Son Of Abraham

Genesis 15, the Abrahamic Covenant, and God’s Promise to Bless the Nations

If you would please stand for the reading of God's word. Today's Old Testament reading can be found on page 10 in your pew Bible, which is Genesis 15. After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision.

Fear not, Abram, I am your shield. Your reward shall be very great. But Abram said, oh Lord God, what will you give me? For I continue childless, and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus. And Abram said, behold, you have given me no offspring, and a member of my household will be my heir.

And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, this man shall not be your heir, your very own son shall be your heir. And he brought him outside and said, look toward heaven and number the stars, if you are able to number them.

Then he said to him, so shall your offspring be. And he believed the Lord, and he continued it to him, as counted it to him, excuse me, as righteousness. And he said to him, I am the Lord who brought you out from Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to possess.

But he said, oh Lord God, how am I to know that I shall possess it? And he said to him, bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtle dove, and a young pigeon.

And he brought him all these, cut them in half, and laid each half over against the other. But he did not cut the birds in half. And when the birds of prey came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away.

As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram, and behold, dreadful and great darkness fell upon him. Then the Lord said to Abram, know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in a land that is not theirs, and will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for 400 years.

But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they shall come out with great possessions. As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace. You shall be buried in a good old age, and they shall come back here in the fourth generation, for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.

When the sun had gone down and it was dark, behold, a smoking firepot and a flaming torch passed between these pieces. On that day, the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, to your offspring I give this land from the river of Egypt to the great river, the river Euphrates, the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites, the Kadamites, the Hittites, the Perizzites, the Rephraim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites, and the Jebusites.

The Visit of the Wise Men and the Birth of the King

Today's New Testament reading is in Matthew 2, verses one through 12, and that's on page 807 in your pew Bible. Now after Jesus was born in Bethlehem of Judea in the days of Herod the king, behold, wise men from the east came to Jerusalem, saying, where is he who has been born king of the Jews?

For we saw his star when it rose and have come to worship him. When Herod the king heard this, he was troubled, and all of Jerusalem with him. And assembling all the chief priests and scribes of the people, he inquired of them where the Christ was to be born.

They told him, in Bethlehem of Judea, for so it is written by the prophet. And you, O Bethlehem, in the land of Judah are by no means least among the rulers of Judah, for from you shall come a ruler who will shepherd my people Israel.

Then Herod summoned the wise men secretly and ascertained from them what time the star had appeared. And he had sent them to Bethlehem saying, go and search diligently for the child, and when you have found him, bring me word that I too may come and worship him.

After listening to the king, they went on their way, and behold, the star that they had seen when it rose went before them until it came to rest over the place where the child was. When they saw the star, they rejoiced exceedingly with great joy, and going into the house, they saw the child with Mary, his mother, and they fell down and worshiped him.

Then opening their treasures, they offered him gifts, gold, frankincense, and myrrh, and being warned in a dream not to return to Herod, they departed to their own country by another way.

The Son of Abraham as the Fulfillment of Christmas

Take your Bibles this morning and turn to Matthew chapter one. We're in that time of the year where we celebrate the coming of the Lord Jesus, which why would we celebrate anybody's birth.

At this scope?

None of you have birthdays that are celebrated around the world, I would venture. Why in the world would we celebrate this one? The only reason it makes sense is if this is God incarnate, if he's come to do something, if he's accomplished this work, and this is the one who was called Quentin and Nicole and made them a part of this church.

He's the one who's called us, and that's why we celebrate his birth, but we want to look at something about Jesus here. I think that's important for us. I want you to follow as I read verse one of Matthew one.

The book of the genealogy of Jesus Christ, the son of David, the son of Abraham.

Let's pray.

Father, thank you now for your word. We pray that as we look at the story of scripture, you would open this up to us so that we might understand more about this one that we call our Savior and our Lord, our King.

Help us now to do that as we sit under the ministry of your word, as your voice speaks to us through the text of scripture, and we'll thank you in Jesus' name, amen. I was watching one time a production on television, and these two guys, they're in a unit headed for England where they're gonna train for their part in D-Day, and one of the enlisted men says to the other that their commanding officer must be a son of Abraham.

Well, one of the, the one who he was talking to said, you got a problem with that? Because I'm a son of Abraham, too. Now, what were they arguing about? What were they talking about? The whole thing was their commanding officer was a Jew, as was this enlisted man.

Well, as you read this first verse of Matthew, you might be tempted to say there's nothing special here. Jesus was the son of Abraham. He's a Jew. Well, as you read Matthew, you become aware that God is not intent on telling us the people groups from which Jesus came.

