Cutting the Covenant

[00:00:00] Well, good morning, everyone. [00:00:03] I wonder, I would bet there are lots of people here who have sat maybe across a desk from a banker looking for a loan. [00:00:12] Let's just pick an amount. A million dollar loan. And the banker has the money, and you come and you want the money. [00:00:21] So that's what happens when there's a conversation between two people. The greater the banker, the lesser me, who wants the loan to buy a house or a piece of equipment or perhaps to start a business. [00:00:38] And a contract gets written up, doesn't it? A contract that says the banker will give you the money and you agree to paying it back. [00:00:49] Right? That's how the contract works. Well, I want to talk today about a contract that we see in the Old Testament. It's called a covenant. Would you pray with me? [00:01:02] Lord, open our ears and our hearts to hear your word. Draw us near unto you through it. [00:01:08] Amen. [00:01:10] So we heard that beautiful text today from Genesis 15, where we find God indicating to Abram that he's going to make of him a great nation. He says, look at the stars of the heavens. If you can count them, you know how great your descendants will be. [00:01:34] And Abram says this amazing thing to God. He says to him, oh, wait, it's God who talks. Pardon me. [00:01:48] Abram believed. [00:01:50] And the Lord reckoned it to him as righteousness. [00:01:57] That's the amazing statement there. Okay, Abram believed. Then God goes on to say, now I have something else for you. I have some land, the land you're standing on. I called you out of Ur of the Chaldees to this land, and I'm going to give you this land. [00:02:13] Now, Abram doesn't have any kids yet, and he's been given the promise. A great nation. [00:02:19] But how on earth can he possess this land he's standing on if he has no family, he's got nothing. And this land has people on it and has tribes on it and probably has armies on it. And so he's wondering, how are you going to do that, God? [00:02:38] In fact, he says it this way. He says, O Lord, how am I to know that I shall possess it? It's a simple question. It's not unbelief, because we already know he believes in God and about the starry host and the great nation. [00:02:53] So God says, tell you what, I'll make a covenant with you. [00:02:59] Contract in our varlands today. Okay? Hear how they did that, contracts back in those days. [00:03:06] He says to Abram, he says, go and get me a heifer and, and a goat and a ram and a Turtle dove and a young pigeon. And God tells him to cut those large animals in half. [00:03:25] Are you with me? [00:03:26] Anybody ever had somebody bring some game home from a mountain hunt? Anybody ever been around? Slaughterhouse. [00:03:35] This is a bloody mess. [00:03:37] But this is how they did it. They cut open these animals and laid them side by side. And then the way a covenant would work is the greater the giver and the lesser the receiver would walk between the pieces of this cut open covenant. [00:04:00] And it was if they were saying, may the Lord God do the same to me if I don't keep up my end of the bargain. [00:04:12] Well, really, that's no different than going to the bank, is it? [00:04:17] I hear some chuckles, but it's true. You have to keep up your end of the bargain or. [00:04:24] Yeah, forfeit. Okay, so Abram's got to be all excited. He goes and he cuts open the animals and he lays them. And we know it's kind of a big bloody mess because he has to scare away the birds of prey and. But then an interesting thing happens. Abram falls into a deep sleep. [00:04:46] And while he's in that deep sleep, I don't know how God does this. Maybe it's like a dream or something. But God reveals to him his story and the history of Abram's story up until about the time of entering the promised land. [00:05:03] And then, then God. [00:05:12] We understand it to be God because he's indicated as a fire pot and a flaming torch passing between the pieces. [00:05:21] He walks the cut covenant. [00:05:27] Only something is amiss. [00:05:31] Where's Abram? [00:05:34] He's not. He's not. [00:05:36] He's not there, is he? [00:05:39] God walks the covenant. God makes the promise all on his own. [00:05:47] In effect, he's like the banker who says, I'll give you the loan and I'll make the payments too, because Abram is not there. [00:06:03] How am I to know? [00:06:07] Was the question. And God answered it in spades. [00:06:11] Just like he did it over and over again with all kinds of people throughout the Old Testament. I mean, think about when Abram had to take Isaac up the mountain and God had instructed him to kill his son, to sacrifice him on an altar. And only when he was ready to plunge the knife. Remember, this was his heir, his son, his only son, who was going to help populate the earth with scads of people. [00:06:39] Kind of an end to the promise. God stops him. [00:06:42] Or how am I to know? [00:06:44] Moses must have thought, when he's been charged to walk God's people out of Egyptian slavery and right up to the edge of the Red Sea. [00:06:55] And wave his staff. [00:06:58] Or how about Joshua commanded to go and march around the city of Jericho seven times and blow trumpets and shout? [00:07:13] Or how about Ruth, dear Ruth, who's a Moabite and she follows her mother in law because she's destitute and her mother in law is destitute, and yet they go back to their homeland in Israel, and she could have been as good as dead there, but God stepped in. [00:07:38] Or Hannah, who prayed for years and years for a son. Or David, who in his early life ran for his life from King Saul because he had been promised to be the king of Israel himself. How am I to know that I shall possess that? Or Esther, Esther, who's the queen of Babylon, basically, and she's been called upon to go into the throne room and explain to