WEBVTT 1 00:00:00.160 --> 00:00:04.240 Three thousand years before the first church was built, God 2 00:00:04.320 --> 00:00:07.639 made a deal with a man. To seal that deal, 3 00:00:08.039 --> 00:00:10.800 he told the man to cut five animals in half 4 00:00:11.119 --> 00:00:14.640 and line up the pieces. Then God put the man 5 00:00:14.720 --> 00:00:19.640 to sleep and walked between the bloody halves alone. Both 6 00:00:19.719 --> 00:00:23.399 parties were supposed to walk through. Both parties were supposed 7 00:00:23.399 --> 00:00:27.199 to swear their lives, but God took both sides of 8 00:00:27.239 --> 00:00:30.800 the oath. So who was this man and why did 9 00:00:30.839 --> 00:00:33.840 God choose him out of everyone on earth. If you 10 00:00:33.920 --> 00:00:37.880 want to understand why God chose Abraham, you first need 11 00:00:37.880 --> 00:00:42.000 to understand what Abraham was walking away from. And what 12 00:00:42.159 --> 00:00:47.240 Abraham was walking away from was the most sophisticated civilization 13 00:00:47.439 --> 00:00:51.119 on the planet. The city of Ur sat in the 14 00:00:51.159 --> 00:00:56.520 fertile crescent of southern Mesopotamia in what is today southeastern Iraq. 15 00:00:57.320 --> 00:01:00.640 And when I say city, I don't mean some cluster 16 00:01:00.759 --> 00:01:04.120 of mud huts around a well err In the third 17 00:01:04.200 --> 00:01:09.359 millennium Bcee was a metropolis at its peak under the 18 00:01:09.400 --> 00:01:14.400 Third Dynasty, roughly two thousand years before Jesus, Er had 19 00:01:14.400 --> 00:01:18.359 a population of around sixty five thousand people, which made 20 00:01:18.400 --> 00:01:21.159 it one of the largest cities in the entire world 21 00:01:21.200 --> 00:01:24.400 at that time, the streets of Rr were laid out 22 00:01:24.439 --> 00:01:29.879 in organized grids. The houses had two stories, with interior courtyards, 23 00:01:30.200 --> 00:01:35.680 drainage systems, and private chapels on the ground floor. Archaeologists 24 00:01:35.760 --> 00:01:40.159 have uncovered schools where children learned mathematics and writing in 25 00:01:40.280 --> 00:01:44.799 Cuneiform script on clay tablets. There were courts of law, 26 00:01:45.200 --> 00:01:50.840 trade guilds, and a complex economy built on agriculture, textile production, 27 00:01:51.400 --> 00:01:54.959 and long distance commerce that stretched from the Indus Valley 28 00:01:55.000 --> 00:01:58.480 in modern day Pakistan to the shores of the Mediterranean. 29 00:01:59.359 --> 00:02:02.319 And the plumbing alone would have impressed the Romans two 30 00:02:02.400 --> 00:02:07.439 thousand years later. Homes Inur had terra cotta drainage pipes 31 00:02:07.560 --> 00:02:12.080 running beneath the floors. The wealthy had private bathrooms. Some 32 00:02:12.319 --> 00:02:16.439 residences had thirteen or fourteen rooms arranged around a central 33 00:02:16.479 --> 00:02:20.639 courtyard where families gathered in the evenings. If you stood 34 00:02:20.639 --> 00:02:23.400 in one of those courtyards and looked up, you would 35 00:02:23.439 --> 00:02:26.240 see the same stars that God would one day use 36 00:02:26.520 --> 00:02:31.000 to illustrate a promise. But the thing that dominated everything, 37 00:02:31.479 --> 00:02:34.280 the structure you could see from miles away as you 38 00:02:34.319 --> 00:02:38.560 approached the city across the flat Mesopotamian plane, was the 39 00:02:38.639 --> 00:02:43.719 great Zigarat imagine a massive stepped pyramid rising seventy feet 40 00:02:43.800 --> 00:02:47.479 into the air, built with millions of mud bricks, its 41 00:02:47.560 --> 00:02:51.280 core held together with layers of woven reed matting, and 42 00:02:51.400 --> 00:02:56.080 its exterior surfaces coated in baked brick and bitumen. At 43 00:02:56.080 --> 00:02:59.919 the very top sat a small temple, and that temple 44 00:03:00.159 --> 00:03:04.360 was the home of Nana, the moon god. Nana, also 45 00:03:04.479 --> 00:03:08.680 known as Sin, was the patron deity of Er. Everything 46 00:03:08.719 --> 00:03:12.680 in the city revolved around him. The calendar was organized 47 00:03:12.719 --> 00:03:18.039 around lunar cycles. The festivals, the sacrifices, the economic rhythms 48 00:03:18.080 --> 00:03:20.960 of planting and harvesting were all tied to the phases 49 00:03:21.000 --> 00:03:24.159 of the moon and the worship of this god. The 50 00:03:24.240 --> 00:03:27.520 high priestess of Nana was often the king's own daughter. 