Why Failure is never an option

Genesis 24:5 The servant said to him, “Suppose the woman is not willing to follow me to this land; should I take your son back to the land from where you came?”

Yesterday we began looking at a blessed mission in Genesis 24 to understand The Blessed Mission that every Christian is called to in evangelizing the world for Jesus Christ.  We dealt with the actual concept of blessing - defining it as God's guarantee of success by virtue of His presence with His people.  Today we want to offer you a defense against the common discouragement that hinders many Christians from becoming involved in The Blessed Mission.

Why failure will never be an option in God's Blessed Mission
Eliezer, the servant of Abraham, raises a legitimate question in Genesis 24:5 about the possibility of not coming back with a bride for Isaac.  If the outcome had taken place, not only would Isaac not have a bride, but the whole plan of God in bring forth Christ in His humanity would had been jeopardized.  This godly servant knew the implications - failure was not an option.   As you go down through the text of Genesis 24, we discover how we can be encouraged as we fulfill God's desire to use us in His effort to call forth sinners to salvation.

1. God's word states that the blessed mission will not fail
Abraham's response to Eliezer's concern is recorded in Genesis 24:8 “The LORD, the God of heaven, who took me from my father’s house and from the land of my birth, and who spoke to me and who swore to me, saying, ‘To your descendants I will give this land,’ He will send His angel before you, and you will take a wife for my son from there."  Abraham is firm - Eliezer will succeed - a bride will be found, a particular bride, from the family of Abraham's realtives.

Jesus says these words concerning the certainty of His Great Commission in Matthew 24:14 "This gospel of the kingdom shall be preached in the whole world as a testimony to all the nations, and then the end will come".  Christ connects the certainty of His second coming to the certainty of the fulfillment of the Great Commission.  As God the Holy Spirit calls and convicts sinners to saving faith, He through Christians are compelling people to be reconciled to God. (please compare 2 Corinthians 5:15-21).  Thus God's word tells me that when I am telling others about Jesus Christ, I cannot fail.

2. God's Law, when accompanying the Gospel message, always points to the Bridegroom
As Eliezer set out on his long journey of some 300 miles, the Bible states in Genesis 24:10 - "Then the servant took ten camels from the camels of his master, and set out with a variety of good things of his master's in his hand; and he arose and went to Mesopotamia, to the city of Nahor."  Camels in Bible times were the status symbols of Abraham's day.  They always pointed to the wealth and power of the owner.  Commonly too, whenever a bride was being sought for a son, the father would always send gifts to be given as a way of communicating to the bride and her family the intentions of the marriage proposal.  Unless Eliezer would had brought those ten camels, Rebecca's family most likely would had ignored his claims.  However when he came with all those camels, suddenly the intrest level increased. 

When God the Holy Spirit begins His work, He does so through the Ten commandments, the law of God.  Psalm 19:7 reminds us that "The law of the Lord is perfect, converting the heart" (KJV).   The goal of the law of God is to show sinful man the awfulness of his sin, and that he falls short of the glory of God. (please compare Romans 3:13-21)  The fact that God would even do that is remarkable, since mankind is bent towards only one thing - being at war with God. 

The ten commandments also function to point the sinner to Christ.  When the Holy Spirit convinces the sinner of the Awesomeness of the Son, the sinner sees that He is more desireable than his sin, and thus chooses Christ.  That's true conversion.  God the Holy Spirit's convicting work through the law of God (both written and on the human heart) is required if the sinner is to be convinced to choose Christ. 

3. Remember, the person's response hinges upon God's work, you just have to go and tell
When Eliezer finally arrives at Laban's (Rebecca's brother's home), a big meal is placed before him.  It has been over 70 years since Abraham has had contact with his extended family.  To hear that his chief servant has come with a wedding proposal is big news.  However the servant of Abraham is so eager to tell them what his master has to say, he refuses to eat until he has given them the good news - Isaac, the son, is seeking the hand of your daughter in marriage.  The servant brought gifts to Rebecca, the would-be bride's family - paid for by the Father on behalf of the son.  The gifts and the message do their work.  Rebecca is given the choice - go with the servant, or stay with mom and dad, fetching water for the rest of her life.  Which would you choose?

