An Epic Deal
Epic - The Story of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob • Sermon • Submitted • Presented • 54:38
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How many of y'all enjoy shopping? How many of you went out on Black Friday looking for those deals? Way back when, before Cyber Monday was a thing, you could only get those deal on Black Friday. People would camp out and wait in line to get into stores on the eve of Black Friday (also known as Thanksgiving). Why? Because there were limited amounts of $100 60 inch TVs and other items that were in high demand at ridiculously low prices.
Back in the year 2005, I had my first Black Friday experience. Ian was only 8 months old, and Tahsha, her parents, and I took Ian to a mall. No, we didn't go early and camp out, it was early in the afternoon. As we went to the mall with some light shopping planned, I noticed there were a TON of people. I think I said something to the effect of, "There are a TON of people here!"
My mother-in-law casually responded, well, it's because of Black Friday. As I looked around, I noticed that in every store, there were signs and advertisements for discounted products. Some signs said 50% off while others boasted certain things were being sold at 80% off, "today only."
After that, for many years, Tahsha would get up at 4am (and sometimes earlier) and she would go either with her mom or some friends of ours to stand in these ridiculous lines to get her hands on good deals. We bought many Christmas presents on Black Friday because that is when we could get the most bang for our buck.
I hated the idea of going, and conveniently for the years of 2006 - 2014, we had kids that were either babies or just toddlers that needed me to stay home and take care of them. By stay home and take care of them, I of course mean stay in bed and not wake up until Tahsha got home later that day!
But really, those were some great times. I would watch the news on Saturday as the reports flowed in and security camera footage showed angry mobs trampling each other as they fought their way to the products that they wanted.
One year, there was a lady that made it on the news because she pepper sprayed another customer that was getting the last of something that she wanted to have. Yup, pre-Covid, Black Friday shopping was not for the faint of heart!
People would do crazy things to get their hands on these epic deals.
You might wonder how that fits in with today's sermon, but today, as you can see on your notes sheet, we are talking about an Epic Deal. It is actually not a sales deal that we will be seeing today, but an agreement between to people. And not just any agreement, but a solemn one, one that we would call a covenant.
Now as we venture into Chapter 15, we are going to see an EPIC COVENANT take place.
About a month ago we discussed what a covenant is as we studied the end of the flood and God's solemn promise to never destroy the whole earth again with a flood.
A covenant is more than a contract, it is a solemn agreement between two people. Each party agrees to uphold their end of the covenant. However, God made a covenant with the world as the sole responsible party. When He vowed to never destroy the earth with a flood, it did not rest on the action or inaction of the world or the people in it.
He gave a sign of the covenant and we know that as the rainbow.
In chapter 15, God is about to make a covenant, not with the world, but with Abram. He starts off by reiterating His promise to Abram, but also giving a few more details to that promise.
Genesis 15:1-6 After these things the word of the LORD came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward. 2 And Abram said, Lord GOD, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus? 3 And Abram said, Behold, to me thou hast given no seed: and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir. 4 And, behold, the word of the LORD came unto him, saying, This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir. 5 And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be. 6 And he believed in the LORD; and he counted it to him for righteousness.
There are a few things I want to highlight here along with a few cultural notes that I would like to make. I have mentioned the issue of identity many times from this pulpit, and will continue to do so, but we have only seen some surface level things about it so far. Today, we will not dive deep, but in the first three verses, we see how our identity drives our understanding of things. It even drives our understanding of who we are and even of who God is.
Our identity must be dictated by what God says. If we believe that God knows us better than we know ourselves, because He created us with a purpose and with a plan in mind, then better to rely upon than Him for our identity? When God says something about Himself or about us, it is best to take Him at His word and live as if those things were true because they are!
Abram goes through an identity crisis here that is not resolved until many years later.
An identity crisis is a period of uncertainty and confusion in which a person's sense of identity becomes insecure, typically due to a change in their expected aims or role in society. People in an identity crisis do not always see that that is actually what is going on.
So let's look at an identity crisis here in the beginning of chapter 15.
Genesis 15:1-3 After these things the word of the LORD came unto Abram in a vision, saying, Fear not, Abram: I am thy shield, and thy exceeding great reward. 2 And Abram said, Lord GOD, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the steward of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus? 3 And Abram said, Behold, to me thou hast given no seed: and, lo, one born in my house is mine heir.
In V1, God tells Abram that he is the recipient of an exceeding great reward. But Abram doesn't understand this, nor does He understand who God is.
