Genesis 12:10-20

0:02 Looking at our world from a theological perspective. This is the Theology Central podcast making Theology Central. Good morning everyone. It is Thursday, July the eleventh, twenty twenty four. It is currently nine forty three am Central Time, and I am coming to you live from the Theology Central studio located right here in Abilene, Texas. I hope you're having a wonderful day. I hope you're ready to put on those that those well, if I'm speaking to multiple people, I hope all of you are willing to put on your thinking cap. Is that better? I want everyone to put on their thinking cap this morning, because we're going to be digging in. We're going to be digging into a very well known passage of scripture, and we are going to challenge the way it is typically presented and preached. And whenever I do that, I find myself usually in the middle of some form of controversy. It is amazing. I look, I don't understand why that for passage after passage after passage of scripture, it's almost like a template has been handed down, right, Someone's like handed down to template, like this is how you preach this passage of scripture? And you can go from sermon to sermon to sermon to sermon to sermon, like, well, they got the memo, they got the memo, they got the memo. They're using the template. And sometimes I like to come along and go no, no, no, no, no, no no, let's challenge this. Let's question this, because I

1:33 don't think this template is actually handling the text in an accurate way. In fact, I think it's presupposing and placing things on the text and in the text that aren't actually there. And we see this happen continually with Old Testament narratives. Right, people just read into these narratives things that I'm like, where, why are we reading it from this perspective? But to challenge it, well, people, you'll get some pushback. People will get very irritated with you. It's almost like, I don't know, they get very defensive. Maybe that's a better word. They get defensive and they're like no, no, no, no, no, no, no no, this is the way it must be understood. Like, well, I don't know, maybe maybe we can at least consider that our approach to the text has been incorrect. Maybe possibly, so hopefully you will at least allow me to present maybe a different way to look at a very well known text of scripture, and hopefully we will all benefit from it. Now, here's what we are doing. If for some reason you have missed everything. I have in front of me. The May twenty second, twenty twenty four issue of the Sort of the Lord newspaper. Right, May twenty second, twenty twenty four.

2:58 I got a brand new issue of the Lord newspaper in the middle yesterday. Okay, but this is the May twenty second, And I was looking at the May twenty second, twenty twenty four issue a couple of days ago, and I made it to page ten of this issue of the Sword of the Lord newspaper. And there's a section called the Preacher's Column. And I always like to look at the Preacher's column because a lot of times it gives you maybe an outline or an illustration or something that you could utilize or build maybe an entire message upon or a devotional message. You could do something with it, maybe a Bible study. It gives you kind of the maybe the basic concept, and then you could build upon it. So I was looking the first one state, or the first one is entitled are Christians Heartless? And I'm like, okay, maybe I could do something with that. Maybe I don't know, we'll see. And then I looked down and then the very next thing was leaning wrong. Leaning wrong. Now, at first I thought it said learning wrong, and I'm like, I thought it was going to be like something about how Christians look the wrong way. And I'm like, ooh, that could be. That would be right up my alley. I'd like to correct how Christians learn. Okay, but it's leaning wrong, and I'm like, oh, okay, that's interesting. And then right underneath that is Proverbs chapter three, verse five that don't quote the entire verse. They quote this part lean not onto thine own understanding, don't lean to your own understanding. And I'm like, oh, okay, this this could be interesting.

4:30 It's in Proverbs. This was supposed to be the Summer of Proverbs summer, the Proverbs summer of twenty twenty four was going to be about Proverbs, and we did do a lot of work in Proverbs. And then the next thing, you know, Summer twenty twenty four is really turned into the summer of Psaw eighty three. So we won't get into that entire story. That's been crazy, right, and we have more developments about psaw Maty three, but we won't get into that right now. So I was like, Okay, lean not onto thine own understand that's that's a very well known verse. And then underneath that, they have this, if we have any leaning toward anything, we are sure to fall to the thing towards which we lean.

5:15 If we have any leaning towards anything, we are sure to fall to the thing towards which we lean. Now immediately I kind of challenge that, right because I'm like, well, I don't. That's again placing the issue external outside of us. If I lean towards that, then I'm going to fall. And my argument is, I'm leaning towards certain things because of the fallen nature that is in me. My fall in nature is what causes me to lean towards certain things. It's not the thing that I'm leaning towards. It's not its fault. The fault is inside of me. See, I lean in certain ways because I'm fallen inside. My leaning is evidence of my fallen nature, my sinful nature that is inside of you. Whether you are a believer or an unbeliever, I know Christians like to act like the fallen nature is gone and has been eradicated. I don't know why that's I know Christians try to say that's not the case. Christians do this maddening things. I was listening listening to a sermon yesterday that I wanted to just start screaming.

6:27 It was based on the Book of James and the pastor literally like within three minutes, basically said these like wildly contradictory ideas. In Christ you are a new creature, the old is gone. Everything is new. You have been set free from bondage. You have been set free. You are free, You're no longer in bondage to sin. And then literally like thirty seconds later. But as Christians, we continue to fight the flesh and we continue to wait a minute, if I'm set free and I'm a new creature and the old is gone, what am I fighting? What am I still struggling with?

7:08 If I've been said for it? Like, it's weird how Christians state this and they don't hear themselves contradict themselves. Well, in this particular case, I would argue, if we have any leaning towards anything, we are leaning that way because of the fallenness inside of us. That's the way I would state it, I am fallen inside. I have a sinful nature, and that sinful nature wants things, and it desires things, and it's full of lust and coveteousness and adultery and pride and anger and bitterness and unforgiveness. That is what we are in our nature. We can try to deny it, we can try to cover it up, we can try to pretend it's not there, and it manifests itself when I start leaning this way or that way. So that was my first kind of issue with it. Is I hate to say it. I'm not saying that this is the author of this article would even claim this, but it almost felt a little Pelagian to me, a little bit of Pelagianism, or at least semi Pelagianism. And I reject Pelagianism outright, semi Pelagianism. I reject outright, completely opposed to Pelagianism.

8:20 I loathe it. I can't stand. I don't think it's an accurate understanding of human nature in any way, shape or form, and I think all Christians should reject it, all right. So, and we've done plenty of study on discussions of Pelagianism. I think I did what the eighteen points of Pelagianism. So we've covered that in the past, all right, So then after the article does that, it gives us seven, count them seven examples of people leaning in the wrong direction. The first one is Abraham, all right, and it reads, Abraham leaned towards Egypt in unbelief and soon found him self crippled by it. Abraham leaned towards Egypt in unbelief and soon found himself crippled by it. And we spent over an hour yesterday covering that one. So let me just remind you it gives you seven. Those seven are Abraham and him leaning towards Egypt, found in Genesis twelve ten through twenty.

9:20 Second, it mentions Lot, who leaned towards sodom Genesis thirteen ten and Genesis nineteen seventeen. Number three David leaning towards unholy desire and laziness. Second Samuel eleven two through four. Number four is jehosephat leaned towards worldly association. First Kings twenty two twenty nine through thirty two. Then number five, King Saul leaned towards his own inclination. First Samuel fifteen ten through twenty three. Number six, Hezekiah leaned towards pride, Isaiah thirty nine, and number seven Peter leaned towards self sufficiency Luke twenty two two verses thirty three and fifty five through fifty seven. Now, your goal was what my not necessarily your goal, my assignment for you. My goal for you was for you to write all of those scriptures down and read them five times and then start finding random sermons on each one of those sections of scripture. Right, That's what you were called to do. That's what I challenged you to do. Now, yesterday we covered number one, and I really really disagreed a lot with this assumption. The assumption is that when we read the story in Genesis twelve ten through twenty that Abraham was doing something wrong, he was demonstrating unbelief, he was doing something that was ungodly, a lack of faith, and there's all kinds of criticism is heaped upon him. And I challenged that based off a

10:52 number of things that based on where this story occurs, what is not stated in the story. I think there's just a lot of things pastors impose upon that text that's not based on anything we have in scripture. There's nothing in scripture that condemns him going to Egypt. There there's no record of even God saying, hey, what you did was wrong. There's no record, there's nothing. There was no scripture prohibiting him from doing that. There was nothing. And yet the story is always handled as a like, Abraham did something wrong. So I told so, we covered that, I challenged it, spent over an hour. Well today today is all about choosing a random sermon on that one number one Abraham leaned towards Egypt and unbelieved, and I chose a random sermon, the very first one I found. I think it's called Greater God, Genesis twelve ten through twenty. It's the first. I just went to the sermons two point oh app did a search for Genesis twelve ten, and this is the first thing that showed up. That's simple. So I remember, this all goes to our sermons two point oh app Sermon Challenge.

