- 2 days ago
The Common Sense Bible Study crew covers Romans 4:16–25, focusing on God's promise to Abraham and how it rests on faith so it can be guaranteed by grace to all his offspring—both those "of the law" and Gentile believers who share Abraham's faith. The group compares translations (ESV, TLV, YLT) and discusses Greek ambiguity, inserted words, and why "the law" here likely means Torah.
They explore Abraham as father of many nations in three senses, connect "God gives life to the dead" to Abraham and Sarah's restored ability to conceive, and explain "calls into existence things that do not exist." They address Abraham, Hagar, and Ishmael as misunderstanding timing rather than unbelief, discuss sins of weakness versus sins of rebellion, Israel's grafting-in pattern, and conclude that faith in the God who raised Jesus is counted as righteousness for believers.
From Jay Carper at Common Sense Bible Study (https://CommonSenseBibleStudy.com) and American Torah (https://www.AmericanTorah.com).
This content is free, but I accept contributions via Paypal at https://jaycarper.com/paypal.
Follow me on X: https://jaycarper.com/twitter
Follow me on Facebook: https://jaycarper.com/fbat
Follow me on Whole Bible Community: https://jaycarper.com/ttn
They explore Abraham as father of many nations in three senses, connect "God gives life to the dead" to Abraham and Sarah's restored ability to conceive, and explain "calls into existence things that do not exist." They address Abraham, Hagar, and Ishmael as misunderstanding timing rather than unbelief, discuss sins of weakness versus sins of rebellion, Israel's grafting-in pattern, and conclude that faith in the God who raised Jesus is counted as righteousness for believers.
From Jay Carper at Common Sense Bible Study (https://CommonSenseBibleStudy.com) and American Torah (https://www.AmericanTorah.com).
This content is free, but I accept contributions via Paypal at https://jaycarper.com/paypal.
Follow me on X: https://jaycarper.com/twitter
Follow me on Facebook: https://jaycarper.com/fbat
Follow me on Whole Bible Community: https://jaycarper.com/ttn
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LearningTranscript
00:00:02All right, so welcome back to Common Sense Bible Study and A Journey Through Romans.
00:00:06And we're starting at Romans 4.16.
00:00:09Last week we got through 13, 14, and 15.
00:00:12That is why it depends on faith in order that the promise may rest on grace and be guaranteed to
00:00:17all his offspring,
00:00:18not only to the adherent of the law, but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who
00:00:22is the father of us all.
00:00:24As it is written, I have made you the father of many nations.
00:00:27In the presence of the God in whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence
00:00:32the things that do not exist.
00:00:34In hope he believed against hope, that he should become the father of many nations, as he had been told,
00:00:39So shall your offspring be.
00:00:41He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead since he
00:00:46was about a hundred years old,
00:00:48or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb.
00:00:51No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God,
00:00:54but he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to
00:00:58do what he had promised.
00:01:00That is why his faith was counted to him as righteousness.
00:01:04But the words it was counted to him were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also.
00:01:09It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead, Jesus our Lord,
00:01:13who was delivered up for our trespasses and raised for our justification.
00:01:18All right, more powerful words.
00:01:20We've been talking about the promise that God made to Abraham, how the natural seed through Ishmael,
00:01:30although Isaac was conceived through a miracle, he is still the natural descendant of Abraham
00:01:37through more or less natural processes, at least after God restored Abraham and Sarah's bodies.
00:01:45And so we talk about the Jew and the Gentile, the Jew being the natural descendant of Abraham, Isaac, and
00:01:52Jacob,
00:01:52and the Gentile believer, someone who is an heir of Abraham merely because of promise, because God said so.
00:01:59So there are two ways that Abraham, three ways that Abraham became the father of many nations.
00:02:04One, physically through all of his children, all the children of Keturah, Hagar, and Sarah.
00:02:11Two, through the many people that Israel became.
00:02:16And three, through all of those people that are pulled out of the nations to become children of Abraham.
00:02:22So in this verse, that is why it depends on faith, in order that the promise may rest on grace
00:02:28and be guaranteed to all his offspring, not only to the adherents of the law,
00:02:33but also to the one who shares the faith of Abraham, who is the father of us all.
00:02:38What translations are you all using?
00:02:41ESV.
00:02:42Kevin, what translation are you using?
00:02:45W-E-B.
00:02:48W-E-B.
00:02:49Oh, that's the World English Bible.
00:02:50Is that what that is?
00:02:52W-E-B.
00:02:53Okay.
00:02:54Kevin, what translation do you usually use?
00:02:57I usually use the ESV and the KJV.
00:03:02I mean, Blue Letter Bible.
00:03:04Yeah.
00:03:05So I try to get to as close to the original language as possible.
00:03:11Okay.
00:03:12Yeah, I know.
00:03:12Paula, you usually use the NASV or ESV or TLV, one of those three?
00:03:18Sometimes I use the scripture.
00:03:22Yeah.
00:03:23Yeah, I reference scripture.
00:03:27That's the South African translation, I think.
00:03:32Young's Literal Translation.
00:03:35ESV and NASV are my standbys.
00:03:38Those are my favorites.
00:03:38But I go to all of those because it's really helpful to see how different translators understand a verse.
00:03:44And this is one that translators really get a little confused about this first couple of clauses in this verse.
00:03:53Apparently, the Greek is ambiguous and it leaves out a lot of words that we would use in English.
00:03:59So the ESV that is on the screen right now, they really took a lot of liberties with the first
00:04:04part of this verse.
00:04:05I don't think it's wrong.
00:04:07I mean, it gets the meaning across.
00:04:08But they had to enhance it a little bit to make it readable in English.
00:04:14I want to bring up, let's see, TLV.
00:04:18That's the Tree of Life version.
00:04:21For this reason, it depends on trust so that the promise according to grace might be guaranteed to all the
00:04:26offspring,
00:04:27not only to those of the Torah, but also to those of the faith of Abraham.
00:04:30He is the father of us all.
00:04:32It's very similar, but there are also some significant differences.
00:04:37And I think the Young's literal translation, put that up on the screen, I think, obviously, it's more literal.
00:04:45So it's getting closer to what the original Greek reads word for word.
00:04:50And honestly, I think that this rendering is even clearer.
00:04:54The words are a little archaic and it might be a little awkward.
00:04:59But I think it communicates more clearly exactly what Paul was trying to say.
00:05:05Because of this, it is of faith that it may be according to grace for the promise being sure to
00:05:10all the seed,
00:05:11not to that which is of the law only, but also to that which is of the faith of Abraham.
00:05:15And you notice there are italicized words there.
00:05:18When you see italicized words in most translations,
00:05:21it means that the translator is having to interpolate some words,
00:05:25that those words aren't in the original Greek or Hebrew.
00:05:28But the translator is putting them there because it doesn't really make sense otherwise.
00:05:34And sometimes they get that, sometimes they don't.
00:05:38And as we've seen the last couple of weeks,
00:05:40frequently they insert words and forget to tell us.
00:05:43Like when they say the law instead of law.
00:05:47In this case, where it says the law,
00:05:50that's in the Greek.
00:05:51The definite article is there.
00:05:53So in this case, Paul is almost certainly talking about Torah.
00:05:57So the Tree of Life version is probably right when it says keepers of the Torah.
00:06:04Or it says those of the Torah.
00:06:06One of the big differences in the ESV is in this phrase here where it says,
00:06:12in order that the promise may rest on grace.
00:06:16The translators in the English standard are rearranging several of the words in order to get that sentence.
00:06:24It actually says,
00:06:26this is why it's of faith in order that grace.
00:06:30And then it talks about the promise.
00:06:33So I think where the YLT says,
00:06:43Even that's a little awkward.
00:06:46But I think it's saying that this grafting in and the air that Abraham received was by his faith.
00:06:55He believed God and this was counted to him as righteousness.
00:06:58And this is according to God's grace.
