Sermon(Gen 15:1-6): God will satisfy your needs

The original korean text: https://blog.naver.com/stevision/50025221527

 

 

Sermon(Gen 15:1-6): God will satisfy your needs.

 

Scripture reading: Gen 15:1-6

>> 1 After this, the word of the LORD came to Abram in a vision: 'Do not be afraid, Abram. I am your shield, your very great reward.' 2 But Abram said, 'O Sovereign LORD, what can you give me since I remain childless and the one who will inherit my estate is Eliezer of Damascus?' 3 And Abram said, 'You have given me no children; so a servant in my household will be my heir.' 4 Then the word of the LORD came to him: 'This man will not be your heir, but a son coming from your own body will be your heir.' 5 He took him outside and said, 'Look up at the heavens and count the stars-if indeed you can count them.' Then he said to him, 'So shall your offspring be.' 6 Abram believed the LORD, and he credited it to him as righteousness. <<

 

The Lord told Abraham to go from his country his kindred and his father’s house to the land that He would show him. But He showed Abraham not all blessings that he should receive later. He promised Abraham who had no son to make of him a great nation and to make his name great. God is one who promises beforehand. Because Abraham was not yet in a position to receive all the blessings of God, and it was not suitable time for Abraham to be blessed with all promised blessings of God.

 

The scripture reports that the Lord appeared to Abraham again. The God reassures what He promised, because humans have a habit of believing only what they see with their eyes. God’s promises are in the future, so He promises them to us again and again lest we should forget them. Because God’s promises will surely come true.

 

The scripture says that first the God says to Abraham, “Fear not!” Humans are vulnerable to fear. Abraham is one who fears, for he grows old but has no son. Abraham and his wife are too old to get a son. All his property will be other’s after his death. Abraham’s name will not last after one generation. Nevertheless the God who promised future blessings has not yet accomplished anything concretely. He has to believe God’s promise, but, seeing his circumstances, cannot but sigh. Abraham might feel dread about the nature of God who was testing him. ‘I must believe in the omnipotent God. I told lots of my friends that He is good. But now I am but a poor mortal, so I become angry and am afraid.’ Is the God whom I believe in really merciful?'

 

God tells him not to be afraid. Abraham with weakened faith and sad heart and anger is standing before God and must be afraid. Why not? He sees his inner thoughts! But God says to him who fears, "Do not fear!." God sees man as man. Therefore He forgives man. How much you feel relived if you have sinned before God and now He tells you not to be afraid (of punishment)! We Koreans have a maxim: A man's word is as good as a lump of gold. (= A man never goes back on his word.) How much more will you have to feel relieved when the God who created the world by his word says to you, "Fear not!"? God's mercy is far bigger than our unbelief.

 

Fear is an unbelief, and Abraham's unbelief is one that is not without reason. To such a man, Abraham, the God promises that his descendents will be as many as the stars in the sky. What a word that tests man's faith! (He promises that to him who has no son.) Then Abraham recovered his sense and believed God's promise, and God regarded it as his righteousness. The key here is faith and righteousness. The faith as defined by the Scripture is 'to believe that God will fulfill His promise without fail even if the fulfillment is tardy'. And the faith is 'to believe that God is good even if He does not do as I wish'. God reckons him who trusts in God's sincerity like this to be righteous. Abraham certainly showed the people of later generations what faith is. And the God certainly showed us what kind of blessing the man of such faith received.

 

Even in the human community, when another man readily trusts in me, I also gladly forgive him all his faults done to me and do everything I can do for him. So does God! God reckons us to be righteous when we believe in Him in spite of negative situations. Recognition of our righteousness means that He will give us even the heaven. It means also that He regards us as His children. When we believe Him to be good, He also thinks us to be good. When there is no hope for the future, and when there is no strength in us to live, nevertheless, if we acknowledge that the God who created the world is good, the God will acknowledge that we who are dirty with sins are good. Atheists deny God because they think the world is a bad place to live in. When compared with the belief of those people, how beautiful is the belief of ones who think God is good? God sees this beautiful faith and gives them eternal life. one of man's words that God dislikes is "Damn this world!", because the God is the Creator of this world. The world created by God was originally good, but men made it a bad place with their evil head. Nevertheless, if we, in such world, have the faith that God is good, He will value our faith.

 

Everlasting life is a good thing, and God promised Abraham worldly blessings also and fulfilled them. God gave him what he urgently needed, that is a son and many descendents. Abraham worked hard and got many servants and assets. He got also a beautiful woman to wife by doing everything to win her love. But to beget a son was not yet accomplished as he wanted. All other things were visible and tangible for him, but a son was not so. Abraham couldn't get a son as he hoped. But God is the one who promises future blessings and will fulfill them. All other fortunes are God's blessings indeed, but God promises us what we don't have and what we are not able to get, and tells us to believe Him.

