God’s Promise
Published by Stanley Pouw in 2024 · 15 September 2024
Who do you trust? That’s a very profound question. In our age, we’re well on the way to trusting nobody. And we’ve developed a kind of a psychosis of distrust in our world that is commonly known as the credibility gap. Young people are being taught to trust nobody, as well as learning it by experience. Promises are given, and they mean nothing. The whole world is full of liars.
In fact, the Bible says that the whole world lies in the arms of the Father of Lies, Satan. Some turn to religion. They spend their life in a particular religious system, and they never find peace, and they never find meaning. In another religious system, they spend their life praying to a particular saint only to be told, after years of such prayer, that that saint wasn’t really a saint.
The testimony of the New Testament is given to us in 1 Timothy 4:10. It says this, “For this reason we labor and strive, because we have put our hope in the living God, who is the Savior of all people, especially of those who believe.” Can you give your life to Jesus Christ? Can you place your hands, your life, in the hands of God and be secure that God will hold on to that?
Now, the writer of Hebrews has been urging the Jews to completely abandon everything from the old covenant. They’re to commit themselves entirely to the new covenant and to Jesus Christ. You can forget the temple; you can forget the priesthood; you can forget the holy days; you can forget all of the feasts; you can forget all of these things in the terms of their meaningfulness.
He says to that Jew who’s not yet saved, but who’s intellectually convinced about the Gospel, “You need to come all the way to Jesus Christ. You need to let go of all that you’re holding onto. You can throw your life on this Messiah, on this new covenant and find out that God is worthy of your trust.” He urges them to come to Christ before they fall away into apostasy and be lost forever.
And then He reaches back into Hebrew history and pulls out Abraham. And He says, “If you want an example, then look back at a man from your own history, Abraham and see how that man trusted God. And Abraham is a perfect illustration of a man of faith, who went all the way with God, who totally trusted God for everything in the midst of unbelievable kind of adversity.
And note that whenever the New Testament writers spoke to Jews, they invariably used Abraham as the basis of faith, because so very often the Jewish mind assumed that salvation was by keeping the law. And so the New Testament message is, “It’s by faith; not by keeping the law.” Paul says in Romans 4:3, “Abraham believed God, and it was credited to him for righteousness.”
Abraham wasn’t circumcised when he believed God. Abraham began the Jewish race only in the sense that God called him, and he was already a fairly old man when God called him – 75 years old. He hadn’t experienced circumcision. The Jew always put his stock in the fact that he was a Jew and circumcised the eighth day. Abraham was righteous because he believed God.
Verse 11, “This was to make him the father of all who believe but are not circumcised, so that righteousness may be credited to them also. 12 And he became the father of the circumcised, who are not only circumcised but who also follow in the footsteps of the faith our father Abraham had while he was still uncircumcised.” Paul is saying, “Your only way to God and to righteousness is by faith.
And verse 13 sums it up, “For the promise to Abraham or to his descendants that he would inherit the world was not through the law, but through the righteousness that comes by faith.” Verse 20. God said, “Abraham, you’re going to have a son. Abraham thought, “Do you know how old I am? Do you know that my wife is 90?” And Sarah was in a corner laughing, according to Genesis.
Romans 4:20-22 say, “He did not waver in unbelief at God’s promise but was strengthened in his faith and gave glory to God. 21 because he was fully convinced that what God had promised, he was also able to do. 22 Therefore, it was credited to him for righteousness.” Righteousness comes as Abraham believed God. Salvation in the Old Testament was not by law; it was by faith.
And God suddenly came to him in Genesis 12 and said, “All right, Abraham, pack up; you’re leaving. Get everything you’ve got and get out. I’m going to take you to a place where I want you to go.” Now, that’s a big issue. Packing up his whole tribe, of which he was chieftain, and moving them all out, to a place called Canaan. He finally did, and settled in a place called Haran.
When he got to Haran, he received another promise. God would bless him and multiply his seed and give him a great nation and that through his seed all of the families of the earth would be blessed. This is repeated to him in Genesis 12, Genesis 13, Genesis 15, Genesis 17, Genesis 18, and Genesis 22. God says to him, “Here’s My promise,” and Abraham believed God.
Hebrews 11:8-9 says, “By faith Abraham, when he was called, obeyed and set out for a place that he was going to receive as an inheritance. He went out, even though he did not know where he was going. 9 By faith he stayed as a foreigner in the land of promise, living in tents as did Isaac and Jacob, coheirs of the same promise.” That is faith. It’s the evidence of things not seen.
When the Lord promises, He puts His integrity on the line. It’s a matter of His character, and every promise of God is secured by His character. If God says, “You’re safe with me,” then you better be safe with Him, or His word is worth nothing. Can you give your life to God? Can He finish the work He begins in your life? Is there real security with God? The Bible says there is.
Look at verse 13, “For when God made a promise to Abraham, since He had no one greater to swear by, He swore by himself.” That verse says there’s nobody greater in the universe than God. Now, that means that whoever He is, He makes the rules. And the reason that God cannot lie is that God invented truth. No person always tells the truth. But whatever He says is always the truth.
Jesus, in the High Priestly Prayer in John 17:17, said, “Sanctify them by Thy truth; Thy word is truth.” Therefore, if God makes a promise, He will keep it. And to those Hebrew readers who were unsaved but who believed it and heard the whole Gospel and seeing some of the miracles, and they were afraid to let go of Judaism. To them the Holy Spirit says, “Come on, you can trust God.”
What was His promise to Abraham in verse 14? He said this, “I will indeed bless you, and I will greatly multiply you.” Did He keep it? Do you want to know how many Christians there are right now in this world today? There are now, 2.18 billion of the seed of Abraham still roaming the world. He said, “You’re going to have a great nation, as numbers the sand of the sea and the stars of heaven.”
