Old Testament in a Year: Genesis 18-29

A few weeks ago, during the holidays, my youngest son and I and my brother, my son in law, were attending a Hornets game. It's the first time I've been to a Hornets game in a while. When we came out after the game, we went into the parking deck where my son had parked his car, and we discovered somebody had done a dash and grab, a smash and grab, pardon me, on my son's car. The back window on the driver's side smashed it out. Nothing visible inside the car, nothing of great value, but they smashed the window, made a huge mess, created a lot of expense for us.

I had to call, make an appointment for somebody to come and replace the back window. And when I did, they said, well, we can come on such and such a day. They gave me a day. And then, you know how they do. They gave me a window of time.

Would you rather have 8 to 12? Would you rather have 12 to 4? Give me a window? And I got it. I expected that.

But then on the day of the appointment, the repair person himself called me and said, hey, it looks like I'm gonna be at your house at whatever the time was, 10:30. And I'm like, well, that helps a lot. Like, that's a big difference from 8 to 12, knowing it's gonna be around 10:30. And then as it got closer to time, the repairman called me again and he said, hey, it looks like it's gonna be at this time. And then he gave me a way that I could actually track his location so I would know when he was actually 10 minutes out from arriving at my house.

That was awesome. I have Amazon prime where we order stuff on Amazon, like I'm sure many of you do, and they tell you your package is going to arrive on this day and it's going to be around this particular time. Would it be great if the promises of God worked the same way? Come on. Would anybody appreciate that if, like, when God makes a promise to us, God says, hey, by the way, on February 18, the promise is going to be delivered to you.

But how many of you know that's not the way it happens with the promises of God? Why? Because God doesn't operate on our timetable. God operates on Cairo's time. Cairo's time is the appointed time of God based on his sovereignty and based on his wisdom.

Sometimes that might be days, sometimes that's weeks, sometimes it's months. And as many of us know, sometimes that's years. That's even decades at times. Today we're talking about the promises of God. We're looking at a chunk of scripture.

We're walking through the Old Testament, the entire year of 2026, going through the Old Testament. We're taking these big blocks of scripture. And the reason we're doing that is I shared on week one was because there's 1189 chapters in the Bible. So if we took one chapter a week, it would take us about 22 and a half years to get through the entire Bible. That's why we're taking big chunks, big blocks of scripture.

Today we're looking at Genesis chapter 18 through chapter 29. And let me tell you, it's not just a collection of stories. What we find there in these chapters we're going to look at in a moment is a reminder to us of this truth that God always keeps his word and he always fulfills his promises. If you believe that, say Amen today. And these chapters cover decades of waiting, moments of failure, deep grief, radical faith, and quiet obedience.

And through all of it, what we're going to see is that God keeps His promises moving forward throughout the course of time. He's a faithful Father. There are three truths that we see from these chapters that I want to share to you today. The notes are in the app. These truths are there in the app today, but three really important truths for you and I to understand when it relates to the promises of God.

And the first one is this, that a delay does not mean a denial or a defeat. Come on. Has anybody discovered that when God makes a promise that oftentimes there's a delay until we see the fulfillment of the promise? You see, we get a promise from God and we just make up our minds that, you know, we kind of figure out when it's going to happen or when we think it should happen, when we think God's going to come through. And what's the ideal time?

What's the ideal moment for God to fulfill his promise? And what I've discovered in my life is that oftentimes there is a delay to the fulfillment of the promise of God. And many people interpret that as God saying, no, you know what, I didn't really mean that, or I changed my mind, or I just wanted to kind of get your hopes up so I could just crush you into delay. No, God doesn't operate that way. But some people think God's saying no to that promise or it's just a defeat because of the delay.

We're never going to see the fulfillment of the promise. I know we're talking about Genesis 18, but we're going to briefly go back to Genesis 15 for a moment. And I talked about this two weeks ago when I preached online about the covenant that God made with this guy by the name of Abram. And when he did that, he tells Abram, I want you to go outside, I want you to look up, it's at nighttime. He says, I want you to count all of the stars that are in the heavens.

Of course that's impossible task to do. But the point that God was making was, and this is what he said to Abram, he said, you're gonna have children and descendants that are gonna outnumber the stars in the heavens. And then as we fast forward to chapter 17, Abram is 99 years old. And he tells him the same thing again. He says, you're going to be the father of many nations.