12:01 So hopefully you're still participating in that. And so this fits perfectly because you're supposed to be choosing random sermons. I've given you. Now I want you to choose random sermons on these sections of scripture. Make sure random. Don't look for your favorite broadcaster, don't look for a particular kind of church. Just search for the scripture. And what you get is what you get. And you don't throw a fit. Well you can throw a fit, but yeah, you hear different perspectives, different broadcasters, and you never know what's going to happen. So I've done just that. I've chosen a random one. The only thing I know about the message we're about to hear is that the volume is insanely loud. It's almost at times distorted, So I'm going to have to pull the volume back on my end, So be patient.

12:46 If it's a little too loud, and then I go maybe a little too low, I'm going to be messing with it, kind of trying to figure out exactly where to have it. So be patient. But here we go. Are you ready? Genesis twelve ten through twenty. That's thirteen minutes of getting you all on the same page, all right. I sometimes I don't like doing that much of a review, But if I don't do that review, then kind of just jumping in, you lose the context, and all of that context is essential. So what I'm basically telling you and my introduction is we're going to be listening to a sermon on Genesis twelve through twenty. My expectation is it's going to go after Abram or his name wasn't Abraham at the time Abram. They're going to go after him basically claiming that what he did demonstrated a lack of faith or a lack of that of unbelief, et cetera, et cetera, et cetera. And I've already challenged that presupposition.

13:41 So there's a high probability that what we're going to listen to they're going to go that direction, and I'm going to be challenging it. That's what I that's my expectation. That is what I'm predicting. If I'm wrong, great, but either way, this is how you benefit from this. The goal here is not just to critical, like if I go if I disagree with everything they say, that has nothing to do with me attacking them or thinking I'm smarter than them. It's just I have a different perspective. So here's the Oh, A lot of times people listen miss this right. They think it's just me trying to find a sermon to be critical. No, that's why I don't listen to them in advance, because then nobody can accuse me of just finding something I'm being critical of. I'm just listening to a sermon following the very assignment I gave you. I'm following. Now I may have a different perspective. That doesn't mean I'm being mean or think that I'm better. I'm just gonna put forth my perspective. You, the listener, you benefit by hearing two different perspectives in one episode. So you walk away go, well, here was the theology Central perspective, Here was the perspective of the sermon. Well, I think that Theology Central podcast. I think they're idiots. That's the they don't know what they're talking about. Wait, I disagree with that other pastor. I think that they don't know what they're talking about. You get the opportunity. I think that that's great. That's awesome, and it also demonstrates, sadly, it's very frustrating that no matter

15:13 what text you look at, the one thing you can always be certain of is that Christians will not agree on how to interpret it. That's madening. All right, are you ready? Here we go? No book's open, pencils in hand, have something to drink, have a snack, get a bible, Tell your kids, hey, it's sermon review time, and then watch them go, ah, I'm run out of the house, okay, which I don't know why they wouldn't want to listen to a sermon review, but here we go. Henry Father, thank you for bringing us together again.

15:56 Please clear a mind of the distractions from the road, from what we have on our schedule, from life's worries, riches and pleasures, from the trouble that is going on, from the way our hearts may be troubled over things. Okay, now you know you know my feelings about open prayer, about opening prayers in sermons and concluding prayers in sermons. I've stated it before so many times. I get bothered by opening prayers and closing prayers because I don't believe in most cases the pastor is actually praying. It's almost like he's just getting a head start on his sermon, or he's repeating what he's already preached. And when you're supposed to be talking to God, you don't need to be preaching to him. But in this particular case, he seems to actually be praying. You're not necessarily trying to preach a sermon. At least I don't think he is at this point. But what I'm always curious about in prayers, especially in churches before sermons, either one that bothers me is the prayers where they basically say, God, you know, show us, teach us, give us understanding. Well, that drives me insane because if God is teaching, guiding and giving us understanding, or as some preachers state and misc and I think misapply a scripture, lead us into all truth, I don't think that has anything to do with us. That was leading the

17:29 original writers of the New Testament into all truth, that that was a prayer for them, not for us. Because if God is leading us into all truth, ladies and gentlemen, I don't know, there wouldn't be thousands of denominations, and there wouldn't be one hundreds of thousands of non millions of different interpretation of every single verse in the entire Bible, no agreement on anything. Two thousand years later. We can't agree on baptism, we can't agree on the Lord's Supper, we can't agree on the structure of the church, I agree on anything. So clearly God is not leading us into all truth. He's not teaching us, he's not guiding us, or we would all arrive at the same location, at the same destination. So either God can't lead, or we keep praying for something that God is not going to do.

18:17 Our job is to take the Bible and figure it out. God is not the one guiding and leading because and the minute you say God is the one guiding and leading your understanding of scripture, you're basically claiming your understanding comes directly from God, so you can never be challenged on it. So that's that already creates almost a magisterial authority for yourself. That's that's that's frightening, and that's basically a return to Catholicism. So no, we have to study the Bible. So I have when I hear these prayers. That kind of prayer always bothers me because I'm just like no, or when pastors like somehow in their prayer or they tell the congregation, God gave me this sermon. Well, that's crazy because now I can't criticize the sermon it came directly from Okay, that's problematic. Now in this one, he's asking God to remove all distractions Now, I would love to believe that a pastor could pray for God to remove all distractions before a sermon, and every all distractions would be removed.

19:18 But as someone who has stood behind a pulpit for twenty three years, I mean twenty three years, week after week after week, hours upon hours, yeah, I don't think I would love divine intervention to stop all distractions. I just don't. I don't know. I don't know. You can ask yourself. So let's back that up and we'll just let hear the whole prayer now, and I'll try not to interrupt it. Here we go, he many, Father, thank you for bringing us together again. Please clear a mind of the distractions from the road, from what we have on our schedule, from life's worries, riches and pleasures, from the trouble that is going on, from the way our hearts may be troubled over things. Lord, Please take control of our minds and our hearts and lead us now in and through your word for your glory. Help us to understand, as we look at Abraham and his story, how you work, how you're in control, and how we can react differently than what is natural, what is no

21:03 it's hard for me not. It's hard for me not to hear that he's starting to preach a sermon, he's giving a preview to the sermon. And God take over our minds. I mean that would that Would that not be the greatest? Would that not be awesome? If God just took over your mind today? He just took over your mind. God's controlling your brain. He's controlling every thought. Because think of how much of you you are is controlled by your mind. If God was to take over your mind, well, every thought would be right, every thought would be pure, everything, every decision would be perfect. If God was to take over I mean sometimes these prayers, I just I just so baffled by the praying. Sometimes God is really going to take over our minds, ladies and gentlemen, we would there would be the Christianity would be the most unified religion in the history of religion. We would have one interpretation because we would all think the same thing.

