Please turn to Genesis 12. Genesis 12.
We begin with verse 1.
Now the Lord said unto Abram, Get thee out of thy country, and from thy kindred, and from thy father’s house, unto the 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 be thou a blessing:
And I will bless them that bless thee, and him that curseth thee will I curse: and in thee shall all the families of the earth be blessed.
So Abram went, as the Lord had spoken unto him; and Lot went with him: and Abram was seventy and five years old when he departed out of Haran.
And Abram took Sarai his wife, and Lot his brother’s son, and all their substance that they had gathered, and 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 unto the place of Shechem, unto the oak of Moreh. And the Canaanite was then in the land.
And the Lord appeared unto Abram, and said, Unto thy seed will I give this land: and there builded he an altar unto the Lord, Who appeared unto him.
And he removed from thence unto the mountain on the east of Beth-el, and pitched his tent, having Beth-el on the west, and Ai on the east: and there he builded an altar unto the Lord, and called upon the name of the Lord.
Genesis 13, verse 14.
And the Lord said unto Abram, after that Lot was separated from him, Lift up now thine eyes, and look from the place where thou art, northward and southward and eastward and westward:
For all the land which thou seest, to thee will I give it, and to thy seed for ever.
And I will make thy seed as the dust of the earth: so that if a man can number the dust of the earth, then shall thy seed also be numbered.
Arise, walk through the land in the length of it and in the breadth of it; for unto thee will I give it.
And Abram moved his tent, and came and dwelt by the oaks of Mamre, which are in Hebron, and built there an altar unto the Lord.
Genesis 22. We begin with verse 4.
On the third day Abraham lifted up his eyes, and saw the place afar off.
And Abraham said unto his young men, Abide ye here with the ass, and I and the lad will go yonder; and we will worship, and come again to you.
And Abraham took the wood of the burnt-offering, and laid it upon Isaac his son; and he took in his hand the fire and the knife; and they went both of them together.
And Isaac spake unto Abraham his father, and said, My father: and he said, Here am I, my son. And he said, Behold, the fire and the wood: but where is the lamb for a burnt-offering?
And Abraham said, God will provide Himself the lamb for a burnt-offering, my son: so they went both of them together.
And they came to the place which God had told him of; and Abraham built the altar there, and laid the wood in order, and bound Isaac his son, and laid him on the altar, upon the wood.
Let us pray.
Our heavenly Father, we do thank Thee for Thy precious Word. We ask that Thy Holy Spirit will open Thy Word to us, that we may see Thee in Thy Word and be transformed in the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.
We mentioned before that the book of Genesis is a book of biographies. God gives us the biographies of eight persons, and through these eight persons God desires to show us what His will is concerning man: how much He is interested in man, what work He has done in man, and eventually what glory He will receive out of man.
In the first man, Adam, we see the tree, because God’s purpose is that man should have His life—the tree of life—in him, that he may be united with God and be one with Him.
But unfortunately, man chose the tree of the knowledge of good and evil. In other words, man declared his independence of God. Man wanted to develop his own soul, his own power, to be his own god; and the result is death.
Then, in Abel, we see the sacrifice. It is through the blood of the Lamb that we are able to return to God. The way to God is through the sacrifice, even our Lord Jesus.
After we have returned to God, then we need to walk with God. That is what we find in Enoch. Enoch walked with God, and this is what we need to do. The result of that walking was that he was taken by God.
If we walk with God, we have the opportunity of being raptured to heaven without passing through death, because we know He is coming. It is very near.
Now, the secret of walking with God is to abide in Christ, and that is what Noah’s ark tells us. Noah was shut up in the ark for a year and ten days, through the whole period of the flood. When he came out of the ark, he inherited a new earth.
Brothers and sisters, we are exhorted to abide in Him. If we abide in Him, we shall inherit the new heavens and the new earth.
