A Firm Faith

Introduction

Well, good morning!

If you have your Bible and I hope that you do, open ‘em up with me to Genesis chapter 15. We’re gonna be verses 7 through 21 this morning.

Listen, while we were in Honduras a couple of weeks ago…the main question we asked people as we went door to door, it was “what would happen if you were to die today?” We asked that question at just about every house we visited…and listen, for me and my team, we always asked that question after we asked if they knew who Jesus was. Most of the time, people would say, “Yes!…He’s God! He died on the cross!” But when we asked ‘em, “What would happen if you died today?” Almost every signal time, they didn’t know…there wasn’t any certainty or assurance. We heard all kinds of answers. People would say, “Well, that’s something only God knows,” right? Like its some kind of secret that God doesn’t want anyone else to know. They’d say, “Well, if I’m a good enough person, when I die, I’ll go to heaven…but that’s IF I do certain things.” There’s still a ton of uncertainty in that answer, right? Like what’s good enough? They won’t know until they’re actually standing before Jesus to give an account.

Let me ask you that question, “What would happen if you died today?”

Hopefully, your faith, its rooted in the person and work of Jesus and you have no doubt in your mind that you’re gonna be wherever Jesus is because of everything He’s accomplished for you, right? But maybe you’re sitting there and you don’t know…you have no idea! You’re thinking about that question, and there’s no certainty in your faith.

Listen, I wanna say this before we read our passage and before we walk through it…God, He wants us as believers to have the upmost confidence in His promises and in the future He’s secured for us by His own power. And I know…its a touchy topic…perseverance of the saints…or eternal security…but that’s what this passage is all about. Abram literally says, “But God…how am I supposed to know that all these things are actually gonna happen?” He says that on the heels on Genesis 15:6, “And he believed the Lord, and he counted it to him as righteousness.”

“God, how I am supposed to know? How am I supposed to be confident that what you’ve told me 20 times already is actually gonna happen?”

Guys, if that’s my kid…I’m not answering from a place of patience. But God, instead…He gives Abram undenying assurance. And listen, He does that because God wants believers to trust in His power. We’re saved not because of anything we’ve done but because of the God we serve…and our future as believers, its secure, not because of anything we’ll do…not because of any choices we’ll make…not because of our works or lack of work…but because of the work Jesus did on the cross. God wants us to have confidence that what He promises, it will come to pass. That’s exactly what we see here with Abram. What He’s promised Abram…He wants Abram to know, its gonna happen…and its gonna happen despite you…its gonna happen because of who I am!

And so, if you’re there with me this morning, would you stand with me as we read our passage together? It says this, starting in verse 7:

Genesis 15:7–21 (ESV)

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, “O Lord God, how am I to know that I shall possess it?” He said to him, “Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtledove, 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 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 four hundred 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 fire pot 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 (Ken-nites), the Kenizzites (Ken-knee-zites), the Kadmonites (Kad-ma-nites), the Hittites (Hit-tites), the Perizzites (Pear-a-zites), the Rephaim (Ra-finem), the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Girgashites and the Jebusites.”

Thank you, you can be seated.

[Prayer]

If you’re taking notes, I’ve got three points for us this morning. Number one, assurance is the result of Jesus’s work…Number two, assurance is reserved for believers…and then number three, assurance is confirmed by God’s Word.

And so, if you’re tracking with me…let’s look at this first point together.

I. Assurance is the Result of Jesus’s Work (vv. 7-9)

Assurance is the result of Jesus’s work.

I think it’s pretty clear at this point, as we’ve walked through the life of Abram…I think it’s pretty clear who’s initiated and who’s sustained and who’s followed through on their promises, right?

In fact, on the heels of everything we looked at last week, God reminds Abram of this again in verse 7. He says, “I am the Lord who brought you out from Ur of the Chaldeans to give you this land to possess.”

Abram, he didn’t dream up this idea of moving to Canaan on his own…He didn’t dream up this idea of starting a new religion. He didn’t map out this master strategy for taking the land from the Canaanites. God did it all. God was the one who promised…Abram just received what God promised.

And listen, I just want you to remember our passage from last week. Abram, he was lying in bed, feeling some anxieties from his decisions back in Genesis 14, and it shows us that God came to him…God comforted him. God reminded Abram of the promise he made of offspring and land. And immediately, Abram questioned, “Will I really have offspring? Will they really be from my body?” And you remember what God said? He reaffirmed His promise, right? He told him to walk outside, gaze at the stars…his offspring, they’d be as numerous as those. And it says, “[Abram] believed the Lord, and [God] counted it (He reckoned it or credited it or imputed) it to him as righteousness.” Meaning, even Abram’s righteousness, it was all God’s doing.