the king that her people are about to all die. Only her own life is potentially forfeit for even going to speak to the king. [00:08:22] How am I to know? And that's what I think is so great about having this text from Hebrews today. Because not only did we hear Abram's faith, that he believed the Lord, and the Lord counted it to him as righteousness, but then this letter from someone to the Hebrews says that faith is the assurance of things hoped for and the conviction of things not seen. [00:08:49] And by faith we understand that the universe was created out of the word of God so that what is seen is not made out of things that are. Oh, I said that wrong. So that what is seen is not made out of things. [00:09:03] Am I doing that right? So that what is seen was not made out of things that are visible. [00:09:09] In other words, God speaks, and it is, and that becomes the substance of our faith, that we believe that what he tells us that he has done, that we believe that he has accomplished his very word, even in visible form, that he comes through. And this goes on the faith of Enoch, the faith of Noah, the faith of Abraham and Sarah that we've been talking about, what, for weeks now, Right. [00:09:39] And that this faith is the key to the assurance. [00:09:49] How will I know? [00:09:58] I mean, there had to be some anxiety, right? There had to be anxious people. [00:10:04] Because it seems like God always sort of waits till wit's end corner. Have you ever been to wit's end corner? [00:10:13] I've been to wit's end corner. It's kind of like the end of your rope. [00:10:18] But God always shows up at just the right time. He did for all those people. And yet what does he say to his disciples in our gospel lesson today? He says, I tell you don't be anxious about your life. Well, they must have been being anxious for him to start that sermon. [00:10:35] About what. What you will eat or about your body, what you will put on. Well, look, he says, life is more than food and the body more than clothing. Look at the ravens. God clothes them. [00:10:46] Or look at the lilies, how they grow. They neither toil nor spin. And yet, I tell you, even Solomon in all of his glory was not arrayed as one of these. You just go look at a lily sometimes. I mean, they're majestic. Or any flowers, for that matter. Or just a blade of grass. [00:11:05] And God so clothes the grass that is alive today in the field and tomorrow is. [00:11:15] God takes care. [00:11:19] He is reliable is what Jesus is saying to his disciples. [00:11:26] Because they were asking, how am I to know you're going to deliver? [00:11:38] Which made me think about us. Were we ever anxious? [00:11:43] You ever anxious? Oh, I don't know. Anxious about the rent is due on Monday, groceries for the table. I hope my crops come in. I hope I have a good yield. [00:11:57] There's a banknote due. [00:12:05] How about aging? Anybody ever anxious about aging? [00:12:13] Sickness? [00:12:17] Oh, school starting. [00:12:21] A few. [00:12:23] A few teachers across the country I'm sure have a little bit more anxiety than others. But, you know, you get anxious as a school teacher. Am I going to get through this school year with success? [00:12:35] Will I be able to teach the lesson to little Suzy, who she just doesn't seem to get it? [00:12:45] Or how about the students that might be anxious about, oh, I sure don't know if I'm going to be able to learn those math lessons that they're going to have in fifth grade this year. I struggled with math last year. [00:12:58] Or I wonder if. [00:13:01] I wonder if I'll have a good friend this year. [00:13:07] All kinds of things to be anxious about. [00:13:10] Or how about this one? [00:13:15] How do I know for sure that my sins are forgiven today like Pastor said they were up here? I mean, how do I know I shall possess the forgiveness of sins today after what I have done? [00:13:36] Or how about our other great enemy, death? [00:13:42] How do I know he's really going to take me home to his heaven when I die? [00:13:51] How am I to know? [00:13:55] And Jesus answers in this passage. [00:13:59] He says, instead of all this concern, he says, seek the kingdom and all these things will be added to you. [00:14:08] He says, fear not, little flock. It's your Father's good pleasure to give you the kingdom. [00:14:18] Well, then he says, stay dressed for action and keep your lamp burning, which is Jesus. Really neat way of saying, have faith. Have faith like Abram had faith that I was able to count as righteousness on his behalf. Have. Have faith that I will follow through on your behalf. Just like I did for all these other people through all time. I mean, name me one person that God did not show up for. [00:14:53] But again, how can I know? [00:14:58] And it would take us right back to this covenant that God cut with Abram. On that Old Testament lesson from Genesis. Where God walked through the pieces. [00:15:12] And he didn't just walk through to make his promise, sure. But he walked through on Abram's behalf because he was out cold. And he did for Abram what Abram couldn't do for himself. [00:15:29] Just like he does for us. [00:15:34] God made him to be sin that knew no sin, that we might have the righteousness of God. It is as though God is the provider of eternity, of heaven, of an eternal home. [00:15:52] And the debt payer. Because he took our sin upon Himself and gave us life in its place. [00:16:01] He took our penalty, our debt, paid it in full. He's like that banker who said, we'll give you the loan and we're going to make the payments too. [00:16:16] And why? [00:16:20] Why did he do that? [00:16:27] One love. [00:16:30] God so loved us that he gave his only son to be bloodied, crushed on a cross. [00:16:44] Taking our debt to the covenant and paying in full. [00:16:55] How can I know? [00:16:59] Look to the cross. [00:17:02] Amen.