The Foundational Four // Obedience When it Doesn't Make Sense

Well we're gonna be in Genesis chapter 22 for the message today.

Genesis 22 · chapter mention

How many of you in the room you like roller coasters?

Roller coasters?

How many of you are like, I do not like roller coasters.

Alright, right?

So you know the feeling.

You know the feeling when you get on a roller coaster and they strap you in.

And you're like, the point of no return.

Here we go.

I remember when I was in high school, we went to uh Six Flags Magic Mountain in Southern California.

Any of you guys ever been to Six Flags?

Six Flags, right?

So they have this ride there.

Uh it's called Goliath.

Goliath.

And I remember thinking, okay, I want to ride this ride.

And we get in the we get in the ride, we we strap ourselves in, and I'm like, ugh.

I get the, you know, my stomach starts feeling some type of a way.

I get the kind of the intrepidation.

The ride starts moving, and I'm like, here we go.

Here we go.

And we go through the ride and we're looping and spinning around all these things.

And halfway in the middle of the ride, I have this like realization.

This is awesome.

I love this.

In fact, when we we finished the ride, we got to the end of the ride, and I'm like, I want to go again.

Now I went with uh some people and some people that didn't want to ride on Goliath.

They were sitting on the bench underneath the shade.

Some of you are those people.

And I get off the ride and I'm like, guys, guys, guys, guys, this ride was amazing.

Like, are you sure you don't want to do it?

They're like, no.

It's kind of scary.

Kind of like it's it feels like it's kind of risky.

It's I don't know what's gonna happen.

I'm like, guys, guys, you gotta try it.

Just like one time, please.

Like, I don't know.

I don't know if I really want to do it.

And they didn't want to go on the ride.

It was too risky and too scary.

And they were like, I don't think I want to do this.

And I bring this up because sometimes when it comes to obeying God, it can feel risky.

And it can feel scary.

And it's easier to sit on the bench underneath the shade than it is to take steps of obeying God.

But here's what happens when we sit on the bench instead of taking steps and obeying God is we miss out on God literally doing miracles in our life.

We miss out on seeing what only God can do in our lives when we choose to obey Him.

Because what God has on the other side of our obedience cannot be reached any other way.

But can we just be honest?

Obeying God can be challenging.

Obeying God can be difficult.

Obeying God isn't always easy.

Which takes us to Genesis chapter 22.

Genesis 22 · chapter mention

One of the most emotionally charged passages of the Bible.

Because for a young man, obedience looked like him climbing on the altar and literally giving his life and dying.

A young man that had a future, a young man that had hopes and dreams.

But for him to obey, it required him, and for him and his father to do what God wanted him to do, it required him to get on the altar and give his life.

Which begs the question: what kind of a God would ask a father and a son to go to a mountain and have the father sacrifice his son?

It also just makes me think, what would it have been like to be Isaac to get on the altar and know that obedience is gonna cost you your life?

What's that gonna be like?

Well, we're gonna see how this story unfolds, and we're gonna see the power of obedience and how God has some things on the other side of our obedience that cannot be reached any other way.

If you're ready for it, would you say amen?

Genesis chapter number 22, verse number one.

This is what the text reads.

It says, After these things, God tested Abraham and said to him, Abraham, here I am, he answered.

We are currently in a series that we started last week called The Foundational for the People that God used to form a nation, the nation of Israel.

So last week, let's see how well you remember.

Last week we talked about a man, his name was let's go, Abraham.

Edgar preached a great sermon on Abraham.

Abraham was a man of faith.

Now we get to this text, and Abraham's faith is being tested.

We've seen Abraham, his faith.

Now we're gonna see how his faith is tested with the second person, Isaac.

It says in verse 3, verse number 2, it says, take your son, he said.

This is God speaking to Abraham, your only son.

Isaac, whom you love.

Go to the land of Moriah and offer him there as a burnt offering on one of the mountains I will tell you about.

This wasn't just Abraham's son, this was his only son.

This was the promised child.

This was a child that Abraham had literally waited decades for.

This was the child that God's promises rested on his shoulders.

Isaac was the jewel of Abraham's life.

And now God said, Abraham, the jewel of your life, the promised child, the one you waited decades for, your only son.

That one, I want you to sacrifice him.

Offer him as a burnt offering.

What do you do?

If you're Abraham and God tells you that.

I'll tell you what I do.

I don't know about that one, God.

You sure about that?

I don't think so.

Look what Abraham did in verse number three.

It said, so Abraham got up.

What's that next next word?

