Promises Made to Abraham

Well, last Thursday, as was already mentioned in the sermonette, we celebrated the national holiday of Thanksgiving here in the United States. And many of us, no doubt, we gathered together with family and friends and enjoyed good food together and good fun and fellowship together, maybe watched a football game or two. There's always the lineups that go head-to-head on Thanksgiving Day. And during that time, we remembered with Thanksgiving the blessings that God has poured out on us as a nation. And hopefully, brethren, we remember as well the blessings that God has poured out on us as the people of God, of the fact that we're not only His physical people, but His spiritual people, the Church as well.

It's not my primary purpose today to speak on Thanksgiving itself, but I'd like to use that as a jump-off point to talk about the topic that we will walk through, which is the source of those blessings. As we stop to observe and celebrate and remember the blessings of this nation that have been poured out on us, what is the source of those blessings? Why are we so blessed as a nation? And where have these things come from? Is it just a matter of our own good decisions that we're blessed as a nation? Or indeed, is there something more to it even than that? Today, we're going to examine the biblical topic of the promises made to Abraham.

And that's the title of the message for today, the promises made to Abraham. If you were to take out our fundamental belief booklet and thumb through it, you'll find that the promises to Abraham is one of the fundamental beliefs of the United Church of God. It's a fundamental belief that goes back decades in the history of the Church.

And in fact, it's the 15th fundamental belief listed in our booklet. I encourage you, after the sermon today, to take that and to study through this topic in greater detail, because it's a big topic. And I'm not going to attempt to cover all aspects of the promises made to Abraham in the sermon today, but I would at least like to lay the foundation to scratch the surface on the topic. So we do indeed, hopefully, understand where the blessings that we have enjoyed as this nation have come from.

Abraham was a man whom God made many incredible promises to, and these are promises that continue to this day, and they affect not only Abraham's physical descendants, but indeed, they affect the whole world at large. A number of the prophecies and the promises given unto Abraham were physical in nature. Promises such as physical prosperity and blessing, promises of land and territory, and specific location of that territory as well, as well as kingship and rulership that would come from his descendants.

These were physical promises that God gave unto Abraham, but right alongside that as well, and I would say more importantly, is the promise of the spiritual element, the spiritual salvation that would be made available to all of mankind through the promise seed, through Abraham, the Messiah, which would come through his descendants, through whom all the families of the earth would be blessed. Our fundamental belief starts out the topic in this way. It says, we believe in God's enduring righteousness.

In other words, God is righteous, and his righteousness endures forever. It wasn't just at a sliver of time that God felt generous and made this promise, and now, you know, he's changed his mind and gone in another direction. No, God's righteousness endures forever, and the promises that he makes endures forever as well.

And so a lesson that we can learn as we walk through the blessings and the promises given to Abraham is that what God promises, he will indeed fulfill. He has not only the will and the desire to fulfill those things, but he has the power and the ability to bring them to pass as well. And we will see that he has done so, and he continues to do so, and it should be for us hope and confidence that he would do so, yet even in the future.

Fundamental belief also says his righteousness is demonstrated by God's faithfulness in fulfilling all the promises that he made to the Father of the faithful Abraham. Now, an additional element we need to understand as we lay the foundation of God's promises is that God chooses who he will work with and when he will work with them. Because there's times where maybe we say, well, God, why haven't you called this person or that person? I tried to explain to them the truth, and it seems like I'm just bouncing off a blank wall.

Well, God will call and extend that call to all of mankind according to his timing and purpose. But as we will see through Abraham, we come to understand that God calls those and works with those whom he will, when he will. The reference scripture to this is Exodus 33.19. There God states, I will be gracious to whom I will be gracious, and I will have compassion on those whom I will have compassion. So that is God's prerogative as God to decide whom he will work with and how he will work with them and what is the timing of that process.

Again, as God, that is his prerogative. God chose Abraham in his day, and he chose with him at that time to work with him by his grace and to fulfill a plan which not only started in his time and continues in our day, but indeed will continue to be fulfilled all the way to the end of the age. Let's begin the account here in Genesis 12. This is essentially the beginning of the narrative of we see of God's interaction with this man, Abram, the beginning of the promises of God, the beginning of Abraham's faithfulness and response.

Genesis 12, verse 1, it says, It says, So right off the bat, we see Abram is asked from God to make some pretty drastic changes in his life. He's living life. He has his routine. He has his family, his friends, what it is that he's doing. He's actually an aged individual at this point. And God said, stop what you're doing, pick up, pack up your family and leave, and not only to that, go somewhere where I will show you later.

You know, if you've ever been in the car with the kids and they say, where are we going? And you say, well, you'll see when we get there. That's essentially what God told Abraham. Hebrews 11, verse 8 says that he went, not knowing where he was going.

And so, you know what? He didn't pull it up on Google Earth ahead of time. Check out the terrain. Let's see. Do I really want to live there? Will I like where God is taking me? Now, the point is, God said, get up and go, and Abraham responded. Verse 2, we begin to see the promises.

