Sermons 2024

Video:

Text: Genesis 17”1-6,15-17

Outline
2. Abram’s shortcut
1. God’s response to Abram and Us

Introduction: Grace, mercy, and peace be to you from God our Father and our Lord and Savior, Jesus Christ.

My dear beloved flock, the text for our meditation today is the Old Testament lesson of Genesis Chapter seventeen verses one through seven, fifteen through sixteen. 

Boys and girls, have you ever been with mom or dad when they have taken a shortcut on a trip thinking that it will save time? Has it ever worked in cutting time off of the trip? Usually more time is added. Too often, shortcuts end in bad ways. There is the dead-end road or the two-lane road with heavy traffic so it is no shortcut at all and takes you longer to travel. What about a shortcut when mom or dad is trying to fix something at home or on the car? They think they have an “aha” experience, and then it breaks again and costs more to fix the second time! Shortcuts do not usually work.  We see Abram try to take a short cut in our text for today. How does God respond to it? Ponder this question as you hear the rest of the sermon. You may go back to your seats and those who love you.

2. Abram’s shortcut

        What we see in Abram today is a desire to take a manmade shortcut. He wants to do things his way under his own terms and power. He has figured out a way to have an heir using Hagar, Sarai’s slave woman. After all, he is ninety-nine years old. He and Sarai are not going to be having children. It is just too late. So, Abram has a plan for an heir that is done in such a way that God can save face. Abram wants Ishmael to be his heir. Ishmael is already born. Abram loves Ishmael. He practically begs for Ishmael to inherit everything, praying to God, “Oh that Ishmael might live before you!” He knows he and Sarai are too old to have a son, so just make Ishmael heir of the promises, make him the one through whom the Messiah will come. This is Abram’s fervent wish and his answer to his problem.

        We see here the weak faith in Abram and Sarai. Abram doubts that God can keep his promise and provide him an heir. This would be impossible—too much to ask! Abram takes matters into his own hands. He wants to fix the problem. He thinks he has the perfect solution: “God, let’s do things my way this time.”

        How often do we find ourselves operating the same way? We have problems in life. Everyone does. We, as the people of God, go to Him in prayer. You pour out your heart to Him. You tell Him you believe in His promises. As soon as you pray “Amen,” you start looking for your own solutions, your own answers, the way you think the problem should be solved. Just like that, there’s worry, fear, anxiety. Give it to God and then take it right back just as fast as you can. The real problem here is that you don’t trust God and His ability to answer as is best for you. You want to do it. After all, you might not like God’s answer and his solution. Just like Abram!

1. God’s response to Abram

        So God comes to Abram face-to-face. God does not come to chastise or to condemn. God comes to Abram to strengthen his faith by speaking to him the promises of the covenant. If Abram thought it was impossible, unbelievable, that he and his wife could have a child in their old age, he must have been astonished at the unbelievable promises that God made to him.

        He changed Abram’s name to Abraham. Why? To signal to Abram the assuredness of the promises. The “Exalted Father” would become the “father of a multitude of nations.” Sarai was changed to Sarah because she would be the mother of many nations. God would not work this promise through Ishmael, but He would keep His original promise by giving Abraham and Sarah a son of their very own even in their old age. God was going to work two miracles. First, Abraham would have his own son. Second, he would make him very fruitful and make him literally into many nations.

        God was going to bless Abraham with descendants, generation after generation. In fact, God would bless him so that this would be an everlasting covenant. The covenant would be everlasting because of one of those descendants. Human beings each have their own life expectancy, beginning and ending. To be an everlasting covenant would take a special descendant who would be like Abraham, a human descendant, but also like God, who has no end, everlasting. One of Abraham’s descendants would be the Savior, Jesus Christ. 

        Finally, God would give to Abraham the land of Canaan, literally the Promised Land for his future descendants. This Promised Land would be an everlasting possession. Again, it would be everlasting because there would be a land far beyond anything on earth. There would be a Promised Land that would last forever.

        God fulfilled his promises to Abraham and Sarah, and, in doing so, he has kept his promises to you and to me. Jesus Christ, the descendant of Abraham, has come. He has come for all people, all nations, all generations. He came to bring the promises of God to ultimate fulfillment. He did so to remove the sins of our weak faith, our doubts, our constant desire to do things our way, to solve problems without regard to God’s will. He did so by his own suffering, his own shed blood to cover our sins, his own death to pay our wage of sin, and his glorious resurrection to conquer death itself. Through Jesus Christ, the promises of God to Abraham and to us are fulfilled. By faith in Jesus, we, too, are now descendants of Abraham.

        He has changed your name too. At the day of your Baptism, the day you received the Holy Spirit, the day your sins were forgiven, the day you became an heir of eternal life, God gave you a new name: Christian. God applied His very name to you. He keeps his promises to you. He gives you “a new covenant in his blood, given and shed for you for the forgiveness of sins.” His covenant, sealed in his holy, precious blood, strengthens your faith and keeps you in faith to life everlasting in the everlasting Promised Land.

        Conclusion: God made promises to Abraham. The promises seemed impossible, unbelievable, to an old man and his wife. But God Kept His Unbelievable Promises
to Abraham and to Us!
All the promises were fulfilled in Jesus Christ when he came for you and me. Now we have new names, forgiveness of sins, an everlasting covenant, and a promised land. These are indeed unbelievable promises. 

The peace of God which surpasses all understanding, guard and keep your hearts and minds in Christ Jesus. Amen.