Look, Walk, Worship

Looking at God’s Promise After Lot Separates from Abram

Well this morning we continue forward in chapter 13, which we look to complete together. We're continuing on with this wife of Abraham. Of course, he's not Abraham yet, he's still Abram. We've been careful to try to keep his name as it's stated in the text until God changes it.

But we're taking steps toward that great promise being made sure. And so we're looking at verses 14 through 18 together this morning. And I want us to keep in mind what we've seen so far in this chapter as well as a little bit from chapter 12.

Remember that God first called Abram. He called him out of Ur of the Chaldeans. He dwelled in Haran. And from Haran God called him to journey into the Promised Land. When he went into the Promised Land there was a famine.

After a time there was a famine and he traveled down to Egypt. And God, despite all of Abram's schemes and hoped for manipulations, God delivered Abram. Despite Abram, God was true to his promise. Delivered him from the hand of Pharaoh.

And as we saw last week, as Abram made his way back into the Promised Land, that time in Egypt came with consequences. Came with many possessions, which was a blessing, but those possessions caused strife between the herdsmen of Lot and the herdsmen of Abram.

And so we concluded last week with Lot separating from Abram. Abram humbly said, look around, lift your eyes. Name the place you hope to dwell. If you go to the left, I'll go to the right. If you go to the right, I'll go to the left.

Lot chose poorly. He chose the wrong way, as we said last week. He chose to pitch his tents as far as Sodom. And the last verse we saw, verse 13, states the problem with that. That those who were in Sodom were sinful against the Lord, wicked men, evil in his sight.

Abram chose the right way. We had in verse 12 that great contrast. Abram dwelt in the land of Canaan. Abram was staying in the land that God had portioned to him. Abram chose the right way. And keep in mind everything that has happened between Egypt and Canaan.

His walk has been impacted in a way that Lot's walk was not impacted. Lot still had a heart toward Egypt. He still had a heart toward provision. A fleshly heart that caused him very strategically to straddle the border between Canaan and Sodom.

But again, Abram chose the right way. We saw last week he was humbled by his deceitfulness, by his cowardice, by his lapse of faith. He recognized that nonetheless God had delivered him with a mighty deliverance.

He recognized that though he was sinful, God was full of grace and compassion. And so he retraced his steps. And there he sought to restore himself by worshiping. He restored himself, renewed his commitment to the Lord's promise.

And he renewed his faith in the Lord's goodness. It equipped him to withstand temptation. Even the temptation to dwell in the plains of the Jordan. To dwell toward Zoar. Toward the land of Sodom. And then we have in our focus this morning will be v. 14 to the end of the chapter.

God responds to Abram's response. Abram is back in the land. He's repented and he's worshiped the Lord again. And the result of that is he gives over to Lot to prevent strife between them. He gives over to Lot.

The choice in Lot departs. And then God, as it were, responds to Abram. He confirms the promise to Abram. He confirms the promise to Abram. And we see really three actions that are a part of these verses.

First we see God saying, lift up your eyes and look. So there's this action of looking, of beholding. So that's the first action, look. The second action is arise, walk. It's the second command. Lift up your eyes, look.

Arise, walk. So we have this action of walking in the land. And then the last action we see is at the end of the chapter, Abram builds an altar to the Lord. What we've seen throughout is when you have an altar being built, you have worship being conducted.

So these are the three actions, look, walk, worship. We're going to see how significant I hope that is, not only for Abram in this chapter, but for us as believers, as children of Abram.

To look, walk, and worship.

God’s Promise to Abram in the Land

So first, notice that Abram is called to look at the promise of God. Looking at the promise. Verses 14 -16, the Lord said to Abram, after Lot had separated from him, Lift your eyes now. Look from the place where you are.

Northward, southward, eastward, and westward. For all the land which you see, I give to you and your descendants forever. And I will make your descendants as the dust of the earth. So that if a man could number the dust of the earth, then your descendants also could be numbered.

One little detail that we can't let escape our notice is how the Lord responds to Abram after Lot had separated from him. That's what the text says. After Lot had separated from him. We have to take a step back and realize how significant this departure has been.