And later in the chapter, God tells him that Sarai's name is going to be changed to Sarah, Abram's name is changed to Abraham, and that even though Sarah is 90 years old, she'll become the mother of many nations. And Abram, or Abraham now laughs to himself because he's almost 100 at the time. Now, chapter 18, beginning in verse one, we see some really interesting things that begin to unfold. It says this and the Lord appeared again to Abraham near the oak road belonging to Mamre. And one day Abraham was sitting at the entrance to his tent during the hottest part of the day.

He looked up and he noticed three men standing nearby. And when he saw them, he ran to meet them and he welcomed them, bowing low to the ground. And then we discover that Abraham was a good old southern boy. Because Abraham says, hey, let's throw some burgers on the grill. Y' all stick around for a little while.

Let's have a meal together. Doesn't really say that in scripture. I'm just joking with you. But in my southern brain that's kind of what happened. Abraham says, hey man, let's share a meal.

Let's hang out together to these three strangers. And then we pick it up in verse nine. And they say to him, where is Sarah, your wife? The visitors ask. She's inside the tent, Abraham replied.

Then one of them said, I'll return to you about this time next year and your wife, 90 year old wife Sarah, will have a son. Sarah was listening to this conversation from the tent. Abraham and Sarah were both very old by this time, and Sarah was long past the age of having children. Hey, listen to me real quick. One of the things that's so important for you And I to understand about the promises of God are that the promises of God are not limited to the laws of nature.

Come on, are you hearing me today? Like, we want to limit God. We want to relegate God to the laws of nature and say, well, that's impossible. 90 years old, past the age of childbearing. And the thing about God, and we see it all through scripture, when it comes to nature or waves or parting an ocean or whatever it might be, God is not limited to the laws of nature.

And when it comes to the promises that he makes to you and I, he's always faithful, even if it supersedes the laws of logic or nature.

Sarah laughs to herself just like Abraham did when she hears that she's sitting inside the tent. I'm going to return this time next year, they say to Abraham and Sarah. 90 year old Sarah is going to have a son. She's going to hold a son, her arms. And she laughs.

She's not laughing in faith, going, ha, ha ha, oh man, that's wonderful. Now she's laughing in disbelief because she thinks that the delay of the promise of God, and she's heard this now for almost 25 years, and that delay for her either became a denial, like, no, God's saying no, or it's a defeat. So she laughs in disbelief. She's held on maybe in the first few weeks, maybe in the first few months, maybe even for a few years, Sarah was full of faith. I'm gonna have a baby.

I'm trusting God. I know I'm beyond the age of childbearing, but God's gonna do this. And then when a year turns into 2 years and 5 years and 10 years and decades go by, all of a sudden Sarah is laughing in disbelief because now she sees this as a total defeat. There's no way, no way this is going to happen. Because in her mind, it's over.

Biologically, it's over. Socially, it's over. Logically, it's over. But then we find arguably one of the most powerful questions in the entire bible in verse 13 and 14. Then the Lord said to Abraham, why did Sarah laugh?

Why did she say, can an old woman like me have a baby? Here's the question, is anything too hard for God? Hey, we need to pause for a moment because there are some of you believing God and you've been believing God for a long time for a breakthrough or for a miracle or for healing or for the salvation of a loved one. And I think God wants us to come face to face with that Question today, and I think God wants us to answer. Is anything too hard for God?

Is that loved one that you're praying for? Are they beyond the reach of God's grace? Is that miracle that you need in your body? Is it too difficult for the Lord to touch you and heal you? It's the job that you're believing for too hard for God?

Answer the question today. Is anything too hard for God? And then they say, I will return about this time next year, and Sarah again will have a son. And the problem for so many of us is that we often interpret the delay as a denial or as a defeat. We lose faith in the process, waiting for the promise of God to be fulfilled.

I need to remind you today, and I want you to hear your pastor, God's delays are not denials. They're not defeats. But let me tell you what they often are. They are often a season of preparation for the miracle. Come on.

Are y' all with me today? Hey, listen, we haven't been together for two weeks. You ought to be a lot more excited and a lot more vocal about the word of God than what you're showing right now. I need somebody to make a little bit of noise and recognize that God is faithful today.

We've all experienced delays, but it doesn't mean that God's changed his mind. It doesn't mean that you didn't hear him correctly. It doesn't mean that you're defeated in this. It might just mean that God is just preparing you for the miracle. Here's the second truth.

