Welcome to the Liberty Baptist Sermon Archives.
The message you're about to hear was preached at Liberty Baptist
Church in Easton, MA. You can find out more about us
or contact us at my libertybaptist.org or just look
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message from God's Word will be a blessing to you.
It's a pleasure to be with you here today.
And pastor asked us to introduce ourselves.
So my name is Estevan Lopez. I come from Argentina.
That's my country of origin. And right now I'm in living in
Oklahoma City. I'm attending Southwest Baptist
Church and I'm going to Harlan Baptist Bible College.
And as a student there, I want to say I appreciate, we
appreciate your guys's support of the school and making it
easier for us to go. That's a real blessing, and it's
a real blessing to be there learning to serve the Lord.
So let's get right to the passage.
Tonight. We're going to be in Second
Chronicles 34, chapter 34, and I'll check that time to make
sure I don't go over. If not, a pastor said he'll pull
me down. So I'll try to not let that
happen. So let's read Second Chronicles
chapter 34. We'll read the first 2 verses,
and then we'll talk a little bit more about the rest of the
chapter. The Word of God says Josiah was
8 years old when he began to reign, and he reigned in
Jerusalem 1 and 30 years. And he did that which was right
in the side of the Lord and walked in the ways of David, his
father, and declined neither to the right hand nor to the left.
Let's pray. Lord, thank you for this
opportunity. Thank you for your word.
You know Lord, that there's nothing I can do to transmit
your word in a in a good way if you're not in it.
And I know that it's your spirit that has the power to to speak
to us and to convict us. So please Lord, do your work and
let it all be from your power. Nothing of me Lord, just help us
and let us be a blessing for everybody in Jesus name, Amen.
Josiah here we learned that he's 8 years old and there's there's
a cycle that's starting in the Kingdom of Judah where he's
reigning. There have been a lot of kings
before him. There will be a lot of kings
after him. And there was always a cycle
almost of sin, sin, sin, and then repentance coming back to
God and God forgiving the people.
And then another king, a bad king comes up and sin, sin, sin.
And this cycle is repeated over and over again.
And there are cycles in our life that we all know about, right?
Just the starting of this year, probably a lot of people started
a gym membership on the 1st of January probably.
And around the 8th or 9th, probably all those memberships
will be cancelled. And then in the next year,
January 1st, again, the same guys and the guys at the gym
will be like, oh, there he goes. It comes again for his annual
gym membership that he's going to cancel later, right?
And then as college students, we have probably some cycles where
we get an assignment at the beginning of the semester and
we're like, oh, that assignment is at this date.
So OK, I'll study for it all through the month so I can get
it on time and have a good grade.
But we forecasted it until the last night, and we study until
the dawn, and then sometimes it goes wrong, sometimes it goes
good. I don't know.
But that's usually a cycle. It shouldn't be, but it is.
So this is a cycle that's starting to be in Judah because
the grandfather of Josiah was Manasseh.
Manasseh was probably the worst king of Judah, and he rang for
50 years and it says that he filled Judah with blood from end
to end. And then after that Manasseh
dies and Ammon his son comes and he rings for two years.
But the short time did not stop him from being one of the worst
kings as well. And he says he did just as bad
as his father did. But then there comes Josiah, and
Josiah has an opportunity to follow the cycle that has
started, or he has the opportunity to break away from
it and start something new. He has an opportunity to break
away from the cycle that his grandfather and his father
started. So the title for this short
message that I want to share with you is breaking the cycle,
breaking away from the sync cycle that's coming behind us.
And I told you that I come from Southwest Baptist Church and
Pastor Jason Gaddis is there. So I'm going to be do my attempt
at doing a title. And he always does a subtitle
and I in no way can compare myself to him.
But here's my attempt at it. Taking the right steps to avoid
walking the wrong paths. Taking the right steps to avoid
walking the wrong paths. And we'll see four things that
Josiah did to avoid being in a bad cycle that his grandfather
and his father had begun. It says that in verse #2 Josiah
didn't have the law, and he didn't have a good example in
his father, in his grandfather. The nation of Judah itself was
in sin. He had no good example to grab
on to. But in verse #2 it says he
walked in the ways of David, his father.
So he looked for a mentor. He looked for a person that he
could look up to, a person that he could follow after his
footsteps and followed in his ways.