51 00:03:28.159 --> 00:03:31.840 The temple complex wasn't just a religious center. It was 52 00:03:31.919 --> 00:03:35.680 the administrative and economic heart of the entire city state, 53 00:03:36.280 --> 00:03:40.759 and the worship of Nana was not casual, it was totalizing. 54 00:03:41.360 --> 00:03:45.879 Every commercial transaction in Er passed through the temple. Economy, 55 00:03:46.319 --> 00:03:51.479 grain stores, textile workshops, cattle records, all managed by the 56 00:03:51.560 --> 00:03:55.360 temple scribes. To be a citizen of Ur was to 57 00:03:55.400 --> 00:03:59.240 be a worshiper of Nana. There was no distinction between 58 00:03:59.360 --> 00:04:03.080 civic life and religious life. They were the same thing. 59 00:04:03.840 --> 00:04:08.479 This is the world Abraham was born into. This was normal. 60 00:04:09.319 --> 00:04:12.840 But here's the thing that gets lost in Sunday school retellings. 61 00:04:13.520 --> 00:04:18.839 Ur was not just religiously pagan. It was intellectually sophisticated 62 00:04:18.879 --> 00:04:22.920 in ways that make the Abraham story even more astonishing. 63 00:04:23.639 --> 00:04:27.079 The Scribal schools of Ur produced some of the most 64 00:04:27.120 --> 00:04:32.279 advanced mathematical texts in the ancient world. Sumerian scholars at 65 00:04:32.480 --> 00:04:36.160 Ur and the surrounding cities had already developed a base 66 00:04:36.240 --> 00:04:39.839 sixty number system, which is why we still divide ours 67 00:04:39.879 --> 00:04:44.360 into sixty minutes and circles into three hundred and sixty degrees. 68 00:04:45.000 --> 00:04:50.959 They had sophisticated astronomical observations. They tracked the movements of Venus, 69 00:04:51.360 --> 00:04:57.560 predicted lunar eclipses, and mapped constellations with remarkable accuracy. These 70 00:04:57.600 --> 00:05:00.519 were not primitive people fumbling in the in the dark. 71 00:05:01.160 --> 00:05:06.560 These were brilliant minds building a civilization of extraordinary complexity. 72 00:05:07.160 --> 00:05:12.040 And their brilliance was entirely framed by, dedicated to, and 73 00:05:12.240 --> 00:05:17.240 oriented around a religious system that worshiped the moon. So 74 00:05:17.360 --> 00:05:20.439 when God called Abraham out of this world, he was 75 00:05:20.480 --> 00:05:24.040 not pulling a naive shepherd out of a dusty village. 76 00:05:24.079 --> 00:05:27.439 He was pulling a man out of the beating, intellectual 77 00:05:27.560 --> 00:05:32.079 and spiritual heart of human civilization. It's as if God 78 00:05:32.199 --> 00:05:37.160 reached into Mit or Oxford or Silicon Valley and said, 79 00:05:37.199 --> 00:05:40.920 to someone embedded in the most dominant worldview of the age, 80 00:05:41.399 --> 00:05:46.839 everything you have been taught is incomplete. Follow me. And 81 00:05:47.000 --> 00:05:51.000 this is where the story gets misunderstood. We tend to 82 00:05:51.079 --> 00:05:55.720 imagine Abraham as a proto monotheist, someone who was already 83 00:05:55.720 --> 00:05:59.639 inclined toward the One True God, someone who just needed 84 00:05:59.639 --> 00:06:03.199 a little push in the right direction, a man sitting 85 00:06:03.240 --> 00:06:07.360 in his tent, gazing at the stars, already questioning the 86 00:06:07.399 --> 00:06:11.920 idols around him. That is a much later tradition. It 87 00:06:11.959 --> 00:06:16.600 comes from rabbinic midrash, written thousands of years after Abraham lived. 88 00:06:17.000 --> 00:06:21.759 Beautiful stories about young Abraham smashing his father's idols and 89 00:06:21.839 --> 00:06:27.560 debating the logic of polytheism. Those stories are meaningful, they 90 00:06:27.639 --> 00:06:33.000 carry theological weight. But the text of Genesis itself tells 91 00:06:33.040 --> 00:06:38.040 a very different story. Joshua, chapter twenty four, verse two. 92 00:06:38.759 --> 00:06:42.920 The text is blunt. It says that terror Abraham's father 93 00:06:43.319 --> 00:06:48.240 served other gods, the Hebrew verb used is avad, which 94 00:06:48.279 --> 00:06:51.480 means to serve or to worship. It is the same 95 00:06:51.600 --> 00:06:55.639 verb used for the Israelites serving Pharaoh in Egypt. Terra 96 00:06:55.800 --> 00:06:59.279 did not dabble in idle worship. He was devoted to it, 97 00:06:59.680 --> 00:07:03.720 and his son grew up in that devotion. Acts chapter 98 00:07:03.800 --> 00:07:09.240 seven confirms this. When Stephen, in his speech before the Sanhedrin, 99 00:07:09.439 --> 00:07:13.079 describes the God of Glory appearing to Abraham while he 100 00:07:13.199 --> 00:07:17.600 was still in Mesopotamia, before he lived in Haran, the 101 00:07:17.639 --> 00:07:25.720 implication is clear. Abraham did not seek God. God sought Abraham. 