We can only imagine how difficult it would have been for Abram and Sarai to watch Lot, their beloved nephew, vanish over the horizon. Remember, we read a little detail that Abram's brother had died. Nahor had died.

And from that time forward, even all the way back in Ur of the Chaldeans, Abram had become a father. And Lot had really become more than a nephew. He had become a son to Abram. And then they dwelled in Haran together as God made His promise more concrete.

And Lot followed Abram like a dutiful son into the promised land. And when that hard time came, Lot would have done what he could to help Abram provide for the herds and for the servants. And he followed Abram down into Egypt.

And he was there as God delivered them from Egypt. And this whole time, there's been this bond, this familial bond. Lot's been more than a nephew. He's been there as God's dealt with Abram from the highs to the lows.

And now he's departed. You can imagine how sorrowful this must have made Abram feel. We've all had experiences like that, I trust, in our lives where we've had people that we love part ways. Friendships that grow distant, that grow apart.

Relatives that we're very close to that move away, or perhaps pass away. Sons and daughters that grow up and move out. We can sympathize with how this must have made Abram felt. Remember that Abram and Sarai are childless.

Sarai's barren.

How special this relationship was. More than any servant, more than any prized possession, Lot was truly one of the great joys of Abram's life.

And this is a loss.

It's a loss that he's experiencing. That great caravan is set out now, and there's a sense in which, I won't see him. And he won't see me. And we're going to find out that that's not the case. Abram will come to the rescue in chapter 14.

But again, just situate yourselves here. There's been this conflict, and now Lot's leaving. And Abram's really at a low ebb. And it's really only heightening his situation.

Here he is.

God has promised him an inheritance in this land, but he still has no heir. And now it's painfully clear that Lot is not going to be an heir. Lot is not going to be an adopted son. Now, even that family's being broken up.

And perhaps in the back of Abram's mind he's thinking, you know, this would have never happened. I would not have to separate from Lot, and from all this love, if I had stayed in the city of Haran. If I just hadn't come into this desolate land, this famine land.

If I just stayed in the city, we were together, and we did well. But I answered the call of God, and here I am. And now, look, Lot goes from me. So it's heightening the situation. Here he is. There's little promise, right?

Lot's leaving because there's something green in the plains of the Jordan. There's something green eastward. That's not true of where Abram is, but he's staying in the land. So there's little promise of any provision in the immediate.

There's little promise of an heir. Sarai's still barren. Now his closest one, a son figure, has departed from him.

He's at a low ebb.

This is a sorrowful exchange. But notice that Abram's resolve is firm. He's still responding to the promise of God. And now God responds to him. God, as it were, comes down and strengthens his resolve.

Confirms his faith. Yes, you've trusted in me. You've trusted in my word. Lift your eyes now. Lift your eyes, as if he's been looking down, so sorrowful. Lot's out from vision, and here I am.

Week after week.

Month after month.

Year after year.

And Sarai's still barren. And the land is still desolate.

And God's promise does not seem to be coming true.

And God is here confirming his faith.

Lift your eyes now. And look.

Look from the place where you are. Look northward.

Look south. Look east. Look west.

Do a 360. Everything you see, I am giving to you. And to your descendants forever. Notice that God is acknowledging just how far from sight the promise of Genesis 12 seems to Abram. And he says, lift your eyes and look.

And notice that that's coupled with this next statement. From the place where you are. Lift your eyes and look from the place where you are. Now, I don't think that's just merely saying, oh, from this place you happen to be standing, look.

As though he could look from some other place.

Right?

What place could he look from but from the place where he's standing? There seems to be something a little more to what God is saying here. Look from the place where you are. Look from the place where you're standing.

The place where you're walking. Look from where your heart is and where your mind is. And where your anxieties are becoming a burden. Look deeply from where you are. In your stance before me, before my face.

Look from where you are.

Lift your eyes. And look up. Look. Look all around you.

Look at the promise.

