God Will Provide

I want you to look at a statement
in Genesis 22, verse 1. It came to pass after these things
that God did. The word in the King James is
tempt. A better word is test, Abraham. And it came to pass
after these things that God did test Abraham. The Lord will test
his people. God will try his people. Contrary
to most preaching, which we hear today, to which we are exposed,
it's fun being saved, happy all the time, happy all the time.
Contrary to that, the Word of God declares that God will test
his people. Yes, God will bless us. Blessed
be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hath blessed
us with all spiritual blessings and the heavenlies in Christ.
God will bless us. That's true. God will forgive
us. John wrote in 1 John 1, 9, if
we confess our sins, he is faithful, he is just, to forgive us our
sins and to cleanse us from all unrighteousness. God will forgive
us. And God Almighty will meet our needs. He will supply our
needs. Paul wrote that in Philippians.
He said, But my God shall supply all your needs according to his
riches and glory through Christ Jesus. God will meet our need,
and Almighty God will keep us. Peter wrote, We are kept by the
power of God through faith. Jude wrote, Unto him that is
able to keep us from falling, and God will raise us. Christ
said, Because I live ye shall live also." God will bless his
people. He will forgive his people. He
will supply our needs. He will keep us. He will raise
us. He will glorify us. But this
is just as true as any of those statements. God will test us. It came to pass after these things
that God did test Abraham. Now, God will test our fear of
the Lord. Now, here are three areas. God
will test or try our fear of the Lord. Look at verse 12. And
God said, Abraham, lay not thine hand upon the lad, neither do
thou anything unto him, for now I know that thou fearest God. Now, I know this is not a popular
word in this generation, but the Lord delights, and you remember
this, the Lord delights in the person who has a holy reverence
for his God. Now, I know this is a scarce
article these days. There's no fear of God before
their eyes. But blessed is the man who feareth
the Lord. The Scripture says, Come, my
children, I'll teach you how you ought to fear the Lord. The
Scripture says the beginning of wisdom is the fear of the
Lord. And in Old Testament days, when
a believer was described, he was described in this fashion,
one that feared God with all his house. And in the New Testament,
an unbeliever is described in this fashion, no fear of God. God's going to try, God's going
to test our fear of God. I fear the Lord. I fear God. And that fear is not a slavish
fear. It's not the fear of one who
thinks that he may any moment be cast into prison or cast away
from the presence of God or cast into hell. That's not it. It's
a holy awe. It's a holy reverence. It's a
holy fear in the presence. It's a respect for God's power
and God's sovereignty and God's rights and God's holiness and
God's justice. It's a reverence for the Lord.
Holy and Reverend is His name. And then God will not only test
our fear of God, but He will test our love for Him. He will
test our love for Him. He says in that same verse, Now
I know that you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your only
Son from me. Turn to Matthew 10, verse 37.
Now God is a jealous God. He will not share our affections
with other gods. He will not share our affections
with idols. God must be loved first. In Matthew 10, verse 37, our
Lord said, He that loveth father or mother more than me is not
worthy of me. And he that loveth son or daughter
more than me is not worthy of me. Our God will test our love. Now, if we love Christ with all
our hearts, we will hold loosely to anything connected with the
flesh and with this world, being willing, as Abraham was here,
to surrender his most precious treasure. There's no doubt that
he loved Sarah. Abraham loved his family. Abraham
loved the things of that God had given him. Abraham loved
the good life. Abraham was a prosperous man.
And there's no doubt that Isaac was his most precious treasure.
Isaac was the son of his old age. Isaac was the promised heir. Isaac was the miracle child.
Isaac was God's gift to him. And he loved Isaac. But he loved
God more. And God's going to test this
love. And then he will test our faith in him. Turn to 1 Peter
1. These things are going to be
tested. God will test his people. It would not be right for me
to tell you that if you are a child of God, if you are a believer
in Christ, that everything is going to go your way from now
on. No, it won't. It would not be right for me
to tell you if you believe on Christ, your problems are solved.