Abram's response is indicative of these two things. How many of y'all remember the Publishers Clearing House sweepstakes? They are still around, but in the 80s and 90s they were a huge deal. They would roll up on a house with their Prize Patrol, knock on the door, and tell the resident inside that because they had entered the sweepstakes, they were a lucky winner of some crazy amount of money very week, for life.
If you saw those commercials, you dreamed of what it would be like to be sitting on your couch and all of a sudden hear a knock at the door. You dreamed of what your reaction would be. There were some people that reacted as though they thought it was a joke; some people went nuts; others nearly fainted at the excitement; but there was one guy that I will never forget. He was straight-faced the whole time. Took the giant, oversized check, calmly said thank you and tried to just nonchalantly walk into his house.
I had my reaction ready. I was a kid and didn't understand you had to purchase entry into the sweepstakes, I just thought they picked a house at random... But, I had a reaction ready. I wasn't going to go nuts, but I wasn't gonna be like the last guy either...
Can you imagine your reaction to being told that you are getting $10M a year for the rest of your life?
Well, here is Abram, and he has just been visited, not by the Prize Patrol and not by Ed McMahon (from another competing company, btw) , but by Almighty God. God says, "You are," in present tense, not you will be, "You are the recipient of an exceeding great reward."
And Abram doesn't understand. He says, "What will you give me? I don't have a son." Basically, Abram says, "If the reward isn't a son, then it doesn't really matter."
You ever give a gift to someone, and they respond with, "No thanks."
But this isn't just any gift. God says to Abram, "I got you an exceeding great reward, and it's me!" You get ME. And Abram doesn't understand 2 things here.
He doesn't understand who God is. Or maybe he doesn't understand how great God is. Because God just announced that He himself was Abram's great reward, and Abram asks, "So where is my son. 'Cause, I don't have a son yet." That is like someone saying that you won the Publisher's Clearing House and you being unhappy because you have been waiting for your job to give you a raise and it hasn't happened yet.
God is giving Himself to Abram. Abram now has full access to God. Think about that. He gets to have a close relationship with Almighty God and talk to Him, like a man talks to his friends.
But secondly, Abram didn't even fully understand who he was. Abram was a wealthy man. He had been very blessed with cattle and servants. That was your proof of wealth in those days. Abram, as we saw last week, even had his own personal army. Abram was blessed to have a wife, and a beautiful one at that. Abram was blessed to have a close relationship with God. A type of relationship that was not very common back in those times. But Abram did not live in the identity of a wealthy man. He did not live in the identity of a military commander. He did not live in the identity of a husband with a trophy wife. He didn't even live in the identity of having a special relationship with God Almighty.
Abram lived in the identity of what he desired and did not have. He was focused on one thing. Abram wanted a son.
This is why when God says, "Abram, you have an exceedingly great reward and that reward is me," Abram responds, "But what is my reward? What are you going to give me? I have no son to leave it to." He is so worried about the family name being carried on, that he misses what he has. God is talking in the present tense when He says, " I am your exceeding great reward." Abram in stead hears, "I am going to give you a great reward someday."
Because Abram responds, "What will you give me? What is the reward that is coming? And what good is anything if I cannot pass it down to a son after I die."
He continues to say, "The only person that will inherit my stuff and my money is Eliezer. As the law and custom stood in those days, if you had no male heir, your head servant, or the steward of your house, would be the one that would inherit your things when you died. And that is the point that Abram makes to God. In verse three, Abram not-so-subtly makes a dig at God when he says, "And it's your fault that all this inheritance will go to Eliezer because you have not given me a son."
And if I were God, the next verse would sound something like this: And behold, the word of the Lord came unto him saying, "Abram, just who do you think you are?!" But I have always said, it is as good thing that I am not God and that He is not like me! Because this is how God responds:
Genesis 15:4-7 And, behold, the word of the LORD came unto him, saying, This shall not be thine heir; but he that shall come forth out of thine own bowels shall be thine heir. 5 And he brought him forth abroad, and said, Look now toward heaven, and tell the stars, if thou be able to number them: and he said unto him, So shall thy seed be. 6 And he believed in the LORD; and he counted it to him for righteousness. 7 And he said unto him, I am the LORD that brought thee out of Ur of the Chaldees, to give thee this land to inherit it.
God says to Abram, "Don't worry, Eliezer will not be your heir. It will be an actual, biological son of yours." Then God takes Abram and tells him to try to count the stars, because just like they would be impossible for him to count, Abram's descendant would be so numerous that they would be impossible to count.
The next verse, verse 6 tells us that Abram believed God and it was counted to him for righteousness.
Then verse seven is God reminding Abram that He is the one that brought him out of Ur of the Chaldees for the purpose of giving him and his inheritance the land on which Abram now stands.
