Sunday Night, May 6, 2018 PM

Did I find a marker? Questions that we can discuss tonight, we can go ahead and do that.

Yes, ma 'am. Why did Naaman's friends yield it and others didn't?

Say it one more time. Why were the Naaman's killed and the woman of Zarephath, or Sidon, why were they killed rather than a

Jew? They were outsiders. Oh, yeah, that's a good question.

So this is going to, the story of Naaman, right? And the widow of Zarephath? Yes. Her son, right?

Who was, or was it? No, she was fed by Elijah. That's right.

Okay. So she was, her and her son had no food.

Is that what it was? And she was down to the last bite. And then there came the miracle of enough oil and meal to feed her and her son.

What now? Luke four. And then. Okay. So a question about why were

Naaman and this widow blessed by God, healed and provided for when they were outside of the nation of Israel?

So let's look up the story. Let's see, where's the story of Naaman at?

It's going to be in Kings, second

Kings. Is that right? Oh, first Kings 17.

There we go. Let's try second Kings five. First of all, let's look at Naaman. Let's look at Naaman.

Naaman was the captain of the army of the King of Aram. And he was a great man with his master and highly respected because by him, the

Lord had given victory to Aram. Notice that God is involved in the affairs of pagan nations.

Right? That, and you read about this in Proverbs.

The King's heart is in the hand of the Lord and like rivers of water, he turns it whichever way he wishes. In the book of Daniel, Nebuchadnezzar thought himself high and lifted up.

Look at all that I have made. And God humbled him and made him eat grass, made him like a wild beast until he finally restored him to his right mind.

And in his right mind, he acknowledged that the Lord is the one who gives dominion and rulership to the nations.

Okay, so first of all, we see that God is involved, not just with Israel, not with just Judah, but he's involved with all the nations.

And so we find that Naaman was a victorious and powerful man by God's hand.

And also he contracted leprosy. And we're brought to understand in the course of the story that ultimately

God is using that to bring attention to his own glory, to spread the fame of his name, even to the

Arameans. For Naaman is gonna come back healed. And this servant girl who had been captured in some

Aramean raid and she's far away from her homeland is a witness and a light to those who are there.

And good comes to this Naaman, to this captain of the army because of her witness, because of her saying,

I know a God who's powerful enough to heal a leprosy. And there's a prophet in Israel that you need to turn to.

You may imagine that the Jews in exile, living in Babylon, find great significance in that story.

Look at that servant girl. Look how she was able to bring attention to the power of God, the one true God. Look how

God was glorified through her witness, though she was but a servant girl. And so it has significance for the

Jews and how they're going to live and especially moving along in history when they were no longer seen as dominant or the world certainly did not revolve around them like it did in Solomon's day.

And how they're supposed to be a light to the nations. And now you said that, and this other story, he says in chapter seven.

Okay. That's good.

And so we find the story in, we find these stories brought together in Jesus' teaching.

Jesus in chapter four in verse 16 came to Nazareth where he was brought up.

And as was his custom, he entered the synagogue on the Sabbath and stood up to read. And the book of the prophet Isaiah was handed to him.

And he opened the book and found the place where it was written, the spirit of the Lord is upon me because he anointed me to preach the gospel to the poor.

He has sent me to proclaim release to the captives and recovery. Of sight to the blind, to set free those who are oppressed, to proclaim the favorable year of the

Lord. And now Jesus is reading the

Bible in a way that those there did not read it. I was mentioning that this morning. Jesus is the word of God.

He's the God's messenger. And here he is. And he's reading the Bible in a way that they have never read it. Are they going to listen to him or stick with what?

Oh, I already know what this means, right? So he closed the book and gave it back to the attendant and sat down and the eyes of all in the synagogue were fixed on him.

And he began to say to them today, this scripture has been fulfilled in your hearing. This is sounding good.

They like it when God's promises come true. So they're all speaking well of him and wondering at the gracious words, which were falling from his lips.

And they were saying, is this not Joseph's son? And he said to them, no doubt, you will quote this proverb to me, physician, heal yourself.

Whatever we heard was done at Capernaum, do here in your hometown as well. And he said, truly

I say to you, no prophet is welcome in his hometown. So Jesus is saying, when

I'm reading here in Isaiah and I'm saying this is coming to pass, you're going to be saying to me, oh yeah, we're poor, we're oppressed, we're captives, we're blind, heal us.

Do for us all the nice things here in Nazareth that you did over in Capernaum. But they're not going to accept his message that he is

Messiah, that he is the son of God and they're going to reject him. And he wants them to understand that these poor captive oppressed blind people are not just Jews.

That's going to be a really hard pill to swallow. And so he begins to talk to them, no prophet is acceptable in his hometown.