That's not true. It would not be right for me
to tell you, if you receive Christ as your Lord and Savior, that
you'll be happy all the time. There'll be no struggles, there'll
be no doubts, there'll be no fears, there'll be no conflict,
there'll be no dark days. That's not true. In fact, to
be perfectly honest with you, God just made, if you're one
of His choice people, if you're one of His choice servants, if
God is going to really use you for His glory, He just may give
you the hardest time he's ever given a person of your acquaintance. He just may. The best gold goes
through the hottest fire. The best ships sail the deepest
seas. The strongest vessels are tried
by the hardest storms. And if God is going to really
use you and glorify His name in you, it just may be. I don't
know. It just may be that He'll single
you out for the greatest adversity. He did Job. You read Abraham's
nine great trials, nine of them, nine severe trials. He did Peter. God used Peter, but not before
He stripped him, not before He broke him, not before He humbled
him, not before He humiliated him. And it may be it's not right
for us as preachers to stand and tell people, if you want
the happy life, take Christ. It's the ultimately happy life.
It's the eternally happy life. But it may be for this present
time, a time of great sorrow and a great time of great trials
and great trouble. God's going to test His people.
And He calls it in Peter here, fiery trials. Verse 7, that the
trial of your faith, being much more precious than of gold at
perish, though it be tried with fire, might be found under the
praise and honor and glory at the appearing of our Lord Jesus
Christ. God tried Abraham's faith. He
tried his fear of the Lord. He feared God. He tried his love
for Christ. I have known people who claim
to be saved, claim to know God. God comes in and visits them
with a little affliction, and they begin to curse God. God
comes in and takes a wife away from a husband, and he grows
bitter. He never did love God, he loved
his wife. God comes in and takes a child, and the mother cracks
up, and the father quits church. Those people don't know God.
They know a God. And I'm not being cruel, I'm
not being harsh. They know a God, but not the
God of the Bible. Because a person who knows the
God of the Bible is willing to surrender, not only mother and
father, husband, wife, son and daughter, but his own life also. And able to say with Job, though
he slay me, I'll trust him. Who can say with Eli, it's the
Lord, let him do what he will. or with the prophet Job who said,
the Lord gave and the Lord hath taken away, blessed be the name
of the Lord. If you cannot endure these trials, it's because you
do not know God. If you know God, these trials
will come. God's going to try your fear. If any man who would
live godly in Christ Jesus shall, not might, not could, shall suffer
persecution, God will try your love. And he may pick, and he
will pick. The object of your greatest affection,
he will do it. And then he'll test your faith.
But Abraham believed God. He believed God when he left
Ur of the Chaldees, and he believed God when he walked in the wilderness.
He believed God in the sunshine of blessings. He believed God
in the rain of affliction. He believed God in life when
Isaac was born. He believed God when he took
Isaac to the mountain to slay him. He believed God then. He
believed God in joy. He believed God in sorrow. He
believed God at the door of birth. He believed God at the open tomb. He believed God. This thing of believing on the
Lord Jesus Christ encompasses a lot more than shaking a preacher's
hand and giving mental assent to some doctrine. This thing
of being S-A-V-E-D, saved, this thing of being a child of God,
a son of God, this thing of receiving Christ's scepter and Christ's
rule and Christ's reign and Christ's Lordship is a whole lot more
than wanting to go to heaven when we die. It's submitting
to the King. And if the King is pleased to
send the sunshine, it's still submission. But if the King is
pleased to send the clouds and the rain, He's still King. If
the king is pleased to bless me with prosperity, he's the
king. If the king is pleased to send
me through the valley of poverty and loneliness and desertion,
he's still the king. You see what I'm saying? Actually, Paul gloried in his
infirmities. He gloried in afflictions because
he knew that God was trying him. Unhappy is the man who has never
tried, the woman who has never tested. That's a good sign that
you don't belong to God. If you be without chastening,
and chastening is not just punishment for sin, chastening is correction. And if you be without chastening,
if you be without trial, if you be without testing, God said,
Paul said, you're not a son, you're not a child of God, whom
the Lord loveth, He corrected. God will test His people. He
will test their fear. He will test their love. He will
test their faith. And then secondly, He will test
them again and again and again. Look back at verse 1. And this
particular phrase just jumped out of verse 1, and it came to
pass, "...after these things." My soul, how much more, God? "...after these things." Nine
great trials. Sometimes take your Bible study
those nine great trials. Some of them, first of all, he
left his home, get thee out of thy country, away from thy kindred,
out of thy father's house, to a land I'll show thee. He was
a man in his seventies. He'd been there all his life.