It's as though God is saying to Abram, from the very place that you are, even though you cannot see everything around you, in this humble resolve you now have, in this despair you're feeling over a lot, while you're wrestling with belief mixed with unbelief, in your worry but also in your hope, from that place, Abram, lift your eyes up and look.

Behold.

Look around you. Look from the place where you are. To the land that I will give you. Look from where you are to what will come. This is how God gives promises to his people. I find this very instructive.

God is condescending in a way to, first of all, acknowledge where Abram actually is. What state he is in. And then to lift him from that place. So he affirms and acknowledges where Abram is. Perhaps in his sorrow.

Perhaps in mingling, you know, lingering unbelief. Lord, I believe, help my unbelief. Perhaps that's where Abram was. And yet he's affirming this promise to him. Even as Lot is going out of distance. If we could borrow the language of John Bunyan from Pilgrim's Progress, Abram sort of is the original Christian, isn't he?

The original pilgrim. He's being called out of the city of destruction and he's traveling toward the celestial city. And we could almost say Egypt was Abram's slow of despond. Just when he's in and he's on his way and then he gets trapped and he begins to despair, he had stumbled in his faith.

But then the Lord delivered him and gave him strength and energy on his way forward and confirmed his promise so that Abram would look with eyes of faith even when that promise seemed far off. Notice that God is cultivating Abram's faith.

Look from the place you are. Now look all around you. I am giving this to you and to your descendants forever. He's now cultivating. We say that because he's taking a step further in his promise. He's giving a little more detail in his promise.

And I notice that in our lives, God always seems to work in this way. He always confirms His truth, His promises to His people from the place His people are. He's calling you this morning from the place that you are.

From where you are in relation to Him. In that place of perhaps mingling unbelief. In that place of perhaps sorrow or distance. Dryness. Or in a place of strength and zeal and you're waiting for Him to open a door to shed new and stronger light on the path and you can go forward from strength to strength.

He acknowledges where you are.

When He affirms His promise and His will for your life. Notice then that God does not affirm you or confirm His promise to you from the place you think you are. He does not affirm Himself to the place you should be.

He does not affirm His promise, His will for you unto Christ from the place you wish you were. He actually comes to where you are. From the place you're standing. Here is where God makes Himself known to you.

From the place that you are. And He repeats this promise.

He cultivates this faith.

The Lord said to Abram, remember back in chapter 12, get out of your country, from your family, from your father's house, to a land I will show you. I will make you a great nation. Verse 3, and you, all the families of the earth shall be blessed.

And then when he enters into the land, verse 7 of chapter 12, God says, to your descendants I give this land. This land. And so He builds an altar there at Shechem. Then He journeys down between Bethel and Ai and then on down to the Negev.

Remember, in 13 He's come back out of Egypt toward the Negev, back to settle between Bethel and Ai and this is where this exchange is taking place. God does not simply repeat that promise. And the Lord reminded Abram of what He had said.

No, He actually develops it.

He expounds upon it.

And first it begins with looking, beholding. Look around you. He's going to do this again. This is just so fascinating, the way that God interacts with His people. He's going to come again when Abram's at a very low ebb.

He's saying, look, my house is desolate. Eliezer is going to be my heir. The slave in my house is the closest thing I have to a child. And what does God do? He doesn't say, well, let me remind you of the promise I made back in chapter, no, He's not there.

He's not in chapter 12. What does God do? Abram, come outside. Come outside and what?

Look. Look.

Now it's not look northward, southward, eastward, westward. It's look at the stars of the heavens.

Look up.

So God wants Abram to begin framing his expectation of the promise by beholding, by looking, looking with eyes of faith. And He's expounding on this. God wants Abram to get a larger sense of the magnitude of His promise, not just this land in some vague indiscriminate sense, but as far as you can see in any given direction, that's the land I'm giving you.

And then He's going to even go further than that. Walk around this land.

Walk in this land.

So there's further detail being given to the promise. And this is how the Lord works with His people, isn't it? This is a walk of faith and there's a certain sense in which He progressively reveals His presence, reveals His truth to His people.

We walk in obedience to what He has made known and it seems that more light is shed along our path. This is part of the growth of sanctification in the Christian life, part of maturity. And so we're all at different places in our walks with the Lord here this morning.

