Latest / More Than Medicine / DWDP-Gen 15: 8-21 Promise Renewed, Prophecy Revealed, Propitiation Predicted

Transcript

DWDP-Gen 15: 8-21 Promise Renewed, Prophecy Revealed, Propitiation Predicted · More Than Medicine

• 0:02
  SPEAKER_01: Welcome to More Than Medicine, where Jesus is more than enough for the ills that plague our culture and our country.
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_01: Hosted by author and physician, Dr.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_01: Robert Jackson.
• 0:16
  SPEAKER_02: Papa, can you tell me a story?
• 0:19
  SPEAKER_02: Do you really want me to tell you a story?
• 0:22
  SPEAKER_02: Well, you go get your brother and your sisters, and I will tell you a story.
• 0:28
  SPEAKER_02: Welcome to Devotions, Dr.
• 0:30
  SPEAKER_02: Papa.
• 0:31
  SPEAKER_02: Gather round, grab your Bibles, and let us look into the written word which reveals to us the living word who is our Lord Jesus Christ.
• 0:42
  SPEAKER_02: Today we're in Genesis 15, verses 8 through 21.
• 0:46
  SPEAKER_02: My title today is Promise Renewed, Prophecy Revealed, and Propitiation Predicted.
• 0:55
  SPEAKER_02: So I'm read through these verses just a few at a time and then I'll stop and talk about these verses as we go along.
• 1:04
  SPEAKER_02: So let's start with verse eight, which says talking about Abram, he said, O Lord God, how may I know that I will possess it?
• 1:14
  SPEAKER_02: Now he's asking the question because God has promised to him that he would possess the land, the promised land that God had promised to give him.
• 1:26
  SPEAKER_02: Now this was a legitimate question, since he has no offspring, no children.
• 1:33
  SPEAKER_02: He just confessed his belief that God would give him a son from his own aged body.
• 1:43
  SPEAKER_02: But how?
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_02: How could he do that at his advanced age?
• 1:49
  SPEAKER_02: Have you ever believed God and yet at the same time questioned how he would accomplish his will at the same time?
• 2:00
  SPEAKER_02: I certainly have.
• 2:02
  SPEAKER_02: We can trust in God but have questions simultaneously.
• 2:08
  SPEAKER_02: They are not incompatible.
• 2:11
  SPEAKER_02: Abram was merely seeking a fuller explanation.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_02: So then move to verse nine through eleven.
• 2:21
  SPEAKER_02: So God said to him, Bring me a three year old heifer and a three year old female goat, and a three year old ram, and a turtle dove, and a young pigeon.
• 2:34
  SPEAKER_02: Then he brought all these to him and cut them in two, and laid each half opposite the other, but he did not cut the birds.
• 2:43
  SPEAKER_02: The birds of prey came down upon the carcasses, and Abram drove them away.
• 2:50
  SPEAKER_02: A most remarkable ceremony occurred in these verses.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_02: God instructs Abram to bring one each of the acceptable animals for sacrifice.
• 3:04
  SPEAKER_02: Abram knew that forgiveness came only by the shedding of blood of an acceptable sacrifice.
• 3:13
  SPEAKER_02: He had just experienced imputed righteousness in verse six that came to him by grace through faith, but that gift of righteousness always came at a very high price, which was now being illustrated in this ceremony.
• 3:36
  SPEAKER_02: The slain animals were cut in half, except for the birds, and separated in the custom of the day so that the two parties of the covenant, the agreement could walk between the halves.
• 3:53
  SPEAKER_02: Each of the parties would be bound by the terms of the contract.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_02: If either party broke the contract, then the death of the animals would apply to the person who broke the contract, or perhaps their livestock.
• 4:12
  SPEAKER_02: Subsequently the animals roasted and eaten to seal the deed, to seal the contract.
• 4:22
  SPEAKER_02: However, after Abram laid out the offerings, nothing happened all day long.
• 4:32
  SPEAKER_02: Finally the sun went down and darkness ensued.
• 4:38
  SPEAKER_02: Theologians interpret the delay as symbolizing that God's covenant, although certain, would take many years to be fulfilled.
• 4:52
  SPEAKER_02: In fact, Abram had to wait until he was an old man for Isaac to be born.
• 5:00
  SPEAKER_02: Then it was four hundred plus years before Jacob's seed became a great nation and occupied the promised land.
• 5:11
  SPEAKER_02: Then it would be a thousand more years before the seed of the woman would bless all nations.