He was raised there. Those were his people, his friends,
his fathers, his contacts, his influence, his home. Everything
was here. God said, get out. What a trial! Well, Lord, can't I serve you
here? Get out! Well, Lord, I can witness for
you here just as well as I can there. Get out! And you go to
a land I'll show you." That was a severe trial, but Abraham went,
not knowing where, as the Scripture says. And then he stood out there,
and he'd taken Lot with him, his brother's boy. Kind of looked
out after him. Lot went with him. God had prospered
Abraham and prospered Lot and prospered them so much that they
couldn't stay in the same area. Their herdsmen were conflicting,
having all sorts of trouble, and Lot came to him and said,
We've got to separate. And Abraham said, All right,
Lot. He said, Just take your choice. Wherever you want to
be in business, you just take your choice, and I'll take whatever
you don't want. And Abraham Lot took the well-watered
plains of Sodom. He looked down there, and there
was that beautiful bottom land. All well-watered plains, and
all these, the thing just looked so good, and he said, That's
what I'll take. And Lot said, All right. And Abraham said,
All right. And he went the other way. That was a trial. God was
testing Abraham's faith. God was testing his dependence
upon him. I've opened my hand to the Lord.
And I won't fear what man can do." And he turned away. And
then when he rescued Lot and all these folks from Sodom, from
the hands of the enemy kings, and the king of Sodom and the
king of Gomorrah stood before him and said, Abraham... Brother
Milton talked about twelve tons of gold. Abraham looked at twelve
tons of gold. He looked at all the diamonds
and all of the gold and the silver and all of the wealth of Sodom.
Accumulated through the years and the king of Sodom said this
is yours Take it Now that was a trial That was a real trial
But Abraham turned his back on it. He said I I've opened my
hand to the Lord and he'll meet my need and I don't want what
you've got Turned it. That's a trial. Yeah, let me
tell you something and you remember it We've got some odd ideas about
how God tests his people. And we usually connect God's
trials and tests with misfortune. But don't be deceived. It may
be God will try you through riches and prosperity. It may be that
instead of taking something away from you to test your faith,
God may give you something. That's right, God may give you
something. You know, the prophet prayed, he said, Lord, keep me
from poverty lest I curse thee and steal. But Lord, keep me
from riches lest I forget thee. And I'll tell you this, poverty
is a whole lot easier to handle than wealth. And I'll tell you
this, losing something is a whole lot easier to handle, a whole
lot easier to handle than an abundance. And a time of affliction
is a whole lot easier sometimes than a time of prosperity. Satan's subtle. He knows how
to deal with human nature. He's been dealing with it 6,000
years. He's a master at it. He knows how to bait the hook.
He may not cover your hook with quinine. He just may cover it
with caviar. God will test his people again
and again. And Abraham turned down the wealth
of Sodom. I've known men who talked about
making a lot of money so they can support the kingdom of God.
But when they made a lot of money, they forgot the kingdom of God.
I've known men who've gone into business with the idea, I think
sincerely, of making, of prospering so that they could help others.
And they wound up more greedy and selfish than they were before
they got to prosperity. God tested Abraham. He tested
him, not only calling him away from his country, not only testing
his faith concerning the planes of Sodom, but he tested him with
the presentation of the possibility of becoming the world's wealthiest
man. And then God tested Abraham when
he had to send away Ishmael. Have you thought, you talk about
the sacrifice of Isaac. Abraham loved Ishmael. Ishmael
was his son. Not a doubt in my mind. Ishmael
was born of Hagar, I know that. Ishmael was not Saber's son.
Ishmael was not the promised seed. In Ishmael it doesn't say
thy seed shall be called, but that boy was about 16 years old.
And God came to Abraham one day. He was born to Abraham. Abraham
loved him. He was a boy in which Abraham
could be proud. He was a strong boy and an able
son and an enjoyable person. And God came to him and said,
Abraham, the son of the bondwoman and the son of the promise can't
live together. Law and grace can't live together.
The son of the bondwoman's got to go. You can't have grace and
works. You can't have works and mercy. You can't have the law and the
grace of God. You can't have man's doings and
God's doings together. There's no mixture. And Ishmael's
got to go. Send him away. Let me tell you
something. You just put yourself in that
old man's place as he took Hagar. whom he loved, and Ishmael, in
whom he delighted, and stood outside that camp and put a bottle
of water on her shoulders and said goodbye. But he believed God. He believed
God. Now look at verse 2. After these
things, isn't that enough? After these things, God said,
Abraham, and he said, Behold, here I am. We get a message one
of these days on Here I Am. You notice how many times in
here Abraham said, Here I Am? Every time he heard the voice
of God, he said, Well, here I am. Here I am. Here I am. I'm right here. I'm within listening
distance. We need to remain there, don't we? We need to remain in
listening distance when God speaks. To hear his voice. Here I am.