22:02 Would it be great? If God just good, just take over our minds two thousand years of church history. Has God ever taken over our minds? And if I say God has taken over my mind, then you could not question or challenge anything that I gave you because God has taken over. If I say I have been praying for God to take over my mind and as of yesterday he has done it, well, guess what. Back off, You can't challenge anything I say. You can't challenge any conclusion, because God has taken over my mind. Like I don't even know. Like, at one hand, it's one thing to pray for it, but if you're praying for it, you obviously are believing God can do that. The minute you think God has taken over your mind, I don't know what that leads to. The Consequences of that seem pretty frightening to me, right But Okay, so he's kind of starting to give the preview. And again this is why opening prayers and closing prayers. Ah, if I'm the pastor and I'm praying, it's supposed to be me communicating with God. When I get to the pulpit. What do I need to communicate with God at that moment?

23:14 What do I need to communicate with God with? Like I should have already prayed for my sermon. And at that point, if I'm saying God, because pastors will say God, let me, you basically take control and let me only say what is pleasing to you. Well, how does that work? Because you have a Presbyterian praying that, you have a Baptist praying that, and they will preach a sermon on baptism giving completely different philological conclusions. God, if God is controlling what we're saying, he would have stopped one of them because they both can't be right. You'll have someone who's a you know, a someone who olds to reform theology, maybe an Augustinian view, a Calvinistic view, as someone who's a have an Armenian view, and guess what, God, They'll say, God control my lips, let me only say what is pleased. Well, that's two completely contradictory systems. So does God. I don't Sometimes I think in church we use we use language without thinking of what we're actually saying. I would love for God to take over my mind. Man, that would be awesome. Can you imagine that?

24:26 Ladies and gentlemen, you're listening to the Theology Central podcast. This podcast is hosted by an individual whom God has taken over his mind, meaning everything you were about to hear in this podcast it comes directly from God, comes from a mind that is controlled by God. Therefore what I say is infallible, It is an errant. It is true, and you cannot challenge and you cannot question it. Can you imagine if I did a podcast like that, people would lose their minds. But yet we pray like that, God control what I say. Control well, the consequences of that would be better than the pope. We can act in faith. Please lead us now in Jesus.

25:21 Amen. All right, Genesis chapter twelve. I'm gonna read for you verses ten through the end of the chapter, and just you can tell that it's kind of distorting a little bit, So I have the volume turn I keep going, like, turn it down, go back up. So I apologize if if it's all over the place. But we're gonna we're gonna just try to now let him just get far into this. I'm gonna try. I'm gonna try not to interrupt or say anything. Who am I kiddy.

26:02 Let's just see what happens. Now. There was a famine in the land, so Abram went down to Egypt to sojourn there, for the famine was severe in the land. When he was about to enter Egypt, he said to Sarah, his wife, I know that you are a beautiful woman, beautiful in appearance, and when the Egyptians see you, they will say this is his wife. Then they will kill me, because they will let you live. But they will let you live, say you are my sister, that it may go well with me because of you, and that my wife may be spared for your sake. When Abram entered Egypt, the Egyptians saw that the woman was very beautiful, and when the princes of Pharaoh saw her, they pray to Pharaoh, and the woman was taken into Pharaoh's house.

27:07 And for her sake, he dealt well with Abram, and he had sheep, oxen, male donkeys, male servants, female servants, female donkeys, and camels. But the lord afflicted Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarah, Abram's wife. So Pharaoh called Abraham and said, what is this? What is this you have done to me? Why did you not tell me that she was your wife? Why did you say she is my sister so that I took her from my wife? Now, then here is your wife, Take her and go. And Pharaoh gave men orders concerning him, and they sent him away with his wife and all that he had all right, So think about Genesis chapter twelve. Here a lot happens, A lot happens, and again, for time's sake, the way Moses writes this, he writes this in such a way that everything is just a matter of fact. He doesn't really make much commentary. He just gives us the plain truth of the story. And so the story in Genesis chapter twelve, this starts out well with great promises. I hate that, not even that's nothing

28:44 about the sermon yet, but it's just about from a preaching perspective, I hate when I'm preaching or teaching and I have to cough or something because I almost inevitably forget to mute my mic. You're wearing a lapel mic, so right there, you know, on your hip, you usually have the little receiver there right, and you can usually just click it over one and mute it. Right, you commute it, but almost inevitably you because you're thinking about the sermon, you don't think of it. So then I'll cough, and I'll be like, oh, oh man, what what what? Why didn't I mute the mic or or at least turn my head from the mic, like take my hand and cover the mic. Now, here. When I'm broadcasting, I can just simply I can just simply click the little mute button right here. When you hear that click, that's me muting the mic.

29:37 But yeah, you always forget that when I go back and if I'll listen to one of my messages, I'm like, oh, man, what was I? Oh? That sounds like trash. And then sometimes I'll just delete the message because I get really bothered by Now I've seen most people you probably don't even think about that, But from a public speaking perspective, I hear that. Now it's hard for me not to go m see I that would have That would bother me if I did that, But maybe it doesn't bother you. I don't know how it's perceived by the people sitting in the pew versus the person behind the microphone. For me being behind the microphone, that that bothers me. But all right, here we go Genesis twelve. All right, say are you glad I interrupted for that? But see, I'm just if I wouldn't, I would be a liar if I don't turn stop this and at least tell you what I'm thinking, because that's why I would be thinking. That may be very fleshly may be very not spiritual.

30:30 But I'm just saying, when you've been preaching for years and years and years and years and years, sometimes when you start listening to a message, this is one of the negative things. You start kind of critiquing the style, and and that's that's not necessarily a good thing. Great, great promises from God, and if God makes a promise, he keeps his promise. God promises land, he promises great nature or descendants, and he promises blessing. All the families of the eyes will be blessed through you. He says, Now this is very important here. Look at exactly what God promises in Genesis twelve. Right, hey, Land, make a great nation and to bless He does not promise I will feed you in a famine. He does not promise that. I think it's very I think maybe the key to Genesis twelve, ten through twenty and to combat the way most preachers handle this is look at exactly what is promised to Abraham or Abram and what isn't promised. I think you may want to make that list because because I think you're gonna hear a lot of the preachers are going to kind of almost imply, well, why did Abraham go to Egypt when there was a famine? God promised?

31:55 But did God promise, hey, I will feed you? And not only that. What is even more mind blowing to me in this section is in Genesis twelve, God literally speaks to Abram, literally interrupts and speaks directly, initiates the conversation twice with Abram twice in Genesis twelve, two times. And then you get to Genesis twelve ten there's a feminine land and guess who doesn't initiate a conversation God, God does not say a word. Now, guess when God shows back up when he then plagues Pharaoh's house. So why if God already initiated a conversation twice as soon as the femine hit, why didn't God just step in and go who whoa Woa? Abram? Abram? Abram, don't go to Egypt. Don't I will feed you. I will provide for you if you did not understand that that was implied in my promises.

32:52 But I'm now being very specific so that you understand why didn't God show up that to me? To me, that may be the biggest question in Genesis twelve, God initiates two conversations. But then here God's just like, I'm sorry. And when when when Abram's coming up with this plan, Hey, here's hey, Sarah, tell them you're my sister. They're gonna come take you. I don't know what's gonna happen to you when they take you. I mean, it could go really bad. But just know I'll be safe and I'll be okay. God didn't step in and go Abram, I don't know what you're doing. But this is a horrible idea. God doesn't step in. He doesn't step in when he decides to go to Egypt. He doesn't step in when he comes up with them. God just go silent. That to me is more of a question than anything else. Now, let's see maybe he's going to address that. I think most of the time, most of the time, I don't think people do because it makes them uncomfortable.

