Abraham, Father of Faith Part 19 “The Cave of Machpelah”
Abraham, Father of Faith • Sermon • Submitted • Presented
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19 And after this, Abraham buried Sarah his wife in the cave of the field of Machpelah before Mamre: the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan.
20 And the field, and the cave that is therein, were made sure unto Abraham for a possession of a buryingplace by the sons of Heth.
Introduction
Introduction
Abraham was a nomad, a sojourner, he never owned a home in the promised land.
9 By faith he sojourned in the land of promise, as in a strange country, dwelling in tabernacles with Isaac and Jacob, the heirs with him of the same promise:
10 For he looked for a city which hath foundations, whose builder and maker is God.
Looked For = Expected
looked for—Greek, “he was expecting”; waiting for with eager expectation
He looked at the unseen world.
18 For I reckon that the sufferings of this present time are not worthy to be compared with the glory which shall be revealed in us.
19 For the earnest expectation of the creature waiteth for the manifestation of the sons of God.
Waiteth = Looked for, Expects
What was He looking for?
A city with foundations.
11 For other foundation can no man lay than that is laid, which is Jesus Christ.
He looked for a city built by God. It’s foundation is sure.
Cain laid another foundation.
17 And Cain knew his wife; and she conceived, and bare Enoch: and he builded a city, and called the name of the city, after the name of his son, Enoch.
Abraham recognized that those cities, like Ur of the Chaldees, like Sodom and Gomorrah, were built by the effort of man, with no foundation.
Everything man made will be shaken loose.
Everything will be shaken, so let me look beyond brick and mortar, let me look beyond my job, my house, my car, and let me see a city with foundations, eternal in the heavens.
We get what we expect. Abraham expected a city made by God, so he endured affliction patiently.
17 For our light affliction, which is but for a moment, worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory;
18 While we look not at the things which are seen, but at the things which are not seen: for the things which are seen are temporal; but the things which are not seen are eternal.
1 For we know that if our earthly house of this tabernacle were dissolved, we have a building of God, an house not made with hands, eternal in the heavens.
If this earthly tent be dissolved we have a “building with foundations”
Abraham’s actions were influenced by what he saw by the expectation of faith.
1 Now faith is the substance of things hoped for, the evidence of things not seen.
2 For by it the elders obtained a good report.
3 Through faith we understand that the worlds were framed by the word of God, so that things which are seen were not made of things which do appear.
He and those after him looked for, and died expecting something they never saw in life.
Paul tells us about Abel and Enoch and Noah and Abraham and Sarah, and then says this:
13 These all died in faith, not having received the promises, but having seen them afar off, and were persuaded of them, and embraced them, and confessed that they were strangers and pilgrims on the earth.
14 For they that say such things declare plainly that they seek a country.
15 And truly, if they had been mindful of that country from whence they came out, they might have had opportunity to have returned.
16 But now they desire a better country, that is, an heavenly: wherefore God is not ashamed to be called their God: for he hath prepared for them a city.
He talks about Isaac and Jacob and Joseph and Moses and Rahab.
32 And what shall I more say? for the time would fail me to tell of Gedeon, and of Barak, and of Samson, and of Jephthae; of David also, and Samuel, and of the prophets:
33 Who through faith subdued kingdoms, wrought righteousness, obtained promises, stopped the mouths of lions,
34 Quenched the violence of fire, escaped the edge of the sword, out of weakness were made strong, waxed valiant in fight, turned to flight the armies of the aliens.
35 Women received their dead raised to life again: and others were tortured, not accepting deliverance; that they might obtain a better resurrection:
36 And others had trial of cruel mockings and scourgings, yea, moreover of bonds and imprisonment:
37 They were stoned, they were sawn asunder, were tempted, were slain with the sword: they wandered about in sheepskins and goatskins; being destitute, afflicted, tormented;
38 (Of whom the world was not worthy:) they wandered in deserts, and in mountains, and in dens and caves of the earth.
39 And these all, having obtained a good report through faith, received not the promise:
40 God having provided some better thing for us, that they without us should not be made perfect.
This is what Abraham looked for, a city with foundations, a more sure word of prophecy.
All of Abraham’s actions were influenced by this city, and prefigured it.
He died expecting it.
Bro. Branham ties this to our Future Home:
This is the City that Abraham was looking for. See? Being a prophet, he knowed that City was somewhere. The Bible said so.
And he forsook the city he lived, and he went over; look where he went, exactly where it’ll be. See? “He was looking for a City Whose builder and maker was God,” see, being a prophet.
Jesus gone to prepare, with the Divine hands, a Divine City; Divine Architect, for a Divine-boughten people, for a predestinated people. He has gone to prepare.
Abraham was looking for it. “And he professed that he was a pilgrim and a stranger, for he looked for a City Whose builder and maker was God.” That prophet, knowing it was somewhere! John saw it coming down, but Abraham thought it must be on earth right then.
Why? He met Melchisedec, the King of it, and give Him a tithe. “Which had no father, or no mother. He had no beginning of life or no ending of life.”
