in the fifteenth chapter. Well, notice in the lesson on your outline and the fact that we skipped chapter fourteen, you may wonder why would we skip a chapter containing the lesson on Melchizedek and discussing a lesson of Abraham. Well, the reason why is because the lesson on Melchizedek is a whole new series in itself. So perhaps, Lord willing, I can take that up with you at some other time. We can discuss the priesthood of our Lord, the pattern of Aaron, the order of Melchizedek, and then the believers' priesthood. But until then, we'll skip it for the sake of this study. We'll go on to chapter fifteen. However, we might just set a little background. In chapter fourteen, we have the rebellion of the kings. The kings of Sodom and Gomorrah and the surrounding area. have been paying taxes to a king that is far from them. They finally decide that that's not such a good idea. So they form together their armies and they form a rebellion in which they are going to fight against these other kings. Well, when the kings from another country further away, when they no longer are getting their taxes from these kings of Sodom and Gomorrah in this area, they decide that it's time to go and put the squeeze on them. And so they bring this massive army across the hills and across the desert there, and then they will come and attack these cities, Sodom and Gomorrah being the two major cities. In the course of this attack, Lot and his family are going to be taken captive. Abram and his household will then pursue this massive army. Now, historians and archaeologists and scientists and so forth have said that chapter fourteen of Genesis is just too impossible, that this was too early in the history of man to have such kind of military maneuvers and so forth. However, archaeologists have recently discovered that a massive army did in fact move across this terrain during this period of time and that there was, in fact, as they've seen on different historical documents and so forth, that they discovered that this great military maneuvering did actually take place. Now the thing that we want to keep in mind here for our purposes is that Abram armed his household and attacked this massive army and defeated them, thus freeing his nephew Lot and returning them back to the city of Sodom and Gomorrah. along with all of their goods. Now this was no small feat. This is not just one tribal family attacking another tribal family. This was a tribal family taking on a massive military army. And this great army under the direction of all these kings was defeated by this little tribal family of Abraham. So now keeping this in mind, we read from verse one of chapter fifteen. After these things, after the military victory, after he meets Melchizedek, who will pay tithes to Melchizedek, and so forth, so after these things, the word of the Lord came unto Abram in a vision saying, Fear not, Abram, I am thy shield and thy exceedingly great reward. And Abram said, Lord God, what wilt thou give me, seeing I go childless, and the heir of my house is this Eliezer of Damascus. Now just take note of this because this man, Eliezer, is going to play a very important role in one of our later lessons. Eliezer is the first servant of the household of Abraham. And Abram said, Behold to me thou hast given no seed, and lo, one born in my house is mine heir. Behold, the word of the Lord came unto him, saying, This shall not be thine heir, But he that shall come forth out of thine own loins shall be thine air. And he brought him forth abroad and said, Look now toward heaven, and count the stars that thou be able to number them. And he said unto him, So shall thy seed be. And he believed in the Lord. Notice this terminology. He believed in the Lord, and he counted it to him for righteousness. And he said, I am the Lord who brought thee out of the year of the Chaldeans to give thee this land to inheriteth. And he said, Lord God, whereby shall I know that I shall inheriteth. And he said unto him, Take me a heifer of three years old, a she-goat of three years old, a ram of three years old, and a turtle-dub, and a young pigeon. And he took unto him all these, divided them in the midst, laid each piece one against another, but the bird divided he not. Verse And it came to pass that when the sun went down, and it was dark, behold, a smoking furnace, and a burning lamp that passed between those pieces. And the same day the Lord made a covenant with Abraham, saying, Unto thy seed have I given this lamp from the river of Egypt under the great river, the Euphrates, the Canaanites, the Canaanites, the Canaanites, the Gershonites, and the Jebusites. Now Sarai, Abram's wife, bore him no children, and she had a handmaid, an Egyptian, whose name was Hagar. And Sarai said unto Abram, Behold now the Lord hath restrained me from bearing. I pray thee, go in unto my maid, that it may be that I may obtain children by her. And Abram hearkened to the voice of Sarai. Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar her maid. The Egyptian, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife. And he went in unto Hagar, and she conceived. And when she saw that she had conceived, the mistress was despised in her eyes. And therein I said unto Abram, The wrong done me be upon thee. I have given my maid unto my bosom. And when she saw that she had conceived, I was despised in her eyes, the Lord judged between me and thee. Now chapter seventeen. When Abram was ninety years old and nine, The Lord appeared to Abram and said unto him, I am the Almighty God, walk before me and be thou perfect. And I will make my covenant between me and thee, and will multiply thee exceedingly. And Abram fell in his face, and God talked with him, saying, As for me, behold, my covenant is with thee, and thou shalt be a father of many nations. Neither shall thy name any more be called Abram, but thy name shall be Abraham, for a father of many nations as I may be. And I will make thee exceedingly fruitful. and I will make nations of thee, and kings shall come out of thee. And I will establish my covenant between me and thee, and thy seed after thee, and their generations, for an everlasting covenant, to be a God unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, and I will give unto thee, and to thy seed after thee, the land wherein thou art a sojourner, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession, and I will be their God. And God said unto Abraham, Thou shalt keep my covenant therefore, thou and thy seed after thee, and their generations, This is my covenant which ye shall keep. Between me and you and thy seed after thee, every male child among you shall be circumcised. And ye shall circumcise the flesh of your foreskin, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. And he that is eight days old shall be circumcised among you, every male child in your generation, he that is born in the house or bought with money or any foreigner who is not of thy seed. He that is born in thy house, and he that is bought with thy money must need to be circumcised, and my covenant shall be in your flesh for an everlasting covenant. And the uncircumcised male child whose flesh with his foreskin is not circumcised. That soul shall be cut off from his people. He has broken my covenant. God said unto Abraham, As for Sarai thy wife, thou shalt not call her name Sarai, but Sarah, shalt her name be. Back to chapter fifteen. and verse one. The first thing that we want to zero in on this evening is these words, The Word of the Lord came unto Abram. The Word of the Lord is speaking to him, and the Word of the Lord is saying to him, I am. Now you'll notice that probably in your text the M is in italics, which as you know means that it is not found in the original text. In the Hebrew wording of this text, the word M is understood. So we have I thy shield and thy exceeding great reward. Now in the Hebrew text if you were reading it, you would see that the M is understood. Therefore it is appropriate and accurate that the M be put in there. Now this is important as you're going to see in a moment. I M is speaking to Abraham. Now I believe that this is another case of a theophany. Now this is a vision that is given to Abram. Now theophany very simply is Theo, which means God, and then the phony is an appearance or an appearance of God. God is making an appearance or a manifestation to this person. Just like theology is Theo. And then ology or the study of the study of God. We now have theophany, an appearance of God. God makes him known to men in the person of his son. His son, our Lord Jesus Christ, in the New Testament, then is the one who is coming and speaking to Abram. Follow up to this point. Good. Glad. So the Son of God is speaking to Abram, revealing to Abram, rather, God. The angel of the Lord in the Old Testament, I believe, is none other than the Son of God himself. Whenever we see the angel of the Lord, it is speaking of the Son of God. That is, our Lord Jesus Christ in the Old Testament. In the New Testament, then, he is named. the Christ, He is our Lord. In the Old Testament, the Holy Spirit will speak of Him as being the angel of the Lord. Now, in this case, He is going to come as the Word of the Lord, the great I am. Now, you may be wondering, I'd like to see how you're going to prove that from Scripture, that this is the Son of God. Very well. Let us think for a moment of what we find in the New Testament. As you can see in your outline, I have be the manifestation of God. John one, one state, in the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God and the Word was God. The Word, word, comes from the Greek word logos, which means the manifestation of a being. It is not the utterance of a sound, like we might think of a word, but it is actually the manifestation of a being. In the beginning was the manifestation of a being. This manifestation was not just simply the expression, but this manifestation was, in fact, God. In the beginning was the Word. The Word was with God, and the Word was God. This is God, as well as being one who is revealing God. So this is the Word. What is that Word that was in the beginning? Well, John one gives us a clue. In verse fourteen it says, and the word was made flesh and dwelt among us, we beheld His glory, the glory of the only begotten of the Father, full of grace and truth. Who would that be? Well, our Lord Jesus cried. This is the one who was made flesh. In first John, in chapter one, and about the first four verses, I believe it is, John expands on this very scene, saying that which was from the beginning, says that which we have seen, that which