And Abraham looked at Sarah and said, “Well, you got to start with one, and we don’t even have that.” And it didn’t look real good, but he believed God. He hung in there. And he tried to help God a little bit, and got over there with Hagar and produced Ishmael, but God just used that as a punishment. Ishmael fathered the Arabs, who have been trouble for the Jews ever since.
Verse 15, “And so, after waiting patiently, Abraham obtained the promise.” Abraham said, “God, I’m just going to trust you,” and he sinned, but God caught him. And it looked impossible. He took little Isaac, and he got up on that mountain, and he had that knife lifted in the air, but God stayed his hand. And he went that far because that’s how much he believed God. That’s faith.
The Abrahamic promise was an unconditional covenant. God said, “Get up and go,” because God had a plan. And in the generations after the flood, man continued to depart from the Lord. Even though God tried to reach people, through various institutions and various men, it didn’t really work. And those people were not responding to God’s rule. God had to do something.
Now, God picked out a certain nation or a certain people and using them as His channel around the landslide of sin. Now, from Abraham’s loins were to come the whole nation of Israel. Jesus said in John 4, “Salvation is of the Jews.” And He meant not that the Jews are the only ones that can be saved, but the channel is the Jews. Jesus came through the line of Judah through the Jews.
There was an interesting custom in Abraham’s day. Whenever two people made a covenant, they sealed it with blood. And the way they did it was they took an animal, and they cut the animal in half, laying a piece on each side, and together they walked between the blood pieces. That signified that they had made a covenant in blood to keep their promise. And it would be witnessed.
That means the Abrahamic covenant wasn’t even made with Abraham; it was made between God and Himself. Therefore, it is an unconditional covenant. God is simply saying, “Abraham, go to sleep while I make a covenant with Myself.” God promised Himself, on the basis of His own purpose, that this is what He would do, and Abraham had nothing to do with it.
The whole design of God, in calling Abraham, really had nothing to do with Abraham. When He chose Israel, what were they supposed to do?” God’s flowing blessings were given for seven purposes. Number one, they were to proclaim the true God. Isaiah 43:21 says, “The people I formed for myself will declare my praise.” Secondly, they were to reveal Messiah, the Savior of the world.
Thirdly, they were to be God’s priest nation. In Exodus 19:5 - 6, they’re called a kingdom of priests. They are to represent God to the world. Fourthly, they were to preserve and transmit Scripture. In Deuteronomy 6, it says they were to write it all over the place. Fifthly, they were to show the faithfulness of God. They were to be a living illustration that God was faithful.
Sixth, they were to show the blessedness of serving God. Psalm 144:15 says, “Happy are the people whose God is the Lord.” And seventh, they were to show God’s grace in dealing with sin. Their whole sacrificial system was a portrayal of how God graciously dealt with sin. Because God purposed before the world began to conform you to the image of our Lord Jesus Christ.
Romans 9:8, “That is, they who are the children of the flesh, these are not the children of God: but the children of the promise are counted as the seed.” In other words, he’s talking about Israel. Not all Israel is Israel. In other words, it’s not just the people who happen to be Jewish that are the chosen of God; it’s the one who are the children of promise. That is to whom God has given a promise.
Verse 16, “For people swear by something greater than themselves, and for them a confirming oath ends every dispute.” This explains this idea of an oath. In other words, if you’re going to make an oath, you swear by somebody greater than yourself. When a guy said, “I swear by God,” then that was confirmation. That ended the argument, when a man would swear by somebody higher than himself.
Verse 17, “Because God wanted to show his unchangeable purpose even more clearly to the heirs of the promise, he guaranteed it with an oath.” He wasn’t only showing it to Abraham; He was showing it to the heirs of the promise. That means all those of faith through all the ages stands as a testimony of God’s faithfulness. Now, notice, “His unchangeable purpose?” His purpose can never change.
Verse 18 says, “So that through two unchangeable things, in which it is impossible for God to lie, we who have fled for refuge might have strong encouragement to seize the hope set before us.” There are “two immutable things” His promise and His oath. He stated it, and then He swore by it. He says, “Come on to Christ. There is nothing to fear. I’ll never let go of you.”
Also in verse 18, “It is impossible for God to lie, and so, we might have a strong encouragement to seize the hope set before us.” You’ll never know until you flee to Him for refuge. You read it in Numbers 35. 1 Timothy 1:1 says that The Lord Jesus Christ is our hope. Colossians 1 says that that hope is the Gospel and salvation. And you’ll know it if you believe Jesus Christ.
God gave Abraham the security of His person, His purpose and His pledge. God added another pledge and security, Jesus Christ. Verse 19, “We have this hope as an anchor for the soul, firm and secure. It enters the inner sanctuary behind the curtain.” Your soul, when you come to God, isn’t drifting anymore. It says right there the anchor is sure and steadfast, and it’s inside the veil. What does that mean?”
Our Great High Priest Jesus Christ performed the perfect sacrifice, and He entered into the heavenly Holy of Holies. And when He went in there, He didn’t just stand around and leave, the Bible says He went in and sat down. Jesus finished the job. The veil was ripped open, and He left, as the writer of Hebrews says, “A new and living way into the presence of God.” Wow, fantastic.
Verse 20, “Jesus has entered there on our behalf as a forerunner, because he has become a high priest forever according to the order of Melchizedek.” He went in there, and when I put my faith in Him, I threw my anchor; it went in the veil, and He holds it in His hand, and He’ll never let go. How long are you anchored there?” Forever. There never was such a high priest like that. Let us pray.