00:07:01Not because Abraham deserved to be called righteous because he believed or not because he earned it.
00:07:07But because God chose to reward that faithfulness and that trust.
00:07:15And that's where the grace comes in.
00:07:18Abraham's righteousness was of faith in accordance with God's grace.
00:07:24And because God showed Abraham grace in counting his faith as righteousness,
00:07:30that's how we can be sure that the promise for the seed of Abraham,
00:07:36that we can be counted as children of Abraham, is also sure.
00:07:40Because it doesn't depend on us.
00:07:43It doesn't depend on our behavior, on our earning God's favor.
00:07:48However, no amount of sin that we have done in the past has any effect on whether we are counted
00:07:56as Abraham's seed.
00:07:57It's solely based on our faith in God's promise.
00:08:01And technically, no amount of sin after that point of coming to faith is what counts us as righteous either.
00:08:09It's a good thing, and it is a kind of righteousness.
00:08:11But that's not the thing that God counts as righteousness for the sake of being an heir of Abraham and
00:08:16eternal life.
00:08:18It's not whether or not we are sinning.
00:08:22It's whether or not we are repented from sin.
00:08:26And repenting means turning away from it with the understanding that we will likely fail.
00:08:32We had a longer conversation about this last week.
00:08:36It does get a little confusing in that if you're repenting from sin, doesn't that mean that you've turned away
00:08:41from it?
00:08:42Yeah, but we're human.
00:08:43Again, we are still going to sin, and we're still going to fail.
00:08:47And as long as we don't just give up and say, okay, God, I'm done with you.
00:08:51I'm not going to do your thing anymore.
00:08:53I'm just going to go do my thing now.
00:08:55As long as we don't do that, then that sin does not cut us off from Abraham or from that.
00:09:03Yeah, it doesn't cut us off from him being our father.
00:09:05Does that make sense?
00:09:07Or am I just rambling too much?
00:09:09That makes sense.
00:09:11Okay.
00:09:11So I got a couple of questions for you.
00:09:14Let me go back to the ESV.
00:09:17So I talked about all of this already, but when it says, when it talks about the promise here, what
00:09:24promise do you think it's talking about?
00:09:26The promise that was given to Abraham also?
00:09:30Which promise is that?
00:09:32Is it the promise that through Abraham at that point were all his children?
00:09:39Yeah.
00:09:40The promise that God would make him the father of many nations, even though in his body, he was as
00:09:48good as dead.
00:09:49And the thing that this affects us, why it matters to us, is that the seed was only through miraculous
00:09:56intervention.
00:09:58God fulfilled that promise by intervening in the natural course of events, which means that he can make any of
00:10:04us children of Abraham.
00:10:05Somebody who's got a Bible handy, pull up Luke 3.8.
00:10:10Luke 3.8.
00:10:12Bear fruits in keeping with repentance.
00:10:15Do not begin to say to yourselves, we have Abraham as our father.
00:10:20For I tell you, God is able from these stones to raise some children for Abraham.
00:10:26Yeah, I'm pretty sure this is John speaking, right?
00:10:28John the Baptist?
00:10:29Yep.
00:10:30Yeah.
00:10:31And so he's got people from all over the region, probably all over the empire, who are coming to be
00:10:37baptized by him.
00:10:39And he's talking to the crowds there, and most of them are Jews.
00:10:45He's probably directly addressing Sadducees and Pharisees, and they're all saying, we don't need this.
00:10:53We'd rather, they all want John in prison.
00:10:56Maybe not all of them as a whole.
00:10:59They want John to be quiet because he's stirring up trouble.
00:11:03But he's saying, he's out there preaching a baptism of repentance, saying, the kingdom of God is at hand, so
00:11:11repent from your sins and be baptized.
00:11:13And they're saying to themselves, because we have Abraham as our father, we don't need to repent from anything.
00:11:21We're in already.
00:11:23There's nothing we need to do.
00:11:25In a way, they're right, but this also shows a lack of faith in God.
00:11:31And John points out that by saying, from these stones, God is able to raise up children for Abraham.
00:11:38In one sense, he's pointing back at Abraham and Sarah's own bodies.
00:11:43They were dead, and they essentially had to be resurrected for God to bring children through them.
00:11:48But he's also referencing all the people who are standing around him, because it's not just Jews who are standing
00:11:55there and coming to John to be baptized.
00:11:57There are also a lot of Gentiles out there.
00:12:00And when he says that God can raise up children for Abraham from these stones, he might have been pointing
00:12:08at literal stones, or he might have been waving his hand around and saying, look at all these stones.
00:12:13You think you're special because you're a natural child of Abraham.
00:12:16But these other people that you look at is no more alive than stones.
00:12:21God can make them into children of Abraham, too.
00:12:23And that's part of the promise of being the father of many nations and through him being a blessing to
00:12:30all the nations of the earth.
00:12:32Yeah, I think some still have that same mindset today.
00:12:37Oh, yeah.
00:12:38And not just Jews.
00:12:40Correct.
00:12:42So in the second part of this verse, it talks about two different people.
00:12:47The ESV is a little fuzzy here, too, because it says not only to the adherent of the law, but
00:12:53that's not what the Greek says.
00:12:54The Greek says not only to those of the law.
00:12:59Adherent of the law is assumed, but that's not really what it's talking about.
00:13:05It's not talking about whether or not people are obeying the law.
00:13:08Who are those of the law?
00:13:11Who would Paul be talking about?
00:13:13The Pharisees and the Sadducees?
00:13:16Yeah, the Jews at the very least.
00:13:18Those who are heirs of Abraham according to the law, according to the law that they knew.
00:13:24Obviously, Isaac was born through a miracle, so that was not according to natural law.
00:13:30But now all of Isaac's children are born through natural processes.
00:13:36And now we've got the Sadducees and the Pharisees and the Essenes and all of the other Jewish people who
00:13:40are living in the land of Israel.
00:13:43They're all people of the law, and not just in the land of Israel, but all over the Roman Empire.
00:13:50Paul himself considered himself among those of the law because he was a natural-born Jew.
00:13:57He was brought up.
00:13:59I'm sorry, say that again?
00:14:01He was taught by Gamaliel also.
00:14:04Yeah, he was taught at the feet of Gamaliel.
00:14:06Well, so I think that this leads to the question, how are they heirs of Abraham if being an heir
00:14:15of Abraham is only through faith?
00:14:17How can Paul say, not only to those of the law, but also to those who share the faith of
00:14:23Abraham,
00:14:25when he just pretty much said that only those who have the faith of Abraham are counted as children of
00:14:30Abraham?
00:14:31Is he contradicting himself here?
00:14:33I don't think so.
00:14:37Because some through faith and some through natural birth.
00:14:42Yeah, Yeshua had a controversy with these people also, talking about being sons of Abraham.
00:14:50And he pointed out that, at least through faith, they were sons of their father, the devil.
00:14:57And he was talking to, I think, the Pharisees at the time when he said this.
00:15:01But that was a, they weren't literally sons of the devil.
00:15:05This is a metaphor.
00:15:06It's kind of like saying we are sons of Abraham.
00:15:08We're not literally children of Abraham.
00:15:11Some of us may be.
00:15:12But we are made children of Abraham by faith.
00:15:16And so by a lack of faith, some are made children of Satan.
00:15:21Not literally, of course, but because they lack faith.
00:15:25They are counted as part of his house instead of part of Abraham's house.
00:15:29But that doesn't mean that they are no longer counted as Israelites.
00:15:35Not necessarily.
00:15:37Paul was among the worst.
00:15:39He was a murderer.
00:15:40He persecuted the church.
00:15:42He persecuted the followers of Yeshua.
00:15:45But God still counted him as an Israelite.
00:15:49And then when he repented, God made him a teacher of the very people that he was trying to persecute
00:15:55before.
00:15:56And I want to jump forward to, I think it's Romans 11.
