Introduction
Let me begin with a discipleship question: will we trust and obey Jesus in the real decisions of everyday life? Christ forms us through truth received, repentance practiced, and obedience lived out.
Main Points
Faith and Obedience
this is one of those passages of scripture that if you don't know the full picture of the word of god it could be read in a very stumbling kind of way because the call of god is so intense as revealed in the call of god in abraham's life that without a full knowledge of how this story ends and ultimately how this story points us to a fuller picture of the story of god's love for us this is a very challenging read but with the proper lens on this story this is the igniter of your faith this is something that could restore and refresh your love for god and it is given to us and it must be read through the lens of verse number one because it says now it came to pass after these things after the life that abraham has lived with in the call of god the ups and the downs and the challenges there is coming a moment that will be given to abraham to show abraham to reveal even to him what he really believes about god because it says after these things god tested abraham and this is what the test is it says he said to abraham so abraham responds here i am and then in verse 2 it says that god said take now your son. your only son isaac whom you love and go to the land of moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains of which i shall tell you again we have to keep a full picture of the story of god in mind but just that simple test on abraham's life is to take his son and offer him to god and we have to view this through the lens of the test in this god is taking abraham through even a course of his own life something that will refine who he is before god and he does that with all of us and really without a test in our lives we don't really know what we believe or what we would do in certain circumstances i think of a different test that is popular in the study of physiology it's the test that you hear often called fight or flight which is how would you respond when some unforeseen circumstances thrown at you that could be impending danger could cause harm on your life and you need to respond very quickly and so do you respond by confronting it face on and fighting and standing your ground or do you respond by fleeing the situation and it takes a certain amount of life experience to know which is the proper response i think of that test in my own life actually happened right here at this church on a night of ministry that i was doing with one of our ministry leaders named chris smith who leads our addiction recovery program meets every thursday night in the lobby it's called words of freedom and he and i were talking to a man who had come into the church who was clearly drunk and not only was he drunk but he was also reeling because he had just gotten out of prison and he was trying to navigate what his life on the other side was going to look like and he was dealing with it by drinking which meant he was already violating some of his terms of release and so he came in and he was really struggling and we tried to minister and we tried to talk to him and in the midst of that he pulled out a gun and now you have the unforeseen moment that is going to show you who you are and all of us in the fight-or-flight idea you hope to say that you would fight when it's appropriate because we all love the marvel universe and that we would flee when it's appropriate because no one wants to get buried in avalanche but in that moment chris and i had two very different responses i started the engine of my plane and i hopped on and i flew away and chris held his ground and he talked to the man and he made sure that the situation was disarmed and he loved on him and he prayed for him and it made a situation that could have gone horribly go a lot better and so afterwards me dealing with my feelings of being like a hireling what did i do back there i talked to chris and i said how did you do that and he said i grew up on the streets i've seen this all the time not the first time i've hung out with someone who just got out of prison not the first time that i've hung out with someone who was in the middle of a parole violation and it's definitely not the first time that someone's pulled a gun on me so in the moment the test has to have real life experience to know who you are because you don't know if you're fight or flight by answering a questionnaire in the same way there is a test on your life that can go one of two directions this is the test of faith or the test of the flesh and when you respond to the call of god and the circumstances of life and the temptation of the world and the flesh and the devil you have to have real experiences to know who you are and to know what the proper response is and so what has happened in abraham's life is he is coming to another real life circumstance between he and god to where what is inside of him will produce what he will do to respond by faith or by flesh and really this is the story of abraham that we've been studying all the way back since genesis chapter 12. we could frame all of the stories through the lens of a test so you think back to genesis chapter 12. we could call that the test of comfort because genesis chapter 12 sees the first call of god on abraham's life in the land that he grew up in it was the land of mesopotamia where there was riches and there was wealth and there was his father's household and there was everything that he knew from society to religion to culture and god said leave it all to a land that i will show you and where does god take him initially it takes him to canaan which will become the promised land and it is at the moment a famished land god calls abraham to live by faith by removing him from comfort and that's one of the tests and then we could fast forward to genesis chapter 13 where we find the test of power which is one of the tests that all of us will go through because god calls us to be people who receive him in humility and he says he rejects the proud he rejects the powerful in their own strength