And we know that David was a great example that he could
follow. And that's that's what Josiah
did. He said that he did, which was
that which was right. He walked in the ways of David,
his father, and declined neither to the right nor to the left.
So he made a decision. He chose a mentor.
He followed those good footsteps and he didn't deviate from it.
That was his first good step. He chose a good example, even if
he didn't have one really close to him.
Second verse #3 It also says that in the eighth year of his
reign, when he was 16 years old, he began to seek after the God
of David, his father. Again, seeking David as his
mentor and it says that he began to purge Judah and Jerusalem
from the high places and the girls and the card images and
the molten images. He began to take away all the
idols of Judah. So that was a second step that
Josiah took that brought him out of that cycle of taking away
away all the idolatry that his father and his grandfather had
promoted. 3rd chapter chapter 34 verse 27.
Sorry if I'm going a little fast that when I get to the end of
this, it says that his heart was tender to the law of God.
He started reconstructing the temple and because of this, the
book of the law was found and they brought it to him.
It was read. And it says that Josiah, instead
of saying like when they read the book that there was a
judgement coming that there was sin in Judah and that they were
going to be destroyed and they were going to be judged instead
of him being but God, I'm doing everything right.
I've taken out the idolatry. I'm following David in the
footsteps of his footsteps. Why is this going to happen?
None of that. Josiah just says the Bible says
that he his heart was tender and he did humble himself before God
when he heard the words against Judah in verse 27.
So the third step was his heart being tender toward the Word of
God. And then the 4th is in verse 31.
It says that he stood in his place and made a covenant before
the Lord to walk after the Lord and to keep his commandments and
his testimonies. And the verse goes on.
So the 4th good step that Josiah did took was he had a personal
relationship now with God. Now he did not only depend on
David and his footsteps and his example, but now he had a direct
relationship with God where he decided I'm going to make a
covenant with God. I'm going to keep his
commandments, his testimonies, and I'm going to be faithful to
him no matter, no matter what David did, no matter what else
everybody else does. I'm going to make a covenant,
covenant with him result of him having a tender heart toward the
word of God. So how does this apply to us?
How can we look at Josiah and, and be like, OK, this can be a
help to me in my life. Well, I don't, I don't know
everybody in here. Probably these guys are the ones
that I know best, unfortunately. And the rest, I don't know your
situation. I don't know, maybe you have
parents that haven't been a good example to you.
Maybe you have siblings that you looked up to that they haven't
been a good example either they would have left you astray if
you had gone after them. Maybe you have people that were
in leadership or you looked up to and that you like that you
love and they have let you down. Maybe you have people that are
trying to right now lead you away from the the word of God,
from from a good path and you have a choice.
You have a choice whether to follow the cycle that your
grandparents, parents, siblings, friends, this world has set.
Or you can like Josiah, like he did at a young age, decide to
walk in the ways of God, decide to do the right thing and decide
to maintain it and not deviate to left or to right.
And first, first of all, you have to make a decision to walk
with God. Walk with God doesn't happen by
accident. A walk of God does not just
suddenly appear in your life. And oh, I'm just, I'm a St. now,
I'm holy, I do all things right. No, and we'll never get to do
everything, but we have to start by making a decision to follow
God and to break away from the cycle of sin.
Second, it's hard at the beginning when one is saved
recently. We need someone to help us.
We need someone to stand close to us and encourage us and to
show us the way. So find someone that you know
God, that loves God and that is godly, has a good testimony and
follow them and ask them for help and read with them and pray
with them so that they can lead you.
Like David LED Josiah, even he was, David was dead.
David was gone a long time ago, but he followed just I followed
his example. And you can do the same with a
mentor that God, that loves God and that can lead you in the
right way. Third, be sensitive to the Word
of God. And the word of God was found
when what was being done, the temple was being rebuilt.
So we find the instruction from the word of God right here in
the Church of God. So come to the Church of God, be
sensitive to the word when it's preached.
Have a personal relationship with God.
Just after your mentor has taught you and helped you, now
it's time for your relationship to be with God, independent of
everybody else. And last of all, you may say,
maybe I'm too old to break away from this cycle.
Maybe I've done bad decisions in my life.
Maybe I failed God. Maybe I followed in this cycle
of sin instead of breaking away from it.
