A Smoking Fire Pot and a Flaming Torch

Good morning. Happy Sunday to all of you.

Have you reached the point in your life that you are now starting to manage

expectations when it comes to your physical limitations?

Anyone there yet? Some of you, right? Like, have you got the point in your life

when you're realizing the things that you once did with great ease,

with little effort, little thinking about it at all, now takes a greater effort to accomplish?

You're there. Some of you are, at least. Good.

Perhaps you're at the point of your life that now when you stoop down to tie

your shoe, you figure out what else all you can do while you're down there,

because getting up and down is just a lot if you're there.

Maybe some of you have left shoestrings altogether, and you are now doing through

the slip-on mode. Anyone there?

Slip-ons? No, okay. Some are shaking their head, and I'll never do that.

Just wait. You might. We'll see how it goes. Now, perhaps you are at the point

of your life, like I have a good friend on his birthday last year,

he said to me, Doug, I see a lot of people,

like every time they have to get up and get down, it always comes with like

a grunt, like, and then, oh, get the body moving.

He said, I am never going to be one of those people. Are you relating to any

of that? Are you a grunter and huffer when you have to get up and sit down?

Maybe you are at the point of your life where you are realizing the days are passing, The weeks,

the months are going by and your window is closing on the ability to do some

things or to do them the way you used to do them.

Running an eight-minute mile.

Those days are long gone. Sundial is more of an applicable effort right there we have.

Actually, I'm trying to keep it in the nines. And some of the young people are

like, nine? Man, you are slow.

Well, enjoy your youth. Your day is coming. For others who said,

nine, that's impressive.

I really like you. You're good. I didn't see that. That would be good. So it's true.

One of my boys just recently started dunking a basketball, which,

of course, in our family, it's a very competitive family if I have not told you that.

One of my boys said, dad, could you ever dunk a basketball?

Already implying, like, could you, knowing that I could not and I still cannot,

never have been able to. He knew that.

I think he just wanted me to like speak it and say it.

But I did just go on in that conversation and let them know I am a very highly

skilled dunker when it comes to an Oreo and a glass of milk.

Like I can dunk with both hands.

Any skilled dunkers like that out there? Yes. Here's the bottom line.

Hate to be the bearer of bad news. We're all getting older. You can laugh about

it, cry about it, or do both.

But managing expectations comes with the process.

In our series of how it started, we have started tracking Abram's life when

he started out at 75 years old, which might sound like, ooh,

retirement type years, but he's just getting started.

Genesis 25 records Abram dying at the age of 175.

So he has 100 years to go in front of him.

However, even he understands his physical limitations are beginning to be encroached on his life.

And he has come to the point in his life here in Genesis 15 where he has this

one big unanswered question.

Today is part 14 of Genesis 15, a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch.

Sounds a little intriguing.

Just make sure someone has told me this twice now. Make sure you say the title

right, a smoking fire pot and flaming torch and not smoking pot and flaming torch.

So I want to make clear that's a whole different sermon, This is a smoking fire pot and a flaming torch.

Genesis 15, Abram has questions centered around him getting older and managing these expectations.

God is going to not only have answers for him, he is going to perform this unique ceremony.

And in the middle of this back and forth conversation, this dialogue going on

between these two here in Genesis 15, we are going to come to one of the greatest

verses in the Bible. It is fantastic.

I hope you will be on board with me when we get there because this is not just

sit here like, what's this about? No, this is exciting part of verses coming.

Take your Bible, turn to Genesis 15. It's here on the screen if you have to. Here it comes.

After these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision.

Fear not, Abram, I am your shield. Your reward shall be very great.

But Abram said, O Lord God, what will you give me? For I continue childless,

and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus.

And Abram said, Behold, you have given me no offspring, and a member of my household will be my heir.

And behold, the word of the Lord came to him, This man shall not be your heir.

Your very own son shall be your heir.

And he brought him outside and said, Look toward heaven and number the stars

if you are able to number them.

Then he said to them, So shall your offspring be.

