Faith Waiting Some More: Abraham

He then brought some curds and milk and the calf that had been prepared and set them before them.! While they ate, he stood near them under a tree. Where is your wife, Sarah? They asked him.

! There in the tent, he said. Then the Lord said, I will surely return to you about this time next year, and Sarah, your wife, will have a son.

Now Sarah was listening at the entrance to the tent, which was behind him. Abraham and Sarah were already old and well advanced in years, and Sarah was past the age of childbearing.

So Sarah laughed to herself as she thought, After I am worn out and my master is old, will I now have this pleasure? Then the Lord said to Abraham, Why did Sarah laugh and say, Will I really have a child now that I am old?

Is anything too hard for the Lord? I will return to you at the appointed time next year, and Sarah will have a son. Sarah was afraid.

So she lied and said, I did not laugh. But he said, Yes, you did laugh. Turn over to Hebrews chapter 11.

Hebrews chapter 11, verse 11.

By faith, Abraham, even though he was past age, and Sarah herself was barren, was enabled to become a father, because he considered him faithful who made the promise.

And so from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky, and as countless as the sand on the seashore.

Well, we're walking in Canaan, and there sitting outside of his tent in the land of Hebron, we see a 76-year-old man.

And after exchanging greetings with him, we ask him, saying, You're new in these parts. What's your name? And he says, Abram.

And we say, Oh, Abram, that word means exalted father. So tell me, how many children do you have, exalted father?

Well, I don't have any children yet. An exalted father without any children? That's like someone claiming to be cowboy of the year, without any horse or cowboy boots.

If you're an exalted father, I would expect your quiver to be full. All I know is that the Lord told me he would give me descendants like the stars of the heavens, and like the dust of the earth, And I expect to find it to be true.

And so what seemed like the delusion of a silly old man was, in fact, precious faith in the promise of God. And God saw that faith, and it pleased him.

Now, Old Testament examples of faith are meant to strengthen our faith. That's why they're given to us here in Hebrews chapter 11. And among other examples given us, we have Abraham set before us.

Abraham, who's known in the Bible as the man of faith, the father of the faithful. And so here in Faith's Hall of Fame, more is said about Abraham's faith than any other.

Twelve verses are taken to cover four episodes of his faith in action. Now, two of those episodes have to do with the promised land, and we saw those last week.

The other two have to do with the promised seed, or offspring. And we'll look at the first of those today. But from last week, you remember God called Abraham to leave his homeland, and to go to a land that he would later receive as an inheritance, and by faith he obeyed and went, even though he did not know where he was going.

He traded home for a mere promise of God. That's the first episode of faith. Second one, we see his faith in what he did once he got into the promised land and found it totally occupied by others who would not scoot over and give him the land.

What did he do? By faith. He made his home in the promised land like a stranger in a foreign country, living in tents, hanging around, waiting for the fulfillment of the promise when that land would become his.

And as he waited, he looked by faith beyond Canaan, beyond that physical land that he was dwelling in in tents, and he looked to his heavenly home, a home made without hands, without human hands, but made by God himself a better country, a better land, a city that God was preparing for him.

Now, we too are living by faith on the promised land that is occupied by other people currently.

But one day it will be ours, as the Lord has promised that his meek would inherit the earth. And he will give this land that we dwell on to his people, to the children of Abraham, when he makes it a new heaven and a new earth, when Christ returns, the home of righteousness, 2 Peter chapter 3.

So by faith we wait. We wait, content to live now as pilgrims in a foreign land, ever looking for our promised final home.

So God made promises to Abraham about a land, but that's not all he made promises about. He also made promises about a seed, descendants, an offspring. And God made this promise to Abraham many times over.

When God first called Abraham when he was in Ur of the Chaldees, God said to him, I will make you into a great nation. And once he got into the promised land, the Lord said to him, Look north and south, east and west, all the land that you see I will give to you and your offspring forever.