Well, let me give you a little bit of hope.
Manasseh, the grandfather of Josiah, at the end of the days
of his life, it says that he's, he prayed unto God and humbled
himself in the last days. And God forgave and gave grace
and Manasseh changed his life around, took out the idols of
Judah. And we don't know, I can't say
exactly for sure, but looking at the years, Josiah probably saw
Manasseh, Manasseh repent and go back to God.
Maybe that was even a reason why he followed God in his
footsteps. So you are not too old, you're
it's not too late to go back to God.
And if, if you say maybe I'm too young to make a difference,
well, just I was 8 years old. He was 16 years old when he
began to clean Judah. So there's no excuses to not
follow God. Even if you don't have good
examples, good cycle, you can start a new cycle of godliness
right now, today, if you choose to follow the Lord and His Word.
So first of all, my name is Ezra Barbosa.
I am from Texas, not as extravagant as Argentina right
here, but I come from a church, a Hispanic church called Iglesia
Bautista Biblica Fundamental, Katy, TX.
It's around 45 minutes around the center of Houston.
And well, if my English is somewhat choppy right now, it's
because I usually preach in Spanish, not in English.
This is the first time for me, I'm going to Hartley Baptist
Bible College. I am a music minister major, so
this is also pretty new. But all right, we're going to be
in First Kings chapter 12. We're going to be reading 2
verses, verse 3 and 4. And it says that they sent and
called him, and Jeroboam and all the congregation of Israel came
and spake unto Rehoboam, saying, Thy Father made our yo grievous.
Now therefore make thou the grievous service of thy Father
and his heavy yoke which he put upon us lighter, and we will
serve thee. All right, we're going to pray.
Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for the day you have given us.
Thank you for letting us be able to come to your house and just
be able to hear your word and just apply it to our lives.
God, I ask that you use me as a vessel, just that I can portray
whatever it is you have for your people.
I ask that they understand the words that come out of my mouth.
In Jesus name I pray, Amen. All right, so real bomb, second
king, do we all know him as the king that separated both the
nation of Israel into Judah and Israel, something that shouldn't
have happened because they should have been united for one,
but especially not because of who was his predecessor Solomon,
the wisest man after Jesus. Now here the people of the
nation are saying rear bone. Your father worked us to the
bone, your father put taxes upon us, your father made it hard to
live. Basically all we ask of you is
that you make it lighter and we promise if you do, we will serve
thee. Kind of a no brainer right
there. If he wanted the nation to be by
his side. Hey, just lower the taxes a
little bit more you know? Amen.
Lessen their load on work or stuff like that.
Real Boehm on the other hand, he says, OK, give me 3 days, come
back to me and I'll give you all an answer.
So he goes, those three days are happening.
And he finds consultants first from the ones who were with his
father, the advisors of his father.
Now the advisors of Solomon, they must have seen many things.
They must have seen how Solomon dealt with people, dealt with
money, dealt with all sorts of things.
So they knew a thing or two, let's say.
And he says, what should I do? What should I do with this that
the king, the Kingdom has asked of me?
They just, like, listen to them. It's not a bad request.
Yeah. Your father was hard on them.
They are worked. They're tired, They're hungry,
you know, lessen their load and you gain something out of it.
I mean, like, there's no, it's a win win.
He's like, all right. He takes it into advice, into
consideration. But what he does do, does next
is he asked a group of men who he grew up with, you know, close
friends, friends that will tell you what you want to hear,
probably at the wrong time, or just someone that like, hey, you
know what? You can do whatever you want.
He asked them, what should I do? And they're like, put a heavier
load. Show them that you're tough.
Show them that you're not messing around, that you're
going to be a strong king that fed his ego a little bit, I say.
So three days passed, the Kingdom comes back, and he says,
you know what? I'm going to make it heavier for
y'all. Instead of being whipped with
whips and everything, I'm gonna have scorpions on you, That's
what he says. And after that, the nation
splits. That shouldn't have happened.
Now many of us, I haven't even given out a title.
I am sorry. So the title is When Pride
Divided Kingdom and in honor of Jason Gaddis, I also did a
subtitle which says which voice are you listening to?
So we already know which voice real bomb listen to.