33:42 But I think it's a good question to ask. Then we after the great promises, we have great beginning. What does Abram do you bease God? It says Abram wimt Verse four. So Abram went as the Lord had told him, and Lot went with him. And it goes on and tells us that they went on together, and so there was this great beginning. After the great promises, there was obedience. And then two times in the next few verses, it said that Abram built an altar that he worshiped. So you see Abram being obedient and him bowing down before God. Now that makes God silence that much louder. If Abram, whenever God does initiate a conversation and tell him what to do, if Abram immediately obeys, now we could argue is he obeying by bringing a lot with him? Now we could argue this right. And trust me, you would think everyone would have an agreement on it. They don't. Even in my own church. When we've covered this, I got some people like, I don't think Lot did anything wrong. You got other people like what what what? I don't think Abraham did anything wrong by bringing Lot along. I don't think he did anything wrong.

35:05 And others would be like, what are you talking about? Abram was supposed to leave everyone. He definitely did something wrong. And you have people in the same church, reading the same Bible who cannot agree. That's maddening. Okay, But here's whether you believe his obedience was partial or complete or incomplete, whatever you believe about it. He obeyed to some level God tells him to leave. He leaves. So then this makes God silence loud. Let me explain if every time God initiated a conversation, Abram at least obeyed in part what God told him, then all that was needed to avoid the entire Egyptian scandal, the entire Egypt scandal, Abram could have. All God needed to say was don't go to Egypt. Problem solved because Abram has demonstrated that he would obey what God told him. God never initiates a converse, not one time. Why wouldn't God step in here? Hey could have stopped the entire Egypt scandal, the entire scandal that would have been all over you know social media. Did you hear what Abram did? Did you hear what he did to his wife? This is a piece of trash? Okay, that's how. But God doesn't step in. He could have stopped it.

36:22 I mean, obviously Pharaoh thinks Abram's a piece of trash. Why why did you do this to me? Right? Pharaoh is not too happy with Abram, So there's at least scandal there. I know there wasn't social media? Obviously, I'm joking. The point is all of this could have been avoided because if every time God has spoken, Abram pretty much obeys, then why wouldn't God you step in here? God's been giving him direction, but then when there's a famine, God's direction stops. It's like, Oh, God's given me a GPS. Oh we got a famine in the land. You're tapping on the screen. Whypn't to my GPS? Oh no, my GPS went out. I guess I've got to figure out what to do now. Now he figures out what he does now, is that leaning to his own understanding? Well, you could argue it is, But where else is he supposed to lean if God's and if God's not initiating the conversation. Abram can't pull out his Bible into a Bible study. He doesn't have that, So all he can rely on is if God doesn't intervene, Abram's got to make the decision. There is no prohibition. There is no instructions between Genesis one and eleven not to go to Egypt, so you can't impose that being wrong.

37:35 So what do you expect Abram to do here? Now? The whole thing he does with Sarah, his wife. We could call that into question. But again and that culture, he is there some prohibition again about how you are to treat your wife. Is there any instruction about how to treat your wife in Genesis one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten eleven. You can go take from other scripture, because Abram would not know what you're talking about. What a great response, what a great beginning, right to a man, or from a man who is from a completely pagan culture. His father, Tera moon worshiper, was from a family that was idolatrous. And God calls him out of that and says, nope, this is what I'm going to do with you. You go, you listen, and he does great promise, great blessing, and it says even in verse A. From there he moved on to the hill country on the east of beth l and pitched his tent.

38:55 Well. That word Bethel there that means house of God, Beath means house and l is God. So Bethel is the house of God. And so the idea here is that Abram's life was surrounded with God and worship. That doesn't mean that's all he did. Right, he had to work, he failed to function, but his life was centered around who God was in God's promises. This is also this verse here of verse eight is reminiscent of Jesus in John chapter one, where it said that he pitched his tent among us.

39:50 That's literally the words that could be translated in John chapter one and be set about Jesus. And this is what it says about Abram here Bethel. He went to Beth and pitched his tent. He dwelt there. He understood the idea of pitching a tent is I mean, back then it literally was a tent. But the idea of pitching a tent is a temporary place of dwelling. You know, even though you and I live in homes that are made of brick or siding and have concrete and have all these great structures to them, they're temporary. Right. We're not going to last forever. We're not going to live here forever, and even our houses that are built well aren't going to endure forever. Right, So this idea of pitching a tents is the idea of that we're just soldiers, we're just temporary here as God allows us to be that's interesting. I'm not in any way disagreeing with the fact that to pitch a tent would be seen as a temporary lodging place.

41:02 And okay, but is the purpose of this narrative is to point us to Christ in his incarnation? I don't think so. Is this to remind us that we pitch a tent in our our flesh and it's a temporary dwelling place, so we're just pilgrims. I don't know. I don't know. I don't know if that. I think this is just he pitched a literal tent because well, that's what he had. Now, you could argue that Abram as a pilgrim, as a stranger is indicative of us, because the Bible does say that we're pilgrims and strangers. His whole journey may be one. I don't know about the pitching the tent. Okay, but all right, you know, don't You can argue if that's a decent application, if that's fair, if that's if that's in accordance with the text. All right.

41:52 I just want to see overall where he's going to take this story. I have a feeling where this is going, but let's see let's just let's try to let it play out little more. All right, So we have great promises, great blessing, obedience, worship in the House of God, and then we have great failure. All right, Well, I figured that's where it was going. We have great failure. So he is now accusing that the actions of Abram starting in Genesis twelve ten is great failure. Now does that mean great sin? And what has he failed? Now this is the issue. What did Abram fail at? Did he fail to obey God?

42:44 Does he disobey God? Here? God doesn't say don't go to Egypt? Is there a clear prohibition that Abram is violating? Here there is no prohibition. There is no instruction that he is violating. And even if you say Abram fail, why didn't God simply intervene? He speak, He looked, look, look, just a few verses before verse seven Genesis twelve seven, then the Lord appeared to Abram and said, so, just a couple of verses before he literally appeared to Abram, all you would have to do now is just appear one more time to Abram has said, please don't go to Egypt. I don't want you to go to Egypt. That's against my will, don't do it. But he doesn't. And even after Abram goes to Egypt, he never does God ever reprimand Abram. Does he ever tell Abram that he did wrong, does he ever correct him, does he ever rebuke him? But preachers come along, Abram was wrong on the basis of what?

43:45 Well, on what basis are we saying that what he did was wrong? Or are we just imposing that on Abram? I find it fascinating that everyone wants to run to this text and say what Abram did was wrong. In fact, this is called a great and he will see how he emphasized it great fail your a great failure? Well, what did he fail at? Now we take some of these actions and judge them according to standards, ideas, morality, and scripture that comes much later, way after Abram has died. We can then take that morality, those ideas, those scriptures, bring them back to Genesis twelve, and then judge him. But why how can Abraham be judged on rules, laws, and morality that has yet even been established or even stated. He's literally having a ongoing conversation with God.

44:47 God is the one establishing the rules here, what rule did Abram violate great failure. Verse ten. Now there's a famine in the land. Okay, that's something that Abram could not help. That's something he did not have control of, was the famine in the land. Just as you and I do not have control of the economy here, we don't have control of diseases. You know. I think if anybody in this room could, could you know, wave your own little magic wand you would have said, let's not do COVID. Right, if we were quote unquote in control, we would have said, let's do this. Different gods in control and things like COVID or other diseases, bad things like a famine. You know what they are.

45:52 They're part of the curse of the world. They're part of sin. They're gonna happen. Okay, so there's a famine that out of Abram's control. But do you notice what happened Moses as he writes this about Abram, talks about Adam's Abram's faith here right his great beginning, he's obedient, he's worshiping. Now something happens disruption. Now you've got chapter breaks in your Bible or not, Well, you have chapter breaks, but you also have section breaks. In your Bible, and you have headings that wasn't written originally. Okay, it wasn't written there, and it doesn't say when Moses wrote this.