102 00:07:26.480 --> 00:07:30.720 The initiative was entirely divine, and this is the first 103 00:07:30.759 --> 00:07:34.279 shock of the Abraham story. God did not choose the 104 00:07:34.279 --> 00:07:37.800 most righteous man available. He chose a man embedded in 105 00:07:37.879 --> 00:07:41.720 a pagan culture, the son of an idle worshiper, a 106 00:07:41.800 --> 00:07:46.040 resident of a city whose entire identity was built around 107 00:07:46.120 --> 00:07:50.759 the worship of a moon deity. He chose someone who, 108 00:07:50.879 --> 00:07:54.720 by every measurable standard, should have been the last person 109 00:07:54.800 --> 00:07:58.839 on the list. But that was exactly the point, because 110 00:07:58.879 --> 00:08:01.800 if God had chosen so someone who was already righteous, 111 00:08:02.160 --> 00:08:07.800 already seeking, already inclined toward monotheism, then the story would 112 00:08:07.839 --> 00:08:11.680 be about human merit. It would be about Abraham earning 113 00:08:11.720 --> 00:08:16.279 his place through spiritual achievement, and that is precisely the 114 00:08:16.319 --> 00:08:19.560 opposite of what the Abraham story is designed to teach. 115 00:08:20.560 --> 00:08:24.360 The election of Abraham is a story about grace before 116 00:08:24.399 --> 00:08:27.879 the word grace had been invented. And to grasp how 117 00:08:28.000 --> 00:08:31.759 radical this was, you need to see what ERR's religion 118 00:08:32.000 --> 00:08:37.480 actually looked like up close, because it wasn't just abstract theology, 119 00:08:38.240 --> 00:08:43.679 it was visceral. In nineteen twenty two, British archaeologist Leonard 120 00:08:43.679 --> 00:08:48.039 Woolley began excavating the Royal Tombs of Er. What he 121 00:08:48.159 --> 00:08:53.679 found there changed our understanding of Mesopotamian civilization forever. The 122 00:08:53.679 --> 00:08:59.440 tombs contain staggering wealth, gold helmets beaten so thin you 123 00:08:59.440 --> 00:09:04.559 could see the craftsmanship in every curve. Lapis Lazuli jewelry 124 00:09:04.679 --> 00:09:09.039 imported from mines in what is now Afghanistan more than 125 00:09:09.080 --> 00:09:14.320 fifteen hundred miles away. Harps decorated with bull heads made 126 00:09:14.360 --> 00:09:19.440 of gold and silver. The artistry rivaled anything produced in Egypt. 127 00:09:20.039 --> 00:09:23.639 But the most disturbing discovery wasn't the treasure. It was 128 00:09:23.679 --> 00:09:27.720 the bodies in the tomb of Queen Poibi. Wooli found 129 00:09:27.720 --> 00:09:33.240 the remains of dozens of attendants, soldiers, musicians, and servants, 130 00:09:33.279 --> 00:09:38.320 all arranged in orderly rows, all apparently having consumed poison 131 00:09:38.759 --> 00:09:42.960 and died voluntarily to accompany their queen into the afterlife. 132 00:09:43.159 --> 00:09:46.919 One tomb, known as the Great Death Pit, contained the 133 00:09:46.960 --> 00:09:51.720 remains of seventy four people, mostly women, dressed in elaborate finery, 134 00:09:52.279 --> 00:09:54.919 lying in neat rows, as if they had simply laid 135 00:09:55.000 --> 00:09:58.720 down and gone to sleep. Wooley found a woman who 136 00:09:58.799 --> 00:10:01.799 appeared to have been late to the ceremony. She had 137 00:10:01.799 --> 00:10:04.960 a silver hair ribbon coiled in her pocket, not yet 138 00:10:05.000 --> 00:10:09.080 put on. She arrived, lay down among the others, and 139 00:10:09.240 --> 00:10:14.559 died before she could finish preparing herself. This was ritual 140 00:10:14.720 --> 00:10:20.639 mass death, human sacrifice on an organized, institutional scale, and 141 00:10:20.720 --> 00:10:24.159 it was connected to the religious system that Abraham grew 142 00:10:24.240 --> 00:10:27.600 up in. Now I want you to hold that image 143 00:10:27.600 --> 00:10:31.799 in your mind, the silver ribbon in the dead woman's pocket, 144 00:10:32.440 --> 00:10:35.639 because later in this story, when we talk about the 145 00:10:35.639 --> 00:10:39.519 binding of Isaac on Mount Moriah, you need to remember this. 146 00:10:40.159 --> 00:10:44.519 Abraham came from a world where the sacrifice of human 147 00:10:44.559 --> 00:10:48.840 beings to please the gods was not just imaginable, it 148 00:10:48.960 --> 00:10:52.840 was normal. It was expected. It was woven into the 149 00:10:52.960 --> 00:10:56.519 very fabric of religious life, and the