Visions of God - Part 4 — David Adams

Good morning to you all. Let me tell you what you did this morning. You woke up this morning, you looked out the window, you might have opened the door and stepped out, and you said you saw that fog and the rain and the drizzle, and you said, this is the day that follows Wednesday, so it must be thirsty.

Very well. I knew you would. I just knew you would. You probably finished it, though, in a different way than I did. Habits of a lifetime die hard, don't they? I want this morning, I wish this morning, if I may, to make a few closing comments on the life of Abraham and then move over to the life of Jacob.

Abraham’s Final Test at Mount Moriah

I felt that time-wise we should not spend any longer with Abraham, and then there's chapter 22, and what do we do with that? We must make some comment, even though it is only brief, on chapter 22 in connection with Mount Moriah.

As you will know, this is the culmination of God's dealings with Abraham. This is a high water march. This is the place where we rise to heights that previously we had not known, and this is the point that's carried over into the New Testament, which our Lord makes reference when he was here.

It was the ultimate in God's walk with Abraham. It was the ultimate in Abraham's walk with God. No higher point of experience could have been had by any man when he was here than Abraham had in chapter 22 of Genesis.

He has walked with the Lord, as you know, from the time the God of glory appeared unto him first in Ur of the Chaldees. He's come through Haran, or Charon. He's come down into the land, and from the land he's gone down into Egypt with its disastrous consequences.

He's come back up out of Egypt again. He's had those dealings with Hagar in chapter 16 and chapter 21, and he's had the experience with Abimelech, the king of the Philistines, in chapter 20. And now, when we come to chapter 22, we reach what I like to call, at any rate, the ultimate in his experiences with God.

I don't know of anything that's comparable in the Old Testament with this passage that we have here, and I doubt if any man has come to the height that Abraham did come in his acknowledgment, in his appreciation, and in his honoring of God as Abraham did.

So we're not going to go into the details of the chapter. We all know the story very well. We know that Abraham did on this occasion what he had done earlier when he left Ur of the Chaldees. He left the place where he was, not knowing where he was going, because God appeared unto him and he said, Get thee into the place that I will show thee out.

Take thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and offer him there as a sacrifice or an offering unto me. So Abraham rises up early in the morning. He is going on a very difficult journey. It's the last difficult journey of his life.

God has exacted of him the expression of his faith such as none of us have been required to do. Through these varied experiences in the receiving this son, and you know as we were commenting yesterday morning just exactly what was involved in Abraham getting Isaac, and that Sarah being the mother rather than Hagar, and you know all the testings and the trials, and finally Abraham in his advanced years comes to be the father of the covenant promised.

And now that Isaac has grown considerably and Abraham is much older even now than he was, for he was 100 years old when Isaac was born, when his heart laughed, now what will his heart do? How will his heart react now when God says to him, Get into the place that I will tell thee of, and take thy son, thine only son Isaac, whom thou lovest, and offer him there to me upon an altar for a burnt offering?

We are not told, but the instantaneous response of this man of faith and trust and confidence in God is sufficient to assure us that there was no vacillation, there was no doubting, there was no hesitation in the heart of Abraham.

He didn't protest, he didn't have anything to say to the Lord as to why this should be. I have waited all these years, and now you have given me the promised heir, and now you're requesting that I give him back again in sacrifice.

No such comments are given to us, no such reasoning of his heart, we don't know. But we do know that he rose up early in the morning, as it says here in verse 3 of chapter 22, and he prepared his animals and two of his young men with him and Isaac his son, and he made the preparation for the sacrifice.

And then it was on the third day when God revealed to him, as we have it in verse 4, he saw the place afar off. That so significant place, that so remarkable place, that place that stands out and will stand out forever in the history of mankind, and doubtless in the history of the universe.

For it was here that we had another comparable experience, you remember, in connection with the life of David the king, and also something finally in the days of our Lord himself. They saw the place afar off.

The Hour of the Son’s Sacrifice

I'm reminded of the words of the Master in John chapter 17, and there were five words there at the opening of that steward's son's prayer, sometimes called the High Priestly Prayer. That's only a small portion of the prayer, actually.