And he believed the Lord and he counted it to him as righteousness.

And he said to him, I am the Lord who brought you out from Ur of the Chaldeans

to give you this land to possess.

But he said, O Lord God, how am I to know that I shall possess it?

He said to him, Bring me a heifer three years old, a female goat three years

old, a ram three years old, a turtle dove, and a young pigeon.

And he brought him all these, cut them in half, and laid each half over against the other.

But he did not cut the birds in half. And when the birds of prey came down on

the carcasses, Abram drove them away.

As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram, and behold,

dreadful and dark, great darkness fell upon him.

Then the Lord said to Abram, Know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners

in a land that is not theirs, and

will be servants there, and they will be afflicted for four hundred years.

But I will bring judgment on the nation that they serve, and afterward they

shall come out with great possessions.

As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace. you shall be buried in a

good old age, and they shall come back here in the fourth generation.

For the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.

When the sun had gone down and it was dark, behold, a smoking fire pot and a

flaming torch passed between these pieces.

On that day, the Lord made a covenant with Abram, saying, To your offspring

I give this land, from the river of Egypt, to the great river,

the river Euphrates, to the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites,

the Katamonites, the Hittites, the Perzites,

the Rephaim, the Amorites, the Canaanites, the Gergashites, and the Jebusites.

This is the word of God. Amazing, powerful, true word of God.

I would like for us to work our way through this chapter and then at the end,

make some application points for us.

First, the chapter begins, verse 1, by saying, after these things.

What things? Well, technically, you could go all the way back to Genesis 1,

1, all the way up through Genesis 14 and technically be right.

But in a more concise way of what we've been seeing as we've been tracking Abram's

life and his lifeline, a better way to say it was after these things,

like after the famine in Egypt,

after the bickering with Lot, after the battling of the kings,

after the blessing of Melchizedek, after these things, a new thing is to happen.

And this new thing is God initiating a conversation with Abram.

Well, how does that happen? Well, throughout the Old Testament.

Prophets, dreams, visions, revelations, angels, even some unusual things like

talking donkeys and burning bushes.

That's the way that God communicates with people.

Verse one continues, after these things, the word of the Lord came to Abram in a vision.

Fear not, Abram, I am your shield. Your reward shall be very great.

So we see here, God is using a vision to speak with Abram. And the conversation begins with fear not.

I am your shield, your reward. Not only just a reward, a great, very great reward.

Well, what could Abram possibly be fearing that God tells him, don't be afraid?

I think there are a couple of things that we could fill into the blank here.

First, perhaps, perhaps he's fearing the past.

Like he is looking over his shoulder. Where are those kings that I just beat?

Are they out for retaliation?

Are they out to get me? That could be a very real fear going on.

Perhaps his fear is in the very present moment because let's not miss this.

God, Yahweh, has shown up in his tent in vision form.

That kind of showing up, that kind of fear comes with a wow and an ow of God,

surely to make someone's knees start trembling a little bit.

Perhaps that is the fear.

Perhaps his fear is of the fear of the future. and maybe that's why this whole

vision thing is happening in the first place because Abram is fearful that God

is not keeping one specific promise,

and Abram isn't getting any younger.

Maybe it's a combination of all three of these, but God says,

don't fear for I am your protection. I am your shield.

Now, when you hear that, I am your shield, don't just think of this front arm shield, right?

And I got it, I got it, I got it with like these openings and blind spots in the back.

No, God's shield is a encompassing 360 degree force field shield.

That is God's protection.

No weaknesses, no chinks in the armor. Nothing can get in.

Literally, you can think of it as he is the divine bubble wrap.

That is the shield that he is.

So that's what we have there. But here's the thing.

Abram, he knows this. His life experiences attest to God being his protector

and his rewarder. Think back some things.

Abram is a rich, rich man, but he doesn't take credit for that.

He goes, oh, God did that. He knows that.

Abram is still alive and kicking because God has kept him alive.

He knows these things. He has seen God do amazing things in keeping his promises.

