Genesis 22:11-14 Bible Study | Episode #289

November 17, 2022

Hope Alive: Applying God’s Word to Your Daily Life

Genesis 22:11-14  Bible Study | Episode #289

I am Chad Harrison, and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and had been serving as a pastor for 25 years. I'm also a practicing attorney. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word and find God's will for your life. The purpose of studying scripture is that you might know the character of Jesus Christ, and that you might see the world from the Father's perspective. That you gain wisdom that changes your life. I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God would open His word to you and allow you to see Him and to know Him. To know His will, that you might glorify Him and that you might walk in faith and power each day, especially today. In Jesus name.

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Transcript

This is Chad Harrison, and you're listening to Hope Alive, Applying God's Word to your daily life.

Hi, this is Chad Harrison and I am the teaching pastor of Lake Community Church and have been serving as a pastor for 25 years. I'm also a practicing attorney. This podcast is designed to help you study God's word and find God's will for your life. I pray in the name of Jesus right now that God would open up his word to you and allow you to see him and to know him.

And to know his will, that you might glorify him, and that you might walk in faith and power each and every day, especially today in Jesus' name. Good morning. Welcome to Late Community Church. Morning Bible Studies. Good to be with you. This morning we're dealing with Abraham and Isaac, and yesterday I talked about the symbolism behind Abraham.

Today I'm going to deal with I'm gonna be, I'm gonna deal with with Abraham himself. Just the man himself In this situation, Isaac is the obedient son. I think if you reading this story and you read clearly, Isaac does exactly what his father tells him to do. Isaac is a picture of Jesus.

He's a picture of Jesus in in. Every possible way. He's a picture of Jesus when later on we're gonna see him get a bride. The Abraham's gonna send a unnamed servant again, which is a picture of the Holy Spirit back to his home area. And they're going, he's going to pick out a bride for him.

And that bride is going to be brought back by that unnamed. For Isaac and her name is Rebecca and she's just a picture, it's just a straight up picture of the Holy Spirit going and getting the church and bringing the church to Jesus as his bride. It is Isaac in every possible way is a picture of Jesus.

He's a picture of the church. He's a he's a picture of God's. Inhumanity he's a picture of Jesus in this for sure. Because he is obedient and completely obedient and and he doesn't wave one little bit in anything his father asked him to do. He is along for the journey and he does exactly what he's told.

And apparently he's a child of fairly fairly advanced years because he's the one that carries the wood up the mountain for the burnt offering. You wouldn't do that with a six or seven year old. You'd have to, you'd have to be fairly old to do that. So in verse three, it says, So Abraham rose early in the morning.

Notice verse two. Then he said, Take now your son. God said your only son. Whom you love and go to the land of Morai and offer him there as a burn offering on one of the mountains, which I will, I'll tell you notice verse three. So Abraham rose early. Where's the arguing with? Where's the where's the bargaining with God?

Where's the deciding with God? Exactly what you're going to do and why you're gonna do it? Where does that take place? In here? It doesn't, And if you'll notice, it's not like Abraham's nature was it to ask God questions and try to inquire of God exactly what he wanted to do.

It's not like that was not Abraham's Nature. When the angel of the Lord and two angels came with him to go and destroy Sodom and Gamora Abraham quizzed the angel of the Lord pretty clearly. He just asked him questions. He was questioning why he was going to destroy Sodom and Gamar.

And now the angel of the Lord shows. And God says to him take your son and sacrifice him as a burn offering. And you know what? Abraham doesn't ask a single question. He doesn't, He doesn't even flinch. He just begins to make plan. He he was just able to make plans to to.

To go and do what God told him to do. Now the reason for that is because this is the secret of the faith. Okay? This is the only way for me to explain it to you is this is the understanding that you have to have in order to walk. Life changing, life giving faith, and it's not, And when I say understanding, it's not just a empirical understanding that you have in your own mind.