So God reiterates His promise to Abram. And Abram believes God. And in Verse 8, we see that Abram's faith was not perfect. Because even though he believed God, Abram has the audacity to ask the God that never lies this question:
Genesis 15:8 And he said, Lord GOD, whereby shall I know that I shall inherit it?
"So God, how do I know you're going to keep your promise?"
Once again, if were God, the next verse would have read something like this: And He said unto him, "Boy, I am finda smack you right upside the head!"
But that is not what verse nine says. The next few verses are God graciously giving Abram a visible sign that He was going to fulfill His promise.
Genesis 15:9-10 And he said unto him, Take me an heifer of three years old, and a she goat of three years old, and a ram of three years old, and a turtledove, and a young pigeon. 10 And he took unto him all these, and divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one against another: but the birds divided he not.
This might seem like a weird sign. That is a lot of dead animals and a lot of blood, but I want to bring your attention that this was how things were done back in that time. This was called "cutting a covenant."
Because of ancient Hittite and other manuscripts, we know what these ceremonies looked like and what the significance is of these things.
Normally, a covenant of this type would be between two parties. There would be a superior party and an inferior party. The superior party was an overlord (something similar to a feudal lord from medieval times) and the inferior party was the vassal, or servant to this lord.
In these ceremonies, it was the vassal, or the inferior party, that cut the animals in half. They would cut them down the middle and lay the halves parallel to themselves with a small space in between. At that time, the terms of the covenant were dictated. Usually the list of the vassal’s duties and responsibilities was much larger than that of the lord's. In fact, a covenant, including the duties of the vassal, was imposed on the vassal by the lord. Think of it something like this: The Lord would say, "I promise to protect and provide for you. You in turn promise to work for me, pay taxes to me, work the land for me, give me a percentage of what you grow from the land, provide your sons and daughters as personal servants for me if I ever need them, and to fight for the lord in battle if the occasion ever arose. Also, the vassal was not allowed to work for anyone else, move, or even marry without the lord's express permission.
The vassal would then light a torch and would walk between the two halves of the animals. This would symbolize what would happen to the vassal should he not fulfill his side of the covenant.
But there are two things that are different about the covenants I just told you about and the covenant God makes with Abram.
Yes, the animal halves are there, but there are two things that are different:
Genesis 15:10-21
And he took unto him all these, and divided them in the midst, and laid each piece one against another: but the birds divided he not. 11 And when the fowls came down upon the carcases, Abram drove them away. 12 And when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram; and, lo, an horror of great darkness fell upon him. 13 And he said unto Abram, Know of a surety that thy seed shall be a stranger in a land that is not theirs, and shall serve them; and they shall afflict them four hundred years; 14 And also that nation, whom they shall serve, will I judge: and afterward shall they come out with great substance. 15 And thou shalt go to thy fathers in peace; thou shalt be buried in a good old age. 16 But in the fourth generation they shall come hither again: for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet full. 17 And it came to pass, that, when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those pieces. 18 In the same day the LORD made a covenant with Abram, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this land, from the river of Egypt unto the great river, the river Euphrates: 19 The Kenites, and the Kenizzites, and the Kadmonites, 20 And the Hittites, and the Perizzites, and the Rephaims, 21 And the Amorites, and the Canaanites, and the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.
The first difference is that this is a unilateral covenant. There is nothing that is said about Abram's responsibilities or the responsibilities of his descendants. The focus is on the promises that God makes to Abram, not the other way around.
The second difference is that Abram, the inferior party, the vassal or servant to the Lord, is not the one that passes through the animals with the torch. It is God who carries a torch through the midst of the animals.
This is God declaring that He would first die before He allowed His promises to fail.
In addition to this promise of giving him a son, God makes a few prophesies that we will get to cover as we go through the rest of the book of Genesis and into the book of Exodus.
Briefly, here is what they are.
V.13 talks of Abram's descendants being sojourners in a land that is not theirs. This is Egypt. Not only that, but they will be enslaved their for a period of 400 hundred years.
"But," God says, "I am going to judge them after that time, and they will leave that country with great substance." A thing that they do in the book of Exodus.
Then, God tells Abram that he is going to live for a long time and die in piece at a ripe, old age.
God says that Abram's descendants would come back to Canaan again, at the time when the Amorites sin was full. This is a prophesy that God is giving about the Israelites' return to Canaan where God will use them to judge all the wicked nations that have been serving false gods and doing terrible things in Canaan land. The term Amorites is a general term referring not only to the Amorite nation, but the entire grouping of nations that would be dwelling in Canaan when the Israelites came back to occupy their land after being enslaved by Egypt.
