Did you see all those names? Anything look familiar of the people that we’re going to be studying this fall? What an exciting journey God has us on. Dear friends, grace to you and peace from God, our Father, and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ. Today, we continue our study, God’s Timeless Call. I can’t help but think about the fact that each one of us Fall, we start a new series. And there are a few ways that we approach our Bible study, our sermon series. We do so either focusing microscopically on all of the details that are often hidden beneath the simple reading of the text. Or we sometimes approach it academically, focusing on the Bible from afar. This is a book about God and about people, but not really about our everyday lives. However, I just feel compelled this year to offer a third way for us to approach our study beginning this fall. The Bible’s worth to us can also be found, you see, if we study it relationally. Looking at the ordinary experiences of life of the people that we will. be looking at in their lives and I encourage us to pray for the Holy Spirit to come week after week and help us discover how similar our lives are to their lives. The men and women of the Bible that we are about to meet. You see, we As we study their stories, and their trials, and their celebrations, and look at their needs, and their challenges that they faced, we too can find that we are facing similar things. And I can’t help to think that if we do this, We just might find out that the God who walked with them, the God who provided for them, the God who protected them, then is the same God who right now, at this moment in our lives, walks with us, provides for us, protects us, and guides us as well. Can you imagine how exciting it will be for us to discover that our God still interacts with us the same way that he did with the characters of the Bible? How powerful will it be for us this fall to rediscover again how our God made and kept covenants and promises with the ordinary men and women He used to stir nations and to change the course of history. And maybe, just maybe, if God accomplished His will through them, then then just maybe He might use us in the same powerful way to change the course of history now. To do His will in the work His work and His will in the world now. Let’s pray, and then we’ll see what the Holy Spirit has for us in the story of Abraham.

Dear Father, thank You for once again calling us to come and to sit before You May we do so with bowed heads and hearts. May we sit before you humbled, worshiping you. Father, we pray for the Holy Spirit to give us the faith we need to believe as Abraham believed. So Jesus, send your Holy Spirit to help us discover again the power of your grace. As you take me out of your way, we pray in Jesus name. Amen. Today we turn our attention away from the Garden of Eden. We leap 19 generations forward, skipping over Noah and the story of the flood. We land in the the land of Ur of the Chaldeans. And there we meet a man named Abram and his wife Sarai. That’s where they lived. When, chapter 12 of Genesis tells us, God called to Abram, and he said these things, leave your country, leave your relatives, leave your father’s family, and go to the land I’m about to show you. God went on to tell Abram, not conditionally, but he went on to promise him that he would make Abram into a great nation, that he would bless Abram and make him famous for Abram was going to bless others. And he promised Abram that he would bless those who blessed him, he would curse those who came against him and, uh, meant harm to him. And he did it because through this man, God was making this promise to all the peoples of the earth. All the nations of the earth would one day be blessed through him. And we know through our study of scripture, that’s a foretelling of the coming of Jesus.

This call to follow God to an unknown land, to an unknown future. is also a call to a seemingly impossible future. Sarai was barren, and they didn’t have any children, so how in the world would Abra become a great nation someday? Further study of Genesis 12 to 14 tells us that Abram and Sarai did indeed leave and go to where God had told them to leave. However, along the way in those chapters, we know there are many trials that happen because they do what we do. They inserted their plans into God’s plans, and it became a mess. And when we do that, our lives are a mess as well. You see, the world that they lived in was a dangerous place. There was little to no civil law or protection of person or property. And so unless you lived in a walled city, like Abram’s nephew Lot had chosen to do when he went to Sodom, you lived out on the plain and out on the desert like Abram had chosen to do. As such, in order to be safe, you had to make alliances and covenants with local chieftains and kings. They were the only means of securing peace and security and protection to your family. This might be one of the reasons that it seems like Abram is often confused about whether or not he can truly trust God to keep the promises that he had spoken back in chapter 12. What a great relief it must have been to both Abram and Sarai when God revealed how He was going to be their protection and how He was going to be their provision.