The prayer, rather, is an account of a steward's son speaking to his father concerning the commission that was given to him, the mission that he had now fully accomplished. But those five words are, to me, the most poignant words that we have between the Master and his father in all of the New Testament, and they are these, Father, the hour has come.

There is so much wrapped up in those five words, or the two words even, the hour. Abraham is going to give us a picture of exactly what was going on in terms of human experience between the father and his son on the journey to the cross.

It was a three-day journey for Abraham. It was millennia or millennial long for the father and his son. It even went back from before time was. Certainly, as Peter says, before the world was ordained.

And how long that was, we cannot measure, we cannot compute, that the father and the son were moving together all through these pages of human history, through these pages of the Old Testament, through the lives of the prophets, the sayings of the prophets, the sacrifices of Israel, the countless sacrifices of the Levitical priesthood, and on down even into the days of the New Testament.

These two have been traveling together from before the world was with this, the place in view. And our Lord says, Father, the hour has come. I cannot tell you at times how that appeals to me. There is more depth of pathos, there's more depth of feeling, there's something awesome about those words.

You'll recall in the Gospel by John particularly, we read frequently, they couldn't do this, they couldn't do that, that couldn't happen to him, something else couldn't happen to him because his hour was not yet come.

And then in the garden, when he was betrayed and Judas came with the band, he said, this is your hour and the power of darkness. But just before that happened, standing on the edge of the garden, he lifts up his eyes to heaven and he encompasses, he brings together all the previous thousands of years and the plan from before the world was.

He brings them all together and he looks to his Father and he says, Father, the hour has come. What tremendous things are wrapped up in those words. And then the Master followed by saying, Father, glorify thy son, that thy son also may glorify thee.

And I don't know how you associate that or what meaning you put upon that, because it is often linked with passages later on in that chapter, John 17, and the Lord is looking forward to the time when he shall be resurrected, he shall be glorified, he shall be caught up into heaven.

May I suggest to you, rather, that it can be linked with those five words, Father, the hour has come, because it is directly associated with those words. That's when the Master said it. These are the circumstances under which he said, Father, glorify thy son.

It takes you back in measure, perhaps, to chapter 12 of John, when the Greeks came up to the feast and they said to Philip, I suppose they picked Philip because he had a Greek name, and they said, we would see Jesus.

And Philip and Andrew go to the Lord and they say, there are some folks here, these Greek folks here, and they want to see you. And the Lord said, the hour has come that the Son of Man should be glorified.

Except the corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, to abide alone. And who he would ever have been alone, singularly alone, solitarily alone, in all the fullness of his own personal completeness, if he hadn't fallen into the ground to die.

And it was only because he was to go into the ground to die, that corn of wheat was to fall into the ground to die, that it bore much fruit. And you and I are here this morning as the result of that corn of wheat falling into the ground and dying.

But what he had said was, now is the hour that the Son of Man should be glorified, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die. It abideth alone. When is a man then to be glorified? When he dies to self and lives to God.

For if we live to self, we die. But if we die to self, we live. And the Lord has given us Himself as the example and proof of that. Now is the Son of Man glorified, except a corn of wheat fall into the ground and die, it abideth alone.

And it was through that death he was to be glorified, as well as to glorify God. So, he looks to heaven, and he says, Father, the hour has come. Glorify thy Son. Where? How? In the hour, by the cross.

Isaac as the Burnt Offering

So, Abraham and Isaac journey together, as we have in the early part of this chapter. Let me call your attention to the fact that as they're going, they're talking. But you have several times mentioned about this offering.

At the close of verse 2, offer him there for a burnt offering upon one of the mountains, that I will tell thee of. He hadn't told them yet. And then in verse 3, towards the close, he claimed the wood for the burnt offering.

And then farther down, verse 6, Abraham took the wood of the burnt offering, and so on. And then Isaac says at the close of verse 7, where is the lamb for a burnt or ascending offering? And Abraham replies in verse 8, my son God will provide himself a lamb for the ascending offering.

Now, this story is so very well known, and it is used so frequently, that perhaps we have come to a final conclusion as to what the teaching really is. And it is used often in Sunday school, as every Sunday school teacher knows, and every Sunday school teacher has used, I suppose, as a picture of reconciliation, a picture of substitution, particularly.

