And we are going to start out with 285 where every song today starts with I will sing. Guess what that means? You will sing and we will start it out with 285. I will sing of my redeemer and we're glad that Louise she joins us today from Dallas. He was in for our Towns Prophecy Conference and stayed over an extra weekend because we're such lovely people. And so we talked her into joining the choir. And we have Steven Gloria back from Murfisboro, Tennesseethousenemexico. We're glad that they're here. Let's stand together. I will sing of my redeemer we're going to sing just the first and last on this and you join us together. Aren't you glad you're free? Let's have a word of prayer. Heavenly Father, there is so much to sing about, especially the grace of our Lord Jesus Christ on the cross. He sealed my pardon and made me free and that indeed is a song worth singing. We're grateful for this, dear Heavenly Father, and grateful for the opportunity to join together and be able to study the Word today, to worship the Lord today together with friends and family today. And for these here, for those far away who join us online as well, we just rejoice in this gathering. Whether it be physical or electronic, it is a blessing to us, dear Heavenly Father, and most of all, what we pray is for insight from Your Word and the presence of Your Spirit right here. And that when we leave this place, without a doubt, we'll know that we have been with God. We ask this in Jesus name. Amen. God bless you. You may be seated. Singers, you may be seated as well here as we do a few announcements. Thanks everyone, for being here this morning. And we had a fabulous week. We had our Post Prophecy Conference road trip and the number varied every day from about eleven to 16 or so. And we went all over northern New Mexico. Not all over northern New Mexico. There's weeks and weeks and weeks of stuff we could still see. But we had a really great time and some of you joined us for all of that. It was beautiful, the weather was perfect. It was just everything that a person could ask for. Right, Genie? Yes, it really was great. We'll look forward to it next year. Now, let's see, wednesday night we have supper at 05:00 p.m.. And we did a lot of Cooking for Work Week followed by Prophecy Conference, followed by Road Trip. So this week we decided we're having pizza. Pizza for supper on Wednesday night. And I don't know, you can bring a dessert or something along with that or anything that goes with pizza. That will be 05:00 p.m. For supper. Our Bible study will be at 06:00 p.m.. This will be the last night of our Feast of Israel series. This Wednesday night, 06:00 p.m.. And that'll be in here. And then the next week, we're going to begin a series through the Book of Hosea. I think there's a lot of misunderstanding about hosea, a lot of reading the wrong people into the Book of Hosea. So we'll see all that. Remember him? He's the guy that moved to Tower, married a prostitute or something like that. I think I have part of those details right. Anyway, but the Book of Jose a week from Wednesday will start that. We have men's breakfast again this Thursday, 08:00 a.m. In the fellowship hall. We invited the ladies last week and we had a nice little crowd for breakfast. Ladies, you're not invited this week. Got the kids programs. One of the new kids programs is the Science Club on Tuesday. And that's a fun one. I peeked in a little on the last one. It's first and third Tuesday. First and third Tuesday. This is the first Tuesday. So check that out. And the other info, that is all right there. Let's see. Next Sunday, we'll have worship only no Sunday school just next week, but we'll have our worship service next Sunday. And now we are always delighted to have guests with us and glad that you're here. And I like to embarrass you and then make it worth your while. So today our guests get a bookmark bigger than the book. The bookmark is what is happening in the world. And it describes that just a little bit. And the book is Dispensationalism for Dummies, written just for you. I wrote this three simple principles for biblical interpretation. That's your gift today. But you do have to stand and introduce yourself in order to earn that. And we would also like you to put one of these pins in our mat back there because that's always encouraging for us to see the places that people have come from, from all over the country. And we are grateful for that. And Louise, you were here last week, but sometimes we make people do it two weeks in a row, and last week was a different gift. So if you want this one, then you have to stand and introduce yourself. Louis, come every week. It was indeed. Louise, we're so glad you've been here. It's been a blessing. And up from Colorado, back with us again. Stand and introduce yourselves. Amen. We love it when you're here. Thanks for being here. From Pine. You said Colorado. Excellent. God bless the Parsons for being with us here in the back row, back here from Texas. I'm very glad you're here from Amarillo, Texas. You all on vacation. Good. Some people come from Amarillo, Texas and decide not to go back, so it's a possibility. But it's only, what, 6 hours, which is not so far that you couldn't just come to church here every Sunday. We got an extra room in the parsonage. You can just get here on Saturday night if you want to be casual about it. Excellent. Thanks for being here. And let's see from Chicago area, back with us again, Ursula's dad. Stand and reintroduce yourself. You can't beat that, can you? Good people, good air and good food. Amen. 87 years young. God bless you. Thanks for being with us again. Very still kicking. Amen. We are glad that you're here. Thanks for being with us. Alex, good to have you back. It's been a little while. Glad you're here. Oh, and the Romero has been gallabant and all around the world. I'm glad you all are back too. Thanks for being back. I think the rest of us are home folks there here. So why don't you stand and shake someone's hand? Just a moment. We'll come back and we will sing at the mercies of the Lord. Stand and greet one another here. Thank you. And now would you turn in your hymnol to him, number 625. I will sing of the mercies of the Lord forever. I will sing him number 625. I think if you don't know it, you'll know it. Soon you'll remember it and let's just sing all the verses. 