Remember, I told you there are three. Second truth is this. God's promises are protected. They are supernaturally and divinely protected. Now, we know that from the time that a promise is given until the fulfillment of the promise, many people lose faith.

Many people grow tired. They grow frustrated. They eventually give up, or worse, they take matters into their own hands. And that's what we see from scripture. Oftentimes, I've done it, you've done it.

We become frustrated. We become weary. We lose faith, we lose heart. And we decide God must need my help to figure out how to make this promise happen. So we jump in, we say, well, I can figure this out.

And that's what Abraham and Sarah do. Let's look together in chapter 18 or, pardon me, back to chapter 16, verse one. Now, Sarai Abram's wife had not been able to bear children for him, but she had an Egyptian servant named Hagar. Years have gone by since God gave the promise. Abram, count the stars.

Your children are Going to outnumber them. Count the grains of sand on the beach. Your children are going to outnumber them. Years go by, years. And all of a sudden that delay in their minds somehow becomes a denial or defeat.

Now watch what happens. So Sarah, Sarai said to Abram, the Lord has prevented me from having children. Go and sleep with my servant. Perhaps I can have children through her. That's a man made solution.

And Abram agreed with Sarai's proposal. So Sarai, Abraham's or Abram's wife, took Hagar, the Egyptian servant and gave her to Abram as a wife. This happened 10 years after Abram had settled in the land of Canaan. So Abram had sexual relations with Hagar and she became pregnant. What did they do?

Well, I can tell you one thing they did. They created a mess. Because Abram and Sarai, at some point, through discouragement, through frustration, through disbelief, decided, oh, God must need our help in figuring out a way to make this promise become a reality. So what did they do? They created a man made solution.

They came up with this idea. Now watch the results of this. We go on to read in verse 11 and 12. And the angel also said, now the angel is speaking to the maidservant. You are now pregnant and will give birth to a son.

You're to name him Ishmael, which means God hears, for the Lord has heard your cry of distress. This son of yours will be a wild man, as untamed as a wild donkey. He will raise his fist against everyone and everyone will be against him. Yes, he will live in open hostility against all his relatives. Now one thing I want to point out to you is that even though this was a man made solution, even though Abraham and Sarai stepped outside of the boundaries of faith and created what they thought was going to bring about the promise of God, even though that happened and Ishmael is born, God did not reject Ishmael.

In fact, God made sure that Ishmael was cared for. But I want you to notice this. Out of that decision, out of that one act on the part of Abram and Sarai, the entire nation of Islam was born. The entire nation of Islam came through Ishmael. And what was said about that son that would be born, what was said about Ishmael has come true to this day.

The angels said to Hagar, he will be a wild donkey. He will raise his fist against all of his relatives. And that's exactly what we see happening played out today. The nation of Islam opposing the people of God. The nation of Islam raising its fist against the one true God, against divinity, against the man, Jesus.

And because of that one act of saying God must need our help. Now look what it has created in the earth. But then stay with me. Genesis 21. God gives the promised son Isaac to Abraham and Sarai.

God's promises. Listen to me. I'm so grateful for this. God's promises were not based on Abraham's consistency, but they were based on God's character. Come on, let me say that again.

You missed it. That was a good chance for you to say Amen. God's promises are not based on our consistency because we oftentimes shortcut the plan of God. We oftentimes come up with our own human solution and ideas to help God fulfill the promise. But thank God that his promises are not based on our consistency, but they're based on his character and based on the fact that what he says will come to pass.

Come on, somebody say Amen then. In Genesis 22, we're talking about the protection of the promises of God. Many of you are familiar with the story. God instructs Abraham to take his long awaited son. 25 years waiting for the promise, waiting for the fulfillment.

And watch what happens in Genesis 22, verse 1. Sometime later, God tested Abraham's faith. Abraham, God called. Yes, he replied. Here I am watching.

Take your son, your only son. Yes, Isaac, whom you love so much. The promise of descendants that would outnumber the stars. Take that guy, that son, 25 years in the making. That would be the vehicle where all the nations would come.

The descendants that would outnumber the grains of sand on the beach. Yes, Isaac, whom you love so much, go to the land of Moriah. Go and sacrifice him. Sacrifice him as a burnt offering on one of the mountains, which I will show you. Watch this in verse three.

