Genesis 12:1-3
Galatians 3:15-29
Jesus: The seed of Abraham
Question for you:
Do Christians have to obey God’s laws?
Do we have to obey God’s laws?
In my opinion, people often ask this question because of two very different motives.
On the one hand, some people ask this question, do we have to obey God’s laws? because they are looking for an excuse to keep doing the wrong thing. They want a strong “No- of course we don’t have to keep God’s laws”. Sometimes people who are caught in a sin, and continue to sin, and they know what they are doing is wrong, ask this question, because they want to hear that “it doesn’t matter if you follow God’s laws or not”.
They would argue that obeying God is just an old Testament thing, and that we don’t need to follow his laws now, the death and resurrection of Jesus has abolished our need to follow the laws of God.
And so, this is why people would ask this question- they would want to justify their sinful living! What they may be really asking is, “how much sin can I get away with?”
And yet on the other hand, some people would ask this question, do we have to obey God’s laws?, because they want to show others just how self- righteous, they are. They want to hear that “yes, we do have to follow God’s laws, and we have to follow them all perfectly”, so that they can show others just how righteous they are. They are the ones who want to rise above others- they are the ones who are quick to tell you what you are doing wrong, they don’t drink any alcohol, they don’t smoke, they read and pray 5 times a day.
And so, it is good question for God’s people to ask, do we have to obey God’s laws?
Because how we answer that will affect how we live our lives.
But in order for us to answer this question, we must go back to Abram and the promise that God made to Abram. That was his name before he became Abraham- the father of nations.
And the first thing which is crucial for us to know about God’s promise to Abram, as the apostle Paul was quick to point out in his letter to the Galatians, is that the promises that God made to Abram came long before God gave the law to Moses.
The Promise of God came before the law of God- and so as the apostle Paul points out, when the law came after the promise that God made to Abram, it did not change the promise, otherwise it would fail to be a promise.
In other words, the promise that God made to Abram, God was going to keep, no matter if the law was given to Moses later or not. The promises that God made to Abram were not based on the conditions that Abram had to keep the law, since the law wasn’t even given at that time.
Did you notice that the promise that God made to Abram in Genesis 12:1-3 where all promises that were dependant on God keeping his promises and in return, all Abram had to do was go.
To use a modern day anology, it was like God said the Abram, I have 10 billion dollars to give you- all you have to do is meet me at the bank and I will give it to you. That’s it, no conditions, just go and meet me there.
Let me just read these few verses again for you and I will emphasise the amount of times God said “I will”…..
Now the Lord said to Abram, “Go from your country and your kindred and your father's house to the land that I will show you. 2 And I will make of you a great nation, and I will bless you and make your name great, so that you will be a blessing. 3 I will bless those who bless you, and him who dishonours you I will curse, and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed.”
God never put conditions on his promise to be kept to Abram. He didn’t tell Abram that if he didn’t obey, then he wouldn’t bless him, he didn’t say that if he didn’t obey, he would not make his name great. No- God made a promise to Abram, and when God makes a promise, he always keeps it no matter what.
We can see that when Abram messed up throughout his life, - God still kept his promise to Him.
Abram failed to trust God in his provision for his promised, son Isaac.
Abram failed to believe that God could provide a son from his old wife’s body.
And so instead of Abraham waiting and trusting in God’s promise, Abram took matters into his own hands, had a child by his servant Hagar, had a child Ishmael and from that created a whole world of mess.
And yet despite Abram mistrust, God kept his promise and gave Abram his own son- Isaac, from his wife Sarah.
Even when Abram acted cowardly and passed his wife off as his sister, in fear of a foreign king - God still kept his promise to Abram.
When God makes a promise, he always keeps it.
This was shown when God sealed his covenant with Abram.
When Kings of old would make a covenant or an agreement between two nations, they would seal the deal by cutting a bunch of animals in half and walking through the middle of the dead animals- as a sign to show the other king, that if they break their promise, they would be liable to death. If they broke their promise, they would be like the dead animals on the ground.
Now, when Abram prepared this covenant ritual with God, Abram got all the animals ready, chopped them all in two, but than he fell asleep, Abram never walked through the dead animals, only God in the form of a flaming torch walked through the dead animals. In other words, it was only God who signed the contract between Him and Abram- Abram never signed it.
Why?
God’s promise did not rely on Abram- God was going to keep his promise, even when Abram failed.
And so, God’s promise to Abram didn’t change, even when God gave the law to Moses.
So what was the point of God giving us his law?
The whole point of the law, which God gave to Moses after his people had been enslaved in Egypt for 430 years was to clearly show, that just like Abram, people couldn’t simply keep trusting and taking God at his word. The law was given to show, just how sinful we all are.
The law wasn’t given to add conditions to the promise of God, as Paul points out, if the promise depended on conditions, it wouldn’t be a promise anymore.
And so, we know that the promise that God made to Abram which were recorded in chapter 12 were going to be fulfilled, they must be, because God is true to His word.
Even the last promise that God made to Abram in chapter 3 was going to be fulfilled, look at that promise with me:
God promised Abram- and in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed
Just think of the enormity of that promise that God made to Abram- in you all the families of the earth shall be blessed- by the way, I love that God said families, and not individuals- but that is a talking point for another time.
