Abraham: Fact-Checking Your Future - Part B

So here's the fact check for your faith. Even the little things you do in life can have great influence.

The little steps of faith you take that expand your influence in people's life make a huge difference. Today on Connect with Skip Hyten, Pastor Skip wraps up his series fact check and shows you how God kept his promise to Abraham and Sarah, giving them a child when it seemed impossible. But first, here's Skip and Lenya to share some exciting news about a trip to the Holy Land. Well if you've ever dreamed about visiting Israel, let's make that happen. Lenya and I are leading a tour group to Israel next summer in 2024. We'll start up north visiting Nazareth, the Sea of Galilee, and the Jordan River. We'll spend several days in Jerusalem, see the Temple Mount, the Garden of Gethsemane, the Upper Room, and more. Now visiting the places where the Scriptures unfolded, where Jesus lived out his earthly ministry, it never gets old.

That's why I keep going back. Join Skip and I and our friend Jeremy Camp next summer in Israel. See the itinerary and book this Israel tour with Skip Heitzig and Jeremy Camp today at inspirationcruises.com slash c-a-b-q.

That's inspirationcruises.com slash c-a-b-q. Now let's turn to Hebrews 11 as we join Skip for today's teaching. Now he's already old when God made him a promise. He's 75 when God said I'm going to make you a great nation.

He's 75. He won't have a kid, well he'll have Ishmael, I'll get to that, but he won't have his son Isaac till he's a hundred years old. Well this requires patience because I don't know how long you've been waiting for what you think are God's promises to you, but 25 years he waited. Now in verse 11 we meet his better half.

I guess that could be debated. We meet Mrs. Abraham. We meet Sarah verse 11. By faith Sarah herself also received strength to conceive seed and she bore a child when she was past the age because she judged him faithful who had promised. Therefore from one man and him as good as dead were born as many as the stars of the sky in multitude innumerable as the sand which is by the seashore. Abraham and Sarah had I suppose a normal life maybe a three bedroom tent, two camel garage, right? They had each other but they had no child and even though God said I'm going to make a nation out of you I'm going to bless you and you all the nations of the earth will be blessed.

Great but time passed and he's not getting any younger. In fact he's getting quite a bit older and one night God says to him I am your shield and you're exceeding great reward and this is wonderful but you can just almost feel Abraham's resistance because he's been patient and waiting so long. He says what will you give me seeing that I am childless and I have this guy named Eliezer who's my heir this dude from Damascus but he's not like mine.

What are you going to give me? So when he says that God says Abe step outside let's do some stargazing together. Check those stars out.