But if you remember, when we started walking through the life of Abram, I said this promise, it came to him in the form of two parts, right? A people and a land. God just encouraged him and reminded him that an offspring would come from him and not just any offspring but that it would lead to THE promised offspring from Genesis 3. But now, God shifts and encourages Abram’s heart, reminding him that he’d also receive land.

This opening phrase, “I am the Lord who brought you out,” its an important phrase that God would use later to remind Moses at Sinai…who did the work in delivering the Israelites from Egypt? Exodus 20:2:

Exodus 20:2 (ESV)

“I am the Lord your God, who brought you out of the land of Egypt, out of the house of slavery.

God cares about His glory and God wants us to remember who’s done the work in our salvation. Abram was delivered from Ur, by God’s power…the Israelites, they were delivered from Egypt, by God’s power…and likewise, we were delivered from darkness and slavery and sin, by what? By God’s power. The Lord glories in what he’s accomplished as both an act of power and of grace. Yes, Abram got on his donkey with his family and headed out, but it was the Lord who told him to do so and it was the Lord who ensured he’d make it safely to the Promised Land.

But listen, I love this…look at how Abram responds to God’s statement. Verse 8, “O Lord God, how am I to know that I shall possess it?”

ABRAM?! Dude?! Like what’s wrong with you? Guys, I just struggle when my kids ask me like three times for the same thing…Literally on the heels of God comforting his fears…a few verses back…he’s questions God all over again. Like, if you’re standing by Abram as he’s doing this…he’s the guy you’re gonna move over for because you just know God’s about to strike that guy down, right? Like what’s wrong with you? For record, we’re gonna talk about this in just a second but Abram’s question, its not coming from a bad place…its coming from a fearful place. The point of it being here, its to show us that Abram’s powerless in fulfilling God’s promises on his own. It’s all God’s doing!

But listen, here’s what I love…instead of reprimanding Abram…God initiates a covenant with him. Look at verse 9, “He said to him, “Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years old, a ram three years old, a turtledove, and a young pigeon.”

Now, notice, God, He’s not negotiating the terms here. He’s not asked Abram his opinion…He doesn’t tell Abram that its gonna happen because He’s believed and been counted righteous, right? None of it’s Abram’s doing. Instead, God gives further proof that everything He’s promised, its gonna happen solely because of who He is and because of everything He’s doing. He tells him, “Get me these animals…we’re gonna make a covenant and I’m gonna show you that these things are gonna happen because of my faithfulness.”

Now, we’ll talk about the details of this covenant in just a moment, but guys you have to see that God’s doing all the work here…God’s doing everything to show Abram, to give Abram assurance that what He’s promised, it will happen. And notice, the Hebrew word for “making” a covenant, it literally means “cutting” a covenant…which we see in God’s instructions to Abram here. Abram, he “cuts” these animals because ultimately this type of oath or commitment…this type of faithful binding, it requires blood. Why? Because as we’ll talk about, God cares about life.

When you get to the end of this chapter, Abram he sees some things happen, right? There’s a smoking fire pot…there’s a flaming torch that passes between all the animal pieces that Abram cuts up. And I get it, this sounds strange…its a little weird…but here’s what you need to know…both are symbols of God. Abram, he’s sleeping through this…This picture here, remembering the context of Genesis…who wrote it? Moses…Who was the original audience? The Israelites, wandering around in the desert…this picture it was meant to remind them that God was the pillar of cloud and the fire that led them, day and night.

These two symbols, the fire and the cloud, as Alexander Maclaren observes, point to the double aspect of God’s nature, that “He can never be completely known; and [that] He’s never completely hid.” But also, “It speaks of the twofold aspect of the divine nature, by which to hearts that love, He’s gladsome light, and to unloving ones, He’s threatening darkness. As to the Israelites the pillar was light, and to the Egyptians darkness and terror; so the same God is joy to some, and dread to others”

But guys, the main point here, its that God alone, He passed between the animal pieces. It was a unilateral covenant between Him and Abram…one in which everything was dependent on God alone. All Abram could do was snore and receive what God provided.

And so, how’s all this relate to us? Just as God gave Abram this graphic picture of His covenant and its approval to assure him…He’s given us a very graphic picture in the New Testament of the New Covenant through Jesus.

I mean think about the Lord’s Supper, we just observed that last week. We have this visual reminder that God’s entered into a covenant with us and that He’ll keep His promises to us. It shows us that through Jesus, by sending His Son…through Jesus’s body, through Jesus’s blood…through His death on the cross…its a reminder that He chose us when we were yet still dead in our sins. He sealed the covenant with Jesus’s blood…and all we can do is receive what He’s done. Our assurance of salvation, it doesn’t depend on our shaky performance…it depends on God’s sure promise.