Verse 2, God said, I will make you a great nation, and I will bless you, and make your name great, and you shall be a blessing. I will bless those who bless you, I will curse him who curses you, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed. So again, we have God making promises to Abraham, both physical and spiritual. These were the promises whereby all nations of the earth would be blessed. Ultimately, in God's timing, the salvation extends to all of mankind, according to his perfect timing.

Verse 4, so Abram departed as the Lord had spoken to him, and Lot went with him, and Abram was 75 years old when he departed Haran.

We begin to see here the obedience of Abraham. Again, 75 years old, it wasn't like he had nothing else going on, and he wasn't settled in his life and his ways. He was. But God said, get out of your father's house. I'm going to show you a better way. And Abraham responded. There's not a whole lot here, biblically, about Abraham's life before God called him out. Some extra-biblical sources, some historical and secular sources indicate that Abraham was not an insignificant man at the time in his own rights. He didn't appear as if he had nothing better going on, and, well, this is the best offer I've had all day. It was the best offer he'd ever had, but the point was Abraham appears to have been educated, appears to have been fairly well-to-do in his own rights, and he was willing to walk away from quite a lot in order to follow God's lead. Genesis, or Galatians chapter 3 verse 6 says that Abraham believed God, and it was accounted to him for righteousness. So he believed, and it wasn't just, well, that sounds good, I believe, no, it was a belief that led to action. And as James says, your faith, show me your faith by your actions. If you have faith in God, it's going to be demonstrated in how you live your life, and Abraham responded accordingly. I want to jump forward now to the time where Abram and Lot part ways, because what we find is that God then expands the promises to Abraham. Genesis chapter 13 and verse 14, we'll pick it up there. You just might as well keep your Bible open to Genesis. We're going to be reading quite a bit through the book of Genesis today. Genesis chapter 13 and verse 14. So God here is promising to Abraham an abundant heritage.

There's just one little problem, though. And maybe it was something God overlooked from Abraham's perspective, but maybe God hadn't noticed Abraham was childless.

Abraham and Sarai, again, 75 years old when God brings them out. Again, to be kind of old, there's no children. And God says, look, north, south, east, west, your descendants, as the dusts of the earth, are going to possess this land. Maybe Abraham's starting to wonder here, well, how's God going to pull this one off? Genesis chapter 15 verse 1. Genesis 15. After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision, saying, But Abram said, Lord God, what will you give me, seeing I go childless? And the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus. He says, I have no children from my body, no seed that I've produced. Indeed, the child of a servant in my house is heir apparent. Eliezer of Damascus. Verse 3, then Abram said, Lord, I am your shield, your exceedingly great reward. But Abram said, Lord God, what will you give me, seeing I go childless? Look, you have given me no offspring. Indeed, one born in my house is my heir. And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, saying, This one shall not be your heir, but one who will come from your own body shall be your heir. Then he brought him out, and he said, Look now towards heaven, and count the stars if you are able to number them. And he said to him, So shall your descendants be. And he believed in the Lord, and he accounted it to him for righteousness.

So again, here God is promising Abram an abundant future for his descendants and his heritage. And this is why Abraham is known as the father of the faithful. Because it says he believed God, trusted in him. It was accounted for him as righteousness. When God called Abram out of the land of his father's house, he went out. He acted. He departed. And God brought him into this land, and God made him promises Abram believed. Even if he didn't know exactly how God was going to fulfill that which he promised, he believed. And it was accounted to him for righteousness. Brethren, the lesson for you and I, if we're going to be pleasing in God's sight, and if we're going to grow into the children that he desires, is we too must believe God and respond accordingly.

Even if we don't understand exactly what God is doing or how he's going to fulfill it, we need to trust in his word, believe him, and respond accordingly. And if you live by that faith, it will be accounted to you as righteousness as well.

Genesis 16, verse 1. Now Sarah, Abram's wife, had borne him no children, and she had an Egyptian maidservant whose name was Hagar. So Sarah said to Abraham, See now the Lord has restrained me from bearing children. Please go in. Take my maid. Perhaps I shall obtain children by her. In Abram, he did the voice of his wife Sarai. So again, these great promises were made, and yet no children had come. Abram was 75 years old when they left Haran, wasn't getting any younger. He'd been in Canaan now for 10 years, and it seemed like things weren't happening according to the timing that maybe Abram thought they should happen. And this wasn't like he had deserted his trust in God. But, you know, maybe they could help God along the way to help fulfill what it is that God has promised. And so they come up here with this alternate plan of their own devising for the fulfillment of the requirement that this heir must come from Abraham's seed, a child from his body. Verse 3, Then Sarai, Abram's wife, took Hagar, her maid, the Egyptian, and gave her to her husband Abram to be his wife, after Abram had dwelt ten years in the land of Canaan. So now he's 85 years old. Verse 4, So he went into Hagar, and she conceived, and when she saw that she had conceived, her mistress became despised in her eyes. You know what? I can have children. You can't. And now Sarai is despised in the eyes of Hagar. And this is the consequence, then, of trying to do God's work for him. You know, at times when we maybe try to seek to take on ourselves what God has promised to handle, God, I'll take care of this. What happens? Well, what happened here? The outcome is often less than stellar. Now there's contention in the household between Hagar and Sarai. Hagar is pregnant, and she ends up thrust out. Verse 5, Then Sarai said to Abram, My wrong be upon you. I gave my maid into your embrace, and when she saw that she had conceived, I became despised in her eyes. The Lord judged between you and me. So Abram said to Sarai, Indeed, your maid is in your hand, due to her as you please. And when Sarai dealt harshly with her, she fled from her presence. Now the angel of the Lord found her by a spring of water in the wilderness, by the spring on the way to Shur. I want to stop for a moment. I want to address for a moment the term here, the angel of the Lord. I've actually stopped using the term as it is written in the English, the angel of the Lord, because the word that is translated here, angel, in the Hebrew is malek, and it means messenger. And it can be a divine messenger, it can be an angelic messenger, it can be a human messenger. The prophet Malekai was a human Malek, a human messenger from God.