Can you count them? I'm going to make your offspring more in number than the stars that you can count in the sky and it says after God told him that another promise says Abraham believed God and God accounted it to him as righteousness just going okay I believe it amen sure whatever you know he just made a statement of faith and God said okay that's enough for me to account you as righteous. Now in that conversation Abraham is now 86 years old from 75. 11 years pass and he says look at the stars I'm going to make your descendants like the stars of heaven so it has been 11 years since Abe gets the first promise that his wife Sarah is going to have a child so you know month after month year after year after year after year same question are you pregnant yet nope I can't get pregnant and I'm a really old person so I the odds are not in my favor now you know that Abram is a name that means exalted father that's what his name means exalted father which is an embarrassing name for a guy who can't have a kid so the caravans come by and they go hey what how are you doing he goes great and the caravan leader says what's your name he goes exalted father and so the caravan leader would say oh great well how many do you have how many children do you have he goes well I don't have any you know he sees it as he's a laughing stock by the time Abraham gets to be 99 years of age still no kid God changes his name from exalted father Avram to Avraham which is father of a multitude and I can see Abram going please no lord don't make me wear that name but remember Abram believed God and there's no indication that he balked at that so he took the name father of a multitude because he believed God okay now here we have Sarah's faith in what we just read highlighted in Hebrews 11 when we read however the text back in Genesis it seems to read a little bit differently we don't we're not like struck by her faith right because in chapter 17 of Genesis she basically says uh Abe look I'm old year old this ain't gonna work um I have a handmaid named Hagar I think what God meant by that promise we can't really like take the bible literally so I think what God really meant is that you can just go in and have relations with Hagar and they'll have a baby and that baby will be let's call that the promise of God okay it's a spiritualized promise so there's not an indication of faith Ishmael is born and there's a lot of lessons that could be learned with Ishmael we think we may know what's best and kind of order God to do it our way we don't really know the full scoop so don't ever do that I love the story about a girl who went to a computer dating service and she knew exactly what she wanted in a suitor and a husband and she was very specific on the computer she wanted somebody who was short because she herself was a wee little ass so she said I want somebody who is short somebody who prefers formal wear and somebody who loves water sports so the computer sent her a penguin short formal attire loves water sports okay here's the point even when we order up a penguin in life an Ishmael God is still faithful so they go ahead and have a child named Ishmael chapter 18 of Genesis God comes to Abraham again and says Sarah's going to have a baby and Abraham goes oh Lord this is getting so old let Ishmael live before you oh that Ishmael might live before you just fulfill your promise through him you know we went through this rigmarole to have him he's here use him and God says nope I'll bless Ishmael I'll make him a great nation but your wife Sarah is going to have a natural born child now when Sarah heard that promise because it says the Lord and these these angels appeared at the tent and they're eating a meal and make this promise it says that Sarah laughed within herself so she just kind of went that's funny because ain't no way I'm having a baby no way I'm having a baby and then the Lord said hey uh Abraham why did Sarah laugh and she goes I didn't laugh the Lord says yeah you did I heard it I know it so she laughed that was not a laughter of faith it was not a laughter of joy it was a laughter of I don't believe it yet it remarks here about her faith yet before the year ended she was pregnant delivered a child and named the child laughter Isaac means laughter and she said the Lord's made us laugh now this was this second laughter different than the first laughter the laughter first laughter was a laughter of unbelief the second was just a laughter of sheer joy God did it God did it God turned a retirement home into a maternity ward and it's just so weird all they could do is laugh with joy here's what I love Hebrews 11 doesn't mention her unbelief doesn't mention her laugh of mockery mentions only her faith which must have been right at the end as she grew in her pregnancy and delivered her child so Hebrews 11 makes no mention of her initial doubt only her eventual faith why well there's a principle in 1st Corinthians 13 love keeps no record of wrongs here is God not not even acknowledging the bad part of her testimony and just includes the good part because he's the God of second chances now through all of this 25 years Abraham was patient verse 12 notice it again therefore from one man and him as good as dead he's 100 years old he's 100 years old were born as many as the stars in the sky and multitude innumerable as the sand which is on the seashore reproductively his body was dead physiologically Sarah was barren but Abraham is not thinking of human frailty but of divine faithfulness circumstances I've said this on many times occasions I want to just want to resurface the circumstances don't make you and they don't break you they reveal you when things get good or things get bad the real you comes out and and and I think we could all say about COVID-19 with all the restrictions and all the stay at home and some of us have lost jobs and our faith is on