GWSGenesis12-33
GWSGenesis12-33
[00:00:00] Hey everyone, you're listening to God's Whole Story. This year we're taking a book by book journey throughout scripture to see how God uses the story of scripture to accomplish his purposes. If you enjoy the content, we would love to partner with you. Look at the show notes to see how you can do that and we hope you enjoy this episode.
Hey everybody, welcome back to God Soul Story. This is Chris and I am here with Chelsea and Ryan. Hey! We are in part two of our Genesis overview. Part one we really spent a lot of time in the first part of the book, which is mainly four main events, but actually we only really talked about two of them, Creation and Fall.
Oh no, we already have a failing grade. But Flood and the Tower of Babel is also in there, but now we're going to move from those events to part two. People, there's four major people in the book of Genesis, and we're going to talk about the first two of them in this episode, Abraham and Isaac. So we'll get to a little bit of Jacob too, actually.
Okay. A little bit of Jacob even [00:01:00] thrown it. So it's like a two and a half person episode. So this is, this is wild. Um, It, to me, looking over these chapters, like when you look at what we looked at last week and you look at what we're going to look at this week, to me, um, hopefully this is not heretical or terrible.
It just feels like We'll be the judge of that. Yes. Thank you. Disclaimer. We We have a liability statement at the end of these podcasts. We cannot be held accountable. We should have one of those people that talks like 500 miles a minute. Um, it gets a lot more personal. Like, I understand that like Adam's a real person.
Eve's a real person. Cain, Abel, real people. It just seems like here we're like getting into actual families with actual family issues. Like, I don't know, like it just feels like more real. People and relationships that you can actually kind of wrap your head around. Like, Oh yeah, I've been in a situation like that.
Or I think I can see how that would feel now. Not all of them. There's going to be some wild things that happen to these as well. It's like, it's like, did you ever [00:02:00] wrestle God next to the relatable? Yes, I did. In fact, I'd love to talk to you actually. Um, it just like, we're, we're going to get. Uh, Abraham, basically the call of Abraham, significant, uh, story where God is going to establish a covenant relationship with Abraham.
He's going to make a promise to Abraham that probably still affects us today, right? Like this definitely still has real world impact, 110%. It still has real world impact. Yes, it does. Um, And then we're going to get into like how God is faithful to his promise. How many, many people are not faithful to his promise, uh, and how God handles like unfaithfulness.
Um, so we, we are starting, I guess, officially for this segment in Genesis chapter. 12, one of my favorite things about kicking off in Genesis 12 is last week. We talked a little bit about the tower of Babel. If you look at chapter 11, uh, verse it's verse four. So this is the people that are going to build the tower of Babel.
Uh, then they said, come, let us build ourselves [00:03:00] a city and a tower with its top into the heavens and let us make a name for ourselves, which is not good. Like this is like the people are trying to create a life for themselves. That is not based on following God. They're trying to become a bigger deal than God.
God punishes them by dispersing them. But then if you notice it's so easy to miss this, um, Genesis 12, just one chapter later, verse two, God says to Abraham, I will make you a great nation. I will bless you and I will make your name great so that you will be a blessing. I think it's a very intentional, like.
Parallel, where there are people who are trying to live without God, make their own name great. And then you have Abraham, who essentially knows nothing about God, most likely. And God says, I will make your name great. I think there's like, there's something to be learned from that. Yeah. I think that's, that's a really cool point to make there.
Um, one of the interesting things to kind of speculate on Ryan, you alluded to it a little bit, like who is Abraham and why him, you know, [00:04:00] and who was this guy before? Like we don't really have any of those details. Uh, but if you. Take the general culture of the day you take just a normal guy in that culture I mean Abraham would not have been a God worshiper He probably would have been involved some kind of pagan worship perhaps doing some foul things that is involved in pagan worship and God Picks him, chooses him, reveals himself to him, and makes him the father of the people of God.