But from whatever place we are, as we respond to God by faith and obedience, as the hymn would have it, trust and obey for there's no other way. Now the hymn says to be happy in Jesus. Let's modify that a little bit.

There's no other way to receive further light for the path. No other way to continue to grow. No other way to be drawn closer into fellowship with Him. As we respond to God in faith and obedience, more light is shed on our path.

We begin to know more of Him. More of His Word. We find His promises to be true not because they come to our ears by precept, but we experience them. We experience the truth of His Word. We come to see and to know by experience His goodness, His power, His providence, His love.

God is expounding this promise to Abram, and we have this beautiful picture. It's sort of the logic of Psalm 119, 105, isn't it? Your Word is a lamp unto my feet, a light unto my path. Notice how the word here is being used in this analogy of a journey.

So the idea is that the worshiper is never at a standstill waiting for everything else to become illuminated, but rather the Word sheds light on a path, on a journey. Progressive revelation of God's Word.

We wish we could know it all up front, but God does not reveal Himself in this way. He does not reveal His Word in this way. He comes to the place where we are, and He affirms His promise from the place where we are, and we exercise faith in that Word.

We obey that Word, we trust Him and walk with Him until He cultivates further, expounds further, draws us to the next realization or truth. And so Jesus says, for instance, to His disciples in John 16, a good illustration of this.

John 16, 12, I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. I still have many things to say to you, but you cannot bear them now. How would you have liked to have been on the receiving end of that?

If you go home and tell your little five-year-old, I have many things to teach you, but you're not able to bear them now, what does that five-year-old do? Tell me, tell me, please, tell me, tell me.

It's like, no, you literally cannot understand that.

You need to live a life.

Before you can actually receive some of these things. You're just not capable, you're too young, your mind can't grasp the concepts, you haven't experienced things. I have so much to teach you, but you just gotta trust and obey what I can reveal to you, what you are able to bear now.

And that's just how it is with the Lord, isn't it? And so John 16, 12 is true for every Christian in this room. The Lord by His Spirit has many things, many things that He has yet to show us,.

Yet to teach us,.

Yet to bear us up through, yet to guide us toward. We're just not able to bear them yet. We're not able to bear them yet. Isn't it wonderful to know that the Holy Spirit will lead us into truth? That's a promise that God gives to His people.

The Holy Spirit will lead you into all truth. But He doesn't do that by a batch download, does He? I'm gonna lead you into all truth, here's the zip drive, all truth. And now I can understand everything about God's will for my life.

That's just not how it works. It's sort of this dialogue, this back and forth,.

This really is light being shed.

As you continue to take steps on this path. As you hide His Word in your heart, line by line, precept by precept, this is how God moves in His people. We see that here even with Abram. The promise is now getting a little more color, a little more clarity.

That's gonna continue. More details, more of an expounding of what it's going to look like. We're gonna get to such detail, know this at this time, your children will be slaves in the land of Egypt. There's just more detail, more clarity that comes along with God's revelation.

What a great encouragement to know the Lord has much to teach us, we're just not able to bear it. But we will be able to bear it because He has begun a good work in us and He's carrying it through. So mapped out in our lives are these successive stages of God furthering revelation, opening up illumination, giving us eyes to see, ears to hear, hearts to believe what He will make known to us.

We don't do this by our flesh. We do this by faith and obedience. And so that's why we say the word is a means of grace. We become Bereans, we become students of the word.

We hide it in our hearts.

We order our lives around it. We want our lives to be characterized,.

Shaped by the word.

So that God will continue to make known Himself through it. And this is God's way of leading. Abram, lift your eyes now and look from the place where you are.

To what I will give you.

Notice it begins with looking.

God is calling Abram to look, look, look.

He doesn't say go, he says look. It's so fascinating to me.

That God begins with. Look, behold.

In fact, I can't confirm this. I have not done a study on this, but I have an inkling that when God gives a promise, more often than not, it begins with some type of look or behold or I make known to you.