No, as you read the story of redemption, you know that Jesus being the son of Abraham is one of the key titles that he bears. In fact, this is one of the keys that unlocks the whole narrative of scripture.

There are many titles that Jesus has. As we look at him, we, in this book, he's identified as Immanuel, God with us. He's identified as the son of David, the promised king who's going to come and build God's temple.

And now we see him identified as the son, not a son, but the son of Abraham. We understand how Jesus is the son of Abraham. We have to go back before Abraham in order for us to see the whole sweep of the story and to understand who Jesus is.

Now you remember that Adam and Eve sinned in the Garden of Eden, and they brought corruption and the curse of sin upon all of the world. And in the first 11 chapters of Genesis, you see that corruption spread like a wild infection in the body.

As you read those first 11 chapters, it just seems that you see that corruption explode on humanity, and you see everything going wrong, you see all of these things happening. And as the corruption spreads, you see God in almost every instance, well, in every instance, bringing a word of judgment, but then he gives a word or an act of grace.

You see that happening throughout those first 11 chapters. Adam and Eve sinned. You remember God had threatened them with death. Here is the judgment for your sin, it's death. And he pronounces that judgment, and then, what does he do?

He delays that death. He doesn't execute the judgment immediately. You see Cain and Abel. Cain kills his brother Abel. What happens? God says, because of that, you're gonna be a wanderer in the earth, the word of judgment, but then a word of grace, but I'm gonna put a mark on you so that no one can touch you.

And then you see that corruption just spreading wide and deep in humanity, so much so that God determines to destroy all of humanity except for one family. And so this act of judgment comes in the flood, this universal flood that wipes out mankind, except for this one family, who is then transferred into a new world, a new world in which nature will operate.

As it should.

Now you come to Babel at the end of this 11 chapters. You come to Babel, where these people in their pride are going to build this tower to their pride, to their reputation, and God brings down judgment by scattering all these people and spinning them off into all these different nations.

But it's interesting, at the end of Genesis 11, you find no word of grace. It just seems to end. There's nothing from God. It appears that God is done with mankind. It looks like God is done being gracious.

It looks like he's gonna reject the nations in wrath. And up to that point, God had addressed mankind universally, every time he's speaking to all of mankind, only this time, they're silent. So when you come to chapter 11 of Genesis, after this great act of judgment, it's silent.

You don't hear anything from God. I want you to turn back to Genesis 11 for a moment. Genesis 11. Babel has happened. The people now have their different languages. They're scattered now to form different nations.

And then we read this. This is at the end. There's nothing said. Judgment. And then you come to chapter 11, verse 27. Now these are the generations of Terah. Terah fathered Abram, Nahor, and Haran. And Haran fathered Lot.

Haran died in the presence of his father Terah and the land of his kindred in Ur of the Chaldeans. And Abraham and Nahor took wives. The name of Abram's wife was Sarai, the name of Nahor's wife, Milcah, the daughter of Haran, the father of Milcah and Iscah.

Now Sarai was barren. She had no child. Terah took Abram, his son, and Lot, the son of Haran, his grandson, and Sarai, his daughter-in-law, his son Abram's wife. And they went forth together from Ur of the Chaldeans to go into the land of Canaan.

But when they came to Haran, they settled there. The days of Terah were 205 years and Terah died in Haran. 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.

Here the word of grace arrives. After being done with Babel, it seems that God is silent. Now the whole focus in those first 11 chapters from all of humanity, the focus now goes to one man. And the word of grace comes to one man, Abram, later to be called Abraham.

And God says to this one man that he's not done with the nations, but through him, God would bless all those nations. So you see the focus now narrows down to one man, but for the purpose of God, God's grace, reaching all the nations, all those people that he has just judged.

Abraham’s Seed, Joseph, and Blessing the Nations

Now who is Abram, who we know later as Abraham? Well, he comes from Ur of the Chaldeans. That's the fertile band of land that stretches in present day Iraq, just south of Baghdad. And Abraham was part of an advanced civilization at that time, a very prosperous and advanced civilization.

Their religion centered around the worship of the moon God, Nana. Now maybe his father, Terah, stood out as a worshiper of Yahuwah, the one true God, or maybe this God, Yahuwah, called Abraham suddenly and miraculously and brought him out.

But what we do know from this text is that Abraham followed in full faith, trusting that God would lead him to this new land. But God says, I'm going to promise, or I promise to bless all the nations through you.

And from now on, the story will unfold through the rest of scripture, how through this one man, God blesses all the earth, all the nations.