God who called 150 00:10:56.519 --> 00:11:00.279 Abraham out of that world was about to rewrite every 151 00:11:00.399 --> 00:11:06.840 single rule. Genesis Chapter twelve, Verse one. Three Hebrew words 152 00:11:06.919 --> 00:11:11.919 that split history in half lesch lecha in English. Most 153 00:11:11.960 --> 00:11:16.519 translations render this as go or go forth, and that 154 00:11:16.559 --> 00:11:20.919 translation is fine, it's accurate, but it misses something that 155 00:11:21.000 --> 00:11:24.679 anyone who reads Hebrew will tell you jumps off the page. 156 00:11:25.440 --> 00:11:30.039 The verb lek already means go. That's all you need 157 00:11:30.120 --> 00:11:33.639 to give a command. God could have simply said lek 158 00:11:34.080 --> 00:11:37.879 go and the sentence would have been grammatically complete. But 159 00:11:38.000 --> 00:11:42.679 he adds lecha, which is a reflexive form. It literally 160 00:11:42.759 --> 00:11:48.559 means go to yourself or go for yourself. This is unusual. 161 00:11:48.879 --> 00:11:53.519 Hebrew scholars have debated the significance of this construction for centuries, 162 00:11:54.000 --> 00:11:57.720 and the consensuses that it carries a meaning far beyond 163 00:11:57.919 --> 00:12:03.360 simple geographic relocation. Letch letcher doesn't just mean leave your country. 164 00:12:03.960 --> 00:12:07.799 It means embark on a journey into who you really are. 165 00:12:08.720 --> 00:12:12.519 Go toward the person I created you to be. Leave 166 00:12:12.600 --> 00:12:16.120 behind the identity that your culture and your family and 167 00:12:16.159 --> 00:12:20.639 your city have imposed on you, and discover the identity 168 00:12:21.240 --> 00:12:26.559 I have for you. God was not just asking Abraham 169 00:12:26.639 --> 00:12:30.919 to change his address. He was asking Abraham to change 170 00:12:30.960 --> 00:12:35.440 his entire understanding of reality. And what God asked him 171 00:12:35.480 --> 00:12:40.320 to leave was devastating. The text says leave your land, 172 00:12:40.559 --> 00:12:44.879 your birthplace, and your father's house. In Hebrew, this is 173 00:12:44.919 --> 00:12:49.519 structured as a narrowing focus. Land is the broadest category, 174 00:12:49.879 --> 00:12:55.200 your entire country, your geographic identity. Birthplace narrows it to 175 00:12:55.279 --> 00:12:59.840 your community, your social identity. Father's house narrows it for 176 00:13:00.000 --> 00:13:05.879 further to your family, your personal identity. God is systematically 177 00:13:05.960 --> 00:13:10.440 stripping away every layer of belonging that Abraham has everything 178 00:13:10.519 --> 00:13:15.159 that tells him who he is, everything that gives him status, security, 179 00:13:15.240 --> 00:13:19.759 and meaning in the ancient world. And in exchange, God 180 00:13:19.919 --> 00:13:24.080 offers him a promise so absurd that it borders on cruel. 181 00:13:24.799 --> 00:13:28.200 I will make you a great nation. I will bless you. 182 00:13:28.799 --> 00:13:31.879 I will make your name great. All families of the 183 00:13:31.919 --> 00:13:36.080 earth will be blessed through you. Abraham is seventy five 184 00:13:36.159 --> 00:13:39.600 years old with a barren wife. He has no children, 185 00:13:40.000 --> 00:13:43.440 no heir, and no land of his own. And God 186 00:13:43.519 --> 00:13:46.879 tells him he's going to become a great nation that 187 00:13:47.000 --> 00:13:50.799 his descendants will be as numerous as the stars. Try 188 00:13:50.840 --> 00:13:54.000 to sit with how that sounded to Abraham, not to 189 00:13:54.080 --> 00:13:56.879 you reading it from the comfort of knowing how the 190 00:13:56.960 --> 00:14:02.840 story ends. To him and in Haran, probably still mourning 191 00:14:02.879 --> 00:14:06.480 his father Terror, who had just died, with his elderly 192 00:14:06.519 --> 00:14:11.279 wife Sarah beside him, and some nephew named Lot, tagging 193 00:14:11.320 --> 00:14:16.759 along with no GPS, no map, no destination beyond a 194 00:14:16.879 --> 00:14:22.440 land that I will show you. The destination itself is unnamed. 