625. Love the Lord forever I love the Lord forever I will sing up the mercies of the Lord with my mouth till I make known thy faceless with my power will I make known Thy faithfulness to all generation now turn to same number 633. We're going to have to work hard at this one because the pianist could not play this song but we had to have it to finish out our I Will Sing trilogy and you know it. And we have two Church of Christ trained musicians and therefore we can sing it fella. Or as they say in Mexico, acapulco. Now Brenda is going to get us started. Here we go. For me how he left his home in glory for the cross the cavalry yes. I'll sing gathered by the crystal sea the crystal sea on the second I was lost but Jesus found me round the sheep that went astray all the guards around me drew me back to his way yes. He woke keep me till the river roses water might be then you'll bear me safely over where my love one time shall you all just sound like professional and you may be seated as our professional Tau Tabernacle choir now sings a little song. We sang it not long ago, Saturday morning or Friday night at the tauist Prophecy Conference. But hey, we were all warmed up. We wanted to do it again. Here we go. Just tap your toe or sing along with it if you would like to because, you know swing low, sweet Syria. I think most of us would take the next ticket ride if we could. Especially if we could all go together. Wouldn't that be nice? In the rapture of the church that we look forward to. Our Missionaries of the Month are Colton and Shauna Williams. This month of September is the last day for them. They have just been doing such a fabulous job in Papa, New Guinea, teaching the Bible chronologically to those who live in remote villages. And they have really had quite a resurgence of excitement for their work within the villages on some things that have happened there, that they got lots of new people coming and saying, hey, we want to hear this teaching as well. And so you pray for them, Colton and Shawna Williams, their two sons, as they serve there. We have an offering box back there. And if you give your gift undesignated, it goes to support the work of our church here. If you give it Mark missions, it goes to support the work of Colton and Shauna Williams. And with that, let me lead us in the word of prayer. Heavenly Father, we are grateful that with all the joys of this life, there is that which is greater to come, and indeed, also with all the struggles and challenges of this life. It's not one that will last forever, but we shall someday be face to face with Christ our Savior. We pray, dear Heavenly Father, that in the meantime, we're faithful to you and to your Word. And our prayer is also that you would be with Colton and Shauna and their boys. Give them encouragement this beginning of the month here as they carry out the work that they have been doing and watch over them and encourage them in every way. And we just ask this in Jesus name, amen. Let's have a little time of offering. There's a box back there again, as I mentioned, you can get it now or you can put it later at any time, and we will have a little offering and then come together for a pricing. And who can name that tune more love to be you get a copy of Joseph asis government and Christianity. No, I'm going to deliver it to you now. Joseph A. Size wrote this in the midst of the Civil War, and it's got some interesting things to say. It's one of those books that I agree with him wholeheartedly until I disagree with him wholeheartedly. But it's an interesting read. We gave those out last week. Steve, that was the leftover gift. But since you got more love to be correct, you get that book. And Steve, I'll just leave this to you. It's a little bit of trivia. Oh, I probably wrote it in there. This is going to be too easy, so I won't give you much here. If you, within the week, can tell me the trivia about Joseph asis as it relates to him. You get a free copy of the Essential Gospel. No, you have to tell me the trivia first. And by the way, we give those out free. Anybody would like those? Well, let's get started in our sermon here today, the 12th chapter of Genesis. If you look there, we'll be looking at verses one through ten here in just a moment and we are looking at the life and times of Abraham. We started this actually two weeks ago and just gave a little bit of introduction to Abraham's Abram as he's named here. And as I go through this sermon, I'll try to call him Abram, but if it comes out Abraham, same guy, you know who I'm talking about. But we introduced Abram and his family and that kind of interesting thing. It says, and I believe it's 1127, where it says now these are the generations of terror, the generations of terror. And that we mentioned is a marker, is a flag in the book of Genesis that says there is a shift that is taking place here and those markers come a number of times. I believe this is the fifth one in the book of Genesis that really say, hey, get out the highlight or something big is about to happen. But then we're kind of surprised because we thought it was going to happen to Terra. Now these are the generations of Terra and it doesn't happen to Terra. Terra comes and goes in just a few verses. And we speculated, I don't know if I like the word speculated, because we took several scriptures and put them together and came up with a conclusion that is not explicitly stated in the scripture, that perhaps God did want to do a great work through Terra and perhaps God chose him because he was such a family man. And again I'll use the word speculated or deduced that he was a great family man just from some of the wording in those verses. I'll try not to give the whole sermon there, but from the wording of those verses we said, hey, here's the guy who really does care about family and how family is the thing that passes down values from one generation to another. So God like this and yet then he goes away and Abraham Abram takes up the mantle, so to speak, and carrying out this work and the entire section on the generations of Terra is about Abram, later known as Abraham, what took place here. And we saw that Terra from everything we can tell, and I think this was far more than speculation, this is pretty rooted in biblical exegesis that Terra was an idol maker and probably an idol worshiper as well. In fact, the Hebrew word