4. The Blessed Mission is all about the Master's Message about His Son 
In our evangelism, we present as it were the message of our master.  We tell people that salvation has already been bought and paid for.  We tell them that Christ, the bridegroom, would desire them to leave their reliance upon themselves and take their place at his side.  All we do is tell the message.  If God is so working in that person's heart at that time, and if the Holy Spirit has so chosen to affect our message, that person, like Rebecca, will come.  If that person does not come, it is not our fault, and it is not God's fault - rather it is that person's fault.  When Jesus did miracles, the Bible says in John 12:37 - "But though He had performed so many signs before them, yet they were not believing in Him".

Thus we have nothing to fear.  In doing the Lord's bidding of going into all the world andmaking disciples, we are succeeding.  In the realm of God's will, failure is never an option. 

The Blessed Mission

Genesis 24:3 "but you will go to my country and to my relatives, and take a wife for my son Isaac.”

A Blessed Mission, 0ver 2,000 years before Christ
Abraham, the great patriarch of what would become the Jewish nation, is growing old and is concerned about his son having a wife.  In the prior chapter, Genesis 23, Abraham's wife Sarah dies.  Clearly his advanced age is prompting him to a realization that his son must marry in order to carry on the promise that God spoke to him concerning his descendants. 

Genesis 24 certainly is historical, and it tells the account of Abraham sending his chief servant Eliezer to search out a bride for his son, a bridegroom, Isaac.  This account helps the reader to see how God is still keeping His promise to Abraham that through his son Isaac would come the ultimate "seed" or promise of salvation.  Remarkably, this same chapter gives us a great picture of what God is doing right now as He, by the Holy Spirit, is sending out the saints of God with the life changing gospel, so as to gather a "bride", the church, for the Bridegroom, Jesus Christ. 

To be blessed means God's guarantee of success 
The servant, Eliezer (whose name by the way means "helper") asks Abraham a legitimate question about his mission in Genesis 24:4 "The servant said to him, “Suppose the woman is not willing to follow me to this land; should I take your son back to the land from where you came?”  How is it that Abraham is so convinced that his servant's mission to find a bride for Isaac is going to result in success?  Abraham and the whole chapter of Genesis 24 bases that conclusion on the fact that God's blessing is upon the servant and Abraham Himself. 

What does it mean to have God's blessing?  In Genesis 24:27, we discover that after finding the bride - Rebecca, the servant of Abraham states - He said, “Blessed be the LORD, the God of my master Abraham, who has not forsaken His lovingkindness and His truth toward my master; as for me, the LORD has guided me in the way to the house of my master’s brothers.”  On six occassions we find the word "blessed" throughout Genesis 24, revealing to us the main thrust and theme.  On three occassions we find the idea of God's blessing being associated with the word "success" (Genesis 24:21,40,42).  Thus the servant was successful in his mission, because he had God's blessing.

The Blessed Mission, over 2,000 years after Christ
As we noted earlier, Genesis 24 is a picture of how God, The Holy Spirit, works through Christians to search out and find those who, by grace through faith, will believe and become a part of the bride of Christ.  Jesus says these words in the Great Commission text of Matthew 28:20 "teaching them to observe all that I commanded you; and lo, I am with you always, even to the end of the age."  So when Christ pledges His presence with his church doing the work of Evangelism, He is blessing it.  That is, Christ is guaranteeing the success of the Great Commission.  It too, like Eliezer's search for a bride for Isaac, will be a successful mission. 