we have heard, that which our hands have handled. He's talking about the physical appearance of our Lord Jesus Christ, the manifestation of God. Hebrews chapter one and verse one then goes on to say, God, who in sundry times and in diverse manners, spoke unto the fathers and times passed by the prophets half in these last days spoken unto us, how? By His Son. God is revealing Himself by His Son. Now obviously today the Son is not here in this physical being. We cannot do as John did. We cannot physically see him, physically hear him, physically touch him. We do so by faith. But the Word is still here. This book. This book is still here. Here is God making himself known to man. So the Word of the Lord came to Abraham. What is that Word? Well, John one, one, Hebrews one, one tells us it's the Son of God. The I am now is speaking. He came to Abraham and he declared himself to be the I am. Who is the I am? The Gospel of John again is going to tell us. In the Gospel of John, our Lord declared himself as the I am seven times over. I'm just going to give you a list of these if you like to jot them down very quickly. These are all found in the Gospel of John. The first one is, I am the bread of life, John six, thirty-five. I am the light of the world, John eight, twelve. I am the door, John ten, nine. I am the good shepherd, John ten, eleven. I am the resurrection and life, John eleven, twenty-five. I am the way, the truth, and the life, John fourteen, six. I am the vine, John fifteen, one. The I am is the same one that spoke to Moses. Exodus chapter three in verse fourteen. It is the I am that is going to bring to close time, Revelation twenty-two verses thirteen and sixteen. This is the great I am, it is our Lord Jesus Christ. This is why the Jews of his day picked up stones to stone him, because they read the Old Testament. They read this very section. Fear not, Abram, I am thy shield. They knew, that's God speaking. Then our Lord walked upon the earth and he said, I am. And they knew what he was saying. He's saying, I am the same I am that was back in the Old Testament. It is the same I am that spoke to Moses. out of the burning bush. Notice what the IN says. First of all, fear not. Then, I am thy shield and thy exceedingly great reward. You'll notice those seven INs that I just read off, all fit individual needs of a Christian or man. Man is in need of life or is that I am the way, the truth, and the lie. Man is stumbling around, looking for the right way. He is the way. He is the life. He is truth in the midst of a world of lies. Are men hungry today? He is the bread, spiritual bread. Are men thirsty today? He is the water by which they will never thirst again. And here he comes to Abraham. and he is going to speak to him as the one who is going to be all that he needs. Abraham, I am come to fit your needs, to fill your needs. Now here was Abraham after this grave conflict, and he had already acknowledged in this previous chapter he gave all the glory to the Lord. He would not take any pride money from the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah, because He said then they would say they made me rich. That's not so. He gave all the glory to the Lord. And now the Lord comes to Abram and says, Abram, I am your shield, your protection. Abram could have stood there and asked, but Lord, there are great armies that surround me. My enemies surround me. All these people. He is traveling as a stranger in a strange land. All of these people who occupy this land, they could suddenly collect together and collapse down on Abram. But the Lord came to Abram and he said, Fear not, Abram. I'm your shield. Dear child of God, are there times in your life when you feel like everything is collapsing now? Is there times in our life when we feel like our enemies are about to overcome us? Circumstances, situations, or actually physical human enemies. I know there have been times in my life when I wanted to utter the word, my enemies are more than the hairs on my head. I don't know if that was true or not, but it kind of seemed that way sometimes. You ever been in a spot like that where you just feel like crying out, Lord, I'm about to be overrun by my enemies. The I am comes to us and says, I am your shield. I am your protection. I am the one that will fend off your enemy. In Ephesians chapter six, we read concerning our shield, a very familiar portion of Scripture, but one that it is well to rehearse in our ears every once in a while. Ephesians chapter six. Verse ten, finally my brethren, be strong. How? In the Lord and in the power of His mind. Brethren, sisters, the Word of God is speaking to us and saying, Be strong. We are not to be overcome. We are not to be the losers. We are the conquerors. We are the victors. We must be strong. But we would respond, but Lord, I can't. The Lord said, that's right, you can't. That's why we have the I am. The I am comes and says, be strong in the Lord and in the power of his might. Put on the whole armor of God that he may be able to stand against the wilds of the devil. For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places. And then we read concerning the armor, and in verse sixteen we read, Above all, taking the shield of faith with which ye shall be able to quench all the fiery darts of the wicked. Our Lord