00:16:02I say then, God has not rejected his people.
00:16:05Sorry, let me move this over to the screen.
00:16:08I say then, God has not rejected his people, has he?
00:16:11May it never be.
00:16:12For I too am an Israelite, a descendant of Abraham of the tribe of Benjamin.
00:16:15God has not rejected his people whom he foreknew.
00:16:18Or do you not know that the scripture says in the passage about Elijah how he pleads with God against
00:16:23Israel?
00:16:24Lord, they have killed your prophets.
00:16:26They have torn down your altars.
00:16:27And I alone am left.
00:16:28They are seeking my life.
00:16:30But what is the divine response to him?
00:16:32I have kept for myself 7,000 men who have not bowed the knee to Baal.
00:16:37In the same way then, there has also come to be at the present time a remnant to God's gracious
00:16:42choice.
00:16:43This remnant is, these are natural descendants of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob.
00:16:49Or at least they are, this is another conversation we had last week.
00:16:54This is complicated by the existence of the mixed multitude who was grafted into Israel at the time of the
00:16:59Exodus.
00:17:01These were Egyptians and all kinds of other people who lived in Egypt,
00:17:05who came out of Egypt with the Hebrews when God redeemed them.
00:17:10And in the wilderness at Sinai, you know, God divided up the camp into all the tribes and arranged them
00:17:17around the tabernacle.
00:17:18And there was no camp for the foreigner.
00:17:21There was no camp for the sojourner.
00:17:22They were all sojourners because they all lived in temporary dwellings in the wilderness without any inherited land.
00:17:29All of those people who are faithful to God, no matter who their parents were, were counted as descendants of
00:17:34Jacob.
00:17:35And we see the same thing in Ezekiel 47, which we also read last week, talking about at the end
00:17:43times,
00:17:44when God restores Israel to the land, he divides up the land again.
00:17:48And then he says, and all of these foreigners who are sojourning among you, whatever tribe they're living in,
00:17:55you will give them an inheritance in the land among that tribe,
00:17:58and they will be counted as the natural born sons of Israel.
00:18:02So God takes foreigners periodically and he grafts them into Israel.
00:18:07The cross wasn't the first time this happened with Paul evangelizing the Roman Empire.
00:18:12It happened at the great, at the Exodus from Egypt.
00:18:16It happened when they invaded Canaan and they adopted people like Rahab and the Gibeonites.
00:18:23Now the Gibeonites did it by fraud, but eventually they were absorbed into Israel.
00:18:28So the people that Paul is talking about in Romans 11, these are the descendants of the natural children of
00:18:35Jacob
00:18:35and all of those who are grafted in and counted as natural children.
00:18:39So as far as we're concerned, they are the natural descendants of Jacob.
00:18:42Does that make sense?
00:18:45All right, Kevin, you got your hand up. Go ahead.
00:18:48Yeah, I just find it interesting how a lot of Christians will say that was for Israel.
00:18:57And that's, that was for Israel.
00:18:59Yeah.
00:18:59The Sabbath was for Israel.
00:19:01Yeah.
00:19:02It's just, it's weird because when you actually read the scriptures, you get a little confused.
00:19:09And you're like, wait a minute.
00:19:11So yeah, even from when God created the world, he rested on the seventh day.
00:19:19So the argument of that was Mosaic law.
00:19:23So the Sabbath was, the day of rest was way before it.
00:19:30It is very confusing, especially growing up in America.
00:19:35Yeah.
00:19:36And the thing is that Paul comes the closest to anyone in scripture of spelling these ideas out.
00:19:43They're hinted at in various places.
00:19:46I see Paul and Ezekiel both.
00:19:48But you get this, you have to really pay attention to the patterns that are happening between God and Israel
00:19:54and the nations to really understand what's happening in all of these different relationships and how, and who Israel really
00:20:02is.
00:20:03I made a video series on called who is Israel a few years ago.
00:20:07It was one of the first videos I ever made actually.
00:20:09So it's not exactly professional quality.
00:20:11Not that any of my videos are, but I still think it's pretty good.
00:20:15So I'll put that in the notes later after I upload the recording.
00:20:21June, go ahead.
00:20:21Okay, when the nations joined Israel on the departure from Egypt or the Egyptians, because I'm certain they had people
00:20:36from other nations that were there.
00:20:39Now, I believe some of them joined because of fear, what they saw Yahweh did to the Egyptians.
00:20:52And when we see bad things happening to bad people, we may be caught in the middle, not totally bad
00:21:03or not bad, but not good.
00:21:05But because of fear, we said, you know what?
00:21:09I'm seeing what God is doing for this set of people.
00:21:14I'm going to just join them because I'm afraid of what may happen to me.
00:21:18And it also had people now who really believe in the power of God.
00:21:29So they left with a purpose in their heart that they're going to follow this God that has been a
00:21:37stranger to them.
00:21:38But when they saw the powerful work of his hand, they decide to join with the Israelites to trek through
00:21:48the Sinai journey.
00:21:49So I believe there was a mixture of people and that's why some of them became so rebellious because they
00:21:59didn't really leave because they believed, totally believed in God.
00:22:04They left because they were afraid and fear could cause people to move in direction that they think if they
00:22:13move there, it's going to save them from the destruction of the other people who totally objected to God as
00:22:22their savior.
00:22:23I think you're right.
00:22:24There were a lot of those people probably left with Israel, not because they necessarily believed God's promises, but because
00:22:31he was obviously a bigger, more powerful God than Egypt's and they didn't want to be on his bad side.
00:22:37I think a lot of them really did believe there's probably a mix.
00:22:41Just like when they came into Canaan, Rahab, really, she saw the power of God and feared it, but she
00:22:48also believed in him.
00:22:50Whereas people like the Gibeonites, they saw God's power and they feared, but they lied in order to be spared.
00:22:57So they didn't really believe the promises.
00:23:00So there's definitely a mix.
00:23:03Back to verse 16.
00:23:05Oh yeah, we were talking about who are the people of the, who are those of the law in essentially,
00:23:10I think what we've come down to is that those of the law are the natural descendants of Jacob, but
00:23:16it's more, more likely the faithful remnant.
00:23:19The ones that Paul was talking about in Romans 11, using the, the 7,000 prophets or however many it
00:23:27was as a, as an illustration that there might've been millions of people in Israel at the time.
00:23:35And who was it, Elijah, Elijah thought he was all alone.
00:23:40And God says, Oh no, we've got all of these thousands left.
00:23:45That's actually a lot.
00:23:477,000 men is a lot.
00:23:48So that doesn't even include women and children, but compared to the millions, that's a very small number.
00:23:56But it was probably the same in Paul's day and the same today.
00:24:02Most people among the Jews are not really believers.
00:24:06You've got reform Judaism and Hasidic Judaism and all these offshoots that are so messed up.
00:24:14The reform Jews, they don't believe in God at all.
00:24:17For the most part, they believe in themselves.
00:24:19They have a very humanistic kind of religion where they've remade God in their own image.
00:24:25Just so much of Christianity.
00:24:28There are faithful Christians.
00:24:30There are faithful Jews.
00:24:32I suspect that there are people in other religions who believe in the God of Abraham.
00:24:38They just don't know the right name to call him.
00:24:40They don't know his written laws.
00:24:42They just know he exists and they believe in him.
00:24:45I won't be surprised if after the resurrection, we meet people who were Hindus and Muslims and other people who
00:24:53just never heard the full story of Yeshua in the kingdom and all that Yeshua did.
00:24:59But they believed in God, that there was a creator, that they were sinners, and that God could forgive them
00:25:07and restore them through his own grace.
00:25:10And Yeshua is still the door that they all have to go through.
00:25:14I'm just not, I just don't believe that they have to have all the right theology to make it happen.
00:25:19They just have to trust God and trust him to take care of all the details.