And the substitution we teach in the boys and the girls in the Sunday school here, a marvellous picture. Isaac is to be the offering, he's laid upon the altar, and then there's a provision made for him.

And so our Lord became the provision for us poor, miserable sinners. And he becomes the sin offering for us. Well, you will see repeatedly, it is not a sin offering, and it is not a sinner finding a substitute.

That is an application, but that cannot be the interpretation. When I was a young Christian, I used to hear frequently, it said very dramatically and very definitively off the platform, that the Bible passages only have one interpretation and many applications.

And of course I accepted that as being the final word on the subject for a long time, until I began to read a little for myself and do a little thinking for yourself. That can be dangerous, but anyway, try it once in a while.

And I discovered that that's a very acceptable statement because somebody of importance said it, and somebody else of importance picked it up and repeated it, and if you repeat anything enough times, everybody takes it for granted that's the way it is.

But that's not necessarily true, I may say to you. I can give you several examples from the scripture where the Bible has two or more interpretations, made so by the Spirit of God Himself. He is not restricted to one interpretation of any passage.

I know there may be multiple applications, I realize that, but nevertheless it is not true that the Bible passages only have one interpretation and many applications. Now, I know you don't want any examples for that because you'll find them yourself, but nevertheless, that is so.

Now, we have used this passage here in Genesis chapter 22 as a sample of the sinner being delivered, and so the Lord is the ram caught in the thicket, I have no question about that, and then the one who should be upon the altar slain is relieved and He has provided a substitute for him, and then we apply that to the sinner and to the death of Christ.

But it is not so. There is no suggestion of a sin offering anywhere here. There's no trespass offering anywhere here. This is a burnt offering. This is an ascending offering, and repeatedly, as I have pointed out to you in this chapter, it is always stated as a burnt offering, always stated as a sin offering, whether it were to be Isaac himself or whether it were to be the ram of consecration in the thicket, it was always to be a burnt offering.

Well, you say that spoils the picture. No, it doesn't spoil the picture at all. In fact, it enhances the picture. If you want to say, well, the ram caught in the thicket by its horns was the substitute for the man, for the boy, yes, very well, but does that alter the fact that it was to be a burnt offering?

Isaac was to be a burnt offering. He was to be an ascending offering. And why are you and I here if we in our entirety, in our whole life, spirit, soul and body, have not been meant to be, to God, constantly an ascending offering?

I suggested to you last evening that there are seven offerings in the New Testament priesthood which a priest may offer. Here is one of them. The Christian himself is to be an ascending offering, a burnt offering, with nothing for anyone else but wholly for God.

And Isaac was to be that ascending offering, that burnt offering. And yes, there was a provision made. And the angel of the Lord, it's remarkable, I think, here that he should be called the angel of the Lord, because it is the same one who in verse one says, God Elohim, the triune God, did test or prove Abraham.

The same one who is the angel of the Lord in verse 11, and at the close of verse 18 he says, Thou hast to obey my voice. So when the angel of the Lord speaks and says, Thou hast to obey my voice, it's the voice of verse one, the voice of the triune God.

Now, the angel of the Lord comes to Abraham at the time when his hand is raised to sway his son, and he calls to him out of heaven, and he shows him a substitute. So there's a ram caught in the thicket, and I've wondered about that, and I don't want to strain these things too far, but I have wondered at times that this ram caught in the thicket with its horns, it says, is not a picture of the master when he was here in his consecration of life.

And let me suggest to you that this probably is the mountain sheep, the two-pronged mountain sheep, because it speaks of his horns in the plural, and may I suggest to you that it's a type of the Lord Jesus as he was here, as he came, the consecrated one.

But what do the two horns represent to us, do you suppose? Well, may I say to you, let me suggest this to you, that you remember he said in John chapter 12 again, he said, Now is my soul troubled, and what shall I say?

Shall I say, Father, save me from this hour? How can I say that? Because it was for this cause came I unto this hour. That's why he was here, in total, in full consecration, to be the whole burnt offering first to God.