I will make your offspring like the dust of the earth, so that if anyone could count the dust, then your offspring could be counted. And a little later, God took him outside at night and said, Look up at the heavens and count the stars.

If indeed you can count them, so shall your offspring be. And Abraham believed God, and it was counted to him as righteousness.

Now our text in Hebrews 11, verses 11 and 12, say that by faith Abraham, even though he was past age and Sarah herself was barren, was enabled to become a father because he considered him faithful who had made the promise.

And so from this one man, and he is good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars in the sky and as the dust, the sand on the seashore.

Now I'm aware that there is some disagreement among translations over whose faith is here being spoken of in verse 11. Was it Abraham's faith or was it Sarah's faith?

Indeed, a footnote, an alternative reading noted in the NIV is that by faith even Sarah, who was past age, was enabled to bear children because she considered him faithful who had made the promise.

So there is this division of translation, in translations and commentaries. Let me just say a couple of things about this briefly and we'll move on. I'm going to take it that we, as we find it here in the predominant text of the NIV, as a statement of Abraham's faith.

And I'm going to do so for these reasons because every other place in the Bible that comments on this incident speaks of Abraham's faith. And because it is Abraham's faith that is up for review here in this section of Hebrews 11, there are other reasons for doing so in the grammar and in the words that are used here in Hebrews 11.

But having said that, there is no reason to reject out of hand at least the idea that Sarah too had faith in God's promise.

We know she had her troubles believing the promise the first time she heard it. We find her even offering her handmaid Hagar to Abraham, thinking that perhaps God means to raise up a seed through her.

And when the angel of the Lord came and told Abraham that a year from now your wife Sarah will have a child, she in the tent was giggling in unbelief.

It can't be. So all of her unbelief recorded in Scripture is so true, and yet it is quite possible that she could have, through all of that, and God's dealing with her, come to faith in the promise.

Let me ask you, have you always believed the first time you've read a promise in the Scriptures? Or have you sometimes been disbelieving, and yet later come to rest your promise on a certain word of God?

Well, possible that Sarah too came to believe that promise, but I believe here in verse 11 it's speaking of Abraham's faith, and I'll consider it such. So the first point we see about Abraham's faith is that it's all the more remarkable because of the obstacles standing in the way of his faith.

Let's notice them. First, the challenge of time, by which I simply mean that it's easy to believe for a week or two. But it's quite another thing to go on believing over the long haul when there's no outward signs of the promise being fulfilled anywhere.

Nothing's seen to encourage faith. So that nagging health problem has stretched on for years and years into decades, and it makes it hard to believe the promise that God is working in this for your good.

Your faith was fine in the first few months of that health problem, but now you're struggling with unbelief. Maybe a troublesome relationship that's not improved over the past 25 years.

Maybe a painful loneliness that seems to worsen as time passes, and it's hard for you to believe the promise that God's grace really is sufficient for this thing in your life.

Or the fact that it's been 2,000 years and Jesus still hasn't come back, that's a long time waiting for the promise, and it makes it hard to live with expectancy for the Lord's return.

Even so for Abraham, do you realize that it was 24 years from the time that he received the promise of offspring until Sarah finally became pregnant with Isaac.

24 years. It's not easy to keep faith alive and well over the long passage of time. Dale Ralph Davis says there's something about the passing of time that tends to wither faith when there's no evidence of the promise anywhere.

Faith grows weak with the passing of time. So Abraham was 75 and Sarah was 65 when he first received the promise of offspring.

and perhaps in the first flush of excitement they were daydreaming and talking about this coming child and then the first month passed and nothing.

And Abraham says, oh dear, we must continue to wait on God. His promises are true, you know, maybe next month. And next month turns into 12 months and 12 months turns into 11 years and still no promised offspring.

offspring. And so the vibrancy of faith was long gone in Sarah. And she suggests, well maybe the offspring to be raised up to you, Abraham, is to come through my handmaid, Hagar.