and abraham going through that test after he leaves egypt after the famine and he comes back he's been given as a blessing away from egypt great wealth in the form of livestock and herdsmen not only for himself but also as we remember from our study his nephew lot so much so that abraham and lot begin to grow beyond what the land can handle and in that moment there is a test of power because abraham has every right to choose for himself the land of plenty he is abraham's he is lot's elder he is the head of the household by which lot came to the land and it is his call that brought him to the land and it's the promise of god that the land was his and yet what does he do in the test of power he says to lot the younger with no rights first choice and we see in the example of abraham faith that trusted in god that rejected the power plays of this world it's one of the tests that we'll go through but we continue because the test of power then turns into the test of wealth in genesis chapter 14 it's not long before he realized lot chose poorly for himself he chose a land of plenty where there was plenty of water and plenty of green fields for his mini stock but it was also a land of wickedness where a land where sodom would eventually be destroyed for its exceeding wickedness and because of the wickedness there was warring in the land and the king of sodom was overtaken by other kings in the region and god used abraham to rescue lot it was a preview to another rescue and that would happen in genesis chapter 19. and in his rescuing the king of sodom so grateful for abraham's intervention with all of his mighty men that would come and defeat the other armies he said here's your wealth take it all and what does abraham say i'll take none of it lest anyone think that i was who i am because of you i've made a covenant with my god and so it is the test of our lives will include an offering of this world to exchange the riches of the glory of god for something that this earth has to offer you and that's why jesus says to all of us don't store yourself up treasures here because you got rust and you've got moth and you've got thieves that will come in and take them store it for yourselves by faith the treasures in heaven but really the theme in all of those is the test of patience because god called abraham to a land that he would show them and then promised him a descendant through the seed of his body and his wife sarah that would bless the nations there would be a fulfillment of the genesis 3 promise that the curse would not go on forever but god would send a deliverer in the seat of the woman and that seed would start with abraham and it would go from his descendants to the blessings of the world ultimately bringing the savior of christ but it was the test of patience and there will be that test in our lives the test to wait on the timing of god and the provision of god and the plan of god apart from all of the ways that you see fit for those things to work out in your life but now we come and maybe for the purposes of our last view in the life of abraham for our sundays we come to what could be called the final test or the final exam this is the one that really defines the outcome of abraham's life and this test is true also of your life in all of the ways your faith will be refined and god will mature you from glory to glory through the ways that you come to forks in the road between the flesh and the faith that god is calling to there is a final exam that will set into place all other answers and that is the exam that we look at this morning and we find that again in verse 2.
Grace and Justification
this is the test of devotion look what he says to abraham in verse 2. now take your son unless there be any confusion about which son god is talking about he says your son isaac whom you love and go to the land of moriah and offer him whom you love whom you love more than anything whom you've been waiting for and you are devoted to in the book of genesis it's always worth noting the first time you see a biblical theme revealed in your journey and this is the first time in the bible that we see the word love it was god calling abraham to offer his choice thing person treasure devoted of all things the love of his life given back to god and this is the call the final exam on our faith before god says do you love me more than anything else it's also a preview into the way that will make sense of this story in its fullness that god is not calling abraham to offer a child as sacrifice in himself but he's giving us a preview that we will see over lane throughout this journey in genesis chapter 22 until the sacrifice is attempted that this is a picture of god's love your son your only son that you love the father's love for the son is the greatest the first and the primary love that god reveals to us in his living word and this is the challenge or the exam of our faith this morning because all of us have a primary devotion to something apart from god that will define what the altar looks like the cross the sacrifice the call to discipleship jesus says in the gospel of luke unless you hate mother father sister brother yes even your own life you can't be my disciple there is a call to make god the primary aim of your life and this is a call for all of us now because we come here to worship god i heard it this morning we sang our hearts we said you have no rival and you have no equal and then we come to sit under the authority of god and yet there are competing things that we desire to worship and there are competing authorities in our hearts all of us this morning that god will say let it be known who you really are i am calling you to the altar and you must bring that thing that you love more than anything else how did we see the first tension of this play out in abraham's life remember in genesis chapter 15 it says after these things this is an after these things the moment that we find the king of sodom offering those treasures to abraham and abraham says i've made a covenant with god i've made a covenant with yahweh i don't need your riches and i don't want anyone to think that you're rich riches made me and so