Terrafime comes from Terra, the maker of the Terra theme, the little household idols, if you will, that are there. And so now we're going to pick up, now that we have that introduction of Abram. Abram comes and he is going to begin looking for some land. Genesis, chapter twelve, verses one through ten. Let me go ahead and read the entire passage and then we'll come back and analyze it. In Genesis chapter twelve it says, now the Lord had said unto Abraham, get thee out of thy country, and from my kindred and from my father's house into a land which I will show thee, and I will make thee a great nation, and I will bless thee and make thy name great, and thou shalt be a blessing. And I will bless them that bless thee and curse him that curseth thee, and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed. Obviously, I said I was going to read the whole thing, didn't I? I knew when I said that this was not going to work. Obviously, verses one through three are arguably some of the most famous words of all the Bible. I will bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth thee. In thee all the families of the earth will be blessed. The promise that is given there with the Abrahamic covenant, verse four. Then so Abram departed as the Lord had spoken unto him, and the Lord went with him. And Abram was 75 years old when he departed out of heron. And Abraham took Sarah, his wife, and Lot, his brother's sons, and all their substance that they had gathered and the souls that they had gotten out of heron. And they went forth to go into the land of Canaan and into the land of Canaan that came. And Abram passed through the land unto the place of Sheckham in the plain of Moray. And the Canaanite was there in the land. And the Lord appeared to Abram and said, unto thy seed will I give this land and their buildeth he an altar unto the Lord and appeared unto him. And he removed from thence unto a mountain in the east of Bethel and pitched his tent, having Bethel on the west, Haye on the east. And there he building an altar to the Lord and called upon the name of the Lord. And Abraham journeyed going on still toward the south, and there was a famine in the land. And Abraham went down to Egypt to sojourn there, and the famine was grievous in the land. We'll stop there and pick up at that next time. But I want us to consider, first of all, in this famous journey that takes place on the outline, I said verses one through five that's when he leaves and enters into the land of Canaan, really, the journey goes on through verse ten. But on this very famous journey, he starts with this very strong command get thee out. Isn't that a nice poetic way of strongly saying, don't let the door hit you on the way out. Get the out. Very powerfully spoken. And then he's given the command in verse one to get out, really of three things that are mentioned in verse one again. You see, the Lord just said, Get thee out, first of thy country, second of thy kindred. And third, from thy father's house, get the out of thy country. Let's talk about that one first. Get the out of thy country. That one is fairly simple. We can understand that. As a matter of fact, the Hebrew word that is used here is the word eretz. Eretz is one of those words that if you learn I would guess if you learn a dozen Hebrew words, eretz would be one of them. Eretz simply means land. The reason you probably would learn that is because often in Hebrew you would hear the phrase eretz Ishrael the land of Israel. And because the land is such an important part of Israel and the being of Israel and the promises to Israel, eretz is one of these very well known words. As a matter of fact, I would say that the word eretz is very seldom, if ever again translated as country. It means country as in, hey, here's the countryside that I live in. Get out of that country into another country. And it really has to do with the physical locations, the border, the land. Get off this land into another land. Get the out of thy country. So he had already left the Caldis. Now he's living in Harane. He's supposed to leave Haran, get the out of Haran and he's supposed to go into the land that God would show. So number one is get the out of thy country. That's the easy part, I think, as you and I would know, if we wanted to get out of our country, the easy part would be getting out. The hard part would be knowing where we were going to go once we get out of our country. That, as we'll see with Abram, certainly is the hard part because he doesn't know where he's supposed to go, but he gets the out. Now, second, it says get thee out from thy kindred. From thy kindred. Now, we normally would take kindred to be relatives. Get away from your relatives. The problem is the next phrase says get out from your father's house. Well, your father's house. That sounds a lot like your relatives. Get away from your relatives. And I think that really is what it is. Speaking of using the word house bait in a larger sense of your relatives. So what is the idea if he doesn't mean get away from your relatives? What does he mean when he says get away from thy kindred? I brought artwork for you today. There we go. Goodbye to Hamburg. Otto Dix, what in the world does that have to do with avery right? Well, first of all, it enabled me to give you a little break in the sermon and to put a picture up just in case you begin to drift. You can look at this guy who is saying goodbye to Hamburg. This was after World War One. I'm sure has some connotations with it. My guess is Otto Dix. We might not like him if we studied him too much, but nonetheless, he's got this picture. You see the nationality flags, all the stuff right here. He's going to leave. By the way, do you know what hamburger is most famous for in the United States? Hamburger. Hamburger. You're exactly right. The hamburger was either invented in or named after Hamburg. This is why there is no ham in a hamburger, because it's not named after ham, it's named after hamburger. I looked this up one time because I'm kind of a hamburger fan. But nonetheless, now, you know, so I put this picture up because it does kind of give a little picture of, hey, it's a challenging thing to get out of the country, but it's a lot more challenging to get out of your national kind of thinking. As a matter of fact, the Hebrew word that's used here, it's not such popular or common Hebrew