time we was in a meeting. My son, bless his heart, he got
us in a mess. And I was sitting right in the
meeting. two or three lawyers on this end, some officials on
that end, taking these depositions from people, and there I sat.
And I thought to myself, this is out of control. This is absolutely
mushroomed out of control. I could do nothing but sit there.
And my heart kept crying out, O Lord, overrule this situation. O Lord, please bring us out of
this situation. It had got out of our control.
And if the Lord had not intervened, in that situation and delivered
us, our lives would have still been in amass until this day.
I love that Scripture where the Lord Jesus was praying one time,
and He said, Father, all those that You've given Me, I've kept
them. I've kept them. I've kept them in Your name,
and not a one of them is lost. I've kept them. Why? Why do we need for Him to keep
us? We're so ignorant, aren't we? Oh, Father, they're so ignorant. Now I'm committing them to You.
And if You don't keep them, things they think, things they say,
things they do, oh, Father, keep them from the evil. They're in
this world. I'm no longer in the world. I'm
coming to You. I'm coming to heaven. But my
people are in this world and they're in danger. And they're
out to get themselves into a dilemma that they can't get out of. Aren't
you glad, brothers and sisters? for the faithfulness of your
Lord, Abraham and Sarah would have
been gone. That's it. They would have been
gone. History is out of their control if the Lord had not intervened.
I love that Psalm 105 where the Lord was speaking of
Abraham and his prophets and He said, He suffered no man to
do them wrong. Yea, He reproved kings for their
sakes. And he said, that's my anointing,
don't you touch it. That's my child, don't you touch
it. And do my prophets no harm. Second thing about this year,
though, was this. Abraham had gotten an embarrassing
reproof. Did you notice that? There in
verse 18, Pharaoh called Abraham and said, what is this that thou
hast done unto me? Why did you not tell me she was
your wife? Why did you say she's your sister? I might have taken her to meet
your wife. Here's a heathen king that the
Lord allowed him to speak down to his father. That must have
been so embarrassing. I've been here. It is embarrassing. Pharaoh reproved him because
he lied to him. You know in chapter 20, and we'll
get over there to this, you know in chapter 20, Abraham and Sarada
did this again. They did it again. And when we
get over there, we'll see the reasons that they did it. But I'll tell you one thing,
when they did it in chapter 20, that's the last time they did
it. It's the very last time they did it. Abraham went down to
a place called Givah, king of Bimelech. And said the same thing
about Sarai there. And Abimelech took her into his
house just like Pharaoh did. And the Lord appeared to him
and said, you're a dead man. He said, Lord, what did I do?
He said, that woman that you took to your wife over there,
that's another man's wife. And boy, Abimelech got all upset
and he said, Lord, I didn't know that. He lied to me. You know
he lied to me. In the integrity of my heart,
I'd have never done this if he hadn't told me that. And she
told me that. And the Lord said, I know it. I know it. And this
is the second time Abraham and Sarai has done this. But he said,
they'll not do it again. And you know what Abimelech did?
He took it one step further than King Pharaoh did. King Pharaoh
said, why did you do this to me? And he didn't give Abraham
time to answer it. But when Abimelech questioned
him, When he said, Abraham, why did you do this to me? He stopped
and made Abraham answer him. He said, you brought upon my
country and upon my people a great sin. Why did you do this? Pharaoh asked that question,
didn't he? Why did you do this? But he didn't give him the time
to answer. The Lord seemingly let Abraham
buy with this, with just a reproof. But boy, the second time He done
it, He put a stop to it. He put a stop to it. And what
do we learn from this? What do we learn from this? You and I should listen, brothers
and sisters. We should watch and listen. When
the Lord sends us a message, you better hear it. If you're
in trouble and you're in need of deliverance, if you're needing
instructions, if you're needing correction, be careful that you
listen to the Lord the first time He speaks. Because
if you don't, if you don't hear what He's saying to you, you
may get into deeper trouble next time. Abraham should have listened
and learned this message. when Pharaoh rebuked him for
it. But he didn't. He didn't. And
look what a mess he got himself into next time. If you get in trouble, and you
need directions, and you need to escape that trouble, I'll
wager this much to you. You'll never get out of your
trouble. if you don't listen to what the Lord tells you to
do in His Word. I don't care what else you do.
I have been there. I have experienced this. I never
did quit coming to church. I never did quit reading the
Scriptures. I never did quit praying and singing and worshiping. But my troubles stayed with me
until I obeyed what the Lord told me to do in His Word. That's
the only way to escape your troubles. And if you don't, they're just
going to increase. Listen. Listen. When the Lord
sends you a message. The Lord sent Abraham a message
by Pharaoh. Why have you done this to me?
Abraham should have considered that, shouldn't he? But he didn't. But boy, he did
next time. He did next time. See what I'm
saying? See what I'm saying? The Lord speaks to us through
many different ways, don't He? Sometimes sickness, sometimes
through a message, sometimes through His providence of some
way or another. But listen, listen. Thirdly, about this, I thought
this was very strange here because we're all so guilty of this.
All these are practical things. How cruel you and I can be in
our estimation of other people. How cruel we can judge people.
Abraham here, he estimated Pharaoh to be a man that had no virtue. He had no honor about it. He
had no conscience about it. Here's what he said about Pharaoh. Here's what he thought, and here's
what he told Sarah. He said, Sarah, this king, he's
an adulterer. Ain't that his estimation of
it? And he's a murderer. And he's such a sorry, low-down
scumbag that he'll kill me just to get you. That's the estimation
he had of this man. But was Pharaoh that bad a man? Well, no. He abhorred adultery. He was scared to death of commitment.
Would he have murdered Abraham? No, he wouldn't have murdered
him. He told his men to guard him, give him safe passage out
of his land. How harshly we judge others at
times. We don't know their motives,
yet we judge them. Sometimes we're not even for
sure if their actions are sinful, but yet we judge them. A dear
friend of mine told me one time about this man. He's a member
of the congregation. And out of the blue, this other
member of the congregation brought charges against this brother.
Hadn't gone to the brother and talked to him about it, but he
just brought charges. They said, what's the charge
you want to bring against? He said, well, I was down on
so-and-so street the other night, and I saw him and this other
fella coming out of this nightclub. Coming out of a bar. And I don't
think Christians should be in those places. And I'm bringing
charges against him. He ought to be disciplined. Something
ought to be done about it. Well, they say, well, have you talked
to him about it? No. No, I ain't talked to him about it. Well, come to find out, you
know what had happened? The bartender knew this man, and he knew this
man's son. And the man's son was down there
drinking himself drunk. So the bartender called the dad
and said, you probably should come and get your son. The dad
went down to get the son, and he was coming out the door with
him to take him home when the other church members saw him. We need to be careful, don't
we, how we judge people. Why did you lie to me? That's
what Pharaoh, Pharaoh wanted to know that. Why did you lie
to me? Why don't you tell him Abraham?