Remember in Egypt, even though he's lying like a, I don't know if dogs lie,

but he's lying like a dog.

And yet he gets blessed on his way out from God.

With Lot, Abram gives Lot the first pick, Pick your land.

Lot picks. And then God says to Abram, everything else you see in all the directions is yours.

And then we have the whole battle with the kings, the Eastern kings.

God keeps him safe, protects him, and gives him a victory.

Abram knows that God is his protector and rewarder of great things.

It's almost as if whatever Abram touches or does, whether good or bad, turns to gold.

He knows God is the reason for his success and safety.

And yet, despite all this knowing and having all of this proof of God's kept

promises, the one thing burning front on his brain is this one question, verses two and three.

But Abram said, Oh Lord God, what will you give for me? for I continue childless

and the heir of my house is Eliezer of Damascus.

And Abram said, behold, you have given me no offspring and a member of my household will be my heir.

Okay, Abram not getting any younger, understanding the days are dwindling down

as far as it goes and having children, managing those expectations.

And despite having all these other areas of kept promises, he's got this one big burning question.

Abram is saying to God, God, God, the stuff is great.

The silver, the gold, the servant, the livestock, oh, those camels,

fantastic. Thank you, God.

God, your protection for me and my family, it unquestioned, thank you so much, God.

But what about the baby?

What about the child? What about the heir? God, you promised the child,

The one thing that is most near and dear to my heart, I don't see it and I'm getting old.

All I have is my chief assistant, Eliezer. He's getting everything.

God answers in this vision conversation in verses four and five.

And behold, the word of the Lord came to him. This man shall not be your heir.

Your very own son shall be your heir.

And he brought him outside and said, look toward heaven and number the stars

if you are able to number them.

Then he said to him, so shall your offspring be.

Abram, Eliezer is not what I have in mind. Who told you that?

Did you come up with that on your own?

You will have your own son.

Now imagine, imagine here what Abram must have been processing going from presumably

inside of his tent to outside to look at the stars.

Like imagine, imagine a dark, dark night.

Now this is our best attempt. Okay, Abram, start counting the stars, all right?

One, two, three, four, five, six.

Oh, God, 10,001, 10,002. God, I can't count all of them.

Exactly, Abram. There will be millions, and they will all come from your flesh and blood.

Now, how just amazing, ironic, How ironic is it that God uses the stars for

Abram to count his children,

knowing that his greatest descendant is the one who is called the bright morning star, Jesus.

Isn't that amazing?

Good job, sound booth.

Abram, though getting older,

believes, verse six, and he believed the Lord and the Lord counted it to him as righteousness.

This is the verse that I was referring to at the beginning. It's one of the

greatest verses in the Bible.

Genesis right here, 15, six. It is quoted four times alone in the New Testament

and it has so many other like indirectly referenced times.

That's because this verse, Genesis 15, verse six, and Abram believed the Lord

and the Lord counted it to him as righteousness.

It is a linchpin for the entire Christian faith.

Like without verses like this, there's no such thing as Christianity.

There's no such thing as gospel.

But because this verse is here and others like it, it serves as the foundation of Christianity.

All the other teachings are built out of this foundation.

When a person believes God and God counts it as righteousness,

all other things of Christianity flow from this.

So in technical, fancy terms, if you will, this is called the doctrine of justification.

It is the absolutely staggering, stunning work of God,

declaring an unrighteous person to be righteous because God has counted or credited

his own righteousness on his behalf to this unrighteous person because this

person believes God. That's justification.

If it's a courtroom term, it would look like this. It is a guilty person with

a rap sheet standing before a judge and he's got these crimes right there.

The judge is looking at these crimes.

He's looking at the law. certainly the judge is gonna make this decision.

This is a no brainer. This is easy. This is guilty. But that doesn't happen.

Except God is the holy, perfect judge.

And now this criminal minded person believes in God.

And God, almighty judge, renders not only a not guilty verdict,

but also renders to this criminal to be righteous in his sight.