word when it says get the out of I kindred, the word normally would be translated as birthplace. Get away from your birthplace. The problem is, when God is speaking this to Abram, he's already out of his birthplace. He was born in Ur of the Caldis, and now he's in Star to say Hamburg. Now he's in Haran, and so he's not out of his birthplace. So how do you interpret this thing that normally would say get out of the place you were born and move on to another place? So it's translated here as kindred. But the idea behind the word as it's used really kind of in a broader sense here, is to get away from your nationality, get away from the patriotism that you have, perhaps towards the Caldes, the manner of life, the society, all of the things that go with that. I suppose Louise could talk about this more easily than we could talk about it because she was born in Shanghai correct. And raised in Hong Kong and then moved to the United States to go to college. And now as an American citizen and I suspect that there are things Shanghai in I suspect there's some Shanghai ni that is still within you. It is very hard to rid yourself of that nationality. Or as we sometimes say in these parts, you can get the boy out of the country, but you can't get the country out of the boy. Now, this is a hard thing. Get out of Hamburg. Get out of her. Get out of heron. I want you to change your patriotism, if you will. I want a conversion, really, of who you are. I suspect that here in our vast audience today, I suspect that out of 2000 I think it looks like out of 2000 people here today, I suspect that 2000 of them are somewhat frustrated with their country. All of us are somewhat frustrated with our country. Somewhere along the way, in the last, I don't know, two days or the last few months, we've looked and said, oh, my goodness, what is this? It's going somewhere in a handbasket. I know that. And we are frustrated with our country. I suspect that from time to time think, hey, if there was paradise out there, I would buy a plane ticket, I would go there, and I would just live happily ever after there. You know what I suspect would happen once we got there? I suspect that about the 4 July, we would be pulling out the red, white and blue, and we would be putting the flag there, and we would have all these national kind of sentiments that would come up within us. I suspect even you and I, when we're so frustrated with our country, if you're like me, you go to the parade and something patriotic just stirs up within you and you find yourself putting your hand over your heart and saying, God save the king. Sorry, I was mixing nationalities there. We have a sentimentalism towards nationalism, right? And so when the Lord says, get thee out of thy country. Get off this land. Okay, that's hard enough, but not near as hard as get the out from thy nationality, from your devotions, from your patriotism, from all of those things and move on to another. And then in the third place, again in Genesis, chapter one, he says, get thee out from thy father's house. Father's house is a very literal interpretation. In Hebrew it'd be avaitav. AV is the father. And you remember the word abba, right, from the New Testament, abba, father. Abba is the familiar kind of AB. It's kind of like dad and daddy. Okay, so AB is the dad, daddy abba is the daddy. So bait of get out of the bait of, you know, some other bait words like batelham, Bethlehem, house of bread, bait l Bethel. We'll get there in a moment. House of God. L baitl. Here is beta. Get away from your father's house. I don't really think this is talking about the literal structure. In fact, very seldom it could be, but very seldom in the Hebrew scriptures is the word bait actually referring to the sticks and bricks that make up the building of the house. It is much more as it would be used in Bethlehem. It's not a house made out of bread, but it's a bread basket, so to speak. And so it's the house of bread in that sense and then some spiritual connotations as well. So it's taken in that broader sense, and I doubt at this time that Abraham and Sarah lived in the same physical structure as Terra did. Imagine they were already out of the house. So this idea here, when it says, hey, get the out of veda out of thy father's house, it's saying leave the relatives behind. And probably because his wife went with them, no doubt some of the others went with him, sarah went with him, but Tara did not go with him. And some of the extended family, if you will, probably because of the association with idols. Now, when you look at this, depart from your land, depart from your nationality and depart from all the people that you ever knew in your home really becomes almost a remaking of this man Abraham. Wouldn't you agree? In fact, I think that even did some of you grow up and move off somewhere? Yeah, I thought so. A lot of us grew up and we moved. I grew up down the road. You move, you end up coming back 30 years later, but you can get the boy out of the country, but you can't get the country out of the boy. Something like that. When we move, we leave our land, we leave our local patriotisms, we leave our family. That's often a time, especially in a younger person's life, that's a time when they really do become someone very different. And this is what's going to happen to Abram, is he's going to become someone very different. That is going to be this point of demarcation for Abraham when he's 75 years old. Here, I imagine 100 years later on his deathbed, when he was 175, and they're interviewing him, saying, hey, Abram, what was the Abraham by then? What was the pivotal point in your life? I suspect he would say, well, I was 75 years old, and I decided to move out from Dad's house. That's when I left everything behind it. I became who I am at that point. So what we see in this get the out, really, I think is a precursor of things to come. Abram is going to become a very different man. He's even going to have a different name that comes about it. You know, there's something kind of interesting here. You remember another person that left home, left land, nationalities and family, and became a very different person. And let's see if I can pull up the scripture here. That was a woman named Ruth. Remember? Let's look at Ruth 116. And Ruth said, entreat me not to leave thee. She's talking to her Jewish mother in law, Naomi. Entreat me not to leave thee, nor to return from following after thee. For whither thou goest, I will go. Whither thou lodgest, I will lodge. Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God. You know, Jewish scholars say that this is the conversion of Ruth, that she is converting from whatever Moabite religion she had into Judaism. Your people will be my people, your God will be my God. Well, certainly it is a major transformation in Ruth's life. As she says, I am going to leave the land I love, and I'm going to lodge with you. I'm going to leave the people I love, and I'm going to lodge with you. I'm going to leave the patriotisms, the worship, all those kind of values that I love. And your god will be my god. That's in chapter one, verse 16, if we go down just a little bit to chapter two, verse eleven, it says, Bowie has answered and said to her, it. Has fully been showed me all that thou hast done unto thy mother in law since the death of thine husband. And let me raise this up just a little bit. And how thou hast left thy father and thy mother and the land of thy nativity and come into a people which thou knowest not heretofore very much a parallelism that is given with Ruth. As it's time for Ruth to leave Hamburg, she is marching on to a different place, Abram. That's what we see here as well. So when we think about Abram going to a new country, often we think of that which is ahead. But there really was that which is behind, which had to have been left behind. It's time to leave all that and move somewhere else. Now that's what he leaves. Get the out of thy country, of thy kindred and of thy father's house very strongly. Get thee out. Again, let me emphasize the strength of that little Hebrew phrase, get the out. There is a Hebrew word that says leave. Wouldn't you agree with me? Even in English? Is it time for you to leave? Say no. No, it's not. You got 20 minutes before it's time for you to leave. Not before you leave leave. It can be stated strongly. Why don't you leave now? How am I going to miss you if you just won't leave? Yeah. And there's this strength of if I say, hey, Alex, in the time you leave, or if I say, Alex, get me out, there's something different there. I think the Lord really does let me back up. It's often dangerous to try to read the tone of a text and all we have here is the text. But I know that the Lord speaks this in words that are stronger than just a simple time to pack up, time to move on. Got a great adventure for you. Come on. It is stated in a strong get the out kind of way that I think that and we can understand the natural affections that would be involved here. I think that the Lord is stressing to Abram. Hey, this really is not going to be an easy thing for you. I want you to snip cut the ties, get out of there. That is a thing in the past. You are going to be a different person. So we can't understand who Abraham is going to be without understanding who Abram was. Get the out. Now we come into the second portion here versus one through three. And we're going to see what he is going to gain. He leaves Hamburg and he is going to gain here is a picture of Malaxis threshing machine. What does that have to do with Abraham? I'll tell you in a minute. But the get the out. Look at the parallelism here again. In chapter one, you got get thee out of thy country, thy kindred, thy father's house. Now look at verse two. I will make of thee a great nation. I'll make thy name great and thou shalt be a blessing. And you jump down to verse three and you, all the families of the earth will be blessed. Now I will make of a great nation. Excuse me, I missed into verse one. That's what I'm looking for. Go onto a land that I will show you in verse one. So get thee out of thy what country? Do you remember the Hebrew word eretz? Get the out of the Iarets and go to a land that I will show you. Anyone want to guess what the word land is? Eretz. You got it. If we were reading Hebrew get out of the arrest to an erratic that I will show you. Leave one land, go to another land. And that is the parallelism, if you will, that is given there, moved from one eretz to another eretz. Now he is to leave again thy kindred in verse one, you go on to verse two. And I will make of thee a great nation. I want you to leave one set of patriotisms to gain another set of patriotisms. I want you to have new devotions that you are committed to. And so there's so much to be gained here. And then I want you to leave the bait of the Father's House, that's family kind of thing. I want you to leave that family. And he says then he crosses that and he says, hey, but in leaving your family and you, all of the families of the world will be blessed. So you've got this parallelism that goes on, all three of those, and is carried out now. Leave country, go to a new country, leave kindred, go to a new nation, leave family. Be a blessing to all the families. That's what we're looking at. So there's a lot to leave behind, but there is a lot to gain here. Not given the full picture of what all is to be gained there, but certainly a lot there is to gain. Now, I think anyone who reads the Bible, shall we say, even casually, would come and say by the time you read just a chapter or two beyond here, saying to 1314, you would say something major happened in chapter twelve versus one, two and three. That this really was a shift. So much was it a shift that you would have to say, well, you would notice things like, for example, as we talked about last week as well, the first ten generations up to Noah, god was just dealing with kind of everybody. The second ten generations from Noah up to Terra, god was dealing with one family, the family of Noah. But now, from this point on, what you would notice is God is dealing with one man. The work of God really has changed. And you would begin to I think a basic student of the Word would recognize the change. Yeah, something really did happen in Genesis, chapter twelve. As a matter of fact, I think you could go almost the world over the world of Christendom and pull just any commentary there is on the book of Genesis. You could take Jewish commentaries as well and what you would find is they always, always break after chapter eleven and before chapter twelve because everybody says this is such an obvious point of demarcation that God is now not dealing with. Let's just generalize