would speak to our hearts and say, I am your shield. Do you believe God? Well, yes, of course we do. We say we do. Do we really believe God? Do we really believe His word? Then take up the shield of faith. And there is nothing that our adversary can do to penetrate that kind of armor. I've been reading again the book Pilgrim's Progress and I'm also reading it to my children, the children's version of Pilgrim's Progress. My favorite part is where the devil pounces on Pilgrim while he's walking on this dark pathway and suddenly has him down until he has this armor that takes the sword and the shield of faith. Like the shield of faith. The devil's about ready to throw those dart at him and he shields them off with the shield of faith. How often the Lord's people are despondent. How often the Lord's people seem to collapse beneath the load of constant battle with the wickedness that we see all around us. oh how our Lord wants to come to us and say, I am your shield. Take up the shield. Take up the shield of faith, believe God. Then we also read where he says, I am your exceedingly great reward. In other words, God was saying to Abram, I am all that you need. Now Abram knew this to some extent. He knew that he did not need the spoils of battle. He knew that he did not need reward from the kings of Sodom and Gomorrah. But here the Lord was coming to him and bringing to light. This is the revelation, the manifestation of God, and God is coming and bringing to light to Abram. I am all that you need, Abraham. In First Peter, or Second Peter, Chapter One, we read these words, According as his divine power hath given unto us all things that pertain unto life and godliness, through the knowledge of Him that has called us to glory and virtue, by which are given unto us exceedingly great and precious promises that by these ye might be partakers of the divine nature." How are we going to bear fruit in our Christian life? How are we going to know real peace, real joy, real purpose? by understanding that our Lord comes to us as the exceedingly great reward. All that we need for life and practice is found right here in this book. It is through knowledge. The verse says, all things that pertain unto life and godliness through the knowledge of him. First, second Peter, one, three. The knowledge of him that's in this book. Knowing him. Seeing Him revealed unto us is all that we need for life and godliness. He's provided it all. He speaks to us as He spoke to Abraham long ago. I'm your reward. I'm all you need. And so many times we go hunting elsewhere. So often we're looking for answers within the physical or the human realm. So often we think, somehow I've got to work this out. No. not somehow I've got to work this out. It's just surrendering everything to the Lord because He is our reward, our exceedingly great reward. He will supply all that we need for this life. I was talking to a young lady at a camp this last summer in New Mexico and she had come to me, told me that she had a terrible problem. And she was quite a feisty young lady. As a matter of fact, she had gotten in a fight with one of the other girls, and it took two men to separate them. I have them to be one of them. And I'll tell you, this girl was quite hefty. She resembled somewhat of a bulldog. About this high and about this wide. And she could fight. And she came to me to explain why she had gotten in this fight. He said, Mr. Kane, I think I ought to tell you the problem I'm having. And I said, well, what is it? She says, well, I usually smoke three packages of cigarettes a day. And here at camp, we can't smoke. He said, yes, isn't that something? He says, well, I'm getting a bit nervous. And so my sister, it was her sister, she got in a fight with, he said, my sister just kind of... was the last straw, and so I wanted to punch her out. And she would have, too. So she said, what can I do? So I sat down with her, and I reviewed with her her salvation. Number one, I wanted to make sure I was talking to someone who was saved. So I reviewed this with her. And then I said, very well, I've got to do something about these cigarettes. She says, well, I know, but I've tried. I said, that's the problem. You're trying. It's time for you to learn what it means to surrender to the Lord. Give it up to Him. I told her, listen, you're not going to quit smoking. It's only God working through you that's going to make you quit. That girl had to learn what it meant. I am by exceeding great reward. I'm all that you need. All, if we'll only surrender every area of our life to Him, we'll see how that He takes care of every need. That we don't need these vices of the world. We don't need these subtle escapes from reality. We don't need these things. All that we need for life and godliness we find in Him. Later that week, that girl turned in to me her cigarette. I was a little skeptical at first. She gave me one package, and I kind of had a hunch maybe she had some more, but then she gave me her lighter, so then I knew I had her. But we're going to still pray for this girl, because she's in a home where the whole family smokes cigarettes, and it's awful hard for someone to quit in that kind of environment. But one of these days she's going to learn, but God says to Abram, I am thy exceedingly great reward. Listen, we don't need