This morning, we would like to come to the fifth person: Abraham. We know that God is the God of Abraham, the God of Isaac, and the God of Jacob. Abraham is the father of faith.
In Abraham’s life, we see one thing, and that is the altar. You find that throughout his life he built altar after altar—not just one altar, but altogether four altars. The altar is symbolic of the life of Abraham.
Now, brothers and sisters, no one builds an altar for himself. You may build a house for yourself, but when you build an altar, it is for God. In other words, the altar is symbolic of our religious life, or, to put it more accurately, our spiritual life.
Without the altar, there will be no spiritual life.
The altar in the Old Testament is the cross in the New Testament. You find in Hebrews 13:10 that it says, “We have an altar.” Now, what is our altar? If you read the context, you know that it speaks of the cross.
We must not only have a basic faith in the cross of our Lord Jesus; we must also have a continuous, subjective experience of the cross working in us.
We know that an understanding of, and faith in, the cross of our Lord Jesus is basic. Why? Because if we have no understanding of and no faith in the cross of our Lord Jesus, then there is no salvation. We have no life. There is no forgiveness. There is no redemption.
It is the cross of our Lord Jesus that gives us salvation. So we need to know the cross of our Lord Jesus: how our sins were borne by our Lord Jesus in His body on the cross; how we ourselves were crucified with Him on the cross, because we were in Him; and how the enemy, Satan, and all the powers of darkness were completely routed and taken captive by the victory of the cross.
We need to know all the different aspects of the work of Christ on the cross, because this is the basis of our faith, and this gives us salvation.
But more than that, we need not only to know the cross in its objective sense, but we must receive the cross into our very being and let the cross work in us—to cast away that which is of the flesh, of the old creation, of ourselves, and to bring in that which is of the new creation, which is of Christ.
That we may be transformed and conformed to the image of God’s Son. So, brothers and sisters, the cross is most vital to our spiritual life. If there is no cross, there is no Christ. If there is no cross, there is no Christian. It is as important as this.
You cannot separate the cross from Christ, and in the same way, you cannot separate the cross from Christians.
Now, in the life of Abraham, we find altars throughout his life. When he was in Ur of the Chaldees, that was his native country.
In Acts 7, we are told that the God of glory appeared to him in the land of Ur of the Chaldees.
Tradition tells us that Abraham’s father, Terah, was a maker of idols. Excavations have shown us that Ur of the Chaldees was a city full of idols. At that time, the whole world had left God. The whole world worshipped idols, and Abraham’s father was an idol maker.
But the glorious thing was this: out of a city of idols, even from the family of an idol maker, God called Abraham. The God of glory appeared to Abraham, and God called him.
There is a Jewish story which says that Abraham was seeking after the truth. He often wondered about these idols. One day, when his father went away, he told his son Abraham to take care of the idols that he had made.
After his father left, Abraham began to take an arm from one idol and a leg from another idol. He broke them all into pieces and put them into confusion. When his father came back and saw all these idols lying on the ground, falling upon each other, and broken up, he was very angry at his son.
He said, “Why did you not take care of my idols?” Abraham said, “After you left, these idols began to fight against each other, and that is the result of the fight.” His father said, “That is nonsense. These idols cannot fight.” Abraham said, “Why should we worship them?”
That was a Jewish story; it is not in the Bible. But, anyway, you find that here was a man who was completely delivered from idol worship. The God of glory appeared to him, calling him to leave his land, his kindred, and to go to the place which God would show him.
But unfortunately, Abraham consulted with flesh and blood. The result was that, instead of leaving his land and his kindred, Genesis 11 tells us that it was his father Terah who took Abram and his nephew Lot. They left Ur of the Chaldees on their way to the land of Canaan, but stopped in Haran.
Evidently, after Abraham heard the call, he consulted his father. When his father saw that he was insistent on leaving, his father said, “All right, I will take the initiative.” So Terah took him out.
Instead of following the Lord all the way, he stopped in the middle way. If you look at the geography, you find that Haran is just in the middle.