Angelic realm are often messengers, translated angels, but as we understand who this being is, the angel of the Lord as it's translated, we see through a number of places in Scripture that this is a divine being. This is not a created being. An angel is a created being. The word who became Jesus Christ is uncreated. And so, just from my personal perspective, to use the term the angel of the Lord borders on, perhaps being blasphemous, to the acknowledgement of Jesus Christ. So, I tend to anymore, and as I read through passages on this, I'll use either the term the Malek of the Lord or the of the Lord. I think that is staying true to the translation. In the original Hebrew, it is Malek Yahweh, and again, the of the is inferred in the translation. But just so you know, as I go forward, as what I am referencing.

Verse 8, and he said to her, Hagar, Sarai's maid, where have you come from and where are you going? And she said, I'm fleeing from the presence of my mistress Sarai. And the messenger of the Lord said to her, Return to your mistress and submit yourself under her hand. Then the messenger of the Lord said to her, I will multiply your descendants exceedingly, so they shall not be counted for multitude. So, although this is not the line through which God would bring the promises that he promised to Abraham, this is still a line of a Brahms' descendants. This is still a seed from his body, and the promise is he will be multiplied exceedingly as well, and he will be a great nation.

Verse 11, and the messenger of the Lord said to her, Behold, you are with child, and you shall bear a son, and you shall call his name Ishmael, because the Lord has heard your affliction. And he shall be a wild man, his hand shall be against every man, and every man's hand against him, and he shall dwell in the presence of his brethren.

So there is a line of descendants on the earth from Abraham by Hagar, who have come down now as descendants through Ishmael, who populate the earth and become a great multitude, and as we look around today, it is the Arabic people who are the descendants of Abraham, again, by Hagar through Ishmael. Now, running right alongside that as well are the descendants of the heirs of promise. The descendants through who God did fulfill, and is fulfilling the promise to Abraham, down through the promise line, and that heir in descendants comes by Sarai through Isaac, and we'll see that shortly. And through those descendants then came the Messiah, the offering of salvation by which all the nations might be blessed. So what we're seeing here, beginning in Genesis 16, is the consequences of Abraham and Sarai's attempt to handle things in their own way. Take my maidservant. Let's produce an heir. And literally mankind has lived with the consequences and the conflict of that decision all down the line. Globally and on a historical scale, there has been conflict between the seed of Abraham through Ishmael and the seed of Abraham through Isaac, down through history, even playing out in the world around us today. Again, it's a good reminder for us, brethren, that in our decisions that we make, they rarely impact us alone. Our decisions oftentimes impact others around us as well. This has had a global effect. Verse 13, then she called the name of the Yahweh who spoke to her, You are the God who sees. For she said, I have also here seen him who sees me. So the Malek who spoke to Hagar is also referenced in this passage as Lord, as Yahweh. I didn't write it. Moses wrote it by inspiration of God. And she is recognizing that the being who she saw and spoke to her is God as well. Carrying on, verse 15, so Hagar bore Abram a child, and Abram named the son whom Hagar bore him Ishmael. And Abram was 86 years old when Hagar bore Ishmael to Abram. So he leaves his father's house at 75, 10 years later. Hagar becomes pregnant, and then he's 86 years old now as Ishmael is born.