 

We know from the biblical text that the God lets the descendent of him who was a man of faith in God succeed to the blessing promised to the man of faith. God lets the blessing and promise continue to the descendents of him who lived a righteous and sincere life before God. Abraham and his wife Sarah are free people, not slaves. The blessing that Abraham was to receive was not for Eliezer, his servant, or his son Ishmael whom he begot by Hagar, maidservant of Sarah. God is saying that Abraham's blessing will be inherited by only the legitimate son Isaac who was born by a legitimate couple Abraham and Sarah, free people. God wants holy family and good couple sincere to God. This is the bowl that can hold God's blessing and promise. God permits boundless blessings to the house the members of which have lived righteously, believing God's promise, keeping God's commandments throughout tens of generations. So people realize, 'We can see in that house the God who blesses. God is in that house!' We see the God in the history of Abraham's house, the God who has made Abraham's house prosperous and great. 'Oh! The people of that house have not served demons, consulted fortunetellers, stolen, swindled, yet they have received such blessings! That house worships only the God. I will worship the God whom they believe in, too. And I want to live as a decent man and be blessed like them.' In fact, is there another sure way to prove the existence of God than this?

 

If the God does not guard such a precious house as the apple of his eye, he will suffer great losses. It’s a great glory to God when we believe in God though the life in the world is hard. God becomes a shield to the believers in order that the glory may not be taken to the Devil. God allows us to suffer trials for his glory and our train of faith, but will nerver allow us to fall forever. Thus we can be daring. Christians believing in God impeach sins of the world boldly and proclaim God’s word boldly, believing firmly that God is our shield. We suffer no loss when we do God’s work boldly. Quite the reverse! Doing the work of God, you need not be afraid of defamation of character or damage of human relations. God, too, works for us if we work for him.

 

Look at the stars in the sky. They are shining distinctly in darkness. We call greate men of the world stars. In the military, generals are stars. God gave descendants like stars to Abraham who had endured to the end with devout faith. The world of men is in the darkness because the Devil reigns over them, however, the descendents of Abraham shine even therein because God's grace is upon them. God promised Abraham that he would give him innumerable such stars. No other blessing is greater than good descendents! on the other hand, what a curse it is that a man has descendents who disgrace their parents and who are losers! Believers who, like Abraham and Sarah, believe God's promises and blessings, endure, and observe his commandments will be blessed with descendents like stars.

 

Abraham could not understand God. He couldn't understand God's mind for the promise he had received from God in his old age hadn't been fulfilled by then, for several decades. But Abraham didn't know what blessings he would receive. He couldn't count all the stars! He could not guess the amount of the blessing he would receive later. Seeing from the present point of view, all Christians around the world are his descendents in faith. Would Abraham have dreamt of such an honor? The world is fair anyway. Greater patience means greater faith, and greater faith, greater prize. God says to Abraham, "I am your very great reward (Gen 15:1)." In fact, Abraham's faith was a feeble faith. He was called to God in his old age, but didn't wait for the fulfillment of God's promise and begot a son Ishmael by his wife's maid, and laughed inwardly when God appeared to him, a 99-year-old man, and said that now He would really give him a son. Of course he said outwardly that he believed it. The delay of the promise was about thirty years. Such a faith was great from the standpoint of man, but not so great from that of God, because the blessings Abraham received from God later was infinite and eternal. The blessing was one for which he could endure sixty years of delay. I'm saying this for there may be someone who might feel pity for Abraham.

 

So the God commands us to thank Him always in any circumstances. To thank is to affix our seal to our faith in the faithfulness of God. We put a document of blessing in force by affixing our seal to it, a document which God has drawn up. Isn't it wonderful? What a good thing! Our gratitude is the seal. Let me ask you a question. Is it wrong to thank God in advance for the future sure blessings? Therefore God's demand that we should thank Him always is absolutely legitimate. Beloved brethren, thank God unconditionally! He who doesn't thank God because he feels rather depressed today is a foolish man who kicks off a big blessing that will blow away all his grim reality. Particularly a man whose wife doesn't believe him, or a woman whose husband doesn't believe her should believe in God's goodness, knowing that it is a great virtue to trust a person. Putting yourself in others' position, you can trust and thank always. The God too has sealed the blessing and the eternal life for us by crucifying His Son. For this reason, we also must seal our faith by thanking God always during our lifetime. You can thank always if you think on the cross. Usually, people are apt to thank about the past, irrespective of good or bad. one confesses easily, "I thank God when I think about it (or bygones)." But he hesitates to thank about the uncertain future things or the hard present things. God wants you to thank about all of the past, present, future things! This is the genuine life of gratitude. Housewives who prefer new TV dramas to old ones telecasted 10 years ago should thank for today's everything. Woman who is grateful looks classy.

 

God satisfies your needs! He said He would be our shield and reward. Abraham believed in this God and won not only secular blessings but also God Himself at last. God tells others that he is the God of Abraham! It is an honor to say "I am a student at Harvard University." When God the Creator says, "I'm the God of Abraham," people who know the almighty God can understand the great honor that Abraham won. Stars in the sky are good, but the God who made them is much worthier than them. Abraham won both the world and the God. If you possess secular things, you can live somewhat well. If you possess the God, you become a holy, noble, mighty man. The Devil can't touch a man of God.

 

Let's follow Abraham and his wife. Let's believe God's promise unconditionally. Thank unconditionally, wait unconditionally! Never swerve to the right or to the left. Our personal thoughts in the faith in the God are nothing but impurities. Let's burn out these impurities and dregs by the fire of the Holy Spirit. Light the fire of our faith with love. Affix the seal of thanksgiving to our faith. Let's by faith give the God all that is ours, our body, our will, our love and our precious things. And make him our God. Like the couple Abraham and Sarah!

Chong Tack Kim

 

                             - Dongtoma Sunshine Church -