00:25:25That's one of those things that's likely to get me into a lot of trouble if I say it too
00:25:28much.
00:25:30Yep.
00:25:31But I'm with you.
00:25:32Okay, like the Hindus, they believe in Vishnu.
00:25:39Yeah.
00:25:40So they believe in this Vishnu and they see him as what you think will be the outcome, their outcome.
00:25:52No, I don't really know a lot about Hinduism and their gods.
00:25:56But I believe that just like Abraham, who, at least according to tradition, was a pagan idolater, I think that
00:26:05somebody who is raised as a Hindu, if at some point they listen to their conscience and the remnant of
00:26:14God's law that is still written into their DNA,
00:26:16they hear that and they think, all of this nonsense, why are we worshiping things that aren't worth worshiping?
00:26:23And say, I know that there must be an ultimate creator of everything.
00:26:28And that this God has perfect standards because he is perfect by definition, and I can't possibly measure up to
00:26:37that.
00:26:38So I'm going to pray to this God, even though I don't know his name, and ask him to teach
00:26:45me, tell me the right thing to do, and I'll turn away from all the wrong things that I'm doing,
00:26:50including worshiping Vishnu or whatever it is they do.
00:26:52I think that those people are very rare, but I think that there are people like Abraham out there who
00:26:58have heard God's call, but they haven't heard, they don't have access to the written word, they've never met somebody
00:27:05who preached the gospel to them, they just know that God is real.
00:27:10Does that make sense?
00:27:12It does.
00:27:13I think part of the element of this, too, between believing and not believing is it's full rejection, almost like
00:27:22being a scoffer.
00:27:25One thing I think is wrestling with your faith and not being sure about certain things, but I think it's
00:27:33the, and I don't know how far I can go with it,
00:27:36but it's knowing that he's real and he's there, and then you just turn your back on that faith and
00:27:46scoffing at it.
00:27:48I was hearing a small clip of this atheist, and he was pretty much saying that even if God would
00:27:55spell his name in the stars, he still wouldn't believe.
00:27:59So to me, that is completely full rejection of him, because the difference is some people really love their flesh,
00:28:08like they really just want to live, and they just want to do the things they want to do without
00:28:15having the law, the Torah telling them what's righteous and what's not, because they want to keep living in their
00:28:23own righteousness.
00:28:23I think that's a little bit different, but I think that we've all at some point have met one of
00:28:30my good friends.
00:28:32He's a Muslim, and I'll tell you, he's one of the most honest, kindest persons that I know, righteous persons
00:28:42that I know.
00:28:44I don't know all the details on how he follows his faith or anything like that, but I know he's
00:28:49a good man.
00:28:51And I'm sure just like that, like you said, in Hinduism and other faiths, they all have that strife to
00:29:00do good, to the point where there's almost like rejection towards their religion.
00:29:06Yeah, they're good people in spite of their religion.
00:29:09Yeah.
00:29:10They see some things about their religion, and they make an excuse off of it, but they're like, no, I
00:29:15know I need to do this part of it, because that's what I understand to be correct.
00:29:20Even if their belief system or their scriptures say one thing, they'll use an excuse to turn around and say,
00:29:28yeah, that's not, they almost cherry pick the good parts of religion and use that and not keep the other
00:29:38ones.
00:29:38But I think there's a lot, a lot difference than of rejecting God completely.
00:29:43And with that said, I will say, still, with everything we said, yes, Yeshua is the only way.
00:29:50Yeah, I don't think there's, I want to make sure that nobody misunderstands what I'm saying.
00:29:57I'm not saying that Hinduism has the truth, or Islam has the truth, or anything like that.
00:30:04But what I'm saying is, what Carlos is pointing out, is that some people, that God calls all people, at
00:30:10some point, everybody has an opportunity to choose the right path.
00:30:15No matter where you grew up, no matter what religion you were taught, what language you speak, whether you've heard
00:30:19the gospel or not, God gives you an opportunity to choose him over other stuff.
00:30:26If you grew up worshiping Vishnu and Krishna and whoever else, whatever, your Hindu religion or whatever, worships, and at
00:30:37one time, God speaks to you, and you say, all of this is wrong.
00:30:44I don't, all of these fake gods who act like children, why are we worshiping these things?
00:30:50There is a better way.
00:30:50I just don't know all the details of what it is, but I'm going to seek that God instead.
00:30:57He may have never heard the name Jesus or Yeshua, but he knows that such a person is necessary, that
00:31:05God must make a way to restore us to his perfection.
00:31:09I don't know what that way is.
00:31:11It's totally up to God.
00:31:13This is this person, this hypothetical person speaking.
00:31:16But that in itself is faith in God's grace.
00:31:22God's grace to save you despite your sins and to make up that infinite gap between us and him.
00:31:30And that is Yeshua.
00:31:32Yeshua is the bridge that crosses that gap.
00:31:35There is no other.
00:31:36There's no other way for us to be reunited with God the Father.
00:31:41And I think that God can make that way work for even people who have never heard of the Bible.
00:31:47Sorry, I got something in my eye.
00:31:49Go ahead, Kevin.
00:31:50You got your hand up.
00:31:51Yeah, just to piggyback on that.
00:31:54I grew up in the church.
00:31:57And I think I only read Job, the book of Job and Genesis.
00:32:02I can never get past Genesis.
00:32:04Maybe a little bit of Exodus, but I didn't really read the scriptures.
00:32:08And when God saved me, I was living in sin.
00:32:16It was a radical change.
00:32:19And it wasn't like I needed to read scripture in order to not desire.
00:32:28I didn't need scripture necessarily to have that new heart where I wanted to make changes.
00:32:39At that point in time, I wanted to make changes because I love my God.
00:32:45I love him so much that I want to follow him.
00:32:50I want to know what is true because I didn't know what was true at the time.
00:32:56And when I look back at my own testimony, it really is a reflection of God's work.
00:33:03And all of our testimonies is God's work in us.
00:33:08And I wanted to stop doing things before I even picked up the Bible.
00:33:14And then I started reading the Bible.
00:33:16And then I started saying, oh, this makes a lot of sense.
00:33:21And, oh, this is what God wants.
00:33:26And so I say that personally because there's people out there that do not have the scriptures, but God has
00:33:36called them to follow him.
00:33:39And it's very scary because in the United States of America, we are the ones that claim our own religion,
00:33:52right?
00:33:53I'm a Christian.
00:33:54I'm this and that.
00:33:55And I think I said this before, but it's a beautiful thing when we follow God and people know that
00:34:06we're a peculiar people.
00:34:08And we're living the stuff that we're reading.
00:34:12We're living it.
00:34:13And it's genuine.
00:34:16And people can see that.
00:34:20And when people see that, they can either hate you, think that you're crazy, think that you're a looney tune,
00:34:27or they can say, I want what you have.
00:34:32What is, what is, like, there's something different.
00:34:35And that's our chance to share the gift of the gospel with others.
00:34:44And so, yeah, I'm just saying that it is, we live just like the Pharisees were back in the day.
00:34:53People can call themselves a Pharisee and say they follow God.
00:34:58But Jesus said, nope, you actually do not follow him.
00:35:03And, yeah, I just wanted to mention, just say that.
00:35:08Because it's, it is frustrating at times living as a, it's hard.
00:35:15We're going to be persecuted for our faith in one way or another.
00:35:20And we just, you know, we stick to what God has called us.
00:35:25And he said it in his scripture.
00:35:26We get to read his scripture.
00:35:28Back in the day, they didn't have the full scripture.
00:35:30But they still were able to follow God.
00:35:33Yeah, and you can tell that, brother, it's like a breath of fresh air when you encounter someone who is
00:35:43attracted to the things of God.
00:35:44Even if they don't know what it is, and they see your difference in behavior, the different way that you
00:35:51speak, the way that you treat people, just your general behavior.
00:35:56When somebody sees that, and they want to know, and they appreciate it, that's somebody who is much more open
00:36:03to the things of God.
