Episode Transcript
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I'm going to have you sit this
morning as I actually have a longer passage
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to read than is in your bulletin's
going to continue in Romans nine, four
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through five, but after reading that
I'm going to read a longest chapter in
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the book of acts, and I'll
explain why in just a moment. I'm,
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as you're, turning to Romans nine, versus, for and five.
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Of course, if you've been with
us for the last several weeks know that
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we've been moving through these verses.
I'm sort of Noun by Noun and thinking
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and considering what it is that God
has given to his people. And Paul
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says, there are these things that
belong to the Israelites and we've been considering
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each one of them. Today we
consider this word Patriarchs, or father's,
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and in doing so I want to
focus on Stephens speech and acts seven and
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consider what that has to say about
the Patriarchs. Stephen has actually quite a
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lot to say which will help us
to understand what Paul means here and how
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things we ought to conclude from it. So, with that brief introduction,
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let's hear Romans nine, versus four
and five. They are Israelites and to
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them belong the adoption, the glory, the covenants, the giving of the
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law, the worship and the promises. To Them Belong the Patriarchs and from
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their race, according to the Flesh, is the Christ who is God over
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all, blessed forever. Men.
Now we turn to acts chapter seven to
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hear a Stephen's speech. For those
of you who aren't very familiar with the
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Old Testament, this is your golden
moment. Stephen here in this speech gives
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an overview of the entire Old Testament. So that's why I say it's a
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little long, but it's a lot
shorter than the old testament is. We
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have just one chapter here. Acts
Chapter Seven, Stephen Thinks about who the
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fathers are of Israel and their relationship
to God. You remember that Stephen was
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one of these early Christians greatly blessed
by God. He was doing various signs
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and miracles, and the Jews,
who had crucified Jesus, were not happy
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about this. They spread lies and
false witnesses, brought him in before a
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council and demand him to speak.
In Verse Fifteen of Chapter Six we read
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and gazing at him, all who
sat in the council saw that his face
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was like the face of an angel. Can you imagine? Now? Here's
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what Stephen says in Acts Chapter Seven. And the high priest said, are
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these things so? And Stephen said, brothers and fathers, hear me.
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The God of glory appeared to our
father Abraham when he was in Mesopotamia,
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before he lived in Harn, and
said to him, go out from your
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land and from your kindred and go
into the land that I will show you.
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Then he went out from the land
of the Chaldeans and lived in Harn,
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and after his father died, God
removed him from there into the land
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in which you are now living.
Yet he gave him no inheritance in it,
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not even a foot's length, but
promised to give it to him as
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a possession and to his offspring after
him, though he had no child,
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and God spoke to this effect that
his offspring would be sojourners in a land
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belonging to others who would enslave them
and afflict them for four hundred years.
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But I will judge the nation that
they serve, said God, and after
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that they shall come out and place
me in this place. And he gave
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him the covenant of Circumcision. And
so Abraham became the father of Isaac and
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circumcised him on the eighth day,
and Isaac became the father of Jacob,
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and Jacob of the Twelve Patriarchs,
and the Patriarchs, jealous of Joseph,
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sold him into Egypt. But God
was with him and rescued him out of
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all his afflictions and gave him favor
and wisdom before Pharaoh, King of Egypt,
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who made him ruler over Egypt and
over all his household. Now there
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came a famine throughout all Egypt and
Canaan with great affliction, and our fathers
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could find no food. But when
Jacob heard that there was grain in Egypt,
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he sent out our fathers on their
first visit, and on the second
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visit Joseph Made himself known to his
brothers and Joseph's family became known to Pharaoh,
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and Joseph sent and summoned Jacob,
his father and all his kindred,
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seventy five persons in all. And
Jacob went down into Egypt and he died,
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he and our fathers, and they
were carried back to Shechem and laid
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in the tomb that Abraham had bought
for a sum of silver from the sons
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of Hamor in Shechem. But as
the time of the promise drew near which
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God had granted to Abraham, the
people increased and multiplied in Egypt until there
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arose over Egypt another king who did
not know Joseph. He dealt shrewdly with
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our race and forced our fathers to
expose their infants so that they would not
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be kept alive. At this time
Moses was born and he was beautiful in
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God's sight, and he was brought
up for three months in his father's house.