He listened to the wrong one. And because of that, the nation
of Israel split, something that if he was humbler, hum, if he
was humble and just did what the nation asked, could have made
them a lot stronger. Instead, because of his pride,
they got weak, they went astray, they split.
Now he was a leader. We have many leaders here, a
pastor, maybe a parent, maybe even someone that a little kid
looks up to, a boss. Maybe we have people who look up
to us. I know back in my home church I
have 3 kids that they have met called the Tonios.
They look up to me. I have to set an example.
I have to lead them in the correct way that they won't
fail. Rear Bohm had that same exact
duty, but what he did was feed into his pride.
What he did was wrong. What he did was just what he
wanted, not what the benefit was for everybody else.
Now we as leaders, we're going to have tests that come up into
our lives. It may be difficult times, maybe
something that happens, a random problem that you blindsided you
and you had no idea that was coming.
How are you going to respond? Are you going to be defensive
and argue back? Are you going to go seek
council? And if so, which council Now
Rear Bohm had all the opportunity to do that.
He had the council of the wisest king on earth and yet he ignored
them. He had people who knew things.
He had people who saw things. And if I could just say we have
a Bible that tells us what we should do, what we shouldn't do.
We have a path right here that we can listen to.
Not only that, we have prayer with God.
We have preachings every week. We have a pastor, y'all have a
pastor that teaches y'all preaches to you.
I'm sure he gives excellent counsel not because of him but
because of who he asked for. Now you may go to your friends
and be like, hey, what should I do?
And don't fit into your ego. Be careful with that.
Now Estuan was saying steps that we should take to be like King
Jeho Josiah. Right now.
I'm going to give y'all things what y'all should do that
Rehoboam should've so we don't turn out like him.
Four things. Number one, seek God first.
Every bomb, just imagine at that time where God was actually
speaking to people, every bomb actually went to God and say,
Hey God, what should I do? This is your, this is your
Kingdom. Like I am just governing it.
My place is replaceable, You can change me whenever you want.
What should I do? Don't you think God would have
told him what to do? Don't you think if you go ask
God right now we should do with this situation or that he won't
tell you or he won't show you #2 value wise counsel.
As I said, we have counsel all around us.
If it's in the Bible with God, our pastors, our friends who are
spiritual and well LED. I ask for dumb counsel all the
time and they give me man, but I can ask Pastor Gaddis, my father
who's a pastor, Brother Andrew, Albert, and even them because I
know their heart is in the correct place and they give me
good counsel. I'm not going to go ask friends
that I had in high school who are now drinking or now in bad
things or now doing things that I shouldn't even be doing.
Hey, what should I do with this? No value.
The wise counter you have. When I was a kid, my dad, he
would always Take Me Out to not dinner, to breakfast with him.
And he would go with the men of the church, all white hair, just
old. And every single time, right
before, right before we go into that diner or Denny's where we
usually went, he would tell me to listen to what they had to
say. Those white hairs aren't there
for just show. That's experience right there #3
reject pride quickly. Instead of proving to yourself
and to others, humble yourself, your servant.
If Jesus, who being, let's say, at the top of the food chain,
came down to earth and washed the feet of the disciples, how
much humbler do we have to be as Christians?
Think about that. And the last point, be
teachable. You do not know everything.
We have someone who does. We can ask them.
We can ask him. We can read his word.
But you don't know everything. You can learn for sure.
Yeah, It's no harm in learning. But once you start rejecting
like, oh, no, I don't need that. I don't need this.
I know what you're talking about.
I know what I have to do. You're going to fall.
You're going to do something that was wrong.
I've been there. Be teachable.
The quicker we realize that we don't know everything, the
better we can use and better we serve others.
We're just servants. You have to go through this
world, teach people when the Christ and we don't know what
they're going through. Sure, learn a little.
Listen, the only thing if y'all didn't pay attention to the
whole measure, the only thing I want y'all to hear and think
about for the OR that stays in your mind.
Be teachable. We're not God, obviously.
We don't even try to be like and we know what's something we
can't reach. But learn, learn how to do this.
Seek wise counsel. Seek God first and trust me, I'm
sure He's going to give you the answer so just put your feet in
Him, seek Him and try to be better.
Well, good evening, brothers and sisters.
What a blessing to be here. My name is Isaac Alvarez.
I'm from Harlem. Well, I'm from Mexico.
