Genesis 12:1-9 (p. 11)
Hebrews 11:8-16 (p. 1192)

Aliens on earth

I want to welcome all of you who are back from travels over the summer. I hope all of you will plan to stay after worship for a welcome back reception. Also a special welcome to those of you who are just starting your first semester of College. Before the sermon today, I have asked Martin Gorton to share something with the congregation.

Martin --

Thankyou. I appreciate the opportunity to say something to you today. For those of you who don't know me, I'm Martin Gorton. Ruth and I have been part of Stony Brook since the church started. This church family really means alot to us. We've really appreciated all of your help in so many ways -- helping us in settling in to our new house. [elaborate as appropriate] It's been wonderful to be in South Hadley, so much closer to all of you.

And that makes what I have to say very difficult. You see, the Lord spoke to me last night. He said to me very clearly, "Martin, leave South Hadley." He said "leave your house, leave your job, leave everything your familiar with. I want you to trust me alone."

So we're leaving. We've put our house on the market. We'll be loading up a truck this afternoon. If any of you can help that would be great. If all goes well we'll head out tonight.

I know it sounds a bit crazy. We have no idea where we'll end up. We have to leave that in God's hands. We expect to be homeless for a while. I guess we'll head South to begin with since fall is coming and we'll be camping out for a while. Then we'll head west and see where God leads us.

You can pray for Ruth-- she's having a bit of a hard time with this. She doesn't like the idea of camping very much. I'm sure she'll come around though. The kids are taking it pretty well although they're a bit upset about missing soccer season.
Now I know that some of you will be very concerned about us just leaving like this. But I don't want any of you to worry. The Lord has told me that if I obey him he will bless me tremendously. He has promised that he will make my name great, and that people all over the world will be blessed through my ministry. Isn't that wonderful!

So that's all I had to say. I appreciate your prayers.
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Now in case you had any doubt, this is a set up. Martin is not leaving. He has not sold his house. He has not quit his job. But what if he had? How would you respond. I know how I would respond -- I would want to get him into therapy fast. We'd probably be having an emergency meeting of the board of elders right after the service. He's hearing voices in the night. He's leaving a perfectly good job and a newly purchased house and a wonderful church. He has no idea where he's going. Clearly delusional.

But if Martin is delusional -- what are we to make of Abraham?

Look at Genesis 12:1-9 (p. 11)

Normally when we read this story, we just gloss over it. We don't think its all that strange that Abraham would hear the voice of God and just get up and leave -- dragging Sarah along with him. After all he is a Biblical patriarch and Biblical patriarchs just do that sort of thing. They hear voices. They travel thousands of miles without having any idea where they're going. It's just part of their job description. Abraham lived a long time ago. Things were different then. The rules have changed. So we have a sort of double standard. It's OK for Abraham -- but Martin Gorton, he would be crazy to do the same.

But when we think this way, we lose the whole force of the story of Abraham. The whole point of the story is to figure out where you and I fit into it. And of course I don't mean that we should be waiting for a voice in the night to tell us to leave. But we should be asking, how do I respond when I hear the voice of God. The story is not given to us to make us admire Abraham from a distance-- it's meant to make us ask -- What would it mean for me to be like him? What would it mean for me to have faith like that?

And that is a really important question, because our eternal destiny depends on it. We are clearly told in scripture that the ONLY way we can please God if we live by faith. And our model of living by faith is Abraham.
So if Abraham is a model of saving faith, it becomes extremely important for us to understand what it means to have faith like Abraham's. We need to bring Abraham's faith into the present and ask "what would it mean for me, or for Martin, or for any of us to have faith like that?"
So I'd like to make a few simple observations about Abraham's life of faith to help us explore what it might mean for you and me to live by faith.

1. First observation: Abraham staked everything on a promise.

Not on scientific proof, not on what his senses could tell him, not on a guarantee, but on a promise. God said, "Go, and I will bless you" and Abraham packed up and went.
Turn to Romans 4:20-22 (p. 1115) "He did not doubt the promise of God in unbelief but was strengthened in faith, giving glory to God, being fully convinced that God was able to do what He promised . . . "
The essence of Abraham's faith was accepting and acting on the promises of God.

At every moment of our lives we are faced with conflicting voices: On the one side we hear the voice of the world, whispering You've got to look after yourself, protect yourself, depend on yourself, be self-sufficient.
On the other side the voice of God says: I am all that you need, Trust me and I will bless you.

Abraham heard the two voices -- the one said play it safe. Don't take the risk. You have no idea where your going. The other said, "Go and I will bless you." Abraham believed the voice of God over the voice of the world. And that was the beginning of his life of faith.

Living by faith means hearing God's voice and obeying it.

Let me give an example from my first semester in College. I remember almost nothing of my first semester of college. But one thing that does stick in my memory -- and that is fire alarms. I remember very vividly being woken in the middle of the night -- usually between 2 and 4 in the morning. I was in a new dorm with a faulty alarm system, and the alarm must have gone off about once a week for the first couple of months. The whole dorm would gather outside, sometimes waiting a half hour for a public safety officer to arrive to turn off the alarm.

At first it was almost fun -- a sort of party atmosphere. But an interesting thing happened as the semester progressed. As the weather got colder, the population of the dorm seemed to grow smaller and smaller. It was really odd. At the start of the semester we had a dorm of maybe 150 people. But by the 7th or 8th fire alarm there was only a small shivering band of us -- maybe 15 or 20. Most people just plugged their ears and waited it out. Why go out in the cold for another false alarm.