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And when he was exposed, Fay
rose daughter adopted him and brought him
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up as her own son. And
Moses was instructed in all the wisdom of
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the Egyptians and he was mighty in
his words and deeds. When he was
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forty years old, it came into
his heart to visit his brothers, the
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children of Israel, and, seeing
one of them being wrong, he defended
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the oppressed man and avenged him by
striking down the Egyptian. He supposed that
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his brothers would understand that God was
giving them salvation by his hand, but
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they did not understand and on the
following day he appeared to them as they
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were quarreling and tried to reconcile them, saying, men, you are brothers,
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why do you wrong each other?
But the man who was wronging his
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neighbor thrust him aside, saying who
made you a ruler and judge over us?
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Do you want to kill me as
you killed the Egyptian yesterday? At
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this retort, Moses fled and became
an exile in the land of Midian,
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where he became the father of two
sons. Now, when forty years had
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passed, an angel appeared to him
in the Wilderness of Mount Sinai. In
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a flame of fire in a Bush. When Moses saw it, he was
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amazed at the sight and as he
drew near to look, there came the
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voice of the Lord. I am
the God of your father's the God of
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Abraham and of Isaac and of Jacob, and Moses trembled and did not dare
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to look. Then the Lord said
to him, take off the sandals from
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your feet, for the place where
you are standing is holy ground. I
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have surely seen the affliction of my
people who are in Egypt, and I
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have heard their groaning, and I
have come down to deliver them, and
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now come I will send you to
Egypt. This Moses whom they rejected,
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saying who made you a ruler and
a judge? This man God sent as
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both ruler and redeemer by the hand
of an angel who appeared to him in
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the Bush. This man led them
out, performing wonders and signs in Egypt
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and at the Red Sea and in
the Wilderness for forty years. And this
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is the Moses who said to the
Israelites, God will raise up for you
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a prophet like me from your brothers. This is the one who was in
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the congregation, in the Wilderness,
with the angel who spoke to him at
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Mount Sinai, and with our fathers, he received living oracles to give to
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us. Our fathers refused to obey
him, but thrust him aside, and
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in their hearts they turned to Egypt, sang to Aran. Make for US
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gods who will go before us.
As for this Moses, who let us
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out of the let us out from
the land of Egypt, we do not
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know what has become of him and
the cat. They made a calf in
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those days and offered a sacrifice to
the idol and were rejoicing in the works
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of their hands. But God turned
away and gave them over to worship the
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host of Heaven at is, as
it is written in the book of the
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Prophets. Did you bring to me
slain beasts and sacrifices? During the forty
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years in the Wilderness, Oh house
of Israel, you took up the tent
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of Moloch and a star of your
God. Refen the images that you made
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to worship, and I will send
you into exile beyond Babylon. Our Father's
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had the tent of witness in the
Wilderness, just as he who spoke to
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Moses directed him to make it according
to the pattern that he had seen.
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Our Father's, in turn, brought
it in with Joshua when they dispossessed the
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nations that God drove out before our
fathers. So it was until the days
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of David who found favor in the
sight of God and asked to find a
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dwelling place for the God of Jacob, but it was Solomon who built a
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house for him. Yet the most
high does not dwell in houses made by
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hands. As the Prophet says,
heaven is my throne and the earth is
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my footstool. What kind of house
will you build for me? Says the
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Lord or what is the place of
my rest? Did Not my hand make
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all these things? You stiff necked
people, uncircumcised in your heart and ears,
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you always resist the Holy Spirit,
as your father's did. So do
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you. Which of you, which
of the Prophets, did your father's not
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persecute? And they killed those who
announced beforehand the rock coming of the righteous
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one, whom you have now betrayed
and murdered. You who received the law
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as delivered by angels and did not
keep it? Now, when they heard
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these things, they were enraged and
they ground their teeth at him. But
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he, full of the Holy Spirit, gazed into heaven and saw the glory
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of God and Jesus Standing at the
right hand of God, and he said,
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behold, I see the heavens opened
and the son of man standing at
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the right hand of God. But
they cried out with a loud voice and
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stopped their ears and rushed together at
him. Then they cast him out of
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the city and stoned him, and
the witnesses laid down their garments at the
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feet of a young man named Saul. And as they were stoning Stephen,
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he called out, Lord Jesus,
receive my spirit and, falling to his
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knees. He cried out with a
loud voice, Lord, do not hold
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this sin against them. And when
he had said this, he fell asleep
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and Saul approved of his execution.