Incredible faith on the part of Abraham. The next morning Abraham got up early, saddled his donkey, took two of his servants with him, along with his son Isaac. Then he chopped wood for a fire, for a burnt offering, and he set out for the place that God had told him about. On the third day of their journey, Abraham looked up and he saw the place in the distance. Watch.

Verse 5. Stay here with the donkey, Abraham told the servants. The boy and I will travel a little farther. Watch. We will worship there and then we will come right back.

What a statement of faith. Abraham, who without hesitation takes the long awaited promise of God and is walking him up a three day journey to the top of a mountain, somehow believing God's gonna do something different. God's gonna do something supernatural. I'm gonna obey God, even if it doesn't make sense. And he's walking Isaac.

Now, we don't know how old Isaac is at the moment, but we know he's not an infant. He's not an eight month old infant. He can walk, he can talk, he can carry a bundle of wood on his shoulders. And there they are, just near the top of the mountain. And Abraham makes one of the greatest statements of faith in the entire Bible when he says to his servants, stay right here.

We're gonna go a little further. We are gonna go up there and worship and then we will come back. I don't know how it's gonna happen. I don't know what God's gonna do, but we are going to come back. Because I know my God.

I know the promise that he's made to us. And I know somehow, somehow God will do a miracle. Now watch what happens. So Abraham placed the wood for the burnt offering on Isaac's shoulders while he himself carried the fire and the knife. And as the two of them walked on together, Isaac turned to Abraham and said, father?

Yes, my son Abraham replied, we have the fire and the wood. The boy said, something's missing. Where's the sheep for the sacrifice?

We got everything we need but one vital piece to this whole thing playing out. We don't have an animal for the sacrifice.

God will provide a sheep for the burnt offering, my son Abraham answered. And they both walked on together. And when they arrived at the place where God had told him to go, Abraham built an altar, arranged the wood on it, and then he laid his son Isaac, and he tied his son Isaac and laid him on the altar on top of the wood. And Abraham picked up the knife to kill his son as a sacrifice. Still in faith, still trusting somehow God not going to take away the thing that he promised at that moment.

Has the knife above his head? The angel of the Lord called to him from heaven. Abraham. Abraham. Yes, yes, here I am.

Don't lay a hand on the boy, the angel said. Do not hurt him in any way. For now I know that you truly fear God. What is a mark in our lives that that would indicate that we fear the Lord? Let me tell you what it is.

Obedience.

Obedience, he says. Now I know that you truly fear God. You've not withheld from me even your son, your only son. And then Abraham looked up and he saw a ram caught by its horns in a thicket. And so he took the ram, sacrificed it as a burnt offering in place of his son.

Abraham named the place Yahweh Yairah, which means the Lord will provide. Let me tell you what I've done many times in my life and let me tell you what probably some of you have done in those moments that require great faith, in those moments that defy logic and reason. When God calls us to step out, when God calls us to do something radical. Oftentimes what I've done in my life is the closer that I've gotten to the top of the mountain and have not yet seen the provision of God. I take matters into my own hands and I think, well, God must need for me to find the sacrifice.

And had Abraham done that, he would have missed the divine provision of the Lord which was a ram caught in the thicket. God, I'm believing you for a miracle. I'm believing you for a healing. I'm believing you for a husband or for a wife. And the closer we get to the age that we think we should be married, the more tempting it is for us to come up with a man made solution.

Just start dating anybody because we want to be married rather than waiting for the ram that's caught in the thicket. God, I need a new job. And the closer we get to the severance running out, the closer we get to the end of the job that we currently have. We decide God must need my help so I'll come up with a man made solution and we miss the ram caught in the thicket. What God wants you and I to do is to stay in faith and not get in fear.

What God desires for us to do is to believe and trust that he's faithful to his word and and he always fulfills his promises. And that at some point, even though it might be last minute, there's a ram caught in the thicket for you, there's the provision of God waiting for you. But if we don't give time for the plan of God to play out or to unfold, what we end up doing is creating an ishmael. What we end up doing is creating a man made solution that has a lifetime of ramifications for us. Are y' all with me today?

I said, are y' all with me today? Here's a question for you. What do we trust more? Do we trust the promise given or do we trust the promise giver?

Let me ask it again. What do you trust more? Do you trust the promise given or do you trust the promised giver? Listen. On Mount Moriah, God spared Abraham's son Isaac 2,000 years later, on that same mountain, God would not spare his son Jesus, but gave him up for you and I. Isaac carried the wood.