That we really begin our conception of what God is going to do by beholding it before we act on it, before we respond to it. So God can command His people to go, but when He gives a promise, it's behold, it's consider, it's look.

Abram, look. Don't slow down.

Just look. Take the time to look. Let this sink in. Look around you. Behold what My Word is. Behold the promise. Look with eyes of faith all around you. This is what I'm going to give to you. It doesn't look like that from the place that you're standing.

But look around you. Look to the heavens.

Look to the earth.

Don't take your eyes off My Word. Don't depart from My promise. It is a sure promise because I am. And so yes, Lot's leaving, but Lot was never meant to be your heir. Remember the promise I gave to you from your loins.

And God will again and again confirm this promise to Abram, just as God again and again confirms His promise to us.

Look. Behold.

I wonder, have we come to church today and have we viewed this as a priority of our time? To just behold the promise of God. Behold what the Lord has done. To consider what the Lord is doing.

What He will do.

We all lean toward certain priorities in how we gather and why we gather. And truly, these all must be the case. We must, in a sense, gather to behold, to consider, to be moved by, to be melted by a vision of who the Lord is, what He has done, what He will do.

We're just meant to behold that. Don't act on it yet.

Just behold it.

Consider it.

Be amazed by it.

Worship as a response to it. But then perhaps there's some of us that, yeah, been there, done that. We're looking for that new insight. We're looking for grist for the mill. I've come to learn. I've come to love the Lord God with my mind.

And so I understand the behold, that's more looking with your heart. I've come to look with my mind. I want to be renewed after a new knowledge. I want to gain insight and clarity in His Word. And so that's why I've come.

That's my priority.

And then others, well, I want to know what to do with that Word. I've got hands. I've got feet. I've got a busy week. I've got a hungry family.

What do I do with the Word?

So they've come, and they've come for the Word too. They've come to understand what to do with it,.

How to apply it.

And you can never make everyone happy, right? Those that have come to behold, perhaps, they say, Amen. What a wonderful service. Those come to learn to say, Yeah, no, it was good. I just didn't really learn anything new.

Those that came for application, Oh, well, you know, I don't really know how to apply it. I kind of wish we got through to more application. Ideally, all of these are always the three strands that are never broken.

But I tend to think, in our setting, we minimize or marginalize the call just to behold. It's a modern worship song, and I just love the first line of it. Come, behold the wondrous mystery.

What a great call to worship.

What a great opener to worshiping God. Come, just behold. Behold the mystery that God took on flesh and died in a sinner's place. Died condemned in your place so that you might become the righteousness of God in Him.

Come behold that wondrous mystery. The rest inevitably follows. So beholding is taking the same promise but adding new color to new clarity, new warmth, new response to it.

Come behold. Look.

That's what we're saying.

Lift up your eyes. Look.

That's what God's people want you to do. That's where we begin. I hope we'll see as we move forward this morning, there's this succession between looking,.

Walking, and worshiping.

Notice that the order begins with looking. Now what is Abram to look at as he looks around at all the land? This brings us to a theological theme, and I just want to sow some seed here. If it doesn't mean a lot to you right now, that's okay.

I'm just sowing some seed because in chapter 15 we're going to spend a lot of time looking at this. When God points Abram to look at all the land, that little phrase, all the land, is pointing us all the way forward to Christ.

Christ in His dominion.

Look at all the land.

This is the blessing of the nations in short form. Remember that God is expounding His promise in chapter 12? Well, it seems like we've lost something, have we? It went from a promise of a seed, descendants, and a promise of a land that God's going to show, but what was this whole talk about God making Abram a blessing to all of the nations,.

To all of the peoples of the earth?

Did that drop away here in chapter 13? We're just not going to deal with that? No. It's all being contained in this little phrase, all the land. Look at all the land. It's pointing us forward to the seed.

The true seed. Not the immediate fulfillment, not the seed by the flesh, but the seed by promise. Who is Christ. And all that are in Christ.

To this seed, God gives all the land.

Don't take my word for it. Paul says the same thing in Romans 4. Chapter 13. For the promise that Abraham.

