Sermon Tone Analysis

Introduction - We’re in the middle of our “Big Picture of the Bible” series that we’re teaching through what is called “Chronological Bible Storying”.

The idea is to learn & internalize the Word of God by applying lessons we learn from the major stories of the Bible.

Each story reveals part of God’s plan of redemption through human history.

It helps us remember Scripture and the Lord will use this to draw us closer to Himself as He reveals Himself to us through these stories He recorded for us.

These stories will also help you share your faith with others and I encourage you to tell these stories to someone outside of church each week.

I’ve been doing this and it’s amazing to see how people are interested in hearing them.

Romans 10:17 says “Faith comes by hearing and hearing by the Word of God.”

(Focus on listening, to retell the story to someone else later).

Review: So far, we’ve learned that God has always existed in the spirit world before creation as Father, Son & Holy Spirit.

God had millions of angels who served him including the most beautiful and powerful angel of all, an angel named Lucifer who was in charge of the other angels.

Lucifer coveted God’s position, power & prestige.

One day Lucifer rebelled against God and got 1/3 of the angels to join him in an attempted coup against God.

God flicked Lucifer, aka Satan, The Adversary, out of heaven with great ease as no one is more powerful than God.

God demonstrated His power by creating everything in the natural world by the power of His spoken word.

God’s ability to create out of nothing makes Him the owner of the universe and God alone decides what is right and wrong.

God created male and female humans in His image as the crowning glory of Creation.

God created the first institution, marriage by bringing the woman to the man and joining them together as one flesh.

God placed this couple in a beautiful, lush, perfect garden and God provided everything they needed.

God gave the man Adam & Eve his wife great freedom and liberty in the garden saying they could eat of all the trees of the garden including the tree of life; all but one tree, the tree of knowledge of good and evil.

God promised if they ate from that tree they would die.

One day Satan/Lucifer came and tempted Eve to eat of the fruit of the forbidden tree.

Satan lied to Eve and said she would not die but she’d be like God knowing good and evil.

So Eve allowed lust and desire to be like God consume her and she ate of the fruit and gave it to Adam who was there with her.

They ruined God’s perfect environment and most importantly ruined their relationship with God.

God cursed Satan, Adam and Eve for their actions and we still experience the consequences of their sin and rebellion to this day.

God was gracious however and covered their sinful shame and nakedness by taking the life of an innocent animal to cover their sin.

God expelled them from the garden and guarded the way to the tree of life so they wouldn’t live forever in a sinful condition.

God had prescribed the way Adam & Eve were to approach God - in faith and with a blood sacrifice.

They passed this on to their two sons, Cain & Abel.

Sadly when their sons were grown, Cain disregarded God’s instructions and approached God the way he wanted.

Abel however acted in faith and brought God a blood sacrifice.

God respected Abel’s offering but God rejected Cains.

Cain got angry and jealous and yet God graciously warned Cain if he did what was right by faith, he too could be accepted like Abel.

Cain didn’t listen to God and one day in the field, he rose up and killed his brother Abel.

God cursed Cain and put a mark on him and made him a wanderer on the earth.

God gave Adam & Eve another son, named Seth that followed after God by faith.

Last week, we learned the first man Adam died after living 930 years on the earth as a consequence for his sin and rebellion against God; just like God promised would happen.

Over the course of time, the earth had become a very wicked place very quickly because of sin and rebellion against God.

God was grieved by the wickedness of man and was actually sorry He had made mankind.

As a matter of fact, God saw the hearts and imaginations of mankind were only evil continuously.

God decided to judge the earth with a cataclysmic flood.

Of all the humans who lived, there was one man, a descendent of Seth, named Noah who found grace in the eyes of the Lord.

Noah was 500 years old and had 3 sons, Shem, Ham & Japheth.

God told Noah how He planned to destroy the world by flood and told Noah to build a large boat to accommodate a pair of all the animals, Noah and the 7 others in his family as well as anyone else who would respond to God’s warnings by faith.

You see up until that time it had never rained or flooded on the earth so Noah must have sounded crazy to the people around him as he obeyed God and built the ark.

Finally, after years of building and preaching the righteous warnings from God, when Noah was 600 years old, God told Noah and his family to enter the ark and God brought the animals into the ark 2 by 2. It rained for 40 days & nights and the fountains of water in the earth were broken up so the whole world was destroyed by flood.

The water was so high it was almost 25 feet above the highest mountain peak!

Noah & his family were in the ark a total of 206 days before the water subsided and they could leave the ark.

God made a promise He wold never again destroy the world by flood and put the sign of the rainbow in the heavens as a reminder of God’s promise and His judgment of the earth.

God commanded the animals & Noah’s family to be fruitful & multiply and fill the world with animals & people.