Listen, just think about it…if our salvation rested on our choice of God or if it rested on our actions…how could we ever be sure that what He’s promised would actually happen? I mean, we’re just like Abram…we doubt, we second guess…we wonder if what we know to be true is really true. There’s no assurance in those things.

Dear Christian, listen to the Word of God…our assurance, it rests on God’s sovereign choice of us and on His finished work through Christ…We can be assured that “He who began a good work in [us] will perfect it until the day of Christ Jesus” (Philippians 1:6). And listen, we can be sure…especially as we see this constant doubt of Abram here through his life, that God wants us to be confident in His promises…that He wants to assure us that what He promises will come to pass.

But listen, as we’re impacted by the sure promises of God, something in us changes…which moves us into point two.

II. Assurance is Reserved for Believers (vv. 10-11)

Assurance is reserved for believers.

Now we have to remember, these verses, they follow what Moses wrote in Genesis 15:6:

Genesis 15:6 (ESV)

And [Abram] believed the Lord, and [God] counted it to him as righteousness.

Meaning, according to the Word of God, Abram believed in God’s promises. He had faith that what God said, it would come to pass. It sounds like Abram’s doubting here when he asks that question in verse 8, but remember last week…God knows us, right? God knows our motives…He knows our hearts. Abram wasn’t questioning God in this sense to challenge Him or call him a liar…He’s just struggling, internally, emotionally. I’m sure all kinds of people close to him are pushing back. “What are doing Abram? Why’d you lead us out here Abram?” It’s not coming from a place of unbelief…I think its coming from a place of pain and anxiety.

I mean if you’re familiar with Zecharias in the New Testament, that’s a story of unbelief. When the angel told him about John…he said the same thing, “How shall I know this?” He asked in complete unbelief and because of that he was struck dumb until John was born, right? We don’t see that with Abram here.

Abram, as we’ve seen over and over again…he was submissive to the Lord. When the Lord told him to do something…he did it…no if, and’s, or but’s…he didn’t ask questions…he just did it.

And so, understand when Abram says, “Lord how shall I know…?” He’s not shaking his fists at God…He’s not demanding an answer…Put yourself in His shoes, he’s struggling…he’s a foreigner, living in a tent…he’s given everything up…it seems everyone’s against him…he’s asking from a place of submission. He’s asking for assurance…confirmation.

And listen, I think Abram’s submission, its seen in verses 10 and 11. God told him to go and get some animals…and what he’d do? Verse 10, “10 And he brought him all these, cut them in half, and laid each half over against the other.

Now there’s some that put a lot of significance in the number and kinds of animals here, but I just have trouble putting that much in those interpretations…I try and figure out, “What’s the clear, simple, plain meaning of the text,” right? And listen, I think its pretty simple here, it’s about Abram’s obedience.

Understand this…God doesn’t meet the demands of skeptic’s. An unbeliever isn’t gonna come to God and demand proof that He exist. God doesn’t work like that. And listen, its not that God doesn’t love the skeptic, its just that the need for them, its not evidence, its repentance…they need to hear truth. God only gives assurance to those who’ve put their trust in Jesus and who’ve come to Him with a submissive, obedient heart. He gives believers the assurance they need to go on believing. As Jesus said in Matthew 25:29:

Matthew 25:29 (ESV)

For to everyone who has will, more be given, and he will have an abundance. But from the one who has not, even what he has will be taken away.

“Well, then,” you might say, “how can I have the faith I need to get assurance?” It’s sounds almost like when an employer tells you that you need experience to be hired but nobody’ll hire you to give you that experience, right?

The answer…we need to repent of our unbelief. Unbelief isn’t a condition which we’re helpless to remedy. Unbelief, its a sin…we choose to not believe because ultimately we don’t wanna turn from our own rebellion against God…we don’t wanna lose control…we don’t wanna be told what we have to belief. But guys, the Bible shows us that if we’d just submit to Him as our Sovereign Lord…God will give us the assurance we need to go on believing…even though we may never realize God’s promises in our lifetime (just like Abram)! And so we yield our will to God…we cry out to God, “Help my unbelief!” Assurance, God’s assurance…confidence in His promises, its reserved for believers. You can’t trust God at His Word if you haven’t first repented and turned to Him. It’s not for skeptics…its not for unbelievers. Which is why Abram responds the way he does…its why what happens here, it comforts him…it moves him to action…and He believes God.

