05/06/2007
UNDERSTANDING GOD’S PROMISE (Gal 3:15-18)
Today – God’s Promise
We talked about the promise and the blessings that come from the promise when Paul told the Galatians to consider Abraham, whose faith was credited to him as righteousness
Promise made to Abraham in Gen 15 and affirmed in 22
Abraham (actually still Abram) is told he will have offspring outnumbering the stars in the sky, the sands on the seashore, and that all nations will be blessed through his seed.
When the promise is made, God and Abram are having a conversation. Abram was feeling really down because he had no heir.
He was in his eighties, getting pretty old, he had prospered, and God had already told him that he was giving him the land, him and his offspring, or seed.
If you have children then you know that we naturally have this desire to pass along what God has blessed us with, our estate, what little wisdom God has allowed us to gain – built in desire put there by God
Abram was depressed, because it looked like his estate and blessings would be left only to his servant because he had no children
God takes Abram outside to look at the stars.
Its there that he tells Abram to count the stars, if he can. His offspring will be that numerous – and Abram believed God
There is something about a star filled sky at night.
Have you ever had a deep conversation with someone you care about on a starry night?
Maybe take a long walk somewhere where there aren’t a lot of lights so you can see the stars
Maybe you lie down and just look up at the sky together.
For some reason it seems taylor made for deep thought if alone
Or deep conversations if you are with someone
Maybe its the testimony of God’s creation – puts me in Awe of God’s glory
Because of the vastness of the sky, and the stars that you know are millions of miles away, but its like you could almost reach out and touch them
Alex and I used to get up a cpl hours early and take long walks before the sun came up
Some of our best talks
You know what I think? I think God made it that way. I think he made starry nights especially for deep thought and deep conversations
I think that is why he took Abraham outside to show him the stars and remind him of HIS Power, so when he made Abraham the Promise, Abraham would see the promise in light of God’s power, and he believed God
It’s that promise, made by God to Abraham and his seed on a starry night so long ago that Paul is talking about in our passage today
Galatians 3: 15-18 (NIV) 15 Brothers, let me take an example from everyday life. Just as no one can set aside or add to a human covenant that has been duly established, so it is in this case. 16 The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. The Scripture does not say "and to seeds," meaning many people, but "and to your seed," meaning one person, who is Christ. 17 What I mean is this: The law, introduced 430 years later, does not set aside the covenant previously established by God and thus do away with the promise. 18 For if the inheritance depends on the law, then it no longer depends on a promise; but God in his grace gave it to Abraham through a promise.
1. Nature of the Promise: Irrevocable
15 Brothers, let me take an example from everyday life. Just as no one can set aside or add to a human covenant that has been duly established, so it is in this case.
Paul gives his readers an illustration from everyday life – something preachers often do
The human covenant that he refers to would be like a will
Now many of us have wills. A will defines our inheritance.
My parents have a will – changed when I went into the family business, stake in Co.
Changed back when I left the family business
This IS NOT that kind of will
What we would refer to as an irrevocable TRUST – like a WILL that cannot be changed in any way, added to, or canceled.
It is IRON-CLAD, to give people involved a sense of peace that the document cannot be messed with no matter what kind of games people try to play.
It’s funny how people can act when there is a significant inheritance involved
A will like that is like an un-breakable promise.
And Paul is saying that God’s promises to Abraham are like this irrevocable trust
IRON-CLAD
Once it is duly established, it’s written in stone – cannot be changed.
With a human covenant, like a will, these days we sign a document and have it notarized, which makes it official.
They had ceremonies back in the day of Abraham to establish covenants as well, in which each person clearly indicated their commitment and called curses upon themselves if they broke the covenant.
We see in Genesis 15 that after God made his promise to Abraham, Abraham asks God, how can I know that I will gain possession of the land?
So God goes through a ceremony to duly establish his covenant.