Now that's on our behalf, I recognize that. While there was part of the burnt offering of himself that was strictly for his father, the burnt offering was to be accepted for the offerer, you remember, in Leviticus 3.

So, the burnt offering, while it was wholly for God, the whole thing went up in smoke as an ascending offering to the Lord. Nevertheless, the offerer was associated with the offering. So, our Lord was here.

Christ’s Humanity and Deity in the Burnt Offering

Well, what are the horns? Well, I like to think of it this way, anyway, if you allow me the privilege. I like to think of the fact that the very fact he was here, he said, for this cause came I. How did he come?

He came via the Virgin's womb. Sacrifice and offering thou wouldest not. The sacrifice and offering of transgression for sin thou didst not delight in. But a body hast thou prepared me. You follow that from Exodus 21 through Psalm 40 and on to Hebrews 10, because that's the story, as you recall.

The born ear in Exodus 21, the servant forever. When you come to Psalm 40, you read it again, mine ear has he digged, or opened, or bored through. And that's where he says, sacrifice and offering and burnt offerings and offering for sin thou wouldest not.

Then said I, lo, I come in the volume of the book it is written of me. I delight to do thy will, O my God. So, he speaks about the bored ear, and he speaks about the sacrifice in Psalm 40. When you come over to Hebrews chapter 10, Psalm 40 is repeated, but it's added this to it.

Instead of the bored ear, what you have is a body hast thou prepared me. Now, the Lord is here in his human body, and this body has been specially prepared to be the burnt offering. So, the fact he is here in the flesh, this one horn I suggest to you, and the fact that he being God is here, for he says even as man before Abraham was, I am, my father and I are one.

The very fact that you have someone here who combines in himself the human side, or the human body, and the divine side, for he is God and man complete, he's caught in a thicket by the horns. Because he says, for this cause came I unto this hour.

If I were not here, then this might not have happened, but because I am here, it has to happen. So, the one who is present in John chapter 12 is the God-man, and he is caught for the sacrifice of the burnt offering.

So, we may see pictures and types of our Lord wherever we look carefully, and so, as it was in this case, the angel of the Lord spoke to Abraham, stayed his hand, and then he looked, and he saw the ram caught in the thicket by his horns.

The Oath, Melchizedek, and the End of the Aaronic Priesthood

After Abraham then, relieving his son, puts the ram upon the altar and offers him for a sacrifice, then it says the angel of the Lord calls unto him again, and that's verse 15. Then he makes a very strong statement, and he says this, if you notice, verse 16.

By myself have I sworn, saith the Lord, because thou hast done this thing and hast not withheld thy son and only son, that in blessing I will bless thee. So, he goes on to the multiplication of his seed, and in thy seed, verse 18, shall all the nations of the earth be blessed, and Christ comes to the front in the word of the angels after the sacrifice has been made.

God puts himself under oath. Now, you will recall Psalm 110, verse 4, that says, The Lord swore and will not repent. Thou art a priest forever after the order of Melchizedek, and when you go over to the epistle to the Hebrews, that whole theme is developed of a priest under oath, and the contrast is made between the Levitical priesthood, the Aaronic priesthood, and the Melchizedek priesthood, because the one is a priesthood by oath, and the other is a priesthood by inheritance.

It is hereditary, and so the sons of Aaron each successively passed on the high priestly office to their successors, but our Lord, being a priest after the order of Melchizedek, there is no cessation, there is no termination.

He has neither beginning of days, nobody went before him, he succeeded no one in his office, he does not have end of life, he shall never have a successor after him. He is the high priest forever after the order of Melchizedek.

You recall in the high priest's palace on the night of our Lord's betrayal, when the high priest put the Lord under oath and said, We are jewelry by the living God, thou tellest if thou be the Christ or not, and he said thou sayest, and so on.

The high priest renteth garments. Now, what does that indicate? Well, in the Old Testament you'll find it indicates different things. Sometimes it's an exclamation of very much a surprise, astonishment.

Sometimes it's an exclamation of grief when they rent their clothes, and then, as the case of Samuel and Saul, it indicated a cessation, a termination of an office, and I suggest to you when the high priest rent his garment that night when the Lord stood before him, it was the termination of the Aaronic high priesthood.