Which is, it's pretty remarkable. I remember one time, uh, I was reading a book by Preston Sprinkle called Charis. And he kind of looks at the life of Abraham and gives some historical background as to what a typical person would be like in that time. And it just really made the story of Abraham come alive in the sense of God just picked him and said, I'm going to do something here.
I'm going to move with grace on your life for the benefit of many, many people in the future, which is pretty, pretty remarkable. I've seen some of [00:05:00] the deep dive stuff into like, the issue is like, did anybody even know God? Um, before Abraham, like certainly people did, um, but why did God choose him specifically?
There's also some interesting stuff on Job and Abraham and that they may have lived in a same general area at a same general time. Obviously, that's, that's interesting. That's like a real stretch. You're trying to like line up stories, but it's definitely a possibility. Um, there is actually, this is like just a cool, fun fact.
You can go to Dan in Israel today and they have preserved like this enormous mud gate that was present at the time of Abraham. It's very likely that Abraham himself walked in and out of this mud gate into the city. That that gate would have opened into. Um, so it's just pretty cool to see actually. Yeah.
And just, just to give us a little context of that period of time we're talking about, I had a really cool experience. One time I was teaching in Egypt. I was, and I was teaching [00:06:00] there. and studying Genesis at the time while I was teaching and it dawned on me that Abraham would have been a contemporary of when the Egyptians built the pyramids.
And so like, if you think about how old Egyptian civilization is and the pyramids, that's how far back we go with Abraham. So that, that was kind of a cool, not that Abraham was in Egypt, but just like that happened in the same period of time that these events with Abraham happened. It's always weird to dig into like what was happening in the world at the same time.
It just like screws with your brain, I think like, cause like a lot of interesting things were happening all at once. Yeah. Cause you read the Bible and it feels like it's in a vacuum, but so many other world events were happening. A hundred percent. Yeah. So I, well, my question is maybe, maybe you answered it and I missed it, but why, so why did God call Abram?
Do we know? Abraham was chosen before the foundations of the earth. That's what we know. Um, there's, there's no indication as to why he was [00:07:00] picked. Um, but he is obedient. That's like, I think that's what sets him apart. Actually. Fun fact, or at least something interesting to think about. We know that Abraham was chosen because he was obedient.
Um, I don't know, like this is probably awful speculation, but like, had he not been obedient, we definitely would not know who he was. Um, but. God makes a promise to Abraham, it's probably worth unpacking some of those things. One, he promises to give Abraham a son, which him and his wife are both old and it's like, silly.
At this point, he's 75 or something like that. Yeah. When he's like, when he's called. And so, already would have been like, oh, you're gonna give me a son? Yeah, like, what? Come on. Um, he promises to turn Abraham into a nation that will bless all people. All nations. It's very important for us today, um, because we are all blessed by Abraham's offspring.
Um, and basically he says like everyone who, uh, blesses you, I will bless. [00:08:00] And everybody who curses you, I will curse. And God basically reveals this promise in 12 and then kind of, I guess, doubles down on the promise in 15. Um, even to the point of, and I always, I think this is so interesting, uh, verse. So I'm in chapter 15, Genesis 15, verse 13, then the Lord said to Abraham, no, for certain that your offspring will be sojourners in the land that is not theirs and they will be servants there and they will be afflicted for 400 years.
God reveals to Abraham exactly what this, uh, Exodus experience essentially is going to be. What's going to happen. He lays out. What's going to happen, the people are aware of this, um, because I think we'll talk about this probably later that Joseph is certainly aware of this and we watch it play out. Um, so it's important to recognize that God makes his plan like pretty clear, um, and Abraham is, you know, Pretty faithful.
I mean, he has some low spots as every biblical hero does, and God continues to be faithful to his promises. [00:09:00] It's exciting. I love these chapters. And I think too, like some of the, if you are able to kind of pull back and see the entire narrative of scripture, the various promises about having a son, becoming a great nation, being a blessing to all the people of the earth, that is ultimately fulfilled in Christ.