Abraham met Him, and they took communion right on the literal spot where the City will be raised up, the holy Mountain of the Lord, where the Redeemed will live. 64-0802 - "The Future Home Of The Heavenly Bridegroom And The Earthly Bride"
Everything he did was influenced by that city. Everything we do is influenced by that city. We are looking at the unseen!
Some time ago, I remember of talking to an intellectual person, that said, “How will you ever know there is anything different than what just any religion could produce?”
I said, “I read, in the Bible, of a living God. I read of His goodness. I read of His patience and His Power. And I believed that just as much as anybody could believe it.
But one day I met that One I read about, then there was a sudden change. And I’ve never been the same since, and hope I never will be.” Something takes place. When sight fails to produce it, faith is there to catch the place and produce it.
(Abraham)
He got a glimpse of the Unseen. By faith he saw it. And the Bible says, that, “He endured, as seeing the invisible God with him,” all along the road.
When a man once catches that vision of the invisible God, and know that He’s always present, there is something that stabilizes that man’s thinking. It stabilizes his actions.
And in the time of distress and trouble, it’ll still make him look upward and above the things that are happening around him, because he’s looking at the Unseen, yet, by promise.
And the reason he believed it, was because God said it. “And if we being dead in Christ, we are Abraham’s Seed. And if the Spirit that was in Christ dwells in us, It does the same thing. It takes every Divine promise of God that’s in His Bible, and calls It present tense, and rests Itself upon there.
Where, if you look at, with your eyes, and you see now that our nation is shaking and trembling. Wars’ clouds are flying everywhere; every nation under distressed and perplexed of time.
Every sign, that Jesus said would happen, is happening. “There would be signs in the heavens above and in the earth below.” And great things would be taking place, like the flying saucers and mystic things taking place.
But He commanded His Church to lift up their heads, in that day, and to look up, for the unseen Christ will be appearing pretty soon.
So if we only walk by sight, we would be children of darkness, sure enough now. But I’m so glad to know that there is a Light that shines in every believer’s heart, until that Eternal Day when Jesus shall come. 58-1003 - "Looking At The Unseen"
When Sarah died Abraham knew it wasn’t over.
1 And Sarah was an hundred and seven and twenty years old: these were the years of the life of Sarah.
2 And Sarah died in Kirjath-arba; the same is Hebron in the land of Canaan: and Abraham came to mourn for Sarah, and to weep for her.
3 And Abraham stood up from before his dead, and spake unto the sons of Heth, saying,
4 I am a stranger and a sojourner with you: give me a possession of a buryingplace with you, that I may bury my dead out of my sight.
The closest thing to Abraham’s life in modern times would be the Bedouin. Observers like Lawrence of Arabia said that the Bedouin usually buried their dead in a simple ceremony in the place where they died. A shallow grave and a pile of rocks.
Abraham did something different, he began to negotiate a price for the land.
12 And Abraham bowed down himself before the people of the land.
13 And he spake unto Ephron in the audience of the people of the land, saying, But if thou wilt give it, I pray thee, hear me: I will give thee money for the field; take it of me, and I will bury my dead there.
They begin to negotiate backwards.
14 And Ephron answered Abraham, saying unto him,
15 My lord, hearken unto me: the land is worth four hundred shekels of silver; what is that betwixt me and thee? bury therefore thy dead.
16 And Abraham hearkened unto Ephron; and Abraham weighed to Ephron the silver, which he had named in the audience of the sons of Heth, four hundred shekels of silver, current money with the merchant.
17 And the field of Ephron, which was in Machpelah, which was before Mamre, the field, and the cave which was therein, and all the trees that were in the field, that were in all the borders round about, were made sure
18 Unto Abraham for a possession in the presence of the children of Heth, before all that went in at the gate of his city.
They marked off the borders and made a deed.
Why this particular field?
Abraham would have known what Job said about the resurrection.
23 Oh that my words were now written! Oh that they were printed in a book!
24 That they were graven with an iron pen and lead In the rock for ever!
25 For I know that my redeemer liveth, And that he shall stand at the latter day upon the earth:
26 And though after my skin worms destroy this body, Yet in my flesh shall I see God:
27 Whom I shall see for myself, And mine eyes shall behold, and not another; Though my reins be consumed within me.
Something happened to Job, He said “I Know”.
Abraham said, “I’ve had the same kind of a vision. When up yonder on the mountain, when (Christ) God met me, and give me the…His redemptive names, as Jehovah-jireh, Jehovah-rapha, and all those; seeing the death, burial, and resurrection.
(Typed in Isaac)
Knowing that I had received him as one from the dead, I believed that He would raise him up again. And through this great hope that beats in my heart, I know He said that He could raise him up.” See? It was a foresight of the resurrection; the same thing Job had.
So he said, “Now, I’m a joint heir with Job, so bury me in the same ground.” That’s right. So they took him over there, took Sarah over and buried her right near Job.
It was the revelation of resurrection in Abraham’s heart that made him buy the field. The resurrection in your heart makes you want to serve God.