Abraham obeyed God only halfway. We do not know how long they sojourned in Haran. Not until God took Terah, Abram’s father, away did God appear again and tell him to leave his land, his kindred, and his father’s house, and to go to the place of God.
So, here in Genesis 12, Abraham took his wife, his nephew Lot, all the possessions they had accumulated in Haran, and all the servants they had acquired there; and from there they went on.
As they arrived in the land of Canaan, at a place called Shechem, near the oak of Moreh, God appeared and said, “I will give this land to your seed.” For this, Abraham built an altar. That was the first altar of Abraham.
God appeared to Abraham when he was in Ur of the Chaldees, but he did not build an altar. He went out of Ur and came to Haran, and he stayed there for a number of years, but he did not build an altar.
He built an altar only after he arrived in Canaan and God appeared to him again, saying, “I will give this land to your seed.” You cannot build an altar anytime or anywhere.
Spiritually speaking, there is a time and there is a place for an altar to be built. Not only must there be the appearance of the Lord; there must also be obedience to Him.
We may call this altar the altar of revelation, because the God of glory appeared to him. Revelation is the foundation of Christian life. If there is no revelation, there is no beginning.
But God appeared to Abraham even when he was in Ur of the Chaldees, and there was no altar. Why? Because after God has revealed Himself, God has to be obeyed. In Haran, Abraham obeyed God only halfway, and because of that he could not build an altar. There was no testimony.
Only after he arrived in Canaan, in a place called Shechem, was there an altar. Shechem in Hebrew means “shoulder”; it means responsibility. Moreh means “teacher,” or “to teach.”
In other words, after God has revealed Himself, you have to put your shoulder under the command of God, be responsible, and learn what God wants you to learn. It is not until then that there is an altar.
Brothers and sisters, God has revealed Himself to us. Thank God, He has revealed His Son Jesus. That marks the beginning of our Christian life.
But when God reveals Himself to us, invariably you find there will be a calling. The calling is to come out and to go in. We are called to come out of the world and to enter into Canaan, which is Christ.
In other words, when God appears to anyone, there will be a calling for separation. God appeared to Abram, and He called him to separate himself from his country, even from his own people, so that he might be completely separated.
Until that separation was completed, there was no building of the altar. In a spiritual sense, this must be true with everyone else. Thank God, He has revealed His Son in us. But with the revelation comes the consequence that we are called to be separated from the world, that we may belong to Christ completely.
We are not our own. We are bought with a price. Therefore, we must be separated from the world.
Now, brothers and sisters, how many of God’s people today have received the revelation of God’s Son, Jesus Christ, and yet fail to follow Him in the way of separation? How many of God’s people today are saved, and yet have not completely separated themselves from the world?
Probably they have come out of Ur of the Chaldees, but they have stopped short in Haran, in the middle way, instead of going all the way with the Lord. Because of this, we find that our life with Christ is not complete. We have one leg, as it were, in the world and another leg in Christ.
Unfortunately, this seems to be the life of many Christians.
We must put our shoulders to the call. We must learn the lesson. It is only then that you find the cross begins to appear. Is there the sign of the cross, you know? Are we separated from the world? Do we belong to Christ? Is this our testimony?
So, this is the first altar.
Then you find Abraham began to move from the plain of Moreh. He began to move south, and he moved up to the mountain.
As he was moving, he came to a place where he pitched his tent between two places: Beth-el on the west and Ai on the east. There he pitched his tent. After he pitched his tent between these two places, with his back toward Ai and his face toward Beth-el, the Bible says that he built another altar and called upon the name of the Lord.
This is the second altar that Abraham built. We may call this altar the altar of communion, or the altar of confession.
Christian life is never static. It is true that after we move on a distance, we may rest for a while to consolidate that which the Lord has shown us. But you find that again we have to move on. Our Christian life is a continuous, ongoing life.
