Genesis 3/4/17

GENESIS

March 4, 2017
By Pastor Kim Hickcox

(All Scripture taken from One New Man Bible unless otherwise noted.)

“And when Abram was ninety-nine years old, the LORD appeared to Abram, and said to him, ‘I AM the Almighty God [El-Shaddai]! Walk before Me and be perfect. ²And I will give My covenant between Me and you and will multiply you exceedingly.’ ³And Abram fell on his face and God talked with him saying, ⁴‘As for Me, behold, My covenant is with you, and you will be a father of many nations.’” Genesis 17:1-4

Notice when the Lord came to Abram to give him a covenant, He used His name: I AM, which we learned earlier is the very powerful name Anokhi, and is used when the Lord needs to express an incredibly deliberate and intense purpose or action. Then He substantiates it with El-Shaddai, Almighty God!

Three more items of note said in these first 4 verses:

a.      ‘Walk before Me and be perfect.’ (verse 1b) The word translated as perfecthere, means maturely. The Lord by no means expected nor expects any of us to ever be perfect! He’s omniscient, after all. But He does want us to walk in Spiritual maturity. Which is, doing what know is right simply because it is right and wanting to please our God Whom we love. And this of course applies when we are alone also, as it is a heart condition – which should NOT be a wanting-to-impress-people condition.

b.     ²And I will give My covenant between Me and you and will multiply you exceedingly.’ (verse 2) As we discussed two weeks ago, when God gives a covenant, it is unconditional. Which should then reinforce the last part of verse 1, in that Abram’s walking in perfection or even in total maturity is neither a condition for the covenant nor an expectation.

AND may I note: neither is it a condition for our covenant! He knows just what He was getting when He got us! This is recorded many times in Scripture, probably because He knew that we would have to be reassured of this many, many times:

“…He chose us in Him before the foundation of the world…” Ephesians 1:4

“…I know whom I selected…” John 13:18

“And we must give thanks to God always concerning you, brothers, as you have been loved by the Lord, because God chose you, First Fruits in salvation by means of sanctification of spirit and faith in the truth, ¹⁴to which He called youthrough our gospel in obtaining the glory of our Lord Y’shua Messiah.” 2^ndThessalonians 2:13-14 (bold mine for emphasis)

“…but I have called you friends, because everything which I heard from My Father I made known to you. ¹⁶You did not chose Me, but I chose you and I placed you so you would go and you would bear fruit and your fruit would remain, so that whatever you would ask the Father in My Name He would do for you.” John 15:15-16

So when we say This is when we found the Lord, it’s not that He was playing hide-and-seek and we finally found His hiding place. It’s more like He had been chasing us our whole lives, and when we finally allow Him to tackle us, He turns us to face Him and we say, in all astonishment, There You are!!

c.      ‘As for Me, behold, My covenant is with you, and you will be a father of many nations.’ (verse 4) After Sarah died (see Genesis 23:1-2), Abraham married again. And although we know that Isaac was God’s chosen one for the line of His Hebrew people, the covenant we read today stating that ‘you will be a father of many nations’ was at least partially fulfilled with his second marriage as seen in Genesis 25:1-6, “Then Abraham went and took a wife and her name was Keturah.²And she bore him Zimran, Yokshan, Medan, Midian, Yishbak, and Shuakh. ³And Yokshan begot Sheba and Dedan. And the sons of Dedan were Asshurim, Letushim, and Leummim. ⁴And the sons of Midian; Ephah, Efer, Hanoch, Abidah, and Eldaah. All these were the children of Keturah. ⁵And Abraham gave all that he had to Isaac. ⁶But to the sons of the concubines that Abraham had, Abraham gave gifts and sent them away, eastward, to the east country from Isaac his son while he yet lived.”

I’m sure you recognize a few [patriarchal] names in the list, and considering verse 5, it’s no wonder they all eventually became enemies of Israel.