00:36:04If somebody is repelled by it, it makes them angry.
00:36:07That's somebody who's got a problem with God.
00:36:10It's not that they have a problem with you.
00:36:12They hate the things of God.
00:36:14And so when they see the evidence of God working in somebody's life, it makes them angry.
00:36:19And they want to push it away, have nothing to do with it.
00:36:23Even if on their own, they might actually be a decent person.
00:36:28They're not a murderer.
00:36:29They're not stealing things.
00:36:31But they see somebody who is obviously trying to be a godly person, and they're repelled by it.
00:36:38That's because they hate God.
00:36:40Now, it's curable.
00:36:42They don't have to be stuck there.
00:36:44But at least at that moment, they are in rebellion.
00:36:47And it's the same thing.
00:36:48We see that in Paul.
00:36:50When Paul was persecuting the church, it wasn't because he hated them.
00:36:55He thought that he loved God.
00:36:56He was certain.
00:36:58He was keeping God's commandments.
00:36:59He loved the idea of God.
00:37:01But he didn't really understand who God was.
00:37:03And when he saw people who were really obeying God, it made him angry.
00:37:08And he wanted to kill those people, which means that he had created a god of his own making.
00:37:15He had this image of God in his mind.
00:37:17And he followed that God.
00:37:20He didn't follow the real one because he hated him.
00:37:23And he had to have that dramatic moment on the road to Damascus.
00:37:28The bright light and the voice and the blinding and all of these things to shock him back to reality.
00:37:34And pointing out to him that when Yeshua said, Saul, why are you persecuting me?
00:37:40He wasn't persecuting the church.
00:37:42Or he wasn't persecuting the followers of Yeshua.
00:37:45That's who he thought he was persecuting.
00:37:47He was persecuting God himself.
00:37:50Because he hated the reality of who God was.
00:37:54I hope that makes sense.
00:37:56Very well said.
00:37:57Very well said.
00:37:58I think so, too, that when it comes to Paul,
00:38:01I think one thing that struck me that you were saying is that he was following the law of God.
00:38:08At least he thought he was following the law of God.
00:38:11He was following the oral law passed down by the Pharisees and the Sadducees that is just mixed up with
00:38:18God's Torah.
00:38:21So he was just probably had an extended version of or a skewed version, I would say, of the law.
00:38:31And he was just interpreting it in his own manner.
00:38:34So when he saw everybody else, the followers of Yeshua, actually following the law the way it should,
00:38:41you're right, that's where I think it steered him wrong.
00:38:43Because he's, oh, if I follow that, then that means I can't do all these other things that the oral
00:38:50law allows me to do.
00:38:51And that's what bothered him.
00:38:54But then when Yeshua told, I actually showed him, that's the heavy yoke that you're getting.
00:39:00Yes, you have these liberties in the flesh to do that.
00:39:05But this is actually the purity of my law and his light.
00:39:11And that's when he saw the light.
00:39:14You're on mute.
00:39:14But I believe that he was so diligent and he believed what he believed in.
00:39:27And that's what Scripture says, that you cannot be lukewarm.
00:39:34You either have to be hot or be cold.
00:39:38Because when you're lukewarm, it means that you're right in the middle.
00:39:44You're neither for nor against.
00:39:48Paul was totally against what he stands for.
00:39:54It was with all diligence.
00:39:58And I believe when we are like that, we could be used more than someone on a demilitarized zone.
00:40:09Yeah.
00:40:10You're standing right there because you want to protect yourself.
00:40:13You don't want to go forward.
00:40:14You don't want to stay behind.
00:40:17There's a thing about some of those that left Egypt because they were afraid that they would have been hurt
00:40:25when they look and see the power of God and what he did to Egyptians.
00:40:32Yeah, that's a great point.
00:40:33Paul was either, he was all in, whatever he was doing.
00:40:37He gave it everything he had.
00:40:40And even though he was fighting against God, he was doing it with such fervor that if he could be
00:40:48turned, he would be just as great an asset or more so for the kingdom.
00:40:52And this also goes along with what June was saying, that because Paul was so deep, he was so hard
00:41:00against the way, turning to go the other direction, nobody was ever going to talk him into it.
00:41:07And he was so invested in what he was doing that to face the idea that everything he was doing
00:41:14was wrong, that would make him a murderer.
00:41:17That would make him a rebel against God.
00:41:19And he had this idea in his head that he was God's champion.
00:41:23And to find out that he was the devil's champion, that would be a difficult thing to face.
00:41:29And a lot of people today have that same problem.
00:41:33And there's this huge divide in culture.
00:41:35And the divide is getting bigger every day.
00:41:39And part of the reason for that is, one, God separates out his people.
00:41:43He makes a stark difference between his people and Satan's people.
00:41:49But Satan does it too, because the further he can entrench his own people into their ways, the harder it
00:41:57is for them to repent.
00:41:57Because it means everything that they've invested so much time and effort into, everything that they believed is wrong.
00:42:05And now I've got to change and do the opposite?
00:42:08That's a really hard pill for most people to swallow.
00:42:11And it takes something really dramatic.
00:42:13You've got to hit bottom, or you've got to be blinded on the road to Damascus, or something like that,
00:42:18in order to change.
00:42:20But God does it.
00:42:21God still does miracles and changes people every day.
00:42:24Amen.
00:42:25Let's move on to verse 17.
00:42:27As it is written, I have made you the father of many nations, in the presence of the God in
00:42:32whom he believed, who gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not exist.
00:42:37It's a curious thing in this first part.
00:42:39As it is written, I have made you the father of many nations.
00:42:43I believe this is Genesis 17, 5.
00:42:48There are two verses here.
00:42:50As for me, behold, my covenant is with you, and you will be the father of a multitude of nations.
00:42:55No longer shall your name be called Abram, but your name shall be Abraham.
00:43:00For I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.
00:43:05At this point, Abraham had one child, and that was Ishmael.
00:43:10But God said, I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.
00:43:15Who can explain that to me?
00:43:17I believe God is in the future.
00:43:21That was his plan for Abraham.
00:43:26So he goes before us.
00:43:28He is there before we can get there.
00:43:30Yeah, since he is outside of time, everything that he says at any moment is true, both in past and
00:43:37present, because God is both past and present.
00:43:39Okay.
00:43:40Does anybody else have an idea?
00:43:42I agree with that, by the way, but I think there's another explanation also.
00:43:45Yeah, that's the first one that actually popped in my head, as well, what June was saying.
00:43:50But you said that Ishmael was there, right, when he said this.
00:43:56So he was talking about Ishmael, too, right?
00:44:00The fact that nations were going to come out of him as well.
00:44:04Yeah, that was one way that God's promise came true, but I don't think that's what God was talking about
00:44:09here.
00:44:10He goes on to say that Sarah will be the mother of these nations.
00:44:16Let me look up the exact wording there.
00:44:19As for Sarah, your wife, you shall not call her name Sarai, but Sarah shall be her name.
00:44:24I will bless her, and indeed, I will give you a son by her.
00:44:27Then I will bless her, and she will be a mother of nations.
00:44:29Kings of people will come from her.
00:44:33Now, in verses 4 and 5, I bring this over on the screen so everybody can see it.
00:44:39Genesis 17, 4 and 5, God gives it in both future and past tense.
00:44:45You will be the father of a multitude of nations.
00:44:47I have made you the father of a multitude of nations.
00:44:51Which, on one sense, supports what June is saying and what you said, Carlos.
00:44:56But I think there's yet another way to read that.
00:45:00Bring it.
00:45:01The other way is that God's promises are done.
00:45:05They are accomplished the moment God gives them.
00:45:08If God promises something, then it is already done.
00:45:12Even if we can't see it.
00:45:14So, when God told Abram, you are going to be the father of many nations, Abraham was past fathering children.
00:45:20He didn't have that capacity anymore.