And Abraham goes along with her suggestion and Ishmael is born and the plan proved to be nothing but trouble. Leaning on their own understanding.

Now, the whole account in Genesis, just several chapters, it reads rather quickly from the time of the promise to the fulfillment, but we need to remember that those 24 years ticked off the calendar one day at a time.

That's nearly 9,000 childless days with only a bare promise to hold on to. That's 300 monthly discouragements and disappointments as to any sign of life in Sarah.

And most of those days were ordinary days with nothing spectacular going on, just the same old, same old. Sheep to look after, squabbles over land and water and wells, famine in the land, trying to scrape up enough food to live.

You know, Abraham and Sarah were not entertaining angels every day of their life. Most days, it was just the two of them. And where is that promise? You know, most days of the Christian life are very ordinary, aren't they?

I'm struck with that as we gather to pray week by week, different venues. I pray with a couple men. We pray together here. And you know, very often, my requests are the same because my days are pretty much the same and yours are too.

It's the ordinariness of life and it was that way for Abraham and Sarah. Can you hold on to God's promise with expectancy in the ordinary run-of-the-mill days of your life, waiting long when little is happening there was the challenge of time.

But secondly, there was the challenge of circumstances. Abraham was not getting any younger nor Sarah as they were waiting. Verse 11 of our text says, he was past age.

That means past the age of fathering children. Verse 12 says, he was as good as dead, as likely to beget children as a dead man.

not real promising circumstance, was it? And the problems were not just with Abraham. Our text says in verse 11 that Sarah herself was barren.

She had never been able to have children. Romans 4 19 mentions the fact that Sarah's womb was also dead. Also dead.

There was a double deadness. Besides Abraham's deadness, there was the deadness of Sarah's womb. And so these obstacles are clear. They were in their face.

They were not small. Wherever he looked, what Abraham saw was a hopeless situation because the son was now a biologically impossible thing for them.

And it's not easy for faith to go on believing the promise when all appearances are to the contrary and when year after year has gone by with no fulfillment of the promise.

But then again, faith does not have to do with appearances, does it? It is sure of things hoped for and it is certain of things not seen. Those things that don't appear.

Faith can be certain and sure of them. Indeed, that's what Abraham is here spoken of for his faith in the things not seen.

And so against all hope, Abraham believed in hope. And in hopeless circumstances, he hoped in his God. How did he do that?

How did he go on believing the promise over 24 years of seeing nothing to encourage that faith? Without it in the sense signs of life?

How could he go on believing the promise without his faith eroding over the passing of time? Without his faith weakening, but rather even being strengthened?

Wouldn't it be good to know how Abraham did that? Would it perhaps provide clues for us on how to wait and to wait long upon God's promises? Well, hold your place here in Hebrews 11 and turn over to Romans chapter 4 because there we're told how Abraham did this.

Romans chapter 4. And we come to the second major point, how Abraham's faith was sustained for 24 years.

Verse 18 says, Against all hope, Abraham in hope, believed, and so became the father of many nations. Just as it had been said to him, so shall your offspring be.

Without weakening in his faith, he faced the fact that his body was as good as dead since he was about a hundred years old and that Sarah's womb was also dead. How did he do this?

How was his faith sustained so long? Notice in the first place, he faced the facts. And the facts of life were that a child for them was biologically impossible due to their double deadness.

Let's learn that the life of faith is not a life with your head in the sand, living in denial of reality. That as long as I can live in my bubble, ignoring certain disappointing facts all around me, then I'm okay and faith is strong and well.

That's not faith. that's folly to live with your eyes closed to the facts. Faith is much stronger than that.

Faith is able to look the facts straight in the eye and not blink, not waver, not even weaken, but rather be strengthened so we can look at that doctor's report and we can read every line of it.