What measures success in the Blessed Mission?
When you or I go out and share the gospel of Jesus Christ, whose responsibility is it to compell, persuade, position that person to trust and believe on the Lord Jesus Christ?  If it were the Christian's responsibility to get that person saved, then we would have to deem the task of world-wide missions a failure.  However, when we look at scripture, we discover that only the Holy Spirit of God, being God, can convince, persuade sinners to trust in Christ.  Thus the measure of success is not on how many souls are won, the measure of success is: have you and I shared the Gospel?  Have we went out to do the bidding of our Master?  With that thought, everytime you and I share the Gospel, we are achieving 100% success. God's blessing and glory is the measure of success.

Christ is All-Sufficient is what He does

John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life

In this final blog of our little series on John 3:16, we have been unfolding this incredible verse, noting why it is that Jesus Christ is the All-Sufficent Savior.  We saw by the phrases "Only-Begotten" and "gave" that He is All-Sufficient by virture of His full Deity and Humanity.  Thus His All-Sufficiency lies chiefly in Who He is.  Today I want us to look at this beloved verse and note how He is All Sufficient in what He does.  Bible teachers have identified three offices that Jesus Christ occupies on behalf of the saints of God: Prophet, Priest and King

As Prophet, He reveals the true and Living God
A prophet in the Bible is someone who represents God to the people.  As the "Only-Begotten Son", Jesus Christ has the ability and Sole capacity to reveal who God is, since he is God.  Salvation in John 3:16 has as its outcome the goal of imparting "eternal life" to all who believe.  This idea of "eternal life" is defined by Jesus in John 17:3 - "This is eternal life, that they may know You, the only true God, and Jesus Christ whom You have sent".  Unless you know the true God, you cannot say that you have true salvation.  Only Christ, and Christ alone, can gain you access to the true God, for He is both the revelation of God and God Himself. 

As a Priest, he represents believers to God
A priest in the Bible represents the saints of God before God.  Jesus Christ is that One Mediator, that One Advocate, between God and man. (please compare 1 Timothy 2:5; 1 John 2:1)  When John 3:16 states "whosoever believes in Him will not Perish", clearly that truth is rooted in who Jesus Christ is as the believer's High Priestly representative.  As it was in the Old Testament, when a saint of God would come to the temple to worship God, they could not just go into the temple unrepresented.  The child of God had a priest who could represent both God's interests and their's.  For us today, Christ fulfills that Office.  As Jesus Himself states in John 14:6 - "I am the way, the truth and the Life, no one comes to the Ftaher but through me".

As the King, He alone has the authority to grant eternal life
When a prisoner in ancient times was sentenced to die, only the King had the authority to reverse His sentence.  When John 3:16 states "should not perish, but have eternal life", that statement is pointing to Christ's All-Sufficient authority as the King of Kings and Lord of Lord's.  When any one by Grace through faith believes on Jesus Christ, they are grabbing hold of His Kingly authority to reverse their death sentence into a sentence of life. 

As Prophet, Priest and King, Jesus Christ forever functions as the Believer's All-Sufficient Savior.  Praise God for John 3:16!

Why Christ is the All Sufficient Savior - P2

John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life

Jesus Christ as the All-Sufficent God, came to be the All-Sufficient man
Yesterday we pointed out why Christ is the All-Sufficient Savior, noting that He is Equal to the Father in both Being and Authority.  Today we want to take this familiar verse again and point our a second reason why Jesus Christ is the All-Sufficent Savior.  Notice that underlined word "gave".  When God the Son, Jesus Christ, came to this world, He did not come displaying His full, unveiled Deity that He has shared with God the Father from all eternity.  King Solomon reminds us in 1 Kings 8:26 that the universe could never contain the full and unveiled glory of God. 

Rather Christ veiled Himself by taking up Himself a human nature through the virgin birth.  He did this in order to dwell among human beings, and to perform the only act that could make salvation possible - His death on the cross.   Christ in His Deity never ceased being God.  When He died on the cross, it was not Christ's Deity that was killed, rather it was Christ's humanity that was crucified, buried and risen.  

