SERMON: Old Testament Overview Part 4 - Patriarchs & the Birth of Israel

 

Old Testament Overview
Part 4 - Patriarchs & the Birth of Israel

• This Session:
• The Patriarchs
• The Beginning of Israel
• I. Introduction
• Last time, we saw that sin resulted in a real, global flood.
• This flood affected both geography and civilization.
• Land formations and archeology give evidence to a global deluge.
• The reduction of life spans.
• The flood introduced us to one of the most important themes of Scripture: The Covenant.
• The Noahic Covenant is unilateral and eternal.  God never flooded the world again!
• The Abrahamic Covenant is likewise unilateral and eternal.  The Jews cannot lose the land due to disobedience (cf. Gal. 3:17), and it gives all God’s people hope of eternal redemption.
• II. The Patriarchs
• Abraham
• The father of the Jewish nation!
• Name change to reflect this (Gen. 17):
• Abram –> Abraham
• Sarai –> Sarah
• Each covenant has a sign.
• Noahic Covenant = Rainbow
• Abrahamic Covenant = ?
• Circumcision
• Even though this was a unilateral covenant, God still commanded His people to keep it (Gen. 17:10)
• The descendants were to circumcise their male infants on the eighth day (vv. 11–12)
• Blood clotting factors are naturally the greatest on this day (Vitamin K and Prothrombin).
• It has health benefits.
• This would set them apart from the other nations.  They’re using an organ marked with the covenant to procreate covenant children!
• Learns Faith in God’s Promised Heir 
• Isaac isn’t born until Genesis 21!
• Abraham attempted to fulfill the promise in the flesh.  However, Isaac was the child of promise, symbolizing our freedom in Christ (Gal. 4:21-32)
• We see that faith in the offering of Isaac
• God commanded him to offer this child of promise.
• Abraham says to his men: “Stay here with the donkey, and I and the lad will go over there; and we will worship and return to you” (Gen. 22:5). 
• He believed no harm would come/ God could resurrect Isaac (Heb. 11:19)
• He said, “God will provide for Himself the lamb for the burnt offering” (v. 8), and when God did, he called the place: “The LORD Will Provide” (v. 14).
• Learns Intercession (When he pleads for Sodom in Gen. 18)
• Learns to Overcome Fear Among the Canaanites 
• When he sees the Lord supernaturally judge the Sodomites in Gen. 19.
• When he repeats his lie to Abimelech and is chastened in Gen. 20.
• Learns Not to Intermingle with the Canaanites (gets a bride for Isaac from extended family , Gen. 24).
• Isaac
• Not much of the record is devoted to him.
• He begats Jacob and Esau, prophesied to be two nations (Gen. 25:23)
• He shows favoritism to the older:
• Allows him to intermarry with the Canaanites.
• He apparently ignores the prophecy about the older serving the younger.
• He eventually gives blessing according to God’s will (Heb. 11:20)
• Jacob
• Obtains blessing initially through deceit.  Learns from the “master,” Laban (Gen. 29).
• Not before God promises protection and return to the land of promise (Gen. 28:10–22).  Fulfilled in Gen. 31–33.
• In the meantime, Jacob gains a wife (or two or four) and twelve children.  These become the twelve tribes of Israel.
• Wrestles with God (Gen. 32:24–32)
• First, “a man” (v. 24)
• The angel blesses him, changing his name to Israel (“he who strives with God” or “God strives” — v. 28).
• Jacob understands this man to be a theophany and names the place Peniel (v. 30).
• The children of Israel needed to know humility before God and that God alone blesses and would fight for them.
• Thus, Israel and his twelve tribes are conceived.
• Much of the rest of Genesis focuses on the struggles of the twelve tribes with each other and with God.
• Central to this struggle was animosity focused at Joseph, the second-youngest.
• The Lord works through this young man.
• Receives revelatory dreams and a special coat that may signify his supervision of his brothers.
• After his brothers betray and sell him, he experiences success in Egypt by the Lord’s hand, both in Potiphar’s house and in prison.  
• Continues to receive revelation and wisdom from God, interpreting the dreams of the chief cupbearer/baker and then Pharoah.
• III. The Birth of Israel
• Because of Joseph’s rise to power in Egypt, second only to Pharoah, he’s able to save everyone (including his brothers) from the famine.
• His family eventually joins him in Egypt.
• “As for you, you meant evil against me, but God meant it for good in order to bring about this present result, to preserve many people alive” (Gen. 50:20)
• Gen. 49 — Prophesies concerning the future of Israel, including that the kingly line will come from Judah, including the True King (v. 10).
• That brings us to Exodus:
• Israel goes into Egypt as a family, but it will emerge a nation.
• Outline:
• Exodus (1–18)
• Law (19–24)
• Tabernacle (25–40)
• The Need for the Exodus
• They spent multiple generations in Egypt (430 total, Gal. 3:17).
• Slavery wasn’t enough.  Pharoah says to the midwives: “When you are helping the Hebrew women to give birth and see them upon the birthstool, if it is a son, then you shall put him to death; but if it is a daughter, then she shall live” (Exod. 1:16).
• He then commanded this of all his people (v. 22).
• However, the Pharoah’s daughter didn’t abide by this (2:5–6).
• The Lord raised up Moses to eventually set God’s people free. 
• Brought up in the world’s system of thinking.
• At 40, realizes his people need redemption, but he goes about it in a fleshly way.
• Spent the next 40 years in the wilderness.
• This is where God calls him (3–4)
• God reveals Himself in the burning bush (cf. 3:14)
• The purpose of the plagues is also to show the wonders of the Lord (4:21)
• The Lord predicts the final plague, death of the firstborn (vv. 22)