This ends God's word to us. May
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He bless it. This saul is
the same Paul who wrote Romans Nine,
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four through five. That's a significant
thing, I think. This Saul,
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who unlikely heard this speech and was
involved in this whole event, was there
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and Heard Stephens Speaking about the Patriarchs. He heard Stephen Talk about these promises
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and blessings that God had poured out
on the Fathers, on the Patriarchs of
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Israel, but he also heard how
the father these same fathers, over and
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over and over again, refused God
and refused to obey him. Instead of
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receiving the promises, instead of enjoying
those blessings, they turned away. And
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Saul was there participating, perhaps even
enjoying, the things that were going on,
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the stoning of Stephen, approving of
his execution. By the time,
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though, he writes Romans nine versus
four and five, Paul Saul is a
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very different man. He understands things
in a different way. He understands the
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Patriarchs not just in his way here
that he belonged to them, as a
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child of Abraham is one belonging to
their race. But he understood the promises
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that were given to them, and
that's the place that I want to start
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this morning. Who Were these patriarchs? What distinguished them from any other father?
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The word there that Paul uses is
potter father. Indeed, you could
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translate it father, and if you
do that it might bring a kind of
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confusion, which is why English translations
use the Word Patriarch. Because if you
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say to them, belong the fathers, well, what's so important about that?
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Who of us here doesn't have a
father? All of us do,
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all of us have fathers. To
all of us belong a father. So
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what does Paul mean when he says
to them belong the fathers? He has
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a particular group of people in mind, and he has in mind the people
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that Stephen spoke about and that we
heard about as he recounts this history,
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particularly Abraham, Isaac and Jacob.
What was important about these people? What
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is it that distinguished them from all
the rest? Well, as Steve and
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puts it, it was these promises. It all begins when God goes to
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Abraham and speaks to him and God
calls him out of the land he belonged
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to into another land, and he
promised Abraham many things, many things.
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He promised him children, he promised
him land. He promised that he would
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be great, that God would make
him a blessing to all the nations.
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He promised these things to Abraham and
he promised them in a kind of unconditional
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way. He said, Abraham,
I'm giving these things to you. And
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then, even in a vision,
God, I'm goes through a kind of
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ceremony where these animals are cut apart
and God walks through them and essentially as
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saying, if I don't fulfill these
promises, may these cut animals represent what
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will happen to me? Of course
that's not going to happen to God,
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because God keeps his promises. Well, this is what he says to Abraham,
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but it's not just to Abraham,
as I mentioned, it's to Abraham
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and his offspring. Over and over
again throughout the Old Testament we see that
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it's Abraham and it's offspring, Abraham
and his offspring. You might understand the
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significance of that if you imagine what
it would be like to be born into
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the most powerful family in a small
town. Imagine you're born into a town
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where your dad owns the grocery and
he's the president of the bank and he's
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been serving as mayor for the last
fifteen years, and your uncle is in
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charge of the feed store and your
other uncle is in charge of of the
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postal system and every aspect of the
town your family is involved in and you're
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born into that. What does that
mean? That means you're born into all
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kinds of privilege and blessing and inheritance
and power. That's what it meant to
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be a child of Abraham. Imagine
if Your Dad, Imagine Your Isaac and
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Your Dad. You're growing up and
as you you grow up, your parents
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tell them tell you things, important
things, things that have happened in their
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life, things that are meaningful to
you. Imagine that your father, whatever
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his name may be, imagine that
your father sat you down at the dinner
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table and said, son, I
need to tell you something important. I
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know we're living in tense and I
know there aren't very many children here,
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but God has promised to me to
give us this great land and that's going
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to be yours, and God has
promised to be our God and to protect
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us and to watch over US and
to keep us and bless us forever and
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ever. I would change your life, wouldn't it? Even more than if
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God had said to you or if
your father came and said to you,
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son, I want to tell you
that we're millionaires, we're going to be
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okay and you're going to be okay. It's much bigger than that. It's
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a much bigger announcement than that,
because Abraham is given not just temporary earthly
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blessings, but eternal, everlasting spiritual
ones. That's what it meant to be
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an Isaac and a Jacob and a
Dan and a Reuben and a Levite,
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all of these men, all of
these Patriarchs, who are born under this
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great promise. That's why Paul is
proud to be a Jew, rightfully so,
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and that's why in Romans Nine,
when he speaks to the Jews,
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he says this belongs to you.