And he said, Take now, now, after these things, take thy son, thine
only son, only one you've got left, whom you love. Get thee into the land of Moriah
and offer him for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains that
I'll tell thee of." And did you notice in verse 4 it says, on
the third day, you know how Abraham just didn't grab Isaac up and
run out there on the side of the hill and build an altar.
God gave him a while to decide whether he really wanted to do
it or not. Gave him three days and three nights. Mount Moriah
was a three days journey from where Abraham was. And God said,
take this boy Isaac, whom you love, your only son, to a place
I'll show you, Mount Moriah, an offering there is a burnt
offering. And Abraham there purposely and deliberately planned the
trip, knowing what was at the end of the journey. Now, this
is something I say to every one of you. And this is something
upon which I have built our ministry. This thing of rushing into a
confession of faith is dangerous. This thing of rushing people
into a profession of faith. And I want to say this kindly,
and I don't want to be harsh, but these so-called soul winners
of today are not only the enemies of God, but they're enemies of
men's souls. When they take their Bibles carefully
marked, the ABCs of the gospel, and rush in the homes and sit
down and throw the Bible open, you believe this? Yes. You believe
that? Yes. You believe this? Yes. Will you take my hand and
confess Christ? Yes. Now you're saved. Come to
church next Sunday and be baptized. God bless you. That is tragic. Why are we afraid? Our Lord Jesus
taught this. Why are we afraid to say to a
sinner, This is the Word of God. All have sinned and come short
of the glory of God. There's none that doeth good,
no, not one. God will be merciful. God is gracious. God will save
sinners. God will forgive sin. When you
receive Christ as your Lord and Savior, He'll come into your
heart. He'll give you grace. He'll give you mercy. He'll give
you life. He'll take away your guilt. He'll give you home and
glory. Now, you sit down and make up
your mind. You count the costs. Do you want
Christ? Do you want life? Do you want
to know God? Go home and seek the Lord. Oh,
you mustn't do that. You must get them on the dotted
line. You must get them while I strike, while the iron's hot.
You must draw the net while there's fish in it. We ain't catching
fish. We're preaching the gospel. We're looking for sheep. We're
looking for sons of God. And this thing, hey, God gives
his people time to think things over. And this thing of haste
and rushing into things and deciding overnight and making decisions
right now and too often we're led by the flesh. We're under
the pressure and the hypnosis of religious emotions. And we
decide things tonight and the cold, clear dawn of Monday morning
comes and the bright sunshine of another day and you're not
in that atmosphere and you wonder, what have I done? Well, I've
made a religious profession. Well, I must try to live it.
Don't like it, but I must try to live it. And I must not be
embarrassed. This is the thing about young
men being called into the ministry. You may think I'm unwise. I don't
think so. A young man comes to me and says,
God's called me to preach. I don't encourage him. No, sir,
I do not. I do not pressure him into going
to school and doing these things right now. You just wait. If
God's called you, He'll make it known to you. And you folks
who listen to the gospel, I'm not afraid of turning you over
to the Holy Spirit. If he's convicting you tonight, he'll be convicting
you tomorrow. If God's calling you tonight, he'll be calling
you tomorrow. If you're his son today, you'll be his son tomorrow.
If you're one of his children now, you'll be his child next
Sunday. You say, what if he dies? Well, God's the Lord of life
and death. He's the Lord of life and death. He's not going to
begin a work and not finish it. He that hath begun a good work
in you, he'll complete it. He'll complete it. And God said,
Abraham, you go to a place, I'll show you. And that old man went
through three days of this. Now if God had come to him and
said, rush out the front door and stab Isaac, he might have
done that under the emotion of God's presence. He might have
done it, he might have rushed out and put Isaac on the altar
already made and slew him. But it would have been under
emotional and the awesome presence of God suddenly coming upon him.