that he's not dealing with everybody now. He's dealing with this one guy. And if you want to be right with God, you better be right with Abraham, right? You better get in good with Abraham because that's how God is, shall we say, dispensing Himself into the world. And so if you were reading, you would say, hey, God is doing something fundamentally new. Beginning in Genesis, chapter twelve. This is not like anything he has ever done before. Something fundamentally new. Now, I happen to call something fundamentally new a dispensation. Here's a new dispensation. This is like a fundamentally new thing. And if you miss this, you miss the basic storyline or the structure upon which the story is built and you'll trip all over yourself trying to interpret the story because you've missed, hey, we got a new, as I'll call it here, a new dispensation. That's where our picture comes in. Because the picture was called the wheat dispensation. Have you ever heard of that? In Clarence Larkins book on Dispensational truth, I had neither, but I kind of liked the picture. It's sort of one of those I don't know what you call this kind of art, but it's sort of like, I don't know, finger painting. Let's call it finger painting. They probably don't agree with me on that terminology, but I couldn't fit it all. There's a little machine over here. There's a horse that are pulling the harvester manually harvesting and they're putting the wheat into the threshing machine. Anybody know what a threshing machine does? Threshes. Exactly. I did learn that thresh and thrash are the same thing, by the way. But threshing is the process of separating the seed from the we'll call it the chaff, the other stuff that you don't want. It bounces it and beats it and hits it and says to the seed, get me out. And the seed separates. By the way, in studying threshing machines I learned what a combine was. I had heard of combines all my life because I used to be pastor in Pan and old Texas and they have combines there that cost $600,000. But a combine is a harvester, a baler and a thresher all in one. It's like combined. So they call it a combine, but it threshes, among other things than it does. Now, the point of the picture here, other than being a slight divergence in the sermon, the point of the picture is when somebody developed, in this case the wheat thresher as the artist here said, that began the wheat dispensation. Because now, all of a sudden, it didn't take dozens of people working hour after hour, endless hours for who knows how many weeks, trying to separate what you want in the wheat from what you don't want in the wheat. Now they just put it in the machine, and by the time they're done with the field, it is separated. That's a whole new ball game, right? And so it enters the wheat dispensation. All of that to point out, to say, if you can have a wheat dispensation, you can probably have an Abrahamic dispensation as well. When God does something with Abraham, it really changes the whole ballgame. This happened several times down through Scripture. And in order to understand Scripture well, you have to spot these places where something fundamentally new began to happen. The good part of that is that all of these really, once you know to look for it, all of them are very obvious. They're surface level kind of things. They're the kind of things you notice, hey, everything was different up to this point, and then it changed after that point. I think we got something fundamentally new here that's probably, let's call it a dispensation. How's that? And you begin to break the Bible up there, and then you begin to rightly divide the truth according to those particular dispensations. And so here God comes and he does this brand new thing, and it's a part of the fulfillment of the promises that he gave to mankind back in Genesis 315, that the seed of the woman would crush the serpent on the head or bruise the head of the serpent. And now how is it going to happen? Well, it's going to happen through this man, Abraham. Through you. All the families of the Earth will be blessed. So you got just imagine Abraham, and maybe we would be like this some too. Imagine Abraham, he's told, get thee out of thy of thy country. I already left her the caldes. I've traveled all this far. Now I got the crops about ready, and now I just figured my way around. I don't want to go any further. That can happen, right? Remember the story of the Pilgrims? You do, don't you? About ten years after Santa Fe and Taoes were settled, the Pilgrims came over on Plymouth Rock. You remember that? And they settled what was their Plymouth Colony? What was the name of that? No, that was the they settled in a little town. I thought Jamestown was in Virginia. Let's call it plymouth. Did you all even go to school? I think it's called Plymouth. So they settled Plymouth. You may remember that the next year, after they made it through the winter it wasn't a very good winter, you remember, but they made it through the winter, and the next year they had crossed the Atlantic Ocean. Someone suggested, let's go 5 miles into the wilderness. No, you got to be kidding. We're not going any farther. Right here is where we're going to be. And many refused to make any kind of inroads then. Well, that's easy to come into. So can you imagine Abraham, if he says, no, I've already moved far enough. I'm not moving any further. I'm not going to give up my land, my kindred, my father's house. Sorry. What he really would have given up is this new dispensation, this whole new thing that God was up to, and he would have denied that. It's an easy spot to slip into. Now, here we come. We've got this new dispensation, and the challenge is now that, okay, I'm going to get out of my country, my kindred, my father's house. But where am I going? To a land that I will show you. It says in verse one, to a land that I will show you. Well, I don't know about you, but I'd like a little more specific direction, wouldn't you? Here's a picture of Moses seeing the Promised Land from afar. James Tiso we've had some of his works before. The thing I think about that is Moses was told where the Promised Land was. He knew where the promise land? All he had to do was lead a whole bunch of people there. And here he's looking out at the Promised Land. Yes, there it is. Sure enough, I see it. Well, Abraham didn't have the blessing of