195 00:14:23.120 --> 00:14:26.360 God doesn't even tell him where he's going. That detail 196 00:14:26.399 --> 00:14:30.000 alone would have been terrifying to an ancient Near Eastern mind. 197 00:14:30.759 --> 00:14:35.799 In that world, gods were connected to specific places. To 198 00:14:35.919 --> 00:14:40.039 leave your land was to leave the protection of your God. 199 00:14:40.960 --> 00:14:43.720 To go to an unknown land was to walk into 200 00:14:43.840 --> 00:14:49.759 territory controlled by unknown and potentially hostile deities. Abraham was 201 00:14:49.799 --> 00:14:52.679 being asked to step off the edge of everything he knew, 202 00:14:53.159 --> 00:14:56.600 with nothing but a voice and a promise. And here 203 00:14:56.759 --> 00:15:01.840 is where the story takes its first extraordinary turn Genesis twelve, 204 00:15:02.240 --> 00:15:07.679 verse four. So Abram went three words. He didn't ask 205 00:15:07.799 --> 00:15:12.039 for details, didn't try to negotiate a better deal, didn't 206 00:15:12.080 --> 00:15:15.600 request a sign to confirm what he'd heard. The text 207 00:15:15.840 --> 00:15:20.279 simply records that he heard, and he went now. Later 208 00:15:20.360 --> 00:15:24.039 in the story, Abraham will argue with God. He will 209 00:15:24.120 --> 00:15:28.600 question God's plans, he will laugh at God's promises. He 210 00:15:28.639 --> 00:15:31.600 will try to take matters into his own hands in 211 00:15:31.679 --> 00:15:36.519 ways that create generational chaos. Abraham is not presented as 212 00:15:36.559 --> 00:15:40.159 a plaster saint. He is presented as a deeply flawed 213 00:15:40.279 --> 00:15:44.000 human being who, in this one moment, did something that 214 00:15:44.039 --> 00:15:47.600 the Bible treats as the foundation of all faith. He 215 00:15:47.679 --> 00:15:50.879 trusted a voice he had never heard before, from a 216 00:15:50.960 --> 00:15:54.200 God he had not grown up worshiping, and he walked 217 00:15:54.200 --> 00:15:59.600 away from everything. The New Testament Book of Hebrews, chapter eleven, 218 00:15:59.720 --> 00:16:04.679 verse eight says it plainly by faith, Abraham obeyed when 219 00:16:04.679 --> 00:16:06.679 he was called to go out to a place he 220 00:16:06.799 --> 00:16:10.399 was to receive as an inheritance, and he went out, 221 00:16:10.879 --> 00:16:14.000 not knowing where he was going. This is what faith 222 00:16:14.080 --> 00:16:18.320 meant before it became a theological category, before it became 223 00:16:18.360 --> 00:16:21.360 a word on a bumper sticker or a chapter heading 224 00:16:21.399 --> 00:16:26.519 in a systematic theology textbook. Faith in its original biblical 225 00:16:26.600 --> 00:16:29.919 form looked like a seventy five year old man loading 226 00:16:30.039 --> 00:16:33.200 up donkeys in the dark and walking into a desert 227 00:16:33.480 --> 00:16:37.000 because a voice told him to and the land God 228 00:16:37.120 --> 00:16:41.919 sent him to was not empty. When Abraham arrived in Canaan. 229 00:16:42.360 --> 00:16:45.360 The text tells us that the Canaanites were already in 230 00:16:45.440 --> 00:16:49.720 the land. Abraham was not walking into an inheritance. He 231 00:16:49.879 --> 00:16:53.279 was walking into someone else's home. He was a stranger, 232 00:16:53.559 --> 00:16:57.039 a foreigner, an alien in a land already claimed by 233 00:16:57.080 --> 00:17:00.919 other peoples with other gods. He would never own more 234 00:17:00.960 --> 00:17:04.559 than a single field in that land during his entire lifetime, 235 00:17:05.240 --> 00:17:07.720 a field he had to purchase from the Hittites at 236 00:17:07.759 --> 00:17:11.759 full price to bury his wife. Sarah. The man to 237 00:17:11.799 --> 00:17:15.680 whom God promised an entire country, spent his whole life 238 00:17:16.279 --> 00:17:22.519 as a tent dwelling nomad, never settling, never building, never possessing. 239 00:17:23.279 --> 00:17:26.559 And yet the text says that at Shechem, at the 240 00:17:26.599 --> 00:17:30.640 Oak of Moray, God appeared to Abraham and said, to 241 00:17:30.759 --> 00:17:35.240 your offspring, I will give this land. And Abraham built 242 00:17:35.279 --> 00:17:39.920 an altar there. That altar is everything. It is Abraham's 243 00:17:39.960 --> 00:17:43.759 response to the absurdity of the promise. He cannot see 244 00:17:43.839 --> 00:17:47.279 how any of this could possibly come true. He has 245 00:17:47.359 --> 00:17:51.599 no children, he owns nothing, He is old, his wife 246 00:17:51.640 --> 00:17:55.440 is old. The land is occupied, and he builds an altar. 