Thinking about God with Abraham
Hebrews 11 • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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· 3 viewsPart one will examine Abraham’s response to testing. We will see how he reasoned out God’s power to raise from the dead.
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
Abraham, as we know, has been an extended topic in Hebrews 11.
He provides so much relevant information to mine vis-a-vis the experience of the audience and the overall purpose of the letter.
His whole life is a fertile ground for thinking about what it means to be a person who lives by faith.
Abraham had to trust God under the following conditions:
Leaving his home city.
Having a promised heir/son.
Conceiving that son when it was no longer physically possible for either him or Sarah.
The writer has not used this as something transactional:
Abraham believed God for X so God brought X to pass.
He uses it, instead, to emphasize three principles:
God’s trustworthy nature.
Abraham’s reliance on God’s nature because he understood it.
Abraham’s perspective about the present and the future was transformed in light of the previous two points.
He was willing to live a certain kind of life in the present because he saw himself as a temporary resident of earth.
The connections abound with Hebrews 10:
We should not forsake the assembling of ourselves together, even in a time of intense persecution. Instead, we should, through our assembling exhort one another to love and to good works.
We should not blend into the culture through living lives like the culture. Our citizenship is in the city whose builder and maker is God. We are not to return to who we once were.
How has believing that Jesus is the Son of God incarnate who gave His life for sin and was raised again the third day changed the way we understand our lives and our responsibilities toward God and one another in the present?
Abraham Believed…Again:
Abraham Believed…Again:
We should reflect upon the account of Abraham’s life from the point of view of faith for a third time (perhaps 4th):
Heb. 11:8
Heb. 11:9
Heb. 11:11 (possibly)
By faith explains, yet, something else Abraham did.
We should note how the writer bounces back and forth:
Abraham had offered Isaac as a sacrifice while being tested (see Gen. 22).
He was offering “the unique one.”
Abraham is the one who anticipated the promises (all that God had made to him both temporal and eternal).
He was told that:
In Isaac your seed will be called: Gen. 21:12.
What connections can we make between ourselves and Abraham?
If we struggle to see them, perhaps that could be part of the point: no one since has been put into that situation.
Perhaps the writer of Hebrews wants to challenge the audience to consider being tested (Heb. 4:12?).
Abraham Reasoned about God
Abraham Reasoned about God
Perhaps the most important thing to consider is that Abraham did not act blindly, neither did he react.
The writer attributes reasoning to Abraham.
He thought about God’s nature and God’s power.
All of the reminders about the importance of Isaac now become relevant.
Abraham figured that God is able to be raising from the dead, hence, he reasoned that is what God would logically do in the case of Isaac.
Read the account in Gen. 22 and pay attention to what Abraham tells his servants.
The Last Lesson Using Abraham
The Last Lesson Using Abraham
Interpretation matters. Understanding biblical reasoning.
From which, he received him back indeed in illustration.
The writer appears to be teaching one of the two following lessons:
Abraham did not have to experience God’s power to resurrect, instead, receiving Isaac back served as an illustration of God’s power to return him to Abraham.
This circumstance is a broader lesson to consider faith’s connection to God’s power to resurrect.
How Abraham conducted himself in the world, by this point, all depended on his certainty that God was reliable. God had made a promise, so the promise must be kept.
Hebrews 6:13-18.
Hebrews 7:20-22: God’s oath establishes Jesus as priest forever.
This returns us to writer of Hebrews’ point: God has made a promise (end of Heb. 10), and because of who God is, He will keep that promise.
Genesis 22:12, 16
Genesis 22:12, 16
The writer of Hebrews probably also expanded this statement based on the phrase: “you did not spare/refrain your son because of me.
νῦν γὰρ ἔγνων ὅτι φοβῇ τὸν θεὸν σύ, καὶ οὐκ ἐφείσω τοῦ υἱοῦ σου τοῦ ἀγαπητοῦ διʼ ἐμέ.
οὗ εἵνεκεν ἐποίησας τὸ ῥῆμα τοῦτο καὶ οὐκ ἐφείσω τοῦ υἱοῦ σου τοῦ ἀγαπητοῦ διʼ ἐμέ