the line it really reveals who we are loving or not loving filled with faith or filled with doubt really sweet or really grouchy whatever it is circumstances simply reveal who we are and we have during this time had to come face to face not just with our kids and our wives and husbands and pets and projects at home but us we have to face us every day and hopefully God is using this to get us here to be men and women of great patience endurance as God is working these things out on us okay let me give you faith fact number four he lived for permanence Abraham lived for permanence verse 10 tells us for he waited for a city or for the city which has foundations remember he's wandering around in a tent he's a pilgrim for he waited for the city which has foundations whose builder and maker is God go down to verse 14 for those who say such things declare plainly that they seek a homeland and truly if they had called to mind that country from which they had come out they would have had opportunity to return but now they desire a better that is a heavenly country therefore God is not ashamed to be called their God for he has prepared a city for them Abraham was a bad one he wandered in tents while he was on the earth and though he was promised land and he was in that promised land he was waiting for the ultimate promised land a heavenly country it is called in verse 16 and then in verse 10 heaven is compared to a city i find this interesting he waited for the city which has foundation he came from a city of 300 000 he's wandering along the Euphrates river out in the wilderness out in the open but he's he's waiting looking for the ultimate town the ultimate city so the bible here is uh refers to heaven as a country refers to heaven as a city most often we're used to hearing heaven described as a kingdom in the book of Daniel the words of Jesus the kingdom of God the kingdom of heaven we think of heaven as a kingdom here it's referred to as the city do you know in the book of revelation at least part of heaven is a big city which isn't typically how we how most people would imagine heaven it's like a city i don't want to go you know like right now in covid you don't want to be in new york city you want to be in colorado or new mexico with wide open spaces right you want to be as socially distanced as you can the idea of of coming to a city with tons of people it doesn't sound like heaven to us you know we think maui not new york right but revelation talks about the new jerusalem and and that is a city that is 1500 miles cubed so 1500 mile the distance 1500 miles if you went from albuquerque to spokane washington that is 1500 miles or from maine to florida that's 1500 miles so if you took that and made a cube 1500 miles cubed that's how big the new jerusalem is it comes out of heaven toward the earth not this earth but a new heaven and a new earth but part of our environment in the future will be a heavenly city called the new jerusalem that we will enjoy why is the city important city is a place of fellowship and proximity there'll be nothing that separates us in heaven that's the idea at least of the motif of the city i believe also a city is secure keep in mind 2 000 years ago people weren't dreaming of ranches in montana colorado or new mexico they were dreaming of living in a city with walls because it protected them it kept them safe from intruders so the idea of a city for ancients was it was a place of fellowship it was a place of security and it was a place of of wealth of storage you you store things in cities there's resources there's amenities in cities so um we are he was looking for a city that has foundations whose builder and maker is god now there's a fact check here when the people around you who are unbelievers are telling you uh well look all there is is right now right here the earth this is all there's going to be this is all that you can expect period that's fake news there's a whole nother real really real world besides the real world that exists that we are awaiting and that is the heavenly city the heavenly country the heavenly kingdom and he lived for permanence and then fifth and finally the the fifth faith fact boy say that 10 times fast the fifth faith fact for abraham is that he lived in god's power abraham lived in god's power verse 17 by faith abraham when he was tested offered up isaac now we're taken forward at genesis chapter 22 in this verse by faith abraham when he was tested offered up isaac and he who had received the promise offered up his only begotten son of whom it was said in isaac your seed shall be called concluding that god was able to raise him up even from the dead from which he also received him in a figurative sense abraham when he was tested genesis 22 verse 1 opens up by saying god tested abraham he said go to mariah go to the land i'm going to show you this mountain and offer your son isaac as an offering as a burnt offering the word test in hebrew means to prove the quality of something by adversity or suffering to prove the quality of something by adversity and and god tests people god does not tempt people sometimes the bible uses the word tempt that's like the old king jimmy modern translations will correct it god tests he never tempts people the devil tempts god tests there's a big difference satan will tempt you to bring out the worst in you god will test you to bring out the best in you now for us it's not easy to tell the difference how can you tell the difference is this a test or is this a test or a temptation can i give you some advice on that if you're wondering i'm going through this hardship i don't know if it's a temptation or if it's a test it doesn't matter in the end it doesn't really matter because in that circumstance i would say satan is trying to trip you up but god is trying to temper you so god would even use the temptation as a test to make you