If you as you read some of those promises it's talking about I will make this covenant an everlasting covenant I will bring kings of people from you and nations which Nations in a fully biblical sense often represents the gentiles that abraham is looked at as the father of the jewish people but even in the calling of abraham, there's a a echoes or echoes foreshadowing of a Promise that the gentiles are going to be included.
So when abraham Here is this promise and looks up at the stars and says, okay, I believe this. He is putting his faith in the ultimate fulfillment of this promise, which is Christ. [00:10:00] And it's at that moment that God says he, he credits him as righteous, which All throughout the rest of scripture. The only way you become righteous is through faith in Christ.
So we have Abraham putting his faith in Christ in Genesis chapter 12, literally over a thousand years, more than a thousand years before Christ actually comes in human form. It's a big deal because a common misconception is that in the old Testament, everyone was saved by their sacrifices and you brought your sacrifice to God and you were found as righteous.
And now in the new Testament, now we're saved by Jesus. And that can. inadvertently lead people to believe that God has, like, changed his mind or become a different person. Person or different God altogether. Like, I think there's significant confusion about this. So it is important to recognize that always, always, always people have been saved by trusting in the provision that God would provide.
And everyone in the old Testament is believing forward that ultimately this provision would be provided, that there would be salvation for [00:11:00] their sins that would come once and for all. And that was Jesus. They were believing ahead to Jesus. We are believing backwards to Jesus. Everyone is saved at the same moment in time in history.
And I honestly, like, I think when that becomes clear to you, it actually clears up some of the, um, I don't know, like distractions or hitches you can have, or the things that like really, I don't know, confuse you or frustrate you. It, it, Can clear up the fact that sometimes people think the God of the Old Testament is different than a God of the yes Yes, no, actually his plan has always been the same salvation has always been the same It's just a matter of are you looking forward or looking back?
It's actually your focus is on the same thing. It's good All right. So in Genesis 14, I think We introduce this dude Melchizedek Who is this guy? Uh, Chelsea has the definitive final answer now that she's gone to seminary. Uh, a priest. [00:12:00] Oh man. That's not very fun. Without father or mother or genealogy. Yeah.
He's just a random dude in the desert. From Jerusalem, right? I think so. King of Salem. Salem. What? Which would have been Jerusalem. Would be Jerusalem eventually. Yeah. Interesting. Interesting guy. Also brought up in Hebrews. So. And Psalms. And Psalms. Yes. He kind of, uh, spans the spectrum of biblical literature that way.
Which I think, I think Hebrews is actually quoting Psalms, which is quoting Genesis. Whoa. Interesting. Anyway. Yeah. Who is he? I just think he, without a doubt, he's a significant figure. Yeah. Um, what is interesting is that he blesses Abraham and Abraham tithes to him. Is that correct? It is. And so a very big common understanding is that this is a type of Christ figure.
You can, you can say, Hey, he's like a symbolic Christ figure. You can actually say like, Hey, this is actually a theophany. Like this is Jesus walking around in the desert, like [00:13:00] blessing Abraham. Um, I like that option. I think it's pretty cool to think about, uh, Jesus just cruising around doing stuff because like Jesus was not just, Jesus did not come into existence, you know, in Matthew, like he's always been.
And so I think that we do see Jesus show up a couple of times in the old Testament. Um, actually I think we see Jesus show up a couple of times just in this segment because, um, in a couple of chapters after Melchizedek, what is this? This is a chapter 32. So quite a few chapters after Melchizedek, Jacob is going to wrestle with God.
Well, anytime you get a. Physical manifestation of God, but it's most likely Jesus. Um, certainly we believe that Jesus is the human form of God. And so probably Jacob is wrestling with Jesus in the desert. Do you think that's fair to you? Do you like that or not really? You know, whether it's a Christophany, an appearance of Christ, or a Theophany, an appearance of God, um, sometimes that's hard to split hairs over, but, I definitely agree it is a Old Testament appearance of one of the members of the Trinity.
