Genesis 12:1-8

Genesis 12:1-8
Conclusion

For the last (seems like) several months I have been preaching on the elements of revival as it pertains to what I believe many of the members of Gateway have been experiencing in their personal spiritual lives. God has been purging us of our spiritual lethargy and worldliness by bringing us to a place of brokenness before the Lord- stoking within us a passion for holiness and obedience to His leading. He has also been reviving in us a deep enjoyment of worship as well as evangelism.

And if you have not been experiencing this, I want to encourage you- it’s happening right now and it’s never too late to enter into revival! But it will cost you.

It all began with prayer, repentance, fasting, evangelism and worship.

Each step of the way I feel that God has gone before us; and I have done my best to resist the temptation to get ahead of God or to put the breaks on His activity. God led us to start Friday night prayers; He led to us to begin the Experiencing God study; He led us to begin doing evangelism at Central City Mall; He led us to hold extended periods of fasting, prayer and revival services (to hold meetings with the Spanish church); He is leading us to do Vacation Bible School; (he brought Rod and I to within a few breaths of losing our lives in Maple Ridge river to show us how fleeting this life really is) and He has been leading us in a multitude of other ways large and small.

But I feel like we have come to a place of asking “what next?”

I heard about a group of men once who were waiting to be interviewed for a job as a wireless operator when a sound like Morse code came over the PA system. No one paid any attention to it as they continued their conversations… except for one man who got up and walked into the manager’s office. A few minutes later he emerged and announced that he had the job. “How did you get in ahead of us, they asked?”
“You might have been considered if you hadn’t been so busy talking that you didn’t hear the manager’s coded message,” he replied. “It said, “The man I need must always be on the alert. The first one who interprets this and comes directly into my private office will be hired.”” The lesson is clear: Too many Christians are not really tuned in, so they do not hear God’s directives.
—H. G. Bosch

Jesus comes as a thief in the night; he rarely visits his church with fireworks and trumpets. His voice is like a mighty rushing river, but it comes as a still small voice. His ways are not our ways and he rarely does the same thing twice. JC Ryle once said, “One thief on the cross was saved, that none should despair; and only one, that none should presume.”

So I’ve been wary not to answer that question too rashly by trying to conjure up the next “experience” for our church. The temptation is always to put God into a box and try to program everything that He’s been doing so far- that’s a great way to kill a revival. From Cain to Judas and Abraham to Peter, the Bible is full of examples impatient people who presumed upon God and attempted to tell Him what he should do next.
I believe that we can have the best intentions and even be on the right path, but if we get ahead of God; and when we do that, we find ourselves all alone and separated from the will of God and the power of God. I see that principle in the life of Abram’s father Terah (Read Genesis 11:21-32).

Terah got ahead of God in several ways: for instance, he named his son Haran (which means mountaineer) while they were residing in the plains of Ur of Chaldeans. Haran died before he ever saw the mountains of Assyria.

Another way that Terah, the father of Abram got ahead of God (even though he was right) was in naming his Son Abram which means “exalted father.” Can you imagine how awkward it would have been to meet Abram? As soon as you found out his name was exalted father you would likely have asked, “where are your children?”

I once met a guy named Caesar. I asked him if he ever felt like his parents had too high of expectations for him.

I am sure many people were embarrassed when they found out Exalted Father had no children because Sarai was barren. Yet Terah was right, Abram did become an exalted father. But Terah held back, he didn’t go all the way with God in choosing Abram’s name- his knowledge of the power of God was too small- because not only was he Abram (an exalted father) but God’s name for him would be Abraham (Father of multitudes). Indeed, three of the world’s largest religions (at least a half of the 6 billion inhabitants of earth) claim him for their father. And as Christians, we are Abraham’s true spiritual heirs.
One more way in which Terah got ahead of God: verse 31 says that he packed up his family and headed for Canaan. We just read in 12:1 that God spoke very clearly to Abram and told him to go to Canaan, but nowhere does the text does not say anything about God having given that command to Terah. So how did Terah know to go to Canaan? Unfortunately, just like when he short changed Abram with his name, Terah also short changed God because he stopped just short of the land of Canaan in the mountains of Assyria and there he died (about 30 years after he arrived there).

I’m not sure why he settled in the mountains. Maybe it was a lack of faith, or discouragement or it provided him with everything he thought he needed and so he no longer needed God’s provision. But Terah proves that it is possible to be right about where God wants us to go but wrong about the timing (or the people involved). And when we get out ahead of God, even though we are going where He intended to lead us, we may find ourselves defeated. Our faith has no sense of victory- we become Sunday Christians because we no longer believe that God can do powerful things through us.

David nearly did the same thing when he decided to build the temple before hearing from God. Abram’s father Terah shows us that it is possible to be partially right about the will of God but limit Him by setting goals according to what is humanly possible rather than trusting God for the impossible. Perhaps Terah saw that there were Canaanites in the land and got scared. He lived by sight not by faith!