The Patriarchs belong to you. In America,
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especially if you've been here for many
generations, we often don't think in
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these kinds of terms, or if
we do, the it's not often seems
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like nation and and nation. Often
trump's a family or race. At least
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in some instances here, family and
race are focused on. He's saying,
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not only are you a nation that
I've covenanted with, not only have I
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given you a law and a worship
and these promises, but you are a
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family. You belong to a father
other to you, Jews Belong the Patriarchs.
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To them that meant that they were
themselves the blessing God promised Abraham Children.
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And if you're a Jew here,
you are you are the present,
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you are the gift. It also
meant to be recipients of the blessing,
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inheritors of God, of the land
of the promised Christ. It also meant
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to have us right to spiritual blessings. Out of all the peoples of the
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world, God chose this particular people
and he gave them this sign of circumcision.
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Stephen Mentions that sign is important because
it's a cleansing sign. It's a
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sign that the Bible talks about as
one in which sin is cut off.
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Its symbolizes cleanliness, a lack of
defilement. Why is that important? It's
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important because all the peoples of the
world were defiled ever since Adam. All
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had fallen into sin they'd already gone
through the Noah's flood to be judged for
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that sin, and following the flood, they had sinned throughout the world and
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fallen into all kinds of other transgressions. Now here. God selects a people
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and he cleanses them. He gives
them this sign of cleansing. He's rescuing
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them out of sin. He's rescuing
them out of the sin and misery of
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humanity. Paul tells us that this
is what it means to be an Israelite.
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This is what it means when he
says to you belong the Patriarchs.
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It means that God has blessed you
above all other people. He has given
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you these gifts. To Be born
a Jew is to be born into a
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special relationship with God, a holy
relationship. It's a similar thing for you
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children who are here that have been
born of parents who are believers. The
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Bible says that if even one of
your parents are holy, you are considered
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holy. You are born into a
family children, you're born into a family
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that already has a relationship with God. God places his mark on You,
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he makes his promises to you.
But there's an important thing that we have
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to understand, and we get it
from Stephen's speech and Paul's going to go
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on to explain this further in Romans
nine. And that's this, that in
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order to receive those blessings, especially
the spiritual ones, in order to enjoy
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walking with the Lord, enjoying his
companionship, in order to be a true
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child of Abraham, we must believe, you must receive those promises and you
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must receive them by faith. The
great example of this is, of course,
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Abraham. We have this, I
think overused phrase, stepping out in
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faith. It sounds to me so
cliche that I try not to use it,
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but with Abraham he really does that. He literally steps out of one
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land into another. Imagine you are
Abraham and imagine the things that you would
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be required to do and believe.
Trusting in God, you are required to
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leave your country, your people,
your family, your father's you're required to
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leave your culture behind to a place
that you don't know where you're going yet.
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Now, later God would reveal this
to him, but for some time
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Abraham's just walking, following the Lord
wherever he tells him to go. Abraham's
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just going. Most of us,
especially as planners among us, don't like
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this kind of thing. We like
to know where we're going, when we're
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going, how we're going to get
there, what hotel we're staying at,
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how much it's going to cost,
how much money we're saving, and on
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and on and on. Even those
of us who don't like to plan must
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like, how must, I imagine, have some desire to know what's coming
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up, something to look forward to. Abraham certainly had that, but it
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was very vague. God didn't spell
it all out to him. He just
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said get because I'm going to give
you something wonderful. We often think about
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our relationships with God and such as
the opposite way. If God will reveal
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to me what he's going to do, well then of course all believe him,
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of course I'll trust in him.
That's not faith, though. Sometimes
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God does reveal these things, and
as time goes on, more and more
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is revealed to Abraham. But faith
is trusting in not the promises that are
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received, but in the promises that
are given, promises. It's trusting not
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in the things that we get from
God, but in trusting in God himself.