46:37 He doesn't go Abram and Sarah in Egypt. He doesn't put that above the section. Right, that's just to help you and I to understand things a little bit better. So he goes right on, and Abram journeyed on, still going toward Negeb. Now there was a famine in the land, so Abraham went down to Egypt. He makes a turn. God didn't tell him to go there. God didn't tell him not to go there. So are we gonna so how are we gonna go? Regulative or normative principle? Now, I know that's typically a principle applied to worship in the church. But is it regulative or normative? It can? Can Abram only do what God specifically instructs him to do or has an example for him to follow. So because God did not specifically say go to Egypt. Because God did not say specifically go to Egypt, therefore he's wrong to go to Egypt. Now we could if we go more normative principle. Well, Abram can do anything unless it's specifically prohibited or specific instruction against. Well, there's clearly no instruction or prohibition against going to Egypt, literally none. And God has been directing every single step up to this point. Right. If God has been directing the

48:07 steps, he appears in Genesis twelve one, he appears in Genesis twelve seven. Now we get to ten, there's a famine in the land. Now I don't know how quickly he goes down to Egypt, but obviously it says he goes down to Egypt to dwell there, for the famine was severe, So obviously it seems that maybe he sticks around until he realizes how bad the famine is, and then he goes down to Egypt. Possibly you could possibly read it that way, Maybe you don't, but it sounds like the famine doesn't just go from no famine boom famine to boom severe famine in like forty eight hours. It would have been a prolonged period of time as the famine got worse and worse and worse. Abron then decided to go down. Now you can sit there. We can argue about this all day, but I can be emphatic and dogmatic about this. Where was God? God doesn't step in. So is the failure on Abram? Or is the failure on God?

49:04 I mean, at this point God's been stepping in. Maybe Abram's like, Okay, well God's not telling me what to do here. I've got I got people to take care of. We're gonna die. Now. You can say, well, that's a lack of faith. What a lack of faith in? What where has God told him? He don't worry about it. I will feed you. No, God said from him will come a great nation. It doesn't say that God was going to preserve all the people with him. Doesn't say God was going to preserve his cattle or any No, he had to make a decision. So is what he's doing here is wrong? I know we love to say that it is. I just don't know how we can be so emphatic and dogmatic that we are condemning this action.

49:46 I just don't know. God could have stepped in at any point and time. That was something he decided to do all on his own. Maybe that's shocking to you now, And and I would say with you, but doesn't it make sense that he would go where their food was? Absolutely makes sense. You and I might make the same decision right, and often we make a decision that seems to make worldly sense that isn't for our godly good.

50:30 Do you believe that if Abram stayed obeying God, stayed in the place to worship God, that God would not have provided for him? What are you basing that off of? Even if God provided for Abram, was he going to provide for the people with Abram? Maybe they would have all starved and died. Would that have been the best decision? Hey, Abram, Well, Abram, like, look, look, guys, I know there's food in Egypt, but hey, we're gonna stay here because God's going to provide. He's not promised me that he's going to provide. He's not shown up, he's not smoke. I know he's spoken to me twice and he's told me exactly where to go. He's he's not talking right now, he's not intervening. But I just know God's going to provide. Well, So let's say God provided fed Abraham other people died. Is that hey it's all good? Though, it's all good. It's all good because because Abram did the right thing. Like I don't understand are why we want to run to this story and throw Abram so far under the proverbial bus. All he has to go by is what is in Genesis twelve one to Genesis twelve nine.

51:39 Genesis twelve one to twelve nine, God literally intervenes and initiates a conversation with Abram twice. Now a famine and God goes silent. But Abram's the one who's wrong. How dare he go to Egypt? What a piece of trash, what a great fell? What? I have a hard time with this perspective. I do. Look, I've preached this perspective because this is what I was always taught. I was always taught. Egypt is a picture of the world. And so Abram, the man of faith, is demonstrating a lack of faith by turning to the world instead of turning to God. So when things go bad in your life, don't turn to the world, don't turn to worldly wisdom. Turn to God and God will take care of you.

52:28 And everyone says amen. Now, of course, everyone turns to the world and our worldly wisdom every single time something goes wrong. But I digress. But in this particular that's the way I've always preached this. But at some point you start thinking Wait a minute, How am I imposing this like sin, this failure onto Abram based of what he knows? He knows God has shown up twice, and he has done exactly as God has told him each and every single time. Then something bad happens and God doesn't show up. So what does Abram do. I absolutely believe that God meant what he said when he promised him, I'm going to give you this land, you and your descendants. You're gonna have a You're gonna have many descendants, more than you can count, right, and you're gonna be a blessing to everybody in yours. There's no promise of feeding him, there's no promise of provision in the middle of a famine. I don't know how we can just like from those very basic promises Abraham is supposed or Abraham is supposed to then go oh wait, wait, wait, guys, guys, guys, guys, based off the and you know, he's got the promises written on the refrigerator, I know, not an actual refrigerator. And he's like, okay, guys, everyone come in right, he's got it written on a white board

54:00 and you know, sharpie and you know brings everyone into the living room. All right, guys, look, look, I know, I know we're all starving everything, there's no food, but look see these promises God gave. This tells me he's gonna feed us. Now, someone in the back and raised my hand. Are you sure? Because I'm not seeing food or or feed during famine and that promise? Well, you just got to see us between the lines. Okay, I got another question, Yes, yes, go ahead ask uh. Well, God spoke to you the first time for us to leave, right, Yes, God spoke to you a second time. Yes? Has God intervened or spoken to you since then? Well? No, hmm, I don't know. Abram if he's been giving us such specific instruction and he's not giving us instruction now, you think then we should just sit here until we get further instruction. Now, you could make an argument there that what Abram should have done is stayed until God spoke.

54:58 I guess you could have could have done. I guess you could make that argument. I guess you couldn't make that argument. Maybe maybe you could present it that way that what Abram should have done is called out to God and said I'm going to stay. But how much does Abram know about God. I mean, we act like that. Abram's got you know, he's been walking with God for seventy five years at this point, and he's got a great understanding. Didn't they all start basically in Genesis twelve? Maybe maybe we could argue a little bit in chapter eleven. I know we can get a whole argument in how twelve one is written, but I just don't know. Let's see where he takes this. Did the famine change that? Do circumstances change God's promises? They don't. Circumstances don't change God's promises. But let me mention a couple of things. Circumstances don't change God's promises, but stop claiming promises that have never been made to you. That's a good one.

56:02 And number two, circumstances don't change God's promises, but circumstances doesn't also call for you to add to those promises. Right, Hey, Circumstances don't change God's promises, but circumstances is not a license for you to add to those promises. Saying Okay, well, God's promised these three things, but hey, guys, I'm gonna go ahead and add some here. He's gonna also feed us he's gonna preserve us, he's gonna keep us, and this is for all of us, all the cat Well, we're not gonna lose anything. Well, but he didn't promise that. I know he didn't promise that. But circumstances allow me to add to his promise. Circumstances don't change God's promises. But circumstances don't allow you to claim promises that are not for you, and they don't allow you to add to those promises. And I'm going to tell you that's really, really hard. It's not hard to understand here, it's hard to do here. Right, Circumstances do not change God's promises.