And listen, you might just be struggling with assurance today, you might refuse to accept that God’s gonna give believers what He’s promises regardless of what it is they do, because you haven’t turned to Him fully, you haven’t experienced that grace for your yourself. You’re approaching it like a skeptic, and God doesn’t comfort skeptics, He comforts and assures believers.

Which leads us to how God assures us as believers.

III. Assurance is Confirmed by God’s Word (vv. 12-21)

Point number 3…assurance, its confirmed by God’s Word.

Listen, if you’re reading this and you doubt God’s intentions here…He makes it very clear in these next couple of verses.

Look at verse 12 with me again. God puts Abram to sleep. That word there, it means an “absolute” sleep. It’s the same thing we see with Adam back in Genesis chapter 2…its a God ordained sleep. And then God tells Abram, in verse 13, “Know for certain…” “Know for certain that your offspring, [know they’re gonna be] sojourners in a land that’s not theirs and [that they’ll] be servants there, and they’ll be afflicted for four hundred years.”

“Know for certain…”, God says! God wants His children to have the upmost confidence in His promises! He’s gonna take care of us, no matter what we do…no matter what we choose. We’re His and we’ll always be His and He wants us to know that. As believers, people who’ve been drawn by the Holy Spirit, people who’ve repented and believed in the name of Jesus as Lord and Savior…we’re now people that belong to God and we’re people that will inherit everything God’s promised, despite what it is we do. God wants us to have confidence in the power of His work.

For parents out there…its almost like with your own children. They might rebellion…they might choose to make your life hard…they may even go wayward later on in life, but as mom and dad, you’ll always love them and you’ll always care for them. And listen, our love for our children, its an imperfect kind of love but if you make ‘em a promise, you’ll keep it, right?…God’s love for us…its so much greater…He wants us to have assurance that what He’s said will come to pass, it will happen just as He’s said…which is why He’s given us His Word and why He’s given us so much prophecy in His Word. He wants us to see that what He’s promised, it happens exactly as He’s said.

God tells Abram here that he can “know for certain” things about the future, right? Knowledge about the future, it gives us assurance in the present. Abram was able to go on trusting God, believing in His promises, because he knew that God was working all things out in His great timeline of history…which Abram knew was far bigger than his own life span…which is exactly what God reveals.

He shows him that his “descendants, [they’re gonna be] strangers in a land that’s not theirs, [that they’ll] be servants or slaves there, for four hundred years.” Listen, if you know your Bibles, if you know what follows the book of Genesis, this prophecy it happens when the Hebrews are forced to travel into Egypt because of a famine. They become slaves there and for 430 years, they’d remain until God pulled ‘em out and delivered ‘em.

God tells Abram in verse 14, “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.”

God says, your people might become slaves, but I’m gonna judge the Egyptians…I’m gonna bring judgments upon them. Which He does, right? It’s awful! He turns the Nile to blood and He sends the locusts…He takes every firstborn male…its awful! And we know God delivers the Hebrews…and listen, when they come out, the plagues were so bad, the Egyptians, they literally give them everything they own because they just want ‘em to leave.

And then He puts in that last statement, “…they shall come back here in the fourth generation,” giving about another 100 years or so, for He says, “the iniquity of the Amorites isn’t yet complete.” It’s just another foreshadowing of what’s to happen…the people in Canaan, they’d become more and more evil to the point where God deems it just to command the Israelites to kill ‘em all. He commands genocide of a people because ultimately, their sins are so great!

People ask, especially in theology classes, why’d God command genocide? Why or how could a good and loving God command this? Read this verse! He’s being gracious…He didn’t judge those people until their sins were deserving of it. God’s a good and just God! That phrase, it tells us that God has a predetermined limit to which He allows nations to go in their sin before He steps in and judges them. It shows us the awesome sovereignty of God, who knows in advance when the sins of a nation will be ripe for judgment.

It also shows the great patience of the Lord, who “isn’t slow about His promise, as some count slowness, but is patient toward you, not wishing for any to perish but for all to come to repentance” (2 Pet. 3:9). Even though it meant that His chosen people would endure 400 years of hardship, God wouldn’t let them invade the land and wipe out these wicked people until those people had filled up their iniquity in His sight.

And so, what’s the practical point of God’s prophetic word to Abram here? It’s that Abram could endure without seeing the fulfillment of God’s promises in his own lifetime, solely because he was assured by God’s prophetic word. And Abram’s descendants could endure 400 years of bondage in Egypt without doubting God, because they knew that God had predicted it and even ordained it, and that it was working into His sovereign purpose for the nations.