he chose loyalty to god over loyalty to this world and then god said this genesis chapter 15 verse 1 the word of the lord came to abraham in a vision don't be afraid abraham i am your shield and i am your exceedingly great reward you chose wisely abraham because you rejected the treasures of this earth you receive the reward of me and that is the reward of our faith by the way it's challenging to not think of the things that god is calling us to or providing us with or blessing us in as somehow the reward those are secondary rewards the primary reward is to hear what abraham heared i am now your shield i am now your god i am now your savior i am now your lord and i want good things for your life i'll lead you and i'll guide you and yet what was abraham's response verse 2 of chapter 15 sovereign lord what can you give me since i remain childless hint if i could choose my reward if it was up to me perhaps you could deliver the thing i've been waiting for i have no child and if i die now my heir is eliezer of damascus certainly you could bring me a child so god says i'm your reward and abraham says what about a child and we all have that i'm your reward i'm your shield i'm your lord i'm your savior i am the primary focus of your life that will make heaven and you say that's awesome now what about this here's a question that's worth asking we ask it from time to time and i think it's framed correctly by john piper when he says it's the question of the generation if you could have heaven with no sickness and with all the friends you have ever had on earth and all the food you have ever liked and the leisure activities you ever enjoyed and all the natural beauties you have ever seen and all the physical pleasures you have ever tasted and there was no human conflict or natural disaster would you be satisfied in heaven without christ the question of the generation is there something on this side of heaven that if you could just remain in that it would be heaven and he goes on to say that the job of the believer as a light into the world is to proclaim a resounding no to the generation that there is nothing that god calls you to lay at the altar to say here was something that was competing as a rival that would ever be worth in exchange for your soul and this is the test of devotion that now we see this morning the example of abraham as to why he is the father of faith we know the story from genesis chapter 12 until now is filled with some moments of faith and moments where he has a lapse of faith but this morning we read why the book of hebrews in the hall of faith proclaims abraham as the father exalted in the faith because he gives us an answer into how he responded into the primary sacrifice of the thing that you're devoted to most apart from god and we should listen to this because it is the final exam first we see in verse three so abraham rose early in the morning and saddled his donkey and took two of his young men with him and isaac his son and he split the wood for the burnt offering and he arose and he went to the place of which god had told him god called abraham obeyed this is the first answer to the test of faith in our life and when god calls us to renew the first love by which we are saved holding nothing back from the acceptance of the free gift of salvation coming with humility and empty hands crying out for god's life in us the answer is that we obey abraham did not delay in his obedience don't you love the detail that's given to us in the word that he arose early and he got to work in his obedience to do what god called him to do god said abraham and he said hear i am three words that point us to the obedience that god calls us to live by faith because faith is not simply a statement of faith that you agree with on a church website faith is not simply the box that you check on the country's census faith is how you respond to the call with your actual life and in the journey of learning from the scriptures the example of men of faith we also have the example where people lapse in faith and that's why we get reminded even this moment of that picture of lot in sodom and gomorrah we studied that weeks ago god was sending judgment on a wicked city because he is a just god that will not allow evil to continue forever and before the judgment comes abraham acting as an intercessor pleads with god so god sends messengers to say flee the city destruction is coming to us he says flee wickedness because your sin will find you out and it will be punished and it will be death and destruction for your life and in the call how do we respond well we see the lack of obedience in lot you remember what it says the angels come as messengers and it says that they urge lot and his family to leave the city and lot lingered isn't that one of the responses of the call to the obedience to god's word this morning it's funny how your flesh always talks you into the opposite of the obedient call when god calls you to wait your flesh says hurry up and when god calls you to flee wickedness to turn from your sin to repent and be refreshed and restored in his present your flesh says not so fast but i can assure you this morning that waiting on the call of god and refusing to obey him does not make the call easier it's kind of like going up a high dive have you ever seen this moment where someone goes up a high dive and they get to the edge and they realize that it's so high that they just need a little time to talk themselves into it so it is the call of god calls us to live as fools for christ confounding the wise of this world meaning he doesn't call us to live by the perfect strategies that make sense to the flesh he calls us to things that don't make sense but honor him in his glory and to trust in him apart from what we see and understand and so often the longer you wait on the high dive the more likely it is you go down by the stairs then we've all made that mistake too often another example of the antithesis of this we find in the future story of god as the nation is developed and it goes wayward like sheep gone astray a picture of our own waywardness from the faithfulness of god he raises up prophets to warn his