Blessed To Be a Blessing
Notes
Transcript
Introduction
Introduction
What does it mean to be blessed?
This is important because when we learn what it means to be “blessed” and understand that as Christians, we are called to be a “blessing” to others, this changes how we make decisions
Right now, many of you are in the stage of life where everything is essentially about you:
Where will you go to college?
What kind of career will you have?
Where are you going to live after you graduate?
All of these are important questions but I imagine your answers to these questions tend to focus on yourselves
Yet, if we understand that if we are in Christ, we are blessed to be a blessing to others, all of these questions must be answered with that in mind
“Will going to this college equip me to be used by God to bless his creation?”; “Will going to this college put me into so much debt that I become a burden to others instead of a blessing?”
“What career can I get that will help me bless my family?”; “If I work a job that allows me to make more than I need, how can I give that money to bless other people in need?”
“Is there a place that I believe I can move to where people need to hear the gospel?”
Now, understanding this requires us to look at God’s plan of redemption of how he intends to bless all the families of the earth
This means we need to study a man by the name of Abraham
The Call of Abraham
The Call of Abraham
We learned last week that in Genesis 11, God dispersed the people from the Tower of Babel and confused their languages
The purpose of this was to ensure that they fulfilled God’s command to “fill the earth” instead of just settle
We also learned that the people at the Tower of Babel simply wanted to make a great “name” for themselves for their own glory and protection
What’s interesting is that you will notice that there are two different genealogies (lists of children) for Noah’s son, Shem (Gen 10:21-32; Gen 11:10-26)
Shem actually means “name” and in his line there are two sons born at the same time
The line through one of the sons leads to the Tower of Babel (seed of the serpent)
The other line leads to Abraham (seed of the woman)
In other words, there are two ways people seek to make a “name” for themselves:
They try and make a name for themselves for their own glory which leads to judgement (Babel)
They are blessed by God who makes their name great which leads to blessings (Abraham)
Are you spending your time and energy to try and make yourself look great to others, or to show how great God is to others?
All of this leads to the call of Abraham (Abram at the time) where God gives a single command with a promise
1 The Lord said to Abram: Go from your land, your relatives, and your father’s house to the land that I will show you.
God calls Abram to “Go” and leave everything behind: his hometown, his relatives, and his family home
He was leaving everything behind for a new “home,” a land that God will give to him and his children
Let’s put this together with what we know from the Bible so far: God is taking Abraham and putting him into a place prepared for him by God
Abraham is seen here as a “new Adam”; Adam was put into the garden that was prepared for him by God
This is the call of Abraham, now let’s look at the promise given to him
The Promise to Abraham
The Promise to Abraham
The promise that God gives to Abraham is that he will “bless” him and he will be a “blessing” (v 2)
The blessing that would come through Abraham would extend to “all the peoples on earth” (v 3)
Attached to the blessing is that God would make him into a “great nation” and make his “name great”
So, what does it mean that God would “bless” Abraham and make him to be “ a blessing” to all the families of the earth?
We use this language all of the time:
“I am just so blessed”; “That gift really blessed me”
What does it mean?
The first time the word “blessed” is used is in Genesis 1:22
This is after God created the fish of the sea and birds of the air
22 God blessed them: “Be fruitful, multiply, and fill the waters of the seas, and let the birds multiply on the earth.”
Then after God creates human beings, Genesis 1:28 says:
28 God blessed them, and God said to them, “Be fruitful, multiply, fill the earth, and subdue it. Rule the fish of the sea, the birds of the sky, and every creature that crawls on the earth.”
What does this tell us about being “blessed”?