It's not just an idea that you have just because you're, just, because you're you're been taught it, and you get it. It has to become a part of your very thought process, your very nature. And oftentimes we don't make this a part of our very thought process and our very nature, and we, and because we don't do that we don't have.

I guess the way to say it is the depth of our faith is very limited because it is almost difficult for us to do this. Notice says, so Abraham Roses early in the morning and he took he saddled his donkey and he took the Holy Spirit the picture of two young men and Isaac, your son, and he split the wood.

For the burn offering. Notice he's doing the work here and he rose and went to the place of which God had told him. Then on the third day, Abraham lifted his eyes and saw the place far off. He had to walk for three days to get there. He had to walk for three days to get there. Abraham, he had to consider this for three days.

He said, Abraham. Said to the young men, Stay here with the donkey and the lad and I will go yonder and worship and we will be back to you. So Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering and laid it on Isaac, his son. I, it's hard for me to tell you how long exactly. Did Abraham, how long did Abraham actually spend.

Going through. This time and knowing that he is going to take his son to the altar and he's not slowing down. He's not delaying anything. He is immediately going and doing what what God took told him to do. He said he took the wood and laid it on Isaac's son and took the fire in his hand and the knife, he takes all the tools.

He doesn't forget anything so he can go back down the mountain and get it. He takes all that. And the two of them went together and I, and Isaac even asked my father and he said, here I am, my son. And he said, Look, the fire in the wood that there's no lamb for the burnt offering. And Abraham said, Here's here.

Here it is right here. My son, God will provide for himself a lamb for a burnt offering. So the two of them went together. Notice God he understands. He understands this, that first of all, God's sovereign over the universe, God gets to decide. He understands too that God is true to his promises. And and that when God says he's going to do something, he's going to do it.

And what God had promised him is that through his offspring, he would bake a great nation and that nation would be a light to the world. And Isaac was. Was that offspring that was going to be alike to the world and finally he understands something that it is difficult for us because we wanna be in charge of our own lives.

We wanna be in charge of how things operate and who we are. He understands this one principle that as at the very core of. And it is very court. See, we don't have a faith. We don't have a faith. That's a four long hope that we're not sure about. We have a sure faith, a faith that we we and a faith that's the type of hope that we call anxious expectation.

We have an anxiousness and an expectation that God, A certain power that is that is the Trump card in every situation. That is the the hope of the universe and the millennial past and future. It is the power of God to raise the dead. It is the power of God over life and death.

It's the power of God to author life and. That is the understanding that we gain starting in Genesis chapter one and any ending in Revelation chapter 22. We get this written through out scripture that God is the author and sustainer of life. And life. When it passes away or when it ends, does not end with.

God has the power over death also. And so life for him is an eternal option. It exist. It exists because of him himself and not because of anything else. And so understanding that God is the author of life, that the God is the author of how life is going to be and how it's going to continue out.

Understanding that God. As the author of Life Decides, gets to decide he's the decider. He's the one who made it. He's the owner of it. The, those that are given life possess it because of him, and they possess it at his pleasure and at his will. He. He says, I have numbered your days.

He says this to, to the great patriarch Joe. He says, I have numbered your days past, which you cannot go. He he is the one who decides when life begins. He said, I knew you before. I niche you in your mother's one. He is the starter in the initiator and he is the ender of physical.

He is the source of eternal life and he is the one who provides it and gives it. And no man conjures it up and no man moves God by his own will to provide eternal life. He says that Jesus said, Those whom the father give me. I give them eternal life. Remember, give is a gift. It is it requires in the legal terms, it requires intent.

It requires acceptance. It requires deliverance. But the first thing that comes is not the acceptance. The first thing is the intent. It is God acting in his own will first. Now, once you have eternal. You receive it and you begin to walk in it. And that's what we call salvation. That's what we call the process of sanctification.