We can see that bad news. We can look at that financial statement. We can look at the messes that we get into, face them, even impossibilities, and we can do that not just for a day, but for 24 years without faith weakening.

How? Look at verses 20 and 21. He didn't, yet he did not waver through unbelief regarding the promise of God, but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised.

Faith was not weakened by facing the facts because that's not all Abraham was looking at, was the double deadness of he and his wife.

He was also looking at two other things, the promises of God and the God of the promises. Yes, he faced the impossible facts, but he didn't focus on them.

He did not fixate on them. You know, it's when we focus on our difficulties and on those obstacles. and that preoccupies our mind. That's when faith weakens.

But faith has its own way of looking at the facts. Faith refuses to look at circumstances without God in the picture, without God's promises in the picture.

You know, God is the most important fact, isn't he? The most important factor in the world, in the universe, is God. what he has promised is more important than all the obstacles of faith.

So faith says, okay, let's look at the facts, all the facts, promises, and the promiser included. Let's fill our minds and absorb our thoughts and be preoccupied with him and his promises.

Notice, he focused, he faced the facts, but he focused on the promises of God. He kept remembering God's promise of a great offspring. This was no dream of Abraham.

God had spoken more than once. God had promised. Could I ask you what difficult facts of life you are staring at? Things that mock the promises of God?

They will monopolize your mind if you let them, and you will go round and round, preoccupied with your obstacles, in the way of the promise.

But don't let them. Let them instead drive you to some promise of God. Have you found that God has said anything about your problem specifically, or that kind of problem?

Has God said anything in his word? Then memorize it, and meditate on it, and be preoccupied with the promise, and let it monopolize your thoughts, and your faith will not be weakened, but actually strengthened as you face the facts, the troubles in your life.

Abraham focused on the promises of God, and secondly, he focused on the God of the promise. You know, the promises are no better than the one making them. If the five-year-old down the street promises he'll protect me from all the bad guys, I probably will not leave my doors unlocked when I go on vacation knowing he's got my back.

But if God, the one we just sang about, God, the true and faithful witness, if he promises to never slumber or sleep in his watch care over me, I'll probably sleep better at night.

You see, he focused on the God of the promise, the one who had made this promise to him. Notice how he did that. Verse 21 says, being fully persuaded that God had power to do what he had promised.

Here's the promiser's power, his ability to do what he had said. So, God has promised us. None other than God has promised us a son. The stubborn facts of life are that a son is biologically impossible.

Faith says, that's alright, because God is the God of the impossible. What is impossible with man is possible with God.

Is anything too hard for me, is what he asked after making the promise that Sarah snickered at. The facts are, I'm as good as dead and Sarah's womb is dead.

We're double dead, but faith says that's alright, because the promise comes from the God who gives life to the dead and calls those things which be not as though they were.

Verse 17. Faith is that full persuasion that God is able to do what he's promised. He's able, he's able, I know he is able, I know my Lord is able to carry me through.

He's able to do immeasurably more than all we ask or imagine. according to his power that is at work within us. So Abraham focused on the promiser's power, but he also focused on the promiser's faithfulness.

This is back in Hebrews 11 and verse 11. By faith Abraham was enabled to become a father because he considered him faithful who had made the promise.

Romans says he considered him able, powerful enough to do what he said. Hebrews says he considered him faithful to do what he had said. In other words, it's God who's promising, not some slick politician who just wants my vote and therefore will promise me the moon just to get my vote and then goes back on his promise.

No, this is the faithful and true witness. This is the one who is faithful and true. The one with whom it's impossible to lie.

God is not a man that he should lie, neither the son of man that he should change his mind. Does he speak and not act? Does he promise and not fulfill? Do you realize, believer, that God has a perfect record for keeping his promises up to this very moment in human history?

He's made a lot of promises to a lot of people and to this moment in history, he's never broken one of them. Now, do you think for a moment that you're going to be the first to break that record?

God is faithful.

