"Be A Blessing"

Scripture Reading: Galatians 3:26-29

We’ve Now Entered the 3rd Month of the Year…

And that Means We’re Starting Our 3rd Theme…

In Our Year-Long Series of Themes…

That Progressively Tell the Story of Scripture

January = Creation

God Created All Things Good…

And Created Humanity to Rule Over His Creation

February = Curse

Humanity Rebelled Against God…

And Brought Sin, Death, & the Curse into Creation

All that was Once Good has Now Been Ruined

But All Hope is Not Lost

God has a Plan to Redeem His Creation

And He’s Going to Do it Through One Family

That Family will Eventually Be Known as:

Israel

And Our Thematic Quote for this Lesson is:

“Be A Blessing”

We’ll Learn What that Means in a Minute

After God Destroyed & Restored the Earth with a Flood…

Noah & His Family Began to Multiply

But So Did Sin, Death, & the Curse

Humanity Eventually United Together…

In an Attempt to Rebel Against God

Genesis 11:4 (NIV)

4 Then they said, “Come, let us build ourselves a city, with a tower that reaches to the heavens, so that we may make a name for ourselves; otherwise we will be scattered over the face of the whole earth.”

Humanity Gathered Together & Built a Great City with a Tall Tower

(Probably a Ziggurat)

They were Religious Sites…

Built to Be Meeting Places Between the Humanity & the Gods

Humanity had 2 Primary Motivations for Doing this:

They Wanted to Make a Name for Themselves

They were Prideful & Desired World Fame & Influence

They Didn’t Want to Be Scattered Throughout the World

God’s 1st Commands to Humanity…

Was to Be Fruitful, Multiply, & Fill the Earth

In Their Pride, They were Rebelling God’s Will for Humanity

If You Know the Rest of the Story…

You Know that God Created New Languages…

And Gave Them to the People…

So that They could No Longer Understand Each Other

This Forced Them to Abandon Their Prideful & Rebellious Project…

And Spread Throughout the World…

And Develop Their Own Tribes, Nations, & Cultures

The City They were Building was Called Babel (Later Babylon)

This City will Go on to Play an Important Role in the Grand Story

After Many Generations Pass…

We’re Introduced to a Man Named Abram

God is Going to Choose Him for a Very Special Purpose

What’s so Special about Abram?

Was He the Most Righteous/Holy/Devout/God-Fearing Man on Earth?

Was He Strong or Talented or Good-Looking or Unique in Any Way?

That’s Just the Thing…

Scripture Doesn’t Tell Us Anything Special about this Man

He’s Just a Man

But Through this Man, God will:

Deal with Sin

Defeat Death

Break the Curse

Through Abram…

God is Going to Save the World

When We Meet Abram…

He’s Living in a Place Called Ur…

With His Relatives & Family

Then God Calls Him to Leave His Homeland…

And Travel to the Land of Canaan

But, They End Up Staying in a Place Called “Haran”

After Abram’s Father Dies…

God, Again, Tells Abram to Go to the Land of Canaan

Our Primary Text for this Morning…

Are the Words that God Spoke to Abram:

Genesis 12:1–3 (NASB95)

1 Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go forth from your country, And from your relatives And from your father’s house, To the land which I will show you; 2 And I will make you a great nation, And I will bless you, And make your name great; And so you shall be a blessing; 3 And I will bless those who bless you, And the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.”

These 3 Verses are Made Up of 2 Imperative Commands:

1.) “Go”

2.) “Be a Blessing”

Each Command is Followed By 3 Promises…

That will Be Kept if the Commands are Obeyed

Let’s Start with the 1st Command & its 3 Conditional Promises:

Genesis 12:1–2a (NASB95)

1 Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go forth from your country, And from your relatives And from your father’s house, To the land which I will show you; 2 And I will make you a great nation, And I will bless you, And make your name great;

God Commands Abram to Go/Leave:

His Country/Land

His Extended Family

His Immediate Family

This Command would’ve Been Extremely Difficult to Obey

For Us, it’s Normal to Move Away from Family…

And Find a Job, Buy Some Land, & Start a Family

But it wasn’t that Simple in Abram’s Day

To Leave One’s Homeland & Family…

Was to Abandon One’s Own Personal Identity & Security

To Obey this Command…

Would Take an Incredible Amount of Faith/Trust

Faith/Trust in What?