We must have looked kind of foolish shivering out there in the cold. We certainly felt foolish. All of the alarms were false alarms. We never had a real fire. But what if we had? Who would be the fools then?

My point is that that little group of students shivering together outside gives us a small picture of what it means to live by faith. To live by faith means to pay attention to God's voice -- to listen to his alarm bell -- even though the whole rest of the world is plugging their ears and trying to ignore it -- even though you don't see any smoke or flames.
And that is exactly what Abraham did. All of his natural human instincts would have told him to stay comfortable, to stay secure, put ear plugs in and ignore the alarm. But Abraham believed that God promise to him was worth more than the life he had. The promise of God was worth staking everything he had on.
What about us? If living by faith means staking everything on the promises of God, then what are his promises to us? Well, God has one central promise:
Romans 10:9 If you confess with your mouth, "Jesus is Lord," and believe in your heart that God raised him from the dead you will be saved.
And without doubt this is the greatest and most precious of God's promises -- and worth staking our lives on. And we often emphasize this. But believing this promise is just the beginning of faith. Faith doesn't stop there. God's promises are a package deal. Either you believe what he says or you don't.
So living by faith means believing ALL the promises of God. Including:

God works everything together for good for those who love Him (Romans 8:28)
He will not leave you or forsake you (Hebrews 13:5).
He will provide everything you need.

So lets say you are facing an ethical conflict at work. You're being asked to do things that are simply wrong. But if you object you'll almost certainly lose your job. You hear two voices: One says, you can't take the risk, you have a family to support. The other says, "I will provide for your needs. Trust me and I'll bless you."

Or say you have an exam in the morning but a friend is in crisis and needs you to pray with her. Two voices again: I can't afford to do poorly on this exam. And on the othr side: Trust me and I will care for you.
The voice you listen to shows who you belong to. If you listen to the world, you become a slave to the world. But if you listen to God, you show that you belong to him. Jesus said, "My sheep hear my voice and they follow me."

So the first symbol of Abraham's faith is the promise.

2. Second observation: Abraham lived his whole life in a tent.

When Abraham heard God's call he was 75. When he died he was 175. The 100 years in between he spent constantly on the move, living in a tent. He was heir to the promises of God, and God had specifically promised him land -- yet he never settled. He never built a permanent dwelling.
What does living in a tent have to do with his faith?

Turn to Hebrews 11:8-10 (p. 1192)

Abraham's tent life was a reflection of where his real home was. By living in a tent he showed that his hope was not in the things of this world, but in God.
What does this mean for us? Living by faith means holding loosely to the things of this world. It means not allowing ourselves to become absorbed in them, but living as though we were camping here. Scripture tells us that we are aliens and strangers here. Our real citizenship is elsewhere.

A desire for permanence and stability in the world is incompatible with a life of faith.
Will anyone believe us that our hope is in God if we do not loosen our grip on devotion to things? Will anyone believe us that we belong to heaven if we cling to this life? Our desires and affections need to be centered not on transitory things that will pass away, but on eternal things.

Imagine yourself in a burning building. Firefighters are outside calling for you to get out. But you cannot because all of the things your are attached to are here, so you stay in trying to gather them together and save them. Thousands of people are killed and injured in burning houses because they stay behind -- or even run back in -- to grab something that they just cannot do without. How foolish!
Yet that is what we do if we become absorbed in material things when eternal things are at stake. This world around us is like a burning building. In some places on earth that's more obvious than in others. The flames and smoke may not have reached your apartment yet -- they may seem a long way off. But they are coming.
Abraham lived his life in a tent, a reminder that he was an alien and a stranger. Like him we need to hold loosely to the things of the world.

3. Third observation: Wherever Abraham pitched his tent, he built an altar.

12:7 The Lord appeared to Abram and said, "To your offspring I will give this land." So he built an altar there to the Lord who had appared to him."

12:8 From there he went on toward the hills east of Bethel and pitched his tent, with bethel on the West and Ai on the east. there he built an altar to the Lord and called on the name of the Lord.

Notice the contrast. He pitched a tent -- but he built an altar. He never built a house for himself, but long after he was gone from a place an altar stood as a reminder of where he had been.
What does an altar symbolize? Worship and sacrifice. By putting the effort into building altars, Abraham was showing where his priorities were.

The altar represents a permanent investment in that which is of lasting value.

Where are your altars? What lasting monuments are you leaving behind? When you move on from here, will those who are left behind find any evidence that you were a worshipper of God -- or will they only find altars to idols.



Let me summarize:

I'd like to fasten in your minds three symbols of Abraham's life of faith: The Promise, The Tent, and the Altar.


1. The Promise reminds us that the heart of faith is to Stake everything on the promises of God. We must believe that what God says is more real than the circumstances around us, and act on his promises.

2. The Tent reminds us that we are aliens here. We must sever our hearts ties with the world. We must recognize that we don't belong here -- that our real home is elsewhere, and hold loosely to the things of this world.

3. The Altar reminds us to invest our time and energy and money in things that will last.


Abraham's example tells us to stake everything on God's promises, to loosen our grip on the things of the world, and to make a permanent investment in the things of God.