An Excursus: Jesus--the Fulfullment of the Promise

My next planned blogpost was to be on the third part of God's promise of blessing to Abram--that would be "and make your name great." We'll get there. Soon. Probably early next week.

You remember that promise, right? We previously explained that it was a heptad or seven-fold promise. Here it is:

1) I will make of you a great nation.
2) I will bless you.
3) And make your name great.
4) So that you will be a blessing.
5) I will bless those who bless you.
6) Him who dishonors you I will curse.
7) In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.

All of these promises are wonderful and each were wonderfully fulfilled in Abram's life. As we come to those moments of promise fulfilled we will be sure to highlight them. But there is more. This promise of blessing pointed forward, also, to a fulfillment in a future nation we know as Israel--Abraham's promised offspring. They also, according to the New Testament writers, apply to you and to me. We are a part of that offspring through Christ.

Which brings us to the point of this post.

Let me state the case plainly. Every single one of these promises finds its ultimate fulfillment in Jesus Christ and without Jesus Christ none of these promises would even be possible.

Don't believe me? Let's look at them one by one.

1) I will make of you a great nation.

Now read the words of the prophet Isaiah and see Jesus as fulfillment of this promise:

For to us a child is born,

to us a son is given; 

and the government shall be upon his shoulder, 

and his name shall be called 
Wonderful Counselor, Mighty God,

Everlasting Father, Prince of Peace. 

Of the increase of his government and of peace

there will be no end, 

on the throne of David and over his kingdom, 

to establish it and to uphold it

with justice and with righteousness 

from this time forth and forevermore. 

The zeal of the LORD of hosts will do this. (Isaiah 9:6, 7 ESV)

Now the next part:

2) I will bless you

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, (Ephesians 1:3 ESV)

All the blessing to the offspring comes through and because of Jesus Christ. Now the third:

3) and make your name great

Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:9-11 ESV)

There is more to this "name" part of the promise than just Abram's reputation during his lifetime or having his name changed from "Abram" to "Abraham". Much more. Christ is in view. (We'll see that in my next post.) 

4) so that you will be a blessing

so that in Christ Jesus the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles, so that we might receive the promised Spirit through faith. (Galatians 3:14 ESV)

It is "in Christ Jesus" that Abram has been a blessing--to the world and to us. Now check out the next two, which fit naturally together.

5) I will bless those who bless you
6) Him who dishonors you I will curse

The Father loves the Son and has given all things into his hand. Whoever believes in the Son has eternal life; whoever does not obey the Son shall not see life, but the wrath of God remains on him. (John 3:35, 36 ESV)

Awesome, isn't it? And last but not least . . .

7) In you all families of the earth shall be blessed. 

Now witness the multitude before the throne singing their new song to the Lamb.

And they sang a new song, saying,  

"Worthy are you to take the scroll
and to open its seals,
for you were slain, and by your blood you ransomed people for God
from every tribe and language and people and nation,
and you have made them a kingdom and priests to our God,
and they shall reign on the earth."  

Then I looked, and I heard around the throne and the living creatures and the elders the voice of many angels, numbering myriads of myriads and thousands of thousands, saying with a loud voice, "Worthy is the Lamb who was slain, to receive power and wealth and wisdom and might and honor and glory and blessing!" (Revelation 5:9-12 ESV)

So what did God promise Abram? A lot of stuff, right? Yeah, a lot of stuff. But when you break it all down here is what God promised Abram and here is what God promised the world through Abram. God promised him and us . . . Jesus Christ. Think on that.

When You See Them In Weakness -- A Sermon

What I like about Pastor John's sermons is that they are always well-thought-out and biblical. John plumbs the text for meaning and then applies it to our everyday life. They are both theological and practical. In other words, they are gospel-centric, Christo-centric, and relevant. John gives us the word.

"The grass withers and the flower fades, but the word of our God endures forever."

Here is John's second sermon taken from the record of Noah found in Genesis 6-9. This one takes place after the flood.



God give us the grace to recognize your mercy in our lives and to respond in mercy and love to those around us when they sin.