But he had time to sit by God, God left him, and he had time
to walk alongside an old burdensome donkey all day long. Here's old
Abraham walking along on a dirt road, plain old rocky dirt road,
with a plain old dirty donkey, with a plain old pile of wood
on a donkey's back, and a beautiful son. God wasn't there, but Isaac
was. Now you think about There were
no clouds to lead him and no fire to inspire him, no preacher's
voice to urge him on, just that beautiful son. Teenage boy. I don't know how old he was,
13, 14, 15. Throwing rocks at things, you know, and running
along grabbing his daddy's hand. Where are you going, daddy? Oh
boy, now, I tell you. That's the time for you to decide
whether you want to be a Christian or not. That's the time for you
to decide whether or not you believe God. When you don't see
the awesome presence of a revealed majesty, you just see these treasures
that you love so much. You just see these things that
mean so much. And he sat there by the campfire,
just an ordinary fire, not a bush burning that would not be consumed,
a fire he built himself and burned his hand doing it. Wood he gathered
himself and piled up there and laid that boy over there by himself
and sat there and looked from that fire to that wood and then
looked up to heaven and no voice, no vision, no dream, no supernatural
revelation. And he kept going on. And when
he came to the bottom of that hill and laid that wood on Isaac's
back, And Isaac shifted the wood on his back, you know. He laid
it on his son. And Abraham reached and got that
knife. And don't you know he stood there and looked at it
a long time. Still no voice. God already spoke to him. That's
all you're going to get is God's Word. And sinner, if you're looking
for the sky to turn green when you get up in the morning, and
here's the worst thing you'll ever do. Now God, if you really
spoke to me last night, in the morning, don't let it rain. You're
a fool. You mean whether it rains or
not means more than this? I know people who call that putting
out the fleece. You better behave yourself. Now
Lord, if you really spoke to me, I'll tell you when I get
up in the morning, you make the phone ring and it be Brother
so-and-so and he wants me to come do so-and-so and I'll believe
you set for me to do that. Sure enough, the phone rings
and it was Brother so-and-so. God gave me a sign. No, God didn't. The devil's in that kind of business
too. I'm not being facetious. I'm telling you the truth. The
devil's in that kind of business. This is all God's going to give
you, His Word. Our Lord said that this sinful
generation, this sinful and adulterous generation seeks the sign. No
sign shall be given but this book. That's right. God Almighty spoke to Abraham.
Abraham knew who it was. He'd talked to him before. Take
your son, whom you love, and go to a place I'll show thee,
and offer him as a burnt offering. That's my word, and that's all
you're gonna get, Abraham." And that's all he got. But he believed
God. He believed God. He believed
God, and it was counted to him for righteousness. That's all
he needed. That's all he wanted. He believed God. And he believed
God out there by the campfire, and he believed God walking under
the boiling burning sun of that desert headed for that mountain.
Wow, Lord! No answer. I've already spoken,
and that's all you're going to get. Show me a sign. You have my word. And he put
that wood on that boy's back, and that boy turned to him, and
he said, Dad, Father, here's the wood. And Abraham had the
fire. They didn't have matches. Lighters
he had the wood torch in his hand where he'd gotten the fire
and here's the fire Where's the lamp I? Want you to listen what that
old man said and Abraham said my son God will provide You know
what that word means. It's in your margin. That's what
it means. It means God will see to it God will see to it God'll
see to it. Abraham answered from his son,
Where's the lamb, my son? God'll see to it. This word had
been the sole comfort for this man all along. God'll see to
it. Don't you know that that night
as he sat by the fire and he started up that mountain, a voice
within his heart said, Abraham, if you slay your son, now we
like to reason things. We're the world's worst. If you
slay your son, How can God keep his promise to you that in Isaac
shall your seed be called? God will see to it. God will
see to it. Abraham, if you slay your son,
how are you going to meet these servants when you come down off
that mountain? What are you going to say? They're not going to
stand. You've taken that boy and gone
up that mountain and they wondered, they didn't say anything, they
wondered where that lamb was too. They'd watched Abraham off
for sacrifices before. They saw the fire, they saw the
wood, they didn't see any lamb. What are they going to say when
you come down off that mountain, your hands dripping with the
blood of that boy? God will see to it. Abraham, if you slay your son,
how are you going to face Sarah when you go home? What are you
going to tell her? You didn't tell her anything when you left.