It’s like looking at what our church is able to manage and then developing a vision for growing our church accordingly and then we wear ourselves out by creating programs and strategies and mission statements with a marketing plan that appeals to the felt needs of unbelievers without ever consulting God! And we end up with a church that worships the felt needs of unbelievers who never darken our doors and we ignore the felt needs of the only one who matters- God! Maybe God had totally different more gloriously stunningly seeming impossible plans for us and we missed the opportunity to see God powerfully at work because we circumvented his will due to our lack of faith and impatience.

Knowing the will of God and hearing His voice- it takes patience. It requires diligence in prayer; discernment about what is happening around us and time in God’s word so that we can recognize his voice.

One of the ways I know when it is God’s timing is when God begins to confirm it in the hearts of other members; I begin to hear things that I have been suspecting confirmed in the conversations of other people in the church or in the community, I will also hear it in the prayer meetings (and that’s why it is so important for us as a church to come together in prayer- we can accomplish more in a 1 hour prayer meeting then we will ever accomplish in an all day business meeting); we will also hear it in our Bible study groups as we discover how God’s Word speaks to each one of us uniquely and authoritatively; and we will hear it in the testimonies on Sunday morning.

God was very clear with Abram about what He was going to do through him. In 12:2 God says,
I will make you a great nation;
I will bless you
And make your name great;
And you shall be a blessing.
3I will bless those who bless you,
And I will curse him who curses you;
And in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”

How could Abram have ever understood the extent to which God was planning to make Abram a blessing to the nations?

I can only think of one way that Abram’s heirs have been a blessing to the nations on that level and it’s the gospel! What we read here in 12:2 is the gospel! Not only is the gospel, it’s the Great Commission! It’s the call to missions for Abram’s true heirs.

Imagine what would have happened if Abram stayed in Haran with his father? Fortunately God’s will and grace are irresistible! Has God called you by faith to go into an unfamiliar land and you are resisting His clear command? God has no other blessing for you. He does not present us with option A or option B. God has only one will for you and as long as you resist his will you kick against the goads. Jesus said to take his yoke upon you because it is easy and his burden is light- don’t forsake for your heavy rebellion.

So, at the age of 75 Abram set out from the land of his family and his father’s house and went in search of a city whose architect and maker is God (this was about the year 2090 BC- more than 2000 years before God planned to fulfill the promise and 400 years before the nation of Israel would enter the land after the exile). Matthew Henry says this about Abram’s obedience:
Abram believed that the blessing of the Almighty would make up for all he could lose or leave behind, supply all his wants, and answer and exceed all his desires; and he knew that nothing but misery would follow disobedience. Such believers, being justified by faith in Christ, have peace with God. They hold on their way to Canaan. They are not discouraged by the difficulties in their way, nor drawn aside by the delights they meet with. Those who set out for heaven must persevere to the end. What we undertake, in obedience to God’s command, and in humble attendance on his providence, will certainly succeed, and end with comfort at last. Canaan was not, as other lands, a mere outward possession, but a type of heaven, and in this respect the patriarchs so earnestly prized it.

I am not sure what God is going to do next in our church. But one thing I am certain of is that God wants us to make much of Him.

I believe that for us to be at the centre of the will of God and open to His further leading then the sole purpose of this church must be the enjoyment of the exaltation of Him. But even as I wrote that sentence in my sermon preparation, I realized that I was repeating the same mistake as Terah. I was falling short of what God wants to; I was limiting him with a few key strokes on my lap top (words are so dangerous when we use them to talk about). What I realized after I wrote those words was that what God really wants this church to is not just the enjoyment of the exaltation of God; He wants us to magnify the enjoyment of the exaltation of God- to make much of making much of God by inviting others to join us in our much making of God.

That’s what we do when we do evangelism- we’re inviting them to the centre of God’s will for us which is that we would make much of God! It’s a pleasing life of true and glorious and fulfilling and satisfying worship!
I know that’s what God wants us to do because that’s what He wanted to do through Abram by making him a blessing to the nations. And I know that’s what God wants to do because that’s what He told us to do in the great commission:
18 And Jesus came and spoke to them, saying, “All authority has been given to Me in heaven and on earth. 19 Go therefore and make disciples of all the nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father and of the Son and of the Holy Spirit, 20teaching them to observe all things that I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age.”

After Abram came into the land he came to Shechem (which means consent) and he built an Altar to the Lord and worshipped Jehovah.

So this morning, we have consent from the Lord for what we are to do next: the Great Commission. It’s no longer about us and our agendas and our opinions and our pleasures and our résumés and our reputations, it’s about the gospel! Gospel, gospel, gospel!

This is a significant turning point in our church because we’ve lost sight of that and we’ve been hanging around in the mountains of Haran enjoying the view either because we were satisfied with being halfway with God or because we didn’t trust that His will was good enough for us.

So this morning I want us to mark this turning point by building an altar to the Lord. Before the altar I have placed a bucket of stones and I want you to consider prayerfully coming to the front and taking on of these stones as a symbol of your life of being a living sacrifice and place it together in the form of a stone altar to represent your consent to be a part of what God wants to do in this church