Abraham got up.

He got up early.

Abraham is going to the 8 45 service.

He got up early.

He saddled his donkey and he took with him two of his young men and his son Isaac, and he split wood for a burnt offering, and set out to go to the place God had told him about.

So Abraham says, I'm not just gonna obey God, but I'm willing to wake up early to do that.

And on the third day, verse number four, Abraham looked up and saw the place in the distance.

Can you imagine what that three-day journey must have been like for Abraham?

Every day, he sees his son Isaac wake up out of bed, and he knows.

He hears his son laugh, and he knows.

He has conversation with his son, the jewel of his life, the one who his future generations are resting on.

And he knows what's gonna happen.

He sees the place in the distance.

In verse number five, what Abraham did is Abraham said to his young men, the young men that went with him, the servant, stay here with the donkey, and the boy and I will go over there to worship, and then we'll come back to you.

Abraham took the wood for the burnt offering, laid it on his son Isaac, and in his hand he took the fire and the knife, and the two of them walked on together.

Then Isaac replied to his father, Abraham, and said, My father, and he replied, Here I am, my son.

Isaac said, The wood and the fire are here.

But where is the lamb for the burnt offering?

Which I think is a very fair question if you're Isaac.

Abraham knows the answer.

Isaac doesn't.

And Abraham answered, God himself will provide the lamb for the burnt offering, my son.

Then the two of them walked on together.

When they arrived at that place, Moriah, the place that God had told him about, Abraham built the altar there and arranged the wood.

He bound his son Isaac and placed him on the altar on top of the wood.

Now if I'm Isaac, and my dad is trying to put me on an altar, I said, Dad, you can obey God, but I ain't willing to obey this way.

I don't know about all this.

I mean, just real life.

Like my dad lives in Southern California.

And if I were to go down to Southern California and he said, hey, we're gonna go on a three-day trip.

Let's jump in, let's jump in the Jeep, let's go.

Which my dad loves his Jeep.

I don't know if there's any Jeep lovers in the room.

He loves his Jeep.

Okay, he loves his Jeep, right?

We were to get to somewhere three days later and get to the top of a mountain somewhere, and I were to see my dad, and he would get out the Jeep and start building an altar, and he pulls some ropes out, and he looks at me, and I'm gonna tell you, I'm gonna have a theological problem with my dad.

I'm gonna say, Dad, I love you, but I dare you to go put me on the altar.

But Isaac is willing.

Isaac knows in this moment this is what God wanted him to do.

And then verse 10, everything comes to a head.

And then verse 10 is when it absolutely gets real.

Abraham.

He reached out, took the knife to slaughter his son.

The knife is raised.

Can you imagine how fast Abraham's heart is beating?

Can you imagine how fast Isaac's heart is beating?

Knife is raised, muscles tense.

This is the end.

But then verse 11 happens.

In verse 11 it says, But the angel of the Lord called to him from heaven and said, Abraham, Abraham.

And he replied, Here I am.

I bet he had never replied that fast in his life.

Then he said, Do not lay a hand on the boy or do anything to him.

For now I know that you fear God, you have fear, you have a respect, a reverence, a love of me, since you have not withheld your only son from me.

You realize that God didn't want Abraham to kill his son.

God wanted to see if Abraham was willing to obey him.

And Abraham looked up verse 13.

He saw a ram caught in the thicket by its horns.

So Abraham went and took the ram and offered it as a burnt offering in place of his son.

And Abraham named that place the Lord will provide.

So today it is said, it will be provided on the Lord's mountain.

We hear the phrase Jehovah Jira, a name for God.

We get that from this passage right here.

Many of us have, we've heard the song, we've we've sang it here.

Jira, God, you are enough.

God, you will provide.

This is who you are.

And we love to claim that verse.

God, you are a provider.

But if you notice in context, the provision of God happened on the other side of Abraham's obedience.

The provision came as Abraham and Isaac obeyed.

And a lot of times what we do in our life is we claim promises from God and we say, God, do this for me, God do that, while we're sitting on the bench underneath the shade.

Instead of stepping out and saying, God, I'm willing to obey you, whether it makes sense, whether it's costly, whether it's difficult, whether I understand or don't understand, I'm just willing to obey you.

And Abraham obeyed, and on the other side of his obedience, God provided for him.

Verse 15 the angel called to Abraham a second time from heaven and said, By myself I have sworn that this is the Lord's declaration, because you have done this thing and have not withheld your only son.

I will indeed bless you and make your offspring as numerous as the stars of the sky and the sand of the seashore.