(Title slide) Today’s story comes from Genesis 12-15

Before we get to today’s story, the Bible tells us after the flood, people stayed close to each other and because they all spoke the same language and they attempted to build a tower to the sky in order to keep from being scattered across the earth as God wanted.

So God confused their language and the tower they built was called Babel, because God confused their languages and people scattered across the earth.

The Bible gives a list of the nations that came from Noah’s three sons and their wives.

Then the Bible focuses on the family line of Shem, the line God would use as part of His over all redemptive plan for the human race.

After the flood, people didn’t live near as long as the curse of sin and the living conditions on earth kept people from living as long.

We’ve learned from our previous stories that the Creator God, is a God of order.

There were 10 generations from Adam down to Noah.

Then from Seth’s line, there were another 10 generations who lived and then God came to a man named Abram.

Abram was the oldest of three brothers born to Abram’s father Terah.

Abram’s brothers were named Nahor & Haran.

(Show Map slide) Abram was born in a place called Ur of the Chaldeans, in Mesopotamia, near the modern country of Kuwait.

Abram’s brother Haran had a son he named Lot and while they were living in Mesopotamia, Abram’s brother Haran died.

Abram & Nahor married wives and we’re told Abram’s wife was named Sarah.

Now Abram’s name means exalted Father.

What’s sad about that is that Abram and his wife Sarah had no children.

A lack of children in those days was believed to be a sign of a curse from God.

After Haran died, Abram’s father Terah moved the family including Abram’s nephew Lot, about 600 miles north along the Euphrates River, north of the modern country of Iraq to a place north of Syria called Haran.

So Abram’s brother was named Haran, but the place Terah moved his family was also called Haran.

The word Haran means dry & parched, maybe that’s why Terah settled in Haran b/c the death of his son left him dry and parched from grief.

Terah and his family lived for quite a while in Haran and he died in Haran at the age of 205.

You know how it is when you live in a place for a long time, you sink roots and it becomes your home.

When Abram was 75 years old, the God of Glory, Yahweh, the Creator God appeared to Abram and told him to leave that land and go to a land that God would show him.

God promised Abram that God was going to make a great nation out of Abram.

God also promised Abram that He would bless those who bless Abram and curse those who cursed Abram and that through Abram, God planned to bless all the nations of the earth!

While there must have been a lot of questions rolling through Abram’s mind about how these promises could possibly be true, Abram immediately obeyed God’s command without question or comment, he packed up his wife Sarah, his nephew Lot, all their servants and property and moved away from his father’s family in Haran and he set out not knowing where he was going (Heb.

11:8).

Abram’s journey took him about another 400 miles farther away from his birthplace, this time south, to the land of Canaan.

He arrived at a place named Shechem and it was there God appeared to Abram again and said this place, this land is the land I will give you and your family some day.

Then Abram built an altar to worship God by faith accepting the promise of God as true.

Abram moved a little farther south to a place called Bethel and settled there.

He built another altar to the Lord there and began to make that home and his place of worship and fellowship with God.

As in any relationship, it takes time to get to know one another well and for trust to develop over time.

After a while, there was a famine in the land of Canaan, so Abram did what most men would do, figure out a way to provide for his family.

So he packed up his family and possessions along with his nephew Lot, and traveled southwest to Egypt.

God hadn’t told Abram to move, and Abram didn’t ask God about moving out of Canaan.

As they were traveling and getting close to Egypt, Abram got to looking at his wife Sarah, Abram told Sarah, you know Sarah, you’re a beautiful woman.

I’m worried that when we get to Egypt, the Egyptians will see that you’re a beautiful woman and since you’re married to me, they may kill me so one of them can have you.

Why don’t you tell them you’re my sister so it will be well for me and I will be able to live.

Well, that’s exactly what happened!

The Egyptians saw Sarah was beautiful, so beautiful in fact, they told the king (Pharaoh), about her, so Pharaoh took Sarah to his house and was kind to Abram and blessed him with more sheep, oxen, donkeys, camels and servants.

Yet God was displeased with this arrangement and He began to plague Pharaoh and his household with great plagues b/c of Sarah, Abram’s wife!

Pharaoh figured out pretty quickly he better not mess around with Sarah b/c she was married to Abram.

He even called Abram and asked him why he didn’t just tell him she was his wife!

Pharaoh even said since you told me she was your sister I might of taken her as my wife.

So Pharaoh sent Abram away with all of his possessions.

Abram went back to the land God wanted him to be in the first place.

God was gracious to Abram and kept Pharaoh from taking Sarah as his wife.

Abram went back to Bethel, to that place where he worshipped & fellowshipped with God and reunited in his relationship with God.

Abram by now was very rich in livestock, silver and gold.

Abram and his nephew lot both had an abundance of livestock by the hand of God’s blessing.