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Call to worship: Romans 4:1-8

Text: Genesis 15:1-21

Summary:

God knows when a faithful man has his doubts. He attends a faintly burning wick. The fainting doubts have to do with the promises of God and present circumstances. Waiting is hard, but patience is holy. In that gulf, God reveals His sufficiency for Abram, which Abram questions. God answers Abram that the promise doesn't have an expiration date because it depends on God's ability to raise the dead. Abram will have a son and, from him, children innumerable. The Word is enough. Faith rebounds. Abram believes God. God counts such faith as righteousness. Abram is justified by grace through faith. But there's still the issue of the land. Where will children innumerable find space enough to rest in God? Abram seeks assurance, and God assures him. Animals are sacrificed. A covenant is cut. Abram is put to sleep. On pains of death, God absorbs all the consequences of any breach in the covenant. By blood that will speak a better word, God promises the next phase in redemptive history: an exodus whereby a judgment upon enemies will yield the salvation of all who take cover under the blood. These will possess Canaan. God's promised it to Abram and to his Offspring, Christ. In all of it, God means to encourage us that, from justification to final rest and everywhere in between, grace guarantees glory.

Main idea(s):

God is our shield against every fear that He will not finish what He started.

Sermon Outline:

1. Know for certain: God will vindicate faith. (15:1-3)
2. Know for certain: God has justified the believer. (15:4-6)
3. Know for certain: God will give the believer Rest. (15:7-21)

Prepare

Discussion Questions:

1. Read Genesis 15:1-21.
2. Why might God find it necessary to steady Abram's faith? Is there a relationship between great feats of faith and the dips that follow? What's God's exhortation to Abram?
3. What does Abram doubt? How does God respond? What's the relationship between God's Word and the steadying of faith? Tracking from Genesis 1, with what is the promise pregnant? That is, what does it assume and bring forward as a presentation to Abram's faith?
4. What does Abram do in light of God's Word? What does Moses note in terms of cause and effect in 15:6? Why is this transaction so critical in the storyline of Scripture and our understanding of the Gospel of God?
5. The justified still wrestle with peace and assurance of inheritance. How does the Lord guarantee and satisfy Abram's doubts concerning possession of the land? On pains of death, Who bears responsibility for getting believers, like Abram, peaceably home? This promise is made to Abram, but also another (15:18; Galatians 3:15-18). To Whom? And why does that only further strengthen the guarantees of grace?