There was to be no high priest after that as far as God is concerned, and there never again will be the last high priest after the order of Aaron that ever was to stand representatively in the presence of God, because you say, Well, but did you read about the high priest in Acts chapter 5?

I know you do, but the rent garment that night, as far as I can consider, the rent garment that indicated that there's no more a high priestly service. The veil of the temple is rent in twain, and the rent garments of the high priest correspond with the rent veil in the temple, and now there's no more Aaronic high priesthood, and there never will be again.

Now, some of you are going to say to me, Yes, but Brother Dave, over in the prophecy of Ezekiel, we have priests after the order of Zadok offering sacrifices in the Millennium. That's true, and there will be animal sacrifices offered again in Jerusalem, and likely elsewhere, in the Millennium.

I don't have any difficulty with that, do you? Yes, some of you do, but I know a lot of people do. I don't have any difficulty whatsoever with the animal sacrifice in the Millennium period, but however, did you notice, though, the sons of Zadok are to be engaged in the priestly ministry, but there's no high priest in the Millennium after the order of Aaron.

Why? Because that's when our Lord takes his place as the Melchizedek high priest for the nation of Israel, and that'll be after the battle in the valley, as I suggested to you the other night, in Genesis 14.

Very well, then. So, what God is doing, he is putting himself under oath. One of the rare occasions when God puts himself under oath, but he says, Abraham, I swear by myself that because you have done this thing, and you have not withheld your son, your only son, from me, I am going to do this, and this, and this, and I am going to bring in through you the seed which is Christ, Galatians 3 tells us, in whom all the nations of the earth submit.

It's the ultimate, it's the high point. Nothing else could Abraham ever have desired, and I think that's why it says he called the place Jehovah-Jireh. In the mouth of the Lord, it shall be seen or perceived, and may I relate that to the Lord's words in the Gospel by John, Abraham your father rejoiced to see my day, and he thought and was glad.

What day was that? It was the day when the Lord promised to him, under oath, he would bring in the seed, not seeds as of many, Galatians says, but one. And so, he's promising to Abraham now that the result of this experience, wherein Abraham did not return, did not keep his son rather, but offered him up to the Lord, he's promising him the Christ, the Messiah, Jehovah-Jireh.

In the mouth of the Lord, it shall be seen. Well, there you go. I never did like these quartz cloths. I used to like the wind-up kind because they could run down before you were finished, and now they are finished before I'm run down.

That's modern technology for you. I'll share with me now with you briefly for the few moments I have left to chapter 28, and I want to have time for just a few comments in closing this morning regarding Jacob.

Jacob’s Deceit and Flight from Esau

There are six times in the life of Jacob when the Lord appears to Jacob, and these are very instructive too. We have a different man altogether than the one we have just been considering. I've stepped over Isaac, the Lord had appeared to Isaac, but then we don't have time, we have to be selective, so I just want to make a few comments about Jacob.

Now, the story of Jacob and Esau and connects with the blessing of the birthright you all know very well, and you know that the consequences of that was the whole thing was instigated by his mother, Rebecca.

She paid a heavy price for that. Anyone pays a price for deceit. Anyone, no matter whom they are deceiving, and especially in relation to the things of God as the birthright blessing was, must of course reap the consequences, the sad consequences.

Subterfuge never has had room in the purposes and plans of God, and so when the Lord looks at Nathanael in John chapter 1, he says, behold an Israelite indeed in whom there is no guile. Not a marvelous thing to say.

An Israelite indeed in whom there is no guile. You say, why did you mention Nathanael? Because he's closely linked to the experience of Jacob. Jacob, because of his treachery in gaining the blessing which stood, the priestly blessing of the father, he hears via his mother that Esau has sworn to kill him.

He's going to work vengeance on his brother because he took away his birthright, you remember, the mess of lentils, and now he's taken away the blessing by deceit with the venison which was goat meat, and also the hairy garments.

So that was Rebecca's doing, her whole thing, and so he's now made afraid of Esau's brother. That fear of his brother is going to last for over 20 years. But Esau had said, now the old man is ready to die.