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Abraham had to walk out to the
Promised Land before he knew where it
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was. Abraham had to live his
life before God. Abraham made love to
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his wife, waiting for a child
year after year, with nothing happening,
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being told you will receive a promise
Sarah. Sarah gets so desperate because things
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are not happening that she says,
here, Abraham, take my slave,
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maybe you can have a child by
her. He does and he takes this
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child and he goes to God and
says, well, here my slave is
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able to bear children. Take Ishmael. God Says No, you will have
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a child through Sarah, and Abraham
and Sarah are called to go on and
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wait. There's so many things Abraham
does that, if you imagine it when
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he's doing it, it would be
hard if you were not someone else in
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the situation. I think it would
be hard to not imagine him as sort
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of an ancient near eastern version of
Don Quixote, just kind of chasing things
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and running after things that don't really
exist. Here's this man acting and moving
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and transferring his family and when he's
an old man, but he's doing it
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not tilting it when mills, but
trusting in the promises of God. Abraham
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was no fool. He had faith. That's why he did what God told
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him to do. For Abraham,
life under the Covenant was not so much
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about receiving the promises as it was
by living by them. I'll give you
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one more story. No, no, just a reminder, kind of like
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Stephen was doing. You remember the
sacrifice of Isaac, after five finally being
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given the Sun. God tells him
to take him up, take him up
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on this mountain and sacrifice him,
and David did so, I'm sorry.
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and Abraham did so willingly. He
did it because he was not trusting in
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the promises received, but in the
very word of God. He was living
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by what God had said. As
a Jew, this is a wonderful thing.
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This is your dad, this is
your father Abraham, this great man
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of faith. Now, sure,
he had errors, he fell into sin,
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he was not perfect, but he
believed and he trusted God and God
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gave to him all of these things. Isaac was very similar. Jacob a
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little more complicated. Jacob was a
rebellious person, a sinner, a trickster
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of the any ways, a very
evil man. But we see in God's
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electing sovereign purposes that he will do
what he wants to do, in choosing
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Jacob, in loving him, in
wrestling him to the ground and causing him
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to have faith. All these things
is what it meant to have the Patriarchs,
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it meant to belong to this family, to have these people as the
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head, to follow their example and
to know in all of it that God
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had chosen you and your race in
this special electing way, that he was
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in love, sovereignly watching over every
aspect of your life, over your family
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life. So you can see why
Stephen, echoing the thoughts of God,
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is so frustrated with them when he
says you stiff necked people, you uncircumcised
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people, Whoa to call the Jewish
people uncircumcised is to say that they have
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rejected the covenant of God, to
say that they have stood outside of the
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covenant. And that's exactly what they
were doing. The proof is in his
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words. These Fathers, the Patriarchs, they sold Joseph into slavery, they
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didn't listen to Moses. When God
is revealing to them, pouring out blessings,
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bringing them into their promises, what
do they do? They make a
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calf, they make sacrifices, they
go after other gods, molech and all
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the rest. This is what the
fathers did. Now Paul would. He
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gives Romans nine, four and five
in particular. He doesn't have this quiet
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in mind yet, the NITT this
negative aspect, but he will move on
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to this. He says to the
Jewish people and US gentiles on the outside
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listening, and he says to us, look, you've been given this great
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thing, but you must believe like
Abraham believed. You must receive these promises.
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You can't crucify the Messiah, you
can't reject the promises, you can't
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turn away to false gods and your
own ways and expect to just be a
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child of Abraham. That's not what
it means. In other words, Paul
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says, Steven says, God says, that to be a child of Abraham
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is not just to be a child
biologically. What's most important of all is
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being a child spiritually. Now,
Steven attempted to be a wakeup call and,
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like the prophets before him, he
was put to death. This man
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of Saul, man named Saul,
giving approval, tearing Christians from their homes,
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receiving the clothing of Stephen, approving
of it all. But in Saul's
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example we come to see how great
the love of God is Matthew Nine.
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We read God says that he can
raise up children of Abraham from stones.
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That's an amazing thing. And Saul, who was a child of Israel but
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acted like he was not, was
so proud that he belonged, thought he
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belonged as so firmly in the promises, but he didn't. Sure he was
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born to good families, sure he
participated in worship, sure he tried to
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follow the law, but he forgot
the element of faith until God saved him.
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Saul failed to grasp the most essential
thing of it all, the thing
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that he will go on to explain
to us in Romans nine, that no
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matter how many good works you do, no matter how much zealed you have,
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no matter how firmly you are imbedded
biologically in the family, it does
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not save. Because Abraham wasn't saved
that way, Isaac wasn't saved that way,
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Jacob wasn't saved that way. Saul
sought to establish his relationship to God
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biologically through good works, through zeal, but the Covenant of Abraham was not
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about that. It was about receiving
what God gave, especially this promised child
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who would come to rule and save
the world. God can certainly raise literal
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stones and make them children of Abraham, and he can do it figuratively too.