So now Abraham has a seed, but this is not the promised seed through which the blessing would come. Just as chapter 17, verse 1, Then Abram was 99 years old. When he was 99, the Lord appeared to Abram and said to him, I am Almighty God, walk before me, and be blameless. This is El Shaddai as God revealed Himself to Abraham. In the Hebrew, the shad means breasted, as in the milk of the breast, as in nourishment and sustenance. And that is the relationship that God had with the patriarchs. He is El Shaddai. He was the one who sustained and nourished them and brought them through their pilgrimage, and they trusted in God. Again, as a babe, trust in their mother. And God said, walk before me and be blameless. Abraham is 99 years old now at this point, 13 years after the birth of Ishmael. Still no direct seed of his own through Sarai. Verse 2, And I will make my covenant between me and you, and I will multiply you exceedingly. Then Abram fell on his face, and God talked with him, saying, As for me, behold, my covenant is with you, and you shall be the father of many nations. So we actually have an expansion now of the promise. In Genesis 12, God said, you'll be the father of a great nation. Now He's saying, you know what, you're going to be the father of many nations through your descendants. Verse 5, No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham. For I have made you the father of many nations. I will make you exceedingly fruitful, and I will make nations of you, and kings shall come from you. And I will establish my covenant between me and you and your descendants after you in their generations for an everlasting covenant, to be God to you and to your descendants after you. Also I give to you and your descendants after you the land in which you are a ship. And I will be a stranger, all the land of Canaan, as an everlasting possession, and I will be their God. Verse 9, And God said to Abraham, As for you, you shall keep my covenant, you and your descendants after you throughout their generations. This is my covenant which you shall keep between me and you and your descendants after you. Every male child among you shall be circumcised, and you shall be circumcised in the flesh of your foreskin, and it shall be a sign of the covenant between me and you. Brahm kind of had a lot going on in his life at 99 years old. And God said, Here is circumcision, and it is the sign of the covenant between me and you and your descendants after you. Verse 15, Verse 15, And God said to Abraham, As for Sarah, your wife, you shall not call her name Sarah, but Sarah shall be her name. And I will bless her, and also give you a son by her. Then I will bless her, and she shall be the mother of nations. Kings of people shall be from her. Then Abraham fell on his face and laughed, and said in his heart, Shall a child be born to a man who is one hundred years old, and shall Sarah, who is ninety years old, bear a child? And Abraham said to God, Oh, that Ishmael might live before you. What about Ishmael? He's my son, he's come for me. What about extending your promises to him?

Verse 19, And God said, No, Sarah, your wife shall bear you a son, and you shall call his name Isaac. And I will establish my covenant with him, for an everlasting covenant, and with his descendants after him. And as for Ishmael, I have heard you. Behold, I have blessed him, and will multiply him, make him fruitful, will multiply him exceedingly, and he shall beget twelve princes, and I will make him a great nation. So as you trace out then Ishmael's descendants, he had himself twelve sons, and then multiplied into a great multitude of people. Verse 21, But my covenant I will establish with Isaac. So God's blessing was upon Ishmael, in prosperity and multiplying, but in terms of the covenant relationship and the promises made to Abraham, he says, My covenant I will establish with Isaac, whom Sarah shall bear to you at this time next year. Then he finished talking with him, and God went up from Abraham.

As I spoke in my sermon that I gave a few weeks ago, what God does, he does in his timing. According to due time and due season, and according to his plan. And sometimes we try to force things according to our timing, and we need to learn, brethren, to wait on the Lord, and allow God to fulfill what he purposes according to his set time. There is now a set time here in which God will give the heir through Sarah. Genesis 21. Genesis 21. Jump forward a few chapters. Genesis 21, verse 1.

He says, And the Lord visited Sarah, as he had said, And the Lord did for Sarah as he had spoken, For Sarah conceived and bore Abraham a son in his old age, And at the set time of which God had spoken to him. He says, And Abraham called the name of the son who was born to him, Whom Sarah bore to him Isaac. Then Abraham circumcised his son Isaac when he was eight days old, As God had commanded him. Now Abraham was one hundred years old when his son Isaac was born.

What do you think about that, guys? Anybody feel up to a child at a hundred years old? I mean, a hundred years old, from our perspective, is when you get pampered, not when you're pampering children. Abraham here now, the heir, the promise from God that he looked forward to all these years now, Comes at the age of one hundred.

Carrying on, verse 8, Genesis 21, 8, So the child grew and was weaned, And Abraham made a great feast on the same day that Isaac was weaned. And Sarah saw the son of Hagar, the Egyptian, Whom she had borne to Abraham, scoffing. Therefore she said to Abraham, Cast out this bond woman in her son, For the son of this bond woman shall not be heir with my son, namely with Isaac. And the matter was very displeasing to an Abraham's sight because of his son, Because of his son Ishmael. Ishmael was Abraham's son. He had grown in his home. This was a son by his body. Abraham wasn't looking himself to just thrust him out, Although he was not the heir of promise. Verse 12, But God said to Abraham, Do not let it be displeasing in your sight because of the lad, Or because of your bond woman. Whatever Sarah has said to you, Listen to her voice, For in Isaac your seed shall be called. Yet I will also make a nation of the son of the bond woman, Because he is your seed. Again, this is blessing through Ishmael, Because of Abraham as well. Different from the promise. Verse 14, So Abraham rose early in the morning, Took bread and a skin of water, Putting it on her shoulder. He gave the boy to Hagar, Sent her away, Then she departed and wandered In the wilderness of Beersheba.

All throughout this process of Abraham's life, From the time that God called him out of his father's land, And he went all the way through this point, God was testing Abraham's obedience, And he was proving his obedience to God. Even if he didn't always understand How God was going to do things, Even if he, in some way, attempted to try to help God Along the way to fulfill this promise, The point Abraham was being obedient to God, And all that God commanded him, Even to the point of not withholding his only son from God.