My home is in Mexico. My home church is in Mexico.
My dad is pastoring there for the last couple of years.
And I met, I was going to say Chucky, but I met Charles like
almost two years ago in Harlan. And it's been a blessing and
it's been a blessing and it's a blessing to be here tonight.
Now let's go to our Bibles. We don't have much time, so
let's go to our Bibles. Book of Psalms, the Book of
Psalms, chapter 48. And we're only going to read one
verse tonight, Psalm 48, verse 14.
The Bible says for this God is our God forever and ever.
He will be our guide even unto death.
Let's pray real quick. Heavenly Father, thank you for
this day. Thank you for your many
blessings. Lord, I need your help.
Please use me. Speak to us tonight, be with us,
give us a good time and just use me as I praise what you put,
what you have put in my heart. In Jesus name we pray, Amen.
You know, the whole Bible is very important, but there are
sometimes when you read your Bible and you read a verse and
it's like, man, what a verse, you know, like wow, You're like
wow. And when I was reading this
verse last year, that's what happened to me.
I was like, wow, what a verse, you know, let me read it one
more time. For for this God is our God
forever and ever. He will be our guide even unto
death. This is a sum that the sons of
Korah wrote many years ago. They were the people in charge
of the adoration, the music in the example, the the praise to
God. And they are writing here some a
chapter, you know, just to praise God, to glorify God for
the for his greatness, for his wonders.
And so this is the last verse of the chapter.
And they're saying for this God is our God, you know?
What I'm going to say. Next is honestly something that
we all know, but sometimes we need to be reminded of who our
God, who our God is. They were writing this for this
guy. Obviously they were talking
about the God of Israel, right? The God of Israel, the God who
created everything, the God who we can see in Genesis, who
created everything, who in chapter 12 of Genesis called
Abraham and made a covenant with him, the God of Abraham, Isaac
and Jacob, the God who later became the God of Israel.
And that God, they're saying for this God is our God, you know,
and, and obviously we know that hundreds of years after this,
after they wrote this, that he came as a baby to die and to
save us for the for this God is our God.
Like I said before, sometimes we just need to, we just need to be
reminded of who our God is. Because honestly, people today,
and I'm going to give the title now before I forget, if you, if
you see me looking at my phone, I'm don't worry, I'm not
watching a movie. I'm just, I'm just looking at my
notes, OK, I'm just looking at my notes.
And the title is very simple. The hope we have in him, the
hope we have in him. You know, people today, they
live without hope. People today they just live for
this life. They just live for, for their,
for their jobs, for money, for, I don't know, whatever things
are, they live for this life. And when this life is over, it's
over. But we as Christians, we know
that we have hope, that we have hope.
And it's not because of us, but it's because of him.
That's right. And so they start by saying this
first for this God, for this God is our God.
And we need to remember who our God is because you know, this
word is full of false religions, full of false gods.
People is just going behind before these gods that are not
even real. But we have the the real and the
truly God of Israel, the guy who created everything, who created
us and who saved us. And we have a real God and we
can we can trust him and we must be thankful and we must remember
this everyday and have this in mind because we have a real God
who is aware of us. He knows us and and then it says
forever the for these gods are God forever and ever.
You know, we have an eternal God.
We have a God that has been there since before creation.
We don't know all the details we can.
We don't really can't comprehend it all these because our minds
are so limited, but we know that he's been there since ever and
he'll be there forever and we have an eternal God.
You know that once he, once he's your God, I want to say this,
he'll be your God forever. Now, how can he become our God?
Well, we know that through salvation we can accept him in
our heart, in our lives, and he becomes our God, our God.
And once he's your God, honestly, he will be your God
forever because he's an eternal God.
That's the idea of salvation. Salvation.
We don't do salvation. Salvation is forever.
And we know that we have a God that he'll that that is going to
be our God forever. And I love the last.
Phrase of the verse He will be our guide even unto death.
We know that when the Bible talks about something that is
eternal, something that is forever, he's not talking just
about this life. We know that when the Bible
talks about something that is eternal, he's talking even, you
know, when it comes to what happens after this life, because
we know that one day we're we are going to die.
We all are going to physically die, but our souls are going to
go to 1 of to one or two places. And if you're saved by the grace
of God, we know that we're going to heaven.