Which is so [00:14:00] weird to think about timeline wise, that somebody who's going to descend from these people, um, Is appearing in their timeline in history. Isn't that interesting? Yeah. That becomes a big deal actually in, um, in the gospels. Like even when Jesus is doing his ministry, people are really wrestling with this idea of, well, like we're born of Abraham.
Like we're, we're in the clear. We're literally Abraham's descendants. Uh, and Jesus says at one point, like before Abraham was, I am, and they immediately pick up stones to kill him. I think that was John 10, maybe. Um, it sounds like it might be. Somewhere in that neighborhood. It's in John. Um, use the name of God that God gave.
Yes. Is that when he just like slips out? Constantly. This is, I just, I said last, uh, last week my wife and I are reading through John right now, constantly Jesus claims to be God in John and constantly they try to kill him, it's When you look at it, it's like every chapter. Well, I mean, and from, from their perspective, it makes sense.
Like [00:15:00] it was blasphemy. Yeah, it is like, Oh, for sure. Blasphemy to claim to be God. So it makes sense that they would want to protect their faith in that way. But suddenly their faith is not trusting. So it's not trusting the provision. Like we talked about it blew their minds. Like it continues to blow our minds because they literally say, well, like, how could you possibly, like, I'm, you're standing in front of me.
I'm seeing you. Like, how could you have possibly have been before Abraham? But it was also the Right after he did something that they know the last time we saw that, yes, God did that. And now this dude is doing that. And then he said, he's God. So it just kind of blew their minds. You, you have to, I mean, it comes right down to us in the year 2024.
You have to make a decision about who Jesus is. Like you have to make a decision about it. He cannot be neutral. He's either God or he's not. And. Some Pharisees made that decision to believe and some did not. So Abraham was obedient to God's call. God does give him a son. Um, first he tries to get a son on his own.
This is a Ishmael situation. Uh, [00:16:00] then he is given a son by the promise. I think that's how Paul describes him later on. Um, Isaac is this promise son. And it's really interesting how like, At least the way the narrative goes right after this promised son arrives god's like yeah, I would like you to sacrifice him And after he waited like 25 years.
Yeah from from genesis 12 first promise to the sun We're looking at least 25 years, right? And then probably it doesn't seem like that many years even pass. Well, I guess isaac is old enough to walk up the hill That's walking and talking. A lot of people believe he's like between 12 and 15. I think so.
Okay Yeah So a fair number of years passed, but What's weird about that story is Isaac is obedient the whole way. Because, um, Abraham is a very old man. And Abraham, like, bounds him. Like, Isaac carries the firewood. He's, apparently, willingly bound. Because, like, this old man couldn't tie up this young kid.
And, constantly, Isaac is, like, basically, [00:17:00] like, Well, where's, where is the sacrifice? And Abraham says, like, God will provide the sacrifice. Which God did. Does that God does not ultimately require, uh, Abraham to sacrifice his son. Imagine if he had like how different this conversation would be. Um, but God miraculously provides the sacrifice.
This appears to be like a test of Abraham's faith. He. And we'll see the narrative shift from Abraham's faithfulness to Isaac's life and you know, the kind of guy that Isaac is, I guess I've heard recently about just someone saying that, um, Abraham is a willingness to sacrifice Isaac as a, Indicator of how much he loves the Lord, which I think is true, like willing to give up your son.
That's a great picture of God and Christ. And that's all true, but it's even bigger indicator of his obedience, like we talked about before. Like he is just an obedient, faithful person. And I think his faithfulness was probably, I mean, [00:18:00] this is an assumption on my part, but he didn't. Even consider the fact that God wouldn't provide something else.
He said, okay, I'm doing it and never once considered. I might actually be sacrificing my son. I think he just all the way thought I'm going to be obedient and God's going to provide. It's so funny. It's, it's really easy to hear something like that and be like, ah, that is so nice. That Abraham was so faithful like that.