57:13 What God says he means, and when God makes a promise, he always fulfills it. It doesn't always look like we think it's going to look like, and it doesn't happen in the time that we think it should take. Abram never saw the fruit of all these promises. He never saw the fruit of all of these promises. But you're telling me he should stick around. And because God was going he was going to see the fruit of the promise to feed him during a famine. Hey, Hey, all these promises, Abram never actually saw the fruit of them. But I want you to know it was a failure for him to go to Egypt during a famine because God promised. Well, what if he never saw the fruit of the promise and he would have starved to death? Like, on one hand, you're like, Abram he had promises, he should have stayed, even though there's no actual promise about providing for him during a famine. But let you say it's implied. But then you turn around and say, hey, but guys, just remember all of these promises that Abram received. He never saw the fruit of it. But yet he should have stuck around to hold on to a promise that he meant and may never see the fruit of. In the time of a famine, where if you don't have food after a certain number of days, you die. You do realize there's a limit to how long you can wait without food, right, you do realize that, right, there's a limited amount of time you can go without food. I mean,

58:50 I mean by all means, either you can test it if you would like, or you can google it. How long can a person go without food? There's a limit amount of time. So it's not like you're like, well, I'm gonna wait for the fruit of this promise. Okay, well, well we just lost a couple of cattle. They died they didn't have food. Oh wait, we lost a couple of servants they died they didn't have food. Or we're gonna keep holding out. But what if one person dies? Do you then just say, well, that's on God. And what I love about this is because to me, this sets up the inevitable contradiction in the world of Christianity. On one hand, we'll look at Abram, he should have just trusted God. Don't go get food, don't do anything. Trust God. But on the other hand, hey, guys, there's been a couple of church shootings. We need to make sure we have people in this church armed with guns in case someone comes in, because we trust God. But if God doesn't show up, we're gonna put a couple of bullets and anyone who attempts to attack us. Hey, hey, Abram, you're supposed to trust God. But hey, we're gonna lock our doors.

1:00:04 We're gonna have a security system. We're gonna do this. We're gonna do this. We're gonna do this, We're gonna do We're gonna take all of these percussions, and we're gonna do all of this, and we're gonna make sure we have provision, and we're gonna do this, and we're gonna save up for the future, and we're gonna do this, and we're gonna have insurance, and we're gonna do this, and we're gonna do this. And we had to wait a minute. Wait a minute, Wait a minute. Did God instruct you to remember? He said, God never instructed him to go to Egypt? Well, has God ever instructed you to take this percussion or this percussion or this percussion? Are you not leaning to your own understanding? Are you not demonstrating a lack of trust in God? Just trust God He will provide. I mean, can't you use the same argument against us that you're gonna use the Abram? Are we gonna hold Abram to a standard that we're not gonna hold ourselves to? Because I am not seeing in these promises that Abram is like, hey, stay right here, I will feed you and all the people with you sure that no one dies. I don't see that promise anywhere, or at least not at this point. If God tells you to be faithful to him in purity, in finances, in friendship, in love, in work, in whatever He's called you to do.

1:01:30 Your circumstances do not change God's ability to fulfill those promises. They do not change God's ability to work through you, or work in you, or to provide for you. And now your mind is going, yeah, but pastor now again if you're going to take this, hey, hey, No matter the circumstance, God will provide. Now, I'm just going to raise some questions. You can look it up today. Look up how many people starve to death every day in the world. Every day? How many people die of starvation? Just look it up? How many people die daily of starvation? Do you want me to look it up for you? Would you like me to look it up for you? Would you do you want me to look it up. I can look it up for you. Would do you want me to No? Yes, No, I'm hearing different answers.

1:02:23 Okay, I'm going to look it up, all right, I'm going to look it up. How many people die each day of starvation? Twenty five thousand people Each day, twenty five thousand people, including more than ten thousand children, die from hunger and related causes. Some eight hundred and fifty four million people worldwide estimated to be undernourished, and high food prices may drive a No, they're one hundred million end of poverty. Twenty five thousand people die every single day, every single day of starvation, twenty five thousand, ten thousand children every single day. So when you go to bed tonight, just remember about ten thousand children has died of starvation. Now, whenever I point these statistics out, Christians get mad at me and they push back and they're like, oh, how dare you say so? But usually the argument, well, they're not Christians, so everyone who dies of starvation is not a Christian because if they were a Christian, God would have provided for That's the go to argument. But again the argument is God will provide. God will

1:03:58 provide. God will provide, so just trust God. Well, then I don't understand. The argument is, Abram, just stay right here, God will provide for you. And hey, you out there, hey, when you facing circumstances, you just trust God will provide. Well, if we're gonna trust God to such this extent, then why do we do it? Why don't we just trust God to provide whatever we need? Now? With then people say, but you've got to do your part. Well, you're telling me Abram his part was not to do anything. So which is Christians seem to go back and forth. Hey, God is our rock, our refuge, our fortress, our shield, our protector. But make sure you own a gun. Well, I see my rock, my fortress, my shelter. Is he or isn't he? When is it? Hey? Hey, we'll sing about how God will protect us in this church, but we will also have armed guards. Wait, I don't get it. So when is he? When isn't he? Which is it? Because I'm hearing that Abraham did everything wrong here? I know it is because mine does the same thing. Yeah, but look at the people over here and how bad they're struggling. Some of them have to I'm not God. I'm not going to play him. I would do a really bad job. All I can tell you is that God is faithful. So we see great failure here. Famine

1:05:33 made sense to go to Egypt not the right thing to do. Again, the accusation is that it was the wrong thing to do. The accusation. But no, nothing is provided to demonstrate that what he's doing here is wrong. We just impose it. We presuppose it and pose it onto the text. There is nothing in Genesis one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, and twelve. One two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, and nine. This says, don't go to Egypt. And not only that, we still have the struggle of God appearing in one, verse one and verse seven. But yet when the famine happens, God goes absolutely silent.

1:06:18 But yet Abram, you're to blame. You're a failure. I just don't get it. I don't. I know it preaches good that I've stated it so many times. Some of the most damage to the Word of God has occurred because of preaching. More than any other thing. Preaching takes the text, and we have to create sermons, and when we create sermons we do a lot of things to the text that was never designed to be done to the text. We go to Genesis twelve, and we've got our preaching is such a morality? Tell right, well, our preaching is always like we got to tell people they can't do this, do this, don't do this, feel bad about doing this, feel bad about everything is morality.

1:07:03 Morality, morality, morality. So we go to Genesis twelve. We are like, Okay, we got to find something that he did wrong so that I can challenge to people about the things that they do wrong, so we can all be challenged to do better. Because all Christianity is is moralism. So we want to throw Abram under the bus here by just imposing onto the text a prohibition that doesn't exist in the text. It wasn't where he was called to go. Nevertheless, he goes down there and I don't know where their church is located. It sounds like it's located right on the highway.

1:07:50 And that car was loud that went by. I don't know if you heard that. That was loud. Okay, so that our church is located right next to us highway and sometimes you'll hear me in the middle Oficarmon going what in the world was that, Because it'll be some loud car that will go by. So I definitely understand their pain. That's so frustrating. When that happens. He's about to answer Egypt and we don't know if people are already noticing the beauty of his wife or not yet doesn't really tell us exactly when that starts to happen. But he understands how pretty his wife was, it's like Tina, and he says, you know what, They're going to want to kill me if they think that I'm a threat, right, if if they think I'm your husband, they're just going to take me out because you know that's not going to look good. Somebody's going to want you, want you more than I can have the ability to protect you or protect this relationship.

1:08:59 So let's lie. That's what he says. He doesn't say that, but that's what he says. All right, now are we ready for this? Here we go? Here we go in Genesis one to chapter twelve, verse nine. Now here's your challenge today. Genesis one one to Genesis twelve nine. Find me where there is a prohibition, law or instruction against lying. Can we take the prohibition that God hates lying? And all the scriptures about lying being wrong that are later revealed not revealed at this time. Abram can't be looking up you know, don't bear false witness, don't lie.