And so he. Will lead us you.
Know this last, this last phrase, He will be our guide
even unto death. It makes me think it makes me
think we live in a world that is like full of confusion.
You know, people is just trying to to to find what to do, trying
to find the guide, trying to find a religion, a church, some
religious leader that can guide them and they're trying to find
something to follow. But we know that we have the
real God and what I hope is or issue be for us to know that God
is our guide and he promised here.
We know that here are the sons of chorus speaking, but we know
that. We know for His word.
That he promised us to be our God in our in our guide in our
lives. So this is not just an issue
about this life, but this is even about after this life
because we know that the death is not the end.
We know that after this life he will even continue being our
God. And this is something to be
thankful for. This is something that we are,
that we need to remember everything, something that we
really are not to forget never, because this is a blessing.
And this as Christians, this is our hope.
You know, like I said before, people today is without hope.
They live without hope. And we have this hope.
We are nothing. We don't really deserve this.
We don't really. We are just simple human beings,
simple human beings. But we have a great God that,
that is eternal and that, and that is going to be our God
forever. And just real quick, I think
there are two things that we should do after, after, you
know, after reading this verse #1 we must be, like I said
before, we must be thankful. We must be thankful because we
don't, we don't really deserve this.
We don't really deserve God. What we deserve, the Bible says,
is we just deserve to die because of our sins.
We deserve hell. But God is so merciful, He saved
us and he became our God. So we must be thankful.
We must be thankful and, and we must be thankful for his
direction, for his guidance in our lives, even for the whole
eternity, right? And #2 I think we must share
this beautiful message with other people because it's like
if someone was, it's like a person that is sick and he's
trying to find the, the, the medicine, the cure.
And we have the cure. We have the medicine that that
is God himself. And we, we can't be the selfish
that we won't share this with other people.
We have the real God. And people, like I said before,
are trying to find their, their, their guidance, their God in
false religions, in the other churches, maybe, I don't know,
but they're whatever they can. Anything can be an idol, an idol
and they're trying to find other God in those things.
But we have, we either have the real God that truly God, we must
share this, this beautiful message with other people.
We, we must share this hope with other people because this is
something that we are, this is what we are supposed to do.
That's why that's why God saved us to share this with other
people and and to bring people to to him.
Amen. So I know it's something very
simple, but I do want to remind you and I just want to make like
a reminder for you. Just Remember, Remember who your
God is and you know, if you're not safe, well, make sure that
you're safe because this life is, this life is going to end
one day. We don't know when, but he wants
to be your guide. And if he's your guide, well, be
thankful and share it with other people.
Amen. All righty well.
Man, I'm glad we're not competing here.
Amen. Yeah, these guys.
Are good. Well, my name is Charles.
Do I say it faster? All right, also, Chuck, you guys
know me by, but I'm thankful to be here all the time.
It's such a blessing. It's so sorry about yes, Sir,
and so such a blessing to be here.
But I want to take your Bibles and let's open up to the
beginning Genesis. We're going to be in Genesis
chapter 12 Justice chapter 12. I've restarted my Bible reading
since it's a new year and I was in the book of Mark, but I
wanted to wanted to jump back from the beginning.
And so I'm thankful for God's Word.
It changes lives and it's changed all of our lives.
And so I'm very thankful for that.
So Genesis 12, just before Genesis 12 arrives, we see Tara,
Abraham's father, is taking Abram, excuse me, Abram, Sarah
and Lot, and to this land of earth from this land of Ur, and
he's taking them into the land of Canaan.
And so we jump into verse, or excuse me, verse 1, chapter 12.
And the Bible says, Now the Lord had said unto Abram, Get thee
out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father's
house into a land, that I will show thee.
And I will make of thee a great nation, and I will bless thee,
and make thy name great, and thou shalt be a blessing.
And I'll bless them that bless thee, and curse him that curseth
thee. And in thee shall all families
of the earth be blessed. So a great promise that the Lord
is making to Abram right here, and continues on.
And verse 4 says, So Abram departed as the Lord had spoken
unto him, and Lot went with him. And Abram was 70 and five years
old when he departed out of Heron.