To be blessed is a way of describing the original state of God’s good creation before the Fall
It is a way of describing a return to the Garden to be in God’s direct presence and under his Fatherly care and governance
This is why we describe wanting to give gifts as a blessing to others; This reflects God’s character as seen in the Garden who gave Adam and Eve everything they could have ever wanted
This is why the “blessings” of the covenant God gave to Israel included abundant food, live stock, etc.; This is how it was in the Garden where Adam and Eve lacked in nothing
More importantly, this is why we understand that more important than physical temporal blessings are spiritual eternal blessings which are found in Christ
Paul says that God “has blessed us with every spiritual blessing in the heavenly places in Christ” (Eph 1:3)
Forgiveness of sins is listed as a spiritual blessing as Adam and Eve were without sin in the garden
Adoption as sons into God’s heavenly family is a spiritual blessing as Adam was the son of God in the Garden; Adam and Eve were part of the family of God in the Garden
These are far greater than any physical blessings! This is why the NT emphasizes spiritual blessings and does not promise physical blessings but instead promises trials and persecution in this world; Our eternal home is not this world but the new heavens and new earth to come
So, when God promises that through Abraham “ all the peoples (families) on earth will be blessed,” he is saying that through Abraham, God will bring back all the families on earth into a right relationship with himself as it was in the Garden
Abraham is here presented as the one through whom God would begin to reverse the curse that came into the world because of sin
The Seed of Abraham
The Seed of Abraham
There’s one major problem that arises right at the beginning of this narrative: Abraham’s age
God promised Abraham that he would make him into a “great nation” which would require Abraham to have children
The problem is that Abraham at the time of his calling was 75 years old (v 4) which would mean his wife, Sarah was 65, far past the age of being able to conceive a child
The other problem is that they had no children at all since Sarah was barren (15:2; 16:1)
Yet, God reiterates that Abraham and his “descendants” will inherit the land that God was bringing him to (12:7)
So, what’s going on here? Why is God calling Abraham to create a new humanity through when his wife is barren and they are childless?
17 As it is written: I have made you the father of many nations— in the presence of the God in whom he believed, the one who gives life to the dead and calls things into existence that do not exist.
God, as he did in creation, was going to “call things into existence that do no exist” by giving Abraham and Sarah children in their old age
This promise of children unfolds more in Genesis 15 where God promises to make Abraham’s descendants as numerous as the stars (Gen 15:5)
It is here that we see the great truth that a person is declared righteous by faith as Abraham believes in this promise of God and God “credited it to him as righteousness” (Gen 15:6)
In Genesis 16, we see that Sarah tells Abraham to have a child with their servant, Hagar, since she had so bore him any children
Hagar bears Abraham a son, Ishmael, but it is clear that this child is not the child of the promise that God gave as he was born of the “flesh” or natural means while the promise of the child would be born by the power of God
God reiterates the promises of the covenant of multiplying Abrahams offspring in Genesis 17 and gives Abraham the sign of the covenant, circumcision
By this point Abraham was 90 years old and Sarah was 80
Finally, when Abraham was 100 years and Sarah was 90, Sarah conceived a son and bore Abraham a child, Isaac (Gen 21:5)
The promise was beginning to be fulfilled!
Then God does something outrageous, he tells Abraham to sacrifice his son, Isaac (Gen 21)
Abraham obeys God and goes to offer up Isaac but before he could complete the sacrifice, God stopped him and provided the ram for the sacrifice instead
Now, you ask, why did God do this? Think of the picture being presented here:
Abraham, the father, is offering up his only son, the promised child, as a sacrifice on a hill
God, the Father, offers up his only Son, Jesus Christ, as the final sacrifice for sin on a hill
Then God tells Abraham, “In your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed” (Gen 22:18)
We now learn that all the nations of the earth shall be blessed (brought back to the Garden) by one of Abraham’s offspring
The NT tells us that this promise was speaking of Jesus Christ our Lord and Savior
Do you see the grand story of the Bible starting to unfold? All of this was meant to point us to Jesus who would be the promised child of Genesis 3:15 that would crush the head of the serpent, and the promised offspring of Abraham who would bless all of the nations!
All of this culminates to show God’s faithfulness to keep his promises