1:09:53 He can't be looking in proverbs about God hates lying lips, and nothing about being true. There's nothing scripture. He's got no Bible, he's got no body. His interaction with God seems very limited to what God has told him in Genesis twelve one and Genesis twelve seven. Some will argue that the call to Abram came before twelve one and it's kind of repeated in twelve one. We could get into that discussion, but the discussion God initiating conversations with Abram have been very limited about this is what you can and this is what you can't, or not. Really, he doesn't even say what you can't do. He just says, this is what I want you to do. There's not really any laying down any system of morality. So Abram he's like, okay, guys, we got to go to Egypt because we're gonna starve.

1:10:41 So he makes a decision. God does not intervene. Then he's like, okay, now we got another problem. All right, if I if we go in this way because Sarah, Sarah is so beautiful, they're gonna kill me. And if they kill me, what does that leave for the rest of you? Where does that leave Sarah? Where does that leave any the wret you're gonna be, You're gonna be all in trouble. So now you could argue, Now you could argue he's being selfish out of fear. You could argue he's trying to be strategic. We could have this debate all day, but he comes up with this scheme. Now I don't like the scheme. I think the scheme is very questionable at best. I think the scheme is somewhat messed up. It puts Sarah in the most vulnerable position. Now, we could argue, how are women viewed in Genesis chapter twelve at that point in time and human history? Was the woman? How was the woman viewed as? Like? How was she viewed? And we probably won't like the answer. She's probably not viewed the way we would think that woman should be viewed today. But either way, he makes this strategic decision. Now again I'm going to scream and emphasize again God doesn't step in. He stepped in in twelve to one, he steps in in twelve seven, and he just goes silent. You're like, God, this is the time to step in, But he doesn't. He doesn't step in, and he allows this to go down. Now again, he just referred to this as a lie to deception? Is this a sin? So here's the question. Can we judge the people in Genesis according to the law that is not revealed until Exodus.

1:12:20 Can we judge the actions of the people in Genesis who are living before the law the law has not been revealed, that the law has not been articulated. Can we judge them? Now? There are times God steps in and says behavior is sinful, or this is wicked, or this is wrong. He seems to clearly articulate that. Now, when God steps in and says it's wrong, then by all means it's wrong because God is now imposing his standard, which is always his standard at any time. But if you're living at this time, you don't have direct access to God's standard. Okay, there's not a book you can read, there's not a law anywhere given.

1:13:04 So is Abraham acting and an accordance to what he thinks is best? Or is he violating a law? But there's been no law established, So like, how do you judge this action? Just as there's no prohibition against going to Egypt in Genesis one, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eleven, Chapter twelve, verses one through nine, there is also no prohibition or instruction against lying in Genesis twelve. Are Genesis one all the way to Genesis's twelve ten, there is no prohibition instructions against it. Now, maybe you can find something that would possibly imply it, but I don't know where that would be. So how to how is Abram to be judged? And even if you find some scripture goes well, this would seem to imply that God doesn't like it. Does Abram have just direct access to the text that you're quoting. He doesn't have access to any text.

1:14:09 Hey, let's come up with this lie. Now, if you've read this before and you know the story of Genesis, you know it's not completely a lie. But that's how most lies are, right, they're the skin of the truth. So turn with me just a couple chapters to Genesis, chapter twenty, and in verse eleven, it says Abram said, I did it because now this is the he's lying again here by the way, I did it because I thought there is no fear of God at all in this place, and they will kill me because of my wife. Besides, she is indeed my sister, the daughter of my father, though not the daughter of my mother, and she became my wife. Okay, so Sarah was actually his half sister. And he said, well, that's weird. It kind of is weird. For us, but back then the population pool was much smaller. Okay, now I love this. Oh this is this is so good. Okay, this is how people deal with Genesis all the time.

1:15:34 If there's something that makes us uncomfortable, and there's something that we don't like, we said, well, well, I know it sounds strange to us, but at that time, and then we make all these excuses for the behavior. Hey, I know he married his in a sense, I guess half sister, but hey, hey, at that time, this would have been okay, wait a minute, wait a minute. So that means we're not going to impose later morality onto Abraham as far as him marrying Sarah, But then we are going to impose later morality on Abram for his line. How do we play this game? Hey, sometimes we look at the people in Genesis and we're like, they violated this, this, this, this, this, But in other times, well, they had to marry this, or they had to they had to be involved in marrying a sibling because well that's that's their only option. Well okay, so then so then we excuse the behavior. And in other cases, so hey, he had to marry me. The population pool was small, he had to marry her.

1:16:43 Hey, there's a femine in the land. Well, he should have just trusted God. He should have just trusted God. That's what he should have done. He was wrong to go to Egypt. God could have provided Well, could God provided a spouse other than a relative? Could he? I mean, you see, we have these weird standards. Like one time we impose this standard, in the next minute we impose a different standard. We are very inconsistent in our morality, in our standards, especially as we read things like Genesis. This is before the prohibition to do such things. So there was no sin in it. See, there's no prohibition against this because there's no sin in it. But there was a prohibition against going to Egypt.

1:17:35 See, he imposed a prohibition on Abram about going into Egypt, even there is no prohibition there. Then when he talks about him marrying his half sister, well, hey, this was okay because there was no prohibition against it. So one second, Abram's wrong even though he's not violating a prohibition, and the next minute he is violating what will be later a prohibition. But he's not wrong because that prohibition doesn't exist. Well, then you can't judge him on any action in which there is not a prohibition against. If you're going to excuse him marrying his half sister, then you've got to excuse every other behavior unless that behavior has a prohibition in the text, or God himself steps in and says this behavior is wrong. And guess what God never does. Does God step in and tell him that he's wrong? And what he does in Genesis twelve, No, he doesn't. In fact, Abram comes out better off, he comes out rich. They come out fed, provided for and rich. God does never intervenes and reprimends or condemns what he did. But yet that's a great failure. Hey over here where it tells me who he married, Hey, that's not a failure because God's not given a prohibition against it. But over here it's wrong even though God's not given a prohibition against it. I think sometimes, I know Christians don't like to admit this. Our morality sometimes very much sounds like relativism, and we pick and choose when it's wrong and when it's not wrong. And that's a problem.

1:19:08 And I think it's a very problematic in how we sometimes handle Genesis because they weren't told any different and in the beginning. That's just kind of what you had to do. And so you know this is dad's daughter and not mom's daughter. And so understand also in that culture, especially where he came from, right, he's coming from an idolatrous place. In that place he came from, it's very likely that the dad's side and the mom's side didn't even mingle, so they may not known each other that well anyway, it is, so now we're going to come up with a cultural excuse. Hey, well, at the culture at that time or at the culture at that time, is it not possible that A if the if the wife's got to die to preserve the husband, then that's the way it should be. Why don't we make a cultural excuse for that at that time and that culture.

1:20:12 If there's a femine in the land going to where there's food, that makes sense. How come there's a cultural explanation for a later behavior, but no cultural explanation for his actions in genesis to wel, I think we just make up the rules. I like this, this is, this is this is fascinating to me how we play these games. This half sister, but it was a it wasn't a half lie. It's either a liar not a lie, right, And he was really lying because he wasn't trying to prove that it was a sister. He was trying to hide that it was his wife.