We pick up our story in Genesis chapter 15. It says, it reads this, 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. But Abram said, Sovereign Lord, what can you give me since I remain childless and the one who will inherit my estate is Eleazar of Damascus? And Abram said, You have given me no children. So, a servant in my household will be my heir. Then the word of the Lord came to him, this man will not be your heir, but a son who is your own flesh and blood will be your heir. He took him outside and said, look up at the sky and count the stars, if indeed you can count them. This, then he said to him, so shall your offspring be. Abram believed the Lord, and he credited it to him as righteousness. The Word of the Lord. Our text begins after this. Well, if it begins with after this, you want to know after what, right? It begins after there was a war between a whole bunch of chieftains. In that war, Nephew lot in a way, our text after Abram 18 of his four years went out and those kings and those chiefs got his nephew back. It happens after a covenant of friendship with the king of whose name is Melchizedek. He met a friendship and Melchizedek gave him a. In response to that, Abram gave one of his property and his two melons. This was after the king of Sodom tried to buy Abram’s alliance, trying to gift him with all the spoils and the wealth of the war that Abram had just won. However, in Genesis, uh, 15, Oh, sorry, 1422. It reads this way. But Abram said to the king of Sodom, with raised hand I have sworn an oath to the Lord God most high, creator of heaven and earth, that I will not, I will accept nothing belonging to you, not even a thread or a strap of a sandal, so that you will never be able to say I made Abram rich. After all of that. The word of the Lord came to Abram, saying to him, Do not fear, I’m going to be your shield, and your very great reward. In other words, God was saying, I’m going to be your protection, and I’m going to be your provision. But there was so much more hidden in God’s promise. You see, the words shield and the word sovereign are the same in Hebrew. So by using the word shield, the Lord God was revealing himself to be the king of heaven. And as such, he was offering a blessing, a heavenly royal blessing to Abram. Abram had already received the earthly one from Melchizedek, and now he was going to receive a heavenly blessing from the Lord God Almighty himself.

So, what would this mean? Could this mean that God would give them the promised son that they had been waiting for for so many years? Could this possibly mean that God himself was gonna come and cut the covenant with Abram so he didn’t have to keep doing it with the earthly kings and chieftains? Cautiously, Abram pursues the conversation with God. Gently, he presses the Lord for answers. Abram said, Sovereign Lord, what can you give me since I remain childless? And the one who will is Eliezer. You hear the yearning in his heart. He that is God took him outside and said look up at the sky and count the stars if Indeed you can count them Then he said so shall your offspring be Up to this point Abram had sometimes tried to do it on his own, but now with this new promise with this renewed promise Abram Somehow, looked at the fact that he and his wife didn’t even have a single child yet. But the Lord God gave him the ability in his heart to believe. And to know that God, just the fact that it was God speaking these words was enough for him to believe it will be done. Not because of me, but because of God. Abram believed the Lord and he was credited it to him as righteousness. Abram believed not in himself, he believed in the Lord. And when he did, Abram entrusted his whole self to God alone. Despite the impossible circumstances of Sarai’s barrenness, God revealed this staggering promise to Abram. Your descendants are going to be so numerous that you won’t even be able to count them, just like you can’t count the stars in the night sky. And Abram’s response was to rely on God and say that this promise will be fulfilled if and when and how God is going to fulfill it. Not how I’m going to do it or how Sarai is going to do it, but how God is going to do it. That type of faith, that type of belief was credited to him as righteousness. You see, this was a divine declaration. Uh, by God, of Abram’s right standing with the Lord. Abram believed the Lord would do what he promised, and Abram committed himself fully over to trusting his God. In essence, he was saying to God, as I said earlier, whether or not this comes to be, it will be on you and not me. I’ve studied this text and this story many, many times over the years, but this year something struck me and I found it fascinating.

You see, Abram believed before. He believed before God cut the covenant with him. That’s going to happen a few verses later. Abraham believed before God changed his name from Abraham to Abraham, and from Sarah to Sarah. He believed before and he had faith before God would give him circumcision as a sign of the covenant that had been cut. Abram trusted in God and he surrendered his life and his future and his family and all of these offspring 430 years before God would give the Law of Moses to his people. This was not about Abram’s ability, it was about God’s ability. And this belief, this faith Abram showed was done by God. Against all hope. Rich just read Romans 4 to us. It’s, and I’m gonna read it again. Against all hope. Abram in hope believed and so became the father of many nations just as it had been said to him, so shall your offspring be. Abram knew there was no way that he and Sarah could accomplish any part of this promise if God didn’t do it for them. That’s why Paul says in verses 19 21, without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead since he was about a hundred years old. I am way past being a dad at this point, he says. And poor Sarah, you know, her body is no better. No way, on our own, we can have this child that will then be the dad, the great great great grandfather of so many generations. Verse 20 says, And yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had the power to do what he had promised. My dear friends, do we have that kind of faith? Do you and I still believe that God has the power to to accomplish the promises that He gives us in our lives, no matter how long it takes for it to happen. What has God promised you that you’re still waiting for? Don’t lose hope. Cling to the faith that you have. Look at the promises that God has always kept, and know that He, if He promised it to you, He will make it happen.