Well, then he moves on and says, well, truly I say to you, no prophet was welcome in his hometown, but I say to you in truth, there are many widows in Israel in the days of Elijah when the sky was shut up for three years and six months, when a great famine came over all the land.

Yet Elijah was sent to none of them, but only to Zarephath in the land of Sidon to a woman who was a widow.

And there were many lepers in Israel in the time of Elisha the prophet, and none of them was cleansed, but only name in the

Syrian. And now rather than them all speaking well and saying all these beautiful words that are falling from his mouth, now verse 28, now all the people in the synagogue were filled with rage as they heard these things.

And they got up and drove him out of the city and led him up to the brow of the hill on which their city had been built in order to throw him down the cliff.

But passing through their midst, he went his way. Well, if we read

Isaiah carefully, Isaiah is very internationally minded.

The nations, the nations, the nations, the Gentiles, the Gentiles, the Gentiles, over and over and over again when you read Isaiah. And this is the scroll that's handed to Jesus to read.

And let's remember that Luke is the only Gentile to write anything in the

New Testament. And Luke is, and all the apostles are interested, but Luke especially is going to be pointing out that gospel is for all the nations.

And so he's got this story in here and showing and demonstrating that, even in the

Old Testament, God had an international focus. And let's not forget that,

I think, is part of what he's trying to say. So I think that's why the examples of Elisha and the widow of Zarephath is here.

Another question. Yes, ma 'am. In Luke 7, 28, what do they mean by John is the lesser than the least?

So Luke chapter seven, and verse 28.

And so the disciples of John reported to him,

I think this is, John is in prison at this time. And the disciples of John hear some things about Jesus and things are going on.

And John's wavering, they're in prison. He wants some more affirmation that he's doing the right thing and preaching the right message.

And so he sends two of his disciples, are you the expected one, the coming one? Or do we look for somebody else?

And Jesus tells the disciples, go back and tell John what you've seen and heard at these miracles of these first fruits of the new creation.

And he's quoting from Isaiah again. And then when the messengers of John left,

Jesus wants to take this teaching moment. So he began to speak to the crowds about John.

What did you go out to the wilderness to see? A reed shaken by the wind. But what did you go out to see? A man dressed in soft clothing?

Obviously, two obvious negative rhetorical questions. Those who are splendidly clothed to live in luxury are found in the royal palaces.

Herod. But what did you go out to see? A prophet. Yes, I say to you, and one who's more than a prophet, this is the one about whom it is written, behold,

I send my messenger ahead of you, who will prepare your way before you, Malachi 3 .1. I say to you, among those born of women, there is no one greater than John, yet he who is least in the kingdom of God is greater than he.

Okay, so what does this mean? John is very much elevated and very much heightened.

And then he says, but. So, I think one helpful way to think about this is that, let's think about it this way.

Who is the king of the kingdom of God? Jesus Christ, okay.

And Daniel pictures one like the son of man coming up to the ancient of days and receiving from him a kingdom which is forever and ever and without end.

And when does Christ ascend and when is he enthroned at the right hand of God to reign?

After his death and resurrection, and then he has this time of teaching and instructing his apostles about how they're supposed to understand the scriptures.

And then Jesus ascends and he reigns. And that's why the book of Acts is really the book of the acts of the risen

Christ and what he does through his apostles as he reigns. So, when we think about the fullness of the kingdom of God, we think about the cross and the resurrection and ascension, the greatest prophet, the most prolific

God -fearing prophet on this side of the cross is not as privileged and as blessed as the least member of Christ's family on this side.

How much more blessed are all of us who live on this side of the death, resurrection and ascension of Christ?

Right, there is an Old Testament and a New Testament, an Old Covenant and a New Covenant. And they're not in disagreement, but to use the words of Augustine, what was in bud here is in bloom here.

And so, I think that's the point that Jesus is trying to make. And Peter says it in other ways that the prophets were just trying to understand, like the spirit of Christ was preaching through the prophets and they're writing these things down and they're looking at it thinking, wow, what does that mean?

How does that, the angels are trying to figure out how is this gonna work? But on this side of the cross and resurrection and ascension of Christ, how much blessed are we?

How much more blessed are we? I think that's his point. Yes, ma 'am.

Yes, ma 'am.

Um, now when the Lord brings you to the land of Canaanite, as he swore, this is verse 11, to swore to you and your fathers and gives it to you, you shall devote to the

Lord, the first offspring of every womb, the first offspring of every beast that you own, the males belong to the Lord. But every first offspring of a donkey, you shall redeem with a lamb, but if you do not redeem it, you shall break its neck.

And every firstborn of man among your sons, you shall redeem. All right, so Dwight, you're teaching through Exodus.

Any ideas? Right. Right.

Yeah, it's kind of saying, you know, the donkey's not yours until you redeem it, until you go through the process of, you know, paying the price of redemption.