We won't go and walk through the process for time today, But God had said to Abraham, Take your only son, Offer him up as a burnt offering to me, And Abraham willingly obeyed what God had commanded. And if you think that was an easy process, I think it was not. He trusted God. He believed in God and the promises of God, And what God had promised through Isaac. He knew God could resurrect and restore him to life once again, But again, how hard would it be even for you To walk through the steps of that process? And yet Abraham walked right up to the point That he was about to slay his son, And God intervened, And provided the sacrifice in his place.

Again, Abraham's obedience was clear. Now as we move on, the blessings promised to Abraham Were passed along through Isaac. Again, he was the promised seed. Genesis chapter 26 and verse 1. You see the transmission of this promise. Genesis chapter 26 and verse 1. It says, There was a famine in the land, Besides the first famine that was in the days of Abraham, And Isaac went to Abimelech, King of the Philistines and Gerar.

Then the Lord appeared to him and said, Do not go down to Egypt, Live in the land which I shall tell you. So what we're going to find as we walk all throughout this process Is God called Abraham out and brought him into the Promised Land, Made promises to him. Isaac, he said, don't leave, Stay in the Promised Land. Jacob, for a time left, God returned him to the Promised Land. Israel went into captivity in Egypt. God brought them out to the Promised Land. They sinned, they were displaced from the land, And the prophecy showed God will again restore his people to the Promised Land.

This is the land of promise for the inheritance of the descendants of Abraham. Continuing on, verse 3, He said, Dwell in this land, and I will be with you and bless you. For to you and your descendants I shall give these lands, And I will perform the oath which I swore to Abraham your father. And I will make your descendants multiply as the stars of heaven. I will give your descendants all these lands, And in your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. And so it's the promise from Abraham now to through Isaac, Through your seed all the nations of the earth shall be blessed. And why? Well, verse 5 tells us why.

Because Abraham obeyed my voice, And kept my charge, my commandments, my statutes, and my laws. So it's because of Abraham's obedience, Abraham's faith in God, Abraham's righteousness by which God is doing these things, bringing these blessings down the line through his physical descendants, even to us today. And there's times I think we can maybe forget, we look at the greatness of America, we see the decline happening in America, and we think if we just get our ducks in a row and just do the right things, then the prosperity will return as if we are the sole source of the prosperity.

The point is, God does bless his people as they obey him. But the source of the prosperity to the descendants of Abraham is not because of our brilliance and our good works alone, it is because of the promise as a result of Abraham's righteousness. Again, it's not the blessing of our righteousness, it's the blessing of the obedience of Abraham and his righteousness. And we must never forget that as a people. Now the same package of promises was also passed down the line from Isaac through his son Jacob.

Genesis 28. This is Isaac's blessing unto Jacob before he departs for Laban. Genesis 28, verse 1. Then Isaac called Jacob and blessed him, and charged him, and said, You shall not take away from the daughters of Canaan. Arise, go to Pandan-Maram, to the house of Beth-Ewel, your mother's father, and take yourself away from there of the daughters of Laban, your mother's brother. Verse 3, he says, May God Almighty bless you, and make you fruitful and multiply you, that you may be an assembly of peoples, and give you the blessing of Abraham to you and to your descendants with you, that you may inherit the land in which you are a stranger, which God gave to Abraham. Isaac sent Jacob away, and he went to Pandan-Maram to Laban, the son of Beth-Ewel, the Syrian, the brother of Rebekah, the mother of Jacob, and Esau.

We have here, then, Jacob leaving the land, promised land, to go and find a wife in this way back in Pandan-Maram. On the way, what we find is he now himself receives a revelation directly from God. Genesis 28 and verse 10. Now Jacob went from Beersheba and went toward Haran, and he came to a certain place and stayed there all night because the sun had set. And he took one of the stones of the place and put it at his head, and he laid down in that place to sleep. Then he dreamed, and behold, the ladder was set up on the earth, and its top reached to heaven, and there were the angels of God ascending and descending on it. And behold, the Lord stood above it and said, I am the Lord God of Abraham, your Father, the God of Isaac, the land in which you lie, I will give to you and to your descendants. So we see this promise continuing on. Verse 14. Also your descendants shall be as the dust of the earth. You shall spread abroad to the west, the east, the north, the south. And in you and in your seed all the families of the earth shall be blessed. Behold, I am with you, I will keep you wherever you go, and will bring you back to this land, for I will not leave you until I have done what I have spoken to you. God says, you know, you're going for a temporary time, but I will be with you, and I will bring you back to this land which I have promised.