That's so great. But actually it's an example for us to follow. Like. We don't want to find our identity in Abraham. That's what everybody was doing when Jesus was here. We want to follow the example. We want to be just as faithful as Abraham was knowing that like, God loves us. He's a loving father. He cares for us.
He provides for us. We can trust him. We can believe him. We can follow him. And that's what we're called to do. Um, so the, the game hasn't changed a whole lot. Um, it just looks different for us. Uh, do you think we freak it's easy to kind of romanticize Abraham's obedience that way? Yeah. You know, that was, it was a long [00:19:00] journey for him to get to that point.
He got the promise that things didn't work out. He took matters into his own hands, did some pretty, not so good things and taking matters into his own hands with, uh, Ishmael. Yeah. That created a whole nother mess. Yep. Uh, but it's only after, you know, 25 years of this that, and then, you know, 10 or so years of Isaac's life that he has gotten to the point where he says, okay, I've learned this lesson over the last five years.
30 some years, it wasn't like, Oh, I'm just going to go be obedient. Sacrifice my son. Yeah. It's a long journey of faith for him, which that's how most lessons are learned. It's so interesting how that's lost on us when we read the Bible, because it's like our experiences, we read it and it's like one chapter, this happens, the next chapter that happens, but there's like years in between and our lives unpacked the same way.
Um, anyway, like speaking of, speaking of reading one chapter, the next Abraham dies. Isaac is now kind of carrying this call, essentially. Um, Isaac gets married, Isaac has kids, and [00:20:00] Isaac ends up being the father of, like, these warring twins, basically. Jacob and Esau. Is there anything you guys want to unpack specifically from Isaac's life?
Uh, it's Not maybe the first but definitely one of the most well known sibling rivalries here dude in with his kids Um, yeah isaac. Uh, he seems like a pretty decent guy. He doesn't get as much press as some of the others, but um He seems like he was pretty faithful. He does repeat some of the same mistakes of his father it is very interesting that he too lies about his wife says Uh, that's my sister which like father like son on that one uh But he overall, he seems to be a pretty good guy.
One of the, one of the really important things to notice from Isaac's life is if you look at Genesis 26, verse four, God speaks to Isaac and says, I will multiply your offspring as the stars of heaven. We'll give your offspring, all these lands and your offspring and all the nations of the earth shall be blessed because Abraham obeyed my voice and kept my [00:21:00] charge, my commandments, my statutes and my laws.
Essentially, God is. Passing on the promise of Abraham to Isaac. We're going to see this play out in real time, but it is like, it, it's worth noting, Isaac does not have a lot of press in here. Like he was apparently fairly faithful. Um, but the story does move to his. Quickly. And the S the story of Jacob and Esau is super interesting to me because these dudes hate each other.
Um, they, they, um, victimize each other regularly. Like Jacob is fairly deceitful. Um, Esau is like, I guess the victim many times, although sometimes it seems like, dude, you could have just like paid a little bit more attention and figured this out. Um, but I think, I think. Recently, I've been thinking about this story.
I think one of the really interesting things is, and this is like terrible cliff notes of the whole thing. Um, Jacob deceives Esau and steals everything that is rightfully [00:22:00] Esau's. Now there is part of that story that is like, God actually said from the beginning that the older would serve the younger, uh, but both would become nations.
And, and that is true that happens. Uh, but I think what's really interesting, this is kind of wrapping up this segment. If you look at, I think it's chapter, uh, 33. Um, the story leads, like, the story lays out, like, all this tension, all these problems between Jacob and Esau. Eventually, Jacob has to flee. Um, because the story of sons, unfortunately, in Genesis up until this point, is, like, generally sons hate each other, and generally sons try to kill each other.
Um, if you're, like, reading along with it, you would expect that this is going to be a Cain and Abel situation that's going to play out. But Jacob is able to escape and he's away for some time, like several years. And Esau becomes basically a nation and Jacob becomes basically a nation. And in Genesis 33, you have this situation where, okay, like you're going to meet each other.