That is mind-blowing justification.

In average Joe terms, justification is God pulling a guilty sticker label off

of a sinful person and slapping on a not guilty sticker.

Justification, just as if I've never sinned.

Don't get bored with that. A key to understanding justification is understanding

all of this is done entirely by God.

God alone justifies. God alone makes a person right and righteous before him.

No one can stand before God with their own slapped on righteous badge. No one can do that.

Only God pardons a person, declares them to be righteous. And this happens every

time a person believes God.

But sometimes we human beings, being all so self-sufficient and all,

thinking we can do everything for ourselves and on our own, sometimes we come

to the thing and think like this, well, I must have some part in this.

Well, fine. If that's how you feel about it, you bring the sinning part.

That's it. You bring the sin. You are the sinner needing justification.

There you go. That's your part.

It's one of the greatest verses in the Bible. Abram believed and God counted it as righteousness.

In verse 7, God returns the conversation back to the land and again confirms

his land promised to Abram. And then this is what happens in verse 8.

But Abram said, O Lord, how am I to know that I shall possess this land?

Now this gets a little tricky because in verse six, Abram believes, he's believing God.

And then in verse eight, he seems to be looking for something more than just God's words of promise.

God, I want a deed. I need some paperwork here. I need to know what you are

confirming so that I can know and others can know what you are promising.

That seems to be his request here.

And then verses nine and 10, well, God said to him, bring me a heifer,

three years old, a female goat, three years old, a ram, three years old,

a turtle dove and a young pigeon.

And he brought him all of these, cut them in half and laid each half over against

the other, but he did not cut the birds in half.

Okay, as unusual as all this might sound to us, God is telling Abram to get

all the supplies gathered up and drawn, because we are about ready to draw up a covenant.

And Abram would have known exactly what was going on here because this was the

way covenants were done in these ancient days.

And part of the requirement, these covenants required fully grown animals.

Thus, the three animals here that we have, three-year-old, a heifer,

a female goat, and a ram, along with two other kinds of birds,

a turtle dove and a pigeon.

So all together now, we've got five animals.

Abram, understanding how these covenants work, he cuts the animals in half.

He places each half on the ground, but for some reason, the birds,

they were not cut into half.

So though we have these unusual procedures compared to our paperwork and our

digital contracts that we're accustomed to.

But if you think about it, we still even use some of this ancient language in

the deals that we make. We say things like, hey, let's cut a deal.

It comes from this ancient type of covenant talk. So we have half the animals

are lined up in a row here and across from them, the other half of the animals

are here making this path right in the middle between them.

When God makes a covenant, he verbally speaks it, speaks the promise,

he tells the terms of the conditions, and then he ratifies the covenant with some kind of act.

Think back in our days of Noah. He promised that he would not flood the entire

earth again. That was the promise. And then he ratified it by putting a rainbow in the sky.

Here in Abram's deal, this covenant ceremony, it begins with two rows of selected

animals cut in half and some birds are placed with them. verse 11.

And when the birds of prey came down on the carcasses, Abram drove them away.

All right, this is sort of a little bit of an unusual verse,

I think. Moses, what do you want from, what are we supposed to get from this?

I think apparently a significant amount of time goes by and these dead animal

carcasses, they're laying on the ground, been there long enough for enough time

to draw the birds of prey attention. They're circling the sky.

Look, there's a feast. Let's go get it.

And there's Abram down there on the ground. Shoo, shoo, get away, get away.

He's waiting on God to come do his part of the covenant.

Now, some suggest that there's a deeper meaning to these birds of prey and that

it's more of a symbolic gesture of coming, of talking about the struggles that

Abram and his descendants are going to have.

We're going to read about those right now in verses 12 through 16.

It fits. I don't know if it's for sure, but here's what the verses say.

As the sun was going down, a deep sleep fell on Abram.

And behold, dreadful and great darkness

fell upon him. So now we've got a vision, kind of like in a vision.