God promised Abram what seemed impossible and God made sure that Abram knew it seemed impossible when God asked Abram to do the impossible- to count the stars in the sky. When God told Abram that his offspring would be as many as the stars in the sky and he told him to count the stars, I wonder what number Abram got up to before, he was like, yes, God I can’t count all the stars, in fact God I don’t need to know how many stars there are, I know you know, because you created them- I’m just going to take you at your word, I don’t need all the numbers, I will just trust you.
Genesis 15:6 tells us that as Abram at some point during the count, just believed God.
And for us, we can look back through history and see that God gave Abram a son Isaac, and Isaac had a son Jacob, who was also known as Israel, and he had 12 sons, who were the leaders of the tribes of Israel. We can look back and see that God did make the nation of Israel great at one time, we can see that God blessed them…….
……..but we can also see that the nation of Israel failed to be who God wanted them to be, and so we could look at the promise that God made to Abram and think that God failed to keep his promise because Israel failed to obey.
And yet praise be to God, we know that even though the nation of Israel may have failed, God still kept his promise, because God’s promise to Abram was ultimately fulfilled in Abraham’s offspring, Jesus.
Look at Galatians 3: 16
Now the promises were made to Abraham and to his offspring. It does not say, “And to offsprings,” referring to many, but referring to one, “And to your offspring,” who is Christ.
Friends, through Jesus, the offspring of Abraham all families on earth are blessed. Through Jesus and only through Jesus we have been given eternal life. Through Jesus, the offspring of Abraham, we too are children of Abraham as Galatians 3:29 tells us. Through Jesus the promises made to Abraham apply to us.
1 Peter 2:9 tells us that through Jesus, we are a holy nation, we are people for his own possession. We, through Jesus, the offspring of Abraham are group of people who are blessed and are called to be a blessing to others, as we offer the hope of salvation to all people. We are not defined by our ethnicity, but we are defined as a nation who belong to Jesus, belong to God.
We now, in Jesus, on this earth at this time, reflect a glimmer of what we will be like one day, when people from all tribes, tongues and nations will be gathered around the throne of God worshipping Him together.
Ephesians 1 tells us that in Jesus we have been blessed with every spiritual blessing.
In Jesus we have forgiveness of sins, in Jesus we have been sealed with his Holy Spirit, guaranteeing our eternal inheritance.
By the way, our eternal inheritance which awaits us, that room that Jesus has prepared for us in his father’s house, is the same inheritance that Abraham was looking forward to.
How do we know that Abraham was looking forward to this heavenly inheritance?
The writer of Hebrews tells us.
Hebrews 11:8-10 says:
By faith Abraham obeyed when he was called to go out to a place that he was to receive as an inheritance. And he went out, not knowing where he was going. 9 By faith he went to live in the land of promise, as in a foreign land, living in tents with Isaac and Jacob, heirs with him of the same promise. 10 For he was looking forward to the city that has foundations, whose designer and builder is God.
And what kind of city is one whose designer and builder is God?
A heavenly one.
Look at verse 16
But as it is, they desire a better country, that is, a heavenly one.
And so, friends, those promises that God made to Abraham way back in Genesis chapter 12 find their yes and amen in Jesus Christ.
And yet I still haven’t addressed the question, I asked right at the beginning.
Do we, the people of God have to obey God’s commands?
It all depends on why we want to obey God’s commands………
Let me explain.
If we want to obey God’s commands because we think that by following God’s commands we can earn salvation- then you are wasting your time.
Paul makes it clear in his letter to the Galatians, that the law cannot give us eternal live- the law does not bring us salvation.
Look at Galatians 3:21
Is the law then contrary to the promises of God? Certainly not! For if a law had been given that could give life, then righteousness would indeed be by the law.
Paul tells us that God gave us his laws, not to give us righteousness, but the law came to show us our sin, and more importantly to show us our need for a saviour.
The law is like the MRI scanner, which shows us the sinfulness of our hearts and our complete inability to fulfil the laws of God. The law points us to our medicine- Jesus.
This means, we obey God’s law, not because we think we can earn salvation, but because we know that in Jesus, we have already been given salvation and so we follow God’s law out of gratitude and thanks- we should obey God’s laws, not because we have to but because we want to.
When we obey God’s laws, we are showing evidence of the salvation that God has already given us in Jesus.
We follow God’s laws not out of fear, but out of Love for God.
Our salvation that God has brought to us in Christ Jesus death and resurrection does not depend on our performance on keeping God’s laws. Just like Abraham, we will fail at some points, but just like God’s promise to Abraham, God’s promise to us in Jesus will never be broken. His love for us, doesn’t depend on our performance. And so, we can, just like David in Psalm 1, delight in God’s laws, delight in following his ways, delight knowing that living his way, is the best way.
Friends, people may obey out of fear, for a while, but they will eventually disobey if they are continuing to obey by fear. We saw that during the pandemic.
But, and here is the good news of the promises of Jesus, if people obey out of love and Joy, they are more likely to continuing to obey, this is why Jesus said in John 14:15
“If you love me, you will obey my commands”. Jesus didn’t say, if you fear me, you will obey my commands but he said if you love me.
Friends, our obedience to the laws of God, actually reflect our love for God, and so this is why we obey God’s laws.
Let us pray.
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