Moses. Abraham didn't know where this promised land was. This land that I will give you, where is it? And so all he says again is, the land that I will show you. And so even without knowing anything other than the land I will show you, it says down in verse four. So Abraham departed as the Lord has spoken to him, Lord went with him. Abraham is 75 years old, and he departed out of Herod. I wonder, as he departed out of Heron, the next verse, verse five at the end, it says, he went forth to go into the land of Canaan. I wonder how did he know where to go? I'm going to show you. I think you've got some possibilities here. One is that the options were limited. I came from that direction, so I don't think I'm supposed to go back there. That direction is the deep blue sea. I don't think I'm supposed to go there. North, honestly, in that day, was not much of anything, just vast land out there that doesn't seem like the place. But south was then in those days, and for much of a history, it was kind of the crossroads of civilization, if you will, between Egypt in the south and the whole Mesopotamian culture over up to the northeast and a little bit of what we now would call the European culture up this way. So it's kind of the crossroads. So maybe it was just a lack of options or common sense hey, this would seem like the best way to go. That is one possibility we could say also maybe, though it's not given here in the scripture, maybe God gave him some sort of manifested leadership, that he sent a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night, and it's just not mentioned in there. That is a possibility that maybe God said, go south. That's where I want you to go. Maybe again, it's not there. It could be also that he remembered, hey, my dad, god told my dad to go to the land of Canaan, but he never made it. He stopped in heron. So I guess I'm supposed to finish the journey and go to where dad was supposed to go. That probably has the best argumentation given to it. But nonetheless, he begins to go down. And it says in verse six this is one of those you get a tad of textual insight. If you look at verse six, it says, he went to the place of Saint Sahim, is what it says in the King James. You may have noticed that when I read it earlier, I just pronounced it Shekham, or Shehem is how you we've heard of Shekhem in the Bible. It's one of those that yeah, I've kind of heard of that on the plane of Moray. That is nothing other than transliterating from Hebrew versus transliterating from Greek one. You get Shekham when you get Shahim, it's all the same place. So he goes down because we're more familiar with it, let's call it check them. It goes down to check them. In fact, if you have a modern translation, my guess is I didn't look at them, but my guess is it probably makes it sham, because Shecom is the place that you know. So it goes down to Sheckham and the plain Amore, the Canaanite was there, and the Lord appeared unto Abram. Now in this land that I will show thee, I would kind of say, hey, as you begin to lose, look at this. The Lord appeared. I don't know, it seems like that might be kind of a clue. Abraham, you have arrived. Welcome to the land that I will show you. That's what I would take it as, I think, but Abram didn't really do that. Look on in verse six, they came to Shekham on the plate of Mora. The canaanite was there. Verse seven, the Lord appeared unto Abram, said, unto thy seed will I give this land. And there he builded an altar to the Lord, who appeared unto him. Verse eight. And he removed from thence to a mountain on the east of Bethel and pitched his hand. Well, I don't know if I had a visit with God and check him built an altar. I think I'd just say, this is the land. God said, this is the land I'll give you. And he moves on. He goes to Bethel, which is beethel again, the House of God, another place we've heard of. And he pitched his tent, verse eight, having Bethel on the west. And then in King James, it has the spelling Hayi, H-A-I haven't said many times I have formerly Nazi stained fingers. I haven't always been a King James guy. And this messes up one of my favorite jokes that I used to always say, joshua fought the Battle of Jericho, and then they went to the Battle of AI. You know how to spell AI? AI. AI. But here it's spelled H-A-I. It's the same place. Actually, the pronunciation in Hebrew would be a little more of A hay. And so putting an H on there kind of helps us get a Hebrew pronunciation. But it's the same place. And he's moving through Bethel and AI. And then as you continue, that was in verse eight from Bethel Hayai on the east. And it says, and he build it an altar to the Lord. This is the second altar he called upon the name of the Lord. But then you get to verse nine and Abraham journeyed going on still toward the south. I think there's something in that word still that Abraham is looking for a land that's going to be giving Him. He comes to one place, God appears, builds an altar, moves on, almost like I don't think this is it. Comes to Bethel, he builds an altar, and he goes on still to the south. I think, and maybe I'm reading too much into the word still, but I think the word still is saying, Abraham, your bonehead. Well, I've showed you where the land is and you keep on going looking for the land. Have you ever met anyone who has a bird nest on the ground and keeps on looking? The ship is going to come in right over here, right over here, right over here. And we never kind of get to the destination, so to speak, and keep on moving. Maybe Abrams got a little bit of this going on. So he goes on still. It says in verse nine. And then it's interesting. It comes to verse ten. He goes to the south, verse nine and verse ten. And there was a famine in the land and Abram went down to Egypt. Now, you and I kind of know the rest of the story, don't we? And we know that Egypt is not the promised land. So Abraham is looking for a land and what does he do? Walks right through it and ends up down in Egypt. Almost like the Lord is testing Him a little bit. Again, maybe I'm reading too much into it. But he keeps going and keeps going, and the Lord sends this famine, or at least there is a famine. And so he just moves away from there, almost like he's not quite trusting the Lord. Have you seen those little Meme cartoons? This one's pretty good. That has this fella asking over and