• 5:20
  SPEAKER_02: Now in verse eleven, let's read that verse.
• 5:23
  SPEAKER_02: The birds of prey came down upon the carcasses and Abram drove them away.
• 5:29
  SPEAKER_02: What is the meaning of this?
• 5:31
  SPEAKER_02: As Abram waited, he had to drive off the birds of prey from devouring the carcasses.
• 5:41
  SPEAKER_02: This no doubt represents Satan's attempt to intervene in the plan of God down through the centuries, as Pharaoh tried to enslave God's people, as he tried to kill all the Hebrew first born, as Satan incited rebellion in the heart of Korah and his kin in the wilderness, and incited Herod many years later to kill all the newborns in Bethlehem after the birth of our Lord Jesus Christ.
• 6:23
  SPEAKER_02: Satan never stops trying to undermine God's plan for redemption through the nation of Israel and also through our individual lives today.
• 6:38
  SPEAKER_02: As Peter says, our adversary the devil roams about like a roaring lion, seeking whom he may devour.
• 6:48
  SPEAKER_02: Hence the multiple admonitions in the New Testament for believers to be on the alert for the tactics and the attacks of our enemy, the devil, the accuser of the brethren.
• 7:05
  SPEAKER_02: But thanks be to God we have an advocate with the Father, Jesus Christ, the righteous.
• 7:14
  SPEAKER_02: Now look at verse twelve.
• 7:16
  SPEAKER_02: In verse twelve it says Now when the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell upon Abram, and behold terror and great darkness fell upon him.
• 7:28
  SPEAKER_02: So Abram falls into a deep sleep and sees a terrible vision of the future.
• 7:35
  SPEAKER_02: He sees terror and deep darkness.
• 7:38
  SPEAKER_02: And then in verse thirteen, God said to Abram, Know for certain that your descendants will be strangers in a land that is not theirs, where they will be enslaved and oppressed four hundred years.
• 7:56
  SPEAKER_02: God explains the future to Abram, and he tells them that exactly well not exactly, but he gives them an approximation that four hundred years they will be slaves in a foreign land.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_02: Exodus chapter twelve in verse forty tells them that it was exactly four hundred and thirty years.
• 8:17
  SPEAKER_02: Then in verse fourteen, God says, But I will also judge the nation whom they will serve, and afterwards they will come out with many possessions.
• 8:30
  SPEAKER_02: Well, God prought judgment and deliverance, judgment on the nation of Egypt and deliverance for the Israelites.
• 8:41
  SPEAKER_02: And Exodus tells us that the Israelites left after God brought ten plagues on Egypt and on Pharaoh, and in fact the people left with many possessions after the plagues and after the plague of the death of the firstborn, the people compelled the Israelites to leave, and in fact the Bible tells us that the Egyptians gave the Hebrew people gold and silver and precious possessions and compelled them to leave.
• 9:21
  SPEAKER_02: And the Bible says that thus they plundered the Egyptians as they were leaving.
• 9:29
  SPEAKER_02: Then in verse fifteen it says, As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace, speaking to Abram, and you will be buried at a good old age.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_02: So Abram is promised by God that he will die at a ripe old age.
• 9:49
  SPEAKER_02: And then he goes on in verse sixteen to say, Then in the fourth generation they will return here, for the iniquity of the Amorite is not yet complete.
• 10:00
  SPEAKER_02: So he's indicating, God is indicating that he is sovereign over all the nations, and has a plan and a timeline for each nation.
• 10:13
  SPEAKER_02: Just as he delayed the judgment of the flood for a hundred and twenty years, so he will delay the judgment of the Amorites people group.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_02: Second Peter three in verse nine tells us that God is patient, not willing that any should perish.
• 10:32
  SPEAKER_02: Did he have a prophet like Jonah, whom he sent to Nineveh, that he would send to the Amorites?
• 10:41
  SPEAKER_02: We know that God sent Jonah to the Ninevites and that they repented.
• 10:47
  SPEAKER_02: We don't know really if he sent a prophet to the Amorites.
• 10:51
  SPEAKER_02: The Bible doesn't tell us.
• 10:53
  SPEAKER_02: But we do know that Nineveh repented, much to Jonah's chagrin, but for whatever reason God has had patience with the Amorites, and he told Abram that the time of the Amorites was not complete, and he delayed judgment on the Amorites for an extended period of time.