Your offspring will possess the city gates of their enemies, and all the nations of the earth will be blessed by your offspring, because you have obeyed my command.

This act of obedience from Abraham and Isaac impacted all the nations.

Because from Abraham and Isaac came the nation of Israel.

From the nation of Israel came Jesus, and from Jesus came salvation to all of the nations.

And it started with this act of obedience.

And what God has on the other side of obedience can't be reached any other way.

What God has on the other side of our obedience can't be reached any other way.

Now, here's the reality about obedience.

It's difficult, it's hard.

Now, sometimes obedience isn't as difficult.

For example, God says we should love people.

I have no problem loving people that are nice to me.

I'll obey that one, God.

Here I am, send me.

Sometimes God tells us to serve people.

Some people I like serving.

Here I am, God, send me to that person.

I'll serve them because I like them.

But sometimes obedience is hard.

Sometimes obedience means forgiving somebody that doesn't deserve forgiveness.

Sometimes obedience means getting out of our comfort zone, and that's uncomfortable.

Sometimes obedience means laying our life down sacrificially and serving that person even though they don't deserve it.

Sometimes our obedience, God calls us to do some things that are, well, not what we had in our 30-year life plan.

And here's the reality about obedience that we that we see from this text.

Here's a reality is that obedience can be costly.

I mean, Genesis 22.

Now here's the thing.

We read on the other side of Genesis 22, and we can be like, hey, Abraham, Isaac, don't worry.

God's gonna provide a ram.

Isaac, you're not gonna die.

Abraham, you're gonna have to give up the promised child.

They didn't know that.

It was costly, it was difficult.

And what Abraham could have said when God told him to do this, he could have said, Well, God, um, well, I kind of got a lot going on right now.

You know, I'm gonna think about that, God.

And when the time is right and I'm ready, then I'll take that step.

Then I'll obey.

But right now, I'm just, you know, I'm not, I'm not really certain about this.

But what did Abraham do?

He got up early in the morning and he said, I'm going to obey you.

He got up the next morning.

He responded immediately.

I remember growing up, I've uh I've always loved sports.

And I'm a fan of God's favorite sports teams.

Raiders?

The uh, the no, not the Packers at all.

Absolutely not.

Actually, that's the devil's favorite team.

No, I'm just kidding.

It's the Raiders.

I apologize.

Um, God's favorite sports teams.

Hold on, you know, hold on.

Let's just San Francisco Giants, San Francisco 49ers.

Okay.

Right.

Now, now some of you aren't there, and and I understand because sanctification is a process.

But I'm praying in the meantime.

So I'd be watching a sports game, and my mom would ask me to do something.

And I, like ten times out of ten, would say, Mom, can I do it on a commercial?

And probably eight times out of ten, she'd be like, Yeah, you can do it on a commercial, that's fine.

But there were those two times.

She'd be like, No, I need you to take off the trouser right now, it's full.

No, I need you to cut up this salary or whatever, right?

Cucumber.

Like, mom, it's the fourth quarter.

There's like two minutes left.

My mom would say, that's like 20 minutes in real time.

And I'd be like, I love my mom.

I want to obey my mom.

I'm going to do this, mom.

My mom taught me something that I've never forgotten.

She taught me this phrase: Delayed obedience is disobedience.

Delayed obedience is disobedience.

She said, if I told you to do something and you're delaying in obeying me, then you're disobeying me, and all the parents in the room know exactly what I'm talking about.

Lucy looks over at him like, what are you saying, right?

And you know, in our relationship with God, it's exactly the same thing.

Delayed obedience is disobedience.

A lot of us have normalized phrases in our spiritual walk and our Christian walk, phrases like, I'm not quite ready right now.

I have a lot going on.

I'm just not sure.

I need to think about this for a little bit longer.

And what these really are are justifications to not obey God.

And we have talked ourselves into doing something, disobeying, that we should be talking ourselves out of.

And we have come to a place where we have normalized these phrases and we're like, I'm gonna get to it, I'm gonna get to it, and guess what happens?

We never get to it.

And we've come to a place where we're like, I don't know, you know, maybe this.

Can I just say sometimes obeying God is hard.

Sometimes obeying God is difficult.

Sometimes obeying God requires you to get out of your comfort zone and for you to lay your life down.

Jesus says, if anybody will come after me, let him deny himself, take up his cross, and follow me.

It's not, hey, hey, hey, Jesus doesn't say if you follow me, just do whatever.

Feels good.

If you want to follow me, do whatever you want to do when you're ready.

