3. Abraham’s Vision
Read 15:1-6. Who does this once again put as the aggressor, and what does it show us? (LORD – grace.)
Dream vs. Vision = (one while sleeping – other while awake.)
What two things did God promise Abram?
1. (shield) (protection)
2. (reward) (preservation)
So how does God deal with fear? (with promises.)
What does this show us about God’s attitude towards fear? (doesn’t want us to run our lives driven by fear – yet our sinful nature has no choice but to fear.)
If you find yourself fearing . . . (go back to God’s promises.)
What seemed to be making Abram afraid? (his not having a child yet. WILLING TO EXPRESS HIS FEARS with God.)
Consider Abram’s life up to this point and then look at vs. 2. How might this surprise you? What does it show you about Abram’s focus? (didn’t matter if he had the whole world without Jesus – all of that mattered nothing.)
Luke 15: 8-9 Suppose a woman has ten silver coins and loses one. Does she not light a lamp, sweep the house and search carefully until she finds it? And when she finds it, she calls her friends and neighbors together and says, 'Rejoice with me; I have found my lost coin.'
How did Abraham sadly try to interpret God’s promise to him? (symbolic – not literal – through his servant – not actually through his flesh.)
How did the LORD become more precise in His promise? (coming from your own body.)
Imagine the thought of vs. 5. (The Milky Way has 100 billion or so stars in it. At one a second it would take you 33 years to count a billion - there are an estimated 100 billion galaxies - at least a billion.)
How did Abraham respond in vs. 6?
What significance was this for Abraham? (the LORD credited it to him as righteousness.)
The word for “credited” is the Hebrew CHASHAV – it means “to think, esteem, make a judgment, count.” “Righteousness” means “being right with God.”
This is why we call justification a “forensic” act. It is a declaration of the judge on behalf of the person on trial. Why couldn’t we call Abram’s faith his own work? (God created it by giving him promises and appearing to him in the first place.)
This is the verse that Paul uses as the key in the doctrine of justification by faith in Romans 4 and Galatians 3. Let’s briefly look at them.
(Romans 4 – note vs. 3 – then vs. 5 says God even justifies the WICKED based on David’s Psalm / note then vs. 17-19)
(Galatians 3:6-8 – God FORESAW and had it written.)
Here we see how . . . (all of the Scriptures hold together – saved the same way throughout time and eternity.)
Read Genesis 15:7-11. Who else asked questions as to whether the LORD would fulfill His promise to them? (Mary and Zechariah – know that Abraham’s question must have followed with Mary and not with Zechariah.)
The LORD answered Abram in the form of a . . . (Chaldean covenant – Abraham grew up first 75 years under their culture.)
We see a similar rite
take place in Jeremiah 34:8-18.
Note how . . . (Abraham does what the LORD tells him to – then has to wait for the LORD to come to him – the LORD comes through sacrifice.)
Read 12-16.
The darkness represented
How do you harmonize this figure with that in Exodus
12:40, “Now the length of time the Israelite people lived in
The long delay is further explained in -
Exodus
Exodus 12:35-36 The Israelites did as Moses instructed and asked the Egyptians for articles of silver and gold and for clothing. The LORD had made the Egyptians favorably disposed toward the people, and they gave them what they asked for; so they plundered the Egyptians.
Note also vs. 16. This might help explain God’s command to . . . (totally annihilate them.)
Leviticus 18:24-28 (After describing sexual sins) ‘Do not defile yourselves in any of these ways, because this is how the nations that I am going to drive out before you became defiled. Even the land was defiled; so I punished it for its sin, and the land vomited out its inhabitants. But you must keep my decrees and my laws. The native-born and the aliens living among you must not do any of these detestable things, for all these things were done by the people who lived in the land before you, and the land became defiled. And if you defile the land, it will vomit you out as it vomited out the nations that were before you.
Leviticus 20:22-24 ”‘Keep all my decrees and laws and follow them, so that the land where I am bringing you to live may not vomit you out. You must not live according to the customs of the nations I am going to drive out before you. Because they did all these things, I abhorred them.
Deuteronomy 9:4-6 After the LORD your God has driven them out before you, do not say to yourself, “The LORD has brought me here to take possession of this land because of my righteousness.” No, it is on account of the wickedness of these nations that the LORD is going to drive them out before you. It is not because of your righteousness or your integrity that you are going in to take possession of their land; but on account of the wickedness of these nations, the LORD your God will drive them out before you, to accomplish what he swore to your fathers, to Abraham, Isaac and Jacob. Understand, then, that it is not because of your righteousness that the LORD your God is giving you this good land to possess, for you are a stiff-necked people.
These four generations were described by Moses to be Levi, Kohath, Amram, and then Aaron according to Exodus 6:16-20.
Read 17-21. What would Abram have been wondering by this time? (is the LORD coming. . . like the parable of the virgins.)
How did the LORD present Himself? (smoking firepot.)
Pieper: A sign of this zeal of the Lord in behalf of His Gospel from Abraham onward is this ever-recurring manifestation, which Scripture calls “cavode adonai”; the glory of the Lord. Wherever God deems it necessary to confirm the grace anew which He swore unto Abraham and his seed, wherever His dispensation of grace is blasphemed, trodden under foot, and the execution of His thoughts of salvation are in danger of being hindered, there, providing a mere word of warning and punishment does not suffice God, this fire and the cloud are likely to appear, announcing God’s presence and His intervention with a deed. It proclaims that the covenant of grace concluded with Abraham remains unalterably in effect, and that it is also holy and inviolable. It is the seal which the Lord of Glory has in advance placed upon the concluding word of the one great Son of Abraham: “He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.”
Think of other times the LORD appeared in this form after
this. (to Moses at burning bush / in desert / top
of
The difference between this and Babylonian blood covenants . . . (the LORD came all the way to Moses – 1 sided / 2 parties are by nomeans equal.)
The LORD’s promise was fulfilled . . .
1
Kings 8: 65 So Solomon observed the festival at that time, and all
What does God’s ordering this blood covenant tell you about him? (he was concerned about Abraham’s faith and wanted to strengthen it.)
In what way has God given us something similar to what he gave Abram? (Lord’s Supper.)