Gen 15: 8 But Abram said, "O Sovereign Lord, how can I know that I will gain possession of it?" 9 So the Lord said to him, "Bring me a heifer, a goat and a ram, each three years old, along with a dove and a young pigeon." 10 Abram brought all these to him, cut them in two and arranged the halves opposite each other; the birds, however, he did not cut in half. 11 Then birds of prey came down on the carcasses, but Abram drove them away.
12 As the sun was setting, Abram fell into a deep sleep, and a thick and dreadful darkness came over him. ... (promise and details)13-16
17 When the sun had set and darkness had fallen, a smoking firepot with a blazing torch appeared and passed between the pieces. 18 On that day the Lord made a covenant with Abram and said, "To your descendants I give this land, from the river of Egypt to the great river, the Euphrates
If this were two men making a covenant agreement between them, both men would pass between the pieces.
Because this promise is from one direction, from God, God alone passes through the pieces and establishes his unconditional promise to Abraham and his “seed”
IRON-CLAD, it can never be cancelled, changed, added to , or subtracted from
2. Promised to the “seed” of Abraham
. 16 The promises were spoken to Abraham and to his seed. The Scripture does not say "and to seeds," meaning many people, but "and to your seed," meaning one person, who is Christ.
Here we have Paul giving us messianic interpretation of OT passages that refer to God’s promises to Abraham and his “Seed”, or offspring
Traditional Jewish thought had always interpreted Abrahams “Seed” as the nation of Israel.
This is at the very heart of the issue in Galatia.
The word for seed or offspring could be used to refer to a singular person, like David, or Isaac, or Christ
Or it could be used to refer to the singular plural – like a nation, like Israel
That fit right in with the viewpoint of Jews who saw themselves as the “Chosen people” the chosen nation. Their national pride had made them reluctant to accept Christ as the seed, and anyone who is in Christ as a child of Abraham, regardless of nationality
The traditional interpretation of the nation of Israel being the recipient of the blessings of God’s promises to Abraham would make it very natural for people to then assume that if you were not born a Jew, you would have to become one in order to be a child of Abraham.
But Paul has already blown up that argument, and when you see the OT through the lens of the revelation of Christ, who fulfills the OT types and shadows, it becomes clear, crystal clear that the Seed referred to in Genesis is none other than the Messiah, Jesus Christ
The blessings of the promise, as revealed in Jesus Christ are your eternal salvation, and the gift of the Holy Spirit indwelling you, setting you apart and sanctifying you, conforming you to the image of God’s Son Jesus
The promise was not made to an ethnic nation, but to the true church. It was made to Abraham’s Seed who is Christ, and if you are a believer and a disciple of Jesus, then he is in you, and you are in Him, and you are in the family, you are a child of Abraham(v29)
Therefore the promise is made to you.
You can almost hear the protest of the false teachers in Galatia – “But the Law says”
The Law
3. Law does not replace or change the Promise
17 What I mean is this: The law, introduced 430 years later, does not set aside the covenant previously established by God and thus do away with the promise.
In traditional Jewish thought, the covenant of Abraham and the covenant of Moses were placed side by side, linked together.
Jewish rabbis even taught that Abraham kept the laws of Moses in detail
Paul points out that the Promise God made to Abraham came 430 years before the Mosaic law – an inconvenient truth
With a standard will, if you change it and make a new one a few years after the first one, the one with the latest date will supercede any older documents.
But that is not true with the type of covenant God made with Abraham. IT was IRREVOCABLE, UNCHANGEABLE
If the 2 covenants were made at the same time, you could argue that they were to be in conjunction with one another.
But they are 430 YEARS APART
The covenant that God made with Abraham and his seed is unconditional, unchangeable, irrevocable.
The law given 430 years later cannot be given as a requirement or a qualification for the 1rst covenant.
It does not supercede it, or set it aside, or change it in any way
The law had another purpose altogether. – We will look at that in our next message in this series.
Right now we are trying to understand God’s Promise of blessing to Abraham and his seed.
It was unconditional, God made the promise without demanding any works to obtain the promise.