00:45:23And Sarah, his wife, didn't have that capacity.
00:45:26But Abraham believed him anyways because God promised.
00:45:30And so, here, God gives it in both future and past tense to say, I am telling you, this is
00:45:36what's going to happen.
00:45:37It has already happened because I said it.
00:45:40So, that's how certain God's promises are.
00:45:44So, for Abram at that time, it would have been futuristic?
00:45:51Yeah.
00:45:51At that time, he only had the one son.
00:45:53Ishmael was still young.
00:45:56And that was his only child.
00:45:58So, it was probably hard for him to imagine, like, how am I going to be the father of many
00:46:03nations?
00:46:05But he believed it.
00:46:06He just didn't know how it was going to happen.
00:46:08But didn't he say that?
00:46:10Was it in Genesis 15 when God told him to kill his effort, the lamb and the kid?
00:46:27Yeah, I think that was in Genesis 15.
00:46:29Yes.
00:46:31Because he was hearing these promises from God.
00:46:37And he wanted to, God, behold, this is going to happen.
00:46:43I mean, show me how you're going to do it.
00:46:47Right?
00:46:48And then it's when God told him, look, get this heifer, get this lamb and get this kid.
00:46:56And it was a covenant God was about to make with him.
00:47:02Because when he did all that, he fell asleep, got tired, probably, shooing away all the predators and everything.
00:47:09Because it was most likely a bloody mess.
00:47:13And then he fell asleep and he had this vision about this generation.
00:47:19Yeah, that's when God told him that his descendants would be strangers in a foreign land.
00:47:24They'd be enslaved and oppressed.
00:47:27And that the ultimate fulfillment, or at least the apparent fulfillment of this promise, wouldn't happen for another 400 years.
00:47:35And that's when it would become obvious to everybody that Abraham had become the father of many nations.
00:47:41And the word for nations just means groups of people.
00:47:45It doesn't necessarily mean nation states like we think of today.
00:47:51In verse 17, it says, God gives life to the dead and calls into existence the things that do not
00:48:00exist.
00:48:01In the context of this discussion of God promising an heir to Abraham and making him into many nations,
00:48:08what does who gives life to the dead?
00:48:11What does that, how does that relate?
00:48:14Why is Paul bringing that up?
00:48:16Because Sarah's womb was dead.
00:48:19Exactly.
00:48:20And he gave life to that womb.
00:48:23Yep.
00:48:24Yeah, and not just Sarah, Abraham also.
00:48:26God had to restore him to full vigor and health.
00:48:30They were both dead as far as future generations were concerned.
00:48:35And God intervened and made a miracle.
00:48:38He essentially resurrected them.
00:48:41Of course, there are lots of examples of God resurrecting the dead.
00:48:44There's the prophecy of the Valley of Dry Bones in Ezekiel, talking about the people of Israel being resurrected.
00:48:53Everybody thinks that they're done for, that they are essentially dead, both spiritually and physically.
00:49:00And God brings them back, restores them to the land, restores them to nationhood, resurrects them spiritually.
00:49:08God does all of that.
00:49:09We could never do any of that on our own.
00:49:11So the second part, God calls into existence things that do not exist.
00:49:17How is that relevant to this conversation?
00:49:20I believe it has to do with Yeshua's mother.
00:49:27She was a virgin, and it was an immaculate conception.
00:49:33So she never thought this would have happened, but she was chosen for it to happen through.
00:49:42So he called into existence his only begotten son, right?
00:49:51So that he will become our salvation.
00:49:55At that time, she was a virgin and never thought that this could have happened.
00:50:04Yeah, and that is literally true in that a woman in herself doesn't have all of the genetic material to
00:50:13create a male offspring.
00:50:16It just doesn't exist.
00:50:18So even if God took a cell in Eve and Mary and cloned it, she would have a daughter, not
00:50:25a son.
00:50:26So in order for her to have a son, God had to create DNA that didn't exist.
00:50:33But and then go back to Isaac.
00:50:36In order for Abraham and Sarah to have an heir between the two of them, God had to create something
00:50:44that couldn't exist naturally.
00:50:45He restored them to life and created an heir through them.
00:50:49Now, he used their genetic material to do it, but on their own, that was impossible.
00:50:55God had to intervene to make it happen.
00:50:58And Yeshua is if you think about Isaac, Isaac is a living prophecy of Yeshua.
00:51:05And this pattern goes through all the prophet or all the patriarchs.
00:51:10Sarah has this miraculous child under questionable circumstances because she had just been in the house of Abimelech.
00:51:17She had been captive in the house of Abimelech right before she became pregnant with Isaac.
00:51:21So there's this kind of shadow to give people.
00:51:25Maybe it was Abimelech's son and not Abraham's.
00:51:28They say the same thing about Yeshua.
00:51:31And then you go to Isaac and Rebekah.
00:51:33The same thing happens with them.
00:51:35Rebekah was barren.
00:51:36She went some, I don't remember how many years, but it was a long period of time without children.
00:51:42Then she was taken captive into the house of Abimelech again.
00:51:45She comes out, she conceives, and they have Jacob and Esau.
00:51:51Jacob, he has Rachel and Leah, but Rachel is barren.
00:51:56And he prays, and there's this miraculous conception, and we've got Joseph.
00:52:01And the same story plays out over and over again through scripture.
00:52:05And these are all prophetic of Yeshua.
00:52:07These are all examples of God creating something where there wasn't anything.
00:52:12Calling into existence things that didn't exist.
00:52:16And only God can do that.
00:52:18Oh, there's a story.
00:52:20I'm sure you've all heard it many times by now, but it's a great story.
00:52:23There are two versions of it.
00:52:25There's one from Exodus, and there's one, some scientists trying to recreate life.
00:52:29In the Exodus, when Moses does some miracle that God gave him, and then Pharaoh's magicians repeat it.
00:52:38When they get to the, I think it's the gnats or the lice.
00:52:42I can't remember which one it is.
00:52:43I think the smaller bug.
00:52:45They can't do it.
00:52:47And they turn to Pharaoh and say, this is the finger of God.
00:52:51Because they believed in the idea of a biogenesis.
00:52:55The more modern story with scientists is that scientists have this contest going with God that they can create life.
00:53:02And so he says, okay, I'll go over here and I'll create some life.
00:53:06And you go over there and create life.
00:53:07We'll come back and compare notes.
00:53:08God creates a man out of the dust of the ground and breathes life into him and say, look, here's
00:53:15what I created.
00:53:16And the scientists go away and they get a shovel full of dirt.
00:53:19And God says, hold on, go make your own dirt, which obviously they can't do.
00:53:25Okay.
00:53:25That was the punchline.
00:53:27Yeah.
00:53:27Okay.
00:53:2818 and 19.
00:53:29We're going to do two verses at once.
00:53:31In hope, he believed against hope that he should become the father of many nations.
00:53:35As he had been told, so shall your offspring be.
00:53:38He did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, which was as good as dead since he
00:53:42was about a hundred years old, or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb.
00:53:47There's a really big question here.
00:53:49If Abraham believed that God would give him an heir and never doubted, says he did not weaken in faith
00:53:58when he considered his own body or when he considered the barrenness of Sarah's womb.
00:54:04What in the world was he doing with Hagar?
00:54:07If Abraham never doubted God's promise, why did they do this thing with Hagar and Ishmael?
00:54:15Anybody have a thought on that?
00:54:16I think the first part, he did not weaken in faith when he considered his own body, is that the
00:54:27reason why he went with Hagar.
00:54:29Then the other part with his wife was through faith?
00:54:36Because when he realized that Ishmael was not the child of promise, went against the wishes of God.
00:54:46So he now has to wait on the child of promise.
00:54:50And that's the other part where he did not consider the deadness of Sarah's womb.
00:54:55Yeah.
00:54:56So what?
00:54:57He went because he thought he could have done it.