people to call them to repentance but not only his people because one of the prophet's name was jonah and jonah was called to people that were not inside the nation of israel the assyrians in the capital city of nineveh and the assyrians in the days of jonah it was very clear were the stark enemies of god's people they had wiped out the kingdom of god they had taken them captive in a cruel and unjust way as a punishment for their waywardness and the wrath of god revealed that god does judge if you do not obey his call but what was his response where lot delayed jonah fleed and isn't that one of the responses as well god calls jonah to nineveh to preach to the enemies as a picture of the love of god the gospel of god that he saves his enemies that he loves his enemies and in fact he calls us to do the same thing that when the spirit of god is living in us we now are ambassadors to the love of god that goes beyond the border of the kingdom it goes beyond the household of the faith it crosses the street into the neighbor's household into the borders beyond your country and your people and sometimes the command to love your enemy to be an ambassador for christ to represent the glory of god through your good works that all men would see his glory shining through you and what do we do god if i do that you'll save them i'm going the other way and we flee the presence of god we flee the commandments of god he calls us to love people and we say surely you couldn't mean them which is another example of someone that we see in scripture as the antithesis of obedience the flesh overcoming the faith in matthew chapter 16 jesus says to his disciples who do men say that i am peter rightfully answers you're the christ the king the one who is coming to set us free rightly said peter upon that rock your confession i build my church and the gates of hell will not overcome and then he gives a preview into what that's going to look like the son of man the christ will go to jerusalem to pick up his cross and die and rise again and now peter says not so lord in the call to flee wickedness lot delays in the call to love the enemy jonah flees and in the call to pick up the cross peter argues and these are the ways that obedience will be overcome by flesh to delay the calling of god that he gives to you this morning to delay the devotion to make god the actual worship of your life to flee the commandments of god and to run in the other direction or just to argue with god not the way i would have done it god not the way i would have planned it not the person i would be my neighbor and we all have opportunities in this world right now to understand the obedience of god lived out by the of faith that is including what james will call faith producing works in fact james says some of you will say you have faith and i have work show me your faith without works and i'll show you my faith by my works you believe there is one god you do well and we preach every sunday morning to people who believe there is one god but unfortunately we're all in evil company if we leave it at what we believe because then james says good but even the demons believe there's a sense of the law of god even on the unbelievers that have hardened their hearts so what separates us we take our beliefs and we turn it into obedience trusting that where god leads us and guides us he takes us to good places with our life but do you want to know a foolish man that without faith works without works it is dead was not abraham our father justified by works when he offered isaac at the altar do you see that faith was working together with his works and by his works by his obedience his faith was protected it was perfected it came on the other side of the exam with the perfect grade now we know how abraham responds because abraham answered the call with obedience now we come to another response of abraham in verse 4 it says then the third day abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place afar off and abraham said to his young men stay here with the donkey and the lad and i will go yonder and worship and we will come back to you a man of faith that we must look at and ponder what he said in a moment where abraham didn't fully know what was going to happen but he did know the result he said we are going to worship we're going to the altar not by a burdensome commitment to obey because of religion but because in the altar of sacrifice of devotion to make god priming our life we are worshiping the lord and we will return together but abraham is faced with a problem that many of us feel and that problem is when the promise of god seems to contradict the command of god or the circumstance that god has surrounded you with your life here's how alexander mclaren says it in his commentary in the book of genesis what a cruel position to have god's command and god's promise apparently in diametrical opposition but faith loosened even the seemingly impossible tangle of contradiction and felt that to obey was for man and to keep the promise was for god to obey is for man and to keep the promise is for god and isn't it funny how the flesh comes in the natural man our ideas and our wisdom and our plans apart from god comes and tries to do the opposite of both of those things the flesh says don't obey you should delay or argue or flee and then it says then as for the promises of god to find life and peace of salvation and relationship with god you fulfill the promise yourself and that's why we find a somewhat conf
Conclusion
We return to the opening teaching: discipleship is not just information, it is transformation through faith and obedience to Jesus. If we receive His Word and walk it out, He will shape us into people who endure and bear fruit.
Lord Jesus, help me hear Your Word, obey it with faith, and grow as Your disciple. Amen.
Conclusion
We return to the opening teaching: discipleship is not just information, it is transformation through faith and obedience to Jesus. If we receive His Word and walk it out, He will shape us into people who endure and bear fruit.
Closing Prayer
Lord Jesus, help me hear Your Word, obey it with faith, and grow as Your disciple. Amen.