And dear friends, if this is the typical way that God interacts with us, can you imagine what this type of faith does in our lives when it takes hold? Think about when you first came to know that Jesus was the Christ, and your faith became alive in you. What difference has this made in your life? You’ve got story after story. I bet you could tell us about how God was faithful here, and He was faithful there, and when I didn’t think it was gonna happen, it suddenly miraculously happened. This is our God, and this is how He interacts with us in our lives today. This type of faith humbles us. This type of faith makes us realize just how much we have to be thankful to God about. This type of faith reminds us that in the Garden of Eden, God promised that one of these days He was going to send His Son to restore everything that had been lost when His children rebelled and sinned against Him. He gave an impossible promise in the Garden, and He fulfilled it. in the birth and the death of his son, Jesus Christ. Jesus Christ was born so that he could die on Calvary’s cross. Why? Why would this sinless man die a sinner’s death? Because you and I sinned. So, he who knew no sin became a sinner. Sin, so that you and I who have no righteousness at all may become righteous through the blood of Jesus Christ. I pray that the story of Abraham may teach us again and again that faith means totally, fully depending on God and God alone. For faith is the channel through which the grace of God comes to give us salvation. As we end today, I pray that when we fall into Satan’s trap, and I say when on purpose, because I know I do it all the time, I fall into the trap that kind of goes like this. Did God really say that? And did he say it that way? And you know, you haven’t had faith in the past. How can you rely on your faith now? How are you so sure he’s gonna do what he said he was gonna do? You hear those words, those voices coming in your ears when he comes, when that Satan comes to try to snatch our joy and our faith away from us. Don’t let it happen because when that happens, we go, you’re right, maybe my faith isn’t enough. And we start making a list of everything that we’ve done. Well, God, you know I was baptized, and I’ve been going to church my whole life, and if you ask anybody, I was the best Sunday school teacher ever, because I brought it every Sunday, and I sang in the choir, and we list it, and we write it, and we write it, and we lift it up, and we go. It’s enough, God. Can I get in?

Dear friends, I pray that every time we do that, That God will snatch that list out of our hands and He will stamp over the top of it that bloody, rugged cross of Calvary and He will remind us, you don’t get in on your own, you get in by the blood of the Lamb. And it is the faith that I give you that will get you there. Not anything that you do, but everything that I do. I pray that we can be reminded. That what has been credited to our account is not our good works, but it is the righteousness of Christ, who saves us by his death, and his resurrection, and his mercy, and his grace alone. Nothing about us and everything about him. Dear friends, this profound interaction between God and Abraham not only highlights the personal nature of God’s promise, but it also invites us to believe and to have faith and to trust in God’s right to love us, when we have the kind of faith to believe. And I praise God that the Holy Spirit has come today. Remind us Powerful words of Rome Was read just a few moments. I want to read it again Listen to this and let this sink in verse 23 The words it was credited to him were not written for him alone. It’s not just for Abraham Listen to what Paul says, but for us also And not just the people that Paul was writing to in Rome, but us sitting here in Victory Lutheran Church today as well. But also for us, to whom God will credit righteousness for us who believe in Him who raised Jesus, our Lord from the dead. He was delivered over to death for our sins and was raised to life for our justification. This is about Jesus, and it is about God who loved us so much that he sent his son to die the death we deserve to die, but we will not because he loved us so much that he went and he died on Calvary in our place. I’m excited about this fall and everything we’re going to be reminded about. In the relationship between God and His people in the Bible, and between God and His people here at Victory, between God and you, between God and me. Let’s pray. God, so many times you deliver promises that are impossible. Abram’s body was as good as dead, Sarah’s womb was dead, and, uh, And you promised the child was coming, and the child came. Against all hope, you stood in the garden and you said, not today. I’m gonna make a way. And you did it. And you stood at that grave and you said, not today. And you opened it up, and Jesus came out, and He was resurrected, and He is sitting at the right hand of the Father, and He’s interceding for us right here in this moment. Amen. Jesus, send the Holy Spirit to give us the ability to have faith. Faith that comes through you. Faith in you. Faith to believe when you said you’re coming back, you’re coming back. Faith that said, I’m not alone, you’re with me. Faith that says, you can survive the chaos of this world, I’m gonna use you to make a difference in the world, because that’s who I am, and I have a timeless call on your life as well. Give us the ability to believe that, Jesus. We are your church. Your children. Use us. to make a difference in the world. Use us to stir up the nations. Use us so that our lives through our lives, you alone may be glorified and get us out of our own way so that we can rely on you and have faith in you and not in ourselves. We pray in Jesus name. Amen.