That God will Keep His Promises

If Abram Obeys, God Promises to:

Make Abram a Great Nation

This Implies a Large Amount of Land & Many People

If Abram Trusts God Enough to Leave His Land & Family…

He’ll Be Rewarded with So Much More

Bless Abram

“Blessings” in Genesis Primarily Refer to 2 Things:

1.) The Blessing of Bearing Many Children

2.) The Blessing of Great Material Wealth

If Abram Trusts God Enough to Abandon His Financial Security…

He’ll Be Rewarded with More Wealth than He Ever would have had Before

Make Abram’s Name Great

Humanity’s Motivation for Building the City & Tower of Babel…

Was to Make Their Name Great

They were Prideful & Wanted to Exalt Themselves

Proverbs 16:18 (ESV)

18 Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall.

Matthew 23:12 (ESV)

12 Whoever exalts himself will be humbled, and whoever humbles himself will be exalted.

Abram Didn’t Seek After World Fame & Influence…

But God Promised it to Him…

If He’d Only Trust/Obey Him

What God is Asking of Abraham is Difficult:

“Leave Everything & Trust Me”

But God wasn’t Asking Him to Sacrifice for Nothing

His Promised Blessings Outweighed Abram’s Sacrifices

That Same Principle is True for Us as Well

Mark 10:28–30 (NIV)

28 Then Peter spoke up, “We have left everything to follow you!” 29 “Truly I tell you,” Jesus replied, “no one who has left home or brothers or sisters or mother or father or children or fields for me and the gospel 30 will fail to receive a hundred times as much in this present age: homes, brothers, sisters, mothers, children and fields—along with persecutions—and in the age to come eternal life.

When God, His Christ, & the Gospel Message…

Is Our Highest Allegiance…

God’s Blessings will Far Outweigh…

All that We Gave Up for Him

God Always Provides for His Faithful Children

All He Demands in Return is that We Trust Him

Do What He Says…

No Matter How Difficult it is

No Matter How Counter Productive it May Seem

Trust Him & Do What He Says…

And He will Provide

He Provides Us with an Abundant Life in this Age…

And in the Age to Come, Life that Never Ends

Do We Trust Him Enough to Abandon…

Anything that Threatens Our Devotion to Him?

People?

Possessions?

Selfish Desires?

Ideologies?

Abram Did

And Abram was Blessed for it

A Great Nation was Born from Him

He Gained Great Material Wealth

He Became World-Famous

Abram Trusted God…

And God Kept His Promises

Now Let’s Look at the 2nd Command & it’s 3 Promises:

Genesis 12:2b–3 (NASB95)

And so you shall be a blessing; 3 And I will bless those who bless you, And the one who curses you I will curse. And in you all the families of the earth will be blessed.”

The Command is Literally:

“Be a Blessing”

This isn’t Just a Command…

It’s an Invitation

God is Inviting Abram to Trust/Obey Him

If He Does, God will Bless Him, as He Already Said

But, God will Also Make Him Become a Blessing

But What Does it Mean for Abram to “Be a Blessing”?

God’s Blessings & Curses to the World…

Will Now Depend on the World’s Relationship to Abram

Those Who Bless/Respect Abram will Be Blessed By God

Those Who Curse/Disrespect Abram will Be Cursed By God

God’s Relationship to Humanity will Now Be Dependent…

Upon Humanity’s Relationship to Abram

In/Through Abram…

All the Families of the Earth will Be Blessed By God

Abram has Become the Medium…

Through Which God will Bless/Curse Humanity

As the Centuries would Pass…

Abram’s Descendants would Become the Nation of Israel

The Israelite People Began to Interpret God’s Blessing of Abram…

To Mean that God had, More or Less…

Given Up on the Rest of the World

“God Only Cares about/Wants to Bless Abram & His Descendants”