Verse 18. Then Jacob rose early in the morning, took the stone that he put down his head, set it up as a pillar, and poured oil on the top of it. And he called the name of that place Bethel, meaning the house of God, but the name of the city had been lost previously. Then Jacob made a vow, saying, if God will be with me and keep me in this way, which I am going, and give me bread to eat and clothing to put on, so that I come back to my Father's house in peace, then the Lord shall be my God. And this is the stone which I have set as a pillar, and shall be God's house. And all that you give me, I will surely give a tenth to you. So Jacob makes his vow at Bethel, bring me back to my Father's land, and you will be my God. And he would tie it to God, and he made this memorial again, anointing the stone, making this vow to God. We know the story as it progresses. Jacob goes to Laban, his mother's brother, works for 14 years, gains two wives in the process, and one night God appears to him in a dream and tells him now to return to the land of his fathers. Genesis 31, verse 11.

Genesis 31, verse 11 says, Then the messenger of God spoke to me in a dream, saying, Jacob. And he said, Here I am. And he said, Lift up your eyes now and see, and all the rams which leap on the flocks are streaked and speckled and gray spotted. For I have seen all that Laban is doing to you. He says, I am the God of Bethel, where you anointed the pillar, where you made the vow to me. Now arise, get out of this land, and return to the land of your family. So God had blessed Jacob exceedingly, even under the oppression of Laban, even with the advantage that Laban tried to take over Jacob. Jacob was blessed exceedingly by God, and now God says, Get out of that place. Return to the land of your father. So Jacob obeyed, packed up his family, his possessions, and returned to the Promised Land, that inheritance that would be to him and his descendants. So on the return trip, then, his name was changed from Jacob to Israel. Genesis 32, verse 22. This is the journey back. And he rose that night, took his two wives, his two female servants, his eleven sons, and crossed over the fort of Jabach. And he took them and sent them over the brook, sent over what he had. And then Jacob was left alone, and a man wrestled with him until the breaking of day. The translators have capitalized man here, because they recognize this is the divine being, this is the word, who became Jesus Christ, who is wrestling here with Jacob. Verse 25 says, Now when he saw that he did not prevail against him, he touched the socket of his hip, and the socket of Jacob's hip was out of joint as he wrestled with him. And he said, Let me go for the day breaks, but he said, I will not let you go unless you bless me. And so he said to him, What is your name? And he said, Jacob, And he said, Your name shall no longer be called Jacob, but Israel, for you have struggled with God and with men, and have prevailed. Then Jacob asked, saying, Tell me your name I pray. And he said, Why is it that you ask about my name? And he blessed him there. So Jacob called the name of the place Peniel, for he was saying, For I have seen God face to face, and my life is preserved. Verse 31, Just as he crossed over Peniel, the sun rose on him, and he limped on his hip. Therefore to this day the children of Israel do not eat the muscle that shrank, which is in the hip socket, because he touched the socket of Jacob's hip in the muscle that shrank. So what we're beginning to see here is that God is bringing Jacob back into the land of promise. He's changing his name from Jacob to Israel, and he's setting the stage to which the fulfillment of the carrying on of the promises to his descendants would continue.

We know the story, brethren. We won't go through it all, but because of jealousy, Jacob's son Joseph was sold into slavery, ultimately ending up in Egypt, eventually becoming Pharaoh's right-hand man. Over the passage of time, there was famine in the land, so the family of Israel was then forced to relocate from the Promised Land to the land of Egypt. And so as we fast forward in time, you have the sons of Jacob are grown, and they have children of their own, and they're beginning to, their families, and they're beginning to form into tribes. And it is at that point we see yet again the passing of the physical and the spiritual promises of God. Those that came from Abraham through Isaac to Jacob, we will now see them passed on as well. Now the birthright promise went from Jacob to Joseph, although Joseph was not the firstborn. Typically the birthright promise went to the firstborn son, but there was a problem in this case, and there's a reason why I went from Jacob to Joseph. Let's look at 1 Chronicles chapter 5 and verse 1.

1 Chronicles 5 and verse 1.

1 Chronicles 5 and verse 2.

It says, Now the sons of Reuben, the firstborn of Israel, he was indeed the firstborn, but because he defiled his father's bed, there was a sexual sin which took place. His birthright was given to the sons of Joseph, the son of Israel, so that the genealogy is not listed according to the birthright. So Reuben was Jacob's firstborn son, and he would have received the birthright inheritance, which would have included the promise from God down through the generations. But again, he disqualified himself, and the birthright went then to the sons of Joseph, the physical birthright. Verse 2, it says, And so what you have is, it was Judah who received the spiritual birthright. It was the birthright promise of which the Messiah would come through his lineage, and there would be kings in his lineage. King David, King Solomon, eventually Jesus Christ. So those spiritual promises went to Judah, but the physical promises, the birthright promises, went through Joseph and not Reuben. And those were promises of wealth and national greatness. It was promises of an inheritance and the controlling of the gates of their enemies, all those things which are listed out to Abraham. Those promises from Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob went through Joseph's son, Ephraim and Manasseh. Back to the book of Genesis, chapter 48, we'll begin to see the connection of how this applies to us in this country today.