We move from the plains to the mountain. We are always ascending and ascending and ascending. It is a continuous moving onward and upward. This is Christian life.
After we have separated ourselves from the world and have given ourselves completely to Christ, then we begin to come to a place between Ai and Beth-el. This is the place where we will pitch our tent, and it is in that place that the second altar will be built.
In other words, the second phase of the cross begins to be built into our lives.
We know what Ai is. The word Ai originally means “a heap of ruins.” We know what Beth-el means. Beth-el means “the house of God.”
On the one hand, you find a heap of ruins. That speaks of the old creation. That speaks of the flesh. It is but a heap of ruins. It speaks of what we are in ourselves. In us, that is, in ourselves, there is no good. We have been ruined by sin.
But on the other hand, you find the house of God. It speaks of the new creation. It speaks of that which is recreated in Christ Jesus. It speaks of the spiritual house in which God dwells.
As we continue to move on with the Lord, as we fellowship and commune with the Lord, we will come to a place where we will begin to see the division of the spirit and the soul. We begin to see that which is of ourselves, of the old creation, is but a heap of ruins. We will leave it behind.
Our face is toward that which is recreated in Christ Jesus, the house of God. Brothers and sisters, this is the place where we pitch our tent. There we stay.
Out of this, God is able to build His beautiful house.
You know, in Ai, the children of Israel later suffered a great defeat. The reason was that one of them, Achan, coveted a beautiful Babylonian garment, two hundred shekels of silver, and a wedge of gold. He took them and hid them in his tent.
Because of his sin, the whole army of Israel suffered until that sin was dealt with. Now, what does it mean? It means that he wanted a beautiful garment; he wanted silver and gold. For what purpose? To build his own house.
In trying to build his own house, you find that Ai keeps on appearing. How often we try to build our own self. We try to beautify our flesh. We try to build up ourselves, and the result is defeat.
God wants us to see that, on the cross, the old creation has been dealt with. It is now all new. It is now all of God. It is all in Christ. It is only then that we find the house of God.
The cross works not only separation from the world, but separation from the old creation—from the soul, from ourselves—that He may be able to build us up into the house.
Abraham built an altar, and he began to call upon the name of the Lord. Now, what does it mean when you call upon the name of the Lord? It means one thing: you realize how helpless you are. Therefore, you have to call upon Him. You have to depend on Him completely.
When you find that you can help yourself, you will not call upon the name of the Lord. So here you find that we begin to realize how helpless we are, that we have to call upon His name and let Him do everything that is needed to deliver us even from the old creation.
That we may live in the good of the new creation and be built up into the house. That is the second altar.
Brothers and sisters, this needs to be seen also in our lives. Has the cross worked in your life so that it begins to divide the soul and the spirit, to show you that whatever is of you is just a heap of ruins—nothing?
Your hope is that which is out of Christ, which will be built into a beautiful house. It is the altar of communion, as well as the altar of confession.
You know, Abraham, because of the famine, went down into Egypt. We will not go into the whole story, but you find that when he was in Egypt, there was no altar.
Materially, he was blessed, because Pharaoh gave him many servants, cattle, and all these things. But Pharaoh took his wife away. There was no altar.
When he returned by the grace of God to the land of Canaan, where did he return? He returned to that place where he had built the altar, the place between Ai and Beth-el. You have to come back to the place of communion and the place of confession.
But after they returned from Egypt, their possessions had accumulated. Abraham had many cattle, many herds, and many flocks; and so had Lot. Their herdsmen began to quarrel with each other over the pastures.
In other words, because of the abundance of material things, the brothers could not stay together in peace and unity.
Finally, Abraham told Lot, “We are brothers. When our herdsmen quarrel before the Canaanites, it is not a good testimony. The whole land is before you. If you go to the east, I will go to the west. If you go to the south, I will go to the north.”