2 Corinthians 1, 9. God is faithful. In other words, faithfulness is not just something God does, it's something he is.

He is faithful. It's his nature to be faithful. It's his very essence of his being. He would cease to be God if he ceased to be faithful. You see how our faith is strengthened when with Abraham, we consider him faithful who made the promise, however staggering the promise, whatever the obstacles in the way.

He was faithful, would have to ungod himself not to keep that promise to me. He's put himself on the line and he will not fail. believers, we can confidently go to the bank with every promise that he has made.

What a difference it makes in my problems that God has both the power and the faithfulness to do all that he has promised me. It's the difference between faith weakening and faith strengthening as we face the facts.

It's the difference between trusting God and leaning on your own understanding. understanding. It's the difference between faith that glorifies God and unbelief that dishonors God.

It's the difference between resting on God and being in constant turmoil. This is simply applied theology, just taking the attributes of God, his power, his faithfulness, and plugging it in to our problems in life.

too often what we learn about God on Sunday never makes it to Monday afternoon and what we think. And so we need to learn by faith like Abraham.

Yes, it's impossible to us, but you know the one that promised me is faithful. He plugs that in. And the one that promised me is able and he plugs that in.

And he finds his faith strengthened right in the midst of these impossible obstacles in his way. So Abraham waits in faith.

Faith that refuses to look at life without God in the picture. He waits with the promise in one hand and the promiser in the other. And so, as Hebrews 6, 15 says, and so, after waiting patiently, Abraham received what was promised.

Very quickly then, the result of Abraham's faith is our third point. Our text says in Hebrews 11, 12, and so, from this one man, and he as good as dead, came descendants as numerous as the stars on the sky, as countless as sand on the seashore.

Faith resulted in receiving the things promised. A seed, an offspring, and the promise was fulfilled in Abraham's physical seed and in his spiritual seed.

Now, we're going to look at both. Abraham's physical seed fulfilled this promise. Sarah had a baby, Isaac, and Isaac himself had children and grandchildren and great-grandchildren, and it grew into a whole nation, this offspring of Abraham.

Israel, as a nation, was chiefly the physical offspring of Abraham. they numbered 70 when, because of the famine, they went down to Egypt for food.

And there they multiplied greatly, even though Pharaoh tried to stamp them out by harsh labor and killing their boy babies. Nevertheless, when they came out of Egypt and came to the promised land, Moses is able to say to them in Deuteronomy 1.10, the Lord your God has increased your numbers so that today you are as many as the stars of the sky.

There is proof that the physical offspring of Abraham, the promise to Abraham, 600 years later, we know that at least by then, the promise had been fulfilled.

Moses says so, Deuteronomy 1.10. But just as the fulfillment of the earthly land in Canaan pointed to a heavenly home, so the earthly physical descendants of Abraham pointed to a spiritual offspring of Abraham.

Abraham's spiritual seed. Listen to Galatians 3, 7-9. Consider Abraham. He believed God and it was credited to him as righteousness. Understand then that those who believe are children of Abraham.

Did you hear that? Those who believe are children of Abraham. The scripture foreknew that God would justify the Gentiles by faith. Are you a Gentile?

Have you believed? You are a child of Abraham. Because the promise was that all nations will be blessed through you, Abraham. Through one of your seed, blessing will come to the whole earth.

Now you know who that seed of Abraham was. It was the Lord Jesus. Indeed, that's why the New Testament begins. The very first verse of the New Testament gives us the record of the genealogy of Jesus, the son of David, the son of Abraham.

He's that seed, singular, heirloom. Abraham. Galatians 3 says, he's the promised seed and everyone united by faith to him then also becomes the seed of Abraham and heirs of the promise.

Galatians 3, 29, if you belong to Christ, Jew, Gentile, whoever you are, female, male, slave or free, if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham's seed and heirs according to the promise.