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He took this rock hard, stony
heart of Saul, who was persecuting
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a man like Stephen and people,
Christians who are following after the Lord Jesus,
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who are entering into all of these
promises of Abraham. He took a
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heart that was that hard and turned
it into the heart of Paul, the
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heart that we have been hearing pouring
out these gospel promises. He can also
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take gentiles who are outside of these
promises, worshiping false gods, and bring
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them in. Paul took this man. Are Sorry. God took this man,
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Paul, whose heart was as as
hard as a stone, and he
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changed him. And then he took
that Paul and he sent him and all
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the world to preach to hardhearted gentiles
like you and me, and through him
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we have this personal invitation to all
the world to belong to Abraham, to
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become children of the promise, and
that all who believe in their children,
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along with them, would now belong
to this family. You Imagine, for
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example, in your mind a family
tree, a big chart, Abraham,
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Isaac Jacob, the twelve tribes,
all going down throughout history, all these
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people. Now, next to that
family tree, imagine all of these other
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family trees, all of these gentile
family trees. What over here? What
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over here one? This one I'm
from, this one you're from. You
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know what God takes. He takes
those and through trusting in Jesus Christ,
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he joins them together, joins them
together, joins them together in such a
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way that we connected in Christ.
Now go I belong to Abraham. Father
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Abraham had many sons. Many sons
had father Abraham. I'm one of them,
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and so are you. So let's
all praise the Lord. We teach
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our children that song because it's true, because in Jesus Christ we belong to
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him and all the promises that are
poured out on father Abraham belong to us.
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We're called to receive them by faith
as members of that tribe. Kids,
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this means that your parents, who
believe if, brought you in,
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made you part of the family by
birth, but it also means that,
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as Abraham's children, you must personally
receive these promises by faith, or else
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you end up just like the Jews, who were a Jew but not a
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Jew circumcised, but not on but
not circumcised or uncircumcised. Each of us
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are called to receive these promises by
faith. God pours them out on the
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world. He pours them out and
offers them to us. This is the
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greatest invitation that has ever been made, and it's all made possible by this
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one who was murdered and crucified and
put on the Cross. Jesus Christ is
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that promised child of Abraham. He
is the one in whom all the blessings
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are poured out on humanity. When
you hear his name, rejoice in God,
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rejoice that you belong to a family
that is privileged and powerful. Rejoice
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that you belong to family in which
you will receive the inheritances of God.
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And be patient and wait. Abraham
had to wait in the promised land without
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even having a foot's length of it. He had to buy the land for
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his own burial. We wait as
well. We are privileged, we are
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powerful in God, we are given
inheritances and blessing, but he calls us
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to trust in him. We wait
for the Lord's return to bring all these
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things to their great and consummated end. Until then, let us walk by
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faith. Let us believe and let
us pray. Our heavenly father, we
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thank you for being our great patriarch, for watching over US and calling us
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your own children. The way in
which you have worked this out in time
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and space is truly astounding. When
we consider the large the the big picture,
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the great overview of history, we
see how um each moment and every
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turn, despite the obstinence and sin
of your people, you continue on steadfast
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to your promises to Abraham and Isaac
and Jacob. You never let go,
404
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you never drop the ball. Despite
our sin, you are always there,
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doing right and doing well. We
ask, Lord, that you would help
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us to believe you when you say
that these things you give to us.
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We asked that you would help us
to believe in the Lord Jesus Christ,
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in the salvation that we have through
him, by believing, even as Abraham
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believed, in the promises that you
have made. We thank you for our
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Savior, are our elder brother,
who brings us into this family, who
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brings about the reason for our very
own adoption. We thank you that we
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are children of Abraham and that in
him, in Christ, we are blessed.
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We ask, Lord, that you
would help us to understand these things
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and to distinguish them in our minds. We asked that you would cause us
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ought to go to the Old Testament
often and to look for you there,
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to hear of your revelation, to
see the ways that you work, in
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the ways that you keep your promises, and we asked that you would keep
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us in them. If it were
not for your work, for Your Almighty
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and irresistible grace, we surely would
be astray, as many, many have
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been. Help us not to take
for granted the promises that you have given
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to us. May We teach them
to our children and our children's children,
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and we ask that the Lord Jesus
would come again soon. We pray this
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in his name.