Job, when he seen this! And Abraham saw it; he buried Sarah near Job. Purchased the field, bought it with his money, so that it would be assured.
Put witnesses before it, that he was assured he bought this field for a burying place. And then, Abraham himself, when he died, he was buried with them, also, in the same field. 55-0410S - "My Redeemer Liveth"
9 And his sons Isaac and Ishmael buried him in the cave of Machpelah, in the field of Ephron the son of Zohar the Hittite, which is before Mamre;
When Jacob got through blessing his children he said:
29 And he charged them, and said unto them, I am to be gathered unto my people: bury me with my fathers in the cave that is in the field of Ephron the Hittite,
30 In the cave that is in the field of Machpelah, which is before Mamre, in the land of Canaan, which Abraham bought with the field of Ephron the Hittite for a possession of a buryingplace.
31 There they buried Abraham and Sarah his wife; there they buried Isaac and Rebekah his wife; and there I buried Leah.
Joseph said the same.
24 And Joseph said unto his brethren, I die: and God will surely visit you, and bring you out of this land unto the land which he sware to Abraham, to Isaac, and to Jacob.
25 And Joseph took an oath of the children of Israel, saying, God will surely visit you, and ye shall carry up my bones from hence.
Why? By Eyes of Faith they saw the place of the resurrection. All of these Patriarchs waited in paradise until Jesus died. When He died the veil was rent:
52 And the graves were opened; and many bodies of the saints which slept arose,
53 And came out of the graves after his resurrection, and went into the holy city, and appeared unto many.
When Jesus raised from the dead, Job seen that coming, said, “I know my Redeemer liveth. The last days, He’ll stand upon this earth. Though the skin worms has destroyed this body, yet in my flesh I’ll see God. I’ll see Him.”
That quickening power come into the grave of Job, where there wasn’t even a spoonful of the dust of his bones left. After all those hundreds, and hundreds, and hundreds of years, his bones had decayed. It went back, and turned back to the gases of the earth, and just a mere ash dust laid there.
But, yet, when that quickening power, according to the Word of God, to the promise, hundreds and hundreds, yes, thousands of years later, when that quickening power was brought forth from the grave; Job, Abraham, Isaac, Jacob, all of them, come out of the grave with Him. 65-0410 - "The Easter Seal"
They knew that firstfruits of resurrection was coming out of the promised land, not Egypt. They were spiritual, they were prophets.
And when Jesus died, on Good Friday, and raised up on Easter morning, the following Sunday morning, the Bible said that, “Many of the saints that slept in the dust of the earth, raised up and come out of the graves, went into the city, went on into Glory with Him.”
Why? It was them prophets that knowed exactly where to be buried, at the place and at the time. It was hid from the eyes of the wise. But they knew what, they looked at the Spirit side. The firstfruits of the resurrection was to come out of Palestine, not out of Egypt.
So is it today, friends. So many people hold onto things of the world, or some great system or something. Bury me in Jesus, for those that are in Christ will God bring with Him in that resurrection.
And I don’t care what the world’s got to say, how much they try to tinselize things. It’s in Christ, those that are in Christ that God will bring with Him. The spiritual mind catches those spiritual things. 63-1214 - "Why Little Bethlehem"
10 And ye are complete in him, which is the head of all principality and power:
11 In whom also ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands, in putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ:
12 Buried with him in baptism, wherein also ye are risen with him through the faith of the operation of God, who hath raised him from the dead.
13 And you, being dead in your sins and the uncircumcision of your flesh, hath he quickened together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses;
14 Blotting out the handwriting of ordinances that was against us, which was contrary to us, and took it out of the way, nailing it to his cross;
15 And having spoiled principalities and powers, he made a shew of them openly, triumphing over them in it.
If you are buried with Him in baptism you are raised with Him in life.
3 Know ye not, that so many of us as were baptized into Jesus Christ were baptized into his death?
4 Therefore we are buried with him by baptism into death: that like as Christ was raised up from the dead by the glory of the Father, even so we also should walk in newness of life.
5 For if we have been planted together in the likeness of his death, we shall be also in the likeness of his resurrection:
6 Knowing this, that our old man is crucified with him, that the body of sin might be destroyed, that henceforth we should not serve sin.
7 For he that is dead is freed from sin.
We are baptized by the Spirit.
13 For by one Spirit are we all baptized into one body, whether we be Jews or Gentiles, whether we be bond or free; and have been all made to drink into one Spirit.
No wonder they said, “Bury me in Palestine.” They knowed the resurrection was going to be in Palestine.
Therefore, today, brother, you can have whatever you want to, all the old cold formal religion you want to, but, bury me in Christ, for those that are in Christ will God bring with Him in the resurrection.
Say whatever you want to, and call it fanaticism and whatever you want to do, but just let me stay in Him, for those that are in Him is coming out of the grave on the resurrection, for God shall bring them up. He promised to do it. Amen! 53-0326 - "Israel And The Church #2"
Conclusion
Conclusion
Let me baptized in His Name, filled with the Holy Ghost, buried in the Word.
My Hope is in the Lord