Abraham Part 1 -- Audio

This is still a work in progress. I am learning as I go. I had hoped to provide something downloadable that you could take with you on your iPod, iPad, or MP3 player. That still may happen soon. In the meantime you can click this link and go to an audio mp3 file of the first Sunday School lesson in our Abraham series: Abraham--Part 1.

When you get there, click 'download' and it should start playing. God bless and let me know if it works.

The Limits of the Rainbow--A Sermon

A tremendous message from Pastor John.



And the conclusion.

Have this mind among yourselves, which is yours in Christ Jesus, who, though he was in the form of God, did not count equality with God a thing to be grasped, but emptied himself, by taking the form of a servant, being born in the likeness of men. And being found in human form, he humbled himself by becoming obedient to the point of death, even death on a cross. Therefore God has highly exalted him and bestowed on him the name that is above every name, so that at the name of Jesus every knee should bow, in heaven and on earth and under the earth, and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord, to the glory of God the Father. (Philippians 2:5-11, ESV)

I Will Bless You, Part 2

Let's be honest. Could we ever really get enough of "I will bless you"?

I was thinking about how to go about making the next in line of blog posts on God's heptad of promise to Abram that he gives in Genesis 12. Next in line would be the third part: "and make your name great." I know what the thrust of that post will be but I was having trouble deciding how to go about presenting it. So I decided to distract myself by reading a little bit from one of my commentaries, hoping it would get my mind focused in on the task at hand. I picked up this:

And opened it up to the book marker where I had left off last night. Here is the first sentence I read:

"By the Abraham narrative, the author of Genesis reveals how God's promissory blessing at creation intended for all peoples will be acquired through Terah's son, Abram."--Kenneth A. Matthews, Genesis vol. 1b, p.84-85

And that, my friends, is exactly why I chose to teach a series of lessons on Abraham's life. When God sets about to bless humankind anyway, God begins with Abram.

That anyway is a very important factor and it's important that we understand its significance. Humans do not deserve God's blessing. In fact, quite the opposite--we have earned, by our actions, his curse.

What is said about "Babylon" in the Revelation of John could easily be said about the whole human race:

After this I saw another angel coming down from heaven, having great authority, and the earth was made bright with his glory. And he called out with a mighty voice,

"Fallen, fallen is Babylon the great!
She has become a dwelling place for demons,
a haunt for every unclean spirit,
a haunt for every unclean bird,
a haunt for every unclean and detestable beast. (Revelation 18:1, 2 ESV)

Indeed, as the Preacher in Ecclesiastes says,

See, this alone I found, that God made man upright, but they have sought out many schemes. (Ecclesiastes 7:29 ESV)

God made man perfect, worthy of receiving his blessings, with the full intention of blessing him all his days. In fact, God intended to bless an entire world of people from day one:

So God created man in his own image,
in the image of God he created him;
male and female he created them.

And God blessed them. And God said to them, "Be fruitful and multiply and fill the earth and subdue it . . ." (Genesis 1:27, 28a ESV)

But man chose his own path, sought his own way apart from God.

Nevertheless, God's purposes are never thwarted. God will bless a world of people. Only now, because of man's sin and rebellion, God must first redeem man and make him "bless-able" again. This he will do, and this he will begin, beginning with a no-name nomad named Abram.

God's grace transcends all human frailty, all human rebellion, all human wickedness. You and I cannot out-sin God's grace. Be honest with yourself. Isn't it true that most of your life has been spent for you with little regard to your Creator? Isn't it true that you have sometimes, maybe even often held his authority over you in contempt, or even expected him to submit to your plans and your viewpoints? Who is really god in that mode of thinking? These are not momentary lapses, this is our nature. This is how we are fallen.

But now God begins the great and wonderful task of changing that. He begins in early human history with Abram. Perhaps he is right now beginning this in you as well. Take the time right now to bow your head in submission to him. Now. Go ahead. You know that's what he wants for you. And having done that you, too, will be on the path of blessing that God has always intended for you.

"I will bless you. . . ."