But that’s Not at All What God was Communicating to Abram

God Choosing/Blessing Abram wasn’t God Giving Up on the World

It was How He was Going to Bless the World

He Didn’t Just Want to Bless Abram

He Wanted to Turn Abram into a Blessing

What Abram’s Descendants Never Seemed to Grasp…

Was that They were Chosen By God…

To Bring God’s Blessings to the Entire World

When God Made a Covenant with Israel as His Special People…

And Gave Them the Law that Revealed His Heart/Character…

It wasn’t Meant to Be Only TO Israel…

But THROUGH Israel to the Rest of the World

God Didn’t Want to Simply Bless Abram & His Descendants

He Wanted to Bless the Entire World…

Through Abram & His Descendants

The Reason We’re Doing this Year-Long Series…

Is to have a Better Understanding of the Story of Scripture

It’s a Story about Redemption

God is Redeeming All Things to Himself

Abram & His Descendants Play an Important Role in that Story

Not to Be God’s Favorite People…

Whom He Exclusively Loves & Blesses

But to Be the Medium…

Through Which God Expresses His Love & Blessings…

To the Entire World

The Story Reaches its Climax…

When a Descendant of Abram is Born in Bethlehem

He will Be the One to Finally:

Deal with Sin

Defeat Death

Break the Curse

Through His Death, Resurrection, & Ascension into Heaven…

Jesus has Made Redemption Possible

Like Abram & His Descendants were Always Meant to Be…

Jesus is a Blessing to the Entire World

All Nations & Families of the Earth…

Can Receive the Blessings of God in/Through Jesus

Humanity’s Relationship with God…

Depends on Humanity’s Relationship with Christ

Those Who Accept Him will Be Blessed

Those Who Reject Him will Be Cursed

John 14:6 (ESV)

6 Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.

Galatians 3:7–9 (NIV)

7 Understand, then, that those who have faith are children of Abraham. 8 Scripture foresaw that God would justify the Gentiles by faith, and announced the gospel in advance to Abraham: “All nations will be blessed through you.” 9 So those who rely on faith are blessed along with Abraham, the man of faith.

Those with a Faith like Abraham’s…

(Who Trust in the Gospel - God’s Promise to Bless the World)…

Are Considered Children of Abraham

Galatians 3:26–29 (NASB95)

26 For you are all sons of God through faith in Christ Jesus. 27 For all of you who were baptized into Christ have clothed yourselves with Christ. 28 There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free man, there is neither male nor female; for you are all one in Christ Jesus. 29 And if you belong to Christ, then you are Abraham’s descendants, heirs according to promise.

When We Came to Faith/Trust in the Messiah, Jesus…

And Joined Him/Became His Disciples in Baptism…

We Became Descendants of Abraham & Heirs of the Promise:

We Became Recipients of the Blessings Promised to Abraham

We Took on the Mission/Purpose of Abraham:

To Be a Blessing to the World

Application

God’s Commands to Abram were:

“Go”

Leave Everything Else Behind & Simply Trust & Obey Me

“Be a Blessing”

Be a Medium of God’s Blessings to the Rest of the World

For Those of Us Who’ve Become Descendants of Abram…

By Placing Our Faith in Jesus the Christ…

We’ve Taken on that Same Mission/Purpose

Jesus Tells Us:

To Surrender All Things to Him & Simply Trust & Obey Him

To Be a Blessing to the World:

By Being Disciples…

Who Love & Serve Our Neighbor

By Making Disciples

Inviting People into:

The Family of Abram

The Blessings of Abram

The Mission of Abram

To Be a Blessing to the World Too

God Chose to Redeem His Cursed Creation…

Through the Family of Abraham

In Christ, We’re Part of that Family

We’re Part of the Story of Redemption

Do We Live Like it?

Do We have a Faith like Abraham?

Are We Following the Life & Teachings of Jesus?

Are We Being a Blessing to the World?