How does that happen?

Well, you gotta recognize the blessings brought to the world in Abraham. Within four generations now, God begins to fulfill this promise. He has a great-grandson, or Abraham has this great-grandson, Joseph.

And Joseph experiences incredible hardship. His brothers hate him, so what do they do? They sell him into slavery. He's taken as a slave to Egypt, not knowing if he'll ever see his family again. He's taken to Egypt, and there he becomes a slave.

He is accused of sexual assault, falsely accused, by the way, of this sexual assault. And because of that, he's thrown in prison. He's done nothing wrong, and yet he's in prison. He's there for seven years.

And then an opportunity comes to interpret the dream of Pharaoh, and he does interpret that dream. And now, from the prison, he's elevated to the second most powerful position, if you will, in the world at that time, as the prime minister to the Pharaoh in Egypt.

And he has interpreted this dream, which says, a famine is coming. And as the Pharaoh's right-hand man, he's put in charge of taking care of Egypt through the famine. And then in Genesis 41, verses 56 and 57, we read these words.

So when the famine had spread over all the land, Joseph opened all the storehouses. Joseph, the one who's organized, who's planned all of this famine relief, Joseph opened all the storehouses and sold to the Egyptians, for the famine was severe in the land of Egypt.

Moreover, no, all the earth came to Egypt, to Joseph, to buy grain, because the famine was severe over all the earth. You see, God has already started to bless the nations through Abraham's seed, through one of his descendants.

But you remember, it also saved Joseph's entire family. And from that family comes a nation, Abraham's family, the nation of Israel. And with Israel come even more blessings. If you would look at Romans 3, verses one and two, you remember the Apostle Paul's making the argument.

He's saying all men are condemned, but what advantage then is there to be a Jewish person? And he says in Romans 3, one and two, then what advantage has the Jew? Or what is the value of circumcision? Much in every way.

To begin with, the Jews were entrusted with the oracles of God. And then in chapter nine of the same book, the Apostle Paul says they are Israelites and to them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the law, the worship, and the promises.

You see, through Abraham's descendants, Israel, comes now this blessing to all the nations, which is the revelation of the true God. All that God is is now revealed to all the nations through this one nation.

You know what? All of Western civilization has been blessed because the Bible, that scripture, has been at the foundation of much of our civilization. You see, the world has been blessed through this family, from Abraham's descendants.

All this revelation of God and all that is good and glorious has come through them to the rest of humanity. Now, one might be tempted to think that this nation, existing among all the other nations as the light of truth, might be the final fulfillment of God's promise, but that wouldn't be right.

The nations are blessed by Abraham by having the light of revelation by God through those descendants. So when you hear Matthew say that Jesus is the son of Abraham, you might say to yourself, oh, Jesus was born into this light-bearing nation.

He's part of that blessing to the nations, but that wouldn't be accurate. It's not. That nation, with its revelation from God, is not the absolute, the ultimate fulfillment of that promise. If you want to see that, look at Matthew chapter three.

Just turn over a couple more chapters. Look at verses one through 10. In those days, John the Baptist came preaching in the wilderness of Judea. Repent, for the kingdom of heaven is at hand. For this is he who was spoken of by the prophet Isaiah when he said, he's pointing to Jesus when he's saying this.

The voice of one crying in the wilderness, prepare the way of the Lord, make his path straight. Now John wore a garment of camel's hair and a leather belt around his waist, and his food was locusts and wild honey.

Then Jerusalem and all Judea and all the region about the Jordan were going out to him, and they were baptized by him in the river, and they were baptized by him in the river Jordan, confessing their sins.

He's kind of like an ancient Billy Graham. Everybody's coming to see this guy, right? You know, I think about this and I say, so all these people are coming to him, so what's he going to say to them? What's he going to say to them, right?

Here's a message for success. Let's keep going. But when he saw many of the Pharisees and Sadducees coming to his baptism, he said to them, you brood of vipers. There's a popular message. Who warned you to flee from the wrath to come?

Bear fruit in keeping with repentance and do not presume to say to yourselves, we have Abraham as our father. For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise up children for Abraham. Even now the ax is laid to the root of the trees.

Every tree therefore that does not bear good fruit is cut down and thrown into the father. You see, just being part of that nation, isn't enough. It's not the ultimate fulfillment of the promise. They were God's covenant people.

They thought they were in with God. They were in truth though, still in darkness. Even though they were the ones who bore the light of God's revelation, they were still in darkness. But John tells them, look, I'm pointing to someone else, right?