Have we come to grips with this? That if we have trusted in Jesus, the seed of Abraham, we thereby have become children of Abraham. We're one of those stars in the sky.

We're one of those particles of sand on the seashore, dust of the earth, so we can sing that children's song if we're true believers. Father Abraham had many sons.

Many sons had father Abraham and I am one of them and so are you. So let's just praise the Lord. There's the result of faith. Whole host of children to Abraham, physical and spiritual.

The fourth lesson, let's not miss the crucial role of faith in God's promise. It was Abraham's faith that received the blessing of these descendants.

Our text says, by faith, verse 11 of Hebrews 11, by faith Abraham was enabled to become a father. Can you deal with that?

What's being said is that it was his faith that enabled him to father a son and all these descendants. It was faith. It was the crucial role of faith.

It was because he considered God faithful and took him at his word that he therefore received descendants as numerous as stars in the sky and sand on the seashore. That simply means that without faith he would not have had a son, Isaac.

Without faith he would not have had a descendant, Jesus Christ. Without faith he would not have had a whole host of believers as children of Abraham today.

No, it is by faith that he was enabled to become a father. Faith was required. He must believe in order to receive what was promised.

Without faith to leave home, he would not receive the promised land. Without faith in God's promise about an offspring, he would not have born a son and many children thereafter.

It's the same way with Noah. If Noah did not have faith to build the ark, he would not have saved himself and his family. And it's the same way with you and me.

Without faith, you will not be saved from God's coming wrath. You must believe the promise that whoever believes on the Son of God will not perish but have everlasting life.

You must believe in order to receive the promised blessing of eternal life. Faith was required of Abraham in order to receive the reward of God.

According to your faith, be it unto you. We see in this the power of faith to obtain valuable blessings from God. By faith, he was enabled to bear, become a father.

And lastly, just two further lessons about God from this study. And the first is that God knows our struggles with faith and stoops to strengthen it. Are you having trouble hanging on to the promise?

God knows that. God knows that. And when he sees weak faith, he doesn't dismiss it. When he sees faith, it's just like a flickering, smoldering wick.

He doesn't say, oh, that's worthless and just snuff it out. Rather, he comes, he stoops and he blows on our faith to encourage it.

Can you see God stooping to Abraham? We didn't have time to read the whole account in Genesis, but the fact that he repeatedly made the promise shows that he knows the struggle Abraham would have.

And so he keeps coming back to him. And especially in his critical points of need. God knows the heart of his children. And he comes, he considers that we're just dust.

And he knows our frame and he comes with encouragement to our faith. How many times does he tell you? He repeated the promise many times to Abraham. How many times does he tell you if you trust in Jesus Christ, he will save you?

Once is enough from the God of truth, right? He tells us dozens and dozens and dozens of times in his word. We might have the assurance of it.

And he's strengthening our faith by repeating. How many times has he told you he would never leave you or forsake you, dear brother, sister? How many times has he told you that he will work everything for your good, never stop doing you good?

You see, he knows our struggles with faith and he stoops to strengthen our faith. He even adds an oath to his promise.

He swears by himself. Why? Just so Abraham might know for sure, not only by the promise of God, but the fact that God would swear an oath by his own name.

That's two things in which it's impossible for God to lie, that Abraham might know, and that we might know, we who have taken hold of the hope held out for us in Christ, we might know that the promise is certain.

It comes from a promising God and an oath-taking God who is faithful. He adds a covenant to his promise.

He kills the animals and divides the parts into two parts and God himself walks through the body parts, the bloody body parts, taking an oath upon himself, may I become like these animals if I do not keep my word to you, Abraham.

He didn't need to do that. All he needed to say is Abraham going to make you a great nation. End of story once it's over. But he keeps coming, blowing on his faith, making an oath, making a covenant.

Has he not sealed his promise of everlasting life to you, believer, by the blood of the covenant? And do we not over and over take the bread and the cup, those symbols, those covenant signs that remind us, yes, the promise is sure.