obvious things like that in order to learn this lesson. In order to have a need to learn this lesson, there's areas in all of our lives that we need to surrender to the Lord. So we need to understand He's all we need. He's everything. He's going to fill us up. And we better move along. Abram believed the Lord in verse six. He believed in the Lord and it was accounted to him for righteousness. This is one of the key verses in the whole Word of God. And we're going to go over now to Romans chapter four and notice how key it is. You'll notice that the main point on the outline is justification by faith. Romans chapter four is going to take this verse, run it up into the New Testament. And we'll see the very great significance of what has taken place. The Lord came to Abram, I'm your shield, I'm your reward, I'm all that you need. And Abram at first said, but Lord, what about your promise to me that my family are going through numbers of sand and the sea and the stars in the heavens? And the Lord told him, you will have a son. It will be your son. Your heir will not come out of your house. It will not be Yileazar. But it's going to be your son. Abram is going to later learn that it's going to be a son that comes from Sarah, not from Hagar, the handmaid. But it says there in that sixth verse, Abram believes in the Lord. Chapter four of Romans verse one, what should we say then that Abraham, our Father, is pertaining to the flesh as found? For if Abraham were justified by work, he had something of which to glory, but not before God. Notice it was not of work. Abraham did not do a work to attain justification, but he believed in the Lord. For what sayeth the Scripture? Abraham believed God, and it was accounted unto him for righteousness. Now to him that worketh is the reward not reckoned of grace but of death. But to him that worketh not but believeth on him that justified the ungodly. His faith is counted for righteousness. Now notice what it's saying. To him that worketh in verse four is the reward or is a payment and not reckoned of grace but of death. If we do a work, if salvation was a work that we did, then God would be simply paying us for a job that was done. And then it would not be great. The Word of God says, there is no work involved, therefore salvation is not the payment of a debt or payment for work done. When I was a teenager, I used to go out and work on farms and I would bail hay for a day and then have an asthma attack at night and have to go get a shot, but they paid me a dollar and a half an hour, so we didn't did it. So they paid me for work done. Probably wasn't very good work, but anyway it was for work done. They paid me. But salvation, what we see here in Romans chapter four, salvation comes not as a payment of a work done, but it comes solely by grace. And so if it is of grace, then work, there can be no works involved at all. So justification comes simply. It was accounted unto him for righteousness. It was put to his cap. Abraham, you are righteous. Why? Not because you did anything to deserve it, because you didn't. Solely by the grace of God and because you have believed. Justification by faith. The word justification then means to be declared right. It is a judicial term. judicially declared right. Why is it a judicial term? Because God is holy and righteous. God and His love wants to declare me, Greg Cain down here, he wants to declare me righteous. However, he cannot just declare me righteous when he's already stated the wages of sin and death. He can't just declare me righteous. righteous and remain righteous on his own standing. He must declare me righteous based upon the payment of sin with the death. Well, the death was paid by our Lord Jesus Christ. He paid the wages of sin with his own death. Therefore, God can still be righteous, looking down at Greg Kane and declaring Greg Kane righteous upon Greg Kane's belief in faith. So this is why we call it a judicial term. We are judicially, legally, declared righteous. God remains righteous. He declares me righteous based upon the finished work of Jesus Christ in whom I have believed. I've believed in the Lord. Now I am judicially declared righteous. This is good. This is something that we praise the Lord for as Christians. Now, if you're not a Christian here this evening, then this is something that you need to experience firsthand. And I would highly recommend to you that you experience it immediately this evening. Very simply, repent, turn away from the way you're going, and believe in the Lord. Just surrender yourself wholly to Jesus Christ as Lord. And then God will declare you right in His presence. You will be justified. Now that is the first part. That is the part that Christians look back to and say, I'm saved. But then there is justification on a practical basis that would be better termed sanctification. We'll look at that in just a moment. But first of all, notice in verse sixteen of Romans four, therefore it is of faith, that is, justification. That it might be by grace, To the end the promise might be sure to all the seed, not to that only which is of the law, but to that also which is of the faith of Abraham, who is the Father of us all." So all of us now who have believed, all of us who have exercised faith in Jesus Christ, we now see how that Abraham becomes