But the actual giving and the authoring of that life comes from God and Abraham intrinsically understood this. He understood what was going on. The reason he questioned the angel of the Lord about Sodom and Gamar is because he knew that God was ending that. Permanently. He was going down there to sommore, he was going to pronounce judgment on those people, and those people would die, and those people would spend eternity in the second death, which is the spiritual death separated from God and his goodness.

And that's what concerned him about that. He wanted to know, would God kill the righteous with the unrighteous, Would God in the life of the righteous, along with the unrighteous and his concern. Eternal life in that regard. But as far as Isaac is concerned, and as far as taking Isaac to the to the cro, to the well, to the cross I'm using Isaac as a foreshadowing of Jesus because he is a foreshadowing of Jesus.

When he takes Isaac to the cross I mean to the, to, to the top of the mountain for the burn offering, he understood this principle very well. He understood either one of two things was going to. Either God was gonna provide a sacrifice for himself that was not his son. Okay? And he says that to Isaac and it's comforting to ties it cuz Isaac didn't see where the offering was and he didn't understand.

And obviously Isaac's older because Isaac has done this. He understands the process and he understands that you have to have someone or something to sacrifice some, something that has blood in it. The without the shedding of blood, there is no remission of sin. He understands that intrinsically, he understands that in who he is.

Okay. All right. So as he's going to the up there, Abraham understands either one of two things. Either God is going. Take God is going to give him something to sacrifice. Or if he does sacrifice his sur Son and even burn him as a burnt offering to God, God is going to raise him from the dead.

God has the power of resurrection. God has the power over life. God is the author of life and he is the power over life. And even if he were to die, he would be raised again. And we're not just talking about. We're not just talking about the second death. We're talking about the first death.

Jesus has that conversation with Martha right outside the tomb of Lazarus, and what does he say? She says she, He says, I'm going to be able to, I'm I have the power of life. And she says, I know you do. I know you. I know we're going to, we're gonna see your power in glory.

We're gonna see your power to raise the dead. And he says, No, I'm the way, the truth in the life. I'm the resurrection and the life. And what he's saying is, I have the power to raise laers from the dead. I have the pa, I have resurrection power because life comes from me. And understanding that, and bringing that idea to the table of life for yourself.

What I mean by that? What I mean by that is that understanding that principle of what God is and who God is needs to become innate in who you are. It needs to become the actual functioning idea that governs every decision that you make. That God is sovereignly the author of all life, and his purposes and his will play out in every situ.

That he's intimately involved in every life situation and that I trust him in every situation that he is working out his will and his way. Which are the best or the best. Okay. His will and his way. Every day in every situation that I see and hear, and find, and that I have an expectation that he's going to bring about miraculous power, Miraculous goodness, miraculous grace, miraculous hope in every situation that goes on around me.

And that I am there to do a couple of things. I am there to join him in those things because he is gracious and good to me and loves his children and wants them to see him at work in the world. He lives in that I am there to see it and be a and be a witness to it so that I might glorify his name and that I am there.

Ultimately to engage my faith in that situation so that I trust him for everything and for all things so that my life might be on a path of total faith in him. Those are the reasons why. I'm in every situation that I'm in, that I see every situation that I see. You say what about my sin? Your sin is evidence that God's holy and that God can overcome sin and death.

What about the troubles of my family and my friends? The troubles of your family or friends are only momentary, and therefore, the purpose of edification, if they're born again and their for the purpose of God's holiness. If they're not if they're not going to. Redeemed or tone for by Jesus Christ in his blood.

They are, they. Every situation glorifies God and every situation God is intimately involved with and knows way farther, more, far, more than you could ever imagine in every situation of life, he is involved in all of them every. In every way, and he knows more than you do about everything, including yourself, even God.

He says even in the New Testament, God tells us he searches our hearts and our thoughts. He knows our heart and our faults even better than we do. He knows the circumstances of every situation of life, far better, better than we do. He is. Ultimately completely, totally in control. And the reason people struggle in their faith is they refuse to give over to that truth.