247 00:17:56.240 --> 00:17:59.279 This is the behavior of a man who has decided 248 00:17:59.319 --> 00:18:02.480 to act on a promise he cannot verify from a 249 00:18:02.519 --> 00:18:06.680 god he is only beginning to know. And that willingness 250 00:18:06.720 --> 00:18:09.319 to walk into the unknown on the basis of a 251 00:18:09.359 --> 00:18:15.160 word is what the Bible calls faith. Trust not perfection, 252 00:18:15.799 --> 00:18:21.839 not piety, not religious performance, just trust. But if you 253 00:18:21.920 --> 00:18:25.880 think Abraham walked in trust from that point forward, the 254 00:18:26.039 --> 00:18:30.480 very next chapter proves you wrong. A famine hits Canaan, 255 00:18:31.039 --> 00:18:34.680 the land God just sent Abraham to, cannot feed him, 256 00:18:35.359 --> 00:18:41.759 and Abraham panics. Genesis twelve, verse ten. Abraham goes down 257 00:18:41.799 --> 00:18:45.079 to Egypt, and on the way, he turns to his 258 00:18:45.160 --> 00:18:49.440 wife Sarah and says something that reveals just how fragile 259 00:18:49.519 --> 00:18:53.000 his faith actually is. At this point, he tells her 260 00:18:53.240 --> 00:18:56.640 that when the Egyptians see how beautiful she is, they 261 00:18:56.680 --> 00:18:59.640 will kill him to take her, so he asks her 262 00:18:59.680 --> 00:19:04.039 to say she's his sister. Think about what is happening here. 263 00:19:04.720 --> 00:19:07.720 The man who just obeyed God's voice and walked away 264 00:19:07.720 --> 00:19:11.839 from everything is now lying to protect himself. He is 265 00:19:11.880 --> 00:19:16.240 offering his wife to another man's household, letting Pharaoh's court 266 00:19:16.400 --> 00:19:21.240 believe she is available, because he is afraid of being killed. 267 00:19:22.200 --> 00:19:26.799 And that is exactly what happens. Pharaoh takes Sarah into 268 00:19:26.880 --> 00:19:36.359 his household. Abraham, because of the deception, receives enormous wealth, sheep, cattle, donkeys, servants. 269 00:19:36.920 --> 00:19:39.920 He gets rich off of lying about his wife. But 270 00:19:40.039 --> 00:19:46.039 then God intervenes. He sends plagues on Pharaoh's household. Pharaoh 271 00:19:46.079 --> 00:19:49.839 figures out the truth, summons Abraham and says one of 272 00:19:49.880 --> 00:19:53.880 the most cutting lines in the entire Bible. He asks 273 00:19:54.000 --> 00:19:57.400 what Abraham has done to him? Why he didn't say 274 00:19:57.440 --> 00:20:01.480 she was his wife? Then he says, take her and go. 275 00:20:02.759 --> 00:20:06.440 A pagan king is lecturing the Father of faith about honesty. 276 00:20:07.079 --> 00:20:11.559 This is Genesis being brutally honest about its hero. Abraham 277 00:20:11.640 --> 00:20:15.839 didn't descend from his spiritual mountaintop and walk in perfect 278 00:20:15.880 --> 00:20:21.680 faith forever. He stumbled almost immediately. He chose fear over trust, 279 00:20:22.079 --> 00:20:27.920 self preservation over obedience, a human scheme over divine protection. 280 00:20:28.480 --> 00:20:32.319 And the Bible puts it right there, just verses after 281 00:20:32.359 --> 00:20:36.359 the Great Calling. And here's what makes this failure remarkable. 282 00:20:37.000 --> 00:20:42.079 God doesn't abandon Abraham. God doesn't say, well, I chose 283 00:20:42.119 --> 00:20:46.319 the wrong guy. Let me start over. God rescues Sarah, 284 00:20:46.640 --> 00:20:52.480 protects the covenant, and keeps going. The promise survives Abraham's 285 00:20:52.519 --> 00:20:57.920 failure because the Covenant was never dependent on Abraham's performance, 286 00:20:58.480 --> 00:21:03.559 It was dependent on God's character. That distinction changes everything 287 00:21:03.599 --> 00:21:07.440 about how you read the rest of Genesis. Abraham's nephew 288 00:21:07.599 --> 00:21:11.319 Lot has been traveling with him since Haran. Both of 289 00:21:11.359 --> 00:21:15.319 them have accumulated herds and servants, and the land cannot 290 00:21:15.359 --> 00:21:20.160 support them. Both their herdsmen are fighting, and Abraham, in 291 00:21:20.240 --> 00:21:24.920 a moment of genuine generosity, tells Lot to choose any 292 00:21:25.000 --> 00:21:28.759 part of the land he wants. Lot looks east and 293 00:21:28.880 --> 00:21:32.559 sees the plain of the Jordan River. The text says 294 00:21:32.559 --> 00:21:35.880 it was well watered everywhere, like the garden of the Lord, 295 00:21:36.559 --> 00:21:40.000 like the land of Egypt. Lot chooses the best land, 296 00:21:40.279 --> 00:21:44.480 the easy life, the fertile valley. He pitches his tents 297 00:21:44.559 --> 00:21:48.960 near Sodom. Abraham stays in the hills of Canaan, the 298 00:21:49.079 --> 00:21:54.319 dry land, the difficult land, the promised land. This scene 299 00:21:54.359 --> 00:21:57.880 is subtle, but the text is making a point. Lot 300 00:21:58.200 --> 00:22:02.440 chose by sight, looked at the land, saw what was good, 301 00:22:02.920 --> 