our Father. Abraham in the book of Romans is spoken of as the Father of all those who have believed. the Father of all that line of faith now that is coming down through the ages. He is seen as that first one in order, so to speak, of those who will believe by faith. This great story of faith, Abraham believed in the Lord, and was accounted to him for righteousness, now becomes the lesson of justification in our lives today. Abraham in James chapter two and verse twenty three, because he believed God, And because of his believing God, he produced works. He is called the friend of God. You want to know something? You and I are even closer than friends. We're heirs and joint-airs with Jesus Christ. God has declared us sons. He has put us in His presence as mature sons. We are His sons. Now comes the point, how are we doing within the framework of justification? Justification comes to us on a practical basis. We are believing God, therefore we ought to be living accordingly. In Romans chapter six and verse eleven we read, Likewise reckon ye also yourselves to be dead indeed unto sin, but alive unto God through Jesus Christ our Lord. Let not sin therefore reign in your mortal body, that ye should obey it in its lust. Neither yield ye your members as instruments of unrighteousness unto sin, but yield yourselves unto God as those that are alive from the dead, and your members as instruments of righteousness unto God. Reckon the old man dead. Reckon ye ye also yourselves to be dead. Again, the word reckon is an accounting term. It means count it up and consider it as being dead. So when this whole flesh rouses up and says, I want to do this, our response is, can't do that because I'm dead. Dead men don't do those things. Dead men can't do that. When we rouse up and say, well, this is what I'm going to do, By the way, the Holy Spirit would respond in saying, you can't do that. You can't even make that decision because you're dead. You know what that means? You're going to be going back to my knees and saying, Lord, what would you have me to do? Lord, you make the decision in my life. This becomes justification on a practical basis. It means that we are declared right. Now we live in the reality of it. Justification on the practical basis. I live in the reality of being righteous before God. This, then, is our sanctification, our holy living, our holy walk. This will be seen down the line in the lesson of circumcision. But before we get there, I want you just to notice on the outline very quickly, and paragraph C, point number four, we have the sign of the covenant in verses nine and ten. And just notice that the sign of the covenant was the five acceptable sacrificial animals that are given to us in the book of Leviticus. A cow, sheep, goat, pigeon, and dove. The sacrifice is what sealed this covenant. Abraham believed in the Lord. It is accounted unto him for righteousness. The Lord then repeated His covenant to Him. Abraham, you are going to have a son. You are going to have a seed that's going to be numberless as the stars in the heavens. I think it's amazing that the Word of God, clear back in the book of Genesis, said the stars were outnumbered, and these sharp scientists are just now figuring that out. Thinking themselves wise, they became fools. It never fails. Anyway, the Word of God is saying, Abram, Your seed is going to be as the stars in the heavens, and then the Lord God is going to show Him how He is going to inherit this. He gives to Him this covenant, and the sealing of this covenant is the dividing of the animal by sacrifice. This is why our Lord would say, this is the New Testament in my blood. as he has given the cup to his disciples, as this is given to the church in First Corinthians chapter eleven. This is the cup of the New Testament in my blood, not the blood of a cow and a goat and a sheep, but our Lord says it's my blood. That makes it even more important and most valuable to our hearts. And then in Hebrews we read, in Hebrews ten it says we go through the veil that has been parted that is to say his flesh it has been parted it has been broken as these animals were broken in half and thus with the blood spread over the ground the covenant was sealed and we see that our Lord moved through these sacrificial animals moved through as the lamp Yes, as a smoking furnace and a burning lamp. Because the Lord is speaking to Abram now and telling him the future of his people, that they will go down in bondage in Egypt, they will be burned in the furnace, they should be let out with the light, as our Lord will go before them in the pillar of fire. Now in chapter six, very quickly, I want you to take note of the lesson in patience. Chapter sixteen, rather, of Genesis. Chapter sixteen of Genesis, we want to take note of this lesson in patience. Sarai now has a scheme. Sarai, Abram's wife, bore him no children. Now, obviously, Abram and Sarai probably talked to each other about this covenant. And I don't doubt that Seriye, being a woman, probably has this over in her head quite often. So misunderstanding, sister, I am not being critical of women. I'm just stating a characteristic. You all have to admit to. You do chew things over in your head a lot. If things aren't going quite right, you have a tendency to do what is known as fret about it. So Seriye