What an Epic Deal for Abram. God promises him a son, a nation out of his descendants, and the land in which that nation will live, and Abram doesn't have to pay a dime. All he has to do is believe. In fact, after that covenant, Abram doesn't even have to believe, the weight of all the responsibility of that covenant being fulfilled is on God's shoulders.
To me, this is a very interesting story. The cultural background of this is incredibly interesting to me, but God wrote this more than for us to say, "Wow, what a cool story!" There is meaning and application for us to pull from this as well.
Application: We will dive into the application a little more deeply during Life Groups, but there are a few things I want to point out.
Did y'all notice what God was doing throughout all this passage? He was showing how great He is, how loving He is, how much grace He has, and how powerful He is. He has been showing this to Abram ever since He called him out of Ur. And when Abram is finally hit with this amazing statement, "I am your shield and your exceeding great reward," Abram's focus is revealed. Abram is looking for a son, not a relationship with God.
A.W. Tozer, the man I often quote as having said, "The most important thing about us is what we think about when we think about God," wrote a book called God's Pursuit of Man. During all this time, God has been, not only driving Abram toward the promised land, but pursuing him in intimate relation.
God likewise pursues us. He uses every thing that happens around us not just to drive us toward His plan for us, but to reveal to us that He desires us and wishes to be in fellowship with us.
There are times when He brings us, like He did with Abram, to a point where He reveals to us that He, not His blessings, but He Himself is our great reward. We, so often, overlook this like Abram did.
In all this, God is gracious. He still stands there as a loving and merciful Father who continues to guide us toward His plan for our lives. He continues to pursue our hearts and our affection.
The other point I want to make is that God was still with Abram and still made a covenant with Abram despite his little faith. We have discussed this before. So much emphasis is placed on having a great amount of faith. But over and over again, we see God working through those that have only a little bit of faith. Jesus encouraged His disciples even after telling them that they had little faith, that great things could be done in that small amount of faith because the size of our faith cannot limit God's power.
If you are stumbling through your Christian walk with God, it is ok. If you are having time having faith one minute and doubting the next, you are not alone. You are in the company of the man that has been labeled the "Father of Faith," Abraham. Later, Abram will show some epic and unwavering faith, but do not forget that it all started with imperfect faith. But it was that faith that God worked with. It was that initial faith, however small it was, that was what was counted as righteousness.
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Life Groups
Three main sources of identity that are common are as follows:
What we do (or what we have done) - job/career, pastimes/hobbies, accomplishments, etc.
What we have (or don't have) - wealth, positions (CEO/captain of football team)
What we desire (live like a millionaire and you will be one)
How can basing our identity in any of these three things be unfulfilling?
What we do and what we are capable of doing can change quickly.
What we have can also change.
Our desires can change or never be accomplished, thereby leaving us living a lie.
Which one of these three points did Abram base his identity on? What he desired - a son.
How did this affect Abram? He had a closer relationship than anybody could have had with God, and yet felt unfulfilled because what he thought would satisfy him was a son.
In what things do you find yourself basing your identity?
Though what we do, what we have, and what we desire are true things about us at any given moment, the TRUEST thing about each of us is that which never changes.
1. We are made in God's image (Genesis 1:26)
2. We are loved by God regardless of what our past looks like (John 3:16, Romans 5:8)
The book of Ephesians gives additional truths for the Christian:
1:3 - We have every spiritual blessing already
1:4 - Chosen to be holy (separated for a purpose) and righteous in Christ
1:5 - Adopted sons/daughters, not because He had to, but because He wants it that way
1:6 - Adopted for His praise and glory; Accepted
1:7 - Redeemed, i.e.: bought back from sin. We no longer belong to Satan nor to sin. We have been fully purchased by Jesus' blood; Forgiven
1:8 - We have all wisdom and prudence (because we have the Holy Spirit which is God who is absolutely wise and prudent)
1:11 - We are heirs of God; He has a purpose for each of us
1:12 - see 1:6
1:13 - Sealed (can't be lost because we were sealed by God, not by anything we have done)
2:1 - Made alive
2:6 - God views us as currently sitting in heavenly places with Christ Jesus, who sits at the right hand of the Father
2:10 - God's handiwork; created and empowered to do good
2:13 - Close to God
2:14-15 - Friends of God
2:16-17 - at peace with God
2:18 - We have access to God
2:19 - Citizens of heaven; belonging to the family of God
4:1 - We are called (We are called children and heirs of God, we should live worthy of that calling)
This is our true identity. This what God says we are. He does not lie, therefore these must be true and unchangeable.
If we were to live our lives based on this identity, how would that look at home/school/work/etc.?