Jesus isn't just part of the blessing of the nations in Abraham. He is the gateway of those blessings to the nations. He is the fulfillment. He is the descendant that does it. So you need to recognize Jesus as the gateway, the one who brings all of these blessings exploding out onto the nations.

It comes through this one man, Jesus, the son of Abraham. Look again at the promise of God that we read in Genesis 12. I will bless those who bless you and him who dishonors you. I will curse and in you, all the families of the earth will be blessed.

The blessing to the nations is promised in Abraham and Jesus here is identified, what? As the son of Abraham.

Justification by Faith and the Blessing of Abraham in Christ

Why?

Because he is the ultimate fulfillment of that promise. It is through him that the blessings will explode on the nations. It is this son of Abraham, the son of Abraham. This is the one through whom all the blessings come.

What are those blessings? Well, let's turn to one more place. Galatians, the book of Galatians. I want you to follow as I read this. This is so important. You see how the story has developed. You see how it's unfolded across the ages.

Now it's reached its termination point in this, the son of Abraham, in Jesus. How then does this work? Well, look at Galatians chapter three. Now listen carefully, the apostle Paul here is telling us how the story is proceeding and how it's going to end.

Chapter three, verse one. Oh foolish Galatians, who has bewitched you? It was before your eyes that Jesus Christ was publicly portrayed as crucified. Let me ask you only this. Did you receive the spirit by works of the law or by hearing with faith?

Are you still foolish? Having begun by the spirit, are you now being perfected by the flesh? Did you suffer so many things in vain if indeed it was in vain? Does he who supplies the spirit to you and works miracles among you do so by works of the law or by hearing with faith?

Just as Abraham believed God and it was counted to him as righteousness. You see what he's saying? He's saying, you're not gonna be made right with God by doing good. That's not gonna help you. It's by faith, just like Abraham had faith and it was counted to him as righteousness as we heard this morning from Genesis 15.

He didn't do anything, he just believed. Know then, verse seven, know then that it is those of faith who are the sons of Abraham. In the scripture foreseeing that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, preach the gospel beforehand to Abraham saying, in you shall all the nations be blessed.

So then, those who are of faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith. For all who rely on works of the law are under a curse, for it is written, curse be everyone who does not abide by all things written in the book of the law and do them.

If you wanna try to obey God, you can't, you gotta do it perfectly. You gotta do the whole thing. Well, what hope is there? There's no hope in there and so he goes on. Now it is evident that no one is justified before God by the law, for the righteous shall live by faith, but the law is not of faith, rather the one who does them shall live by them.

Christ redeemed us from the curse of the law by becoming a curse for us, for it is written, cursed is everyone who's hanged on a tree so that in Christ the blessing of Abraham might come to the Gentiles so that we might receive the promised spirit through faith.

Listen to me now. If you're counting on being made right with God, that God's gonna say I'll accept you by your obedience, it's not gonna happen. It's gotta be perfect. Anybody here wanna say I have obeyed God perfectly?

Listen, I'm 69. I've had a few bad days. How about you?

Right?

What happens? You gotta have faith in Jesus. That's how the blessings come to us. Now look at verses 23 through 29. Of the same chapter in Galatians. Now before faith came, we were held captive under the law, imprisoned until the coming faith would be revealed.

So then the law was our guardian until Christ came in order that we might be justified. That's declared righteous by faith. But now that faith has come, we are no longer under a guardian, for in Christ Jesus, you are all sons of God through faith.

For as many of you as were baptized into Christ have put on Christ. There's neither Jew nor Greek, there's neither slave nor free, there's no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus. And if you are Christ's, then you are Abraham's offspring, heirs according to the promise.

Do you see?

You put your trust in Jesus, that promised seed, and now all the blessings are yours. The blessings are yours. Including the blessing of the spirit that it now empowers you to live differently. Listen, Jesus is the way that the blessings promised in Abraham become yours.

This is why he's the son of Abraham. All the nations will be blessed through this seed, through this descendant of Jesus as they trust in him. They are now made friends with God, reconciled to God. And as we saw today, this baptism says I'm one of them.

I'm one of them. I'm an heir of Abraham's promise of blessing. You see, this is why we celebrate Jesus. He is the gateway of blessings from God. He is the final, the final fulfillment of it all. It's through him that we are made right with God, that we have glory as our inheritance through this son of Abraham.

Father, thank you for the Lord Jesus, the one through whom all the nations will be blessed, the one through whom all the nations are blessed. God, help us to rejoice in all that he has done. Thank you for remaining faithful to your promise that you made so many centuries ago.

God, help us to rejoice in that, we pray, amen.