I'll wait till he's dead, and we have the days of mourning, and then I'll slay my brother Jacob, and I will get the birthright. Well he couldn't do it, of course, as Romans chapter 9 tells us so clearly.

God had chosen Jacob to be the covenant-carrying vessel, and Jacob it must be. Regardless of his own twisted pathway, the covenant of God made before the boys were born must stand. And so Esau says, well the old man's ready to die.

I'll just wait till he's gone, and then I'll get my own back on Jacob. Well now, don't be too sure about the old man passing away that quickly, you see, because they were sure he was just about ready to go.

He couldn't see any longer, and I said, was it you folks that were telling how my little grandson told me that my wife and I had been around long enough, and now it's time we were going? Well, he thought that when he's five years old, he's eight now, he hasn't been mentioning to me anymore, he's got different things in his mind now, he has all kinds of things, don't ask me where he got them from, but he comes out with all kinds of stink prayers when he goes to bed at night, you know, he tells the Lord what kind of a wife he wants.

I don't want an ugly one, and I don't want a fat one, he told the Lord the other night. And I was there on one occasion, there was a thundering lightning storm on, and we're getting ready for meeting, and the little guy's standing at the door, and it's lightning and thundering, and he comes back in and goes into the bedroom where his dad was getting dressed for meeting.

He said, Papa, I was just talking to God out there. He said, oh, well, what did the Lord say? He said, well, I don't know for sure, but boy, he sure talks awful loud. He's getting his answer by thunder, you see.

Well, he comes out with all kinds of things. When we were down visiting the last time, my wife and I, my wife's trying to get him away from the ninja turtles and some of these other things, you know, on TV, so she tells him, you know what you should do?

You should be a missionary to the pygmies. Pygmies, he said, who are the pygmies? Well, the little fella's just about your size, but they're old, of course, and the people there now aren't going to be there all the time, and by the time you grow up, you should be a missionary to the pygmies.

Well, his mother told us afterwards, we were never to tell him that she told us, after we'd gone, the little guy says to his mother about his grandmother, he says, who does she think she is, Miss Chrissy, telling me where I have to go?

And, uh, well, we thought the thing would die there. Well, we got a call from his dad a little while back, and he said, you know what Noah's saying now? What he told him the other day, he's got to go and be a missionary to the pygmies, and I said to him, I don't know where did you get that idea?

Well, he said, my abuela told me, that's what I have to do. Well, he says, how in the world are you going to get to the pygmies and be a missionary? I don't know, but abuela will take care of the whole thing.

So, she's not Miss Chrissy anymore, she's the instigator of a future missionary. Well, Jacob is going to experience the consequences of his deceit, so he's fleeing for safety from his brother Esau. Now, as I said, they thought the old man was going to die, and when Jacob comes back 20 years later, the old man's still there.

Well, I thought I'd buried mine a while ago. I don't mean my father. My father died at 98, and he was a Christian for 88 years, and that was a long lifetime. No, I'm talking about the old man that we carry with us.

We think at times we have him ready for burial, a nice, decent, honorable burial, but it is not so. Now, when Jacob is fleeing from the wrath of his brother, you remember in Genesis chapter 28, he comes to a place which was called Luz at first, and then came to be called Bethel later on, and it's a wilderness place.

Jacob’s Ladder and the Promise of God’s Presence

And then we have in verse 11, we read about that place, the baroness of it, he took of the stones, and he put them for his pillows, and lay down in that place to sleep, and he dreamed, and behold, a ladder set up on the earth, and atop it reached to heaven.

Now, when we come to John chapter 1, we discover what this ladder represents. You see lots of pictures, of course, about the cross, right? But I think John 1 gives us a different slant on that, and the Lord interprets this passage here, in John chapter 1, when he's talking to Nathanael, because when he commented about Nathanael, and said, An Israelite indeed, in whom there is no guile, Nathanael heard it, and he said, Rabbi, how do you know me?

And the Lord says, when you were under the fig tree, mind you, he had to get out from under that fig tree to know who the Lord was, when you were under the fig tree, he said, I saw you before Philip called you, and Nathanael, because he was a guileless man, he could see that what other people couldn't see, and immediately he said, Rabbi, thou art the son of God, thou art the king of Israel.