Then the Lord said to Abram, know for certain that your offspring will be sojourners

in a land that is not theirs and will be servants there and they will be afflicted for 400 years.

But I will bring judgment on that nation that they serve and afterward they

shall come out with great possessions.

As for you, you shall go to your fathers in peace.

You shall be buried in a good old age and they shall come back here in the fourth

generation for the iniquity of the Amorites is not yet complete.

Offspring going to be sojourners? Like if you know what a sojourner is,

it's a person that's kind of wandering around. They don't really truly have a homeland.

They're sort of settled, but not all the way.

Offspring that will be servants to others.

This is the promise. Sign me up. No, I don't.

Offspring facing 400 years of affliction and troubles?

So yes, maybe the birds of prey give this imagery of the coming hardships as described here.

And we've got Abram fighting them off as a picture of these difficulties to come.

Or maybe they're just birds of prey doing what birds of prey do.

Either way, Abram is hearing the disturbing news that this promise from God

is not going to be without its struggles.

It's going to require a lot of time and a lot of waiting for the promise to be fulfilled.

But it will in the fourth generation later when the iniquity,

when the sins of the Amorites are complete, God's promise will be kept.

Today is not the day that I'm gonna dive into these Amorites here in verse 16.

It appears that God has them on some type of sin count and then judgment is going to come.

Other than to say this, God watches nations.

He counts the sins of nations and he judges nations at his appointed time.

God is sovereign over all nations. And there's gotta be a point where we have

to say, And who knows, who knows where the United States of America sits with God in this.

It's real though. That's all I'm going to say about that for today.

I want us to move and talk about this covenant ceremony starting in verse 17.

When the sun had gone down and it was dark, behold, a smoking fire pot and a

flaming torch passed between these pieces.

On that day, the Lord made a covenant with Abram saying,

to your offspring, I give this land from the river of Egypt to the great river,

the river Euphrates, the land of the Kenites, the Kenizzites,

the Kenmonites, the Hittites, the Perzites, the Rephium, the Amorites,

the Canaanites, the Gergashites, and the Jebusites.

What a powerful scene of this covenant coming into ratified existence.

Imagine it. It is dark outside. Blood-saturated animals laying on each side.

And now God, in the form of a smoking fire pot and this flaming torch,

passes between the dead carnage and promises to Abram the exact boundaries of the promised land.

I think it's an intense scene. God in the form of smoke and fire.

We know throughout the Bible, these are times that God takes on this type of embodiment here.

He led the Israelites by a pillar of cloud by day and a pillar of fire by night.

The burning bush, God speaks to Moses.

The firework display on Mount Sinai, God's presence.

Fire descending from heaven as God engulfs sacrifices.

So we see here that fire and smoke, they are always symbolizing God's presence,

his power, and his glory.

We have God walking between these two cut up rows of bloody animals.

God is ratifying the covenant.

It is real important though to look at Jeremiah 34, 18.

Here's why. This is some 500 years later, they are still keeping contracts, covenants this way.

And Jeremiah the prophet is speaking on behalf to God and God's people, of God, to God's people.

And they've made this joint covenant together.

And it says, as for those who disobeyed my covenant, not keeping the terms of

the covenant that they made before me, I will treat them like the calf they cut in two,

in order to pass between its pieces.

If you walk this path between the animals, you put your life at risk if you

do not keep the terms of the contract.

Now notice, who does the walking and doesn't do the walking between the animals in Genesis 15?

Not Abram. He doesn't walk through that path.

God is the one walking through that path. This is a one-way unilateral covenant.

Normally, both parties would walk between it. Both would be on the hook.

But here, God takes full responsibility for this promise.

God alone is ensuring that this promise will happen.

God says to Abram, may what happened to these animals happen to me if I break my word.

And doesn't that just scream, Abram, you can trust me, trust me,

trust me. I will not break my promise to you.

That's Genesis 15. Okay, what do we do with it?

What's the application here? How can I live tomorrow because of this smoking

fire pot and flaming torch?