You said you and the boy were going on a trip. And you come
back without him, what are you going to say? God'll see to it. That's faith. God'll see to it. Oh, we've got to have the answer,
haven't we? I'm bad as you are. We've got
to figure things out. It's so hard for us to walk by
faith. It's so hard for us to get a
a message from God and a vision from the Lord and an inspiration
from His Word and then walk by faith, not having the answer,
but being able to say with Abraham, when all these questions and
doubts and fears arise, God will see to it. I don't know what's ahead for
the Thirteenth-Straight Baptist Church. I know that we have missionaries
depending upon God to meet their need through us. I know we have
a building now. We feel God led us to do it and
got an indebtedness to take care of. And maybe some of us just
don't see how it's going to be done. But I'll give you the best
answer I can come up with right now. God will see to it. Expect great things from God.
If we could just do that, God will see to it. Now we have to,
I know, and I know a man ought to have a little bit of wisdom.
God gives him wisdom. A man ought to sit down and figure
things out before he goes into it. But if sometimes God leads
us in a direction like He did Abraham, you go where I'll show
you later. And to be able to say God will
see to it. Abraham, how are you going to face Abimelech? How
are you going to face the Philistines? They sacrificed their children.
How are you going to face them when they say, you're no different
from us? God'll see to it. Abraham, the
Scripture says, staggered not. That is, what does a man do when
he staggers? He reels under the pressure. But Abraham did not
reel to and fro. The Word of God was his comfort
for every doubt. God'll see to it. And verse 14
said, And Abraham called the name of that place. God'll see
to it. God will see to it. Turn to John
8, verse 56 a moment. I want to show you something.
We'll wind this down. John 8, verse 56. It says here,
I don't know whether Abraham understood the full meaning of
what he was saying. I don't know. I know he understood
some of it, no question about it, because our Lord said in
John 8, verse 56, Your father Abraham rejoiced to see my day."
Abraham raised that knife to slay his son. The angel of the
Lord said, Abraham, don't touch that boy. I know you fear God. You've revealed your faith. You've
revealed your love. You've revealed your fear. God
knew it all along. But it was being shown to Abraham.
It was being demonstrated for Henry's sake. For Charlie's sake,
for Gerald's sake, God was showing us what faith is. These things
are for our example. God didn't discover Abraham loved
him. God knew Abraham loved him. God didn't discover Abraham feared
him. God knew Abraham feared him. And God Almighty was revealing. And when God asked a question,
He's not asking for information. God's asking a question to reveal.
King, where is your brother? God knew where his brother was.
He wanted him to say where he was. He wanted to bring out of
that man's heart what was there. Adam, where art thou? He knew
where he was. God's in every place, beholding
the evil and the good. But he wanted to hear Adam say
it. He wanted you to hear him say it. And that's when he said,
Abraham, now I know you love me. God knew he loved him. He's
revealing it. He's manifesting what's there.
That's the reason God tests you and tries you. He does it to
reveal things. He does it to manifest things.
Now, if I've got a phony faith, I want to know it, don't you?
And the sooner the trial comes, the better. The sooner I'm routed
out of my false refuge, and the sooner my house is torn down
off that false foundation, the sooner I'll get busy building
one on the rock. The sooner God shows me that I'm a phony religionist,
the better. The sooner God reveals to me
that I love Paul more than I love Him, the better off I'll be.
The sooner God reveals to me that I care more for my wealth
than I do for him, the better off I'll be. That's the reason
we ought to welcome these things. Let them come. Let's find out
what we're made out of spiritually. That's the reason Paul says,
I delight in my affliction, but Abraham saw my daily. That's
what Christ said. Abraham saw substitution. Abraham
saw satisfaction. When he took that ram out of
that ticket, took Isaac off the cross, off the wood, and put
that realm in his place, in the stead of his son. Abraham saw
the gospel, substitution. Christ was wounded for my transgressions. The cross was mine, but he bore
it. The altar of sacrifice was my place, but he took it. The
death was mine, but he died it. The punishment was mine, but
he bore it. And he was wounded for my transgressions
and bruised for my iniquities. By his death I'm healed, by his
stripes I'm healed in the stead of his son." Now whether or not
Abraham understood what he said, the full meaning of it, I don't
know, but he spoke it for us. And every word he uttered is
for our teaching and the teaching is this. This is what God's teaching
right here on Mount Moriah. God in the person of his Son
Jesus Christ has provided, he has made provisions, he has seen
to it, that every need for the sinner is met. God has seen to
it that the fullest provision for infinite justice and the
broken law has been met. Our greatest need is satisfied. Christ the Substitute has come
into the world, identified himself with us in every way, he has
obeyed the law in our stead, he has taken our sins in his
body, he has died in our place, he has gone into the grave, he
has risen again, he has ascended to possess what he bought. And
the Lord God interposed when the death of Isaac was imminent.