00:22:06.759 and took it. Abraham had been called to walk by faith, 302 00:22:07.319 --> 00:22:10.440 not by sight, and the man who walks by faith 303 00:22:10.559 --> 00:22:13.279 ends up with the promise. The man who walks by 304 00:22:13.359 --> 00:22:17.279 sight ends up near Sodom. But Abraham's quiet life in 305 00:22:17.319 --> 00:22:21.839 the hills didn't last long because something happens next that 306 00:22:21.960 --> 00:22:26.160 almost never gets mentioned in sermons. The War of the 307 00:22:26.279 --> 00:22:31.640 Kings Genesis fourteen opens with a battle. Four kings from 308 00:22:31.640 --> 00:22:36.160 the east, led by Shedorlaomer of Elam, have been dominating 309 00:22:36.200 --> 00:22:39.160 the cities of the plain for twelve years. In the 310 00:22:39.240 --> 00:22:44.680 thirteenth year, those cities rebel. In the fourteenth year, Chedalaomer 311 00:22:44.759 --> 00:22:48.599 and his allies sweep through the region, crushing every army 312 00:22:48.640 --> 00:22:53.440 in their path. They defeat the Rephaiem, the Zuzim, the Emim, 313 00:22:53.839 --> 00:22:57.240 and finally the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah. In the 314 00:22:57.319 --> 00:23:02.440 Valley of Sidim, the Victoria Eastern Kings loot Sodom and 315 00:23:02.480 --> 00:23:08.240 Gomorrah and take captives. Among those captives is Lot. When 316 00:23:08.319 --> 00:23:13.359 Abraham hears this, he does something astonishing. He gathers three 317 00:23:13.519 --> 00:23:17.680 hundred and eighteen trained men born in his household, and 318 00:23:17.759 --> 00:23:21.079 he pursues a coalition of four kings who have just 319 00:23:21.160 --> 00:23:26.039 defeated multiple armies across the entire region. Stop and think 320 00:23:26.079 --> 00:23:30.759 about what this means. Abraham is not just a spiritual figure. 321 00:23:31.240 --> 00:23:34.640 He is a military leader. He has over three hundred 322 00:23:34.680 --> 00:23:38.960 trained warriors in his personal retinue. This is the household 323 00:23:39.000 --> 00:23:44.119 of a wealthy desert chieftain, not a wandering mystic. The 324 00:23:44.119 --> 00:23:49.960 man who built altars also drilled soldiers. Abraham chases Chedalauma's 325 00:23:49.960 --> 00:23:53.279 forces all the way to Dan, nearly one hundred and 326 00:23:53.400 --> 00:23:57.519 fifty miles north. He divides his men, attacks at night, 327 00:23:57.920 --> 00:24:01.759 and roots the combined armies of four kings. He recovers 328 00:24:01.799 --> 00:24:05.559 all the people and possessions that have been taken from Sodom, 329 00:24:05.640 --> 00:24:09.480 including Lot. This is the same man who lied about 330 00:24:09.519 --> 00:24:13.000 his wife in Egypt because he was scared. The same 331 00:24:13.079 --> 00:24:16.039 man who couldn't trust God to protect him from Pharaoh 332 00:24:16.480 --> 00:24:20.359 is now charging into battle against four kings to rescue 333 00:24:20.400 --> 00:24:25.839 his nephew. Faith is not a straight line. Faith zigzags. 334 00:24:26.359 --> 00:24:30.160 Abraham is brave one day and terrified the next, and 335 00:24:30.200 --> 00:24:33.240 the Bible records both because the point was never that 336 00:24:33.279 --> 00:24:38.839 Abraham was consistent. The point was that God was consistent. 337 00:24:39.880 --> 00:24:43.680 And then, on the way home from this battle, Abraham 338 00:24:43.720 --> 00:24:46.759 has one of the strangest encounters in all of Scripture. 339 00:24:47.359 --> 00:24:54.720 He meets a man named Melchizedek. Genesis fourteen, verse eighteen. Melchizedek, 340 00:24:55.039 --> 00:24:59.000 king of Salem, brought out bread and wine. He was 341 00:24:59.119 --> 00:25:03.079 priest of God Most High. The name itself is Hebrew. 342 00:25:03.640 --> 00:25:07.759 It means king of righteousness, and he is King of Salem, 343 00:25:08.160 --> 00:25:12.839 which is an ancient name for Jerusalem. Salem means peace, 344 00:25:13.559 --> 00:25:17.880 so his full title is essentially King of Righteousness, King 345 00:25:17.960 --> 00:25:22.759 of Peace. He appears out of nowhere. The text gives 346 00:25:22.839 --> 00:25:26.559 us nothing about his family, his origin, or how a 347 00:25:26.640 --> 00:25:30.640 priest of God Most High could possibly exist in Canaan, 348 00:25:30.759 --> 00:25:35.119 before Israel, before the Covenant, before any of the structures 349 00:25:35.160 --> 00:25:38.640 of Biblical religion have been established. He just shows up, 350 00:25:38.960 --> 00:25:42.680 blesses Abraham, and Abraham gives him a tenth of everything. 