Jesus carried the cross.

Abraham said, God will provide the lamb to his son Isaac. And John the Baptist said, behold the Lamb of God who takes away the sin of the world. The promise was protected. The promise of Isaac was protected because God knew that Jesus would be given for you and I. And if God will fulfill that promise, he can handle whatever it is that concerns you today.

Here's the last thing. The promises of God are generational. A delay doesn't mean a denial doesn't mean a defeat. The promises of God are protected, sovereignly protected, divinely protected by Him. And the last thing that we need to understand, the last thing that's so vital for you and I, is to realize it's not just about you, but the promises of God affect the generations after us.

Genesis 23. We find these words, verses one through four. When Sarah was 127 years old, she died at Kiriath Arba, now called Hebron, in the land of Canaan. And there, Abraham mourned and wept for her. And then, leaving her body, he said to the Hittite elders, here I am, a stranger and a foreigner among you.

Watch. He's in a foreign land. He's in a distant land. He's in the land of Canaan now. It's not where he was raised.

It's not where he spent the majority of his life. Now he's in this foreign land. But watch what he says. Please sell me a piece of land so I can give my wife a proper burial. Even in his grief, Abraham knows that the promises of God are not just meant for him, but they would affect the generations after him.

So watch what he does. He buys the first piece of land of what would be known as the Promised Land. Because he was that sure. Even when covered in darkness by grief, Abraham was that sure that the promise that God had made to him was not just about him, it was about all the generations. So he says, while I'm alive, I'm gonna do whatever I can to secure the promises of God.

Even if I never see it myself. I want to secure the promises of God for the future generations. So here I am in a foreign land. Let me buy a piece of land so I can bury my wife. And then in Genesis 24, as Abraham is growing much older, nearing death, he sends his servant to find a godly wife or son, Isaac, knowing that the promises of God would be carried out through him and through all of his descendants.

God was aligning the next generation through Abraham. And here's the point. I've said this many, many times to you, but it's so important, it's worth repeating. And it says that our obedience and our disobedience always has a ripple effect. It's never just about you.

It's never just about what God has spoken to you. There's always a ripple effect for the generations that will come after us because the promises of God outlive us. And your obedience today is critical for the next generation. The greatest promise ever made, salvation through Jesus, has already been fulfilled. And listen, if God kept that promise, he can be trusted with the rest.

If God kept the promise of salvation, the promise of bringing a lamb that would take away the sin of the world. A promise that would say, when this lamb's blood is shed, you don't have to bring animals into the temple anymore because he will be the final sacrifice for you and I. God kept his word. God was true to that promise. And if he did that by giving up his only son, God can handle anything that you need healing.

He's got you financial provision. He's got you the salvation of a loved one. He's got you miracle in your body. He's got new job. He's got you whatever it is.

But the reality is there might be some of you. You've been waiting for the fulfillment of a promise. You thought maybe days, weeks, you thought months. Then you began to think, well, this year. And that year rolled into another year.

You began to think next year. It rolled into five years, rolled into a decade. And maybe some of you today have grown frustrated. Maybe you've grown weary. Maybe in your mind the delay is a denial.

Scott, saying no, change my mind. Or maybe in your mind the delay is a defeat. Maybe you've already quit, you've already given up. It's never going to happen. It's never going to come true.

That person's never going to get saved. I'm never going to have the financial freedom that I thought I was going to have. I'm never going to be healed of this disease or of this pain in my body. And in your mind, the delay represents a defeat. Or maybe in your frustration, maybe in the waiting, maybe you have decided God must need my help.

I'll create a plan. I'll figure something out to move the promise along. And the reality is, and God wants to remind you today, he doesn't need your help.

He's sovereign. His timing is perfect. He knows what you need. And he knows when you need it. What he calls you and I to do is to just trust Him.

There's a powerful scripture in Hebrews, chapter 10, verse 23. The scripture says this Let us hold firmly to the hope. We have confessed. And oftentimes that confession is the loudest and the strongest when the promise is first given. I believe new Job's coming, healing's on its way.

I'm going to be married one day. I'm going to have children one day. Whatever we confess. But then, over time, the confession becomes quieter, less frequent, less full of faith. But here's what the writer of Hebrews says.

Let us hold fast. Let us hold firmly to that confession that's come out of our lips, because we can trust God to do what he promised.