Welcome to Connect with Skip Heitzig. We're glad you've joined us for today's program. Connect with Skip Heitzig exists to connect you to God's never-changing truth in ever-changing times through verse-by-verse teaching of His Word. That's why we make messages like this one today available to you and others on air and online. Before we kick off today's teaching, we want to let you know that you can stay in the know about what's happening at Connect with Skip Heitzig when you sign up for email updates. When you do, you'll also receive Skip's weekly devotional email to inspire you with God's Word each week. So sign up today at connectwithskip.com.
That's connectwithskip.com. Now let's get into today's teaching from Pastor Skip Heitzig. Imagine you call a moving company. A moving truck pulls up in your driveway, loads all your stuff in it. And the driver asks you, where do you want me to take this? And you go, you know, I don't know yet. The Lord hasn't told me.
It wouldn't go over very well. He didn't know exactly his destination. He just had a promise that God will show you will.
That's future tense. Just move. Just go. I'll tell you when to stop. His dad told him when to stop. Unfortunately, they stayed in the land of El Paso for all of those years without getting into the promised land. But he departed and he went.
And Abram took Sarai, his wife. I probably need to be fair at this point and read. You don't have to turn to it. I'll just read that little section in Hebrews 11 that I mentioned. This is the New Testament commentary. By faith Abraham obeyed eventually, but he did.
And it sees him as such. When he was called to go out to the place which he would receive his inheritance, and he went out not knowing where he was going. By faith he dwelt in the land of promises in a foreign country, dwelling in tents with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of that same promise.
So whatever the delay was, let's get past that. Eventually he did take the promise that God gave him and he acts on it. And he'll be blessed because of it. And he'll walk by faith. He'll have his lapses, but he's walking by faith. He's standing now on the promise of God. Finally, eventually, but he's standing on the promises of God. A good question that we should all ask ourselves from time to time is what do you do with God's promises?
There are so many of them in the Bible. What do you do with those promises? You might say, well, I read them. Others might say, I do better than that. I underline them. Others might say, I'll go a step further. I memorize them. All very good steps. But of course, the ultimate and best answer would be, I keep them. I live by them.
I practice them. There's a great story. When the United States of America was being founded, there were no bridges over the Mississippi River and this country was being settled. It was early winter and a man was traveling, came up to the Mississippi River, saw that it was frozen, was unsure how deeply it was frozen. And he wanted to cross it before nightfall.
It was getting dark. He spread out on all fours to distribute his weight evenly, which isn't really a great strategy when going over ice, but he did it. And he's slowly, slowly moving, distributing his weight very cautiously, very trepidously. And then his attention is diverted because behind him he hears singing and up comes a carriage pulled by horses loaded down with goods and the man singing drives right across the frozen river. How foolish did the man on all fours now feel?
Now he realized, oh, this must be a local. This is secure. I can stand. I can walk on this. There's a great old hymn of the church, standing on the promises of God my Savior, standing on the promises of God. If some of us were honest, we couldn't sing that. We would have to sing, creeping on the promises of God my Savior, creeping on the promises of God, not standing firm. Still others couldn't even say that.
They'd have to say, I'm sitting on the premises rather than even standing on the promises. But nonetheless, Abram went from creeping to walking. So he wasn't a creep. Let's go now back to chapter 12, verse 5. Then Abram took Sarai his wife and laud his brother's son and all of their possessions that they had gathered, and the people whom they acquired in Haran, and they departed to go to the land of Canaan. So they came to the land of Canaan. This is about 2090 to 2100 BC when this event happened, when Abram came into the land. Now, if you have a map in your Bible and you trace the route from Ur of the Chaldees through Haran down into the land of Canaan, you'll notice that he begins in the Mesopotamian, Tigris, Euphrates, River Valley, and he goes up. Now, he's really wanting to go from here to here, side to side would be quicker. But he goes up, up, up, up, up, and he moves toward the northwest and then finally takes a turn and goes down into the land of Canaan.
Here's why. That was following the river boundaries. It was a lush area.
Your cattle, your people could be provided for. If you were to go straight across, there's nothing but empty, vast desert. Now, this finally dawned on me when I took a taxi ride from Amman, Jordan to Baghdad, Iraq years ago. One way in a car, it took me 25 straight hours to drive across that empty desert from Amman, Jordan to Baghdad. It finally dawned on me. I get it. Abram couldn't have come this way.