All the firstborn belong to the Lord. So if you don't redeem it, then what do you do with it? Right? You offer it.

But donkeys aren't on the list for sacrifices, are they? Now, if it was an ox, if it was a lamb, if it was a goat, you know what to do with that.

But if it's a donkey, it's not on the list. But it's still not yours, he's saying.

You know, it still matters. Yes. Right. Right, and so when the son comes to you in time to come and saying, what is this?

You shall say to him, with a powerful hand, the Lord brought us out of Egypt from the house of slavery. And this is to remind them of the

Passover and how the firstborn were redeemed by the blood of the lamb. And so we learned about that in everyday farm life and the livestock, and we're just gonna, you know, keep on teaching that.

That's what I'm gonna go with. Yeah, definitely, it's an animal that they're gonna have a lot of as a part of everyday life.

It's part of their, you know, and so they're gonna be dealing with that often. Okay, so in Genesis 17,

Abraham has, when he was 75 years old in Genesis 12, he has received a word from the

Lord to leave his land, to leave his relatives and to go to the land that God would show him and God would make him a great nation, that God would bless those who bless him and curse those who curse him.

And through his seed, all the families of the earth will be blessed. He makes it to the land and he and Lot grow too prosperous to stay together.

So Lot heads towards Sodom and God reaffirms the promise of the land to Abraham in chapter 13.

In chapter 14, Lot and those who were at Sodom were captured by Chittor -Laramore and a

Northern coalition that Abraham chased after and defeated in battle and delivered his relatives and those people from captivity and gave offerings to the

Lord at the city of Salem or Ereshalom or Jerusalem where Melchizedek, priest of God most high, reigned.

And then chapter 15, God makes a covenant with Abraham or reaffirms the covenant with Abraham that his seed would be, his descendants would be as many as the stars of the heavens.

And Abraham believed God and it was accounted to him for righteousness, it says in 15 verse six. And God is telling him, this is the way it's going to be in our relationship.

I have these promises, I'm going to keep them for your sake, for your good, for my own glory. Chapter 16,

Abraham and Sarah get a little nervous because they're in their mid 80s and they still have no offspring.

So she gives her maid servant, Hagar, whom they picked up in Egypt at the latter half of chapter 12.

And Abraham takes her as a wife and bears a son named Ishmael. And this is man's effort that ends in failure and frustration.

And so now Ishmael is getting older, they still have no offspring. And now Abraham is 99 and Sarah is 89.

And the Lord appears to Abram in verse one and said to him, I am God Almighty. He's El Shaddai, he's all sufficient.

Walk before me and be blameless. I will establish my covenant between me and you and I will multiply you exceedingly.

Abram fell on his face and God talked with him saying, as for me, behold, my covenant is with you and you shall be the father of a multitude of nations.

No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.

I will make you exceedingly fruitful and I'll make nations of you and kings will come forth from you.

I will establish my covenant between me and your descendants after you throughout their generations for an everlasting covenant to be

God to you and to your descendants after you. I will give to you and your descendants after you the land of your sojournings, all the land of Canaan for an everlasting possession and I will be their

God. Okay, that's enough to get us started, I think. We briefly talked about Genesis 17 last time and noted that there is essential connection in the language of Genesis 17 with Genesis chapter one and two.

As God says to Adam and Eve to multiply and to prosper and to be fruitful, to exercise dominion over the earth that he has entrusted to them.

And that we're seeing that this pattern, that the way that God deals with human beings is still very much the way that it has always been, that God's interested in their relationship with him.

He wants to define what it means for them to relate to others. He wants to talk about how they're going to relate to his creation that he has entrusted to their care.

And that happens again and again in all the covenants that God makes. In a sense, the covenant, we read about covenants in the

Old Testament that God made with Adam, that God made with creation in Noah, that God made with Abraham, Isaac and Jacob, that God made with Israel at Mount Sinai, that God made with David and his discussion with the prophet

Nathan. And all these covenants that God makes, all these arrangements that he makes, at the center of it is the image of God.

And he's always talking about, here's how you relate to me. Here's how I relate to you. Here's how you deal with those around you.

Here's how you deal with land, territory, substance. This is always the concern.

This is always the focus. He's always defining that for them. And so there's conditionality in all of these covenants of some kind.

And sometimes you can't find any conditions right away, but they're at least implicit.

And then later on, they are made the more clear. With Abraham, we find

God meeting all the conditions immediately in cutting the covenant as Abraham passes into a deep sleep and he sees a flaming torch and a smoking oven passing through the pieces of the animal that were separated as God cut the covenant.

And yet God also calls Abraham to walk before him and be blameless. And that everyone has to be circumcised.