When you're ready to get serious about that, then do it.

No, no.

Jesus says, listen, listen, listen.

You have to deny yourself, take up your cross and follow me and obey me.

And what we need in our churches and in our Christian faith is we need to get away from this idea of when I'm ready and start saying I'm going to obey because you said.

Like some of us are in a place in our life when it comes to baptism, we know we need to take that step and obey, and we're like, oh, you know, I am a Jesus follower when I'm ready.

What do you mean when you're ready?

The word says that you need to get baptized.

It's called obedience.

Some of us are in a place in our life we're like, oh, you know, when life calms down, then I'll do these things.

Listen, guys, we have to obey and get serious about obeying God.

Because there are things on the other side of our obedience that will not be reached any other way.

Obedience can be costly.

And obedience, number two, requires intentionality.

You notice in the text, verse number three, that Abraham he splits wood.

He goes out.

He gets ready for this trip.

So if Abraham is going on this three-day trip to Moriah, he gotta get water for three days.

He gotta get food for three days.

He got the donkeys ready.

He got the servants ready.

He got the wood ready.

He got everything ready to obey God.

It required, watch this.

It required a plan and intentionality to obey.

Now we understand the importance of planning and intentionality in our lives.

For example, let's say you're going on a vacation this summer, and and I hope you go on a vacation, get away for a weekend, a couple weeks, whatever.

You don't wake up one morning and you don't say, well, 8:30, we're gonna leave in an hour, we're going on a five-day trip.

Hey family, we're leaving in an hour.

Where are we going?

I don't know.

What are you gonna do?

I don't know.

That's not how you take a five-day trip.

You gotta take time off from work.

You gotta save some money.

You gotta figure out where you're going, how you're gonna get there.

You gotta get somebody to watch your dog.

If you're a cat, you can just let them do whatever they do.

You can get tickets or reservations for whatever you're doing.

And then you can go on your trip.

You gotta be intentional.

You gotta have a plan.

And what Abraham did in the text is Abraham had a plan.

And you know when it comes to obeying God, obeying God requires intentionality because good intentions are not enough.

Some of us are like, I really mean to.

Like, I'm gonna get around to it.

We don't do that in any other area of our life.

We don't say, I'm gonna get around to paying my rent.

I'm gonna get around to doing this over here.

We have to be we have to be intentional.

And most of us won't be asked to lay our child down on an altar.

But every day, God asks us to obey him in ordinary ways.

I remember several years ago now, somebody introduced me to something called the obedient Christian life wheel.

And what it really does is it just it just shows some foundational and simple but not always easy ways to obey God.

Somebody taught me, they said, hey, if you will do these foundational things of obedience, there's something on the other side of your obedience.

Like there is something that happens on the other side of this obedience.

Somebody they said, hey, we'll start on this left one right here.

They said, hey, you need to prioritize Christian community.

You need to prioritize gathering with the church.

I'm like, well, I'm a teenager, I'm gonna go.

Because my dad makes me go.

They said, no, no, no, no, no, no, no.

You're a teenager now, but you need to decide for you that this is what you're going to do.

I said, okay.

They said, hey, you gotta make a plan to do this.

Okay.

So I started thinking, here's my plan.

When I would go to a job and get a job, I'd say, hey, hey, I'll be your best worker you got six days a week, but Sunday mornings I'm not working.

This is my plan.

When somebody would ask me, hey, you want to do something on Sunday, I'd say, I got a better plan.

You want to go to church with me?

Or I'd say, hey, let's do it Sunday afternoon.

This was my plan.

Because the church is important.

The church is where we're strengthened from God's word, where we encourage each other, where we build each other up, where we worship the Lord corporately.

Even now in my life, I have a plan.

I'm in a growth group, I'm in a deeper group.

This past week, I'm at a table with three other godly men.

And what I'm doing is this past week, literally, I'm giving them a situation in my life and I'm saying, can you speak into this situation in my life?

I need your wisdom.

What do you think I should do?

Why?

It's a plan for Christian community in my life for people to speak into my life as a pastor because I need it.

What's our plan?

What is your plan for Christian community?

What's your plan for scripture and prayer?

To say, I'm gonna spend regular time in scripture, regular time in prayer.

Maybe what you say, and I think this is a great thing, is maybe you take the UVersion devotional app, the Bible app, and you go through a plan on there.

Maybe what you do is you take the book of Proverbs and you read a proverb a day.

So whatever the chapter is, or whatever the date is, you read a chapter that day.