There's nothing here to sustain life. You have to follow the river valley and go up and out of the way and then down. I tell you what, my taxi drive was like the taxi ride from hell. This guy was a perpetual smoker, smoking those camel no filter cigarettes one after the other.
And you know what he played the whole trip? Madonna tapes. What could be worse than that?
Smelling smoke, listening to Madonna through 25 hours of desert. Oh my goodness. I rather would have walked the way of Abram. Verse 6.
I better speed up the pace. Abram passed through the land to the place of Shechem, as far as the Terebinth tree of Moreh and the Canaanites were in the land. Now Shechem is so important. Later on, Jacob will buy a piece of land there, dig a well. By the New Testament times, it will be called Sychar, the land of Samaria. Jesus will go there, talk to a woman who is at the very well that Jacob dug. In fact, she will say, are you greater than our father Jacob who gave us this well?
It's a very, very important place in their geography. Verse 7. Then the Lord appeared to Abram. Second time he appeared, once was in Ur of the Chaldees, appeared to Abram and said, to your descendants, I will give this land.
And there he built an altar to the Lord who had appeared to him. Now, God promises the land, it's part of the covenant, the land to Abraham and his descendants. Now he had a lot of descendants.
How many sons did he have that we know about? The two most prominent ones are Ishmael and Isaac. As we move on in the story, God will be very selective and he'll say, I'm giving this land to you, Abraham, but not to Ishmael, but to Isaac and his descendants. Now Isaac is going to have a couple kids and God will again be later on very selective. He'll say, I'm not giving this land to Esau, I'm giving it to Jacob. And Jacob will have 12 sons and they will become the 12 tribes of Israel. And so God will be very selective who he gives it to and eventually they will occupy it after they leave Egypt after being there 400 years.
So keep that in mind. And he moved from there to the mountains east of Bethel, that's seven miles north of Jerusalem, pitched his tent with Bethel on the west and Ai, that's how Ai is pronounced, Ai on the east. There he built an altar to the Lord and he called on the name of the Lord, so Abram journeyed going still toward the south, the Negev desert in Hebrew. Okay, that's the first nine verses. Verses 10 through 20 is the second part of the chapter. First is his testimony, now is his testing. I hope this is very encouraging to you. I hope that it's encouraging when you find out that the first real test after God gives him all the covenant promises, the first real test, he failed.
I'm so encouraged by that. He's called the father of faith, the father of them that believe and the first test of faith, he failed in believing the promises of God. Now, you and I are going to face trials of faith. Some people panic whenever they get a testing or a trial.
What happened? God doesn't love me. Listen, how would you ever know if your faith is real unless it's tested? Easy to test God when the cupboards are full, when the economy dwindles a bit, things get tighter.
Is God still able to provide? How is your faith then? See, faith is like a muscle. If you want to build up a muscle, you break it down.
You apply pressure against it and then you push against that pressure and that process builds muscle. Same with faith. The pressure is what builds you up.
You'd never know if your faith is worth anything at all unless it was tested. Some people freak out and have these expectations that they follow Christ and everything's just going to be wee, fun, and perfect, and wow, and then reality hits. There was a man who loved his lawn. One year, hundreds of dandelions filled his lawn. He tried everything to get rid of them. He couldn't get rid of them. He tried more things, couldn't get rid of them.
And finally, he writes to the Department of Agriculture and tells him the problem, tells him his tried solution. And he said, what should I do next? What should I try now? They wrote back and said, try getting used to them. You're going through a trial. What should you try next?
Try getting used to them. They're prescribed by God to test and therefore strengthen your faith. You're listening to Connect with Skip Heitzig. Before we return to Skip's teaching, if you want to understand something, it's important to examine its foundations. That's why studying the Book of Genesis is so vital to understanding the rest of the Bible. In Skip Heitzig's book, You Can Understand the Book of Genesis, he takes you on a fascinating journey to where it all began. From Adam and Eve and the fall of man to the birth of the nation of Israel. So you can understand the amazing story of God's love and our redemption in Christ. We'll send you a copy if you can understand the Book of Genesis as thanks for your gift of $50 or more to reach more people with God's love through Connect with Skip Heitzig.