over, lord, I just want a word from you. I want a word from you. Lord, I want a word for you. And there's this hand coming down from heaven holding a Bible. I'm trying to give you a word, I'm trying to give you a word. Could it be that Abram, who was given this kind of nebulous land, that I will show you that then he just doesn't listen very well, and he ends up down in Egypt. Now, we'll look at this more next time, but excuse me, beginning in verse ten, he's in Egypt. Sojourning in the land of Egypt, and then beginning in 1011, going on through the rest of chapter twelve, things don't really go very well down in Egypt. And as we look at that, I want us to jump down to chapter 13, verses three and four. But I decided this would be a good one for this section. I'm still learning is the picture Francis Goya, I am still learning 1824 to 1828. That looks like something I could have drawn, but I kind of like it. Here's this old fella, and he's walking with canes and all that, but I'm still learning. And this is where Abram is. He's journeying, he's looking, he's still learning. So he goes to Egypt. Verse ten in the intervening verse versus disastrous results, check out Genesis 13. Beginning in verse three, it says, and he went on his journeys from the south, even to Bethel, onto a place where his tent had been at the beginning between Bethel and Hai, and unto the place of the altar which he had made there at the first. And there Abram called upon the name of the Lord. It kind of looks to me like Abram finally down in Egypt says, I think I overshop this thing. And Jewish scholars actually point out some of the words that are here. We won't get into the details of it, though I know you would love to at five after twelve. But the reading of the Hebrew actually gives the idea that he went meticulously along the journey that he had come, followed the exact path getting there, he ends up back at Bethel, and he goes back to where he built the altar, and he's still, it looks like, looking for this land. Now, what happens at Bethel, and we'll get there in a few weeks, what happens at Bethel is that that is the place where God says, look up into the sky, count the stars, look down at the sand. This is what's going to become of you. And we have really the most solid picture of the Abrahamic covenant and the giving of the covenant that there is right there. I think with Abraham, let's just pretend like that's Abram and not Abram, 75 years old, given this grand opportunity, god comes and says, here, here, right here, you're there, you're there, you're there. I think I'll keep journeying. And he ends up down in Egypt, but he messes up. He turns around and says, time to backtrack a little bit. I think there is I'm not one that thinks you have to have an application point to everything in Abrams life, but there is kind of a lot of application there in there that you and I. Has anyone here besides me ever messed up? The best thing to do when you mess up is quit messing up more. What's that rule of holes when you're in one? Quit digging. And Abram says, I think I missed it. So what do you do when you miss it? I'm going to turn around. I'm going to go back here. I'm going to try this thing again. I'm going to look at it. I'm still learning and going at it. And that, I think, is maybe even one of the reasons God says, hey, I like this guy Abram, because he's not so stubborn. Let's put it this way. He's not so weak need that he won't do what it needs to be done. But he's not so stubborn. He won't turn around when he needs to. A little bit of balance there. And Abram comes, and he is very much going to be used of God there in all of that. I think that even theologically, I have been and you have been because I've heard your stories, places that man, I sure built my theology down in Egypt, and I stood solid right on that theology. But then I found out it was a train wreck. And so I said, okay, scratch that one back up again and carry that. Friends from Amarillo here, new friends. And I told him I used to pasture in Pampa. It hasn't been long ago, six months I've been carrying around two boxes of cassette tapes of my sermons from Pampa, and I finally decided I don't want there to be a record. I am getting rid of them, and they're all gone now. But you know what? I'm sure if I went back and listened to those, I would say, wow, you sure got that one wrong. We got to keep learning, don't we? Got to keep growing. And when we overshoot, it miss the promised land. Okay, time to turn around, go back again. And it really can be a great lesson there. Get the out. Go where? I'm going to show you. And then when I show you, why don't you stop right there? And it can be a real blessing. Let's pray together. Heavenly Father, thank you for your word to us in this life of Abraham. We look so much forward to seeing how this plays out and the scriptures that we've read many, many times. There's so much insight that can be given and so much joy and learning and walking with Abraham on this journey, as ultimately he searched for a city which has foundations, whose builder and maker is God. And that is that city which never was his, and yet will be as it was promised to him. And we look forward to seeing the fulfillment of that in Jesus name. Amen. Well, I should say the Gospel of Jesus Christ is not in that story. Genesis, chapter twelve. But it does say in thee, all the families of the earth will be blessed. And if you go to the New Testament, it says Abraham begat isaac. Isaac. Jacob. Jacob begat. And it ends up with a fellow named Jesus. And through abram all the families of the earth are blessed. And aren't you glad we have the Gospel of Jesus Christ? That God says, hey, I'm going to shift things right here to accomplish this task that I've got. And that's the salvation of mankind which we have today free as a great gift for anyone, anywhere, anytime. Would love to talk to any of you about that along the way. But with that, we're out of time. Let's dismiss. We'll come back Wednesday night, have a little pizza, and the feast of Israel will conclude that. And next time pick up on Abraham and see what happens when he's down there in the land of Egypt. Thanks for being here today, guests. Always glad to have you and God bless you. I thought the pianist was going to start playing, but she didn't. God bless you. You're dismissed. Ladies and gentlemen, music.