And Abram took Sarah his wife, and Lot his brother's son, and
all their substance that they had gathered, and all the souls
that they had gotten in Haran, and they went forth to go into
the land of Canaan. And into the land of Canaan they
came. And Abram passed through the
land into the place of Shicam, and to the plate the plain of
Moray. And the Canaanite was then in
the land. And the Lord appeared unto
Abram. Now catch this.
The Lord appeared unto Abram and said Unto thy seed, will I give
this land, and there build it. He an altar unto the Lord, who
appeared unto him in verse 8. And he removed from thence unto
a mountain on the east of Bethel, and pitched his tent,
having Bethel on the West. And I've been trying to
pronounce this high or hey, I on the east.
And there he builded an altar unto the Lord, and he called
upon the name of the Lord. Let's pray and we'll get into
the message. Father in heaven, thank you so
much for this opportunity. I also thank pastor for this
opportunity as well. Lord, and I just want to preach
your word. God helping me to be sound.
Lord, give us the words to speak tonight, Lord, as you've already
done, Lord, so help us, Lord, as we've heard so many messages,
Lord Josiah, and so many messages about you, Lord,
knowing who you are and that you're our God forever as well.
And so, Lord, I just pray that you be with us, help us.
And Lord, let us be an encouragement to these folks
today, in Jesus name, Amen. I've been starting to try to.
Preach with my iPad. I think I'm going to go back to
handwriting because it's kind of kind of weird.
But like I said, I'm thankful to be here.
And you know, Harlan's been a great encouragement.
So we want to, we've been trying to preach expository.
So really, really nailing the text here.
And so I want to do that. We only got a short amount of
time, so let's do that tonight. And so here, as I mentioned in
verse 31, Tara took Abram his son and as well as Sarai and
Abram's wife and law as well. And they were from the land of
ER and now they're moving into the land of Canaan.
And so we have this transition. So they got this journey, but
Tara eventually dies. He was 205 years old when he had
passed away. And so now the Lord has made
mention to Abram that he is going to to bless him.
He is going to make him a great nation.
He's going to, he's going to, he's making promises to Abram
here. And and Abram, what it says in
verse 4 is that he departed and listened to the Lord because God
had told him to leave everything that he had leave his land and
depart. And so that's what Abram does
and the Lord had spoken unto him.
But if you jump down to verse 7, this is just a fascinating verse
that I found interesting and the devotional time.
And it says, And the Lord appeared unto Abram, and said,
Unto thy seed, will I give this land?
And there buildeth he an altar unto the Lord, who appeared unto
him. So we see that this altar was
Abram being. Abram was building.
And so this altar was very significant.
It was a place of stones. He had unhewn stones on top of
each other, and he made that his altar.
Now the altar, it was very purposeful.
It was very meaningful. It was a place of acknowledging
who God was. It was a place of submission,
devotion. It was a place of crying out to
the Lord, if you will. He was crying out to the Lord.
And so we see that in verse 7. But it's fascinating because he
didn't just build an altar, He built it unto the Lord.
OK, so now let's let's get this straight, that the altar needs
to be unto the Lord. And so I love what my brother
Isaac said. You know, there's a lot of false
gods out there, there's a lot of religions and a lot of things
straying us. But our altar needs to be built
unto the Lord. And so and so we see that not to
false gods, not to people. I love this because it talks
about God's promises. And so he builds it because God
has been so good to him, because God has given him all the
substance that he's gathered now.
And so all these things that Abram has.
And look at how much you have blessed me, Lord, with all the
promises yet. And yeah, I'm going to build an
altar for you. And then if you jump down to
verse 8 it says and he removed from thence.
Onto a mountain on the east of Bethel.
So he's moving here and pitches having Bethel on the West.
So Bethel is down here, and we have Heyai on the top.
And so he's in between. And so he sees on the east.
And there he builded an altar. OK, so he built an altar into
the Lord, and he's building an altar into the Lord.
But notice this. And he called upon the name of
the Lord. So at first, he builded.
The altar because God had appeared unto him.
But now notice how how the wording has changed here, how
he's building an altar, but he's calling upon the Lord.
And so not only was there a physical work being done, but
there was a spiritual work. The physical work was that he
was building this altar. He was serving the Lord, He was
working for the Lord. He was heavy in heavy labor for
the Lord building this altar. But notice the spiritual side of
things that he called upon the Lord as as work being done for
him. So physically Abram built an
altar using his hands, hard labor, manual service the Lord,
and effort to do what pleases the Lord.