1:20:57 So hey, okay, we're going to excuse this, but hey, his lying was wrong on the basis of what you just said. That his marriage is not wrong because there was no prohibition against it. Where is the prohibition against lying? Where is the prohibition against a half truth? Now you're gonna say, well that's later, Well, there's a letter of prohibition against marrying like this. So if you're going to take that past the future prohibition and bring it back to the text, you've got to bring all the future prohibitions and apply all of them to the text. You can't just pick and choose, all right. So we have this pretty woman here, this beautiful woman Sarah, and this man Abram. Going is the wrong direction because they're going away from what God had told them to do. Now I don't know which translation you all are working on, but here's what happens. So it says the princess of Pharaoh saw her. So these are people that would have Pharaoh's ear, people that are important in the government also took notice how beautiful that Sarah was, and they said, hey, Pharaoh, look at this, and so he takes her into his house with the intention of making her

1:22:30 his wife. Now this is why I said, I don't know what translation you're working with, but verse sixteen it says, and for her sake, he dealt well with Abram, and he had sheep ox and blah blah blah. The sv doesn't make this real clear. The way this could be translated, and probably should be translated, is Pharaoh gave him all this stuff. Okay, Now, Abram already was wealthy, right, He already had his own flock of animals, and he had a lot, and he had herdsman, and he had servants. It said that, you know, earlier tells us that all the people that God gave him went with him. So he gave him a lot of folks already journeying with him on this journey. Sidebar not really having anything to do with the story, but just Middle Eastern culture, something to keep in mind. Okay, we'll stop there. So here's what we need to remind ourselves. This whole series started because of an article and the sort of the Lord newspaper from May the twenty second, twenty twenty four. The articles entitled leaning Wrong, and it's based off lean not onto thine own understanding from Proverbs three to five. It gives us seven examples of

1:24:04 people supposedly leaning in the wrong direction. The example number one is Abram leaned towards Egypt and unbelief and soon found himself crippled by it Genesis twelve ten through twenty. I spent over an hour working through that and challenging that entire presupposition that the way that you're judging Abram. So I told everyone that what you're going to do this week is you're going to go through all seven of these examples. You're going to read these scriptures five times. Right, I've given you the scriptures I gave them at the beginning. Here, I'm not going to go through them again, read them five times, and then start looking up random sermons on the sermon's two point oh app and see how they cover it. I told you from the beginning that I felt that because what I do. What I'm doing here is I just chose a random sermon on the sermon's two point oh app Right. This one is called greater God. I think Genesis twelve, ten through twenty. And I told you that my prediction, my feeling was this was going to go in the very same direction that most sermons go. Abram was wrong. Abram was wrong, And I said I was going to challenge that presupposition because I believe that is at place and presupposing and placing the things upon the text that the text do not support.

1:25:15 I think it's bad exegesis. I think it's bad hermineutics. I think it's bad. But remember the goal here is I'm not criticizing the one preaching this. This is nothing about criticizing to the person. I'm glad they put their sermon out. I'm glad they give a different perspective because this allows me to take my hypotheses, place it next to their sermon, and then you, the listener, get to hear two radically different approaches to the same text. You benefit from it. I benefit because it challenges my approach to the text. I don't think he did anything textually to art to prove my hypotheses as being wrong, and I don't think he did a lot textually to establish his hypotheses. So I still stand by mine, but I'm more than willing to admit that I'm wrong, but I feel that this is what you're going to find as you go through these sermons, or at least not the one, the one for Genesis twelve. I think whatever sermon you choose, it's going to take the exact same approach that Abram did something wrong. Abram did something wrong, and I'm challenging that. And you already said, but what I loved about this sermon is he goes later on it says, see, but what Abraham did, it's you can't judge him. He can't be wrong.

1:26:28 There was no prohibition against it, and there was no prohibition to go against it, to go to Egypt, there was no prohibition against lying. Then all the things you're condemning him for there is no prohibition against. And again, I am going to state this over and over. What blows my mind about this story? And I still think that this is the key to the story. God intervene, initiates and intervenes in Genesis twelve one and speaks directly to Abram. He initiates a conversation and intervenes and Genesis twelve to seven and speaks directly to to not to Pharaoh. Can we state that again God initiates and intervenes, specifically, speaking to Abram and Genesis twelve one, He initiates a conversation and intervenes and speaks directly to Abram and Genesis twelve seven of famine happens. God goes absolutely silent, He just goes incognito. He just disappears.

1:27:23 He just gone right. Abram makes a decision. We judged that decision on the basis of no actual prohibition. But that's okay, we still do that. We throw him under the bus. Then Abram comes up with this great idea with Sarah to try to come up with this scheme to save himself. Whatever you want to think about that, he does it. And then guess what. God then shows back up, going after Pharaoh, not after Abram, goes after Pharaoh. Abram comes out of the situation, fed, provided for and amassing more wealth. God never condemns him, never speaks against Abram in any way, shape or form. Now, if God could intervene in twelve one, he could intervene in twelve seven, and then he intervenes again verse seventeen. So he intervenes in twelve one, twelve seven, and twelve seventeen. He just doesn't bother to intervene at all. When Abram decides to go to Egypt. He doesn't intervene when Abram's making the decision to tell the lie about Sarah. And he doesn't intervene after all of this to rebuke, condemn, or correct Abram. Now you are left to decide how you interpret that. How do you interpret God's silence in this entire matter, God's

1:28:59 absence, his lack of intervention and lack of initiating anything. You have to interpret that. Now we've gone eighty nine minutes. Now again, if you want to find that sermon, look for Greater God Genesis twelve ten through twenty pastor Matt Zodro z O d r W. Yes, I'm reading that right, Zodro, and you can listen to the rest. You probably will have to fast forward. Maybe it looks like we have about twenty five minutes left in the sermon. I think I don't. I don't. I don't know if I'm gonna I don't think I'm gonna do a part too, because we we've already got a pretty basic idea of how he handled it, and he provided us that great example of the relativism and the really contradictory way in which we apply prohibition and condemnation to the people in Exodus and and or and Genesis, and the and the excuses we make for them. We take him in the cases laws revealed an Exodus, apply them to the people in Genesis.

1:30:03 But some cases we excuse behavior because we're like, well, there was no prohibition against it. And then sometimes we condemn them even though there was no prohibition against it, meaning who were basically being very relativistic and our approach to morality and the Book of Genesis that should cause us to pause. All right, that took a lot of work. I can't wait to hear from you news I f at yahoo dot com. News I f at yahoo dot com. That's news. I fit yeahoo dot com. If you listen to a sermon on Genesis twelve ten through twenty today, please send me you know the name of the sermon or a link and tell me give me, give me your summary. Did it have a different approach? Was there something you If you think there's something like wow, you got to hear this part, give me the time stamp and a link, and then we may just review that part of it. I don't think I'm going to continue to I think we've established the basic We were able to kind of establish my hypotheses again, so I think we kind of accomplished what we wanted to accomplish. I hate not finishing one out here, that motorcycle in the background. I think we kind of established that. I think we did a pretty good job with that.

1:31:17 So what we will hopefully do is the next time we will move to the second example lot leaning towards sodom and compromise and lost all he had gained Genesis thirteen ten and Genesis nineteen seventeen. We will cover that, and then of course your job will be to find random sermons on Genesis thirteen ten or Genesis nineteen seventeen. That's the goal. So we're trying to we're trying to continue our sermons two point oh app sermon challenge. We're trying to then turn this into kind of a mini series, and then you know, we give some specific text of scripture to look at, so hopefully you will do that. Now, it sounds like the kids in the neighborhood have their motorcycle out right, they go around the block, then they come down the little side alley between my house and the neighbor's house. Boom. Then they go to the alley in the back, they go back down to the front of the of the neighborhood, and they come back and do around the block. So yeah, and it gets loud. I'm glad they I I am glad they have fun. I just you know, they just don't seem to care that I have a broadcast studio right here. But now I'm glad they have fun.

1:32:28 I want to go out there and hey, let me on the motorcycle. Let me go do that. Come on, it looks fun, all right, But I digress. You have lots of work to do. I guess you have a lot of things to work on, So get to work. What are you doing? Go go get to work, all right, accomplish all of your assignments. It's Thursday. I didn't really say you have to have them done by the end of this week, so so you have time. But get busy, all right, Stop being lazy. All right, Thanks for listening everyone, have great day. You can email me news i F at yahoo dot com. News I F at yahoo dot com. God bless Hm.