• 11:19
  SPEAKER_02: And then in verse seventeen we see that it came about when the sun had set that it was very dark, and behold there appeared a smoking oven or a firepot and a flaming torch, which passed between these pieces.
• 11:35
  SPEAKER_02: Now goodness, what in the world does this mean?
• 11:38
  SPEAKER_02: The fire pot and the lamp show up, and these represent the presence of God in the covenant, in this covenant relationship with Abram, and these two items pass between the parts of the sacrifice.
• 11:55
  SPEAKER_02: Of great importance is that only God, these items that represent God, only God, not Abram pass between the portions of the sacrifice, indicating an unconditional promise on God's part, not dependent on Abram in any way, not dependent on Abram at all, keeping the conditions of the contract.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_02: The conditions of the covenant was all of God.
• 12:31
  SPEAKER_02: It was all of God in response to Abram's faith.
• 12:36
  SPEAKER_02: It was all of God and none of Abram.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_02: And then in verse eighteen God reiterates the covenant promise, saying this, listen to what he said in verse eighteen.
• 12:49
  SPEAKER_02: To your descendants I have given this land from the river of Egypt as far as the great river, the river Euphrates.
• 12:58
  SPEAKER_02: Do you have any doubt that the promised land was given to Abram and his descendants, the Israelites?
• 13:06
  SPEAKER_02: How many times now has God promised Abram that He would give his descendants, the chosen people the promised land?
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_02: Over and over God repeats the promise to Abram, that this land from the river of Egypt, the Nile all the way to the Euphrates, that He's going to give it to Abram's descendants.
• 13:34
  SPEAKER_02: Do not let anybody ever dissuade you from the sure and certain knowledge that that land over which has been many battles and many contentions over the years that that land belongs to the Jewish people.
• 13:52
  SPEAKER_02: For a brief time under Solomon and then under Jeroboam II, Israel ruled this territory, but it is really a token.
• 14:03
  SPEAKER_02: It's a token of the final and permanent possession in Jesus Christ's millennial kingdom.
• 14:12
  SPEAKER_02: Now go back to the vision.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_02: The vision of the furnace and the lamp.
• 14:17
  SPEAKER_02: What do they represent?
• 14:19
  SPEAKER_02: The land of Egypt is often referred to in Scripture as the land of the fiery furnace, the land of suffering for the Israelite people.
• 14:30
  SPEAKER_02: This is a picture of the suffering not just of Israel but of our Lord Jesus Christ as on our behalf.
• 14:40
  SPEAKER_02: The miraculous delivery of Israel by God from the fiery furnace in Egypt when they were enslaved for many years is a perfect picture of you and me being delivered by our Lord Jesus Christ, our Passover lamb, from bondage to sin and from the terror of spiritual death, and it was all God and none of me.
• 15:12
  SPEAKER_02: It was all God and none of you.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_02: Jesus did it all, just like God delivered the Israelites from Pharaoh's grasp with a mighty and uplifted hand, making a mockery of all of his false gods, destroying his army, plundering his wealth, humiliating Pharaoh himself.
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_02: God has disarmed the spiritual rulers and authorities.
• 15:44
  SPEAKER_02: He made a public display of them, having triumphed over them through Jesus Christ.
• 15:51
  SPEAKER_02: Just like Israel was delivered by the mighty hand of God, so we have been delivered by grace through faith by the mighty uplifted hand of God that destroyed the works of the evil one and imputed righteousness and eternal life to you and me.
• 16:16
  SPEAKER_02: It was all of God and none of me.
• 16:20
  SPEAKER_02: What a mighty God we serve.
• 16:23
  SPEAKER_02: Glory.
• 16:24
  SPEAKER_02: Hallelujah.
• 16:26
  SPEAKER_02: You're listening to Devotions with Dr.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_02: Papa.
• 16:28
  SPEAKER_02: If you like what you hear, I pray that you would follow, like, share, or even download it.
• 16:34
  SPEAKER_02: Tell your friends and neighbors, and remember this: Jesus loves you and your doctor loves you.
• 16:41
  SPEAKER_02: Until next week, I pray that the Lord will bless you real good.
• 16:47
  SPEAKER_00: For more information about the Jackson Family Ministry or to schedule a speaking engagement, go to their Facebook page, Instagram, or webpage at Jackson Family Ministry.com.
• 16:58
  SPEAKER_00: Also, don't forget to check out Dr.
• 17:00
  SPEAKER_00: Jackson.
• 17:04
  SPEAKER_00: The family doctors.