00:55:00That's why he went with Hagar.
00:55:02Yeah, I think you're on the right track there.
00:55:04Kevin, go ahead.
00:55:05I was just going to say that Abraham, although he had faith that he was, his faith wasn't weakened.
00:55:17I don't, again, I'm just guessing, but would it be that he did not fully understand how he was going
00:55:27to conceive offspring?
00:55:31And, like, what that was like, because if God was telling me that, and I knew my wife was barren,
00:55:39then I would think, oh, I can't have a child with her, but a child with this, I don't know,
00:55:48other woman.
00:55:49I don't know.
00:55:50Yeah.
00:55:50I think you and June are both on the right track there.
00:55:53Back in Genesis 15, God gave Abraham the promise.
00:55:57It's like, you are going to be the father of many nations.
00:56:00Then there's this long gap and they're going about their lives and they, there's the famine, they go to Egypt.
00:56:08They have this conflict with Sodom and all of these things going on in Abraham is, I know that God
00:56:16said, I'm going to have an heir, but it hasn't happened yet.
00:56:18Have I done something wrong?
00:56:20Did I miss something?
00:56:22And Sarah's, here's my handmaid legally.
00:56:26If she has a child, it's my child.
00:56:28God didn't say it was going to be through me.
00:56:31Now we can assume that since Sarah was Abraham's only wife at the time that God gave that promise, they're
00:56:39one flesh.
00:56:39So if God gives Abraham a promise, isn't he also giving it to Sarah?
00:56:44Yes and no.
00:56:46They're one flesh in a way, but they're still two separate people.
00:56:50If God gives me a promise, that's not necessarily the same as God giving Paula the same promise.
00:56:55It depends on what it is.
00:56:57So it's reasonable that Abraham could say, I totally believe that God is going to do this.
00:57:02Maybe this Hagar woman is the way he's going to do it.
00:57:04I don't know.
00:57:06It wasn't until chapter 17, after Ishmael was born, that God says, okay, stop this, Abraham.
00:57:13That's not the way I meant to do this, because that's a whole legal thing.
00:57:17And I'm going to do this totally outside of all the bounds of legal rules.
00:57:22I'm making something new here.
00:57:25So I'm going to give you a child through Sarah, your wife.
00:57:28She's going to be the mother of nations.
00:57:31That promise didn't come until Genesis 17.
00:57:34So it looks like Abraham is doubting God's promise when it comes to Hagar, but he's really not.
00:57:40He just, he's doubting his own understanding of God's promise.
00:57:45Does that make sense?
00:57:48It does.
00:57:49It does.
00:57:50And I guess now I would ask then why didn't God just say that from the very beginning?
00:57:57Yeah.
00:57:57Good question.
00:57:59There's ask him one day.
00:58:01Yeah.
00:58:02Right.
00:58:02I have an idea.
00:58:04Yep.
00:58:05There's another pattern that goes through all of the patriarchs is that God creates one people and splits them in
00:58:12two.
00:58:13One of them becomes apostate.
00:58:15One is faithful.
00:58:17You've got from the very beginning, Cain and Abel, and then you've got Shem and Ham, and you've got Abraham
00:58:28and Lot, Isaac and Ishmael, Jacob and Esau.
00:58:33Now, Judah and Joseph, it just goes down through generation after generation.
00:58:39And eventually you've got Israel and Judah, the northern kingdom and the southern kingdom.
00:58:43And they both didn't stay.
00:58:45Judah didn't stay faithful.
00:58:46But at least at that time, Judah was the faithful remnant.
00:58:50Ephraim was the unfaithful.
00:58:52So God always has this pattern of his people divided in two.
00:58:56Now, with Isaac and Ishmael and Jacob and Esau, only half of them were actually God's people.
00:59:04Right up until the time of Jacob's children, God was still dividing Israel.
00:59:10Some of Jacob's sons were, they got themselves into trouble.
00:59:14They were not faithful.
00:59:15But God wasn't dividing Israel anymore at that point.
00:59:18They were still an illustration, those patriarchs, Isaac and Ishmael, they were still an illustration of the divided kingdom later.
00:59:27But even in the divided kingdom, God wasn't throwing out the northern kingdom.
00:59:32He was exiling them and promised to bring them back again later.
00:59:37But this pattern of division and reuniting, that just plays out through all of the patriarchs and their lives are
00:59:47prophetic.
00:59:48If you want to understand what God's going to do in the future, study what God did with the patriarchs.
00:59:54Let's see.
00:59:54Is there anything else to talk about in this verse?
00:59:56We've already talked about most of the main ideas here.
01:00:00The devising, as you mentioned, just now.
01:00:04Don't you believe it has to do with?
01:00:08It has to do with God's choice.
01:00:09That's for sure.
01:00:11But doesn't that have to do with our choice, too?
01:00:15To an extent, yeah.
01:00:17The pattern that God was setting with the patriarchs is that God chooses the ones who are faithful to him.
01:00:23And, of course, being faithful to him is our choice.
01:00:27Ishmael did have an opportunity.
01:00:28He could have been counted as Abraham's heir, not through his own right, but if he had been faithful, if
01:00:37he had not been a mocker of Isaac, Ishmael could have been part of Isaac's house.
01:00:43Now, even though he was the older son, he still could have been part of that house.
01:00:49And later, when you have Jacob and Esau, Esau didn't understand his parents' rules.
01:00:55His father, Isaac, loved Esau, but Esau just didn't understand Isaac.
01:01:00He didn't understand Rebekah.
01:01:01He didn't understand Abraham.
01:01:02And he kept doing the wrong things because he didn't understand them.
01:01:07He didn't understand their God.
01:01:09He didn't have the same faith.
01:01:11And that was his choice.
01:01:13But it was also something that God knew was going to happen.
01:01:17All right.
01:01:19Let's move on to the next verses.
01:01:22No unbelief made him waver concerning the promise of God, but he grew strong in his faith as he gave
01:01:27glory to God, fully convinced that God was able to do what he had promised.
01:01:31That is why his faith was counted to him as righteousness.
01:01:35We've pretty much already covered everything in these verses, I think.
01:01:39Is there anything that stands out to anybody that you have a question about or want to make a comment
01:01:45on?
01:01:47Just one little comment I would like to make.
01:01:49It's the part where it says he grew strong in his faith as he gave glory to God.
01:02:00I think this has to do with Genesis 22, when God called him to sacrifice his only son, as God
01:02:11called Isaac.
01:02:15And he had this faith in God that if Isaac is a child of promise, somehow, if he kills Isaac,
01:02:27God is going to resurrect him or whatever God's omnipotence will allow him to do.
01:02:34So he had that faith that God is going to do something so that this promise could have been kept
01:02:43through Isaac.
01:02:44Yeah, exactly.
01:02:47Rabbis have a tradition that there are 10 tests of Abraham and they're all in scripture, whether they were only
01:02:5510 or whether these are just 10 big things that Abraham had to go through that we know of.
01:03:01The point is that there were episodes in Abraham's life, things that happened that could have caused him to doubt
01:03:09and to say, maybe I just heard that wrong.
01:03:14Maybe God, that's not what God promised, or maybe God has changed his mind.
01:03:19But Abraham never thought that he always believed God's promise.
01:03:23And you're exactly right, the episode with Isaac is the biggest one, that God gave him this son and said,
01:03:31through this son, I'm going to make you the father of many nations, now go kill him.
01:03:36What?
01:03:38Clearly, Abraham believed him, because if he killed Isaac, and Isaac stayed dead, then he wouldn't be the father of
01:03:46many nations.
01:03:47But if he believed that that was going to be the case, if he believed killing Isaac would end God's
01:03:53promise, then he wouldn't be believing God, because God said to go do this.
01:03:58So if he believed God, then he would both believe that God wanted him to offer up Isaac as a
01:04:04sacrifice, and that Isaac was going to survive this experience and still be the father of many nations.