Genesis 48 and verse 1 says, And Jacob was told, Then Jacob said to Joseph, God Almighty, El Shaddai, appeared to me at Luz in the land of Canaan and blessed me. And he said to me, Behold, I will make you fruitful and multiply you. I will make you a multitude of people and give this land to your descendants after you as an everlasting possession. And now your two sons, Ephraim and Manasseh, who were born to you in the land of Egypt before I came to you in Egypt, are mine as Reuben and Simeon. They shall be mine. What Jacob is saying is that Ephraim and Manasseh are going to be listed just as one of my sons, in terms of the passing on of blessing to them. This is listing as the tribe, again, Reuben, because of his disqualification. Now these two, Jacob says, they are mine. Verse 6, he says, Your offspring, whom you get after them, shall be yours. And they will be called by the name of their brothers in their inheritance.

Let's jump now to verse 11. It says, And Israel said to Joseph, I had not thought to see in your face, but in fact God has also shown me your offspring. So Joseph brought them beside his knees, and he bowed down with his face to the earth. And Joseph took them both, Ephraim in his right hand toward Israel's left hand, and Manasseh with his left hand toward Israel's right hand, and brought them near him. So the oldest, Manasseh, Joseph takes to the right hand of his father, which the right hand blessing was intended, the greater blessing, to be upon Manasseh. Verse 14 says, Then Israel stretched out his right hand and laid it on Ephraim's head, who was the younger, and his left hand on Manasseh's head, guiding his hands knowingly, for Manasseh was the firstborn. So it would appear what he did was actually reached out and crossed his hands, so that his right hand went on the youngest, and his left hand went on the firstborn, and it said he guided his hands knowingly.

Verse 15, And he blessed Joseph, and he said, God, before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, God, who has fed me all my life long to this day, the Malek, who has redeemed me from all evil. Again, this is a recognition as well of the Word, as Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob were not into angel worship. Jacob was not seeking for an angel to bless his sons, or to pray to an angel for blessing upon his sons. This is an acknowledgement of the Godhead, and the fact that he says, Bless these lads with the blessing of promise.

God, before whom my fathers Abraham and Isaac walked, the God who fed me all my life long to this day, the Malek, who has redeemed me from all evil, bless the lads. Let my name be named upon them, in the name of my fathers Abraham and Isaac, and let them grow into a multitude in the midst of the earth.

Now when Joseph saw that his father had laid his right hand on the head of Ephraim, it displeased him. He was not the firstborn, it displeased him. So he took hold of his father's hand to remove it from Ephraim's head to Manasseh's head. And Joseph said to his father, Not so, my father, for this one is the firstborn, put your right hand on his head.

But his father refused and said, I know my son, I know. He also shall become a people, and he also shall be great, but truly his younger brother shall be greater than he, and his descendants shall become a multitude of nations. So we have here Ephraim and Manasseh, the lads are blessed. Ephraim prophesied to become a multitude of nations.

Manasseh prophesied to become a great single nation, and it's consistent with God's promise to Jacob in Genesis 35.11, when he said that a nation and a company of nations would proceed from Jacob. And I'll comment on that a little more in a moment. Verse 21 says, Then Israel said to Joseph, Behold, I am dying, but God will be with you and bring you back to the land of your fathers. Again, back to the Promised Land. Moreover, I have given to you one portion above your brothers, which I took from the hand of the Amorite, with my sword and my bow.

So again, the promises of God went from Abraham through Isaac, the promise seed through Jacob, and now to Joseph's son Zephram in Manasseh. But the spiritual promise of the Messiahship went through Judah. Genesis 49, verse 1, Jacob called his sons, and he said, Gather together that I may tell you what shall befall you in the last days. Now we're looking at prophecies, looking forward to the end time, to the last days. And verse 10, again, the promise to Judah, says, The scepter shall not depart from Judah, nor a lawgiver from between his feet until Shiloh comes. And to him shall be the obedience of the people.

The scepter was the symbol of kingship that would not depart from the tribe of Judah. From the descendants of Judah, you had King David, you had King Solomon, ultimately Jesus Christ. You also can see more of the blessing that will come to Joseph's lineage, beginning in verse 22.

Just as 49.22. And Joseph is a fruitful bow. A fruitful bow by a well, his branches run over the wall. Again, the descendants of Joseph, Ephraim, Manasseh, and the latter days. The archers that bitterly grieved him shot at him and hated him. But as bow remained in strength, and the arms of his hands were made strong by the hands of the mighty God of Jacob, from there is the shepherd, the stone of Israel. By the God of your Father, who will help you, and by the Almighty, who will bless you with the blessings of heaven above, blessings of the deep that lies beneath, blessings of the breast, blessings of the womb, blessings of your Father, have excelled the blessings of my ancestors, up to the utmost bound of the everlasting hills.

They shall be on the head of Joseph, and on the crown of the head of him who is separate from his brothers. And so this is describing national wealth, describing strength and prosperity that would abound through Joseph's descendants. They would be blessed beyond the blessings even of their brothers of the other tribes of Israel, because to them was conveyed the physical birthright blessings.