As the Only Begotten Son from All eternity, Christ was able to take upon His person a human nature by being born.  Now we witnessed yesterday the difference between "birth" and "begotten".  I won't labor the comparison between the two terms, however, it must be remembered that as true as it is that Christ is "the Only Begotten" touching His Divine nature, He taking upon Himself a human nature required a birth.  When we say nature, we mean the means through which one expresses their existence. Thus Christ expresses His existence through two ways: An unlimited, Eternal Divine way and through a limited though sinless human way. 

Christ in His Humanity makes Him capable of being the All-Sufficient Savior
As God, Jesus Christ is able to be the All-Sufficient Savior, and as man, He is capable of being the All-Sufficient Savior.  Why?  First of all, it was a man - Adam, who rebelled against God in the garden of Eden.  According to God's Law, the penalty, the curse of sin, committed by man, could only be reversed by a man.  The problem is, all of Adam's descendants inherited the sin nature from the bloodline of Adam and Eve. 

Furthermore, the curse of sin, pronounced by God on Adam and his descendants, could only be reversed by One who is God.  To complicate the issue, If God would had reversed the curse after stating it in Genesis 3, then He would had violated His Holy character, since sinful man committed high treason against God. 

Why Christ's Virgin birth qualified Him to be the All-Sufficient Savior
Therefore in order to alleviate this dilemma, there had to be a way in which God, who alone could reverse the curse, could become man, who must pay for the penalty of sin.   Christ as God accomplished this by being born a man.  His birth was not just any normal birth, it was a virgin birth.  Now that is important, since the sin nature of fallen Adam is transmitted through the father's blood-line. (please compare 1 Peter 1:18-19)  Thus Christ, being fully man, did not have a sin nature, and so he could in a real legitmate way represent humanity before Holy God as the New Adam. (please compare Romans 5:11-21)  As God, Christ also has the authority to reverse the curse of the penalty of Sin upon all those who by grace through faith belive upon Him as the All-Sufficient Savior. 

Christ, The All-Sufficient Savior

John 3:16 For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life.

In today's blog I want to share some observations about what is perhaps the most familiar verse in the Bible - John 3:16.  Sometimes the most illuminating moments in our Christian walk is when God takes what we deem familiar, and unfolds for us truths that are indeed precious and profound.  What John is stating here in this verse is this central idea: that God's choice to accomplish salvation through Jesus Christ is tied to the fact of Who Jesus Christ really is.  In short, He is enough, He is All-Sufficient. 

When we read in the above text that "God so loved the world", we come across the incredible statement: "that He gave His only Begotten Son".  Now many English Translations today will render that phrase as "One and Only", which is an acceptable rendering of this description of Jesus Christ given by the Apostle John.  However the NASB above chooses to retain the phrase as "Only Begotten", which as you will see below, is actually the preferred rendering. 

What is meant by "Only Begotten"?

When John writes the term "Only Begotten", He is making a statement pertaining to Jesus Christ being equal in authority and nature to the One who sent Him - God the Father.  Now you have seen the word "begat" in those genaeological lists that mention about how "so-and-so begat so-and-so".  Why is it that the biblical authors don't say "birth" or "born"?  When we compare the term "birth" to "begat", we can understand the reason why:

     Meaning of "birth"                      Meaning of "begotten"
-Begins in time                            -Is not bound to time
-Refers to individual identity      -Refers to an office or title
-Is different in age from birther  -Same qualities as begetter
-Mother centered                        -Father centered
-Based upon human bloodline  -Based on Eternal Decree 

Jesus Christ, the Only Begotten, is God

Now when you apply the above observations of "begotten" to what John is saying here in John 3:16, you begin to understand why it is Jesus Christ alone is the All Sufficient Savior.  In Isaiah 43:11 we read - "I, even I, am the LORD, And there is no savior besides Me".  Without a doubt, Jehovah God, THE LORD, is making this statement.  Only God can create, and only God can be the Source of salvation. 