Here's another one on here for some of us.

This is a tough one.

I got challenged about financial giving.

I'm like, man, financial giving, like I'm a teenager.

What do you mean, financial giving?

I got shoes to buy.

The Nike Olet has a sale right now.

Somebody said, hey, hey, hey.

If Christ is the center of your life and you want to be obedient to God in your life, you need to learn how to give of your finances and trust God of your finances.

But I but I can obey God in other ways.

You're right, you can, but when you give, God really has your heart.

And I was challenged about that.

A couple weeks ago, I shared for Angela and I here's our plan so we can be obedient in our financial giving is we do recurring giving at sasoonchurch.com.

So I can be spiritual for like three seconds and then don't have to be spiritual anymore.

Comes out.

And also we use a budget, it allows us to give.

And then underneath here, the last spoke is serving others.

What is your plan for serving others?

Could be joining a service team, it could be doing things in the community.

We have lots of people in our church making Jesus known in the community in different ways.

But we need a plan, a plan to do this.

And when we will live an obedient Christian life, there are things and people on the other side of our obedience that will not be reached any other way.

I know this because I've experienced this firsthand.

I was in lower elementary school, and I grew up in Sonic County, and there was a man that was stationed at Travis Air Force Base, and he had a wife and three kids.

Translation, he was a busy dude.

And he had prioritized not just gathering with the church, but using his gifts to serve others, and he had a teaching gift.

So he said, Well, if this is my gift, I'm gonna teach.

What are the opportunities?

And he ended up being a teacher in elementary school and what we used to call Sunday school back in the day.

And uh he had the uh the unfortunate experience of having me in his Sunday school class, okay?

And he faithfully, him and his wife, they served together.

It was awesome, they led the class together, they faithfully taught us.

And what they were doing is they were planting seeds of faith in our lives.

They cared about us.

We knew they cared about us, they were there.

They were people that we knew prayed for us, and even as just a little tyke, you think I'm short now, I was really short in the third grade.

As a little tyke, this guy and his wife are planting in my life.

And now, 30 years later, I'm on a stage teaching God's word because 30 years ago, somebody decided they were gonna get off the bench and they were gonna obey God and they were gonna be in a class with kids and they were gonna pray for them and care about them, and now I'm standing here today.

And and and right now, what we need, what we need to understand is that God has people on the other side of your obedience that will not be impacted any other way.

Any other way.

Some of us, we are sitting on the bench, we're underneath, we're underneath the shade, and we look over there at the roller coaster of obeying God, and we're like, that's scary, and I'm uncertain.

I don't know how it's how I'm gonna do it.

Like, I'm gonna have to make a decision that's gonna be life-altering, it's gonna be hard, I'm gonna have to give that up, I'm gonna have to lay that down.

Listen, stop looking at what you're gonna have to give up.

Stop looking at how scary it's gonna be.

Stop thinking, start thinking about the people that God is gonna use, the impact you're gonna have.

Why?

Because you choose to obey God, you choose to obey Him.

And and the obedient Christian life is a life that says, I'm going to obey.

I have decided to follow Jesus, no turning back, no turning back.

And I'm so passionate about this because growing up, there were so many people that obeyed faithfully.

And I look back now and I saw I see the struggles they had and the difficulties that they had, but they still chose to serve Jesus.

They still chose to obey, they chose to make hard decisions when it was difficult at home.

They didn't know how they were gonna make it, and they obeyed God, and I saw faith in them, and now I stand here and I'm so thankful that some people obeyed.

I'm so thankful.

I'm talking to moms and dads that you are setting the path for your kids and they're watching you.

I'm talking to grandmas and grandpas.

Like, eternity is at stake.

I talked to a mom yesterday, talking about her kids.

And she said, yes, like we do all these things, but for us, the most important thing is their spiritual condition, her words, not mine, because that's the only thing that's gonna matter in eternity.

Here's my question for us this morning Is which one of these places on this wheel do you need to obey?

Maybe some of us are a place where we're obeying in these different places, and maybe there's something else that God's leading you to obey in.

Maybe God's leading you to obey by forgiving somebody, by serving in the community somewhere, by doing something that God's put on your heart, by continuing to do something that you are already faithfully doing, but it's hard.

Remember, remember what Paul says.

We will reap if we faint not.

Be not weary in well-doing.

And I wonder this morning, what is God calling you to obey?

Where is God leading you to obey?

If you'll just obey, you can leave all the consequences to Him, and you're gonna make an impact in people's lives for eternity.

Let's all bow our heads.