And we indeed can see those blessings as they have come down to the modern-day descendants of Eshram and Manasseh. Strong military strength. Again, the choicest of rich blessings among the peoples of the earth. As we saw in the previous chapter, their descendants would become a nation, a great nation, and as I said, a multitude of nations. Nearly 3,700 years after the blessings were prophesied, we've seen the fulfillment of them through the British Commonwealth of Nations.

That was that multitude of nations which formed from the descendants of Eshram. We've seen it as well through the United States, the great single nation, which is descended of the tribe of Manasseh. Today the world's single superpower is the United States.

But in the 19th century, the superpower was great in Britain, the largest empire in the history of the world. It's interesting to stop and think because sometimes we make a comparison modern day between the United States and Great Britain and we'll say, well, the United States is greater than Great Britain.

How is it that the descendants of Eshram would be greater than Manasseh? Well, the height of its power, the British Empire, comprised nearly a quarter of the Earth's land mass, a quarter of its population, and it included Canada, Australia, New Zealand, India, parts of Africa, Asia, and the Middle East. And it was said that the sun never set on the British Empire.

And so while at this day and age, the United States is of greater power and dominance than the British Empire, which has gone into decline, the fact is, is that in its time and in its day, by scope of comparison, the British Empire and those commonwealth of nations was even a greater power than the United States in our time.

You can read more detail on these things if you go to the church's booklet, The United States and Britain in Bible Prophecy. You can see the history and indeed the future fulfillment of these prophecies explained.

Summon up, brethren, as we come back to the concept of Thanksgiving, where I began today, and being thankful for the blessings that have been poured out on us. For me, Thanksgiving is a reminder, in my mind, of the modern-day fulfillment of the promises that God has made to Abraham, that today we are living as recipients of the blessings of God through the literal physical descendants of Abraham, but not because of our righteousness, per se. Again, the righteousness of Abraham is a point by which these blessings have been conferred upon his descendants. And it is a reminder for you and I that we can indeed and should be thankful. As the biblical narrative continues on, the tribes of Israel went down into captivity in Egypt. Ultimately, God brought them out, resettled them into the Promised Land, and through sin, he removed them again. The Assyrians took the northern tribes of Israel off into captivity, and they became dispersed among the nations. And the Kingdom of Judah to the south was taken into captivity by the Babylonians at a later date, with only a remnant returning 70 years later. A little over 2,000 years ago, God sent the Messiah, the promised blessing through the tribe of Judah, through whom all the nations of the earth would be blessed, no matter nationality, no matter their lineage, because now this is the spiritual seed of Abraham through Jesus Christ. Those who would believe in Jesus Christ through faith could become, again, those descendants of Abraham by faith, and heirs according to the promise. So, as we understand, this takes place not only as a physical blessing, but as a spiritual blessing going forward on into eternity. The opportunity for salvation for all mankind is the means by which the descendants of Abraham through Jesus Christ, now all the families of the earth, will be blessed. Ultimately, God will regather all the physical descendants of Israel living during the time of the millennium, and He will resettle them once again in the Promised Land. They'll become a model nation to the world. Jesus Christ will sit on the throne of His Father David, and the knowledge of the Lord will cover the earth as the waters cover the sea. And indeed, all the families of the earth shall be blessed. The promises given to Abraham and his spiritual descendants will eventually extend beyond the confines of the Promised Land to include the entire earth. Final Scripture for today, Romans 4, verse 13.

Romans 4, verse 13. It says, So whoever demonstrates the faith of Abraham will be there to share in his Promised Inheritance with him, ultimately, as it says, to be heir of the world, and yet even beyond that, the heir of all things. Join heirs with Jesus Christ. And, brethren, I would just say, may you and I be among the people of the world. Join heirs with Jesus Christ. And, brethren, I would just say, may you and I be among that blessed group.

I'm going to wrap up by reading to you the heading out of our booklet from the fundamental belief, The Promises to Abraham.

It says, As promised, God multiplied Abraham's lineal descendants so that Abraham literally became the father of many nations. We believe that God, as promised, materially prospered Abraham's lineal descendants, Isaac and Jacob, whose name he changed to Israel. We believe that God, through Abraham's seed, Jesus Christ, is making salvation available to all humanity, regardless of physical lineage. Salvation is not, therefore, a rite of birth. It is freely open to all whom God calls, and those who are regarded as descendants of Abraham are those of the faith, heirs according to the promises. We believe that knowledge that God has fulfilled and continues to fulfill the physical promises made to Abraham and his children, and that he is fulfilling the spiritual promise through Jesus Christ is critical to understanding the message of the prophets and its application to the world. So, brethren, I encourage you to study. We've just scratched the surface. I encourage you to study in greater detail the physical and the spiritual promises which God has made to Abraham. They are foundational to understanding the Old Testament, the New Testament, and, indeed, the Holy Day plan of God, which we're beginning to walk through in just a few short months. So, as we come out of thanksgiving, brethren, let's remember to be thankful, not only for the physical blessings and abundance that we have, but for the blessing of being God's spiritual people, knowing that he has called us today, indeed, to be those who are the heirs of promise.