Unexpected Mercy -- A Sermon

Now there was a disciple at Damascus named Ananias. The Lord said to him in a vision, “Ananias.” And he said, “Here I am, Lord.” And the Lord said to him, “Rise and go to the street called Straight, and at the house of Judas look for a man of Tarsus named Saul, for behold, he is praying, and he has seen in a vision a man named Ananias come in and lay his hands on him so that he might regain his sight.” But Ananias answered, “Lord, I have heard from many about this man, how much evil he has done to your saints at Jerusalem. And here he has authority from the chief priests to bind all who call on your name.” But the Lord said to him, “Go, for he is a chosen instrument of mine to carry my name before the Gentiles and kings and the children of Israel. For I will show him how much he must suffer for the sake of my name.” (Acts 9:10-16 ESV)

It's not about us, it's about God's glory.



How can you, how can I, how can our church become an instrument of God's mercy? "

"So often we think that the good we do comes from within us. James 1:17 tells us every good and perfect gift comes from God."

"Blessed are the merciful, for they shall receive mercy."--Jesus

I Will Bless You

We are looking at the seven-fold blessing God promised to Abram in Genesis 12. Here it is again:

Now the LORD said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonors you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.” (Genesis 12:1-3 ESV)

A heptad of blessing:
1) I will make of you a great nation.
2) I will bless you.
3) And make your name great.
4) So that you will be a blessing.
5) I will bless those who bless you.
6) Him who dishonors you I will curse.
7) In you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.

In a previous post we looked at the first one: "I will make of you a great nation." Now let's look at that second one.

I will bless you.

No greater words could be spoken to a human being by God. I will bless you. There are no conditions and no clauses. It is a promise without expected performance or precondition. I will bless you. What grace is this!

But Abram hadn't been previously blessed and was probably thinking by this time in his life that he was simply not to be blessed by the gods at all. He had no son. It is hard for us to imagine the impact of that simple fact on a person of his culture and time. He had no son. He has failed to meet the first criterion of a "blessed" person. Don't even try to tell us you are blessed, Abram, if you don't even have a son. It's like saying you're a golfer but you don't know how to hold a golf club. Sure. Right. Whatever.

But God comes down at this point in his life and says to him, based solely on his grace, "I will bless you."

To be blessed means to be the recipient of God's favor. How would Abram have understood this promise? He probably would have understood it to mean physical blessings: health, wealth, children. Obtaining the favor of the gods was an important endeavor in that society and how to do so an important study. The most widely accepted idea in human history has been that favor is obtained from deity in exchange for something offered to the deity. YHWH makes his grand entrance into this culture by making a promise to bless based solely on his goodness.

I will bless you.

How are we to interpret such a promise? How are we to apply it to our own lives? Without going into details as to how and why (details which I will get into later), understand that you, too, as a believer, are the recipient of this promise. How are you to understand this blessing? In what form will it take? Is this a health and wealth and prosperity promise? Well, yes . . . and no. Mostly no. But mostly yes. Confused? Good.

If you thought God's promises of blessing were all about health, wealth, and prosperity in this life as defined by our dominant media culture, then you are not unlike the people of the Old Covenant for whom this was mostly true. Just remember that in that time (before Christ) God was teaching them (and us) truths about himself through object lessons that they could understand. But when Jesus comes along he turns this kind of thinking on its head. Rather than give you a whole series of blog posts on how Jesus did that, let me just sum it up by saying that Jesus taught us to expand our viewpoint by taking a step back and looking at things from an eternal perspective rather than a temporal perspective. Jesus taught us that it was a good thing to suffer for a short time in this life in view of the eternal rewards we would receive in so doing.

Eternity.

That is how long we will exist. And in that context, any and all things we will experience in this life are very brief indeed. With that in mind, as believers we are blessed in Christ beyond imagination for all eternity, even if we do without and suffer for His name in this life, which is but a short time.

For I consider that the sufferings of this present time are not worth comparing with the glory that is to be revealed to us. (Romans 8:18 ESV)

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, (Ephesians 1:3 ESV)

Spiritual blessings in Christ. That is what we have as believers and every one of these stems from that first promise to Abram: I will bless you. Does that blessing extend to you? It does if you are in Christ. And if you are not, his arms are open wide. Come and be blessed.