01:04:11Just like with the birth of Isaac, just like with the birth of Isaac, he didn't know exactly how it
01:04:15was going to happen, but he believed that it would, because God promised it.
01:04:19This is really the same for us.
01:04:22God has promised that if we put our faith in him, if we believe what he said, then we will
01:04:30have eternal life.
01:04:31We will die, and we will be resurrected, just like Abraham believed was going to happen with Isaac.
01:04:38And so, if we believe that, and if we act according to God's commands, if we keep the faith with
01:04:47him, even when our very lives are threatened, what difference does it make?
01:04:52If people kill me for being faithful to God, God has promised that I will be resurrected.
01:04:57I don't need to worry about that.
01:04:59They can't really take my life away, because God has promised it to me forever.
01:05:03So, we won't be afraid to offer ourselves up when it's necessary.
01:05:09And then God takes that faith, because he keeps his promises.
01:05:14He recognizes our faith to give him everything, and counts that towards us for righteousness.
01:05:22Even though we are flawed, even though we may be still idolaters, or thieves, or whatever sin that we've got
01:05:30a problem with in our life.
01:05:32If we have sufficient faith in God to obey him, when we know to obey him, and even to the
01:05:40point of giving up our lives, God counts that as perfect righteousness.
01:05:45He takes Yeshua's righteousness and attributes it to us.
01:05:50All right, we go down those verses?
01:05:53Oh, Kevin, you got your hand up.
01:05:54Go ahead.
01:05:55Yeah.
01:05:56Excuse me.
01:05:58There's a common theme of obeying God, right?
01:06:02We are to obey God.
01:06:04And so, some people think that this was Abraham, this was Isaac, and they were very special.
01:06:11They were just so godly men.
01:06:13David, he was very godly.
01:06:17And for us, how we should live, we should still be obeying God, but we have a hard time with
01:06:25that grace paradox, or whatever you call it, where he's forgiving, and he'll just forgive us for our sins.
01:06:33I just want to, I don't want to get too off topic, but I just wanted to understand, sometimes it's
01:06:39still, I still question, okay, can, like, people think that they can sin, and they can keep on doing that
01:06:50sin, and they're just going to be forgiven.
01:06:53But if we have that mindset, or if we say, okay, maybe I'm in sin, maybe, maybe this is a
01:07:04sin, and I end up saying, God's just going to forgive me anyways.
01:07:09Would you agree that's a dangerous place to be?
01:07:13And I bring that up just because we're reading a lot about obedience, and I just wanted to, I know
01:07:21it's not exactly on the topic, but I just wanted to know from you what your thoughts are on that.
01:07:26I think that is on topic.
01:07:28It gets right to the meaning of faith.
01:07:30If you believe God, you will do what he says.
01:07:34Now, if you say, I know God said to do this, but I'm not going to do it, and I
01:07:38know he'll forgive me, now you're not believing God, because God said, do this, and if you believe him, you
01:07:46will do that.
01:07:47Does that make sense?
01:07:48Yeah.
01:07:50Does that answer your question?
01:07:52It does.
01:07:54It's just difficult sometimes because...
01:07:57Yeah.
01:07:58It's really the difference between being weak and being rebellious.
01:08:01We all have weaknesses.
01:08:03We all give in to temptations.
01:08:06But as long as we...
01:08:08If we don't know yet that something is wrong, we're just not...
01:08:13We haven't been taught right, or we've been taught wrongly, which all of us have been.
01:08:18We've all been taught errors.
01:08:20And when we become aware of it, then our conscience should provoke us to repentance and change.
01:08:29But it might take time.
01:08:30But we struggle with things.
01:08:33And sometimes we get confused.
01:08:35Sometimes we have a moment of weakness.
01:08:37And, man, I really want to...
01:08:41Whatever the sin is that God has revealed to you that you're working.
01:08:49And you make a mistake.
01:08:51But then you're like, oh, man, I shouldn't have done that.
01:08:54That wasn't my whatever to break or to take or whatever happened.
01:09:01I should have listened to my conscience and not done that.
01:09:04That means that you are progressing.
01:09:06You aren't rebellious.
01:09:08But on the other hand, if you say, I know that's wrong.
01:09:13And I know that God said that's wrong and I shouldn't do that.
01:09:16But I don't really care.
01:09:18I'm going to do it anyways.
01:09:19And I'll ask God for forgiveness later.
01:09:23That is not believing God.
01:09:25And until you get to the point where I really should not have done that and I regret doing it
01:09:30and I don't ever want to do it again, that's when God forgives you.
01:09:34Because that's when you're really repenting.
01:09:36And I remember doing a study on unbelief.
01:09:40And unbelief could be dangerous.
01:09:44By our obedience.
01:09:46Our lack of obedience shows an unbelief in a way that we really...
01:09:52I mean, if we know we're not obedient.
01:09:56It's just interesting to...
01:09:59Because there's...
01:10:00Thank you for your input.
01:10:02I appreciate it.
01:10:02Yeah, sure.
01:10:04All right.
01:10:04Let's move on.
01:10:07We've got...
01:10:07This is the last slide.
01:10:09The last few verses of this chapter.
01:10:10Let's read this real quick and then we'll wrap it up before we lose something else.
01:10:15But the words it was counted to him were not written for his sake alone, but for ours also.
01:10:20It will be counted to us who believe in him who raised from the dead Jesus our Lord, who was
01:10:24delivered up for trespasses and raised for our justification.
01:10:28Now, of course, those words it was counted to him as righteousness.
01:10:33Abraham probably never read those words.
01:10:35That was written long after he was dead.
01:10:38As far as we know, Moses was the first one to write that down.
01:10:42Clearly, the story came down to Moses.
01:10:44Maybe it was passed down through generations.
01:10:45Maybe there was a written record somewhere.
01:10:49But it's unlikely that Abraham ever saw that in writing.
01:10:52So obviously, it was written for our benefit so that we would learn from Abraham's faith that our faith would
01:10:59also be counted as righteousness.
01:11:02And in this case, we have this testimony that Yeshua died for our sins and rose again.
01:11:12That defies all the natural laws that we know.
01:11:15People, there are stories of people dying and coming back to life maybe a half an hour.
01:11:24Those kinds of things happen.
01:11:25And frequently, it's really just their heart stopped and they weren't really dead.
01:11:29I don't know what the definitions of dead are for medicine.
01:11:33But until your body is totally shut down, I don't really consider you dead.
01:11:38Yeshua was in the grave for three days.
01:11:40He was dead.
01:11:41There was no question.
01:11:43And then God raised him from the dead.
01:11:45And if we believe this, if we believe that God says the impossible happened, he brought the dead to life,
01:11:53he made something exist where it didn't exist before.
01:11:57God counts that faith in him as righteousness.
01:12:00But our faith can't stop there.
01:12:02We can't just believe the story.
01:12:04We have to believe God himself.
01:12:07Our faith isn't in just the story of Yeshua's resurrection.
01:12:11It's in the God who resurrected him.
01:12:15If we have faith in that God, that not only did he resurrect Yeshua, but that he died for our
01:12:23sins, that his blood erases ours in God's eyes and makes us righteous in his eyes and enables us to
01:12:31be resurrected also.
01:12:33All of that is included in believing God.
01:12:35Whatever God has said, we believe it.
01:12:37Now, sometimes we're going to misunderstand.
01:12:40We've got ancient documents written in an ancient culture to ancient peoples in an ancient language.
01:12:46And now we've got translations.
01:12:48So there are going to be misunderstandings.
01:12:51Nobody has a perfect understanding of God or of the scriptures.
01:12:55Otherwise, we wouldn't be sitting here talking about it.
01:12:58But if we believe as far as we understand, God has promised this.
01:13:04We know that for certain.
01:13:06We believe that God counts that faith, that belief as righteousness for our sake.
01:13:12And then we will be raised in the end with him.
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