And you would expect that when [00:23:00] they meet each other, that this is going to be not good. Jacob himself expected this would not be good. So he like splits his family in half. He splits his possessions in half. He's like, Hey, if, if this guy's going to kill us, at least he can, the tension's building in the movie.
Yeah. And what's amazing is when Jacob and Esau finally come face to face, there is forgiveness. There is reconciliation. You can have a conversation about how far that reconciliation plays out. Um, because Esau apparently wants to like, stay with Jacob for the long haul. And Jacob is like, yeah, I gotta kind of got to keep going on my way.
Uh, but there is reconciliation. And I think that story in Genesis 33, where this reconciliation is present is a really powerful reminder for us to do the same, like literally with our actual siblings, like it's very common to have, you know, Conflict with your siblings and that can last for a long time.
And the story of Jacob and Esau is a powerful reminder that God is working in your heart. God is working in your sibling's heart. Obviously it's not always about your siblings. Um, but God is [00:24:00] working in people's lives. We should pursue reconciliation whenever we can. That might be a timely word. Uh, just, you know, we've, we've seen a lot of families divided over some of the events in the recent couple of years with pandemics and politics and all kinds of things.
So, uh, perhaps that that's actually a A timely word for some what's amazing to me is we don't know much about what's happening in either of their lives, but we do know that when the opportunity comes for them to reconcile, they're both willing and able to do it. And the way that the text is laid out, it's the last thing you would expect to happen.
Like if you're reading it, not knowing what's going to happen, it'd be like, this is not going to be good. I like to bring this. I brought this up, um, on the other podcast, the daily podcast, um, but. The similarities between this story, where they run to each other, embrace, and weep.
Like that's the next time we see it interaction like this, the father going out and meeting the prodigal son and embracing and weeping, [00:25:00] um, such a powerful, such a powerful imagery for like someone who sins against you and offering that, that grace and mercy. So I'll tell you what, it feels like we're doing like fire hose content.
Um, Out of Genesis, like 12 to 33, what is the most powerful thing for us to be reminded of? Like, like, if you're listening to this this week, like what, what do you do with it? Oh, you're asking? Yes. Chelsea, what will you do with this this week? Um, well, I think what, What sticks out to me is going through these different narratives of the fathers of Israel.
Um, what is apparent to me is that God keeps picking and choosing the unexpected, undeserving person over and over again. And that is a theme that we'll keep seeing [00:26:00] and we'll, we've talked about before. We'll probably keep talking about it, but. It's important because of a couple of different reasons. Um, culturally, these would not have been the people that God would have chosen in the world standards.
Firstborn sons would have been the person every time. And it, it's not that person almost every time. Um, and additionally, their sin does not disqualify them from being chosen. Um, and it's, it's still applicable for us today. I mean, we are. Um, and so it's an ongoing theme from the beginning of time. To now.
It's important because it's our spiritual ancestry. Like this is, we should be reading this and understanding it because, um, while we're not direct descendants from Abram, probably, I don't know. [00:27:00] I believe we're grafted in. I don't know if you are like 1 16th Abram. 1 16th. Half Mennonite, I know that. Well, then probably.
But, uh, but we're grafted in, yeah. This is our, this just like you would read about your great great great great grandfather and all the things that he did. Um, and people love Ancestry. com and all those different things. Like, this is our spiritual ancestry. Like, we should be reading about it. I think, too, even if we pull even further back, the, uh, the 30, 000 foot view is like, In the first, first episode of Genesis, the mandate is be fruitful and fill the earth.
That Adam and Eve were meant to go beyond the garden and fill the earth. Here, Abraham is to be a blessing to all the nations. And that, that continues on, that we see kind of the plan of God continuing on. It inspires us to evangelize. It inspires us to not just stay in our little bubbles, but to actually fill the earth.
Bring the fruit. The truth of God to all areas where it is not. And as Jesus said, bring his kingdom to [00:28:00] earth as it is in heaven. Guys, thank you so much for joining us today on God's full story. And we'll be back with the final installment of Genesis and we'll see you then. Bye.