To that understanding. Abraham was told to take his son to a place a long way away, at least a three day journey, maybe farther, because it doesn't tell us. He says he could see the mountains in three days, doesn't mean that he got there in three days and he carried his son longer. Two servants that.

Without a sacrifice other than his son, knowing that God said, take his son and offer him as burn offering. So he didn't bring a second plan with him. He knew that God would either provide for him a second plan or he would raise his son from the dead because his son was the son of promise. And so God had to bring about, He, he'd already told him many times his son was son Promis.

There would have a child in his, in their old. He was the son of promise. So God was going to have to bring about his offspring through Isaac. And he understood that. And so he had to know, he had to know this, that if he sacrificed his son, Isaac, God would raise him from the dead. Had to know it. There's no way.

No, there's really not any, It's really not any other explanation for it. He's not a psychopath. And he's quite clearly a great man who understands and sees things in ways that that you can't even, you can't even imagine. He says, I know. Who he is. That's why he is in the role Call of Faith and Faith in Hebrews chapter 11.

In fact, he gets one of the primary roles, in fact, probably the primary role in the role Call of Faith in Hebrews chapter 11. He understood that God had the power over life and death, and that everything that went on in his life was under the authority of. And that ultimately, even though he didn't totally understand everything, even though he asked God and question God about certain things, he understood that God handled all those things and he gave God credit for it.

He goes up to the mountain and what does he do? He says and Abraham stretched that. Verse 10. Abraham stretched out his hand and took the knife to slay his son. He understood if I kill him and I even burn him up and offer him a sacrifice, God will raise him from the dead outta the ashes He says. He says, The angel of the Lord called to him from heaven.

This is Jesus calling him to heaven. Abraham. Abraham. So notice for the third time in this passage, he says, Here I am. I am listening to you. I am listening to you and he said, Do not lay your hand on the la or do anything to him. For I know that you fear God, that you have begun and have walked through wisdom since you have not withheld your son, your only son from me, what he's saying is, I know you trust me.

You haven't withheld anything from me, he says. Then Abraham lifted his eyes and looked, and there behind him was a ram caught in the thicket by its hot horns. So Abraham went and took the ram and offered it up for a burnt offering instead of his son. Abraham called the name of the place The Lord will provide as it is said to his to this day the Mount of the Lord, it shall provide.

And and that word is yore. And God does provide, God always provides. That's why we don't live without hope. We have a living hope. We have a anxious expectation of who God is and we anxiously expect him to be God in every situation. No matter how dire or no matter how confusing it may be, to our futile and limited minds.

We trust God. That's why we do it. Being able to do that in every situation is not easy. I'm not telling you it is, but I'm telling you that if you want to see God in his fullness and his reality, you must have an expectation that he is going to do big things, That he has the power over everything.

He has the power over the things that you fear the most, most. He has the power over the things that you hope in the most. He has the power of things that you love the most. He has the power of the things that you you worry about the most. He has total control over everything, and he is working out his will and his purposes for you.

That is what faith's about. It's not about. It's not about hoping in some rolling of the dice that the numbers come up right for you. That's not how it works. Faith is a anxious expectation. Hope it's a trusting of God because you understand and know his nature. It's a belief in what God has said and what God has shown us through his son Jesus Christ.

It's a belief in his son. Remember, what does God require? What his works God requires to believe on the one he sent. What does his one he sent represent at his core the very most. Jesus represents the power of God over death, and because he submitted himself to death, raised himself from the dead, God has given him the name above every night that that all those things come together and understanding that God is a resurrection power.

He's a God who who has the power, the resurrection power over death. Death does not control God. Death is that which God controls himself.

As you go today, I pray that the Lord will bless you and keep you, that he'll make his face to shine upon you and that he will give you hope and peace today in Jesus' name.