And so, what’s the point of all this for us? Everything that God said would happen, guess what? It happened! And that’s the great value of God’s Word to us. While God’s timeline might not always be to our liking or match what we want…it’s always on time. It seems, at times that wicked people are prospering…gaining a footing…but understand this, God predicted it and He’s keeping a tally of their sins. When His time comes, judgement will fall just as we looked at several weeks ago when we walked through Revelation. He works all things in history after the counsel of His will (Eph. 1:11).

Even if we as His people suffer persecution or trials, we can trust that His sovereign plan, it will happen…and we can be assured that God will fulfill His promises to His covenant people.

Listen, just as we talked about as we walked through Revelation, it doesn’t matter the view you take of biblical prophecy, as long as you know that God’s side, its gonna win…and God’s promises, they’re gonna happen. We can trust Him and we can be assured that our salvation, its secure because His Word, it reveals His great plan for our future!

God isn’t just a God of words, He’s a God of action…which is exactly why this passage, it concludes with God’s part in sealing the covenant with Abram. I think God put Abram to sleep here because He wanted Him to know beyond any shadow of doubt that God made this covenant alone…and that God would fulfill this covenant alone…by His power!

Closing

Would you bow your head and close your eyes?

Listen, I have no idea what some of you struggling with this morning. I do know that, some of you, you’re hurting…you’re grieving…you’re confused…maybe you’ve been asking God, “Why?…Why are these happening?”

Let me just read a snippet of Paul’s letter to the Ephesians to you this morning.

Starting in chapter 1, verse 3:

Ephesians 1:3–14 (ESV)

Blessed be the God and Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who has blessed us in Christ with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places, even as he chose us in him before the foundation of the world, that we should be holy and blameless before him. In love he predestined us for adoption to himself as sons through Jesus Christ, according to the purpose of his will, to the praise of his glorious grace, with which he has blessed us in the Beloved. In him we have redemption through his blood, the forgiveness of our trespasses, according to the riches of his grace, which he lavished upon us, in all wisdom and insight making known to us the mystery of his will, according to his purpose, which he set forth in Christ as a plan for the fullness of time, to unite all things in him, things in heaven and things on earth.

In him we have obtained an inheritance, having been predestined according to the purpose of him who works all things according to the counsel of his will, so that we who were the first to hope in Christ might be to the praise of his glory. In him you also, when you heard the word of truth, the gospel of your salvation, and believed in him, were sealed with the promised Holy Spirit, who is the guarantee of our inheritance until we acquire possession of it, to the praise of his glory.

Dear Christian, listen to the words of Paul…whatever it is you’re struggling with…whatever’s on your heart…whatever’s burdening you…hear his words. You’re blessed…just like Abram. You’re chosen…you’re accepted…you’ve been redeemed…you have this wonderful inheritance…you’re sealed with the Holy Spirit, whose the guarantee of that inheritance…Listen, if you keep going in that letter, you’re member of Jesus’s body…you’ve been raised to life…you’re His workmanship…you’ve been purchased…You’re reconciled…You’re adopted…You’re His heir!

Have assurance that what God’s promised…its true…and it will come to pass. Yes, we face hardships…yes, we face trials…but God hasn’t left you or forsaken you. His promises, they will happen.

But dear friend, if you don’t know Jesus as your Lord and Savior this morning…If you’ve not placed your faith and trust in Him, if you’ve not turned to Him…do that today! The Bible says repent and believe.

Understand that while God created man perfectly in the beginning, that Adam chose to rebel…and by nature, from that point on, by one man’s actions, we’ve all been under this curse. We’re all born into sin…with this sin nature…and by choice we all continue to rebel and turn from God today. The Bible, it says, that “none are righteous, no not one…all fall short of God’s glory!…none seek Him.” And listen, because of this truth, every one of us, we’ll all face the consequences of sin, which is death.

But listen, while we were all made sinners through Adam…through another man, Jesus, we’re made righteous. God desired us so much that He came to us Himself through His Son, Jesus. Jesus lived a perfect life…He went to the cross where our sins were placed on Him, undeservingly…and He died our death…the death we deserve. And listen, God’s wrath against our sin, it was satisfied in Jesus. And the Bible says that when we simply repent and believe…when we turn from this world and turn to Jesus…when we believe He’s Lord and raised from the death…it says, we can be saved. It’s that simple!

And so listen, as we close this morning, the praise team, they’re gonna play, and I challenge you…turn to Jesus. You can do that where you’re at…you can come talk to me…but repent and believe.

For the rest of us, I just challenge you…seek the Lord and be reminded of His promises to us.

You take this time, and we’ll close in just a moment.

[Prayer]