There are a lot of applications. I think if you pause and think about them,

like I did throughout the week, I'm gonna leave you with three.

I'm not gonna elaborate much on them, but here they are. First,

the Christian life is a life of waiting.

In these last few chapters from Genesis, Abram is waiting and waiting and waiting

for the promises and he's not getting any younger.

And while he's waiting, oh, there are times that he is doubting.

He's doubting God. He's waiting for a child.

He's shooing away birds, waiting for the covenant to get signed.

And now he hears there's 400 more years of waiting?

Wait, wait, wait.

Likewise, Christians today, we are waiting and waiting and waiting on promises of God.

And doubt can be a very real thing, especially in our culture that thrives on

instant results, instant gratification.

But there is a difference, a huge difference between a doubt that denies God's

promises and a doubt that desires God's promises. Completely different.

So for us, live desiring the promises. Live patiently. Live perseverantly.

Live that way and throw in joy and peace.

Live expecting that God is keeping his promises and will keep his promises.

Second, everyone is fighting a battle you know nothing about.

To be fair, I saw those exact words on Kim D. Hart's t-shirt a while back.

And I thought, that is true. And then I came to Genesis 15 and said, you know what?

Most would see Abram's wealth, his possessions, his livestock,

his land, and think, man, he is living the all Canaanite dream.

All while this man is painfully and getting wrecked, he's got no child.

The one thing that he wants.

Likewise today, it is so easy for us to look at others and think everything is going great.

All is good with them not knowing of the pain that is wrecking them.

We all have these battles going on that no one knows about.

Just in sticking with the example given here in Genesis 15. Children.

There are some couples that can't have a child.

Others are single longing to be married so they can't even have in order to have this child.

On the other side of it, some have lived and they have lost a child.

It's devastating, hard, wrecking, painful stuff.

This is important to note. Abram's promise is not your promise,

but Abram's God is your God, can be your God.

And you can trust him in a way where you go deep with him and you make him your rock in your fortress.

Oh, I'm not saying it's easy. As a matter of fact, on our own strength, it's gonna be no good.

But God gives strength to make it happen and may it be so.

And there are other examples of everyone fighting a battle and we know nothing about.

Well, what do we do? Just let them live in their own world, battling alone?

As a church to one another, we should actively,

but with a tremendous amount of sensitivity and compassion,

be loving and caring as we break through these barriers with one another,

let our shields down a little bit, let our guard down a little bit,

and we find out about these battles,

that are being fought by each other that we know nothing about.

I think there's a big point here that we need to be brothers and sisters in Christ who care,

encourage, help, pray for.

Third, Jesus cuts a deal that's too good to pass up.

Abram had a deal predicated on an animal being cut.

We have a deal predicated on Jesus being cut and crucified on a cross and then

raised again three days that guarantees eternal life.

That's too good of a deal to pass up.

Any person who believes God, believes that Jesus is God's son who was cut and

died for their sins will be declared righteous by God himself.

There is no better deal to receive than God's justification.

And Jesus did all the work. He signed the covenant with his own blood.

A person would be a fool to reject such a deal. Let's pray.

Father, it seems I always start with thanking you for your word.

But why wouldn't we thank you for your word that speaks truth of the history

past of Abram and your love and your care and concern for him and how it speaks

truth to us in our own lives.

Father, I pray that you would do your work with each and every one of us according to your will.

In the waiting,

we would be trusting, patient, persevering.

Help us to put away fear and doubt.

Father,

I do pray for those who are battling through things that are very near and dear

to their heart and maybe nobody else knows.

Comfort them in a way today that leaves no doubt that you are the one ministering to them.

And at the same time, Father, let us good news people and all around the church

as a whole be a people that cares for one another.

Help us to know when to speak and when to be quiet.

When to act and when to sit still.

I thank you for Jesus.

And the deal that he has cut by giving up his body,

bleeding, dying, crucified.

For the sins of those who believe in you.

Father, help us to proclaim this good news message to everyone we can.

In Jesus' name we pray, amen.