He even ties his promise to things Abraham would see. So in the daytime when you see the dust of the earth, Abraham, you can think about all the children I'm going to give you. And at night when you see all the stars, you can be thinking about all the children I'm going to give you.

Because the one who multiplies the one can multiply the other. God knows our struggles of faith and he stoops to encourage and to grow it. And secondly, let's not miss from this account that God does have a tendency, a glorious tendency, of working in unpromising circumstances, even impossible things.

So Sarah is barren. So they are too old to have a children, to have a son. So it was with Hannah, barren, Elizabeth, barren, Samson's mother, barren.

Barrenness is no obstacle to God. For that matter, neither is a virgin birth. Supernatural conceptions are God's specialty. And sometimes God wants to make things crystal clear so that everyone who sees or hears of it will know this is God.

This just didn't happen. God intervened and did this. That's why Gideon was pared down in his army, pared down to 300 against the Midianite hordes until it was 1 to 45.

Why? In order that Israel might not boast against me that her own strength is saved. That's why he puts the gospel treasure in earthen jars that easily crack and break.

Clay jars. Why? So that the all-surpassing power might be seen to be of God and not from men. That God receives the praise. That's why he may send us thorns in the flesh.

That make us feel our weakness. That in our weakness his power might rest upon us and he be praised, not us. That's why he puts you under pressures beyond your ability to endure so that you might not rely on yourself but on God who raises the dead and then when he brings you through God will get all the thanks.

That's why he works with a barren womb of Sarah. Sarah. He's drawn to impossibilities. Abraham, I've waited until you and Sarah are both as good as dead because the world must know that if there's going to be a people of God on the earth, it will be all my doing.

And you know that's still true? The spiritual children of Abraham come into being by supernatural birth, the new birth from above.

And they're kept and preserved from a persecuting and an alluring world by the almighty work of God. So yes, God has no trouble with unpromising circumstances.

Do you have a promise from God but it's as you look around the situations are not promising. that's why the Holy Spirit put Abraham in your Bible that you might draw strength and help and your faith might be strengthened as you go through this trial.

Not weakened by teaching you with Abraham to take the promise of God in one hand and the promiser in the other and to expect to see everything happen just as he said it would.

He promised to see you through to the end, to keep you strong to the end. He's no liar. He's able to do immeasurably more. Trust him. Face the facts.

And then focus on God and his promise. Isn't the God of Abraham something wonderful? There's none like him as we saw last week.

Isn't he praiseworthy? We're going to sing the God of Abraham praise. He's worthy of praise. But I want to ask you, is he your God? Is the God of Abraham yours?

Well, he could be if you would have him. If you would trust in his son, you would become his child. You know, all of his promises are sure. You know, he promised to Christ is coming back to judge all men and those outside of Christ will go to an eternal hell.

He's able to fulfill that. No more. He is faithful to his word. And he would have to un-God himself not to send you to hell if you are not found in that day trusting in his son.

But if you trust in the Lord Jesus and appear before him in judgment, he would have to un-God himself to not receive you into heaven forever because he's promised that whoever trusts in him shall have everlasting life.

Trust in him today. Trust in him today. Know that peace that faith provides. Number in our hymnals, it's number 32, the God of Abraham prays.

Let's pray. Our God, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, we thank you that the same one who took Abraham out and showed him the stars at night is the same one who has made promises to us that there is no condemnation for those who are in Christ Jesus.

We thank you that every promise that he has made to Abraham has been fulfilled or is being fulfilled. Thank you for the same faithfulness to us that Jesus Christ is the same yesterday in Abraham's day, today in our day, and forever faithful and true, able to do all he said.

Send us on our way then, clinging to your promises. Oh, help us to get our eyes from the problems and onto the promises that you've made and onto you yourself.

We ask it for your glory as you are glorified by faith. In Jesus' name, amen.