God gave the land to Abram; God did not give the land to Lot. Lot followed Abraham out. Abraham was Lot’s uncle, and according to the old custom, surely the younger must give ground to the older and respect the older.
Even though Abraham graciously told Lot that he might choose first, Lot should have said, “No, you are my uncle. You have the first choice. You can choose first, and whatever is left I will take.” That was the right thing to do.
But Lot had no revelation and no vision. God had not given anything to him. He thought that the opportunity had come for him to seize the best. So he looked around, and he saw the plain of Jordan, where Sodom and Gomorrah were. It was well watered, like the garden of the Lord, like the land of Egypt, as thou goest unto Zoar.
When he saw that place, he said, “I will take that.” Lot chose for himself.
After Lot left, God appeared to Abraham. God said, “Abraham, lift up your eyes. Look to the east, to the west, to the north, and to the south. Whatever land you see is yours.”
Lot chose his land, but God said, “Whatever you see, Abraham, is yours,” because Abraham saw the land by faith. It was all his. “Now arise, and walk through the land, because I have promised it to you.”
So Abraham began to move again. He moved to the place called Hebron, to the oak of Mamre, and he built another altar. That was the third altar.
We call it the altar of witness. Why?
In the incident that we have just mentioned, you find that Abraham was able to give up his rights. You know, it is very difficult to give up one’s rights.
When you are able to give up your rights, you really give up yourself. You may give up some things, but to give up your rights—that is another matter. Often we say, “Well, that is my right.”
If a person is able to give up his rights, he is giving up himself. In letting Lot make the first choice, the right belonged to Abraham. He showed that Abraham was able to give up himself completely. He was not trying to grasp anything for himself, but was willing to give up even his rights.
In doing that, he entered into a greater abundance. You do not measure your life by what you possess; you measure it by what you are willing to give up.
Because Abraham was willing to give up his rights, God gave him more. He was able to give of himself so completely, even his rights. Therefore, he had entered into an abiding life.
The word Mamre means “strength” or “fatness.” In other words, here you find Abraham was fully established. His life was now fully established in God, and because of that, he was full of strength.
How do we know? Because immediately after that, you find there was a battle of kings. The four kings overcame the five kings, and they took away all the people—men, women, and children—and all the possessions of the cities of Sodom and Gomorrah.
Lot was in the city. So Lot and his family, with all his possessions, were taken captive.
When Abraham heard the news that his nephew Lot had been taken captive, he did not say, “Ha, ha, God has vindicated me.” No, no.
When Abraham heard the news, he gathered the young men whom he had trained in his own house—only three hundred and eighteen young men—and with some of his allies they traveled the whole night until they came upon the four kings. With that small number of men, as it were, they defeated the enemy and delivered Lot and everything out of their hands.
What was this? What a witness it was.
Even after that great victory, you find that the king of Sodom said, “You may take all the possessions, all the riches. Just give me the people.” But Abraham said, in effect, “I do not want anyone to say that the king of Sodom has made me rich. The God of heaven and earth is my God.”
What a witness that was.
This is what is meant when we bear about in the body the dying of Jesus: the life of Jesus will be manifested in us. This is what we find in 2 Corinthians 4.
How can we minister life to other people? Where does the strength come from? The strength comes when we are willing to die, when we are willing to bear in our bodies the dying of Jesus.
Think of the dying of our Lord Jesus. He had every right. Being equal with God, He is God, and that was not something to be grasped at. Yet He emptied Himself. He gave up His rights.
He gave up His rights as God—His worship, His honor, His glory, His majesty, and His own power. He gave up all these things to become a man. Even as a man, He had rights, but He came obedient unto death, even the death of the cross.
Therefore God highly exalted Him and gave Him a name which is above every name, and in that name every knee shall bow and every tongue confess that Jesus Christ is Lord.
This is where the strength comes. This is where the witness comes. This is our ministry. It is when we are willing to give up ourselves, even our rights.