stronger so in the end it doesn't matter joseph when he was um you know what he went through he said it was brothers you meant it for evil god meant it for good same circumstance so you know what the test was it was offering up his son um god touched the most sensitive nerve that god could touch in abraham's life kill isaac why was that the most sensitive because for one simple reason think of all that we studied so far all of god's promises to abraham were wrapped up in the existence and the continuation of isaac he waited 25 years for isaac isaac represented his progeny of faith isaac represented the inheritance in the land of promise not only that isaac represented future salvation messianic hope in you all the nations of the earth will be blessed that's a prophecy of the coming messiah so when god says hey abe take your son that is the son of promise and go kill him he's faced with a dilemma he's faced with an ethical and ethical and spiritual dilemma because the promise of god all the promises of god require that isaac live but the command of god requires that isaac die that's the dilemma he am i dealing with a self-contradicting deity here because he says here's isaac the son of promise i'm going to bless the world through isaac and now he says go kill him so notice what it says in the text we'll wrap this up verse 19 concluding that god was able this is abraham concluding god was able to raise him up even from the dead which he also received in a figurative sense now here's what's noteworthy about the original story we're not going to turn to it but back in genesis 22 when abraham and isaac and their servant come to the land of mariah abraham takes isaac and says to the servant you stay here the lad and i will go yonder and worship and listen to what he says and we will return to you not i will return to you we're going to go and worship and we will return to you wait a minute god said leave him on an altar dead but abraham says we will return to you why is that well probably the night before he's not sleeping well i'm thinking if you're going to kill your son the next day and you know it because god said it you're not you're not having a good night's sleep it's very very unnerving unsettling it's it's that dilemma it's that dilemma you go through sometime in the night it clicked i get it i get it so you see the word concluding in verse 19 greek word is logism i logism is where we get our word logic so let me give you a bad translation because it's not even a word he logicized it he applied logic to this situation and so he reasoned came up with one of two conclusions either number one god is erratic and can't be trusted or number two god is faithful and sovereign and can be trusted which means that i'm going to go up there and plunge a knife into my son and god's going to raise him from the dead in front of my eyes and we're going to come back and see the servant that i said we come back to we're going to go worship and we will be back sometime in the night he concluded that god is going to raise his son from the dead because god said kill your son but god said your son must live for all the promises i gave you to be fulfilled there's only one conclusion logically i can come up with god is going to miraculously raise my son to life in front of my eyes so we'll be back he lived in god's power what did he believe verse 19 that god was able hang on to those words brother and sister god is able what are you dealing with god is able what are you fearful of god is able what are you struggling over god is able and another secret of abraham it said stay here the lad and i will go yonder and worship never forget to worship in the calamity like joe did like abraham did like you and i must that Skip high tech with a message from the series fact check find the full message as well as books booklets and full teaching series at connectwithskip.com right now we want to share about a resource that will equip you to answer the toughest questions about your christian faith josh mcdowell has written books that rank among the best-selling christian works of all time now with his son sean josh has released evidence for jesus god gave us our mind and our heart to work in unity to what to glorify him the bible i call it fact fiction or fallacy i want to answer two questions about the bible this is what i struggle with as a non-believer one is what we have written down the same as what was written down two thousand years ago or has it been changed second was what was written down true in evidence for jesus josh and sean mcdowell have adapted and updated the evidence for jesus section from their classic apologetics book evidence that demands a verdict into a concise readable and accessible resource for those seeking answers about jesus this powerful new resource is our thanks for your gift of 50 or more to support the broadcast ministry of connect with Skip heitzig josh and sean mcdowell make a powerful team if you have questions about jesus or know someone who does this book is perfect so get your copy of evidence for jesus today when you give a gift of 50 or more evidence for jesus is our thanks for helping us expand the reach of the teachings on connect with Skip give online securely at connectwithskip.com slash offer or call 800-922-1888 and we're excited to send you more content from pastor Skip and this ministry right to your mobile device to join our new text messaging group just text the word connect to seven four seven five nine that's connect to seven four seven five nine then be on the lookout for your first message a video from pastor Skip welcoming you to the group join us tomorrow as Skip begins a new series that's all about how god works to do amazing things that defy all odds oh connect with Skip Heitzigen is a presentation of connection communications connecting you to god's never changing truth in ever-changing times