To say that Jesus Christ is the Only-Begotten Son of God is to say that, touching His Divine Nature: He is not bound by time, that He occupies a position that has existed from all eternity and that He shares the same Divine, Eternal nature as God the Father.  Thus what John is arguing for is the reason why Christ alone is All-Sufficient - He has the same Eternal Qualities, Power and Life as the One who sent Him. 

This means then that He is All-Sufficient.  No matter how deep my sin, Jesus Christ can span that depth.  No matter how high my wickedness may run, Christ alone can overcome it.  Despite the gulf that existed between Holy God and sinful man, Christ alone can span it.  He is God.  In tomorrow's blog we will look at the second truth drawn from John 3:16 - namely how Jesus Christ is the All-Sufficient Savior due to the fact that He is also man.   For only as both God and man can Christ bring man and God together. 

Rooted in the Everlasting

Genesis 21:33 Abraham planted a tamarisk tree at Beersheba, and there he called on the name of the LORD, the Everlasting God

In today's blog I want to continue from where we left off yesterday in reference to God, the Everlasting God.  When Abraham referred to God as "El-Olam", He was affirming the truth of God's perpetual and unending character and commitment.  This name for God is made up of two Hebrew words: "El" meaning "mighty One, One who affirms a Covenant" and "Olam" meaning "eternal, unending".   As a way of applying the significance of this name of God to your life and mine, I chose to compose a short poem that speaks about God as the Everlasting God.  I pray you find it to be an encouragement to your own walk of faith.

Rooted in the Everlasting

Rooted in the Everlasting

Unmoved by Circumstance

Guided by Sovereignty

Not led by Happenstance

The Eyes of His Eternal Love

Guide my weary soul

Living in a changing world

Walking by faith I go

The Scripture He opens to me

To quench my thirsty soul

He feeds me and sustains

To overcome the defeated foe

Though life may grow dry

And opportunities may wilt

Yet the Everlasting God is the One

On Whom my faith is built

God's Goodness in His Permanent Relationships

Genesis 21:33  Abraham planted a tamarisk tree at Beersheba, and there he called on the name of the LORD, the Everlasting God.

In these past several blogs we have explored how to see God's Goodness as the focal point of your Christian walk.  We have noted how God's Goodness can be witnessed through His Promises fulfilled and answered prayer.  In this blog we want to discover how to see God's goodness in the permanent relationships He makes with His people. 

When we speak of that word "permanent", we are referring to God's unending pledge of Himself to those who by His grace evidence faith and trust in Him.  Abraham has been walking with God for over 25 years.  He has experienced the fulfillment of a major promise from God - the birth of his son Isaac.  After meeting and making covenant with a king by the name of Ablimelech, Abraham decides to plant a tree in commemoration of the relationship he has with God.

The tree tells it all
Tamerisk trees are interesting trees that grow in the land of Israel.  From what we know about them, they are the type of plant that flourishes in poor soil and hostile environments.  Undoubtedly Abraham saw himself as that Tamerisk tree.  By God's grace he had flourished and grown in circumstances that many would consider to be hostile to his faith-life.  Dear believer, understand that you and I are called like Abraham to flourish where God plants us.  Though we may seen frail, yet in Christ our faith cannot fail. 

God is the Everlasting God
Abraham then utters a name of God, revealed to Him for this occassion - El Olam.  The name means - the Everlasting God.  This name tells us that God, the Everlasting God, was in perpetual relationship with Abraham.  Indeed God's Goodness is as long and High as His character.  Jesus Christ tells us as Christians in Matthew 28:20 that He will be with us always - even to the end of the age.  In Philippians 1:6 I am told that the work God began in me will be completed.  We are reminded in Hebrews 13:5 that Jesus will never leave us nor forsake us.  God is Everlastingly Good - He will not fail you.  He is there all the time.  He is Good.