It is when we begin to be established in Him, in that abiding life, that we are able to minister life to others.
This is the third altar, the third phase of the working of the cross.
Then you find Abraham, when he was one hundred years old, received Isaac.
In Genesis 22, God said, “Take now thy son, thine only son, whom thou lovest, even Isaac, and offer him for a burnt-offering.”
When he was tested, Abraham rose early in the morning. He did not consult flesh and blood. He took his son and traveled three days’ journey to Moriah, because that was the place where God wanted him to offer his son.
When he came to Moriah, he told his servants, “You stay here. I and the lad will go to the mountain to worship, and we will come again to you.”
Then Isaac said, “Father, you have the knife. You have the wood. But where is the sacrifice?” Abraham said, “God will provide Himself a lamb.”
But actually, as they climbed up the mountain, Abraham knew what God had asked of him. He bound his son, put him on the altar, and lifted the knife.
God said, “Now I know that thou fearest God, seeing thou hast not withheld thy son, thine only son, from Me.” God provided a ram to be offered in Isaac’s place.
God told Abraham, “In thy seed shall all the nations of the earth be blessed.” That is the life of faith which Abraham had. We call this the altar of worship.
What is worship?
Worship is seeing God for Who He is. Worship is seeing His worth.
How much is God worth to Abraham? God was so worthy that Abraham could say, “Thy will be done.” He did not withhold even Isaac.
Moriah means “the Lord will see,” or “the Lord will provide.” It does not matter whether people see or honor. What is important is to be seen by God.
What does God see? Does He see in you that appreciation of His worth, that you will not even withhold Isaac?
You know, all the hopes of Abraham were centered in Isaac. All the promises of God to Abraham were focused on Isaac. If Isaac was gone, everything was gone.
But Abraham had faith. He believed that Isaac would be raised from the dead. That is why Romans 4 says that the faith of Abraham is that Abraham believed not only that God brings everything out of nothing and creates everything out of nothing, but that God is a God who raises the dead.
Worship is not withholding anything, but letting go of everything. Worship is not just words. Worship is fact. Worship is life.
Our life must be such that we see God as He is. He is so worthy.
To offer Ishmael is difficult, but to offer Isaac is something else. To offer that which belongs to the natural is one thing, but to offer that which comes from God is another.
Whatever God has given—whether it is a gift or whether it is grace—and one day God asks us to give it up, would you argue with Him and say, “You gave it to me”?
Or are you willing to give to God even the spiritual blessings, even all the grace and virtues that God has given you? If God wants to strip you naked, as it were, are you willing?
There is the point. The cross has to do a deeper work: not only separation from the world, not only separation from the old creation, not only the denial of ourselves, even our natural life, but even the surrender of the spiritual things God has given us, so that God may have us.
Do we allow the cross to work that way?
Mount Moriah became the site for the building of the house, the temple of God. In the life of Israel, we find that the altar was built there. Every altar, you find, is in a higher position.
Likewise, in our life, you find that the cross must be seen in our lives continually. It begins with the cross of separation. It continues in communion and confession, then into witness, and ultimately into worship.
Throughout our lives, the cross must be present.
The problem with the Galatians was that they wanted to escape the cross. They were afraid of the scandal, the offense, of the cross. So Paul ended his message to them by saying:
But far be it from me to glory, save in the cross of our Lord Jesus Christ, through which the world hath been crucified unto me, and I unto the world.
In other words, in the life of God, the cross must have its full work.
God is the God of Abraham. In Abraham’s life, you find that God is his God. May it be so in our lives.
Our heavenly Father, we thank and praise Thee for the cross of our Lord Jesus. Help us to see the power and the beauty of the cross as the expression of Thy love.
Our Father, we pray that as we follow Thee, we may know the fuller work of the cross in our lives. We offer ourselves to Thee.
We pray that as we go on with Thee, it may not be possible for us to go on without the cross. In the name of our Lord Jesus. Amen.