Go to connectwithskip.com slash offer or call 800-922-1888 and request your copy when you give. Now, let's get back to Skip for more of today's teaching. Well, let's see what happens. There was a famine in the land. What?
Did you get that? This is the land of promise. This is the land I will show you. This is the promised land. As soon as he gets there, I'm here. Honey, we're in the promised land. And she probably thought, really?
This is it? Because there's a famine here, sweetie. Isn't it interesting that the land God gave them has a famine in it? And Abram went down to Egypt to dwell there, for the famine was severe in the land. Why did he go to Egypt?
Keep in mind where he came from. He came from a place called Ur of the Chaldeans, and there's two rivers that flood that valley called the Tigris and Euphrates. Egypt was very much like his home, Ur of the Chaldeans. There's the Nile Plain, and that river feeds a wonderful valley. Now, he's in the land of promise, the land of Israel.
Can't wait to show some of you the land of Israel. Because one of the things you understand about it is that it is solely dependent upon rain. That's why God said later on to Moses, if you obey me, it'll rain. If you don't obey me, I'll shut up heaven and you won't get any rain. So there was the early rain and the latter rain, the yore and the malkosh, they call it in Hebrew.
And it was completely dependent upon rainfall, not so Ur, not so Egypt. So he's going to a place that he knows can sustain life during a famine. He's going to a place that's very much like home. And it came to pass when he was close to entering Egypt that he said to Sarai, his wife, indeed, I know that you are a woman of beautiful countenance. Men, you can never go wrong saying that to your wives at any time. Honey, you're a knockout.
You're beautiful. But Abram had ulterior motives. It wasn't just a pure compliment.
It wasn't like stars in his eyes. He's got a plan. Therefore, it will happen when the Egyptians see you that they will, that they will say this is his wife and they will kill me, but they're going to let you live.
Please say you are my sister. That it may be well with me for your sake that I may live because of you. The man of faith. God's hero in the Old Testament. The father of them that believe. Doesn't have much faith here, does he?
What's his plan? Lie. Actually, it's a half lie and it's a half truth and a half truth is a half lie. She was his wife, but they had the same father though they had different mothers. We find that out in chapter 20.
That'll give us that information. So, it was half true, but it was also a lie. She still was his wife. Now, we find out from ancient history that the Egyptians favored Semitic women. She was a Semite and thought they were beautiful because the Egyptians said of their own women, the Egyptian women, that they faded early.
And, if it was a brother-sister relationship, that was, at least where Abraham came from, more sacred than even a husband and wife relationship. Now, if you know how old Sarah is at this point, it becomes even more interesting. She's 65 years old.
He's 75, she's 65. She must have been quite a looker. To be 65 and still looking like, wow, that Abraham would think, I gotta lie about this woman because she's beautiful. Now, we aren't given a physical description, but again, if we rely simply on the stuff that's passed down, it might be historic, it might be hearsay, it might be a legend. According to one Jewish source, they said there is no bride or virgin that has passed under the canopy, that's how Jewish couples got married, that could be compared with Sarah. They used to say that God gave one-third of all women's beauty to that one woman. She had a perfect figure, the records tell us. She was just gorgeous, so he lies.
Said that, you know, they'll let you live, but they'll kill me, so he's trying to protect himself. Please say that you're my sister. Verse 14, so it was. When Abram came into Egypt, the Egyptians saw the woman that she was beautiful. The princes of Pharaoh also saw her and commended her to Pharaoh, and the woman was taken to Pharaoh's house. He treated Abram well for her sake. He had sheep, oxen, male donkeys, male and female servants, female donkeys and camels. At this point, I am certain that Abram thought, good, I'm getting away with this.
I'm being blessed by this. For you see, no doubt he was thinking pragmatically when he was up in Canaan and there was a famine in the land, and he thought, after all, I've got to take care of my family. Everybody's going into Egypt, that's what they do in a famine. I'm going to look after my family.
It's my God-given duty. But all of the promises that God gave to Abram were for the land of Canaan. God told him to go to the land of Canaan. God never said go to the land of Haran.
God never said then also go to the land of Egypt. So he just did it on his own. At this point, he's thinking, I'm getting away with it.
Everything's favorable. There's a great proverb in Proverb 16 that says, the lot is cast into the lap, but every decision is from the Lord. Donald Gray Barnhouse used to translate that, man throws the dice, but it's God that makes the spots come up.