You're gonna be cut off from me forever. And later on when Abraham sacrifices or puts

Isaac on the altar, God says, now because you have obeyed me, I'm going to keep all my promises to your descendants and so on and so forth.

So there's conditionality that is built in these covenants, even the way that God made the covenant with David and talked about the son of David, if he would be obedient, if he would be wise, if he would follow me faithfully.

And these conditions and all the covenants that we find in the Old Testament remind us that God is dealing with us and looking for a faithful son, right?

Looking for a faithful son, a faithful servant, someone to partner with of our race that will keep his covenant, that will fulfill all the obligations of humanity.

And that's Christ. That's Christ, the second Adam, the one who in him was no sin.

And he's completely faithful to God and does all that is required. And that's why in the new covenant, as we say, he says, this is my new covenant.

He says, this is the, he passes the cup to his disciples and says, this is the blood of the new covenant in which

Christ has done everything in our place and for our sake, for us to be accepted with God.

And we can rejoice in that. And those believers of the Old Testament were given those foreshadowings of Christ through the covenants that God made.

Now, I want to emphasize here in Genesis 17.

Let's look for the rest of our time this evening, just about the names, okay?

So what was the name that, let's look at the difference between the names here,

Abram to Abraham, and then

Sarai to Sarah. And what's the significance of the change of the names?

We're told about Abram to Abraham, aren't we? And he says in verse four,

God says to Abram, as for me, behold, my covenant is with you and you will be the father of a multitude of nations.

No longer shall your name be called Abram, which means high father, but your name shall be

Abraham, high father of a multitude, for I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.

Abram has no heir with Sarah. And he's 99 years old.

He does not have a legitimate heir. And he goes from being a high father to high father of a multitude. And God goes on to say, nations upon nations, millions of people are going to get more than you can possibly count.

And kings are going to come forth from you. And he just keeps on saying all this stuff until Abraham finally laughs. He's just like, this is too ridiculous.

99 years old, at least he has a sense of humor. He just can't, this is beyond what he ever thought possible.

So he changes his name from Abram to Abraham, not just a high father, but a high father of a multitude, high father of a multitude of nations.

Now, Sarai means my princess. Can you just imagine her father naming her that?

My little princess, right? A father's love for a daughter. My princess.

It's very, and even as Abram says it to his wife, the way he cherishes her, okay?

But it has this, but notice that they both have a kind of a royal name, right? Abram, high, exalted father.

Kind of a royal name. A princess is a royal name. But then this gets moved to even a grander kind of royal set of names.

Abraham, father of a multitude. And Sarah, Sarah is not as personal as Sarai.

But this has the idea of princess in a larger, more recognized fashion.

Not just my personal princess, but princess recognized. Okay? And so the royalty of Abraham and Sarah are more acknowledged than prior as their names are changed.

And in many ways, when we look at this, we're kind of combining what we've already talked about from Luke four with what's going on here at Genesis 17, the international focus of the

Old Testament, right? This is something that often gets lost in the storyline.

But there is this international focus. Abraham is the father of a multitude of nations.

And it says that Sarah, in verse 16, says,

I will bless her and indeed, I will give you a son by her. Then I will bless her and she shall be a mother of nations.

Kings of peoples will come from her. And as we think about the ultimate trajectory of this story and why

Abraham and Sarah are so important, we have to go back to Adam and Eve.

Adam, who's obviously the father of us all and Eve, the mother of all the living.

And their failure and their sin, yet God's promise of a seed. And we come to Genesis 12 and 13 and 15 and 17 and the promises and then the struggles about the seed in chapter 16.

And we see that God promises to give this seed, this promised one of Genesis 3 .15 to Abraham and Sarah.

And that through their seed, they're going to be seen as the father and mother of a multitude of nations.

That God's interest in humanity is still international. That this seed is a savior for all kinds of people from everywhere.

And there's this idea of we have Adam and Eve in their royal status.

In other words, king and queen of all creation as they're enthroned in the garden there in Eden.

But here is a reset of a kind where again, we have the same language from Genesis 1 and 2 laced through Genesis 17.

And here we go, here's Abraham and here's Sarah. And they're going to, there are new royal names and they're going to have a multitude of descendants, whole nations.

And when Jesus reads Genesis 17 and the prophets, he talks about Naaman and the widow of Zarephath.

And when Paul reads Genesis 17 and 18 and 22, he says, this international, these nations descendant from Abraham are those who are in Christ.

It is through the seed of Abraham, who is Christ, that all of these nations are blessed.

And this is how we're descendants of father Abraham. Father Abraham, amen, right?

And the reason why we understand ourselves as children of Abraham and Sarah are by faith in Christ, who is their seed.

Okay, so that's the backdrop for what's going on, I think in Genesis 17. And there's a whole lot more there and we'll look at it again another time.

So that's encouraging to you. All right, well, let's close by singing the doxology.