351 00:25:43.240 --> 00:25:46.279 But here's the detail that shows how much Abraham has 352 00:25:46.319 --> 00:25:50.400 grown since Egypt. After the battle, the king of Sodom 353 00:25:50.519 --> 00:25:56.039 offers Abraham all the recovered loot, keep everything you earned it, 354 00:25:56.480 --> 00:26:00.319 and Abraham refuses. He says he has lived, did his 355 00:26:00.440 --> 00:26:04.359 hand to the Lord God Most High, possessor of heaven 356 00:26:04.440 --> 00:26:07.519 and earth, that he would not take a thread or 357 00:26:07.559 --> 00:26:11.400 a sandal strap or anything that belongs to Sodom, so 358 00:26:11.519 --> 00:26:15.359 that no one could say I have made Abram rich. 359 00:26:16.160 --> 00:26:18.640 The man who got rich off lying about his wife 360 00:26:18.720 --> 00:26:23.039 in Egypt, now refuses legitimate spoils of war because he 361 00:26:23.119 --> 00:26:25.880 wants it to be clear that his wealth comes from God, 362 00:26:26.440 --> 00:26:32.839 not from the King of Sodom. Abraham is learning slowly, imperfectly, 363 00:26:33.440 --> 00:26:37.839 but he is learning. The Egypt disaster taught him something, 364 00:26:38.279 --> 00:26:43.039 and the encounter with Melchizedek confirmed something. He is beginning 365 00:26:43.079 --> 00:26:46.759 to understand that the God who called him is not 366 00:26:46.960 --> 00:26:51.240 just another deity to be managed or appeased. This God 367 00:26:51.680 --> 00:26:55.400 is the possessor of heaven and earth. But the hardest 368 00:26:55.480 --> 00:26:59.680 lesson was still coming, because now came the waiting. If 369 00:26:59.720 --> 00:27:02.359 I could only show you one chapter of the Bible 370 00:27:02.440 --> 00:27:05.599 to prove that this book is stranger and deeper than 371 00:27:05.640 --> 00:27:10.279 you ever imagined, I would show you Genesis fifteen. Because 372 00:27:10.359 --> 00:27:14.599 Genesis fifteen contains one of the most bizarre, most profound, 373 00:27:15.079 --> 00:27:19.960 and most theologically explosive scenes in all of ancient literature, 374 00:27:20.640 --> 00:27:24.519 and almost nobody talks about it. Here is the set up. 375 00:27:25.279 --> 00:27:28.960 Some time has passed since Abraham arrived in Canaan. He 376 00:27:29.039 --> 00:27:33.079 has had military victories, he has accumulated wealth. He has 377 00:27:33.160 --> 00:27:37.559 met Melchizedek and refused the King of Sodom's offer. By 378 00:27:37.640 --> 00:27:42.079 worldly standards, Abraham is doing well, but the one thing 379 00:27:42.160 --> 00:27:46.000 God promised him, the thing that would make everything else possible, 380 00:27:46.400 --> 00:27:50.640 has not happened. He still has no son, and in 381 00:27:50.759 --> 00:27:56.119 Genesis fifteen, verse two, Abraham finally says what he's been thinking. 382 00:27:56.799 --> 00:28:00.799 He tells God that he remains childless. The heir of 383 00:28:00.839 --> 00:28:05.279 his house is Eliezer of Damascus, his servant. This is 384 00:28:05.400 --> 00:28:09.839 not a prayer of worship. This is a complaint. Abraham 385 00:28:10.039 --> 00:28:14.599 is telling God respectfully but directly, that the promise is 386 00:28:14.680 --> 00:28:19.799 not working. Years have passed, nothing has changed. The great 387 00:28:19.920 --> 00:28:23.319 nation God talked about still consists of two old people 388 00:28:23.640 --> 00:28:27.680 and a household staff. And God's response is to take 389 00:28:27.720 --> 00:28:32.480 Abraham outside at night under the vast Mesopotamian sky and 390 00:28:32.559 --> 00:28:35.839 tell him to look up and count the stars. Then 391 00:28:35.960 --> 00:28:40.599 God says, so shall your offspring be now? Modern city 392 00:28:40.680 --> 00:28:43.759 dwellers have no idea what this looked like. You and 393 00:28:43.799 --> 00:28:46.920 I might step outside and see a few dozen stars 394 00:28:46.960 --> 00:28:51.319 through the light pollution. Abraham, standing in the ancient Near 395 00:28:51.400 --> 00:28:54.920 East with zero artificial light for hundreds of miles in 396 00:28:54.960 --> 00:28:58.200 every direction, would have seen something that looked like the 397 00:28:58.240 --> 00:29:04.000 sky was on fire. Thousands upon thousands of stars, the 398 00:29:04.000 --> 00:29:08.519 milky way blazing overhead like a river of light, the 399 00:29:08.559 --> 00:29:14.440 sheer overwhelming enormity of the cosmos laid bare, and God says, 400 00:29:15.000 --> 00:29:19.519 that is how many descendants you will have. Verse six 401 00:29:19.640 --> 00:29:24.359