Abraham lied to Pharaoh about his wife Sarah, yet God blessed him anyway. The speaker uses this Genesis story to argue that God answers prayers through faith, not perfection, and connects it to Romans 8:1 on freedom from condemnation.
Hey, good morning everybody. I wanted to end the week with a, with a little note that, that tells you, look, you don't have to be perfect for God to answer your prayer. And I, and I want to show that in the Word. But you know, sometimes I think we, we we feel like, I know I do, God, he's not gonna listen to me. I got this issue, I've been dealing with this, or I reacted this way. Look, God is the perfect father. And I know I've given you the example before, but when my son was walking, he took his first step and fell. And I called my mom and said, hey, Seth's walking. And God's a perfect father, he's not counting how many times we fall. And I want to give you an example that will kind of illustrate, you know, Abram was given a promise that an heir would come out of his own body. And Abram wasn't perfect. In fact, he told a story, or lied, to an Egyptian pharaoh. And I want to pick up the story, it's in Genesis 12:10, it said, now there was a famine in the land, and Abram went down to the down to Egypt to dwell there, for the famine was severe in the land. And it came to pass, when he was close to entering Egypt, that he said to his wife, I know that you are a woman of beautiful countenance. Therefore it will happen, when the Egyptians see you, that they will say, this is his wife, and they will kill me, but they will leave you, they will let you live. Please say you are my sister, and that it may be well with me for your sake. And that I may live because of you. So it was when Abram came into Egypt that the Egyptians saw the woman, that she was very beautiful. The princes of Pharaoh also saw her and commended her to Pharaoh, and the woman was taken to Pharaoh's house. He treated Abram well for her sake. He had sheep, oxen, male donkeys, male and female servants, female donkeys, and camels. But the Lord plagued Pharaoh and his house with great plagues because of Sarai, Abram's wife. And Pharaoh called Abram and said, "What is this you have done to me? Why did you not tell me she was your wife? And why did you say, 'She is my sister'? I might have taken her as my wife. Now therefore, here is your wife. Take her and go away." So Pharaoh commanded his men concerning him, and they sent him away with his wife and all that he had had. Look, I know that you probably— I mean, you've probably heard that before, but Abram lied, said, hey, you know, it may have been a half truth. She may have been a half sister or what, I don't know, but the genealogy of it, but he told, look, tell Pharaoh to protect me. Tell Pharaoh that you're my sister. And so in all of that, in that story, Abram got blessed. I mean, Pharaoh, for his sister, Pharaoh gave him donkeys, cattle, all kinds of male and female servants. I mean, he just heaped all kinds of stuff on him. And then when, when God showed up and said, hey, you're, you're about to make a big mistake, Pharaoh pulls Abram out and said, why'd you lie to me? And it tells him to get out and didn't take all that stuff that he'd given him. So God blessed Abram because he was, because he was one of his kids. Because he did, he was believing. God could tell that he was believing. And that's what I want to give you the, you know, the kind of a background. You know, Satan is a punk, and I say that a lot, but he, you know, he's going to bring up all your mistakes, all of your shortcomings. But I want you to go to Romans 8:1, and it says, you know, there is now therefore no condemnation to them that are in Christ Jesus. Because they do not walk according to the flesh but according to the Spirit. So what I mean, what I read out of that is that we're not, you know, when we believe in God, when we believe the Word of God, the Word of God is Spirit and it's truth. So when you walk in the Spirit, you're, when you're reading and believing the Word by faith, you're walking in the Spirit. So there's no condemnation. So I want to encourage you today, I mean, because I go through this all the time, and that's why I'm talking about it, that's why I teach it. You know, I sometimes size my— you know, God's not sizing us up. God's not trying to figure out if we're worthy. I mean, God— because it's in God's Word, the Word is the truth. If it's in there, that truth is for you. And I want you to find the truth this week and just— I mean, just stay on that and just start believing it like Abram believed that he was going to have a child. And as a side note, just to kind of show you where my mind's going or where my mind I mean, because I've got to see things. Abram was 75 when God called him out of the land. And I don't know if you ever saw this, but how good-looking was Sarah at, what, 64? She was 9 years younger than Abram. 64 years old, at least 64, 65 years old, and Abram saying, look, you're so good-looking that they're gonna kill me for you. And I mean, that's incredible. And I mean, I don't know if you picked that up, but you know, when you start reading these and start picturing things, try to help it come alive. I mean, that's incredible to me, but it's a— that's a side note, but it's a— I mean, these were real people, and these were real issues. They were dealing with things, but they believed the word of God, and you know, it was counted to him as righteousness. So he believed that he was going to have a son. And I'm going to tell you next week, I'm going to show you specifically, and I've got something kind of planned. I don't— it's probably a little bit crazy, but what the heck. And I've got to show you how I know that I've got a bunch of unbelief. I mean, I don't want it, it's just there. So I've got to work on getting it out, and I can show you that I believe that you probably have a bunch of it too. But we'll deal with that next week. I want to thank you for coming in. I'll probably announce all that Monday. And have something. I'm going to do something probably Wednesday. But anyway, we'll deal with that next week. But I want to thank you for coming in. I want to thank you for watching. Any questions or comments, just go ahead and leave them in there and I'll answer them. Thanks again. Click to subscribe or to like or whatever you do on this thing. But thanks again for stopping by.
When you pick a side you must choose to be a slave to sin or a slave to righteousness