And spiritually we see that Abram used this altar he built
to call upon the name of his God.
This was a spiritual sacrifice with which God is well pleased,
built an altar for himself to meet God.
I love this altar. I love I love when pastor comes
and he says at the end where he says, come, come to the altar,
right, That invitation come, come, meet God and go speak to
him. Go commune with him.
I think, I think as Christians we can take that for granted and
I'm just going to raise my hand and I take it for granted at
times, I think I think the altar is a place of significance.
I think there's, I think there's great power when you come down
and kneel at the altar and meet God right where you are, right
where you needed, where where you need to be.
And I think there's just great power in that.
And I think we can make our altars, our chairs.
I think we can make our altars maybe kneeling down at the
bedside or, or I think you can make your altar wherever you
want to make your altar. And so we see that Abram built
his his altar unto the Lord and he goes again in verse 8 and he
builds an altar until the Lord and we see that that physical
side where he's building it, but also calling it to the Lord
spiritually. And so and then we drop down to
chapter 13. If you would turn there with me,
we're just going to read a little bit more.
And I think this is where I want to, I want to park because I
think this is very, very helpful for us and.
It says in chapter 13. Verse 1 And Abram went up out of
Egypt, he and his wife in all that he had, and Lot with him
into the South. And Abram was very rich in
cattle, in silver, and in gold. And he went on his journeys from
the South, even to Bethel, until the place where his tent had
been at the beginning between Bethel and Hei to the place of
the altar which he had made there.
At the first there Abram called on the name of the Lord.
And we'll read verse 5 as well. And Lot also, which went with
Abram, had flocks and herds and tents.
Now I noticed this is pretty fascinating that Abram went out
of Egypt here himself and his wife, and he also had Lot with
them and he was bringing them to this place where he had already
made his altar. And so it's fascinating because
he brought him, he he. So Abram had brought Sarai, his
wife, and Lot as well to the altar, but the Bible never says
that they went to the altar and. We've got to read the context.
Here because it's fascinating, because he brought them to the
place, but they never went with them, never went to the altar
with them. When you build your altar, be
sure to bring people with you. And so we see that Abram is
bringing Abram, is bringing Sarai and Lot with them.
But the text never mentions that Sarai and Lot partook and going
to the altar, but it does say that he brought them along.
And I think it's fascinating because sometimes we bring
people to church, sometimes we tell people about the gospel,
Sometimes we try to just be encouragement while we're on
this journey where we're trying to just do so much, trying to
serve the Lord in so many ways and a different avenues and such
as that. But there's people that just
don't want to go. There's people that don't want
to go to the altar with you, maybe to pray.
There's people that maybe you invite to church and they don't
come right? And it can be discouraging, but
notice how Abram went to the altar.
Abram still, Abram still chose to go to the altar that he built
so he can commune with God, so he can devote himself, submit
himself, just spend time with God and just draw close to God.
And it's fascinating because anything, anything that Abram
did, I mean, God, God blessed him in so many ways, all the
promises he made. And yet Abram still chose to go
to God, right? Regardless of what the people's
response was, he still chose to go with God.
And I think, as you know, we wrap up here, I just believe
that, you know, we need to make this altar a place that we go to
that it's not just here, you know, like Abram made a stack of
stones. This is, you know, you could say
it looks like a step, but it's an altar.
It's an altar. It's a place where we can meet
with God and we can come and we can commune with them.
You know, if it's at your house or wherever at your seat, we can
make this place an altar. And so let's be encouraged today
because there's a lot of churches out there that don't
have altars. There's a lot of churches that
have almost abused God's grace and have made light shows and
made sound speakers up here and all this.
I mean, so many. It's so unbiblical.
But yet Abram made an altar and he used it.
And I think as Christians, as believers, we ought to use the
altar and so be encouraged today to just pray to God and commune
to him because there's purpose to the altar.
Thank you for listening to the sermon from the.
Pulpit of Liberty Baptist Church If this message was a blessing
to you, or if there's any way we can serve you, please let us
know by contacting us at info@mylibertybaptist.org.
Or you can visit us this Sunday at 800 Washington St. in Easton,
MA. May the Lord bless you as you
grow in His Word.