is kind of fretting about this situation. And then she comes to the point where she feels that she has a better idea, a little scheme that she is going to put into practice. Now you'll notice here in verse two, Sarai said, The Lord has restrained me from bearing it. Now that statement in itself is true because the Lord had. The Lord was going to have her bear a child in his time, not Sarah's time. But Sarah wants to speed things up a little bit. Now the problem with Sarai at this point, she made a true statement. The Lord had restrained her from bearing. But now she's going to use this to put the blame on the Lord. And from this statement she's going to go on to the next statement, I pray thee go in unto my handmaid. This is where her error or her sin lies. She has lost confidence in the Lord and what the Lord can do. Losing confidence in the Lord, she then says, the Lord has kept me from bearing, therefore we must have to do something else. So Abram, her husband, go to her handmaid. In verse five, she is going to put the blame on her husband. The wrong done me be upon thee. Because then after her handmaid is conceived and was with child, her handmaid looked with scorn upon her mistress. kind of one woman looking at the other, saying, I'm a better woman because I can have a child and you're not. So she looked upon scorn, upon her mistress. So Sarai now is upset and said, the wrong that has done me be upon you, Abram. And yet she is the one that had conceived of this idea. The Lord has said that they would have a child. But Sarai refuses to wait upon the Lord. This is why I call this a lesson in patience. She was to wait upon the Lord's timing, and she did not do it. But you'll notice in verse three, or at the end of verse two rather, and Abram harkened to the voice of Suryod. Kind of sounds familiar from somewhere, doesn't it? Like in Genesis three, seventeen, where we read that Adam harkened to the voice of his wife and took the fruit. You see, beloved, in God's order, God is intended for the man to be the head. The man is to make the decision. When the man hearkens to the voice of his wife and lets her start scheming and making the decision, sin is the result. The man is to take this responsibility. The wife is to aid him in this decision-making. She is a help to him. So whenever we see in Scripture where the man is hearkening to the voice of his wife, we see sin as the result. Sin then became the result. Hagar became what is known in the Old Testament as a second class wife or a concubine. She will then bear a child. This child will bring a tremendous amount of unhappiness upon Sarai. In other words, she will reap what she has sown. She refused to wait upon the Lord. She fell into this lapse of faith. She lost confidence in the Word of God. The end result is a conflict in their family, a conflict that we will see more of later on. This is why we see throughout Scripture that faith waits upon the Lord. I've given two references, Psalms forty, verses one to three, in Isaiah forty, thirty-one, where we read, But they that wait upon the Lord shall renew their strength, They shall mount up with wings as eagles. They shall run and not be weary. They shall walk and not faint. All those good things happen to those who wait." Patience is the result of faith. An impatient person is not exercising faith. We must wait upon the Lord. And I know how hard it is that standing before you is one that has a terrible problem with patience. And I know every time I pray for patience, what's coming? Tribulation, work of patience. But we all need to learn the lesson of patience. In my thinking, whenever I pray, I expect to see things happen right now. I kind of think that, well, Lord, remedy this situation. I expect to look and then bang, it's gone. But the Lord does things in his timing, not mine. It is for us to wait. And as we wait, we will learn tremendous things of our Lord. We become close to Him as we wait. Those that wait upon the Lord, they shall renew their strength. Mount up with wings as eagles. Brother Henry Van Ryan used to say that the mounting up with wings as eagles is to receive instruction from the Lord. Run and not be weary is to run to do his bidding and then walk and not think meant to walk in the fellowship of the saints. These things happen to those who wait. This is the lesson of patience. Had Sarai waited, she would have found her reward down the line. We read in chapter seventeen in verse one, The Lord again is appearing to Abram and said unto him, I am the Almighty God. Walk before me and do the best you can. No. that walk before me and be thou perfect. Once again it brings us back to the Word of God which is able to make us perfect, thoroughly furnished unto all good work. In Second Timothy chapter three and verse seventeen. To be perfect our Lord demands of us that we walk as he walked. First John two six that's holy living. We are to live a holy life And that's not do the best we can, because if we settle for that, then we'll settle for a mess somewhere way down below where God wants us to be. But if we're crucifying the flesh, reckon the old man is dead, so that the Holy Spirit can well up within us, if we're looking to the Lord and through His perfection or going towards perfection, then the Lord will do this work through us. The Word