There is nothing we can do to earn it, and we don’t deserve it
Yet God offers the blessings of the promise to us based on our identity
There is only one word that fits HERE - GRACE
4. The Gift of Grace
18 For if the inheritance depends on the law, then it no longer depends on a promise; but God in his grace gave it to Abraham through a promise.
Here again we see the clear distinction Paul makes between the law and the promise
The law involved doing, obeying, earning, relying on what I can do
The promise is a GIFT. Given to us by the Grace of GOD
IT has to be that way.
Because we cannot earn it. We are not capable
This is something that we have to let sink in
This is something that we have to choose to accept
Because it is not human nature: We are funny when it comes to Gifts
We’re fine with a gift as long as it is a gift giving occasion and whoever got us a gift didn’t get us something too much better than we got them.
Have you ever found yourself in that situation where someone gets you something way bigger than what you got them?
(Susan / Matthew offered to get us garage doors once. – I think we had gone out and bought a little votive candle or something for them, and they offered to buy and have installed a new $700.00 garage door)
We refused the gift – it was too big, we probably should have accepted the gift and thanked them, at the time our garage door had plywood over broken windows, was rotting, leaking, a real mess.
But I didn’t want to feel like I owed them something. Even though they clearly said “This is a gift” – We are happy to get it for you, please don’t feel that way
I couldn’t help it. We have this compulsion to stay even with people, we don’t want to feel indebted.
Guess what – God wants you to feel indebted to him, because you are. He has offered you a gift that surpasses any gift you have ever been given, ever even dreamed of, we’re going way beyond garage doors here
He has offered you the gift of eternal life – Jesus gave his blood on the cross, he laid down his life for you. You are indebted to Him – and that is O.K. that is simply reality
And we need to accept it, because we can’t change it. I should have accepted the garage door from my sister with humble gratitude, knowing I couldn’t pay her back, and let her have the privilege of meeting another persons need. If you refuse help when you need it, you are robbing that person of that privilege.
When it comes to Jesus, you better get used to feeling like you owe him because you do
Either way – you owe. And You owe big.
If you reject Jesus, or try to ignore him, you still owe
You owe a debt for the sin you have committed against God, that’s every sin you have committed against God, that’s all of them - I don’t even want to think about how long that list is.
That’s a debt you can’t pay off. If you continue to reject Jesus and you finish your life in your unbelief – you will spend eternity apart from the God in torment, and that won’t even make a dent in what you owe.
But if you turn from your sin –
If you repent and throw yourself on the mercy and Grace of God.
If you acknowledge your sin, realize your need for a savoir,
and then you call out to God,
and you believe on his Son, you believe that Jesus is the son of God,
that he died on the cross for your sins, that he rose from the grave on the 3rd day
You ask him to forgive your sins – all those sins that have kept you from God
And you accept Jesus as your Savoir and the Lord of your Life.
You give Jesus your life, you hand over the reigns and you make the commitment
To live your life for HIM. Not my will Jesus but yours be done in my life.
You humbly accept the gift that is offered. You didn’t buy it, you didn’t earn it
He saved you, and the glory belongs to GOD
And by his GRACE, you are a new creation. HE lives in you, and you in Him
You have a new Identity as a child of Abraham, as a child of the promise
And based on that ID, God has made you a promise, unearned, undeserved
But he makes the promise unconditional anyway
Eternal life with Jesus, and it begins the moment you accept him as your Lord and Savoir.
That promise he made to Abraham under the stars, a promise of blessing, he made that promise to you, as if you were out there walking under the stars with God.
I want you to do something this week. I want you to pick a night this week, and go outside under the stars.
I want you to think about the promise of blessing that God has made to you. I want you to talk to God like Abraham talked to God. Soak up the peace and wonder and awe of God’s beautiful creation, and thank God for what he has done for you, or if you can’t do that, ponder what it might mean to have a relationship with the one who created all those stars, the one who loves you enough to make those stars for you so that you might walk with him, and talk with him, he loved you enough to die for you so that He can make things right between you and Him, IF you believe, and TRUST.
GOD KEEPS HIS PROMISES -
PRAY