And the Lord God in the person of his Son has interposed when
our death was sure, God commended His love toward us that while
we were yet sinners, Christ died for us. I want you to underline
some things right here and get this beautiful picture and I'll
let you go. In verse 6, see this picture
of Christ. Abraham took the wood and laid
it on Isaac. And the Scripture says in John
19, he going forth Bearing his cross See our Lord going to Calvary
watch Isaac as he goes up that hill bearing that wood on which
he would die See Christ going up Calvary bearing his cross. There's an old Saying by the
people back when the cross was being used to slay men that says
this the cross Is death and he who is to be crucified on the
cross must first bear it Every male factor must bear his own
cross. And that's what our Lord did.
It was his cross. It was mine, but it was his. It was his because
he was numbered with the transgressors. He was identified with us. It
was his from all eternity. And when he paid the debt, he
laid it aside. And His cross, in His cross,
He satisfied the law and God's justice, and that's the reason
we can say, free from the law. As our Lord is free now from
the law, and free from sin, and free from the cross, we are,
because the debt's been paid. Now look at this. This is something
I read very emphatically, verse 6 and verse 8. I wonder how many
of you caught it. The last line in verse 6, look
at it, the last line. And they went, both of them together. That, I was listening to Brother
Clark, Kent Clark, preach on the radio last Monday morning
down in Danville. He's preaching from this, and
when he read that, I said, that's my sermon for Sunday night. They
went, both of them together. Look at verse 8, the last line.
So they went, both of them together. Abraham and his son. What a picture. God was in Christ, reconciling
the world to himself. The disciples had no part in
our redemption. They forsook him and fled. It's
just the Father and the Son. Mary, don't call on Mary, she
had no part in that redemption, just the Father and the Son. Don't call on the Church, the
Church wasn't there, just the Father and the Son. They went,
both of them, together, the provider and the provision. Watch this
too. Abraham said, My son, God will
provide himself a ransom, a lamb. God himself will provide it,
but more than that, he provided himself. He is the priest, but
he's the sacrifice. He is the priest, but he's the
atonement. He is the provider, but he's
the provision. And the Father was in the Son.
Look at verse, if you will, verse 9, "...and he laid him on the
altar." The last line in verse 9, "...see Christ, it pleased
God to bruise him." I know wicked men nailed him to that cross,
but it says, "...you with wicked hands have crucified him and
slain the Lord of glory, but you did what the Father determined
before to be done." It was God's purpose and will that put him
on that cross. Man did what he wanted to do. God turned him
over to his own evil will. But he just did what God Almighty
determined back in eternity for him to do. You know, I was talking
to someone the other day, a preacher from Chattanooga, and we were
discussing these things, and I said, you know, these men cast
lots for his garment at the foot of the cross. Well, it says that
over here in Psalm 22. Just one illustration. Psalm
22, look at it. Verse 18 says, "...they part
my garments among them, and cast lots upon my vesture." Now, these
men, these wicked soldiers, knew nothing about the Scriptures.
They didn't turn to the Scriptures as they crucified Christ and
said, now the first thing is to deny him any water, and now
the second thing is to nail him to a cross, and the third thing
is to cast lots. They did what they wanted to
do. They did what evil hearts wanted to do. But in doing it,
they did what God prophesied, what God purposed, what God said
would be done. And I'll tell you this, the will
of God is both directive and permissive, and everything's
in God's will. God's will's gonna be done. And
God, in order to accomplish His will, will make you willing in
the day of His power, but He can also accomplish His will
by leaving you alone, did you know that? And letting you do
what your will wants to do, what your fallen nature wants to do,
what your evil nature wants to do. But in doing that, you do
it willingly, You do it deliberately, you do it as a plan out of your
own evil nature, but God knows human nature. And even the wrath
of man will praise the Lord. Look at verse, turn back Genesis
22, and watch this. I know, verse 12, lay not your
hand upon the lad, neither do anything to him. I know that
you fear God, seeing you have not withheld your son from me.
I can say this. How do I know God loves sinners? Well...

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