of God is given to us to make us perfect. and thoroughly furnished unto all good works. In chapter seventeen we read in verses nine to fourteen concerning a covenant then sealed with a sign of circumcision. Circumcision to us in the spiritual sense is going to speak of cutting away the flesh. As a matter of fact, in Moses' address to Israel, the last words of Moses to Israel, the book of Deuteronomy, chapter ten and verse sixteen, chapter thirty and verse six speaks of what circumcision is to me, even to Israel. Because there Moses is speaking to Israel and saying that the Lord wants a circumcision of your heart. In other words, the Lord wanted their total love and devotion. The law was given to them to show them how they would come short. But the law was given to them to bring them to God. so that they would love Him and adore Him. This was not accomplished then until the death of our Lord Jesus Christ. Now we under grace, we come and love and adore Him and appreciate Him. But again, the Lord is calling upon us to be circumcised, not physically. Romans chapter four, nine to twelve, it tells us that circumcision did not bring justification. That is in the physical sense. but there is a spiritual significance in Colossians chapter two and verse nine. Colossians chapter two and verse nine we read, For in him dwelleth all the fullness of the Godhead bodily, and ye are complete in him, who is the head of all principality and power, in whom that is in Christ, being in him, ye are circumcised with the circumcision made without hands and putting off the body of the sins of the flesh by the circumcision of Christ, buried with him in baptism, in which also ye are risen with him through faith of the operation of God who has raised him from the dead. And you being dead in your sins and then circumcision in your flesh, have he made alive together with him, having forgiven you all trespasses. in whom ye are circumcised, the putting off the body of sins of the flesh, cut it off, cut off that old man. Now beloved, no matter how we look at it, it is a painful experience. Even in the spiritual realm in which we're talking about now, circumcision, cutting off the old man, cutting off the flesh, that is a painful experience. It's going to hurt. I am crucified with Christ. Nevertheless, I live, yet not I, but Christ liveth in me, and the life I now live by faith in the Son of God who loved me and gave himself for me. I think I missed that. But I am crucified with Christ. This is the point I want to make. Crucifixion is painful. Circumcision is painful. The Word of God is a sword, and the Word of God cuts, and it hurts. But if we'll endure that painful experience by the grace of God, we will be a better Christian because of it. Yield to the sharp knife of God's holy word. Yield to the sharp knife of being in His presence in prayer. Learn what it means, the circumcision of the flesh, to cut off, to kill that old man, and oh how it hurts. but all howl see fruit of the eternal glory. It must be done. Being done, we will understand this covenant relationship with our Lord Jesus Christ, an intimate relationship. Abraham was a friend of God. You and I have an intimate relationship with him. Therefore, the just to live by faith, that means that we are to be patient. The just to live by faith means that we must reckon the old man is dead. The just to live by faith means that we will yield to the Holy Spirit within us. This painful experience of circumcision, painful experience of putting away that old band, the flesh, that experience, even though it hurts, it's what's good for us. My dad used to paddle me good when I was a kid, whenever we got out of line. He used to tell me this hurts me, worse than it does you. To this day, I don't believe that. It hurts. But I know today that it was good for me. Well, it's the same thing in the spiritual realm. It hurts, but it's good for us as we wait upon the Lord and cut away that old man. Live in the reality of our justification. Our sins are forgiven. God has put it away, and he's declared us righteous. because of our believing faith in Jesus Christ as Lord. Let us live in the reality of this justification. Let us live by faith, shall we pray. Our Heavenly Father, we thank thee this evening that thou hast not left us on this earth without comfort, without strength. Father, you have given to us the Holy Word of God. You have given to us the indwelling Spirit. And that those who are in need of comfort and strength this evening, Father, we can ask you that thou would give it to them, knowing that thou art of God who answers such prayers. And, Father, those who are in need of a special word of encouragement, Father, we ask you to give it to them. Father, as we walk upon this earth and this life, we just pray that All of us might learn the circumcision of the flesh, the cutting away of that old man so that the Holy Spirit might live within us. Teach it, Father, each day what it means to kill the old man so that the Holy Spirit may live and dwell up within us. For we know, Father, that this is the better life. This is the sanctified, the holy life. This is the life that is exciting and full of joy and peace and real purpose. Oh, Father, may we live that life. We ask you now to part of tonight's blessing in the name of our Lord Jesus Christ. Amen.