Would be the heir of the world.

Was not to Abraham, or to his seed through the law, but through the righteousness of faith. Now, we're going to build on that, but I just want you to notice this little phrase. The promise that Abram would be.

The heir of the world.

Wait a minute. Where did God say that Abram was going to be an heir of the world? He brought him to this land and said, I give you this land. Well, what is Paul picking up on? He's looking at this promise.

Of all the land.

And remember how he said, our translation, our concept of the land is very different from the earth. And so the land is something very specific and you can point to it in the Mediterranean basin on a map.

But for the ancient conception and in translation, there's no difference between the land or earth. It just depends on context. Does haaretz mean the land or the earth? It depends on the context. God made the earth in Genesis 1 -1.

And then God gave the land. It's the same word.

Notice what Paul is saying.

Paul understands that this all the land is actually pointing to inheritance of the whole world. The promise that he would be heir.

Of the world.

Was his by faith.

It didn't come through the law.

It was given to him by faith. Now, look at how Paul explains this. Romans 4, v. 16 and following. Therefore, it is of faith, so that it might be according to grace. The whole point is that Abram doesn't receive the grace of God as a reward for his obedience, or as a result of his law-keeping.

He actually has the righteousness of faith. He receives it by grace. Therefore, it is of faith, that it might be according to grace, so that the promise might be sure to all the seed, not only those who are of the law, but also to those who are of the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all.

As it is written, I have made you a father of many nations in the presence of Him who He believed, God, who gives life to the dead and calls those things which do not exist as though they did. Like looking around at the land and saying, I'm eventually going to have descendants that fill this and this is going to be my inheritance.

Who, contrary to hope, in hope, believed, so that He became the father of many nations according to what was spoken, so shall your descendants be. Where's Paul quoting that from? He's quoting it from Genesis 13.

Contrary to hope, in hope, Abram believes the promise of God, and because God's promise is that He can look in any direction and all the land will be His inheritance, here's where that promise of Genesis 12 comes right back to Genesis 13.

This is how He becomes the father of many nations according to what was spoken,.

So shall your descendants be.

I don't have it in my notes and I wish I did, but we'll get there in a few chapters anyway. Paul's taking this language out of Genesis 13. Abram's descendants being as the dust of the earth. And that's being run through Hosea 1.

Hosea 1 is this prophecy of destruction upon Israel. Of course, Judah and Israel are in God's sort of bullseye. And Hosea is called to prophesy judgment upon Israel. And Hosea begins by God calling the prophet, this holy man, to marry a harlot, to marry Gomer.

And chapter 1 talks about the offspring of this relationship, of this marriage. Of course, the whole point was that God was like the righteous prophet marrying an unfaithful wife, Israel. And so each child carries a bit of this prophecy forward.

And we read as a result of the promise, the descendants being like the dust. Quoting from Genesis 13 and Hosea 1, we read this prophecy, that God is going to take those.

That He had called His people.

Lo, a me is born. Lo, a me. Those who are not My people. And He's going to call them My people. Paul takes this right over into Romans 9 when he's talking about Israel and how Israel relates to the promise and the covenant of God.

And he talks about how Gentiles are now heirs of the promise. And he quotes from Hosea 1, which quotes from Genesis 13, and he says, as it is written that these Gentiles would be heirs. As it is written, God will take those who are My people and make them not My people.

And those who are far off that were not My people, there they shall be called sons of the living God.

So Genesis 13 reverberates throughout Scripture.

The promise given to Abram here might be immediately fulfilled through the flesh, but its ultimate fulfillment, its ultimate reality, is the seed who is Christ,.

The heir of all the world.

Jew and Gentiles from every tribe and tongue being brought into the kingdom of this blessed son of promise. That's what we have going on here in this promise. It's all contained with, look. Lift your eyes and look.

All the land I give to you. We have a promise about Abram's seed contained within that, to your descendants,.

To your seed.

Now, it's another thing about Hebrew. Sometimes you have a form that can be plural or singular, and sometimes it's indistinguishable. You have a singular that's translated as plural because the concept is singular even though the form is plural.