Now as I have already used the names of both Abram and Sarai when the Lord changed them, we will end with that, as it is part of the same covenant proclamation:

After the Lord tells Abram he will be the father of many nations, He says, “Neither will your name any more be called Avram^*, but your name shall be Avraham^*; for I have made you a father of many nations. ⁶And I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make nations of you, and kings shall come out of you. ⁷And I will establish My covenant between Me and you and your seed after you in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be a God to you, and your seed after you. ⁸And I will give to you, and to your seed after you, the land in which you are a stranger, all the land of Canaan, for an everlasting possession; and I will be their God.” Genesis 17:5-8

Now forgetting all the future heathen nations that will actually be related to, and yet come against God’s chosen people, let us turn to Matthew 1:2-16, where we see that not only was Avraham blessed with kings in his lineage, but also the King of kings!

“Abraham begat Isaac, Isaac begat Jacob, Jacob begat Judah and his brothers^**. ³And Judah begat Perez and Zerach by Tamar, and Perez begat Hezron, and Hezron begat Ram, ⁴and Ram begat Amminadab, and Amminadab begat Nashon, and Nashon begat Salmon, ⁵and Salmon begat Boaz by Rahab, and Boaz begat Obed by Ruth and Obed begat Jesse, ⁶and Jesse begat David the king.

“And David begat Solomon by the wife of Urriah, ⁷and Solomon begat Rehoboam, and Rehoboam begat Abijah, and Abijah begat Asa, ⁸and Asa begat Jehoshaphat, and Jehoshaphat begat Joram, and Joram begat Uzziah, ⁹and Uzziah begat Jotham, and Jotham begat Ahaz, and Ahaz begat Hezekiah, ¹⁰and Hezekiah begat Manasseh, and Manasseh begat Ammon, and Ammon begat Josiah, ¹¹and Josiah begat Jeconiah and his brothers in the time of the Babylonian captivity.

“¹²After the Babylonian captivity Jeconiah begat Shealtiel, and Shealtiel begat Zerubbabel,¹³and Zerubbabel begat Abiud, and Abiud begat Azor, ¹⁴and Azor begat Sadok, and Sadok begat Achim, and Achim begat Elihud, ¹⁵and Elihud begat Eliakim, and Eliakim begat Matthan, and Matthan begat Jacob, ¹⁶and  Jacob begat Joseph, the husband of Miriam, of whom was born Y’shua, the One called Messiah.”

WHEW! I had forgotten how long that was! But it proves beyond a shadow of a doubt that when the Lord blesses – He pulls out all the stops!

The kings of Judah run from David through Eliakim, which makes 23! There was some interruption there and partial kingships due to Nebuchadnezzar, but the Word of the Lord was indeed fulfilled and as always, in abundance! And WE are heirs in this covenant also and more! Not only can we claim all the Lord’s blessings He promised to His people, because we are now one of His people too, but above and beyond that, “because He predestined us into adoption through Y’shua Messiah into Himself, according to the good pleasure of His will” (Ephesians 1:5) Did you catch that?  He chose us, past, present and future warts and all “according to the good pleasure of His will”!! Does it get any better than that?!? “Praise the LORD, for His loving kindness endures forever.” (2^nd Chronicles 20:21)

Let us close with Aaron’s Priestly Blessing, (as WE are also now a royal priesthood to Him according to what He told Peter, who wrote to the congregation and told us in 1^st Peter 2:9) followed by Psalm 150.

Numbers 6:24-26, “The LORD will bless you and He will keep you. ²⁵The LORD will make His face to shine upon you and He will be gracious to you. ²⁶The LORD will lift His countenance to you and He will establish Shalom for you.” Which means that on good thing will be withheld from you.

Therefore –

“Hallelu Yah! Praise God in His Sanctuary! Praise Him in the firmament of His power! ²Praise Him for His mighty acts! Praise Him according to His excellent greatness! ³Praise Him with the sound of the shofar! Praise Him with the lute and harp! ⁴Praise Him with the tambourine and dance! ⁵Praise Him with stringed instruments and flutes! ⁵Praise Him upon the loud cymbals! Praise Him upon the high sounding cymbals! ⁶Everyone who has breath will praise the LORD! Hallelu Yah!” Psalm 150

SHALOM!!!