The ancients used to have their own version of that. The dice of the gods are loaded. So here's Abram thinking, I got away with it, but boy, he did not. The Lord plagued Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai, Abram's wife. And Pharaoh called Abram and said, what is this that you have done to me?
Why did you not tell me that she was your wife? A husband who is out of the will of God is dangerous to his family, to himself. And here, this man places his wife in jeopardy because God still has his hand upon Abram and Sarai, placing Pharaoh and his household in jeopardy, all because of this disobedient man. By the way, there's never a mention that Abram prayed, built an altar, worshiped God, called on the name of God while he was either in Haran or in Egypt, only while he was in the land of Canaan.
He will when he gets back, but right now he's not. The Lord plagued Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai, Abram's wife. And Pharaoh called Abram and said, what is this that you have done to me? Why did you not tell me that she was your wife? Why did you say she is my sister? I might have taken her as my wife. Now, therefore, here is your wife.
Take her and go your way. You know, here's just a real basic but very, very crucial truth. Whenever we sin, we never sin alone. It always involves other people. It always has ramifications far above and beyond just who you are and what you're doing and your little situation.
It affects people around you. Later on in Joshua, a guy named Achan, remember that guy named Achan? He steals money and he steals a garment.
He sends. It causes the entire nation of Israel to be defeated at the battle of Ai. Much later on, David will number the people of Israel just for his own pride. And 70,000 people of Israel will die because of his stupidity. Jonah will go the other direction when God tells him to go preach in Nineveh.
And he'll place the entire cargo ship that he is on in jeopardy and all the people aboard it because of his disobedience. So here is Abram standing before an unbelieving king, an Egyptian king. What irony this is when unbelievers start rebuking believers.
Here's the unbelieving Pharaoh rebuking the man of faith, the father of them that believe, saying, Dude, what are you doing? I could have had your wife. Now take her and go your way. So we must ask, Abram, was it worth a little bit of relief from the famine? There was a husband and wife. They were at the mall. They were shopping together. As they were looking at items, this beautiful young woman walked by. And the husband looked up and his eyes followed her and followed her and followed her. His wife didn't put down the item she was examining.
She just, in a whispering tone, said, Was it worth the trouble you're now in? I can hear God saying, Abram, was it worth the trouble you're now in? Verse 20 ends of the chapter, So Pharaoh commanded his men concerning him, and they sent him away with his wife and all that he had.
If your doubt leads to disobedience, you are dangerous. And he was dangerous. God said that Abram was to be a blessing. He turned out to be a curse to Pharaoh. So what great lessons. He lost his testimony.
He'll get back on track in the next chapter. But you know, it does just sort of leave us with the reminder that we're being watched, we're being listened to. Some more than others, but all of us are being watched and all of us are being examined and all of us are being listened to. And we have a testimony and it's either a good one or a bad one.
It's either solid or soiled. And some Christians, boy, you want them to be more vocal and let people hear about what they believe in because their lives are pure. Others need to wear warning labels, quite frankly, because they're not good testimonies.
They're not good examples. And you want to tell some of them, don't tell anybody you're a Christian because it spoils the whole testimony. Abram's whole faith testimony was spoiled. But at the same time, I'm encouraged that the father of faith wasn't perfect and that the Bible never flatters its heroes because I have failed God. I have failed in my testimony. And God keeps bringing me back to Bethel, bringing me back to the altar, bringing me back to forgiveness.
We're glad you joined us today. Before you go, remember that when you give $50 or more to help reach more people with the gospel through Connect with Skip Heitzig, we'll send you Pastor Skip's insightful book, You Can Understand the Book of Genesis, to help you better understand the story of God's great love and His amazing plan for our redemption. To request your copy of You Can Understand the Book of Genesis, call 800-922-1888.
That's 800-922-1888. Or visit connectwithskip.com slash donate. For more from Skip, be sure to check out the many resources available at connectwithskip.com slash store. Come back next time for more verse by verse teaching of God's Word here on Connect with Skip Heitzig. Make a connection, make a connection at the foot of the cross and cast your burdens on His Word. Make a connection, connection. Connect with Skip Heitzig is a presentation of Connection Communications, connecting you to God's never changing truth in ever-changing times.
